Revolt (22 page)

Disconcerted by his parents’ departure, Ismail returned to his room. Daniela had to be fed and there was no cook in the house.

‘Daniela, there’s no one at home at the moment,’ he sheepishly informed her. ‘I’m sure we can rustle up something to eat between us.’

Warily, Daniela crossed the courtyard, looking from right to left, expecting his parents to appear.

‘Relax, Daniela!’ Ismail reassured her, putting his arm around her shoulder. ‘At the moment, we only have an old retainer and he’s out shopping.’

‘Your villa is so big, Ismail.’ She was gazing up at the top gallery circling the courtyard. ‘Our three-bedroom semi back in England is no match for this place. Now, I can see why you have been so keen for us to build a conservatory. This courtyard is larger than our entire house and rear garden put together. Look at all this marble! The place is slabbed with it! Back at home all the marble we can boast of is our ashtray!’

‘Marble is cheaper and more popular here than in the UK. The wealthy families use it in abundance in their homes, for
everything, from pillars and staircases to bathrooms and balustrades on the rooftop floors. You’ve only seen the courtyard – there is an entire floor upstairs and a conservatory-like garden at the top. And at least three acres of land belonging to my mother which is annexed to our home – it was offered to her as part of her dowry by her father.’

‘Does everyone live like this?’ Daniela was truly awed. ‘I’ve stayed in two houses and both are palatial.’

‘Most wealthy people live like this, but of course there are many humble dwellings like the small two-bedroom terrace houses back home in England.’

‘Ha! I love the way that you say “back home”!’

‘Well, of course! It’s our home, isn’t it?’

‘I know but what about this place? Do you feel more at home here?’

‘Actually, I don’t. Home is where you live your daily life, and mine is with you in our cosy semi in the UK, with our nice warm rugs on the floor!’

‘So you would not exchange this marble floor for our humble kitchen tiles?’

‘Not even our worn-out Chinese rug in the lounge,’ he giggled, hugging her in a tight embrace. ‘I’m beginning to miss our home already.’

‘But this is your home, too.’ Daniela was keen to pursue this topic, trying to gauge his loyalties. The issue of identity suddenly seemed very important to her. Where did her husband truly belong? Here or back in England – the place he called ‘home’.

‘Yes, but I don’t feel very much at home here at the moment. And you know the reasons, too!’ he reminded her, disgruntled, changing the topic. ‘Would you like to see the rest of the house?’

‘Can I?’

Caressing her cheek, he murmured, ‘Remember it’s our home, too. And I am the only heir – unless of course they now decide to disinherit me,’ he teased.

Dismayed, she asked, ‘Would they really do that, Ismail?’

He shrugged, his eyes dull. The storm he had unleashed had to be dealt with and he wasn’t sure which way it was heading.

‘Come, Daniela. And remember, you are not an intruder!’ Smiling, she ran after him – afraid and yet eager to take a tour of her husband’s home.

Mehreen and Liaquat stood awkwardly in the courtyard of Rani’s house, waiting to be welcomed, their
salaams
to be heard.

In both their heads the fearful thought hammered – how would Saher react to them? Their eyes automatically filled when she materialised from the drawing room. A brave but poignant smile played on her face.

Mehreen rushed to Saher’s side and, grasping her arm tightly, she openly wept on her shoulders. Standing woodenly in Mehreen’s arms, Saher was happy to indulge her aunt. Tears and tantrums were her Aunt Mehreen’s domain. Liaquat patted Saher on her head, eyes sad and gentle in their pleading, tears also openly flowing.

‘We are so sorry! How will you ever forgive us, Saher? On our honour and as Allah Pak is our witness, we didn’t know anything about what our scoundrel of a son has done.’

‘No, we didn’t!’ Mehreen chimed between sobs over her niece’s shoulder.

Across the courtyard, Rani watched with cynical eyes from the window of her dining room.

‘We’ve been made strangers in our own home, Saher. It’s a nightmare,’ Mehreen explained, wailing in a piteous tone.

‘I’m so sorry, Auntie and Uncle, but please don’t worry on my behalf. Believe me, I am all right,’ Saher hastened to reassure them. ‘These things happen, you know; perhaps I was never destined to cross your threshold as your son’s bride,’ she ended, looking down at the floor.

‘Another woman has forced herself into our lives! We are helpless, my dear,’ Liaquat added bitterly. ‘Where’s your mother?’

‘Mother didn’t know about the
goorie
. I told her!’

‘You mean that when she visited us, she had no idea?’ Liaquat felt faint.

‘No, I didn’t!’ Rani’s strident voice hit them from behind. Hearts thumping, they turned to face her.

Mehreen shifted from her niece’s shoulder, unable to utter a word. It was left to her husband to enter into a dialogue with a sister who had always been difficult, but today had every reason to be.

‘We’re sorry, Sister Rani, we really had no idea! Please believe us!’ he pleaded.

‘Of course not!’ The sarcasm was not lost on them. Rani’s eyes were gleaming with hatred, ignoring her daughter’s signal not to make a scene. On the contrary, she intended doing exactly that; it was her right to spill out her poison.

‘So you’ve both come to commiserate and have the cheek, the
chal
, to pretend that you didn’t know. You expect me to pardon you! How wonderfully easy it would be for you to wriggle off the hook of blame.’

Deeply offended, and hating her sister for her acid tongue, Mehreen burst into a fresh bout of tears again. ‘Rani, we are suffering, too!’

‘Yes, I know!’ The voice had hardened. ‘The difference is that your son caused it and is married, whilst my daughter has been dumped and left humiliated. Now tell me which situation is worse, my dearest sister? Yours or mine?’ she jeered.

‘I don’t know if that rascal is married or not.’ In her self-pity, Mehreen was sobbing out her own anguish. ‘A strange woman has hijacked our lives.’

Dry-eyed, Rani sized her sister up and down, mouth curled in contempt.

‘Mehreen, my darling, spoilt sister, if you have come to me looking for sympathy, you have come to the wrong place. This is not your beloved Gulbahar’s home, but one that has been wrecked by your brat of a son. Your lousy upbringing spoilt him!’

‘Rani, you’re cruel’ Mehreen wailed.

‘I’m cruel, you say?’ Rani glared her loathing straight into her sister’s frightened eyes. ‘Has your scoundrel of a son not been cruel to my daughter?’ The words were like a whiplash.

‘Mother! Please!’ Saher diplomatically stepped in, horrified at the downward spiral in the sisters’ relationship, and gently pulled her mother back. Liaquat, on cue, similarly pulled Mehreen aside, the image of them exchanging heated slaps at an Eid party not too far off. The sisters had slapped each other hard, much to the horror of their family members.

‘I think, Mehreen, it is best that we return home, my dear,’ Liaquat quietly advised.

‘We’re very sorry, Sister Rani.’ Though shocked and dismayed by his sister-in-law’s hostility, he pardoned her, empathising with her suffering and predicament. ‘Mehreen, let’s go! Saher, please forgive us. If anything was in our hands, do you think we would have let all of this happen to you, my dear?’ His hand momentarily rested on Saher’s bare head – a solid, comforting hand. She really liked this uncle and had longed to spend many years in his company. Alas, it was not to be.

‘Your mother has every right to blame us. Nothing can compare with what she is experiencing … But do you know how much it has hurt us, too? Parents become such vulnerable creatures when their children grow up … and our child has betrayed us in a terrible way. If only we had another son, then I would have married you off to him, Saher, just to keep you with us!’

Saher was now openly crying, touched by his words; he had always cared about her welfare.

‘It’s all right, Uncle. I know how much you respect and love me. Please don’t mind Mother. She’s just upset, that’s all.’

‘She does mean it, Saher, but we don’t mind, do we, Mehreen? Let’s go.’ With Rani’s mouth open, ready to blast them with another bitter comment, he steered his wife firmly out of the courtyard. He had no wish to hear more. Respect for Rani had now reached zero. In some ways, she was worse than his wife, with her daggers always drawn. He wondered how two sisters could hate each other so much. Gulbahar was so different. If
only … he sighed, turning to Mehreen. Today, his mission was to protect his vulnerable wife.

Shooting an aggrieved look at her sister, Mehreen followed her husband.

‘Why does Rani hate me so much? Why is she taking it out on us? We did not bring the
goorie
home. It’s not fair,’ she muttered.

They stood outside Rani’s
hevali
, both experiencing a strange reluctance to return home. The
adhan
from the central mosque’s minaret calling the faithful to prayers reminded Liaquat that he had missed his earlier prayers.

‘Wait in the car, Mehreen, whilst I join the prayer congregation in the mosque.’

In the car, Mehreen pulled her shawl lower over her forehead and shed bitter tears. When would she wake up from this nightmare? The wedding had to be called off. Explanations needed to be given to the gossiping mouths.

‘Ismail, I wish you were never born!’ she cried aloud, peering out of the car window at the village at work – its routine calmly dictated by the cycle of rural life.

There was a tractor tilling the soil, making grey parallel lines in the field. Further along the road, laden with sugarcane plants, a truck was leaving the village, billowing out clouds of dry dust in its wake. Mehreen saw Bina, the rubbish lady. Her shawl tied round her head and
shalwar
pulled up to her ankles, Bina, squatting on her heels was energetically shaping another cow-dung cake between her palms before rising to slap it on the wall of the school. The village school committee had kindly granted her a small portion of the back wall for her cow-dung cakes. This was in appreciation of her work as the school cleaner and keeping the area around the school free of any animal droppings. She had already done her rounds of carrying baskets of rubbish out of many homes. Into one of her baskets, she had swept the streets of all the animal droppings and waste. She very rarely threw it away on the rubbish tip. It went either on the fields as manure or on the school wall for fuel. The sun would dry the cow-dung
cakes within two days, ready to be used for the cooking fire. Bina supplemented her meagre income by selling them to the poorer families who, like herself, could not afford gas, wood or oil for their cooking.

A herd of about 30 black milk buffaloes, their lower bellies coated with mud, stood in the far field, languidly soaking up the sunshine before being herded back into the shade of the farmhouses.

Over on the other side of the school playground, lively schoolboys in their crisp white shirts and black shorts were playing cricket. Teenage girls from the girls’ school, dressed in their demure blue and white starched uniforms with matching white chiffon
dupattas
draped across their chests or over their heads, walked in groups of twos and threes on their way home. They were either hugging their bundles of books to their chests, or carrying them in holdalls slung over their shoulders, their heads bent, chattering away.

‘Ah, what it was like to be a schoolgirl,’ Mehreen mused, remembering her own time at the convent school the three sisters had attended in the city. The village school dismissed as not being good enough for the education of his daughters, their father had a chauffeur-driven car ready to bring his daughters to and from the city.

Mehreen could not help noticing one girl hanging out on the fringes of the group, looking decidedly sulky. ‘Just like our Rani!’ she smiled wryly. It had always happened that way with them. Gulbahar would be with Mehreen, chatting away, while Rani would deliberately hang back – moody and miserable. They could never make out why she behaved like that. Nobody had. She always held back. Her scowling face not only distanced her sisters, but also put other schoolgirls off. Her punishment was that she was left to herself, to wallow in her own misery.

Rehmat Ali, the vegetable man, aged before his time, pushed his wooden cart of fresh fruit and vegetables carefully displayed in raffia baskets. He was halfway through his door-to-door round, keen to sell to those who could not be bothered to go to the shops or the bazaar in the nearby town. Mehreen had
no idea where Rasoola bought their vegetables. Was it with the meat from town or were they from their local general store?

‘This is our very small world that we have happily embraced,’ she thought. ‘Yet, we sisters have cut ourselves off from the rest of the village. We’ve no idea what’s going on in the nearest home and have nothing in common with our neighbours, who often live poverty-ridden lives.’

Their wealth and status divided them from their neighbours, so very few friendships were cultivated within the village. Most of their personal friends – other landowners, politicians and lawyers – were from other villages or towns.

‘Our children have gone to other worlds, Arslan to America, while my son went to England, bringing back their foreign worlds and customs into our lives. Is that what we deserve? My Ismail has brought home a foreign bride and made me a laughing stock!’ Bitterness lapped through Mehreen’s body again.

Another car with one of Rani’s friends from the city drove up outside the gates. Fearful of being spotted and forced to enter into inane conversation Mehreen ducked her head. Now, surely, all of Rani’s friends and the local village folk would be aware that Saher had been jilted and there would be plenty of
gossip-mongering
and commiserating. As the local saying went: ‘One’s daughter is everyone’s daughter. Everyone’s honour.’ And Saher was a daughter they were immensely proud of, looked up to and consulted on all legal matters. Above all, she was the daughter of Mistress Rani – the widow they respected highly and who had won over their hearts and minds with her generosity, despite her unsmiling face.

She was kind, and quietly saw to all the needs of the five village widows and their offspring – from the weekly flour ration, to the dowry and the wedding dinners she sponsored. Similarly, she had donated a portion of her land for the village school. The funeral dinners for the village poor were mostly taken care of by Rani. As the village Imam said, she did ‘grand’ charitable things, but did them with dignity and deliberately kept a low profile. She never made a show of it, always quietly tucking crisp notes into the hands of the poor visiting her home.