Why had Babu left school?

Every morning at six, Babu opened his father's tea stall at the corner of the bus stand. By the time the first bus came in, the water was boiling, the glasses were washed, and the newspapers that the stall kept for customers were neatly folded on the bench.

Babu was fourteen and had left school two years earlier, when his father's knee went bad. But he had made a rule for himself. Between customers, he read the newspapers before anyone else did: one Hindi and one English. The English paper was slow work. He kept a small notebook in his pocket and wrote down every word he did not know, to ask about later.

Most customers paid no attention. But one, a schoolteacher who caught the 7:20 bus, began to notice the notebook. One day she asked to see it. She turned the pages for a long time.

"Who explains these words to you?" she asked.

"Nobody," said Babu. "I guess them. Sometimes I am wrong."

The next morning she came with an old dictionary and a form for the open school, where students could study at home and sit the exams later. "You will have to read even more," she warned.

Babu looked at the dictionary, then at the stove. "Tea first," he said, and poured her a glass. "Then reading."

She laughed, and from that day she paid for her tea and stayed until the 7:40.