The Holy Woman (12 page)

‘That washerwoman was parading her parcels she had brought from the city!’ Kaniz began, flying at her son with her tongue. ‘I bet that they only contained cast-offs from that family,’ she sneered. He was
tight-lipped
, she saw, but paid no heed. In fact, he was
smarting
from his mother’s abusive term of ‘washerwoman’, in describing Fatima. Khawar’s long curly eyelashes swept down and hid his expression from his mother’s gaze.

‘Mother, she wasn’t always a washerwoman!’ he broke in. ‘She has worked hard to raise her family. Pampered women like yourself don’t even know how to feed their children, let alone raise two families and also support a disabled husband. I admire that woman, if you would like to know.’

Her lips parting in surprise, Kaniz snorted in
disgust
. ‘I know why you admire that woman,’ she said, her voice dipping dangerously low. ‘It is because of that chit of hers! That upstart, with her high and mighty airs.’

‘That chit is the woman I would like to marry, Mother. But like you, she is very proud. She has raved that she will not step foot in this house, not even if you came begging on your knees.’ He stopped, laughing inwardly at the sight of his mother. Kaniz’s mouth had gaped fully open in shock, as she struggled to form and roll the words out of her mouth.

‘I … I …’ The breath was choked out of her. ‘
I
beg
her
to marry you?’ Kaniz’s fair cheeks had flamed red, her almond-shaped eyes were flashing. ‘Never! If you want to marry that woman then you’ll do it without my permission and outside this home! And … and I would
never ever let her set foot inside this house!’ she
finished
, her bosom heaving.

‘Listen to me carefully, Mother,’ Khawar rasped, for once not caring if his mother was on the verge of hysterics. ‘Firdaus is the woman I want to marry.’ He had not wanted to say this, but his mother had goaded him into blurting it out.

‘Then you will have to choose between me and that chit. I will cast you out and renounce you as my son!’ Kaniz shrieked, now having lost total control, her hand pressed to her heaving chest.

‘So be it, Mother! I will not put up with your tyranny any longer. I am nearly twenty-seven years old and I can make my own decisions. If you are so small-minded and petty, then I will be forced to act alone and do what is right. I don’t want you to chase other
rishtas
for me. I’ll not lose Firdaus to some city slicker. She belongs here in the village, with me, and in my home. Either come to your senses, Mother, or I’ll walk out of this house.’ He gave her the ultimatum, his eyes totally hostile.

‘Never, never,
never
!’ Kaniz shouted at him, going hoarse and almost stamping her foot on the floor. ‘You can walk out, you ungrateful, love-sick brat! Couldn’t you have chosen to fall in love with a better girl than a washerwoman’s daughter, the daughter of my worst enemy? You have betrayed me, Khawar. I will never forgive you if you marry that
chit
!’ Kaniz was now livid, her cheeks red flags of colour.

‘I
will
marry that chit! That chit will soon be the Headmistress of the school and will be able to hold her head higher than you ever could from your original family status. People from all walks of life will show her respect. She is worth twenty of you any day, Mother!’ Khawar threw back cruelly at her.

Then, angry with himself and his outburst he strode out of the room, knowing full well that he had been very wounding and offensive to his mother, but so be it. Today he had expended his last ounce of his patience in humouring her.

Kaniz sank down heavily on her seat –
thunderstruck
, her mind reeling. The sky had just fallen and shattered around her shoulders. Her only son, to whom she had devoted twenty-seven years of life, had given her an ultimatum. ‘How could he betray me like this?’ Kaniz asked herself in a daze, her eyes filling with tears.

Never! She would rather die than welcome that young woman into her home. Her son had gone truly mad.
Majnoon
! He had probably been drinking
tweez
prepared by that witch. That was how she had wormed herself into Khawar’s heart. ‘How Fatima must now be gloating!’ she moaned.

Her heart thudded wildly against her chest. ‘I will die first than accept that woman as my daughter-
in-law
.’ Kaniz shuddered in loathing. Her worst
nightmare
was staring her in the face. To lose her son to that woman, and have her mother, that fat washerwoman, parading around her beautiful home.

‘Not in a thousand years!’ she shrieked alone in her room.

A
S A FAITHFUL
good friend, Kulsoom Bibi the matchmaker decided to call on her best friend, Naimat Bibi, to ‘honour’ her with the exciting news about Baba
Siraj Din’s eldest granddaughter becoming the Holy Woman.

Making sure she didn’t break her glass bangles against the heavy wooden door of Naimat Bibi’s humble three-roomed house, Kulsoom pushed it wide open. While Naimat Bibi was at home, the door was always left open. Stepping carefully into the dark narrow
hallway
, leading into the smallest of the courtyards in the entire village, Kulsoom’s nose crinkled up in distaste. She held up her new white chiffon
dupatta
to her nose, in an effort to block out the strong smell.

The main feature of the courtyard was the large guava tree. With its heavy branches swollen with
pear-shaped
fruit, it cloaked almost the entire yard, robbing it of any meagre rays of sunshine that happened to slant on the rooftop of Naimat Bibi’s home.

‘Naimat Bibi!’ Kulsoom merrily chirped, carefully stepping off the worn concrete step into the courtyard. She had many a time twisted her ankles on this step. Her eyes wandered over the peeling plaster of the walls, which showed the cracked brickwork underneath. Her friend was crouched over a large wok-like pan of
boiling
water on a pedestal gas stove on the veranda, which she used as her kitchen. With a large wooden spoon she was busy stirring in heapfuls of flour into the water.

When she caught sight of her friend, Naimat Bibi hurriedly got up, almost tripping over her footstool. With a broad smile creasing her amply
chaie
-pigmented face, she greeted Kulsoom with ‘
Bismillah! Bismillah
, Kulsoom Jee.’

‘What are you doing with that water?’ Kulsoom asked, mystified.

‘Making soap,’ Naimat Bibi cheerfully piped, giving her a full customary hug of greeting. Kulsoom held
herself stiffly in her friend’s arms, wondering irritably whether Naimat Bibi’s hands were clean. She feared for her new white chiffon
dupatta
.

Naimat Bibi returned to the large pot of soap
mixture
. Before Kulsoom’s interested gaze she began to stir in some portions of animal fat she had picked up from the butcher, along with some mustard oil.

‘Mind your hand, Naimat Bibi. Remember what happened to you last time you added soda,’ Kulsoom dutifully warned as she saw her friend spoon in a generous amount of caustic soda.

‘I know, but,’ ashamedly, Naimat Bibi lifted the corner of the threadbare shawl she wore especially on such occasions, ‘I am afraid I have already burned another hole in it.’

Kulsoom laughed in a patronising tone, wondering cynically why her friend worked so hard. ‘Why do you bother with all this, Naimat Bibi? Don’t tell me you have made two lots of soap already.’ Kulsoom walked up to the two large earthenware brick-red basins, painted and glazed with a geometric pattern on their rims, left to set in the sun in a corner of the courtyard. She poked the creamy yellow mixture with her thumb.

‘They have hardened nicely, Kulsoom Jee. It’s OK, you can touch it. As to why I make it, it’s because I can’t afford the Surf powder. They come in such small boxes and are quite expensive. They barely last a day anyway, especially when there is the bedlinen to wash. The small household bars of soap are no good for me. They keep slipping out of my large clumsy hands. I am used to the easy task of slopping over a wet article of clothing and giving it a good quick swipe in the soap.

‘Here, I have made one extra soap basin for you,
although I know you hardly ever wash any clothes yourself. Do you know, Kulsoom Jee, I actually
like
making soap. I must be the only woman making
home-made
soap these days. The younger girls laugh in my face when they see me grinding grains of wheat myself to make flour. Everyone has fallen for the modern life of luxury and idleness these days. They just don’t know how to be self-sufficient any more.’

Amused at her friend’s lofty tone, Kulsoom Bibi could not help retorting, ‘Listen, Naimat Jee, some people have better things to do with their time than grind wheat at home and make endless basins of soap. I, for one, have no free time at all. If I sat at home
grinding
wheat every morning and setting basins of soap, how would I run my matchmaking business? I have to be out all the time, visiting different households,
cultivating
relationships with everyone. Why do you like to make your life so difficult? Don’t you have enough to do as a village cook? Your services are always in demand whenever unexpected guests arrive at any household in the village, and of course your
chapatti
oven is burning twice a day, baking for almost half the village.’

‘Well, my business is not so profitable as yours!’ Naimat Bibi defensively threw at her friend. ‘I don’t get presents of clothes and gold earrings as well as money, you know. From the
chapattis
I only get coins,
paisas
or food for my work. What I want to do is some sort of work which will not be so menial, but would bring in hard currency. Any ideas, Kulsoom Jee?’

‘No, I haven’t!’ Kulsoom answered waspishly, now quite annoyed with the direction the conversation had taken. ‘And for your information, you probably make more in total in your
paisas
on a daily basis. I, on the other hand, have to wait for months to be rewarded for
my hard work. Anyway, I haven’t come to talk about soaps and flour-grinding! I have come to tell you about our Zarri Bano. I have just heard from Fatima that she is to become a Holy Woman.’ Kulsoom stopped,
satisfied
with the effect her words had on her friend.

Naimat Bibi’s mouth with its thin pursed lips and a set of uneven teeth had virtually dropped open. She simply forgot about the hot mixture she was stirring. It bubbled away.

‘What did you say?’ Naimat Bibi asked in wonder, ignoring the wooden spoon she had just dropped to the bottom of the pan. ‘Are you telling me that our
glamorous
, educated young madam is to become a
Bibi
? But I thought they only did that in the olden days – here in the village, not in town. How? Why?’

‘Well, it is to do with the death of our young master, Jafar, and their inheritance.’

‘Do you think they’ll actually make her into a very religious woman? I can’t believe it is possible. She dresses like a movie actress all the time. I just can’t see her wrapped in a
chador
.’

‘I have a terrible feeling that they will marry her off to the Holy Quran, to her faith. These
zemindars
are fierce men, like tigers and bulls. And very possessive about their womenfolk.’

‘So that will mean the poor girl can never marry or ever have any children?’ Naimat Bibi’s wrinkled face now expressed both her horror and a kindly concern.

‘She isn’t the only one not to be blessed with
children
in our village,’ Kulsoom said gruffly. ‘I was widowed before I was able to have any. You, on the other hand, I am afraid had a womb that was never destined to be blessed with children.’

‘But my husband stayed with me for ten years,’
Naimat Bibi hastened to remind her friend, offended by her patronising tone and the slur on her fertility.

Shaking her head, ‘I know, my friend. I still believe you should have stayed with him, rather than divorcing him when you gave him consent to marry again. He would have looked after you and supported you, as was his duty. You wouldn’t have to light your
tandoor
then.’

‘No, my friend. I have no regret. I am a very independent, self-sufficient sort of person. I couldn’t have lived with his second wife, and helped to look after her brood. I am happy that he has children now by another woman, but I have no maternal love for them nor do I begrudge them. Why do you talk about me? Think about Chaudharani Kaniz. She is still a
beautiful
, wealthy landlady, and only in her fifties. She never married again, did she? She sacrificed all her life for her son. The landlord, Younus Raees, from the
neighbouring
village, tried to woo her for nearly three years, but she never did marry him or any other man. Did you know he has just become a widower?’

‘Oh, let’s not talk about her, she is just a cold fish,’ Kulsoom remarked bitchily. ‘She is incapable of loving anyone – except herself. What husband could put up with her haughty ways? She is losing her son now through her stubbornness, because she won’t let him marry Firdaus. I have just been talking to him. With regard to the Chaudharani, I am supposed to be going to visit her next, to tell her about Zarri Bano.’

Naimat Bibi laughed sarcastically. It was her turn to have a gentle dig at her friend.

‘Those two families, Siraj Din’s and Khawar’s, are like twin families. The first person Siraj Din would have told would have been Khawar. Kaniz would not
now be waiting for
you
to come and tell her—’ The old woman stopped as her friend looked up in shock.

‘Ugh!’ Kulsoom shouted as she felt a crow’s dropping fall on top of the new white chiffon
dupatta
on her head.

In disgust Kulsoom stepped away from under the tree. Naimat Bibi’s hollow cheeks filled with laughter, but she sensibly turned her face away from her friend.

‘It always happens to you, doesn’t it, Kulsoom Jee?’ she mumbled, trying to keep her face straight.

‘Yes, it does. And I am definitely not amused. Look at my new
dupatta
. It has come all the way from Barra! Every time I stand under your tree I get showered by those damn crows of yours. You must cut down this tree. Whenever you look at this brick-lined floor of yours there are droppings everywhere. It is disgusting to see and a health hazard.’

Flushing red, ‘I wash my floor every day, Kulsoom Jee!’ Naimat Bibi indignantly fumed.

Kulsoom threw down her
dupatta
, on the floor at Naimat Bibi’s feet. ‘You have got plenty of soap so now you can wash it for me!’

‘Oh, I have lots of soap, don’t worry about that. These crows have been crowing all day. I wonder if I am going to have any visitors?’

‘It is probably your brood of stepchildren coming to visit their stepmama from the town.’ It was now Kulsoom’s turn to tease her friend.

‘God forbid!’ Laughing, and making a comical face at her friend, Naimat Bibi went inside her small
storeroom
to fetch another scarf for her friend to wear. After all, she couldn’t go bareheaded in the street.

Taking Naimat Bibi’s new silk
dupatta
, Kulsoom called over her shoulder ‘I’ll return it to you later!’ and walked out of her friend’s home.

Suddenly fancying a cool glass of skimmed milk,
lassi
, and knowing there would be plenty of it at Sardara’s house, Kulsoom headed for the milkwoman’s property. She would also, of course, be doing Sardara a big favour as she suffered from arthritis and was totally wheelchair-bound. Naturally she was now very dependent on kindly souls and faithful friends like herself to pass on any news, trivial or otherwise.

Now, the beautiful, glamorous daughter of their landlord becoming a Holy Woman was reckoned in the estimation of most people to be ‘major’ news indeed. If that wasn’t, Kulsoom didn’t know what was. On second thoughts, perhaps Queen Elizabeth of England visiting their village would create slightly more of a stir. In any event, all the households that Kulsoom would honour with her presence would, by the end of the day, know what was going to happen to their ‘poor’ Zarri Bano.