The Widow's Husband

by Tamim Ansary

  He tossed a final fistful of dirt into the grave. Then he stood up and raised his arms in supplication, facing west toward Mecca. “Oh, Allah, my darling compassionate God! Oh, my beloved! Cherish this brother, this son, this treasure of his parents’ hearts. Accept him into your grace and splendor. Accept our prayers and deeds on his behalf, our loving remembrances. We honor him and through him we honor You. We love him and through him we love You. We surrender to your will, Almighty God. In your boundless generosity You know best for all of us. We say farewell to our beloved Ahmad-jan, but we will see him in the river flowing past our homes, and we will see him in the wheat lifting its green face out of the soil by the millions this spring, and we will see him in our hearts as we see You in our hearts, Allah, when we see the air and the earth and the sky. We will see him as we see You in all things and in our own hearts, forever may we sing Your praises.”

  Ibrahim had closed his eyes and given himself over to such weeping during this recitation that now when the malang’s voice stopped he could not remember where he was. He opened his eyes, aware of a strange snuffling sound all around him. Opened his eyes to find himself among the hundred and thirty men and boys of the village, all weeping uncontrollably.

  But that was not what startled him and lifted his heart into some other realm. No, what astonished him was the fact that the sun was shining. When he closed his eyes the day had been impenetrably gray. Now, sunshine was gleaming off every leaf and rock.

  Then a wind began to blow. Above him, fleecy, gray, bulbous, chunky, edible-looking clouds floated across a blue surface, chased by this sudden inexplicable wind. And with the sun still shining over much of the valley, with the sun still gleaming on the distant compounds from which the wails of the women once again rose to bird-like pitch, rain began to fall on the graveyard. As far as the men could tell, it was falling nowhere in the world except on that graveyard. The men turned about in place, holding their hands out in wonder, tasting rain on their lips, the big heavy sweet-flavored drops of water, and they looked at one another, and they looked in wonder at the malang—but he was no longer among them. High up above them on the slope, they could see him pursuing his solitary way back toward his chosen perch, on top of the hut the village of Char Bagh had built for him, against the gray wall of Baba’s Nose.

  18

  The mourning died away finally. The communal readings of the Quran ended. The last sheep was slaughtered and roasted in a pit oven and the meat sliced off and served with rice from vats as big as horses, to all the people of the village, and the poorest ate till their stomachs groaned. For three days, no one went hungry and for three days everyone wailed. The women gave their condolences to Soraya and the men to Ibrahim, and those who could not get close to either parent consoled Khadija or old step-uncle Agha Lala or the cousins next door, or any close relative they could find.

  The malang’s appearance at the gravesite had left all of Char Bagh drenched in awe. Along with stories about Ahmad and his cheerful nine years of mischief, those who witnessed the event recounted what they had seen and felt. Those who heard their stories passed them on with embellishments. The legend of the malang’s appearance at Ahmad’s grave permeated upstream to Sorkhab and beyond. Womenfolk wove it in with other stories commonly told and retold, stories for example about the famous funeral of Ibrahim’s father, where certain disturbances in the weather had also been observed—although nothing like this time!—and tales from the Shahnama, the Book of Kings.

  “He raised his hands, and the sun turned dim,” people said. “When he began to sing, the rain started falling. It watered the grave like a river. The malang has power, they say, power over wind and water and sun.”

  When such stories were told, people gazed up toward the gray prominence of Baba’s Nose, searching among the featureless shrubs and rocks for that solitary figure. He was most often seen on the roof of his hut, just sitting there cross-legged, a speck in the hazy blue distance.

  Finally, the stories gave way to everyday life. Work had to be done, chores had to be picked up again. Bread had to be made, the fields urgently needed plowing. Ibrahim took his buffalo out and dragged his iron-tipped plow across one of his wheat fields but he could not keep going. By mid-afternoon, his body felt bruised, though he knew it was really his spirit that hurt. Plowing felt pointless, now that he had no son. For whom was he growing these crops? If he were to plant a row of almond trees now, as he had been thinking of doing, who would harvest those nuts? Someone else’s son, after he was dead. Asad, his foolish cousin, had six sons, each stupider than the next, all as healthy as bulls, and likely to multiply. In two generations, Ibrahim would be forgotten, while the progeny of Asad or Ghulam Dastagir filled the village.

  Ibrahim unstrapped his buffalos, loaded his plow, and drove his animals back to his compound. Khadija took charge of them at the gate and led them to the stables, while he headed upstairs without a word to seek the comfort of poetry. In the grim aftermath of his son’s demise, he needed strong poetry. He sat staring at the page, but his eyes refused to take in the words. His son’s face kept interposing, and then his mind was drawn back into his dreams and memories, back to his own boyhood and his father’s hopes for him and his brother. The great man had only two sons, although he himself had been one of eight boys. The surviving uncles all had sons, but in his father’s line the male seed had run thin. His brother had spawned no children at all, and out of Ibrahim’s loins had issued only Ahmad and the three girls.

  Well, God was merciful, and he was still young. He remembered his fruitless search for gray hair in his beard and the memory brought a sad grin to his lips. Being a young man with a younger wife had a good side to it after all: he could spawn more children. God was merciful, God would not let Ibrahim grow old and die without an heir. God would grant him another son.

  The door creaked. He looked up to see his wife’s tear-stained face and grief-swollen eyes. She came without a word, slouching like a beaten dog, her shoulders humped with defeat. Whatever his own grief, Ibrahim felt keenly how much more his wife was suffering. The day after Ahmad’s death, some of the clan worried that she might do herself an injury. She tore her hair so violently, she thrashed her body against the unyielding floor, she flung herself against the walls. No one had seen her this way except when the eerie invisible djinns took possession of her body. She broke pottery, she screamed, she reeled next to the oven, and her sister-in-law Khadija had to grab her wrist to keep her from falling into the pit and roasting alive.

  Now, she was subdued. Along with the wet, bleak distance in her eyes, Ibrahim saw something else, a clench to her that stretched her lips even thinner. Maybe this was a good sign. His wife looked wounded but alive at least, more alive than she had been at any time since Ahmad died.

  She settled next to her husband on the mattress pad and rocked in place. He left her alone and tried to read his book. She wanted his company, he supposed, yet he felt no desire to share his thoughts or to give her any warmth. He wished she would go away. Worse, he detected in himself a desire that Khadija be in her place. Khadija to whom he could blurt, “W’Allah, the hurting won’t stop.” If he said this to Khadija, she would say something like “Hajji-sahib, we feel your sorrow, but we all need your strength now. You have other children. You are father to us all.”

  Soraya was too weak herself to prop his emotions. If he tried to lean on her, he might crush her. He glanced her way and found her gray-green eyes on him.

  “Hajji?” Strange that she should use his honorific.

  “Soraya-jan,” he murmured. “How do you fare?”

  “Hajji, I want to say something.”

  “Speak, my dear. What do you want? Anything you desire shall be yours.”

  “I don’t want to make you angry,” she whimpered.

  “How could you make me angry? Heart of my heart, what do you need? Tell me. I am not just malik of the village, you know. I am your husband too. I know what Allah requires of me, Soraya. I want to end you
r suffering. If only I could! I feel it too, you know. My wife, my dear wife, my heart is not made of stone. I miss our son too!”

  She began to cry, and the tears began flowing from him as well. He bowed his head and bit his lips, and felt his shoulders shaking, and he held himself as still as possible, trying to contain his grief. His wife made no attempt to restrain hers. She let them pour, and as she wept, she crept ever closer to him, until she was huddled directly against him like a baby animal against its mother’s pelt, and he thought, this would do, this was permissible, no shame in this, she was his wife and he, her husband; let her look to him for what shelter and affection he could provide—no shame in this at all. Hesitantly he put his arm around her body. His own tears had dried, and he merely held his wife until her sobs died away. Finally she recovered herself enough to say, “I want to talk about that day.”

  “Yes, my dear, talk, of course. But you know, God has taken his dear soul from us. Perhaps it’s time we move our thoughts to other days…days to come. We still have those.”

  “I mean the day we buried him.”

  “Oh,” he said. “That day? What about it?”

  “When the malang came down to the village? They tell so many stories. They say the skies opened up. They say the malang waved his arms and the rain started falling. They say Ahmad was seen—he was seen, people say. Rising out of the soil, and then…”

  “And then?” Ibrahim felt breathless. “What do they say?”

  “They say he was sitting on the malang’s shoulders with an angel holding each of his arms. Is it true? Is it true? You were there.”

  Ibrahim thought about her question. “I don’t know,” he said finally. "My eyes were shut at the time, but that’s not the important thing, Soraya-jan. Something happened that day, that’s the important thing. That part is true. God was certainly there.”

  “You felt something.” She seized on this eagerly. “Yes! That’s what I mean! That’s what they’re saying. The malang blessed our boy and in death, Ahmad was chosen. He will lift this village, isn’t it so? People will come to his grave to pray. Don’t you think?”

  “Yes they will, my little one.” Ibrahim told her sweetly, sadly.

  “Hajji-sahib. Ibrahim-jan. Oh, my husband.” She clutched his arm entreatingly.

  “What?” Her sudden intensity alarmed him. Never far from madness, this woman. He was always watching for the signs. Now, her eyes had the glisten that he feared.

  “The malang must not leave Char Bagh. See to it! See that he never does—make sure of it . You have the power—make sure of it. You’re the malik. What is your duty if not to keep the malang in Char Bagh?”

  “What more can I do, sugar cube? He’s already chosen us. What are you saying?”

  “He sits above our village, yes. But Sorkhab wants him! They want him, and they have ways to draw him away. They will build a mosque for him. Yes! That’s what they’ll do. They’re big, they have money. They sell flax seed oil to the nomads.”

  “The malang can’t be drawn away with money. Are you joking with me?”

  “Don’t laugh,” she cried out. “It’s not a laughing matter. They will steal our malang. You mustn’t let them. You mustn’t let anyone take our malang. You can’t!”

  Spittle shone on her lips. Her hair had come undone, and she was thrashing her head wildly back and forth as she spoke, beginning that side-to-side flinging motion of hers. In another moment, she would be hurling herself against the walls, trying to break her own bones. She had broken her own bones this way before. The malik made a grab at her arm, but he couldn’t catch it.

  “Do you think I’m crazy?” she shrieked. “Do you think I’m the one who needs care? You’re the crazy one, if you don’t bind this man of God to our village.”

  “How?” he yelled back, shaking her.

  Her body went limp. Her madness had fled from her as quickly as a wild cat bolts

  from a house. “You know how,” she said. “You just don’t want to say it. But I’ll say it. I will say it out loud. The malang needs a wife. Give him a wife.”

  “You want me to give him—?”

  “Who else? Yes! You! Give him a wife.”

  Suddenly he knew what she was asking. He stared into her eyes, and she stared right back. No calculation showed in her gaze, no madness, just determination: a determination to hold her position and let no one budge her from it.

  “Give him your sister-in-law,” she said.

  She knew his secret. She knew what he felt for Khadija. Here she stood, on the edge of madness, her delicate sanity a knife at his throat. He must acquiesce or see her fling herself into darkness. And at that same despairing moment, he knew something else: Soraya was right. Marrying Khadija would tie the malang to the village irrevocably. But did the malang want a wife? Would he marry Khadija? And if he did, how could Ibrahim let her go?

  “I’ll talk to her,” he said to Soraya, his voice dull. “I’ll see what she says.”

  “See what she says? Who cares what she says? Don’t ask her, tell her! She’s your dependent. What choice does she have in this? You’re the lord of this household, you own her!”

  “I will talk to her,” Ibrahim repeated firmly. “If she consents, we’ll see. I will not act without her consent, Soraya. I owe my brother that much.”

  “Your brother! This has nothing to do with your brother,” she cried out. “You’re the one—”

  He clapped his hand over her mouth, muffling her next words so fiercely he felt her teeth against his palm. “I will not hear slander in this house,” he growled.

  Her eyes stared at him, white and fearful but unblinking. He let her go, and she wiped her lips. “All right,” she said. “Talk to her in your own way, then. You know best.”

  19

  Khadija spiked her long-handled fork into the heap of dried alfalfa and lifted as much as she could into the stall for the household’s two cows to grind on. A shadow cut off the light from the doorway, and she heard Ibrahim murmur, “Khadija-jan.”

  She looked over her shoulder and felt his eyes sliding down her body. His gaze was like a hand. She set her pitchfork down, pushed the pail away, and turned to him. His grief was still so fresh. It thrilled her that he kept coming to her in this state. He had not even bothered to wipe the wet away from his eyes this time before seeking her out in this stable.

  “Ibrahim-jan,” she responded tenderly.

  “What are you doing?”

  He knew what she was doing. She did the same chores every day. Animals needed to be fed, even if the malik had lost his only heir. The cows didn’t know about such things. They lowed and munched and gave milk, but only if someone tended them.

  “Just, the work, my dear. Grieve till you’re done. Grieve. Your own Khadija will keep the household going in this time of your sorrow.”

  He bowed his head. “You are the pillar of this compound, Khadija-jan. Listen, I want to talk to you about something. The welfare of the village is at stake. Come to me, upstairs when you are finished with your work. It’s a serious matter and we must be of one mind about it, you and I.”

  Her heart dropped. He was planning to take a second wife. A second wife was a serious matter. She disrupted the balance of a household, set off a power struggle, and forced a rearrangement of the household hierarchy, and yet he might feel he had to look for one at this point to maximize his chances of producing an heir. And so it wasn’t going to be her. He couldn’t possibly marry a barren woman after burying his only son. Oh God, he was going to ask her for advice. He was going to ask her who he should go after. He might even ask her to go courting for him, do the talabgari. What could she possibly tell him? How could she pretend to advise him when her own heart would be breaking?

  She wiped her hands on her skirts, conscious of her palms pressing against her thighs, conscious of his eyes traveling down to watch that pressure. Then his gaze lifted quickly to her face. At that moment, she knew she would never be his concubine. His sense of honor was too
wounded and too strict. He had his uneasy relationship with God, which no one knew about and which only she, of all his kin and fellow villagers, could understand. On top of that, he doubted his own worth. The best man she had ever known doubted his own worth. That, more than anything, was what endeared him to her. That, more than anything made her long to be his wife. She alone, of all the women in the valley, could make him shine in his own eyes. No other woman could give him what he needed. If only he would risk everything and take what only she could give him.

  She nodded. “Go upstairs,” she said. “I will come to you before namaz.”

  ***

  

  He was leaning against his brocaded pillow, one hand on his knee, looking contemplative, and unbearably sad, but he brightened at the sight of her. “Ah, there you are, Khadija-jan. Come sit with me. Soraya is downstairs, keeping the others busy with dinner and chores. No one will disturb us. We must talk openly, dear sister-in-law.”

  “Yes, Hajji-sahib. About what?”

  “You have been to see the malang, Soraya tells me. You led a group of women up there one day?”

  Her heart pitt-a-patted against her ribs. “Was that wrong, Malik-sahib?”

  “Not at all. But you know what the malang means to the village and… to me.”

  “He’s important to us all.”

  Ibrahim nodded. “It isn’t just what he said that day, Khadija-jan. I regard him as my sheikh , you know. I regard him as my father, my brother, my friend, and my guide. Someday all the world will see him as I do.”

  “I see,” she murmured, disquieted by his passion.

  “Why do you suppose I tell you this?”

  “I am only a woman, Hajji-sahib. Explain it to me. I don’t know.”

  “Let me ask another question. The day you women went up to see the malang, who else came there?”