Zemindar

by Valerie Fitzgerald

  Wallace crossed the lawn to investigate and returned accompanied by a figure of just such oriental splendour as I had once imagined all Indian gentlemen would present. This was a man, short and broad and full-bearded, whose deliberate, stately walk and self-contained survey of the company in which he found himself indicated clearly a habit of authority. His dress, though simple, was rich; snowy breeches and a loose shirt of embroidered muslin were covered by a long open coat of multicoloured brocade. Slippers of black velvet embroidered in gold curled up at the toes to end in golden tassels, and on his head he wore a flat turban, whose precise pink folds were embellished by a fine ruby. Jewels shone too on his hands and in his ears, and a curved dagger in a gem-encrusted scabbard was thrust through the gathered satin of his cummerbund. Behind him paced a servant carrying a large round tray covered with a cloth.

  It was obvious that Wallace was at a loss with his unexpected guest, but he ushered him in to our circle of chairs with rather excessive cordiality and said, ‘May I introduce Mr Wajid Khan, the Talukhdar of Nayanagar. I believe he has something of importance to say to you, Laura. This is Miss Hewitt, sir,’ and he indicated me to the newcomer.

  The gentleman bowed politely to the company, then approached me and with his hands joined made a deeper bow.

  ‘Miss Hewitt, madam. My pleasure to meet you is extreme.’

  He bowed again while I wondered whether I should extend my hand, rise, or remain seated.

  ‘I have come, madam,’ he went on before I had resolved my perplexity, ‘to offer you the most heartfelt thanks of myself, my wife and all my family for the great service you have this morning performed for us in the Hazrat Ganj.’

  ‘Oh, the little boy!’ I exclaimed, beginning to understand.

  ‘My son. My servants have told me of your great bravery and the extreme promptness with which you acted on his behalf, to rescue him from those murderous horses.’ He spoke English with ease but his accent was sing-song and he over-accentuated most of his consonants.

  ‘I have no words sufficient for my gratitude, madam,’ and he put his right hand on his brocaded breast, ‘but my heart will never be ceasing to remember your act. You have truly been the saviour of my house. I have many children, and other sons, yes, also. But many have died. This boy is my eldest male child and very precious therefore. He is, as you may say, the apple of my heart, so now it is fitting that I, and with me all my household, place myself at your feet.’

  To my horror this most dignified personage then went down on his knees and would have put his forehead on my shoes, but that I drew back my feet and jumping up very hastily, so that his turban got knocked slightly askew, I took him by the hands and drew him upright again, exclaiming, ‘Oh, please, sir! You have nothing to thank me for. What I did, any other person aware of your boy’s danger would have done, I do assure you.’ He allowed me to raise him and, since I was slightly aghast at what I had done, thinking he might construe as rudeness what was in fact merely embarrassment, I was relieved to see a twinkle in his fine brown eyes and a slight smile part his whiskers.

  ‘You are more than modest, madam,’ he assured me as I dropped his plump hands, ‘but I see I have a little upset you and I ask your pardon. Our ways are sometimes not the same. But now, if you will allow me, my wife has asked me to convey her great gratitude to you also, and begs that you will accept some small offering in token of the thanks which she can never adequately express.’

  He summoned the retainer who accompanied him, who came forward holding out his burden at arm’s length.

  ‘Regrettably it is only some few poor sweetmeats,’ Wajid Khan said, taking the tray. ‘It is known that English ladies would find difficulty in accepting gifts of value, but my wife has asked me to assure you very thoroughly that, were it not for this, she would have sent you the finest of all the jewels obtainable in Lucknow.’

  I knew a moment of acute annoyance at the supposed finer feelings of my countrywomen, while Wajid Khan placed the tray in my hands, with another deep bow. The tray was so heavy I almost dropped it, so I sat down again hastily and, placing it on my knees, removed the covering. It was of heavy silver, finely chased, and built up upon it was a series of cones, squares and pyramids comprised of every imaginable type of sugary delicacy known to Indian cookery.

  I exclaimed with delight, then remembered to beg Wajid Khan to be seated. He lowered himself cautiously into a basket chair, sitting awkwardly with his stout legs in their tight white breeches set wide apart, his beringed fingers clasping the chair arms, while, smiling, he watched us all examine his gift.

  Emily helped herself to crystallized pumpkin and Wally took a coiled golden jellabi at my insistence, but the donor himself would not be tempted.

  In the very centre of the tray, placed upon a pile of puffed sugar macaroons, was a small covered basket made of delicate silver filigree. I took it to contain some especially rare delicacy, and picked it up to open it.

  In a second our new friend had extracted himself from his chair and was beside me, taking the pretty thing from my fingers before I could raise the lid.

  ‘This,’ he said, ’is my own thank-offering to you, Miss Hewitt, and it is maybe best that I explain for you its significance. See …’ He flicked open the lid. ‘It is a little bracelet. Not a jewel, you understand—not even a trinket. Itself, it is worthless, but in my part of the country it is a token, a symbol, of the obligations of true brotherhood. It is called a rakhri. There is, you will understand, a proper festival for the presenting of these bracelets, but though the festival is past for this year, nevertheless the purpose of the giving is the same, whatever the month, and as I can give you nothing of value to betoken my gratitude and esteem, I am hoping that you will permit me to offer you the undying service of myself and all my family with this unworthy toy.’

  The bracelet he held out to me was a charming little object, a row of floss silk rosettes in vivid jewel colours, each one backed by a medallion of silver filigree and strung together on a slender rope of gold and silver thread intertwined. More gold and silver gleamed among the ruby, emerald, sapphire and amber silk, and in the centre of each rosette was a tiny flower of seed pearls.

  ‘Oh, how pretty!’ I exclaimed, as he held it up and the others crowded round to see.

  ‘Pretty, yes,’ agreed Wajid Khan judiciously, ‘but not only that, I am hoping. Perhaps, for who can tell these matters, perhaps one day you will find it also useful. This poor trifle, this rakhri, when I have fastened it upon your wrist I will have performed the small ceremony of rakhri-band and tied myself and all my family and my resources to you for ever. It will mean, then, that if ever you are requiring help in grave matter or small, I am bound immediately to drop at once my own affairs and do all in my powers to help you … as if you were truly my sister and I your brother. And if we are far apart, even to the ends of the earth, and you send me this little rakhri by speedy messengers in token of distresses you may be undergoing presently, I must immediately hasten to your side.’

  ‘What a very touching custom, Mr Khan. You do me a great honour.’

  ‘I am glad that you are approving. It is also a very old custom, most ancient, and many stories are told in Indian history of the use of the rakhri to summon assistance from some king or hero. It is said, for instance, that when the island kingdom of Chitor, many years ago now, was besieged and in foulest peril, the beautiful queen of that kingdom sent a rakhri to the great Emperor Akbar himself. Even before immediately he set out to help her with all his armies and his elephants, and it was no fault of his doing that, when he arrived, he found every Rajput warrior slain upon the battlefield and all the ladies of the court dead upon one great funeral pyre. No, indeed. Akbar had done what he could, for such is the power of the rakhri in our custom.’

  ‘How interesting, and again, how very touching.’

  ‘I am permitted then …?’

  He hesitated, looking anxiously into my face; then glanced at Charles and Wallace as if to ask their
permission. I expect it was difficult for him to realize that English unmarried females are able to make up their own minds in such matters.

  ‘Why, certainly you are permitted, Mr Khan,’ I hastened to assure him before Charles could say a word. ‘I am most honoured.’ And I held out my wrist. Wajid Khan put the glinting gossamer around it and secured the fastening with care. Then he patted my hand in a fatherly fashion and sighed with satisfaction.

  ‘Thank you. Thank you,’ he beamed. ‘Now I can return to my wife and tell her all with utmost pleasure. But you understand … it is not a joke, no? By this rakhri-band I have obliged myself to you in seriousness.’

  ‘Yes. I understand, sir, and I thank you. I will keep my rakhri most carefully all my life and always remember the donor with great kindness.’

  He searched my face as I spoke and, then, satisfied that I was in earnest, made a deep salaam to me again, bowed to the others present and took his leave. Wally pressed him to stay for some refreshment, and I would have enjoyed learning more of him, his family and way of life but, his errand done, nothing would keep him.

  ‘Well, really, Laura!’ expostulated Emily as the little procession disappeared through the gate in the fast falling dusk. ‘You do have the oddest adventures. First Mrs Wilkins on the ship’—I had given Emily a truncated account of my last meeting with the Wilkins ladies—‘and now this. I declare, all India appears anxious to offer you help, and I never in my life met anyone less in need of it.’

  ‘Long may it continue, if it always takes as pleasant a form as this,’ I replied, as I stretched out my left arm to admire the bracelet, while with my right I helped myself to a sweet oozing rosewater. ‘Though, come to think of it, it would really have been more satisfactory if Mrs Wilkins had given me her garter too, in earnest of her goodwill, as Mr Khan has given me the rakhri.’

  ‘Mother has always said you are too impetuous,’ grumbled my cousin in reply. ‘Some day you will find yourself in trouble for not taking thought before rushing into things as you do.’

  ‘Then all I have to do is summon Wajid Khan to my side,’ I reminded her blithely. Emily had not liked my being the centre of attention; Wajid Khan had scarcely deigned to glance her way. So now I merely cocked an eyebrow and licked my fingers provokingly. But inwardly I was as amused as she was irritated by the very diverse persons anxious to lend me their aid, and the odd similarity of the objects that represented their desire—a black satin garter and a floss silk bracelet.

  CHAPTER 11

  The year drew towards its close. By the end of November it was cold enough to enjoy the log fires that were lit each evening in the drawing-room, the mosquito nets were taken down, and when I went to bed I was glad of the stone hotwater jar I found between the sheets. There was an autumnal feel in the air, a hint of sadness in the scent of burning leaves and in the slanted, low rays of a sun that had forgotten its zenith. Horses now were blanketed at nightfall, and the spoilt cantonment dogs waddled down the roads in woolly coats knitted by their mistresses.

  But still the gardens bloomed, not now with the hard hot-weather zinnia and cockscomb, but with familiar English favourites—heliotrope, babies’ breath, love-in-the-mist, London pride and sweet william—all spilling their delicate scent over carpets of pansies, nasturtiums and violets. The cantonment ladies were back from the hills, pink-cheeked and plump, in marked contrast to those unfortunates like Connie Avery who had not been able to leave the plains.

  ‘I used to go every year,’ Connie explained one day. ‘To Simla, you know. Wally said it was much better to go there than to Mussoorie because Simla is a fashionable place. I had a very good derzi there who used to make us all pretty clothes, the babies and me, and a dear little bungalow looking right across the valleys to the snows. Oh, how I did enjoy it all—the smart people and the nice tea-shops and the cool air! But everything has got so much more expensive that I haven’t been up for three years now. Wally’s mess bills are so much higher since he has been promoted; and we can’t do without things here as one could at home. People would notice, y’know, if we didn’t have the buggy and the horses and so on, though I’m sure I get little enough pleasure out of them. What’s to be seen when we do drive out but a lot of people we see every day anyway, and a heap of shabby old palaces? But still, staying down here has been worth it because Wally says he’s quite sure we will have enough money for Johnny and me to go home in the spring. He can’t come with us, of course, but he’ll follow in a year or two. I don’t like to leave him, but Johnny must…’ And her voice trailed away in the manner to which I had by now become accustomed.

  Although she was still pale and unhappy in the mornings, Emily was improving in health and spirits. She must have been ashamed of her outburst on the day Kate Barry told her the probable cause of her ill-health, because she never again mentioned her unhappiness to me. However, understanding what I could not but believe were her true feelings regarding her marriage and the baby, I now became aware of many indications of the tensions, covert but unmistakable, that existed between Charles and herself. Sometimes I would surprise a look of dejection on Charles’s face, an expression of ill-concealed irritation on Emily’s when he was near, that saddened me for both their sakes and, let me be truthful, for my own. I could no longer admit, even to myself, that I was ‘in love’ with Charles as I had been when we left home. If, in my case, familiarity did not breed contempt, it had to a great extent soothed the sentimental anguish of a few months ago. I retained the deepest affection for Charles, a true wish for his happiness, but the tumult of bittersweet passion which I had had to contend with in the early weeks of his marriage was now quite allayed.

  But still, sometimes when I was tired, and the weight of loneliness seemed to crush me, I would acknowledge that had things been otherwise I could indeed have loved him; and so, seeing his love for Emily unreturned, I suffered for him. He had developed during our months in India. He was quieter and more contained. The well-shaped lips beneath his moustache were compressed now in a way that revealed resignation as much as firmness, and the expression in his fine blue eyes was often too long-suffering for a man of his years; particularly when they rested, as often happened, on his gay little wife flirting outrageously with one or other of the young officers who flocked to her banner here in Lucknow just as their counterparts had done in Calcutta.

  At home in Mount Bellew it had been the custom for me to brush Emily’s long fair hair at bedtime, while she sipped a glass of hot milk and we gossiped over the doings of the day. Necessarily, this little ceremony had lapsed during the first months of my cousin’s marriage, but now, with Charles so often out late playing cards or billiards with Wallace and his friends, we had again fallen into the habit. It soothed and comforted Emily, I believe, to revert to this childish pattern, even though childhood was behind her, and it was she who now came into my room with her brush, and as I stroked the tangles into shining order, we would reminisce about our family or dissect (not always kindly) our Indian acquaintances.

  One night she bounced into my room, flung off her slippers and sat down cross-legged on my bed, turning her back towards me and holding out her brush in a peremptory manner, quite like the Emily I remembered in Mount Bellew.

  ‘Old cats!’ she spat out, as I took the brush. ‘Nasty, illnatured, mean old cats!’

  ‘Oh? Who are?’

  ‘All of them! All those dreary women Connie and I were drinking tea with this evening.’ They had been to a ladies party at the house of Wallace’s commanding officer. ‘They talked of nothing but babies. Having babies and bringing up babies, and babies being ill and babies dying and who was about to have a baby. You’d think there was nothing else in the world to interest a woman.’

  ‘Oh, poor Em,’ I comforted. ‘But still, that doesn’t make them ill-natured or mean—just limited.’

  ‘Yes, but… but somehow they have already discovered that I, that I am …’

  ‘I see: that you are going to have a baby?’

 
‘Yes. I can’t think where they can have heard it, because I certainly haven’t breathed a word and I’m sure Kate wouldn’t have either. But there you are, they know!’

  ‘Connie, I expect. You know how good she is at saying the wrong thing.’

  ‘Yes, of course. I never thought of Connie—drat her! She just sat there grinning, with her nose all pink at the end, and hiccoughed into her handkerchief. I felt so mortified, Laura, I can’t tell you. What my mother would say if she knew about Connie! All the other women just ignored her; even when she let her cup and saucer slip off her lap. Mrs Sandes just raised her hand for a servant to clear up the mess and went on talking as though nothing had happened, and poor Connie was so apologetic and nearly in tears. And they all looked at me—pityingly—as though Connie was my responsibility. As if I can do anything about her.’

  ‘And that’s what upset you?’

  ‘Oh, no! That just made me cross. But one of the old … the old besoms, who sat near me, a fat woman with snuff on the bodice of her dress and under her nose, would insist on squeezing my hand and saying things like, er, “Poor little dear. So far from home, and so young and all your good times coming to an end so early. Poor, poor little dear.” Ugh! I could have screamed. And then they all turned and looked at me, measuringly you know, wondering how … how far along I was, and trying to make out whether it showed yet. It was quite horrid, and the worst of it was that I knew I was blushing.’

  ‘I should have been there. I would have looked right back at them in a way that would have made them mind their own business.’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure you would have. You can do that sort of thing so well. But then the fat snuffy one said, and I swear she was gloating, Laura: “What a pity that your dancing days will be over before the Residency ball,” and when I looked at her—blankly, you know—she went on about it not being “seemly” to dance when it was generally known that one was having a baby—not “delicate”, she said. So I turned away very haughtily and talked to someone else. But is it true, Laura? Will I really not be able to dance at the ball?’