Summary

As is the rest of the book, Chapter One is told from the first-person perspective of Lenny, who lives in the “affluent fringes of Lahore” (11). An Englishman scolds Ayah, Lenny’s word for her nanny, for keeping such a large child in a pram. Lenny then reveals that she has an unspecified disability in one of her legs and cannot walk. The narrator, Lenny, observes how men respond to Ayah’s curves and general appearance. Together, they visit Godmother, a childless woman whose bond with Lenny is “stronger than the bond of motherhood” (13).

At the hospital, Colonel Bharucha removes Lenny’s cast, and she returns to school. Back at the hospital, the narrator screams, terrified by the mask used to sedate her. To ease her daughter’s pain, Mother tells Lenny the story of a mouse with seven tails. The mouse demands that...