If the girls see us, let them. Had we committed a crime to be so fearful? Oh, the faint-heartedness! And when she brought the corrected copies to class she would be brimming with fulsome praise for my ideas and point of view but would never tell the girls that they were mine. Returning the answer sheets she would never even take my name, but she would give me the highest marks … Hunh, was this any way to behave? I would come first in every paper, but no teacher would give me such high marks as Miss Fence, who would give up to eighty or eighty-five per cent. So what if she gave me high marks? I would have been so happy if she had praised me in class in front of all the girls and said, ‘See how many marks Gulnar has got.’ Instead of, ‘Such and such a roll number has got so many marks, such and such a roll number has done this, done that, done the other, such and such a roll number, such and such a roll number …’ I had been reduced to ‘such and such a roll number’.
Even Miss Jones with her M.A. from Oxford would spend half an hour at a time praising my essays, although her standard of assessment was very high, and Mrs Soshil Sarojini had said, ‘Heaven be praised! Gulnar has outdone herself this time. What wonderful answers! I read and reread this paper countless times.’ She never had problems praising me in front of the teachers and other girls, nor did Miss Kamla Bai. Apart from the lady teachers, the male professors would also praise my intelligence and capability! The only exception was Miss Fence, who would never use a single word of praise. Perhaps she thought it below her dignity. Hunh!
And how I wanted her to appreciate my beauty! Not all the time, but sometimes impulsively, I would have liked a ‘Gulnar! How beautiful you are!’ At least once she could have let out a ‘Today you’re looking very beautiful, Gulnar,’ or ‘This sari really suits you.’ How I would strive on the days we had a class with her to wear the saris that suited me, style my hair with care and wear colourful bangles. I was specially proud of my wrists and fingers and would place my hands on the table in such a way that Miss Fence would have a perfect view of the bangles fitting snugly on my wrists as well as of my fingers. It was quite evident that she considered me beautiful, otherwise she would not have stared so. And every time I felt that I was looking particularly good I could see she was paying me special attention. Her eyes would be fixed on me. So be it. Did she think I was made of stone or was a lifeless painting only to receive silent admiration? After all, I was a human being. A young seventeen-year-old girl, romantic and emotional! Would her precious hoard of praise have been depleted if she had said something aloud? Granted she was a professor, but Mrs Soshil was a professor as well. Did she not praise my looks?
The day I was to take part in a play which portrayed Queen Nur Jahan’s love of dance and music, how Mrs Soshil had admired me while doing the make-up. ‘Gulnar! You are the most appropriate person to play Nur Jahan. How well you write! Mr Soshil sings your praises. He has also been your teacher, hasn’t he?’ After having applied powder, lipstick, rouge, she said, ‘Now lift your eyes. Let me make them up as well,’ and when I did, ‘Heavens! What beautiful eyes!’ How I wished that instead of Mrs Soshil it had been Miss Fence who spoke those words! Why had I never cared for Mrs Soshil? What was so special about Miss Fence?
Zarina never tired of praising my eyes! And Lalita! She even wrote verses in praise of them! Zini also used to say, ‘Gulnar, you must not wear glasses, they hide your beautiful eyes!’ All of them would shower me with admiration. I took special care of my eyes so that Miss Fence might look into them and in her class I would take my glasses off although I had quite a problem making out what was written on the board. Hunh! Did it ever have any effect on the insensible one? But Parvaiz! Parvaiz’s discerning eyes will, at first glance, respond to the beauty in mine. They will lift of their own accord. ‘Your eyes! Your gazelle eyes! How black! How intoxicating!’
In college I only participated in plays so that Miss Fence should notice me. Saint Joan had been selected as the college play and I was to play Joan. I was so elaborately attired that even I was quite taken aback at my own image in the mirror and broke out laughing, thinking, would Joan, a village girl and a prisoner in court, have been all dressed up? But here in films and plays the paramount consideration is that the girl who plays the heroine must be lovely to look at and wear beautiful costumes. It was not the fault of Mrs Soshil and Miss Jones who had made me up for the part. Miss Jones had made me put on her khaki riding habit, and my long hair had been pinned up and left loose on the shoulders. It had not been combed but was in artful disarray on the brow and forehead. The fault had been Veedhi’s; she had played the part of the Duke of York. She had been applying lipstick when it was time for the curtain to go up. Seizing my hand as I went by, she had pulled me to her: ‘Gulnar! What’s this! You’re the heroine! No rouge, no lipstick!’ She quickly put some lipstick on my lips and rubbed some rouge on my cheeks. As I glanced at the mirror in passing, I froze. How good even my dry and dishevelled hair looked! I was certain Miss Fence would praise me today. In fact she would have no option but to do so.
At the end of the play Mrs Soshil, Miss Jones and Mrs Daniels came running up on the stage and clasped my hand warmly, congratulating me on acquitting myself well in a difficult role. Everyone was electrified by my performance. All this praise, but what about Miss Fence? She hadn’t even sat in the audience to see the play but had stood backstage directing the actors. I had begged her to sit in the audience for the performance, gripping her shoulders and looking at her beseechingly. If I had been in her place I would have melted. Even a stone would have more feeling.
‘Gulnar! I have taken some responsibilities upon myself which I must fulfil.’
Your hallowed responsibilities! Well, at least she had viewed it from the wings.
That night I had been delayed returning to the hostel. Girls had crowded round me at every step. ‘Gulnar! You did brilliantly! How can one praise your performance!’ ‘How beautiful you looked on stage, Gulnar!’ Rescuing myself from the girls I arrived exhausted at the hostel. Zarina was outside waiting for me. She ran and embraced me. ‘My dear Gulnar! You should have your hair cut and make yourself up the way you did for the play. You looked like a fairy tonight, but your make-up was not appropriate for Joan, was it? When the Inquisitor said, “Joan, you look very pale today,” your cheeks were blushing like dawn!’ Both of us burst into laughter. Arm in arm we ran into the dining room. All the girls had sat down to their meal. They showered me with compliments as I entered. I went to bed delighted that night but couldn’t get to sleep. Hunh! What did I care for everyone’s praise? Tomorrow I will meet my Miss Fence. My Angelina. And she will praise me.
The next morning I went to see her with heightened hopes, such expectations. And what did I receive from my Angelina? A deadpan face and anaemic conversation … Zarina was right when she said, ‘Gulnar, a romantic girl like you and the insensible and frigid Miss Fence … you don’t match. You are fire and she is ice …’ She was truly devoid of emotion. A feelingless corpse. A stone statue. A lump of ice! How could she be compared to Parvaiz! Every vein in my Parvaiz’s body courses with life. He is electric. Even in the photograph he looks so romantic.
I also managed to steal a glance at him the day that Abba had invited him to dinner to give him his engagement present. Zarina was over and Jabeen as well. ‘Dulha Bhai is here,’ Zubeida had announced and how my heart had raced! Zarina and Jabeen had run to the window and dragged me along. ‘Get up, Gulnar! Have a look at your dulha as well.’ First I hesitated, but I was longing to catch a glimpse of him. ‘What will Ammi say?’ ‘Oh, come on! Get up! Don’t lose this golden opportunity.’ Zarina succeeded in dragging me over to the window. How shyly he stood in front of Abba. When he entered the hall I tried to peep through the keyhole but the wretched keyholes were too small! We finally came up with a plan. Jabeen turned out the light in our room so that no one would be able to see inside and Zarina silently slid the bolt and opened the door a fraction. Then of course Jabeen and Zarina rushed forward … I don’t know why I
held back.
‘What a handsome youth, Gul!’ Zarina embraced me emotionally. I lowered my eyes shyly. ‘My Gul! What a wonderful couple you make,’ she said tilting my face up, love dripping from her eyes. She resumed her peeping. ‘What a handsome figure and such beautiful eyes! Come here, Gul! Afraid of Ammi indeed!’ Zarina started dragging me again. ‘Have you seen your Parvaiz’s eyes? A true answer to your own … Yes, I saw everything. The beautiful face. The laughing lips. The beautiful eyes brimming with life and impulsiveness. ‘Arri, he looks very romantic, Gul. I bet he’ll go mad over you. I’ll tell you from now, Gul, he’ll spoil you rotten, wear you like a necklace round his neck.’ I was burning with desire. I have fallen into his arms … Crazy …
‘Mad woman, dying over Miss Fence. What hopes you had of that stony, emotionless woman. The same coldness and the same dull eyes in happiness and sorrow, anger or impatience! Look at Parvaiz, what an expressive face he has! As if rays of light are bursting forth …’ Yes, he did appear the embodiment of impulsiveness. His eyes were darting around. Why? Perhaps he is seeking me out.
I wanted to break down the doors. Forgetting everyone’s presence, I wanted to go and stand before him. What if I had been standing behind a curtain and the curtain had shifted for a moment and I had smiled pertly at him and then shyly lowered my eyes and left him breathless? I had been looking so charming in the blue georgette sari with the golden border.
Why should I go out in this sari? I’ll wear the georgette sari brought by my Parvaiz. I pulled off the sari I had just put on and called out to Zakia who was going out with a dish of samosas.
‘Zakia, please get me my blue sari. The georgette one.’
‘All right, I’ll get it, but come quickly. Ammi was saying she’s not going to sit down with Miss Fence at the meal. It would be better if you took her place.’
I looked carelessly at the room. Miss Fence was sitting, hands clasped, looking up. Emotionless, dull eyes. Extremely thin, pale lips, sallow, pock-marked complexion. Suddenly her marks appeared to be increasing, becoming deeper and spreading all over. Her face was becoming repulsive. I quickly shook my head to rid it of the picture etched on it. It was replaced by another burgeoning image. Of Parvaiz. Those beautiful blue eyes, large, almond-shaped, intoxicating, long thick lashes. That face, the broad, beautiful forehead … And the lips? How beautifully they were chiselled. Luscious, full and with a slight uptilt as if they were made for smiling. That dusky complexion. Beautiful Shyam. My Shyam and I his Radha. I picked up Parvaiz’s picture from the table and kissed it in a fever of impatience. ‘This sari?’ Alarmed, I put down the picture. Zakia was standing with the sari. ‘Yes, that one.’
‘Apa, come quickly. The samosas are growing cold and here you are changing sari after sari. How come you’re so unconcerned while there is Miss Fence going on and on about Gulnar?’
‘I’m coming.’
I picked up the picture again and forgetting everything, lost myself in its beauty. What a good-natured face. Oh, those lips. My eyes would first turn to the lips. These lips and … what a thought … I melted with shame. I put down the picture and began putting on the sari … What charm there was in his personality, what manliness! Compact body. Good height. Broad chest. Long, strong arms. In those arms. Uf, these thoughts again. There was electricity pounding through my veins, my heartbeat had increased! And the blood, it was boiling, spreading warmth. Fire. Oh, the crowding emotions, this storm! I fell on my bed and hid my face in the pillows. This … how delicious it was.
‘Gulnar, what has come over you?’
Ammi was standing there, her face burning with anger.
‘Miss Fence has been waiting for you for such a long time. Don’t you have any consideration for an older person, and then she is your teacher as well,’ Ammi went out muttering to herself.
‘She’s waiting for you.’ ‘She’s calling you.’ ‘She’s going on and on about you.’
All right, I’ll go out. Yes, why not? I’ll definitely go out. Wearing the sari that was brought me by my Parvaiz. Yes, and I’ll wear the ring that is a sign of our engagement. I took out a small velvet box. What a beautiful ring. My engagement ring. The first letter of Parvaiz’s name had been beautifully chiselled on it. How the single green gem sparkled in the midst of the white ones. I looked at it with pride and put it on. Yes, I’ll go out like this and I’ll tell her how happy I am about my wedding. She must be thinking I’m ashamed of my behaviour towards her, that I’ll approach her wearing a sad expression, a sorry face, and that I’ll relate my condition in pained tones. My suffering! Perhaps I’ll cry! How I’ll amaze her! On seeing my sari she’ll exclaim, ‘What a beautiful sari!’ And I’ll answer with pride, ‘Parvaiz brought it.’ And I’ll talk about Parvaiz. Joyfully, I’ll tell her how handsome Parvaiz is. I’ll insist on her attending my wedding … I’ll tell her how much I love Parvaiz. She’ll burn up when she hears that. Won’t she? Indeed she will. That time when I went home without taking leave she had inquired again and again, ‘Gulnar, you’re not getting married, are you?’ When I had denied it she hadn’t believed me. ‘You’re hiding it from me, Gulnar.’ That is why she didn’t congratulate me on receiving the news of my engagement … and now seeing on my face not sorrow but this abundance of pleasure, happiness and expectation, how she will burn up! Hunh! If she burns up, she burns up. As if I care. In passing, I picked up Parvaiz’s picture.
Translated by Samina Rahman
MUMTAZ SHIRIN
Descent
He looked up.
A long flight of stairs led up, broad, white and shining. White stairs leading to the white rooms upstairs, which were bathed in light – the light up there.
They stood at the feet of the stairs. He and she. He looked up at the long flight … No, she couldn’t go up. She couldn’t climb all these steps in her condition. He said tenderly, ‘Let me carry you.’
She blushed and shook her head. ‘No … no. Fancy carrying me all the way up, and people looking on.’
‘I don’t care.’ He stretched his arms towards her. But she pushed them aside protesting, ‘I can go up the stairs myself.’
‘All right then, I’ll just hold you for support.’
He put his arm round her shoulders and held her tight.
Together they climbed the stairs, step by step.
The steps, broad, white, shining, led up to the white room upstairs. There was light up there, where life was born.
Pain shot through her, now, at short intervals. A few steps up and the pain became more intermittent and more severe, through her spine, her hips, her belly. Cold shivers ran down her whole body, beads of perspiration stood out on her forehead. He took out a handkerchief and mopped her face. ‘It will be over soon,’ he murmured tenderly. He held her close. ‘Just lean on me, put all your weight on me. There, that’s right. It will ease you.’ She closed her eyes and let her head fall on his shoulder.
Step by step they came up.
The nurses took her in; he was asked to wait outside. Outside, he sat on a bench; it all seemed so sudden. He hadn’t expected it – it was rather early. She had been all right that evening. He came home as usual, dead tired, and she greeted him with a tender, soothing smile. She was pained to see him dispirited and worn out. As usual she brought the pitcher and poured water as he washed his face and hands. What a dutiful wife! Feelings of love and gratitude surged up in his heart. He wished her to sit by him and talk to him, talk to him of the old happy days. But she said he should have his supper first; he looked so weak and exhausted. She laid the supper. He and the children sat down to their meagre meal. She went into the kitchen, perhaps to see if there was anything else to give them, and then – he saw her clutch the door and sink onto the threshold. He left his food and ran to her. He picked her up and carried her to the bed. He asked her anxiously what the matter was. But she wouldn’t tell him. It was always so with her. She tried to conceal her pain from him. But he could feel her pain. And then she had to tell him that �
�it’ had started. He rushed her there.
He hoped all would be well – how she had shivered in his arms as he brought her up the stairs. She must be suffering so terribly. She was so weak. There was hardly any strength left in her. Would she come out alive from this life and death struggle? Pain gripped his heart as he sat there outside, waiting.
And she lay there, in the labour ward. The pains were now unbearable. Her eyes bulged out; she bit her lips hard. But she didn’t moan, she didn’t let a cry escape her lips. For he would know by her moaning that she was suffering terribly and he would suffer, too. She didn’t utter a sound; she just suffered and suffered until she could suffer no more. She lost consciousness.
He stood by the closed door. A madness had taken possession of him. He paced up and down; then he came back and sat on the bench, fidgeting restlessly. He stared into empty space with eyes that seemed not to see. But he strained his ears hard to catch a moan, a cry from the labour ward. Not a sound could be heard from there. All was still. Did it mean …? He was stabbed in the heart. ‘O, God, God! Let her live just this once.’ He prayed silently from the depth of his soul. They said that while a new life was being born out of her, the mother’s own life was nearly extinguished. He strained his ears again. All was still as before. Maybe she was bearing with it patiently. She had borne it patiently, always. Maybe she was alive, she was all right.
He sat on the bench, waiting; waiting endlessly, it seemed. Time stood still. The suffering, the pain, the torture of a lifetime was wrung into those few moments.
And, inside, she lay still unconscious. It was a very tiny baby. Before the cord was cut from its navel, it was no more. Slowly, she gained consciousness. She didn’t ask about the baby. Some hidden, unknown, vague feeling, the ‘sixth sense’, had warned her it was dead. The nurses comforted her. She shouldn’t worry; it was always so with babies born in the eighth month. They rarely lived. A nurse brought the baby and held it for her to see. Slowly, she turned her head sideways. Just a look at that tiny pale face, tiny lifeless body, and two silent tears flowed down her cheeks. And the warm flow of motherly love that had surged up in her breast anew froze within her.
Kahani Page 7