Voices in the Night Part 4

There were two women in the courtyard, one a girl about sixteen, who was lounging lazily behind Lateefa, the other a woman of sixty, dressed in ragged dirty garments, who was spinning as for dear life an arch or two farther down. After a pause, during which she looked almost appealingly at the girl, the latter rose and limped towards an inner court, for Khojeeya Khanum was slightly lame; slightly deformed also, owing to her lameness.

'Keep the lumps to our dinners, Auntie Khojee!' called the girl with a pert t.i.tter; 'for what with paste and the kites it makes we good women have scarce flour left to fill our stomachs!'

Lateefa, after watching the limp disappear, glanced round at the girl.

She was a buxom creature, over-developed for her years, and over-dressed in the cheap finery of Manchester muslin at six _pice_ a yard and German silver earrings at two _annas_ a dozen.

'Thy sort of good woman need never starve, niece Sobrai,' he said (for he was connected by some by way of blood to the Heirs of All Things or Nothing), 'I have told thee that before. There is not a drop of her blood in thee,' he nodded to the inner door. 'I mean no blame; some daughters must favour the father. Indeed, I marvel ever there be so few to do it in this family, since, G.o.d knows! we men be debauched enough to outweigh the virtue of the sainted Fatma herself.' He shook his head and began on a new kite.

'Thou knowest _that_ better than I,' retorted Sobrai sharply; 'though thy memory, Uncle Lateef, can scarce hold the poor souls thou hast injured thereby.'

His deft hands left their work, and the supple fingers spread themselves in emphatic denial. 'Not a one! niece, not a one!' he protested, 'Lateefa makes kites, not souls. I take men and women as they came from their Maker's hands--as I came. For, see you, if my kites fly, as I make them fly, why not His souls?'--he paused for a thin musical laugh which suited his thin acute face--'I say not,' he went on, 'that thou art botched by being built another fashion, but that her life,' he nodded again to the inner or women's court, 'is not for such as thee--that thou hadst best appraise thine own needs betimes.'

'May be I have already,' sneered the girl insolently, 'and without thy help, pander!'

He turned on her swiftly. 'Have a care, girl! have a care! In vice, as in virtue, the old ways are safest. So listen not to that woman from cantonments whom the Nawab brings. .h.i.ther when he entertains. Ah! think not I have not seen thee stealing down on the sly to have a word with her.'

Sobrai gave a half-abashed t.i.tter. 'And to Dilaram _thy_ friend of the city also! Lo! uncle! What is there to choose between them or their trade either? "_If one comes to dance, what matters a veil?_" And if the Nawab would keep his women old-fashioned, why doth he bring Miss Leezie to the house? Ah! say not 'tis only to this outer court where we virtuous need see nothing; for "_'tis only the blind cow which hath a separate byre_," and my sight is good----'

'And thy heart bad,' added Lateefa dispa.s.sionately, as she stood shifting one foot to and fro after the manner of dancing-girls. 'Still, since G.o.d made thee, as I make kites, thou wilt doubtless fly thine own way--if thou canst find some one to hold the string! It needs that ever.'

She began a retort, but checked herself as Khojeeya reappeared with the paste in a green leaf cup.

'Thy work brings quick return, Lateef,' said the old lady, pausing to look wistfully at the growing pile of kites, 'but my wheel twirls for two hours to a farthing tune.' She edged closer and brushed a speck of dirt from the kitemaker's board in wheedling fashion, then went on, 'Couldst not spare me something to-day, Lateef, against the boy's medicine? He needs it sorely, and Noormahal hath not had a _cowrie_ from the Nawab since the races. Dost know what he lost? He says all, but he lies often.' She spoke without a suspicion of blame, simply as if the fact--being a dispensation of Providence--was neither to be questioned nor resented.

Lateefa laughed airily. 'Lose!' he echoed, 'Jehan hath naught to lose, not even credit. He sets free of fate! "_He who bathes naked has no clothes to wring!_" 'Tis Salig Ram, his usurer, whose fat flesh quivers lest his tame pensioner should die prematurely. So take heart, my good Khojee! Things cannot grow worse, or, for that matter, better, since Jehan's affairs are as a slipped camel in the mud. They can neither go back nor forward. For, see you, he must not die of starvation, lest the pension lapse; nor must he live riotous beyond reason, lest once more the pension lapse through his death by surfeit. Would to G.o.d I had such leading-strings to comfortable, clean living myself! But none cares for Lateefa's soul or body. So fret not, Khojee, concerning Jehan. And as for the boy, canst not take the child to the "Duffri'n Hospitar'l" and get physic free? Plenty women go thither, they tell me.'

'Ay! of sorts; but not we,' replied the old lady.

She drew her ragged veil tighter, but Sobrai t.i.ttered.

'Hark to her gentility! Yet she goes to the p.a.w.nshop, Uncle Lateef, and does the house-marketing to boot--tut! auntie, wouldst pretend it is not so? As if our neighbours did not know us all but servantless! as if they could not tell worshipful Khojeeya Khanum, king's daughter, below the domino, by the limp!'

The old worn face--it was one of those Providence meant for beauty, then marred--turned in deprecating apology to Lateefa, as representative of outraged propriety and proprietor.

'Some one must, _meean_,' she said meekly, 'for Ameenan hath but two hands and two feet; yet another set would mean another mouth to feed.

Besides, I grow so old, brother; there is no fear.' The faint forlornness and regret of the excuse made Lateefa's sharp face soften.

'Heed not what Sobrai says, sister,' he replied. 'Lo! thy virtue would stand stiff in a brothel; hers grows giddy looking over a wall; so she doth not understand----'

'Not understand!' retorted the girl shrilly. 'Mayhap I understand too much for old folk and old ways. I hold not with lick-spittling men-folk who wander "Englis fa.s.sen," yet would keep us in the old path--who say, as their granddads did, that "_cattle and women must rub along in their tethers_," but claim a long string to their own kites.'

Lateefa interrupted the tirade with a chuckle. 'Since they are able to hold it! but as I told thee, 'tis the mud in the gutter for the gayest of gay petticoats'--he laid his hand on the growing pile of kites-'if they try to soar alone.'

'I will not ask thee to hold mine, anyway,' she retorted, flouncing off in a meditated whirlwind. For Lateefa was right. Sobrai was not born of those who are patient in well-doing. Even without experience, her manners were those of a different model.

Aunt Khojee looked after her fearfully, then once more turned to representative man in apology. 'Here are ill words, _meean_,' she began tremulously, 'yet G.o.d knows how hard it is to keep girls silent when the world about them hath grown so noisy. In the old days neighbours were of one's own sort; now, if they be ready to pay full rent, that is enough. I say naught against ours--though, good or bad, it was ill done of Alidad, our cousin, to let the house his fathers died in. Still they be decent folk enough, though the son is a _balister_.[1] But, see you, since he returned from England he hath taken his wife to live as a _mem_ beyond the city. And she hath set his sisters agog to learn, as she learns, of a _miss_ from the _missen_. So what with all this talk, and the railway whistle so close, and Sobrai gossiping as girls will over the part.i.tions----'

Lateefa's thin laugh positively crackled. 'Said I not her virtue would not withstand a wall? But heed her not, sister. She is right, _for Sobrai_! Thou art right, for _Kojeeya Khanum!_ Ye are both G.o.d-bred, G.o.d-fed! Except concerning houses--_there_ thou art wrong,' he added, giving the old lady a shrewd tentative look. 'Dead folk should remain in their graves and leave the letting of houses to the living. I deem Alidad wise, for, as the old saw says, "_an empty house is the wasp's estate_." Jehan should do the like with this, if the Nawabin would consent to live elsewhere.'

'Elsewhere?' echoed Khojee, aghast. 'Where else should Noormahal live but in her own house?'

'In a smaller one. Look! saw you ever such a wilderness of a place for five women and a child!'

He swept a derisive finger round the wide courtyard, the terraced arcades, the storied vista of the _zenan-khana_, the half-fortified gateway, where the royal peac.o.c.ks still spread their broken plaster tails. And as he did so the flood of yellow sunshine, as if in answer, betrayed every cranny in the cracked brickwork, every scar in the mouldering stucco.

'Tis as a stone on the tail of a kite, sister,' he went on, 'a burden not to be borne by frailty that can scarce support itself.' He had, as he spoke, been tying his morning's work together ere taking it to the bazaar, and now he stood balancing a balloon-like bundle, almost as big as himself, upon his hand; but he emphasised his remark by withdrawing that support, then, ere the kites touched ground, catching the bundle again, so holding them suspended. 'It needs some one to keep feather brains from the gutter,' he continued gravely, 'and thou, Khojee, art the only body in this house with sense. Khadjee, thy sister, hath decorum, Sobrai desires, and Noormahal, poor soul, dreams! So let me speak thee soberly. Thou hast heard of this plague, sister?'

Khojee cracked all her fingers wildly, to avert evil, ere quavering, 'Who hath not? Hath it come, Lateefa? Shall we be all sent to hospital and poisoned?'

The crackling laugh echoed again. 'Fools' tales, woman, fools' tales.

Why should the _Huzoors_ trouble? Have they not soldiers and guns wherewith to kill?'

'But they have driven out the _Mimbrans_[2]-committee; they have taken possession of all things. Hafiz Ahmad's wife, who lives as a _mem_, said so. She said her husband----'

The laugh crackled again. 'Ay! he is _mimber_, yet he knows which side of the wall to jump. And what be the rights and wrongs of the quarrel, I know not; but, as thou sayest, the _Huzoors_ have taken the reins once more, for the plague is nigh. So they are meddling with G.o.d's work, and finding _hospitar'ls_ and who knows what. And Hafiz Ahmad, for all his grievance, hath recommended his father's--yea! Khojee, the neighbouring house--as _hospitarl_. So, see you, sister, if folk were wise the _hospitarl_ might come to them, and a swinging rent beside; since Behari Lai, the town clerk, told me the doctors said they must have both houses or neither--they were so nigh. Here, then, is Noormahal's chance. Let her claim a writing for half-rent, since, having right of occupancy by her marriage-dowry, Jehan cannot let without her consent. That would stop wheel-spinning for bare bread, sister.'

But Khojee's thoughts were not for herself. 'Can the _Huzoors_ make us go,' she quavered; 'can they force her?'

Lateefa shrugged his shoulders. 'Nay! nay! but if she choose.'

'Then is that the end,' interrupted Khojee, with a sigh of relief.

'Noormahal will never choose. She hath but two things left of kingship--and it comes closer through her than through Jehan, mind you, though, being woman she hath no claim like he-two things, the house and the ring! And she will keep both--for her boy.'

Lateefa had his gay balloon balanced afresh on his palm.

'If she can keep the boy,' he said sardonically; 'but even kites are ill to hold with a rotten string.' So, balancing his burden of nothingness from one hand to another, as jugglers play with a ball, he pa.s.sed out under the broken plaster peac.o.c.ks, singing significantly, in his high reedy voice, the dirge of motherhood which so often echoes out into the Indian sunshine from behind closed doors--

'O child! who taught thee to deceive!

O child! who taught thee thus to leave My throning arms? Didst thou not say Thou wert their king for aye!

So soon dost thou deceive?

So soon hast learnt to leave Thy sonship's crown?

To fling it down.

Thy throne Is lone.

Ah, me! ah, me!'

It fell on Khojeeya Khanum's ears, making her heart sink with its implied warning; for a child doomed to disease, like little Sa'adut, the heir to the Heirship of Nothingness, was but faint hold on the soaring honours of royalty. And Jehan Aziz, his father, was a fainter one still. Rumours had come, even to the wide ruined courtyard, of official reprimands, of threats. What wonder, when even the more reputable members of the royal family looked askance at his doings?

Still he was master in that house, and as that was his day for the weekly visit of ceremony he vouchsafed to his lawful wife, it behoved Khojee to prepare for it after established rule.

Khadeeja Khanum, Khojee's twin sister, had already done her share of preparation. She had put on her best pink satin trousers and a spangled green veil, in which she sate, squatted on a string bed set in the women's court, and sewed at a tinsel cap for the head of the house--that being the correct etiquette on such occasions.

And Khadeeja was far more correct than Khojeeya. In fact, her position in the household was quite different, seeing that she had been betrothed in her youth to an ancient suitor who died before she was old enough to be claimed, while no one had ever made a bid for Khojee's limp. So, while the latter's few trinkets had a trick of remaining with the p.a.w.nbroker, Khadjee's never paid even a temporary visit to that official.

Then her clothes, from that decorous sitting on string beds instead of breathless spinning in the dust, remained so spick and span, that Noormahal, poor soul! when money ran scarce for the heir's medicine, would accuse the general scapegoat of extravagance in providing them.

On these occasions Khojee never retorted that the white muslin in which the Nawabin denied herself was, in the end, more expensive. Neither did she meet Khadjee's demand for more tinsel with the brutal truth that the caps were too old-fashioned for Jehan Aziz to wear. Family facts of this sort she did not even divulge in her prayers; for Khojeeya Khanum's religion, like her life, was strictly impersonal. It could be nothing else, since it was barely decent for a woman to intrude even her own salvation on a Creator whose attributes were distinctly masculine!