by M. M. Kaye
‘It comes to all of us, Ashok,’ said Zarin quietly: ‘He is now well past his seventieth year. There are not many who live as long; and few who have been as contented with their lot. My father has been fortunate in that he has had a full life and a good one; which is surely as much as anyone can ask of God. May we two be granted the like.’
‘Ameen,’ said Ash under his breath. ‘But I – I did not realize… Has he been ill?’
‘III? This is not a sickness – unless old age be one. This is no more than the weight of years. And who is to say that he will not see many more of them? But among our people, seventy is accounted a great age.’
Ash knew that to be true. The men of the Border hills lived hard lives, and a tribesman was considered old at forty while his wife was often a grandmother before she was thirty, and Koda Dad had already exceeded the three-score-years-and-ten that had been promised to the descendants of Adam. Of late Ash had begun to think of life as far too long, and to see it in imagination as an endless road stretching away ahead of him and leading nowhere, along which he must walk alone; yet now, abruptly, he saw that it was also cruelly short, and was unreasonably shaken by this commonplace discovery. Zarin, who was still watching him and knew him well enough to follow his train of thought, said consolingly: ‘There is still myself, Ashok. And the Regiment also.’
Ash nodded without replying. Yes, there was still Zarin, and the Regiment: and when he was allowed to return to Mardan there would be Wally also, and Koda Dad's village lay only a mile or so beyond the Border and a short march away. Koda Dad, who had suddenly become so old… Studying the old Pathan's sleeping face, Ash saw the lines of character that were engraved there as clearly as the lines of time: the kindness and wisdom, the firmness, integrity and humour, written plain. A strong face; and a peaceful one. The face of a man who has experienced much and come to terms with life, accepting the bad with the good and regarding both as no more than a part of living – and of the inscrutable purpose of God.
Reviewing his own achievements by the light of Koda Dad's long and eventful life, it struck Ash with stunning force that they could be summed up as a brief list of sorry failures. He had begun by making an utter fool of himself over Belinda and ended by losing Juli. And in between he had failed George, proved himself to be an intractable and disappointing officer, and – indirectly –caused the death of Ala Yar. For had it not been for his quixotic behaviour in the matter of the carbines, Ala Yar would still be alive and probably, at that moment, gossiping comfortably with Mahdoo on the back verandah of a bungalow in Mardan.
To set against that it could be said that he had saved Jhoti's life, avenged the deaths of Hira Lal and Lalji, and succeeded in rescuing Karidkote's reputation and treasury from disaster. But that was poor compensation for the dismal tale of his previous failures; or for the fact that his brief and passionate love-affair with Juli could only add to her unhappiness in the life to which her own loyalty had doomed her – a life that he did not dare allow himself to think about.
There were few things, in these days, that he cared to look back on; and even less that he could look forward to. But among the former there had always been Koda Dad, a source of wisdom and comfort and a rock to lean upon. Koda Dad and Zarin, Mahdoo and Wally. Only four human beings out of all the teeming millions in the world; yet of immeasurable importance to him. And he was about to lose them. When Koda Dad and Zarin recrossed the Indus and Wally left for Mardan in a month's time, he would be unable to follow them, for they would have entered territory from which he himself was excluded until the Guides agreed to take him back again – which, for all he knew, might not be for years. If so, this could well be the last time he would ever see Koda Dad.
As for Mahdoo, he too was growing old and frail; and if Koda Dad, the immutable, could crumble in this fashion, how much more so could Mahdoo, who did not possess half the old Pathan's stamina and must be at least his equal in age? It did not bear thinking of. Yet he thought of it now, grimly and despairingly, seeing his life as a fragile house – an empty one, since there was no Juli – which once he had planned to cram with treasure. A house supported by four pillars, two of them now almost worn out and in the nature of things unlikely to last very much longer… When those two fell, as one day they must, the walls might still stand. But if a third were to fail, his case would be desperate, and if all went, the house would crash to the ground and break apart, exposing its emptiness.
Koda Dad's head nodded and fell forward, and the movement awoke him: ‘So now there is a new ruler in Gulkote,’ said the old man, continuing the conversation where it had ended when he dozed off. ‘That is good. Provided he does not take after his mother. But if God wills, his father's blood will prove stronger; and if so Gulkote – Chut! that is no longer the name. I forget the new one, but no matter. It will always be Gulkote to me and whenever I think of it, it is with affection; for until the mother of my sons died, my days there were pleasant ones. A good life… Yes, a good life. Ah! here is Habibah. I did not realize that it was so late.’
When the sun dipped behind the hills and the air began to cool, Ash and Zarin went out to exercise the horses in the dusty evening light, and when they returned it was to find that the Begum had invited a number of her brother's old friends and acquaintances to dine with them, so there had been no further opportunity for private talk that night. The next day was Sunday, and as Zarin must be back in Mardan in time to prepare for parade on Monday morning (which in the hot weather was at 5.30 a.m.), father and son would be leaving some time after nightfall. The three spent that day as they had spent the previous one, talking together in Koda Dad's room and resting during the heat of the afternoon, and towards evening the Begum sent a servant to tell Zarin that his aunt wished to see him on some matter connected with the possible purchase of land near Hoti Mardan, and Ash and Koda Dad went up to the roof to catch the cooler air as the sun went down behind the hills around Attock.
It was the first time they had been alone together, and in an hour or so Koda Dad would be gone and there was no knowing when they would meet again. But though Ash would have given a great deal to be able to ask for advice and comfort as he had done so often in the past, both as a child in Gulkote and a junior subaltern in Mardan, he could not bring himself to 0 so. The problem was too personal and the wound still too raw, and he shrank from probing either, and made conversation instead: talking of his coming leave in Kashmir and the prospects of shooting, in a light, cheerful voice that would have deceived ninety-nine people out of a hundred but failed entirely to deceive Koda Dad.
The old Pathan listened and nodded, but did not speak. Then, as the sky took fire from the setting sun, the first stirring of the evening breeze carried a faint, high-pitched cry from the distant city. ‘La Ill-ah ha! il ill-ah ho!’ – There is no God but God!’ It was the voice of the muezzin from the minaret of a mosque in Attock, calling the Faithful to prayer, and Koda Dad rose to his feet, and unrolling a small mat that he had carried up to the roof, turned to face Mecca and began his evening prayers.
Ash looked down from the parapet and saw that several of the household were doing the same in the garden below, and that the aged porter was also at his devotions in the road outside the gate. He watched them for a moment or two as they knelt, bowed their heads to the dust, rose and knelt again, muttering the traditional prayers that were said at this hour; and presently he turned away to face the north-east where, hidden by the heat-haze and the dust and distance, lay the Dur Khaima. But he did not say his own prayer – that ancient Hindu invocation that he had adopted so long ago. He had meant to, but before the words could shape themselves, his mental picture of the goddess of his childhood faded, and he found himself thinking instead of Juli.
He had told her that he would think of her every hour of every day, yet he had tried not to do so; partly because he had not been able to bear it, and also because he had decided that his only hope lay in taking her uncle's advice and putting the past behind him. It had been
like barring a door and throwing all his weight against it to keep out a flood that was building up outside, and though it had been impossible to prevent trickles from that flood seeping under the lintel and through cracks in the wood, he had managed somehow to shut out the worst of it. But now, suddenly, the bars snapped and the door gave way, and he was drowning in the same savage tide of love and anguish and loss that had swept over him in Kaka-ji's tent when he realized that he had made his last appeal and lost; and that he would never see Juli again…
Koda Dad finished his prayers and turned to see Ash standing by the parapet with his back towards him, facing the ‘Pindi road and the eastern horizon where a full moon was drifting slowly up into the sky as. the sun sank down in the glowing, dusty, golden West. The rigidity of that back and the spasmodic clenching and unclenching of the lean, nervous hands told Koda Dad almost as much as the determined lightness of Ash's conversation had done, and the old man said quietly:
‘What is amiss, Ashok?’
Ash turned quickly – too quickly, for he had not given himself time to control his features, and Koda Dad caught his breath in the involuntary hiss that greets the sight of a fellow-creature in physical agony.
‘Ai, Ai, child – it cannot be as bad as that,’ exclaimed Koda Dad, distressed. ‘No, do not lie to me' – his uplifted hand checked Ash's automatic denial – ‘I have not known you since your seventh year for nothing. Nor have I become so blind that I cannot see what is written on your face, or so deaf that I cannot hear what is in your voice; and I am not yet so old that I cannot remember my own youth. Who is she, my son?’
‘She –?’ Ash stared at him, startled.
Koda Dad said dryly: ‘You forget that I have seen you troubled in some such manner before – only then it was calf-love and no more than a boy's foolishness. But now… now I think it cuts deeper; for you are no longer a boy. It is Kair-Bai, is it not?’
Ash caught his breath and his face whitened. ‘How did you… But you can't… I did not –’
He stopped, and Koda Dad shook his head and said: ‘No, you did not betray yourself in words. It was those you did not speak that warned me of something amiss. You told of two brides and spoke of the younger one by name, describing her and telling of things that she had said and done. But save when you could not avoid it you did not mention the elder, and when you did, your voice changed and became without feeling and you spoke as though there was a restraint upon you. Yet this was that same Kairi-Bai whom we all knew, and to whom you owed your escape from the Hawa Mahal. Yet you told us almost nothing of her and spoke of her as you would have spoken of a stranger. That told its own tale. That, and the change in you. It could be nothing else. Am I not right?’
Ash smiled crookedly and said: ‘You are always right, my father. But it shames me to learn that I can be so transparent and that my face and voice are so easily read.’
‘There is no need,’ said Koda Dad placidly. ‘No one but myself could have done so – and then only because of my long knowledge and affection for you, and because I remember the old days very clearly. I will not press you to tell me anything that you do not wish, but I am troubled for you, my son. It grieves me deeply to see you so unhappy, and if I can be of any help–’
‘You have always been that,’ said Ash quickly. ‘I leaned upon you as a child and I have done so again and again when – when I was a raw recruit. Also I know well that had I taken your advice more often I would have saved myself much sorrow.’
‘Tell me,’ said Koda Dad. He seated himself cross-legged on the warm stone, prepared to listen, while Ash leaned on the parapet, and looking out across the Begum's garden to where the Indus glowed red-gold in the sunset, told all those things he had left out of his tale on the previous day, omitting only the happenings of one night…
When he had finished, Koda Dad sighed and said inconsequentially: ‘Her father had great courage and many good qualities, and he ruled his people wisely – but not his own household. There he was both weak and idle, being one who greatly disliked tears and arguments and quarrelling. Hai mai!’
He fell silent, brooding on the past, and presently he said: ‘Yet he too never broke a promise. If he gave his word, he kept it, as befits a Rajput. Therefore it is only right that Kairi-Bai should do likewise, as from what you have told me I see that she has inherited only the good. This you may see only as your misfortune, yet in time I think you will come to see that it was best for both of you that she had the courage to keep faith, since had she done as you desired (and lived to tell of it, which I think unlikely) you would not have found happiness together.’
Ash turned from his contemplation of the darkening river and said harshly: ‘Why do you say that? I would have done anything – everything.’
Once again Koda Dad's sinewy, authoritative hand checked him: ‘Do not talk like a child, Ashok. I do not doubt that you would have done all that was in your power to make her happy. But it is not in your power to build a new world; or to turn back time. Only the One God could do that – were it necessary. And it would be very necessary for you! I myself have had little or no experience of your people, but I have sons and kinsmen who know the ways of the Sahib-log; and having ears to hear, I have listened and learned much during the years since I left Gulkote. Now as I do not believe that all I have heard can be lies, you, Ashok, will now listen to me.’
Ash smiled faintly and sketched a mock-humble salute, but Koda Dad frowned him down and said sharply: ‘This is not a matter for jest, boy. Once, long ago, in the days when the rule of the Company Bahadur' (he meant the East India Company) ‘was young and there were no memsahibs in Hind, the Sahibs took wives from among the women of this land and none spoke against it. But when the Company waxed strong their ships brought out many memsahibs, and the memsahibs frowned upon this practice, openly despising all those who associated with Indian women – above all, those who married them – and showing scorn and contempt towards the children of mixed blood. Seeing this, the people of Hind were angry and they too set their faces against it, so that now both regard it with equal disfavour. Therefore neither Kairi's people nor yours would have permitted a marriage between you.’
‘They could not have stopped us,’ declared Ash angrily.
‘Maybe not. But they would have tried. And if you had persisted, and made her your wife, you would have found that few if any mem-log would have consented to meet her or invite her into their houses, or allowed their daughters to enter hers; and none would treat her as an equal – not even her own people, who would do likewise, and speak ill of her behind her back because she, a king's daughter, must accept such treatment from many Angrezi women whose own parents were far less well-born than hers. They would despise her as the Rana and his nobles did, because her grandfather was a feringhi and her mother a half-caste; for in this respect, as you will have learned in Bhithor, her people can be as cruel as yours. It is a failing common to all races, being a matter of instinct that goes deeper than reason: the distrust of the pure-bred for the half-breed. One cannot overcome it, and had you brought Kairi-Bai away with you, you would have discovered these things soon enough – and discovered too that there would be no refuge for you here; your Regiment would not have wished to have you back, and other Regiments would not have been anxious to accept one whom the Guides had rejected.’
‘I know,’ said Ash tiredly. ‘I too had thought of that. But I am not a poor man, and we should have had each other.’
‘Beshak. But unless you lived in the wilderness, or made yourselves a new world, you would also have had neighbours - native-born villagers or townsmen to whom you would have been foreigners. You might well have learned to like their ways and earned their friendship and acceptance, and in the end been content. But bardast (tolerance) is a rare flower that grows in few places and withers too easily. I know that the path you now tread is a hard one, but I believe it to be the best for you both; and if Kairi-Bai has had the courage to choose it, have you so much less, that you cannot acce
pt it?’
‘I have already done so,’ said Ash: and added wryly, ‘There was no choice.’
‘None,’ agreed Koda Dad. ‘Therefore what profit is there in repining? What is written is written. You should rather give thanks for that which was good, instead of wasting your time in fruitless regret for what you cannot have. There are many desirable things in life besides the possession of one woman, or one man: this even you must know. Were it not so, how lonely and desolate a world it would be for the many, the very many, who through ill-luck or by reason of being ill-favoured, or from some other cause, never meet that one? You are more fortunate than you know. And now,’ said Koda Dad firmly, ‘we will talk of other things. The hour grows late and I have much to tell you before I go.’
Ash had expected him to talk of mutual acquaintances in villages beyond the Border, but he had spoken instead of far-away Kabul, where, so he said, agents and spies of the ‘Russ-log’ had recently become so numerous that there was a jest in that city that out of every five men to be met with in the streets, one was a servant of the Tsar, two were taking bribes from him and the remaining two lived in hopes of doing so. The Amir, Shere Ali, had scant love for the British, and when Lord Northbrook, the recently retired Governor General, had refused to give him any firm assurance of protection, he had turned instead to Russia, with the result that during the past three years relations between Britain and Afghanistan had deteriorated alarmingly.
‘It is to be hoped that the new Lat-Sahib will come to a better understanding with the Amir,’ said Koda Dad. ‘Otherwise there will surely be another war between the Afghans and the Raj – and the last one should have taught both that neither can look to gain advantage from such a conflict.’