The Linnet Bird: A Novel (58 page)

The Pathan spoke again, his eyes still on the fire. “You have been in India long? To know the language.”

He was making conversation with me. How strange, I thought. I am sitting before a fire somewhere near Kashmir, talking with a wild man of the northwest frontier.

“Not so long. A year and a half.”

He nodded.

I needed to stop thinking about Faith, needed a diversion to take my mind from her.

“Tell me about your people—the Pashtuns.”

He threw a stick into the fire, where it crackled and hissed. “There is little to tell. I am of the Ghilzai. My own tribe numbers about one hundred and fifty. We live in no one place but spend our summers in the coolness of the mountains and our winters sheltered in protected valleys. My tribe herds sheep, and we sell or trade the wool for what we need.”

He stopped, and finally looked up at me. “My people love music and poetry and games. We live a simple life.”

His words belied what I saw in his eyes. There was nothing simple about this man. I pulled my heels up and wrapped my arms around my knees, resting my chin on them. “What were you doing in Simla?”

“I catch the wild horses of the plains. When they have learned to take the rein, I sell or trade them, sometimes in Kabul, sometimes in Peshawar or further south in India. I had sold a small herd in Rajpura, and was passing through Simla on my way to collect another herd that waits in Kashmir.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, surprising myself.

“Sorry? Why are you sorry?”

“For how you were treated. It was unjust.”

He nodded, his face grim.

“How did you escape?”

“They took me out. To hang me.”

I heard my own intake of breath.

“Rasool stood nearby. I made the sound he knows and obeys. He broke free of his bindings and came upon the men who held me. They scattered to protect themselves from his striking hooves; I leapt upon him. By the time they collected and mounted their own horses I had a good lead.”

Silence.

“Do you have a family?” I finally asked.

“I have two wives.” He bent forward to pile additional branches on the fire, and his face was hidden by the curve of his hair. Then he leaned back and his hair fell away. “Both have given me a son. Allah has smiled on me.” And then, completely unexpectedly, his teeth flashed in a quick smile, thinking, I suppose, of his children. In that moment his face changed, showing him to be younger than I had first thought. His teeth were white and even. The smile was gone as quickly as it had come.

There seemed little more to say, then. We both studied the fire. Finally I spoke. “I have a husband.” I don’t know why I chose to tell him that.

“Of course,” he said, and then he lay on his side, his head propped by his hand, and through the wavering heat I could see only the outline of his body, the rise of his hip and the thrust of his shoulder.

“What is your name?” I called across the heat.

“Daoud,” he said. “Chief of the Ghilzai.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

I
RAISED MYSELF ON ONE ELBOW AND LOOKED ACROSS THE SMOLDERING
remains of the fire. In the first light the man named Daoud slept, his lashes dark against his cheeks. His face was shadowed with stubble.

I lay back and watched the sky with its shades of layered pink. A waft of scent from the blossoms came to me, and I breathed deeply. At a quiet rustle in the leaves of the overhanging
chenar,
I watched a pair of golden orioles silently groom themselves, pulling at their feathers with their tiny sharp beaks, fluffing up their breasts, and admiring each other with bright eyes. They flew off in a sudden rush of beating wings, and in a moment I saw why—the arrival of a large green woodpecker with a crimson head. He landed on a branch in the same tree, looking down at me with an arrogant proprietary glance, then attacked the hard tree limb with his long, pointed bill. The instant the loud drilling sounded, Daoud was on his feet, knife in hand. He stared around the campsite with jerky alarmed twists of his head.

I sat up, wincing at the pressure, and wordlessly pointed to the branch. At the sight of the bird’s gleaming, busy head, he shrugged as if annoyed, then tucked his knife back into the top of his pants. He turned and looked at the still water, and with one swift movement, pulled off his vest and drew his shirt over his head as he walked to the edge of the lake. I saw, with surprise, that his skin not burnished by the sun was much paler than I would have imagined. He wet his face, hair, chest, and arms, then stood and shook, sending tiny pearls of water flying in all directions. He pulled out his knife and scraped it across his cheeks. Then he walked along the shore, disappearing behind boulders, and I went behind the same lacy screen of leaves where I’d bathed yesterday, tentatively touching my blisters. They had dried in the night. I put on my drawers, washed my face, and raked my fingers through my hair.

We ate the cold leftover fish and handfuls of strawberries standing beside the blackened fire. Daoud covered it with sand, then whistled, and Rasool immediately walked to him. He motioned to his sash, which I’d left beside his saddlebag. I took it and folded it into a thick pad and tucked it into my drawers, this time without even thinking.

Then he lifted me onto Rasool and we traveled quickly for the next few hours, through the foothills and into a valley. As we rode, I grew aware of my breasts pressed against Daoud’s back, the feel of his hips under my hands. Just that, but it was an odd awareness.

Daoud stopped to let Rasool drink at a small pool, and I looked out at the valley spread before us. It was a paradise of lushness, spring flowers blooming everywhere—tiny blue gentians and purple violets fought for space with larger showy, multicolored anemones.

“Are we in Kashmir?” I asked, and Daoud turned his head and nodded.

“You see it at its height of beauty,” he said, with a touch of pride in his voice. “Further north, winter can be very long, very cruel. The Kashmiris wait for spring as the hawk for the hare. The birth of warm weather passes very quickly, but it is a sight to soothe the emptiest spirit. Every year I hope to be in Kashmir in the time of its awakening.” He pointed to a low hill, bordered with trees. “Beyond the trees is a small Kashmiri settlement. I have my horses there, and some of my men. That is where I will leave you.”

He turned to face forward, but before he urged Rasool away from the water, he glanced back at me. “What are you called?”

“Linny,” I said, and then added, “I am Linny Gow.” I said it without thinking, although in the next instant realized I had used my old name. Here I was Linny Gow. I was not Linny Smallpiece, or Linny Ingram. It was here, I realized, that there was no need at all for pretense. For the first time in a long, long time, I was who I was.

He repeated it,
Linny Gow,
and it sounded strange and full of music as it came off his tongue.

I
N A GROVE OF TREES
beside a small stream, the camp was a combination of black tents and animal enclosures built of stone or wooden rails. One of the larger fenced areas held a number of majestic horses, and small pastures held single mares and their foals. In the smallest field, surrounded by a rough stone wall, a mangy, bloated, and limping goat bleated loudly and mournfully as Rasool splashed through the rushing stream.

We had arrived. It had taken us four days to reach this camp, only four days, and yet we had traveled to a world far different from the one I’d left behind in Simla. My breath quickened; what would await me? What if the people here treated me with hostility? Would Daoud protect me?

Once the horse stepped up on the low bank, men, women, and children immediately gathered, talking and pointing. The men were dressed in a manner similar to Daoud—dark pants, white shirts, and embroidered vests, although some wore a white turban. They were all strongly built. Some had well-trimmed, thin mustaches. The women were lighter complexioned, their skin a soft toffee and their eyes light brown, although their hair was very black, hanging down their backs in one tight plait. They wore long, loose, cotton tunics of faded blues, greens, plum, or crimson, and underneath the calf-length robes, full black trousers gathered in at the ankle. Their shoes were of soft material, embroidered, the toes turned up. Most had small, dark blue caps with a loose veil. On some the veil hung behind; others had their faces covered with it. They were all adorned with an abundance of silver jewelry—bracelets, anklets, earrings, and the Muslim nose ring of the married woman.

A hush fell over them as Daoud dismounted, then reached up and swung me down. A child in his mother’s arms repeated something over and over in a shrill reedy chirp until he was shushed with one sharp word. I didn’t know where to look. Nobody smiled at me, or came forward. They all simply stared. I dropped my eyes to the ground, conscious of how odd I must appear to them, afraid to stare back, as if too bold, while at the same time not wanting to show them how uneasy I felt.

Daoud spoke in an unknown language, and I looked up again. A boy of twelve or thirteen, in muslin jodhpurs, a shirt, embroidered waistcoat, and cap, scurried forward and Daoud handed him Rasool’s reins. The young
syce
proudly led the huge horse away, and when he was gone one of the older men approached Daoud. They greeted each other in a chest-to-chest embrace. Then the man asked something, his tone questioning, and all the eyes in the crowd came to me, then went back to Daoud. Daoud spoke at length, and the eyes pivoted to me again. I longed to know what he told them; I prayed it would not turn them against me. He spoke again, and I saw some of the women nod, not unkindly, and my fears were diminshed.

And then Daoud looked at me. “The women will care for you,” he said, in Hindi. “They are the women of the
gujars
—the Kashmiri herdsmen. Their men are driving the goats to pasture, and the women are hired to feed my men. Mahayna!” he called.

A young woman with a baby in a sling on her hip stepped forward. “Mahayna speaks many Indian dialects,” he said, gesturing at the tall angular girl in the deep plum tunic. He addressed her in Hindi. “This
ferenghi
is called Linny. She speaks Hindi. Give her food and fresh clothing, and let her share your tent.” He walked away with long strides, and his men followed.

The sloe-eyed woman nodded at his back, then turned to the rest of the women and chattered in a high-pitched voice. The crowd of about twenty surged forward, and I clenched my hands at my sides. The women’s own rough, reddened hands reached out to touch my dress, my hair, my skin. They spoke to one another in a low murmur, as if I were some strange animal they were assessing. I thought that perhaps they had never before seen a white woman.

Finally the girl called Mahayna quieted them. The baby on her hip looked to be close to a year old, with huge liquid eyes and a fringe of curly dark hair. Mahayna stood in front of me for so long that my heart beat hard and fast. Was she waiting for something? Finally I reached out and took the baby’s pudgy hand. “Your baby is very fine,” I said. “A boy or a girl?”

I had obviously done the right thing. Mahayna’s face split in a large grin, showing several gaps in her teeth. “A son. My first living child.”

I smiled back at her. “A son. You are very lucky. Allah has blessed you.” The baby played with my fingers, and instinctively I put my lips to his little fist.

Mahayna continued grinning, and once more chattered to the women. They all nodded, letting out long breaths that seemed to say “ah—aha” in agreement with my comment. Babies appeared as if by sleight of hand—from under tunics, from slings on hips and supports on backs. They wore tiny muslin shirts, embroidered with delicate flowers, and miniature cloth caps decorated with fine needlework. The infants and toddlers were thrust toward me, one by one.