Page:Fischer - A Week with Gandhi.pdf/19

 vide clothes for the almost-naked millions. “But the habit has not spread very far,” Desai admitted, “and spinning is no factor in India’s national economy.”

At eleven, when I was starved, Kurshed took me over to Gandhi’s house, which is about a hundred yards from the guest house. It is a one story affair with walls of matting and a roof of poor red tiles. I left my bedroom slippers on the outside cement step and walked in and remained in the tiny anteroom from which I could see the one chief room of the house. Gandhi was lying on a white pallet on the earthen floor, and one of his disciples sat on the ground near this bed and pulled a rope which moved a board, with a black cloth hanging from it, suspended from the ceiling. This is supposed to take the place of an electric fan. There is no electricity in the village. Gandhi got up and said to me, “Now put on your shoes and hat. Those are the two indispensable things here. Don’t get a sunstroke.” A woman brought him a folded, moistened cheesecloth for his head. Then, putting one hand on Kurshed, who walked one step in front of him, he said to me in friendly fashion, “Come along.” We passed two houses and came to a common dining hall built of matting. I left my shoes outside, as Gandhi did, gave my sun helmet to Kurshed, who found a place for it on a peg on the wall, and took a seat on the ground