Part 9

Nevertheless peace and contentment reigned apparently in his house. When I sat out in the dark, hot evenings, a glow of flickering firelight from within showed the mysterious mud-walled enclosure by the wall, decorous and conventional. The winking stars looking down into it knew more of the life within than I did, but at any rate no unseemly cries disturbed the scented night air and the _Huzoor's_ slumbers. Perhaps the police supervision had impressed the lover with the dangers of lurking house-trespass by night; perhaps the dark-browed, heavy-jowled young woman who had taken my warning so sullenly had learnt more craft; perhaps the languor which creeps over all things in May had sucked the vigour even from passion. Who could say? Those crumbling mud walls hid it all, and Heera seemed to have begun a new life with the hot-weather vegetables.

So matters stood when an old enemy laid hold of me. Ten days after I found myself racing Death with a determination to reach the sea, and feel the salt west wind on my face before he and I closed with each other. The strange hurry and eagerness of it all comes back to some of us like a nightmare, years after the exile is over; the doctor's verdict, the swift packing of a trunk or two, the hope, the fear, the mad longing at least to see the dear faces once more.

They packed me and a half hundred pillows into a _palki ghâri_ one afternoon. The servants stood, white clad, in a row beside the white pillars, dazzling in the slanting sunlight. I drove through the flower garden dusty and scorched. At the gate stood Heera Nund, one arm occupied by Dhropudi, the other supporting a huge basket of vegetables. He looked uncertain which to present; finally, seeing the carriage drive on, he deliberately let the basket fall, and running to my side, thrust the child's chubby hands forward. They held just such ninepin bouquets as he had carried on our first introduction. "Take them, _sahib!_" he cried. "Take them for luck! and come back soon to the _mâdli_ and the _mâlin_." As the _ghâri_ turned sharp down the road I saw him standing amidst the ruins of the basket with Dhropudi in his arms.

Six months passed before I set foot on Indian soil again, and then fate and a restless Government sent me to a new station. When my servants arrived with my baggage from the old one, I naturally fell to asking questions. "And how is Heera Nund?" was one. My bearer smiled benignly. "_Huzoor_, he is well--in the month of July he was hanged."

"Bearer!"

"Without doubt; it was in the month of July. He killed his wife with an axe. Dhropudi was bitten by a snake while she slept one day when Heera had to leave her with her mother; and that night he killed his wife as _she_ slept also. It was a mistake to be so revengeful, for every one knew Dhropudi was not really his daughter."

"Do you think that Heera knew?"

"She told him when the child died, in order to stop his grief; but it did not. She was very kind to him,--after the other one went to prison for lurking about."

"And did no one tell about it all?"

"About what, _Huzoor?_"

"About the vegetables, and Dhropudi, and the _sootullians_, and the blisters on the back of his head! Did no one say the man was mad?"

"There was a new assistant at the Dispensary, _sahib_, and her people were very rich; besides, Heera was not mad at all. He did it on purpose. He was a bad man, and the Sirkâr did right to hang him--in July."

But as I turned away I could think of nothing but that _can-can_ among the _sootullians_, with little Dhropudi beating time with a carrot.

FEROZA.

Two hen sparrows quarrelling over a feather, while a girl watched them listlessly; for the rest, sunshine imprisoned by blank walls, save where at one end a row of scalloped arches gave on two shallow, shadowy verandah-rooms, and at the other a low doorway led to the world beyond. But even this was veiled by a brick screen, forced by the light into unison with the brick building behind. The girl sat with her back against the wall, her knees drawn up to her chin, and her little, bare, brown feet moulding themselves in the warm, sun-steeped dust of the courtyard. In the hands clasped round her green trousers she held an unopened letter from which the London post-mark stared up into the brazen Indian sky. She was waiting to have it read to her--waiting with a dull, almost sullen patience, for the afternoon was still young. It was old enough, however, to make a sheeted figure in the shadow sit up on its string bed and yawn because siesta time was past.

"Still thinking of thy letter, Feroz? _Bismillah!_ I'm glad my man doesn't live in a country where the women go about half naked."

"Who told thee so, Kareem? The Meer _sahib_ said naught."

A light laugh seemed prisoned in the echoing walls. "_Wah!_ How canst tell? 'Tis father-in-law reads thy letters. Inaiyut saith so. He saw them at Delhi dancing like bad ones with--"

"Peace, Kareema! Hast no decency?"

"Enough for my years, whilst thou art more like a grandam than a scarce-wed girl. Why should not Inaiyut be a man? A husband is none the worse for knowing a pretty woman when he sees one."

She settled the veil on her sleek black head and laughed again. Feroza Begum's small brown face hardened into scorn. "Inaiyut hath experience and practice in the art doubtless, as he hath in cockfighting and dicing."

"Now, don't gibe at him for that. Sure 'tis the younger son's portion amongst us Moguls. Do I sneer at thy Meer amusing himself over the black water amongst the _mems?_"

"The Meer is not amusing himself. He is learning to be a barrister."

Kareema swung her legs to the ground with another giggle. "_Wah!_ Men are men all the world over, and so are women. Yea! 'tis true." She looked like some gay butterfly as she flashed out into the sunlight, and began with outstretched arms and floating veil to imitate the sidelong graces of a dancing girl.

"_Hai! Hai!_ Bad one!" cried a quavering voice behind her, as an old woman clutching for scant covering at a dirty white sheet shambled forward. "Can I not close an eye but thou must bring iniquity to respectable houses? 'Tis all thy scapegrace husband; for when I brought thee hither thou wast meek-spirited and--"

"Deck me not out with lies, nurse," laughed Kareema. "Sure I was ever to behaviour as a babe to walking--unsteady on its legs. So wast thou as a bride; so are all women." She seized the withered old arms as she spoke, and threw them up in an attitude. "Dance, Mytâben! dance! 'Tis the best way."

The forced frown faded hopelessly before the young, dimpling face. "Kareema! Why will'st not be decent like little Feroz yonder?"

"Why? Because my man thinks I'm pretty! Because I've fine clothes! Feroza hath old green trousers and her man is learning to be '_wise_,' forsooth! amongst the _mems_. So she is jealous--"

"I'm not jealous," interrupted the other hotly.

"Peace, peace, little doves!" expostulated the old nurse. "Feroz is no fool to be jealous of a _mem_. Holy Prophet, Kareem! hadst thou seen them at Delhi as I have--"

"Inaiyut hath seen them too. He saith they are as _houris_ in silk and satins with bare breasts and arms--"

Mytâben's bony fingers crackled in a shake of horrified denial. "Silence! shameless one! I tell thee they have no beauty, no clothes--"

"There! I said they had no clothes," pouted Kareema.

The duenna folded her sheet round her with great dignity. "Thy wit is sharp, Kareema! 'Tis as well; for thou wilt need it to protect thy nose! The _mems_ have many clothes; God knows how many, or how they bear them when even the skin He gives is too hot. They are sad-coloured, these _mems_, with green spectacles serving as veils. Not that they need them, for they are virtuous and keep their eyes from men truck. Not like bad bold hussies who dance--"

"'Tis not true," cried Kareema shrilly. "Thou sayest it to please Feroza. Inaiyut holds they are _houris_ for beauty, and he knows."

In the wrangle which ensued the London postmark revolved between earth and heaven as the letter turned over and over in Feroza's listless fingers.

"I wish I knew," she muttered with a frown puckering her forehead. "He saith they are so wise, and yet--"

Mytâben paused in the war of words and laid her wrinkled old fingers on the girl's head. "Plague on new-fangled ways!" she grumbled half to herself. "Have no fear, heart's life! they are uncomely. But for all that, 'tis a shame of the Meer to leave thee pining."

A hand was on her mouth. "Hush, Mytâben! 'Tis a wife's duty to wait her lord's pleasure to stay or come."

There is a dignity in submission, but Kareema laughed again, and even old Mytâb looked at the girl compassionately. "For all that, heart's life, 'tis well to be sure. Certainty soothes the liver more than hope. So thou shalt see a _mem_. For lo! the book-readers have come to this town, and one passeth the door every eve at sundown."

"Oh, Mytâb! why didn't you tell us before?" cried both the girls in a breath.

"Because 'tis enough as it is, to keep two married girls straight, with never a mother-in-law to make them dance to her tune," grumbled the nurse evasively. "_Hai_, Kareema! I will tell thy father-in-law the Moulvie,[18] and then 'twill be bread and water."

"Bread and water is not good for brides," retorted Kareema with a giggle. "And I will see the _mems_ too, or I will cry, and then--" She nodded her head maliciously.

That evening at sundown the two girls sat huddled up by the latticed window of the outer vestibule, while Mytâb watched at the door of the men's court which, with that of the women's apartments, opened into this shadowy entrance. By putting their eyes close to the fret-work they could see up and down a narrow alley where a central drain, full of black sewage, usurped the larger half of the rough brick pavement.

"Look, Feroza! look!" cried Kareema in a choked voice. A white umbrella lined with green, a huge pith hat tied round with a blue veil, a gingham dress, a bag of books, white stockings, and tan shoes,--that was all. They watched the strange apparition breathlessly till it came abreast of them.

Then Kareema's pent-up mirth burst forth in peals of laughter so distinctly audible through the open lattice that the cause stopped in surprise.

Feroza started to her feet. "For shame, Kareem, for shame! He says they are so good." And before they guessed what she would be at, the wicket-gate was open, and she was on the bare, indecent doorstep.

"_Salaam! mem sahib, salaam!_" rang her high-pitched, girlish voice. "I, Feroza Begum of the house of Meer Ahmed Ali, barrister-at-law, am glad to see you."

Before Kareema, by hanging on to Mytâb's scanty attire, lent weight enough to drag the offender back to seclusion, the English lady raised her veil, and Feroza Begum, Moguli, caught her first glimpse of a pair of mild blue eyes. She never forgot the introduction to Miss Julia Smith, spinster of Clapham. Perhaps she had reason to remember it.

"I might have believed it of Kareem," whimpered the duenna over a consolatory pipe, "but Feroz! To stand out in the world yelling like a hawker. _Ai, Ai!_ Give me your quiet ones for wickedness. _Phut!_ in a moment, like water from the skin-bag, spoiling everything."

"'Twas Kareem's laugh burst the _mashk_, nursie," laughed Feroza. She and her sister-in-law seemed to have changed places for the time, and she was flitting about gay as a wren, while the former sulked moodily on her bed.

Yet as the days passed a new jealousy came like seven devils to possess poor Feroza utterly.

What was this wisdom which inspired so many well-turned periods in the Meer's somewhat prosy letters? Beauty was beyond her, but women even of her race had been wise; passionate Nurjehan, and even pious Fâtma--God forgive her for evening her chances with that saintly woman's! The thought led to such earnest study of the Koran that old Mytâb's wrath was mollified into a hope of permanent penitence. And all the time the girl's heart was singing pæans of praise over the ease with which she remembered the long strings of meaningless words. Buoyed up by hope she confided her heart's desire to Kareema.

"Eat more butter and grow fat," replied that little coquette. "Dress in bright colours and redden thy lips. And thou mightest use that powder the _mems_ have to make their skins fair. Inaiyut saith he will buy me some in the bazaar. That is true wisdom; the other is for wrinkles."

Despite this cold water, the very next London post-mark brought matters to a crisis.

"Is that all?" asked Feroza dismally, when her father-in-law, the Moulvie, had duly intoned her husband's letter. "It looks, oh! it looks ever so much more on paper."

The old Mohammedan stared through his big horn-rimmed spectacles at her reluctant finger feeling its way along the crabbed writing.

"Quite enough for a good wife, daughter-in-law," he replied. "Bring my pipe, and thank God he is well."

As she sat fanning the old man duteously, her mind was full of suspicion. Could _she_ have compressed the desire and love of her heart into a few well-turned sentences? Ah! if she could only learn to read for herself. The thought found utterance in a tentative remark that it would save the Moulvie trouble if she were a scholar.

"'Tis not much trouble," said the old man courteously; "the letters are not long."

The effect of these words surprised him into taking off his spectacles, as if this new departure of quiet Feroza's could be better seen by the naked eye.

"So thou thinkest to learn all the Meer has learnt?" he asked scornfully, when her eloquence abated. "_Wah illah!_ What? Euclidus and Algebra, Political Economy and Justinian?"

The desire of the girl's heart was not this, but jealousy and shame combined prevented her declaring the real standard of her aims, so she replied defiantly, "Why not? I can learn the Koran fast--oh, ever so fast."

It was an unfortunate speech, since it brought down on her the inevitable reply that such knowledge was enough for those who, at best, must enter Paradise at a man's coat-tails. Driven into a corner, she felt the hopelessness of the struggle, until, flushed by success, the Moulvie forgot caution, and declaimed against his son's stupidity in desiring more.

Feroza seized on this slip swiftly. If it was as she feared, if her husband's wishes were kept from her ignorance, she must, she would learn. If she could not go to school, the _mems_ would come and teach her at home. They did such work at Delhi; why not here? As for the Moulvie's determination that no singing should be heard in his house, that was a righteous wish, and she would tell the _mems_ not to sing their hymns. Indeed, such a question seemed all too trivial for comparison with her future happiness. Therefore her disappointment when Mytâben brought back a peremptory refusal from the mission-ladies to teach on such condition was very keen. Her piteous, surprised tears roused Kareema's scornful wonder.

"I can't think why thou shouldst weep; it thickens the nose, and thine is over-broad as it is. Inaiyut offered once to teach me, but when I asked him if learning would make him love me better, he kissed me with a laugh. So I let it alone."

"Thou dost not understand," sobbed Feroza; "no one does. The Meer is wise, and I am different."

"_Wah!_ Thou art but a woman at best, and life is over for us with the first wrinkle, no matter what we learn. Ah, Feroz! let's enjoy youth whilst we have it. See! I have a rare bit of fun for thee if thou wilt not blab to Mytâben. Promise!"

Three days afterwards Feroza, escaping from the turmoil of a great marriage in a relative's house, found herself, much to her own surprise and bewilderment, forming one of a merry party of young women disguised in boy's clothes, and bound for an hour or so of high jinks in one of the walled orange gardens which lay on the outskirts of the quarter. The idea, which had at first filled her with dismay, had next grown tempting, and then become irresistible with Kareema's artful suggestion that it would give occasion for a personal interview with the mission-ladies who had taken up their abode close by. So she had allowed her doubts and fears to be allayed; though inwardly she failed to see the vast difference on which her sister-in-law insisted, between the iniquity of standing on doorsteps in the full light of day, and sneaking out at night on the quiet.

"Verily," said Kareema in a pet, "thou art a real noodle, Feroz! I tell thee all the good-style women do thus, and my sister will be there with her boys. _Wah!_ were it not for my handsome Inaiyut, I should die in this dull old house where folk wish to be better than God made them."

So it came to pass that while Miss Julia Smith, spinster of Clapham, sat with her fellow-workers in the verandah resting after their labours, a boyish figure with a beating heart was creeping towards her as the goal of every hope.

The English mail was in; an event which by accentuating the severance from home ties is apt to raise the enthusiasm of the mission-house beyond normal.

"How very, very interesting it is about the young man Ahmed Ali," remarked Julia, in a voice tuned to superlatives. "Dearest Mrs. Cranston writes that he spoke so sweetly about his ignorant child-wife. As she says, there is something so--so--so comforting, you know, in the thought of work coming to us, as if--well, I can't quite express it, you know,--but from our own homes,--from dear, dear, old England!"

There was a large amount of confused good feeling in Julia Smith. A kindly soul she was, if a little over-sentimental. Perhaps a broken sixpence, stored side by side with a decayed vegetable in her desk, formed a creditable explanation of the latter weakness. Such things account for much in the lives of most women.

"I suppose," she continued, "we were right to refuse without hymns; but I shall never forget the sweet child's face as she popped from her prison. I am making up the incident for our magazine; it will be most touching. But now that dearest Mrs. Cranston has written, it seems like the finger of Providence--"

"A boy wanting a Miss," interrupted the nondescript familiar, inseparable from philanthropy in India. "The one with an umbrella, a big hat, and a bag of books."

A very womanly laugh with an undercurrent of militant pleasure, ran round the company. The description fitted one and all, and they were proud of the fact.

The moon shone bright behind the arches, the scent of orange blossoms drifted over the high garden wall, and every now and again a burst of laughter close at hand overbore the more distant noise of wedding drums and pipes.

"What do you want, my son?"

The soft voice with its strange inflections took away the last vestige of Feroza's courage. She stood dizzy with absolute fear, her tongue cleaving to her mouth. A repetition of the question roused her to the memory that here lay her one chance. She gave a despairing glance into the gloom in search of those pale blue eyes; then, suddenly, inheritance broke through her terror. She flung her hands up to heaven, and her young voice rose in the traditional cry for justice. "_Dohai! Dohai!_"

"We do not keep justice here," was the soft answer. "You must go to the Courts for that. We are but women--"

"And I too am a woman! Listen!" The words which had lagged a moment before now crowded to her lips, and as she stepped closer her raised arm commanded attention. "You have taken my husband and left me; and I will not be left! You gave him scholarships and prizes, tempting him away; and when I also ask for learning, you say, 'You must sing.' What is singing when I am sad? Surely God will hear my tears and not your songs!"

Her passion swayed her so that but for Julia Smith's supporting arm she would have fallen. "I don't understand," said the Englishwoman kindly. "What have we done? Who are you?"

"I am the wife of Meer Ahmed Ali, barrister-at-law, and I want to be taught Euclidus, and Justinian, and the--the other things. You shall not take him away for always. Justice! I say, justice!"

"My dears! My dears!" cried Julia Smith, "didn't I tell you it was the finger of Providence--"

Half-an-hour afterwards little Feroza, flying back to rejoin her companions, felt as if Paradise had been opened to her by a promise. But if Paradise was ajar, the orange garden was closed, the gate locked, the key gone. She peered through the bars, hoping it was a practical joke to alarm her. All was still and silent save for the creak of the well-wheel and a soft rustle from the burnished leaves where the moonlight glistened white.

"Kareem! let me in! for pity sake let me in!"

Then a wild, uncontrollable fear at finding herself alone in an unknown world claimed her body and soul, and she fled like a hare to the only refuge she knew. The _mems_ must protect her; for were they not the cause of her venturing forth at all? But for them, or their like, would she not have been well content at home? Yea! well content.

The verandah was empty, and from within came a monotonous voice. She peered into the dimly lit room to see a circle of kneeling figures, and hear her own name welded into the even flow of prayer. God and his Holy Prophet! They were praying that she might become apostate from the faith of her fathers! Tales of girls seized and baptised against their will leapt to her memory. She covered her eyes as if to shut out the horrid sight and fled; whither she neither knew nor cared.

"_Hai!_ have I found thee at last, graceless! scandalous!" scolded some one into whose arms she ran at full tilt.

"Mytâb! oh, dear Mytâb!" she cried, clinging frantically to the familiar figure. "Take me home, oh, please take me home! I will never go out again, no, never!"

That was the determination of ignorance. Eighteen months after wisdom had altered it and many other things, for during that time Julia Smith had sung hymns on the doorstep three days a week. Sometimes she had quite a large audience, and sometimes Feroza herself would listen at the lattice. On these occasions the thin voice had a ring in it; for, despite the fact that her pupil was taught all the truths of religion in prose and monotone, poor Julia used to wonder if this relegating of hymns to the doorstep was not a bowing in the house of Rimmon; nay, worse, a neglect of grace, for she loved her pupil dearly. Not one, but two pair of eyes glistened over the surprise in preparation for the absent husband. Wherefore a surprise no one knew, but surprise it was to be. Feroza said the idea originated in her teacher's sentimental brain; if so, it took root quickly in the girl's passionate heart. Thus, beyond the fact of her learning to read and write, the Meer knew nothing of the change wisdom was working in his wife. And meanwhile time brought other changes to the quiet courtyard. Handsome, dissipated Inaiyut died of cholera, and over him, and the boy-baby she lost, Kareema shed tears which did not dim her beauty. Three months after she was once more making the bare walls ring with her inconsequent laughter. She jeered at Feroza's diligence with increased scorn. No man, she said, was worth the losing of looks in books, and if the Meer really spoke of return, a course of cosmetics would be more advisable.

Even Julia shook her head over Feroza's thin face. "You work too hard, dear," she sighed. "Ah! if it were the one thing needful; but I have failed to teach you that."