Part 9 (1/2)
What would happen then to the woman who had spared his life?
They were curious people, these foreigners. The men dressed in dusty black wool clothing, even in the heat of summer. They wore their stiff hats outdoors, but took them off when they went inside. What an odd thing to do-with bared heads, how could they show one another respect? Their women's dress was even stranger-all of them, even the old ladies, revealed their shapes embarra.s.singly with their tight, uncomfortable-looking garments. This one, too, wrapped her slim figure with heavy, close-fitting things, even when she rode toward the mountains each day, sitting sideways on her mare.
As she walked beside him, Nur Rahman could see a black hem trailing below the loose folds of her chaderi. He turned his head and glanced behind him through his peephole. People were looking at her. They had seen how oddly she was dressed, but luckily, no Englishwoman had ever been seen in the city, so they were unlikely to guess what she was. And among this polyglot population, nothing seemed strange.
He sighed, picturing the foreign ladies in their evening clothes. Those indecently cut gowns were the best of all. Each day after sunset he made a point of waiting at a corner of the English lady's bungalow, in case the family had been invited out to dinner. It would never do to miss a lamplit glimpse of bare chests and shoulders as she and her aunt pa.s.sed out through the front door.
He had also observed how the old woman and her husband spoke to their servants, and what food they offered them. Although the husband said little, maintaining a quiet, worried air, the fat woman spoke stiffly, through pursed lips, to their collection of serving-men and under-serving-men, palanquin bearers, sweepers, gardeners, and water-carriers. She even did the same when she addressed the tall, dignified groom. She barely spoke at all to the albino with his blistered skin and pink eyes.
Nur Rahman had also been shocked to discover that while he, his wonderful old man, and all the household servants ate cooked lentils and vegetables, rice and bread, the English people ate meat, prepared for them daily by a peculiar-looking cook in a loincloth.
Such behavior was unfathomable to Nur Rahman. How could those English have kept the meat only for themselves? Was this an Indian custom? How could they have failed to offer all their food to their servants, especially to Nur Rahman's dear Shafi Khan, for whom he would readily give his life?
Even Painda Gul, may he roast for eternity in the fires of h.e.l.l, had shared his meals, morsel for morsel, with Nur Rahman.
Nur Rahman had not mentioned his distress to the old man. Instead, a few months ago, he had simply waited for his opportunity, and stolen four small mutton chops from a butcher in the bazaar. He had cooked his ill-gotten treasure with a few cloves and black peppercorns and a stick of cinnamon bark slipped from the Englishman's kitchen. When they were done, he had offered them triumphantly to the old man.
Muns.h.i.+ Sahib had looked, unsmiling, at the plate, then at Nur Rahman's flushed face. ”My dear child,” he had said, ”you have not gained this food with your right hand.”
The smell of the meat had filled Nur Rahman's senses and brought water to his mouth, but the old man's words had cut him to the heart. He should have known that the great Shafi Khan would never put stolen meat into his mouth.
”We must not let any food go to waste,” the old man had said. ”Take it outside and feed it to the poor. They are innocent. Eating it will do them no harm.”
Nur Rahman had wept as he held out his fragrant offering to a ragged child. Penniless, he could find no remedy for the n.i.g.g.ardliness of the English people, no delicacy to be cooked for his beloved benefactor, who had counseled the Englishwoman to save his life, who now allowed Nur Rahman to sleep outside his door, and to prepare his morning tea.
Later, the old man had chided him gently, saying that food for the body was no more than that, and that the best food of all was food for the soul.
Food for the soul. Nur Rahman stole a glance at the Englishwoman. What, he wondered, was written on the small roll of paper that lay hidden in her clothes? Did it contain the secrets of Paradise? He would give anything to know what he must do to gain the Garden, where all sins were forgiven. Nur Rahman stole a glance at the Englishwoman. What, he wondered, was written on the small roll of paper that lay hidden in her clothes? Did it contain the secrets of Paradise? He would give anything to know what he must do to gain the Garden, where all sins were forgiven.
As much as he loved his gentle old man, he could not help wis.h.i.+ng that the famous Haji Khan had given him him a little roll of paper. a little roll of paper.
September 24, 1841 The reason you cannot understand these verses, Bibi,” Mariana's muns.h.i.+ explained the following day, ”is that they are written in Arabic.”
”And I must recite them in Arabic?”
He shook his head. ”Only the prayers must be recited in the original Arabic. These lines may be read in your own language, although of course Arabic is better.”
When he first entered the dining room for her lesson, she had hesitated to tell her teacher of her secret visit to Haji Khan, fearing what he would say. In the end she had realized that it would be wiser to tell the truth.
When she had, he had offered her no reproach, only a silent, appraising look.
She stared at the little page, now unrolled on the dining table, its corners weighed down by her inkstand and a candlestick from the sideboard, its surface covered with unintelligible handwriting. What did it say, this talisman from Haji Khan's trove of papers?
Line by line, her teacher translated Haji Khan's paper into English. Line by line, she copied out his dictated words, growing more and more disappointed as she worked.
Shower thy blessings upon our leader and master Muhammad: Thy wors.h.i.+per, thine apostle, thy Messenger, the Unlettered Prophet, His spiritual descendants, his consorts, his progeny, all: In number as many as the numerous things created, As deep as the fulfillment of the soul's longing, As brilliant as the embellishment of the high heavens, As powerful as the Affirmation of Faith.
Haji Khan's verses did not describe the durability of love in the face of obstacles, or explain the necessity of abandoning a lost cause. They did not hint at the urgent, veiled question that had pestered her as she sat beside him in his dark, perfumed room.
Baffled, she pointed to the paper. ”What does this mean, Muns.h.i.+ Sahib?”
”It is a durood durood, Bibi, an invocation of Allah's blessings upon the Prophet Muhammad. In offering a durood, the reciter brings Allah's blessings upon himself. Some duroods also protect the reciter from the promptings of evil, or from those who might do him harm.”
”That is interesting, Muns.h.i.+ Sahib, but why has Haji Khan given it to me?”
”I cannot say.” He frowned. ”Did he give you any instructions?”
”He told me to recite what is written on this paper eleven times, morning and evening.”
”Then I suggest you do it.”
”Impossible, Muns.h.i.+ Sahib. I cannot do such a thing.”
Her teacher shrugged. ”If that is because you are Christian, I remind you that Christians, like Jews and Muslims, are ahl-e-kitab ahl-e-kitab, People of the Book. They recognize the same prophets, the same laws. Haji Khan is known to have traveled very far along the Path to Peace,” he added. ”If he has suggested that you recite this durood, he has done so for a reason, although what it is, I cannot say.”
”He is also blind in both eyes,” she pointed out. ”The cupboard behind him was full of identical rolls of paper. He could easily have given me the wrong one.”
Her teacher did not reply. Instead, he reached into one of the pockets of his long snowy s.h.i.+rt and withdrew a string of carved wooden beads. A silk ta.s.sel hung from a single large bead on the string. ”These are for you, Bibi,” he said, as he laid them carefully on the table. ”If you choose to do what Haji Khan suggests, you will need to count your recitations.”
In her bedroom an hour later she stared into s.p.a.ce, Haji Khan's paper in her hand.
The answer will come to you of its own accord, at the proper time, he had told her. He had also invited her to return.
For all that he had said little to her, he had been a compelling presence, sitting white-eyed before his guests in that close little room. He had known at once that it was she, and not Nur Rahman, who had a question to ask.
And yet these verses offered her nothing.
If he had had meant to give her this durood, why had he done it? What did he think would happen if she did as he had told her? meant to give her this durood, why had he done it? What did he think would happen if she did as he had told her?
She had longed to learn mystical secrets from the moment she had met the Shaikh and his powerful sister, but it had never occurred to her that to do so she might have to stop being a Christian. That she could not do. It was one thing to study Oriental mysticism, but it was quite another to forsake the Church of England.
She could not imagine what her vicar father would say if he learned of the durood, or even of the beads that now lay hidden in the pocket of her gown.
But as alien as those verses had sounded upon her lips, and as strange as Muns.h.i.+ Sahib's beads had felt in her fingers, she was certain that together they offered her a doorway into some beautiful, unknown place.
The doorway beckoned. It was her choice to enter it, or pa.s.s it by.
”IT IS perfectly apparent to me,” Sir William Macnaghten said quietly the next afternoon as he sat in Babur Shah's memorial garden, ”that if London wishes to save money, they should cut expenditures somewhere else.”
The English party had returned to Babur's tomb to enjoy one more outing before the weather turned cold. When Macnaghten and several political officers moved away from the others to a quiet grove of trees, Mariana had followed them and seated herself nearby, her back against a tree, straining to hear their conversation.
”This entire region is open to us,” Sir William went on. ”With only a few more men we can take Bokhara in the north and and Herat in the west.” Herat in the west.”
”Sir William,” Mariana's uncle replied cautiously, ”have you considered our lines of supply? They are dangerously long already, and easily severed by insurgents in all those narrow pa.s.ses.”
”We should perhaps take the Afghan point of view into account,” Charles Mott added, with uncharacteristic confidence, ”especially that of the chiefs of the country and the religious leaders-”
”But,” Sir William went on, ignoring both remarks, ”the government has insisted that I cut back expenses, and I have done so.