Free Malgudi Days by R. K. Narayan

should have died in a day or two, confined to my corner, no food, not an anna to earn—imprisoned in my corner. I should have perished if it continued for another day—But this thing returned—’
    â€˜When? When?’
    â€˜Last night. At midnight as I slept in bed, he came and licked my face. I felt like murdering him. I gave him a blow which he will never forget again,’ said the blind man. ‘I forgave him, after all a dog! He loafed as long as he could pick up some rubbish to eat on the road, but real hunger has driven him back to me, but he will not leave me again. See! I have got this—’ and he shook the lead: it was a steel chain this time.
    Once again there was the dead, despairing look in the dog’s eyes. ‘Go on, you fool,’ cried the blind man, shouting like an ox-driver. He tugged the chain, poked with the stick, and the dog moved away on slow steps. They stood listening to the tap-tap going away.
    â€˜Death alone can help that dog,’ cried the ribbon-seller, looking after it with a sigh. ‘What can we do with a creature who returns to his doom with such a free heart?’

FELLOW-FEELING
    The Madras-Bangalore Express was due to start in a few minutes. Trolleys and barrows piled with trunks and beds rattled their way through the bustle. Fruit-sellers and beedi -and-betel-sellers cried themselves hoarse. Latecomers pushed, shouted and perspired. The engine added to the general noise with the low monotonous hum of its boiler; the first bell rang, the guard looked at his watch. Mr Rajam Iyer arrived on the platform at a terrific pace, with a small roll of bedding under one arm and an absurd yellow trunk under the other. He ran to the first third-class compartment that caught his eye, peered in and, since the door could not be opened on account of the congestion inside, flung himself in through the window.
    Fifteen minutes later Madras flashed past the train in window-framed patches of sun-scorched roofs and fields. At the next halt, Mandhakam, most of the passengers got down. The compartment built to ‘seat 8 passengers; 4 British Troops, or 6 Indian Troops’ now carried only nine. Rajam Iyer found a seat and made himself comfortable opposite a sallow, meek passenger, who suddenly removed his coat, folded it and placed it under his head and lay down, shrinking himself to the area he had occupied while he was sitting. With his knees drawn up almost to his chin, he rolled himself into a ball. Rajam Iyer threw at him an indulgent, compassionate look. He then fumbled for his glasses and pulled out of his pocket a small book, which set forth in clear Tamil the significance of the obscure Sandhi rites that every Brahmin worth the name performs thrice daily.
    He was startled out of this pleasant languor by a series of growls coming from a passenger who had got in at Katpadi. The newcomer, looking for a seat, had been irritated by the spectacle of the meek passenger asleep and had enforced the law of the third-class. He then encroached on most of the meek passenger’s legitimate space and began to deliver home-truths which passed by easy stages from impudence to impertinence and finally to ribaldry.
    Rajam Iyer peered over his spectacles. There was a dangerous look in his eyes. He tried to return to the book, but could not. The bully’s speech was gathering momentum.
    â€˜What is all this?’ Rajam Iyer asked suddenly, in a hard tone.
    â€˜What is what?’ growled back the newcomer, turning sharply on Rajam Iyer.
    â€˜Moderate your style a bit,’ Rajam Iyer said firmly.
    â€˜You moderate yours first,’ replied the other.
    A pause.
    â€˜My man,’ Rajam Iyer began endearingly, ‘this sort of thing will never do.’
    The newcomer received this in silence. Rajam Iyer felt encouraged and drove home his moral: ‘Just try and be more courteous, it is your duty.’
    â€˜You mind your business,’ replied the