Secrets of the Henna Girl

by Sufiya Ahmed

  ‘But surely the so-called “educated” people will know that she is not a witch!’

  ‘She may as well be,’ Nannyma replied wisely. ‘Husna-bhaji’s beauty pulls the glances of the men, and although many wives will tolerate competition from women of their own zaat, they will not tolerate the attractiveness of a peasant woman. Trust me; Husna-bhaji is better off at home tonight.’

  Finally the torture was over and I was allowed to retire to my room. The two girls who had escorted me rushed forward, but I informed them haughtily that I had no need of them. They shrugged and sidled back to the party, in particular a small group of young army officers. I knew my parents would be returning home in the weeks between the engagement and my wedding, so I managed to force a farewell that I hoped looked genuine to onlookers, before I escaped. There was something satisfying in the fact that my dad looked so consumed with guilt he could barely look me in the eye.

  Alone in my room I took off the scarf, the heavy skirt and top, the jewellery and the engagement ring. The whole costume had felt like a prisoner’s uniform. I felt hot, tired and angry. I was furious with Sehar for not coming tonight. I had needed her and she had let me down. Suddenly unable to suppress my rage any longer, I picked up a book and threw it against a mirror, causing it to smash. At the sound of the glass shattering, Feroz-baba, the house servant, ran in.

  ‘Zeba-ji, are you all right?’ he asked, eyeing the broken glass.

  I turned angrily towards him. ‘Sehar did not come!’

  ‘Sehar-ji is having her baby today,’ Feroz-baba explained calmly. ‘Farhat told Abdullah to tell me. I think we will have good news before morning.’

  I stared at Feroz-baba. I couldn’t believe it. Sehar’s baby was coming already? But it was a few days early and … Oh, what did it matter; her passport to freedom was about to arrive. Had it not been my engagement today I would have made my way to the haveli, but it was late and I knew my parents would not let me leave at this hour. Besides, Sehar had Farhat with her. She would be OK.

  Still desperate for some air, I turned towards the open window, only to jump back in fear at a sudden clap of lightning. The storm had come from nowhere and it lasted all night, an outburst to echo my own.

  Chapter 22

  Sehar’s son was born on that stormy night.

  There was thunder and lightning and rain. It was just like the opening scene of the Bollywood movies she loved so much, except that there was no three-hour journey to a happy ending.

  Apparently her baby boy had come out quite still, and so the midwife had been forced to turn him upside down and tap his tiny chest to get him to breathe. The rumours were that it had seemed unlikely he would, however, in the seconds that had followed, the baby boy had breathed air and embraced life … just as the life had seeped out of his mother.

  Sehar died from internal bleeding caused by the complications of giving birth in a medieval village. They should have taken her to a hospital, but they hadn’t. The understanding was that women had given birth like this for centuries, so why did Sehar need a modern hospital? All that feudal wealth, and a qualified doctor could not even be summoned. But I knew the truth. I guessed it. Sher Shah was scared of Sehar. He feared that the excruciating labour pains would loosen her tongue and she would rant and rave against his family in a public hospital.

  My friend.

  Sehar.

  Dead.

  Three days passed before they buried Sehar. They kept her in a fridge type coffin that Sher Shah had arranged. She was locked away in a room all by herself in the grand haveli, while they breached the deadline dictated by Islam that a dead body had to be buried as soon as possible. The reason was Sehar’s family; they had not attended her marriage, but vast numbers of them were flying in to bury her.

  Sehar’s funeral was to be a grand affair. This was an occasion. A young woman had died in childbirth – a foreign woman, and in the house of the great landlord too. Nannyma said the haveli would host hundreds of people under its roof: from peasants to neighbouring landlords as well as industrialists and politicians from Karachi. She also commented that, ironically, there would be more of Sher Shah’s enemies in attendance than his friends.

  Schadenfreude, I immediately thought.

  In Year Nine, my English teacher had gone to great lengths to explain the German word, which describes the joy felt by one person at the misfortune of another. She had even made us write our own stories to prove our understanding of it.

  I knew there were probably many who hated Sher Shah, but their Schadenfreude was misplaced. The simple truth was this: Sher Shah had not lost anything through Sehar’s tragic death. It was another man’s daughter who had died – not his son. In fact, he may even have got exactly what he’d wanted; Sehar with her feisty personality had been an embarrassment to him.

  I climbed the steps to the haveli slowly and painfully. My legs felt as though lead had been poured into them. Actually my whole body was shrieking at me to run from this place, to hide. Denial was still an option; if I didn’t see Sehar in death, then I would not have to accept it. I paused at the top step and leaned against a pillar, trying to still my racing heart.

  ‘Zeba-ji.’

  It was Farhat’s voice, small and scared, almost unrecognizable.

  Three days had passed since Sehar had died, yet Farhat had not sought me out. She had disappeared. I was so angry with her. This was a time when we needed each other, but she had abandoned me. I was in no doubt that she was devastated. She had loved Sehar like a puppy loves its owner – completely and loyally – but that didn’t mean she had to hide herself from me.

  I raised heavy eyes and was not shocked by what I saw. The maid’s devastation was reflected in her appearance. Her cheeks and eye sockets had sunk into her face giving her a drawn, haggard look. For the first time since I had met her, there was no coloured ribbon in the plait that sat on her left shoulder, and her clothes were crumpled and stained.

  The anger that had accumulated in the last seventy-two hours dissolved and I reached out to her, my arms seeking her. She stepped into my embrace and the tears spilled over both our faces and on to each other’s shoulders.

  ‘Are you coming in?’ I asked when we finally pulled apart.

  ‘Naah,’ she said simply.

  ‘Have you seen her?’ I asked, my voice trembling.

  ‘Not for three days.’

  ‘Why won’t you come in?’

  ‘I cannot.’

  I nodded my head. Perhaps it was too much for her. I wished I too could refuse to enter the haveli, but I knew I had to face Sehar one last time. Not to see her now would be to betray her. I squeezed Farhat’s arm and then turned to walk in.

  Sher Shah’s haveli, even in the simplicity adopted for the funeral, looked splendid. Every piece of furniture had been removed to make space for the mourners, leaving only the white pillars, tall and erect, and the grand chandelier hanging ominously over the massed throng. The room was a vision of white; not a single bright dye could be seen on the bodies of the women who were sitting on the floor. Most were hushed, but there were a few who were wailing with their arms in the air and screams of anguish emerging from their throats. I looked closely at these women. Why were they so upset? They hadn’t even known Sehar.

  I pulled my white scarf firmly on my head, trying to stop it slipping and revealing my hair. I took a step forward, my bare feet touching the cold marble and my eyes searching for a gap in the white maze. Somewhere hidden among this crowd was the person who had been one of my few friends in the most desperate time of my life. I had been told by one of the maids that they had taken her body from its refrigerated coffin and laid it on the floor so people could see her for the final time. I had to find her.

  ‘Zeba.’

  Someone said my name. I didn’t know who it was, but slowly a pathway opened before me as women shifted to the sides to let me through. I walked slowly down the path. N
ow the marble floor felt warm from the heat of the women’s bodies. I didn’t want to continue. Looking at Sehar’s body, taking it all in, would make it real, and suddenly I didn’t want to believe it. I turned abruptly, ready to run, but I didn’t get far.

  I felt a warm hand on my arm and looked up into my nannyma’s clear eyes.

  ‘You need to see your friend,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ I whispered through stiff lips.

  ‘Zeba, beti.’ My nannyma’s voice was gentle. ‘You will regret it if you don’t. You need to say goodbye.’

  I stifled a sob and remained frozen on the spot, but Nannyma took my hand and led me into the crowd. I could feel every pair of eyes on me. It was as if for some reason I was the one expected to provide the entertainment.

  ‘Where are Sehar’s parents?’ I asked. ‘Aren’t they coming?’

  ‘They have arrived,’ Nannyma replied.

  ‘Where is she?’ I asked, blindly looking around.

  ‘Right here,’ Nannyma said softly.

  And there she was. My friend, Sehar, wrapped in a white shroud with only her face visible. She wasn’t in a coffin, just on a white sheet on the floor. A crazy part of me wanted to object. Sehar would find the marble hard, it would be digging into her back … and then I remembered she couldn’t feel it.

  My nannyma urged me to sit and I did, falling to my knees to gaze down at Sehar. I had never seen a dead body before, and Sehar seemed … well, she looked like she was just asleep. I reached out a hand to touch her face, but it was grabbed by another and flung away harshly. I looked up and saw an older version of Sehar. The same face shape, eyes, nose and mouth, all the way down to the same smooth skin. I stared at the woman. Her face was a contortion of grief as she gazed down at her dead daughter’s face. Suddenly I wanted to slap her. How dare she pretend to be upset when she hadn’t cared about her daughter when she’d been alive?

  The forced marriage.

  The beatings.

  The humiliation.

  I opened my mouth, ready to fling a torrent of abuse at Sehar’s mother, but my nannyma’s index finger came to rest on my lips, stopping me.

  ‘This is not the time, Zeba,’ she said quietly.

  I flicked my head slightly and Nannyma’s finger fell away.

  ‘Zeba, beti,’ Nannyma’s voice was hushed. ‘Let Sehar have some dignity in death. These people gave her none while she was alive. Act as her friend and let her have some now.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘There is nothing you can say to that woman that she isn’t feeling already.’

  I looked at Sehar’s mother. Perhaps Nannyma was right; perhaps I should just let it go. I glanced around and my eyes fell on Memsahib, sitting two paces away, her face set in a grim expression. Again, I had to resist the urge to reach out and slap her. How dare she sit in Sehar’s mehfil, this gathering to praise Sehar, to give the impression that she cared. The memsahib of this grand haveli had never cared about Sehar. Instead she had encouraged her son to beat her daughter-in-law to break her spirit, to try to reduce her to a cowering shadow of her former self. I could not work out who was worse. The woman who had given birth to Sehar and then sold her like a chicken in the market, or the woman who allowed her son to beat his wife.

  I must have been scowling at Memsahib because Nannyma leaned forward again, a warning in her eyes. Taking heed, I sat back on my heels and picked up a misbaha, a Muslim rosary that was lying spare. These people were praying for Sehar and I would pray for her too.

  ‘God is one,’ I repeated again and again as I flicked the rosary beads between my fingers. It was strange but the ritual calmed me down and made the whole thing more believable.

  Sehar was dead.

  ‘God is one.’

  Sehar was dead.

  ‘God is one.’

  There were ninety-nine beads in the misbaha and I had only got halfway through when a wave of wailing began at the edges of the room and cascaded through to its centre. I wanted to press my hands over my ears against the shrieking and I looked around trying to figure out what had unleashed this agony … and then I knew.

  The men had come to collect Sehar. It was time to bury her. I turned back towards Sehar to find that her mother had thrown herself against the body. She was crying hysterically.

  The handful of men walked slowly along the pathway that had magically appeared from the doorway to where Sehar lay. I didn’t recognize them. In the Muslim tradition, only the male relatives of a dead woman were allowed touch her corpse. I imagined these men to be Sehar’s family: perhaps her father, her brothers, her uncles, her husband. Men who had never asked her what she wanted.

  I watched as the grim-faced men lifted Sehar into a simple wooden coffin and then raised it on to their shoulders. This was it. She was being carried out to a lonely graveyard where she would be buried six feet under the earth.

  Sehar, my friend, who had so wanted to live.

  Sehar, my friend, who never got her own happy ending.

  Chapter 23

  I held Sehar’s son in my arms. The three days of mourning since the burial were now over and the white sheets had been cleared off the floor. Farhat had let me into the nursery. She was caring for the baby, an over-protective surrogate mother. The baby was tiny and my eyes filled with tears. I wanted to scream. This baby was never going to know his mother. Ever. He was never going to know her laughter, or her sarcasm.

  Sehar had been desperate to live her life. She had wanted to climb a mountain, swim in the sea, ride a horse, run a marathon, pick wild flowers, become a Bollywood star. So many things … and she was never going to be able to do any of them. And her son, this tiny baby boy, was going to grow up and know nothing of what his mother had wanted for him. Life was so cruel. This baby’s paternal family were animals, and as far as I was concerned they were responsible for his mother’s death.

  The baby began to whimper and I rocked him gently, trying to ease his discomfort. It seemed to do the trick and he lay content in my arms.

  ‘He is liking you,’ Farhat whispered with a smile.

  I nodded, gazing down at the little bundle. This little boy was supposed to have been his mother’s passport to freedom.

  ‘Farhat,’ I said, ‘were you with Sehar when she died?’

  Farhat’s eyes welled up and she nodded her head. ‘Yes, Sehar-ji and I were very exciting to coming to your engagement … not in good way,’ she said hurriedly when I frowned, ‘but like to supporting you. Sehar-ji kept saying, “Hurry up, Fatty. Zee needs us.”’

  A pang of guilt shot through me as I remembered how I’d mentally sworn at Sehar for abandoning me that evening.

  ‘Sehar-ji was getting ready; she was putting on her blue suit. Making her looking very pretty and she put on matching eyeshadow too. Then her waters broke and baby started coming. I said to Memsahib to take her to hospital, but they said no time.’

  ‘The baby was quick?’ I asked.

  ‘No!’ Farhat cried, and then she stepped close to me and began to whisper. ‘There was time for hospital in big speeding car but Memsahib said no. Sehar-ji crying for medicine to make pain stop, she kept saying she needing drugs. She holding my hand so tight, begging me to help her. I could not do anything. Her screams were very much loud all through night. I am surprising that whole village did not hear her. Then just before the muezzin called the adhan for morning prayer, Sehar-ji starting to bleed and it not stop. Blood all on bed and then on floor. Midwife mopping blood and getting very scared, saying take girl to hospital because she need doctor. But Memsahib said no.’

  I closed my eyes, trying to imagine the pain Sehar must have felt, and beside me Farhat relived our friend’s death in sobbing whispers.

  ‘Sehar-ji screaming, I crying, Mensahib shouting, “Push, push, you useless English guri.”’

  I bit down hard on my lower lip. Was there no end to that woman’s wickedness?

>   ‘It was horrible,’ Farhat continued. ‘Then baby came with one last push, but it was very silent. So midwife turned him other way round – you know, feet facing roof – and tapping his chest and then baby crying. I was so happy now. I put my head next to Sehar-ji and said to her, “Look, your son is born,” but her eyes was closed. I thinking she sleeping and so let go of her hand. It was limp … you know like loose … but I thinking Sehar-ji having no energy, is tiring, so I leave her to look at baby who is crying and being cleaning by midwife.

  ‘Then Memsahib is screaming. She said Sehar-ji is dead. I ran back to Sehar-ji and no heart beating and no tickety-tick-tock in top of her hand or in neck … you know … what word … pulsing?’

  ‘No pulse,’ I supplied through stiff lips.

  ‘Yaah.’ Farhat nodded. ‘Then I was sending out of room to find Sher Shah Sahib. He not in house. Abdullah tell me he is at his mistress house. But who is mistress? No one knows. I tell Memsahib that Sher Shah Sahib at mistress house and she slap me and tell me to leave house.’

  My eyes were still closed when Farhat finished relaying the death scene.

  ‘Zeba-ji?’ Farhat’s voice was nervous and I opened my eyes.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I managed. ‘It must have been horrendous.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You told Sher Shah’s wife that her husband was with his mistress? Is that why you were banned from the funeral?’

  Farhat nodded miserably.

  ‘And now she is buried you are allowed back in the haveli?’