Читать книгу From the Five Rivers - Flora Annie Webster Steel - Страница 5

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The forty days of seclusion being over, Veru, in her finest clothes, sat cross-legged on a string bed ready to receive company. The court-yard had been freshly swept, the brass cooking-vessels scoured and set in a row against the mud wall, where the sun smote them into retaliating rays. A few flat baskets of sweets, covered with penny-halfpenny Manchester pocket-handkerchiefs printed in the semblance of a pack of cards, stood ready for the expected guests, and Gunesh Chund's mother had been busy all the morning making a sort of furmenty in honour of the occasion; for, though she considered her labour thrown away on the birth of a girl, she would not for the world have omitted a single ceremony, and so have given colour to outside condolence. Veru herself was a delicate-looking, pretty woman of about six-and-twenty, with a broad forehead, and a thin-lipped, sensitive mouth--both of which characteristics were more blemishes than beauties in the opinion of her neighbours. Her chief defect, however, in the eyes of the stalwart, open-hearted, shrill-voiced, village women lay in a certain refined reserve, which they set down to conceit born of her pretensions to scholarship--though how any woman could be so wrong-minded as to usurp man's estate by learning to read and write passed their simple understanding. But Veru, who had lived with a rich uncle during her girlhood, had shared her cousin's desultory visits to a mission school for a year or two, and returned to her parents and marriage with a book in which she could read glibly, and a reputation for writing. She could also knit many-hued comforters in brioche stitch, and darn strips of net in divers patterns--appalling and almost incredible culture, viewed with disfavour by all save Gunesh, who was simple enough to admire it; probably because she was woman enough to admire him immensely.

The infant, to whom the name of Nihâli had been given, lay in her arms, bedizened into the semblance of a performing monkey; tight little silk trousers on the bandy legs, a tinsel-decorated muslin bodice, and a flowing veil, the size of a pocket-handkerchief, disposed over the round skull-cap where a black fringe of wool simulated hair. On this outfit Veru had spent much time and trouble, while her mother-in-law grumbled under her breath at the expense, or openly said that in her day a decent woman would have thought it shame to make such a fuss over a girl, after keeping her master waiting ten long years for a child.

There was bitter war between these two women outwardly: yet, however fiercely Veru combated the elder woman's views, in her heart of hearts she could not overcome the inherited conviction that the meanest thing on God's earth, was a sonless wife. Cultured retorts as to what she had heard and read in school of Western opinions, and of the sex of the Queen-Empress, did very well as lethal weapons, but as inward balm were most unsatisfactory. Often and often, after a passage of arms in which her more dexterous point had reduced her adversary to the usual appeal for patience, she would creep away into one of the dark, windowless rooms opening off the central court-yard, on pretence that the light prevented her baby from sleeping. There, safe from observation, she would weep salt tears over its unconscious face. After all her prayers and alms, why had not Fate given her a son? How much easier it would have been for everybody, Fate included; for now high Heaven would have to be wearied once more!

She had seen but little of her husband during her days of seclusion, so the task of shutting her white teeth over a retort when he was by had not been a very difficult one. But now the every-day life was beginning again, and it would be harder to keep up the forbearance--though she was clever enough to see that it earned his gratitude.

He came in before going to his afternoon's work in the fields to inspect the preparations. The sight of the bedizened baby awoke his broad laugh.

"Ho! ho! ho! Grandmother, see what a figure Veru hath made of the child! For sure it is like the puppets Dya Ram brought round at Diwâli Fair, that danced on a string!"

"I'm glad thy wits give thee sense to see the folly of dressing the child so," grumbled the old woman. "In my day there were none of those fal-lals on farmers' children. We left them to the silly town's-folk."

"In your day, mother, farmers' wives did not know how to make them; but I cut and sewed them all," retorted Veru, with studious courtesy.

"Aye, aye, that's true," remarked her husband, relieved. "Thou hast clever fingers despite they are so small.--Hath she not, mother?"

"Clever, mayhap; but in my time wives found better work than snipping and sewing. They made stalwart sons for the hearth, and left clothes to the tailor. 'Tis the other way on now, I suppose. Thou wilt send to the tailor for a son soon, I suppose. It is time."

"Nay, but the mother is right," interrupted Gunesh Chund, hastily, seeing Veru's eyes begin to flash; "the little one is like a puppet, as I said, Veru, and 'tis happier with its arms and legs free. I love to watch it struggling on its back like a young duck with the megrims. 'Tis comical. But feed it well, wife; if 'twere a calf I would hold it over-thin. Young things need fat. Do as the mother bids thee, and 'tis sure to thrive. Had she not daughters of her own in her time?" His voice had a ring of appeal in it.

"Aye, and some of them in man's guise," muttered the old lady as she watched him bending over the baby. Nevertheless, she spoke more softly as she bade him get to his fields, the proper place for a man.

"True, mother, true," he assented happily, as he went to the door with her. "And there is no place I like so well. 'Tis good to stand knee-deep in young corn when it grows blue-green, as this year. Thou shouldst see it in the dip by the sandy bottom. And see the dappled sky like a partridge breast, auguring more rain. A good harvest, mother! A good harvest and new dresses--"

She checked him. "Nay, Gunesh, there is the new wife to think of first. Good harvest days are good wedding days."

They were beyond ear-shot, and yet the man gave a quick glance at the woman within.

"Hush, mother, hush!" he said, almost in a whisper. "Should a man take the name of another woman in his mouth, with the cry of a month-old babe in his ear? There is time yet."

"Time!" she echoed. "Time, indeed! 'Tis not time, but will, is wanting. Get thee gone to thy fields--thank Heaven thou art not a ninny there--for see, yonder comes Kishnu to the reception, bringing all her three. The jade! 'Tis only to crow over our girl!"

Gunesh tried to frown as he stood irresolute, but his mild face refused the task.

"May be, mother," he replied simply, "yet were the boys mine I would take them wherever I went, crow or no crow. They are so sweet."

His mother stamped her foot. "Aye, aye! Sweet for sure. And will not the eldest make a fine lumberdar? Folk might almost deem him thy son."

"I could wish none better."

Foiled by his gentleness, she watched his tall figure go down the alley for a minute, and then began the attack in a more promising quarter.

"Here comes Kishnu, Veru. Did I not say she would be the first? The crowing cock loves early hours. She hath her three with her, and Gunesh, poor soul, must needs stop and fondle them. He loves those boys; and who can blame him? Sure, a man's heart cannot live in his breast always!"

"That is true; but when a man gives it to a wife she can keep it from straying," retorted Veru. She was never without words, but they were empty diet, and she could not help looking at Kishnu's boys with hungry eyes.

"I scarce liked to bring Shivu here to-day," quoth the latter, settling herself with a flounce among the voluminous skirts that hung half-way down her trousered legs. "You see, he grows so big--almost too much of a man for these women's doings."

She tittered, twisted her huge nose-ring to one side, disposed her youngest at her capacious bosom, and, thus prepared for conversation, began afresh in a shrill, strident voice:

"So that's your girl, Veru! Sure you have dressed it for the wedding already! Early days; but with a daughter one has to think betimes.--Is it not so, grandmother?"

"Our women have no difficulty in finding husbands," replied Veru's mother-in-law, who, whatever she might say herself, was not inclined to stand impertinence from outsiders. "But perhaps in thy family 'tis a different story."

Now Kishnu was no beauty, despite her fruitfulness. Neither was she ready of tongue. So she sniffed, comforting herself with the knowledge that words, after all, were but poor weapons against facts. As an immediate revenge, however, she dragged the most disagreeable topic she could think of into the conversation.

"Guneshwa looked but ill at ease, it struck me. No doubt the new settlement in the village gives him trouble."

"What new settlement?" asked Veru, sharply.

Settlement time meant war time, since in the compiling of new records lay ample opportunity for spite; and her husband as head-man had enemies.

Kishnu tittered again. This was better than she had expected.

"So! I have broken the seal of a secret. Mayhap Gunesh said nothing lest it should worry thee during the time of recovery. But 'tis so. My man heard it awhile ago through his friends at court; for certain, yesterday. Sure, Veru, 'tis a thousand pities this is a girl. Gunesh could have written a son's name as his heir in the new papers; and that would have ended dispute forever."

The lumberdar's women folk looked at each other, for once in accord. Gunesh had hidden this thing from them, and they were too proud to show how it had moved them. They preferred letting the shaft rankle, perhaps needlessly, rather than inquire further of Kishnu.

"'Tis no pity at all," retorted Veru, tossing her head. "There can be no dispute that I know of. And I prefer girls."

This went too far for her mother-in-law. At the risk of Kishnu's delectation, she lost patience.

"There 'tis! Heard one ever the like? 'I prefer girls.' So! thus thou mockest the great ones, and by idle words turn my prayers to naught. 'Tis too vexatious--"

"Girls are every whit as good as boys. The great Queen--"

"Pshaw! I am sick of the great Queen! Why did she come to breed dissension, and teach young women to mock at the old? Though, for sure, she herself knows better, seeing she hath proved her worth by a good family of sons."

"So may Nihâli in her time."

"What! That sickly thing! Thou wilt scarce rear her to the first year, and mayhap 'tis better so. 'Dead girls,' thou knowest, 'bring live boys.'"

Veru's face of fear sent a pang of remorse to a heart which beat true after its fashion, and the old lady went on, hastily:

"Nay, daughter-in-law! Perchance I am wrong. The child dwindles a bit, no more. I will make seven spices for it. 'Twill thrive if only thou wilt be reasonable, and save thyself from tantrums and tears. 'Tis the calf has the pain, mind you, if the cow steals green wheat."

"And with a girl the mind is at rest," continued Kishnu, in malicious consolation. "Now, with me, if the charcoal rubs from their foreheads I'm agog with fear of the evil eye, and the rest of my day is wasted in prayers and offerings. As thou sayst, Veru, girls are better."

Veru had no answer ready; and even when the stream of visitors set in, full of chattering congratulations and condolences, she did not find her tongue. The noise, she said, made her head ache and disturbed the baby. She stripped the finery from its little limbs, and, wrapping it warmly in her veil, held it tight to her breast, refusing to uncover it in order to gratify the curious.

Gunesh, coming in from the darkening fields, with their calm in his face, found her crying in the inner room.

"She wants to bring another wife home even now. She will not have patience and wait awhile." That was the burden of her complaint, while Gunesh sat comforting her uneasily.

"Surely, Veru, I have waited," he said, after a time. "Few would have been so patient; but thou art a good wife and duteous even with the mother."

"And thou! Oh, thou art good, Gunesh--so good to me! See, thy patience hath brought Nihâli. Wait a year, only a year longer, husband, and it will bring thee a son."

He looked at the mother and child with kindling eyes.

"A year! Surely, surely! That is but fair. So dry thine eyes, wife, for I am hungry."

That night, when Veru had retired to her bed with the baby, and he sat smoking with his mother in the outer yard, he asked her wistfully if she really thought the child was dwindling.

She turned on him fiercely, perhaps from a feeling of pity.

"And if it does, canst not trust me to physic it? Or wouldst thou have a man doctor to thy women's rooms? They tell me the travelling one sent on his rounds by the Sirkar^[2] is in the next village but now. Shall I bid him come, since thou seemst to hold by new-fangled ways?"

Gunesh Chund filled his pipe again with poppy-leaves and tobacco, and watched his mother carding cotton viciously. What would she say if she knew of the promise he had made to Veru? The narcotic did not soothe him; and when sleep failed, he strolled out to where the village elders sat discussing the possible effects of this new settlement on the total of revenue due from the community. The familiar company was a relief, though it brought a doubt of his own wisdom in waiting a year. Still it was only a year. After that, if Veru failed to bear him a son, his duty to himself, to his ancestors, and to the Sirkar demanded another wife.