Four-year-old Lenny describes the streets that form the boundary of her world, as her Ayah pushes her in a pram. It is 1942 in Lahore, India. She wears a brace on her right leg; she cannot walk well and tires easily, having been stricken with polio as a baby. She lives on Warris Road, close to her “Electric-aunt” and cousin, and her Godmother (11). These are the people she visits on her daily rounds among her relatives and in her visits to the Queen’s Park with her 18-year-old, stunningly beautiful Hindu ayah, who is simply referred to as “Ayah” (nursemaid) throughout the novel.

Lenny’s right leg receives a cast from her Parsee doctor, Colonel Bharucha, which does not change the twisted appearance of her foot, much to her relief. Next, she depicts the surgery on her right leg, which causes her great pain; she wakes up again with her right leg in a cast. Her greatest fear is that she will lose the ability to use the appearance of her leg to gain people’s sympathy.

Lenny adores her Ayah. Her Godmother provides a “haven” and the warmth that Lenny’s beautiful but distant

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