Love Stories from Punjab

by Harish Dhillon

  The little time that she could spare from her household work, Sohni spent in visiting her neighbours. The sick and the troubled, all received her special attention. There was something about her that made them share their troubles with her and made them happier for doing so. With the children, Sohni was never too busy to tell a story or play a game.

  It was little wonder, then, that she became the centre of life in Amloh and everyone agreed that their lives were brighter with her coming. She had accumulated a vast store of love in her days with Mirza and with Mirza not there now to bestow it upon; she lavished it on all around her with spendthrift recklessness.

  Back in the serai in Hyderabad, Mirza, too, tried to make the most of what was his lot. He decided to stay on in Hyderabad because here he could still hope to get some news of his beloved. Whenever a villager visited from Amloh, he would bring some tiny bit of news that would make the rounds of the town and finally reach Mirza’s ears.

  He did, once in a while, visit Tulla but the old couple was so awkward and embarrassed in his presence that he did not go as often as he would have wished to. His finances had long since dried up and, at last, he turned to Yusuf and said, “I must look for a job. I need some money.”

  “That is good, this desire to lead a productive life, but what kind of job is it that you can do?”

  “Well, the job that I am best at doing is trading.”

  The old man shook his head. “You need money to start trading. You must think of something else.”

  Mirza thought for a while.

  “Well, I can keep accounts.”

  The old man’s face lit up with relief.

  “There is some hope in that. Though this is not a large town, we do have some reasonably big traders. I am sure at least one of them will need an accountant.”

  The next morning, armed with the names of all the traders in Hyderabad, Mirza set out to make his rounds. He returned in the early afternoon with a dejected look on his face.

  “What is it, my friend?” Yusuf asked.

  “It is no use,” Mirza said shaking his head. “The two big traders already have accountants. The others do their own accounting and have no need of an accountant.”

  “Don’t worry. Be patient, something is bound to turn up soon.”

  Yusuf’s words proved prophetic and something did indeed turn up. Tula Khan, a rich landlord, kept a large herd of cattle on the other side of the river. For the last year and a half, he had been without a suitable mahiwal, a cowherd. All those he had engaged earlier, had either been negligent in their work or frightened off by the Khan’s harsh words and his wife’s niggardly apportioning of food. He was now, again, without one, but word of his harshness and his wife’s miserliness had travelled abroad and none was willing to take on the job. The Khan was desperate and had hinted that he was prepared to pay much higher wages, but he had still found no one.

  So, early the next morning, Yusuf and Mirza went across the river to the Khan’s estate. While they waited to be ushered into the Khan’s presence, Yusuf said in an urgent whisper, “Leave the talking to me.”

  The Khan sat on a cot, smoking a hookah, while two servants sat at his feet, pressing his legs. He looked Mirza over carefully, the way he would a buffalo that he intended to buy at a cattle fair. The two friends stood silently. When he was done with his inspection, he removed the pipe of the hookah from his mouth. “Huh! You seem strong enough to handle the work. Have you worked as a mahiwal before?”

  “No, your honour, but he has been among animals and knows their ways. He is diligent and hard working and will soon learn all there is to know.”

  “Well we can give it a try.”

  The pipe of the hookah went back into his mouth.

  “Your honour, there is the small matter of the wages.” Yusuf said softly.

  The Khan considered this then once again he drew out the pipe, and said, “What wage were you considering?”

  Yusuf named an outrageous figure.

  “What?” The Khan spluttered, going red in the face. “That is twice what I paid the last mahiwal.”

  “And he lasted four days!” Yusuf reminded him.

  “You are a wily old man,” the Khan said, looking at Yusuf with grudging respect. “You know I have no choice. Muhamada,” he said addressing one of the servants, “take the mahiwal and show him the cattle sheds. Then take him to his quarters.”

  “How many rotis does he eat?” a shrill feminine voice spoke from the shadows.

  “Shut your mouth, woman! Your obsession with rotis will be the ruin of us.”

  Muhamada took them around the cattle sheds. It was a huge herd and for a while, Mirza despaired of ever being able to control it. Then he reminded himself that he had no choice. He was taken to his quarter – a modest room but more than enough for his needs.

  “The midday meal is at eleven at the big house. Be sure not to be late or you will go hungry,” Muhamada called out to him as he walked away.

  After a shaky start, Mirza began to find his feet. He learnt to do all that he was expected to. He drove the cattle out to pasture in the morning and drove them back again in the evenings. He led them down to the river and, after they had wallowed in the water, scrubbed them clean. He learnt to know each one individually and they responded to him with trust and love. He learnt to conduct calvings and to look after the mother and the calf till they were able to look after themselves. When one of his herd was ill, he would sit up all night, a comforting hand on the sick animal’s flanks. While his animals grazed, he sat back in the shade of a tree and gave himself upto thoughts of Sohni.

  At the end of three months, the Khan sat back with relief. He had found his mahiwal at last and mustn’t lose him on any account. Even the Khan’s wife began to give the new mahiwal extra delicacies to eat. But when she found out that he gave them away to the other farm hands, she stopped doing this. The Khan gave Mirza a fine set of clothes on the next festive day, but was much chagrined to find another farm hand wearing them a few days later. He shook his head: he was a strange man, this mahiwal, and he would never understand him. The Khan always addressed Mirza as mahiwal, and taking their cue from him, the other farm hands too began to do the same. His real name was forgotten and people did not know him by any name other than the one he had been given by the Khan. Mahiwal did not mind, he had long ceased to attach any importance to names.

  Like Sohni, Mahiwal too, came to lavish his love and attention on those around him. His needs were simple and he always had much to spare, which he gave away. He gave of his time with equal generosity and came to be loved, respected and admired in that little pastoral community.

  Sometimes he would take a day off and go to Hyderabad to meet his old friend, Yusuf. Sometimes he would glean some news of Sohni and, like a miser, he would hoard it up carefully in some hidden reserve of his mind. Then, back at the farm, when he was sure that he was alone, he would bring it out to his consciousness and examine it carefully, again and again, and find joy in it.

  In Bokhara, things did not go too well for Mirza’s family. His agents managed his affairs well enough and his trade did not languish, but they did not have the imagination that he had had and, in his absence, were not willing to take risks. While the other merchant princes surged ahead, Mirza’s business remained where it was and his household soon lost its place in the front rank of the trading families.

  On the domestic front, too, matters had begun to sour. Irked by his long absence, the wives looked for targets to vent their anger and frustration upon, and found them in each other. There was increasing friction between the four. Where before they had been placid, even tempered women, they now became shrewish. They now began to raise their voices, which they had never done before, and use words they had never before used. They would fly into a temper at the slightest provocation, sometimes real, more often imagined, and hot, bitter scenes would follow.

  Ayesha, the youngest, stormed out of a particularly vicious quarrel one day, and as she came
into the courtyard, saw Iqbal standing there, his head bowed, quite overcome by what he had just witnessed. “You were with him,” Ayesha said bitterly. “You must know. What is it that keeps him from us? Does he not know what his absence is doing? Why does he not return?”

  Iqbal saw in Ayesha’s cry of pain and rage, his long awaited opportunity to speak of his friend’s plight.

  “He cannot come, mistress. He is in love.”

  “In love? You are not in earnest. That cannot be enough to hold him back. If it was only that, why does he not bring her back, here to Bokhara?

  As simply and directly as he could, Iqbal told his mistress of his friend’s predicament.

  “Why did you not tell me this before?” she asked.

  “I was afraid that you would be angry.”

  “Afraid? And all this while, he has been alone with his pain and misery. Wait for me here.” She went across the courtyard to her apartment and returned, a moment later, with her burqa.

  “Come with me,” she said as she tied on the headpiece and he followed her out into the streets to the Mir-Arab Mosque. Through the gates she went and up the narrow flight of steps, leading to the maulvi’s modest apartment, and all the while he followed, a few steps behind. Ayesha knocked at the door and the maulvi bade her come in.

  “Why Ayesha, my child, what is the matter?” he said, getting to his feet. “There was no need for you to come here. You know you could have sent for me.” Not only was the maulvi the spiritual advisor to Mirza’s family but also a friend of many years’ standing.

  “I want khula,” Ayesha said, her words sharp and abrupt.

  The maulvi stepped back at the sharpness of her tone. “Come, come my child,” he said, attempting to lead Ayesha to a seat. “I know that you are distraught. Take hold of yourself. Things are not as bad as they seem. Mirza has been a devoted and loving husband. He will be back soon and everything will be alright.”

  “Nothing will be alright,” Ayesha said with bitterness. “I am a young woman and the blood gushes hot and passionate in my veins. I have needs that can no longer be denied. I can wait no more for a husband who has abandoned me these last two years.”

  The maulvi was at a loss for words and seeing her advantage, Ayesha pressed her point home.

  “You know that he has abandoned me. You know that I am entitled to khula. Would you deny me this and have me go to the qazi?”

  “You are determined then?”

  “Yes, quite determined.” And from the firmness of her voice the maulvi knew that her mind was quite made up.

  “You shall have it.”

  “I want it soon. I want it tomorrow.”

  Again the maulvi sensed the steely resolve in her voice.

  “You shall have it tomorrow. The document will be delivered to you tomorrow morning, duly signed and witnessed.”

  As they went back through the streets, his mistress spoke to Iqbal in urgent whispers through her veil.

  “Tell no one of this, Iqbal, I command you. And make ready to be on your way as soon as the document is delivered. My husband must not suffer his misery any longer.”

  Iqbal busied himself for the rest of the day in preparation for his journey and when the document was delivered the next morning, he took it from his mistress and was on his way.

  Mirza sat on the riverbank looking into the swirling waters, when he heard the sound of approaching hoofbeats. He looked up and saw, in the distance, three horsemen galloping along the river.

  As they came closer, he recognized the leader. It was Iqbal. He got to his feet and ran towards the horseman. Iqbal threw himself from his horse and, still gasping for breath, he said, “It is done, master. You can at last come home. My mistress, Ayesha, has obtained khula. He held the sealed document out to Mirza. Mirza took it gently from his hand and drew him into a warm embrace and held him close, till Iqbal had regained his breath.

  “Your mistress Ayesha is truly blessed.” He paused. Then looking his friend full in the face, he said, “I cannot return. It is too late. Sohni is married to another and all that I can do is to wait here for some news of her.” It took a while for Iqbal to absorb his master’s words.

  “Married to another? Well then, she must divorce him and marry you.”

  “It would be a sin. She married of her own free will and they were good to her by offering her marriage when she was in disgrace and no one else would have her.”

  Iqbal was quite overcome by these words. After all these years of waiting, after all the misery and pain that his love had caused to all who loved him, his master now spoke to him of sin. Something snapped within him and forgetting all his normal reserve, his love and devotion to his master, Iqbal lashed out at him.

  “Sin? You call it sin? Have you no idea of the pain and misery that you have spread all around you? You owe this to all who love you: to the girl, to your wives, to your friends and followers and, most of all, to my mistress Ayesha who has made this great sacrifice to bring you happiness.” Iqbal stopped suddenly, overcome by all that he had said. He looked into his friend’s face, his own suffused by a look of horror.

  “Forgive me, forgive me master,” he said looking down at his feet. “I had no right to speak to you the way I did.”

  Mirza embraced his friend.

  “Who else would have the right to speak to me like this if not you? I comprehend the pain that I have caused to all who love me and I am sorry for it. But the causing of it was beyond my control. I am possessed of a ‘junoon’ and cannot help myelf.” He paused to catch his breath and then said: “Come, you must be tired and in need of rest and refreshment.”

  He led them to his humble abode and welcomed them. Iqbal could not help but contrast Mirza’s present life with his life in Bokhara – the simple homespun clothes he wore with the rich embroidered silks that he had worn there, the simple spartan food served on earthenware platters with the rich fare that had been eaten from plates of gold and silver, the humble hut that Mirza lived in with the grand palace, which, for so long, had been his home. Yet, at the same time, he saw too the radiance on his master’s face and remembered the stiff, cold expression that it had worn in Bokhara.

  Mirza read his thoughts and smiled. “I am content. Content and happy. I find myself more fulfilled, more complete than I ever was at Bokhara. It is as if there is a part of me I never knew there, that I have at last found here.”

  The friends talked late into the night and all of the next day, and Mirza gave Iqbal messages and advice to take back to all in Bokhara. Then, a day later, when the three travellers and their horses were well rested, they made ready to start their homeward journey. It was a touching farewell because they all realized that this could well be their last meeting. As Iqbal put his foot into the stirrup, Mirza called out to him, “Here Iqbal, there is one last behest.” He drew a signet ring off his finger. It was a ring that had belonged to his father. He had worn it all his life, and even at the time of his greatest trouble had not thought of parting with it. He drew it off now and gave it to Iqbal.

  “Give this to your mistress, Ayesha. Tell her that it is all I have to give. She has done so much for me. Yet ask her to do this one last thing. Ask her to wear this ring for me.”

  Iqbal carefully put away the ring. Then he climbed into his saddle and, without a backward glance, he rode away.

  Life went on. Sohni and Mahiwal had both succeeded in creating islands of idyllic happiness around themselves and it seemed they would live out their lives in these havens. But the Gods that be, willed otherwise and fate dealt them one last, dark card.

  Mahiwal had taken his herd to a sand bank on the river, where they were wallowing in the water, revelling in its coolness. He stood knee-deep in water, scrubbing the animals. As he paused in his work for a few minutes and looked towards the other bank, he saw a woman, with pitchers balanced on her head and hips, come down to the water’s edge. There was something familiar in the figure and, in a flash, he knew who it was. His heart beat wildly and f
orgetting his herd, he plunged into the water and began to swim hard against its surge. He reached the other side just as the figure, the pots balanced carefully on her head, turned to go. She took one step.

  “Sohni?” he called softly. She stopped in her tracks. She knew that voice but she had not thought she would hear it again. Was she awake or asleep?

  “Sohni,” he called again, louder this time. The pitchers fell from her head and broke into a thousand pieces. She turned and ran to him.

  He held her close and she clung to his wet body. He covered her head, and face with quick kisses. They did not speak; they could not. The moment stretched on and, when at last, the wild beating in their hearts was stilled; they drew away and looked long into each other’s faces.

  “You are well,” he said at last, and smiled.

  “You too, are well,” she said and smiled in answer. “What do you do here?”

  “I am a mahiwal to the Khan’s herd at his farm, a mile down the opposite bank.”

  “And my village is half a mile up this bank.”

  They smiled again.

  “And all this time we have not known that we were so close.”

  “I knew that your village was somewhere close by but I did not think that I would come face to face with you like this.”

  “And are you glad of it?”

  “I am glad of it.”

  “Then will you come again to meet me?”

  Mahiwal hesitated and looked away. But after a while he looked back again and found her eyes still fixed on his face.

  “You are married to another. It would be a sin for us to meet.”

  “All I ask is to be able to look upon your face, to listen to your voice. There can be no sin in that.”

  “If it will comfort you to look upon me, to listen to my voice, then I will come.”

  “My pots are broken and I must make the trip again. You too, must go. Your cattle is getting restless as they wait.”