by Thalassa Ali
At intervals the soldiers swarmed away, carrying their pillaged goods and bloodstained tulwars, but as soon as they were gone, another mob of them charged in from a different direction, waving weapons and shouting curses, and the little square erupted into violence once more.
With each new arrival, Mariana expected to die, but each time the soldiers had carried out their ugly work without taking notice of her.
During all those hours, the tall haveli doors had remained so tightly locked against her that they might have been the gates of Paradise, and she the worst of sinners.
The afternoon air, now filled with the smell of blood, rotted roses, and rare, spoiled perfumes, had turned cold. She shivered. Like the prince in Safiya's story, she had surely earned her banishment. Like him, she had forgotten charity, for what could be more uncharitable than suspicion?
She had not appreciated the Waliullah family's generosity or the love Hassan had offered her. Instead, proud and mistrusting, she had lost them both. As debased and filthy as the beggar prince, she too was exiled from the perfumed garden of her beloved.
How arrogant she had been when she had arrived at Qamar Haveli
She had misjudged Hassan and underestimated his family. How could she have imagined that the Shaikh would teach her his magical snakebite cure, or explain his ability to read minds, all in the space of a day or two? What had made her think she could master Safiya's healing arts and the source of her stout inner calm at the same time?
Instead of seeing her folly, she had felt slighted when the busy Waliullah household had offered her no long hours alone with either Safiya or the Shaikh. Blind to Hassan's feelings, she had not even bothered to ask why he refused to divorce her.
Walking away from the haveli yesterday afternoon, she had blamed the family for the failure of her visit
She hugged herself under her thin wrappings and wiped her running nose on her foul chador. It would do her no good to think of those things when she was so miserable. She badly needed food and water, but most of all, she needed a way to warm herself.
Her half-bare, bandaged feet ached miserably against the cobble stones. Surely, if she was forced to pass the night in the square, she would die of the cold
A corpse lay half-hidden by a small dome near the center of the square. From where she sat, Mariana could see that its shoulders were wrapped in a woolen shawl. Clenching her chattering teeth, she looked cautiously about her. No live person was visible in the square. She took in a deep breath, rose, sidled over to the dome, and bent over the dead man.
He had been so badly beaten about the head and face that no one could have recognized him. Averting her eyes from the ants crawling on his blood-encrusted features, she loosened a corner of the shawl and gave it a sharp tug, but it did not come loose. Much of the fabric seemed to have bunched beneath his body. Growing bolder, she nudged his corpse with a filthy, painted foot and tugged again.
She was no nearer to having the shawl, but she had gone too far to turn back. She sat down on the stones and braced both her feet against the dead man's stiffening shoulder. Grimacing with distaste, she wrested the fabric from under him.
Back again in her place against the wall, she examined her prize. It was not a rich shawl, but it was thick enough, and it had only two bloodstains. She spread it gratefully over her chador and wrapped its end about her toes, then leaned back against the brick wall of the house, her eyes closing.
“Peace, sister!”
She started. Whoever this was, he must have witnessed her thieving. She looked nervously about her, but could see no one.
“Sister, I am here.” The cracked voice came from close by.
A tiny, misshapen person stood half-hidden by the corner of the building. He raised a hand and beckoned to her.
He was no soldier. Such a small creature could scarcely do her harm, crippled as he was. Glad to see a live human being among all the carnage, Mariana gathered herself and stood, careful not to drop her stolen shawl.
Standing, he came only to her shoulder. His spine was so severely curved that his head, covered with a length of cotton, seemed to have been put on sideways, but his clothes were neat and clean. “I am the Keeper of Shoes for Wazir Khan's Mosque,” he told her, gesturing toward the tall gateway with its Arabic inscriptions that fronted the square. “I have spent the day hidden inside an empty student quarter in the courtyard. I have only ventured out now that it is mealtime and the soldiers have gone to raid the food bazaars.”
“Will they come back?”
“Yes, I fear they will.” The little man looked sideways into her face. “If Prince Sher Singh had prevailed in the Hazuri Bagh, he would have entered the city by now, and the pillage would have finished, but he has not.”
The hunchback gave no sign of disgust at her condition. Instead, his long face held only concern. He pointed to the square with its fallen bodies and broken glass. “You should not be out here with all this evil-doing, sister. You must take shelter as I have, in one of the empty quarters in the courtyard of the mosque. Allah Most Gracious would not forbid you, a woman, to seek safety in His house. There is water in the courtyard tank,” he added gently, glancing at her filthy hands. “I will take you there.”
Water. She could only nod, weak with relief. Her chador drawn carefully across her face, she allowed him to lead her toward the high, tiled entrance to the mosque.
“I do not want to stay away from Qamar Haveli too long,” she told him as they began to mount the gateway stairs. “I am waiting for someone to open the doors.”
“Ah, Qamar Haveli, the home of Shaikh Waliullah … I entered that house once, when I was a child.”
His sigh echoed in the decorated archway behind Mariana. She did not answer him, for she had stepped into the mosque's broad, open courtyard and seen the brimming water tank at its center.
She licked her lips. “Is there a cup to drink from?” she asked, hiding her unclean hands behind her.
The hunchback shrugged. “I am a poor man,” he replied.
She would have to wash before she drank from her hands. After laying her shawls carefully down beside her, she lowered the dirty sheet from her head and face, knelt, and dipped her fingers into the tank.
The water was very cold, but she did not mind. She dug the filth from under her fingernails, scrubbed the dirt from her arms, and splashed water onto her face. Then, she moved to the far side of the tank, knelt again, cupped her palms, and drank.
Satisfied, her chador still loose on her shoulders, she sat back, and found the little hunchback staring at her across the water, his mouth ajar.
“You are not what you pretend to be,” he declared as she turned hastily away to cover herself. “I knew this from the first time you spoke to me in court Urdu instead of the coarse Punjabi of a beggar. Who are you, then, and how have you come to ask for alms at the gate of Shaikh Waliullah?”
“I am no one—” she faltered.
“You are very fair, if you do not mind my saying so,” he went on. “Your white skin puts me in mind of Shaikh Waliullah's foreign daughter-in-law. They call her the Lioness, for it was she who rescued Saboor, the Shaikh's baby grandson, from Maharajah Ranjit Singh when the child was dying of grief and neglect. The Maharajah was still alive then, of course, and—”
“I must return to the haveli now.” Her face averted from the hunchback's gaze, Mariana snatched up her shawls. “Thank you for the water,” she called over her shoulder as she hurried across the mosque's courtyard.
But the little man would not be dismissed. “I will wait with you at the Shaikh's door,” he announced as he trotted beside her toward the entrance. “You must hear this most interesting story.”
He talked as they descended the staircase, recounting Mariana's own past adventures to her as if they were now a part of the city's history. From time to time she tried to interrupt, to change the subject, to ask if he, too, was cold, where he lived, if he had a family, but with no result.
“And then,”
he added as they skirted the horrors in the square, “having seen her bravery and her love of the child, the Shaikh determined that the foreign Lioness should become his son's wife. The wedding took place at the Citadel. Muhammad Ahmad, the diamond merchant, prepared beautiful jewelry for the bride, clothes were stitched, and a bride gift was arranged. You may have seen the gift. It is a house with a yellow door, only one lane away from the Delhi Gate.” He shook his head. “But these stories do not always end happily.”
They had reached the haveli. Mariana prayed that the little man would cease talking and return to his hiding place in the mosque, but he went on, waving his small hands for emphasis.
“Before the valeema celebration could take place,” he continued, lowering himself painfully to the ground and signaling her to join him, “the Maharajah's armed men came and tried to take Saboor Baba away again. It was only because of the quick thinking of a Hindu sweetmeat seller that Saboor Baba and the foreign lady were saved.
“The Waliullahs sent them to Bengal for two full years, but they have now returned.” He nodded significantly as Mariana arranged herself on the stones a few feet away. “The family rejoiced at first, but now it seems that all is not well. The English people who brought Hassan's wife and Saboor Baba from Calcutta are seeking a divorce. They want the Lioness to go away with them when they leave.”
He bent forward and rested his weight on his elbows, his great shrouded hump giving him the look of an oddly shaped ghost. “Imagine the shame of it! But of course, they are foreigners. Who can understand these people?”
In spite of her cold and hunger, Mariana winced.
“It is said that she loves Saboor more than life, and that she wants to stay. Let us hope she does. It would give the family happiness.” He sighed gustily. “No family deserves happiness more than the Waliullahs.”
Mariana closed her eyes. Everyone in the city must know her story. The hunchback himself would learn soon enough that she had run away from Qamar Haveli.
She had never suffered in that house for wanting to divorce Hassan. Every man, woman, and child had known her purpose when she came to stay, but instead of trying to punish her, or even arguing their case, all had offered acceptance, and the hope that she would change her mind.
“I tell you,” the little man went on grandly, “there are great men in this city but the greatest is Shaikh Waliullah. He is known far and wide for his wisdom and his generosity.
“I have kept watch over the shoes outside Wazir Khan's Mosque since I was a child,” he went on, waving one hand while supporting his weight with the other. “In all that time, the Shaikh has never failed to treat me with consideration. Of course, he sees to my health, and his sister sends food to my house, but there is more to his generosity than that. When Shaikh Waliullah greets me, he speaks to my soul, not to my station as a keeper of shoes.” He raised a finger and waggled it in the air. “In this world, it is a rare man who respects the humanity of a hunchback.”
At last, he fell silent beside her. Mariana reached forward and wrapped her feet more closely in her stolen shawl. What a fool she had been
Throughout her stay at Qamar Haveli she had been carefully tutored, her own lessons included invisibly in each of Safiya's regular teaching sessions. Thinking back, Mariana remembered each one, and the significant, accompanying glance Safiya had sent her way, indicating that the lesson was intended for her.
She had broken each one of those carefully imparted rules.
First, she had ignored the importance of charity, forgetting that every beggar, indeed every creature on earth, represented an opportunity for the generous to gain God's blessings. While running away, she had failed to offer the beggars at Shalimar as much as a greeting. She had been rude to Charles Mott. She had abandoned her uncle in his desperate need.
Disregarding Safiya's second lesson, she had taken her own blessings for granted. Like the beggar prince who had forgotten to give away his second silver coin while he ran after the unknown lady's palanquin, she had forgotten what she owed Hassan and his family, and allowed herself to be seduced by suspicion instead.
While caring for the desperate young mother who came to the haveli, she should have learned Safiya's third lesson: that doing the right thing often required self-discipline. Ignoring this truth, she had abandoned her uncle and aunt at Shalimar, pretending that the cure for his cholera was her only reason for returning to Qamar Haveli.
She must improve herself, before it was too late. She glanced across at her small, silent companion. Now that she was a beggar, she suddenly wanted to offer the opportunity for blessings to as many people as possible. What a pity that her audience consisted of one lonely hunchback
She sat straight. But the hunchback had given her charity. He had shown her the water in the mosque. He had told her a story. What else did a keeper of shoes have to give?
She regarded him with a softer eye as he leaned on his elbows, his long face puckered with discomfort. Although she must still smell far worse than that young mother in the upstairs room, he had shown no sign of disgust when he approached her with his offer of safety and water.
Here was a man of charity and discipline. With only a cotton sheet to keep out the cold, he had made no move to steal the clothes of the dead. Although he certainly had seen her thieving, he had made no reference to it.
She dropped her head onto her upraised knees. Please, she prayed, let the haveli doors open soon. Let Safiya possess the cure for cholera, as the woman had told me. Let the cure arrive at Shalimar in time. If I have failed once in my duty to Uncle Adrian, let me find a way to save him in the end….
“Look!” The hunchback raised his head and pointed toward the edge of the square.
A group of men had started across the square, carrying something in a sling between them. Whatever it was, it appeared to be heavy.
As she watched, the men put their burden down and began to argue among themselves and point toward the haveli. When she craned forward, trying to hear what they were saying, they saw her and dropped their voices.
Although she could not hear their words, she was certain they were speaking Persian. Their earth-colored clothing and their coarsely tied turbans told her they were Afghans, like the ones she had seen speaking to the Vulture outside his tent when she arrived at Shalimar. Each of them had one or two elaborately decorated guns strapped to his back.
Their argument resolved, they bent to pick up the object they had been carrying, and strode away. As they did so, Mariana saw that it was the blood-soaked body of a man.
Just after they disappeared from the square with their grisly cargo, the sound of muffled footfalls followed by a heavy scraping came at last from behind the haveli door.
Before one side had creaked open enough to allow a man to look cautiously out, Mariana had jumped to her feet and hurled herself against the door.
“Let me in,” she ordered, while behind her, the hunchback rose, grimacing, to his feet.
The guard leapt aside as if he thought she might be a ghost. Taking advantage of his hesitation, she pushed her way inside.
The high, brick entranceway of the haveli with its single, carved overlooking window looked exactly as it always had. Amazed at such extraordinary normality, Mariana stopped short, then realized that her little companion had not followed her.
“Wait!” she cried to the guard, then turned and flung herself past him and out into the square.
The hunchback must have saluted her before he left, but she had missed that politeness, for in her haste to reach the haveli, she had turned her back to him. By the time she rushed outside again, he had started away toward Wazir Khan's Mosque.
“O Keeper of Shoes,” she called after him, “please come into our house!”
He looked over one bent shoulder, then shook his head. “No, Begum Sahib,” he replied in his high voice. “Qamar Haveli is no place for me.”
Coarse shouting erupted in a nearby street. The soldiers were returning. Heedless of the po
ols of blood or the broken glass that glittered on the cobblestones, Mariana ran after the little man.
Begum Sahib. He had used a title reserved for the highborn. He must have known who she was all along.
“The soldiers are coming back,” she panted as she reached him. “Listen.”
But he shook his head once again and moved to pass her. As he did, she opened her arms and barred his way. “Please. We must hurry,” she pleaded, walking toward him, her arms still spread, forcing him to retreat, knowing he would not allow her to touch him.
The shouting grew louder. She stepped forward again. His long face puckered with grief or shame, he backed away from her, toward the haveli door, where a crowd of staring guards had now collected. Knowing they were all watching, but too desperate to care about the little man's feelings, she flapped her hands in his face.
“Hurry,” she repeated, shooing him inside.
“Look after him,” she commanded the guards, then raced outside again, tearing off her stolen shawl as she flew toward the small domed structure in the square.
She stopped only long enough to fling the length of stained fabric down beside its dead owner, then darted back again, as a mob of yelling soldiers appeared alongside the mosque and boiled into the square.
By the time she gained the haveli, the great double doors were closing. An instant after she had rushed inside and the sweating guards had forced the iron bolts home, something thudded heavily against the doors from outside.
“We were ready to lock you out,” grumbled one of the guards, glowering at Mariana, who stood, trembling, inside the arched en-tranceway. “Do not think we would risk the lives of the Waliullah family for the convenience of a beggar woman.”