by Pamela Morsi
Chapter 4
The Nafee Emporium was the only brick building along the raw, hastily constructed street that represented the commercial district of Topknot. It was adorned with long, covered porches along the front and side, where benches and rockers encouraged loitering. Bunkhouse men and drifters were to be found there any time of the day or night. It was said that the quickest way to hire a man or find a job was to spend a half day chomping crackers and chewing pickles on Nafee's porch. Mrs. Nafee fussed and fretted over the men and personally scrubbed the floorboards every day in her constant battle against fellows whose aim missed the spittoon.
An effusive welcome to strangers and the clean homeyness of the porches were the Nafees' chief ammunition against their competitor, J. M. Nell General Merchandise on Main Street in Burford Corners. Nell had founded his business twenty years earlier upon trade with the Creeks and Osage, who still patronized him faithfully. Later the cotton farmers became his patrons and the little town that grew up around the store was built upon land Nell had once owned.
Nafee was the upstart, the foreigner. But the oil men all knew him. He had followed the oil speculation, he had been a peddler in their camps back east to Corsicana, Jackson, and Gladys City. Several of those men paused in the middle of the stories they were swapping to rise to their feet and nod deferentially to his daughter, Muna, as she passed them on her way inside.
She hardly noticed. For more than a week now her thoughts were a muddle and her mind was continually elsewhere.
It was not as if she had not known that one day she would marry. And it was not that her parents had not warned her that it would be they, and not her, who would choose the proper husband. But somehow she had thought it would be different. She'd thought that it would feel more romantic, more right.
The tiny bell tinkled over the doorway announcing her arrival. Her mind and heart full, Muna entered the store without so much as a hasty glance to the finery and fripperies in the locked glass case by the door, specifically intended to catch the attention of every female who passed beside it.
"Mama, I'm here," she called out, with little enthusiasm.
The Emporium was heavily stocked with everything from bathtubs to Brussels lace. With only three windows, all on the north side of the building, the big store was dark and gloomy. But the pine planking beneath her feet gleamed with devoted care and the white washed walls and shelving made things look spotless and new. Mrs. Nafee believed strongly in the selling power of cleanliness and had taught her daughter to do the same.
She located her mother busily demonstrating the ease of the new twist-off lid canning jars to a small circle of portly matrons. They shared a quick glance and the older woman gestured toward the back room.
"A shipment just arrived on the train,” her mother said. "There is much sorting to be done this morning."
Muna nodded. She hoped it was the ladies' wear. Just a few weeks past she had selected and ordered all the new summer styles. She could purchase, sort, organize, and price bolts, brass fittings, or bearshot. But the lacy confections of ladies' lingerie were her specialty and her weakness. She loved just looking at the latest offering and simply touching the fine, sleek fabrics gave her a cheerful lift. Of course, she had never worn any of it. Mama made up her underclothing in serviceable unbleached cotton. But in her naughty fantasies she could imagine herself in corset covers of delicate lawn and cambric, trimmed with dainty Brussels lace. She would wear pink tinted petticoats with a hundred glace flounces. And beneath it all, French satin pantalettes cut close to conform to the body, not disguise it.
Her thoughts were so pleasantly distracted as she pushed past the curtain-covered doorway into the back room. Then her reality came crashing back. He was there.
Almost as startled to see her as she was to see him, he appeared to fumble for the correct words in English and greeted her in Arabic.
"Sabah elker."
"Good morning," she said.
Her words were less a reply than a reprimand. Her father insisted that Maloof learn English very quickly. The only way to do that was to completely forego speaking in Arabic.
He nodded, not taking offense. "Yes," good morning," he said. "It is good morning, yes?"
"Yes," Muna answered, not quite sure if he meant the words were correct or that he truly appreciated the day.
He was smiling at her. It was a big, broad smile. It was open, friendly and somehow disconcerting. She never knew what he was thinking.
Her parents had told her that he had been sent for. A fine, worthy young man, he was to come to America, join the business and be her bridegroom. His father was a childhood friend of Nafee. Still Baba hadn't accepted him carelessly. He'd taken the train to greet Maloof in Kansas City and had spent a week with the man before he'd struck a bargain and brought him to the Indian Territory to meet his bride.
He had never asked her to wed him. It was all just handled by her father and assumed by everyone that she was well pleased. She was not unpleased. She was not anything, except perhaps confused.
"It is rude to stare," she told him sharply. "You must not stare."
Maloof's brow furrowed curiously. "What is stare?" he asked.
"To look at me so . . . so, to look at me like that," she answered.
Maloof shook his head, puzzled. "How can man be wrong to look at woman so beautiful."
Muna felt her cheeks suffuse with warmth.
"It is right word, yes? You are beautiful."
"I . . . it is an acceptable word, I suppose."
Embarrassed, she turned to the nearest packing crate, already opened, and began to peruse the contents. It contained her favorite goods: ladies' wear. She hardly noticed.
"I think you very beautiful," Maloof said.
Muna glanced nervously around for her father. But he was nowhere near.
"When I am in Tarablos and my father say the daughter of his friend need husband, I am angry. I think, ah poor Maloof, I must wed to loud American woman. She will be old, skinny, and with pig face. I am angry. I am disappointed. I bite my heart and take duty to family." He hesitated a moment and then spoke more softly. "God rewards me. He give me beautiful wife. I am not angry now. Not disappointed."
Gooseflesh skittered along Muna's arms and the back of her neck. His words were halting, disturbing, and somehow enticing. She could not even glance in his direction. Determinedly she put her mind to her task and efficiently sorted the finery in her hands without one thought to the frilly styles or delicacy of the fabrics.
She heard a gasp beside her and suddenly he was right at her elbow.
"What is this?" he asked, picking up a pair of black washing silk drawers trimmed with red ribbon and Valenciennes lace. "I never see so fine thing. The sewing, ah . . . look, it is tiny, perfect."
Muna had been embarrassed before. Now she was horrified as he held the black drawers up for her inspection, and waxed near poetic of their loveliness. Then he looked over at her, smiling, friendly.
"You have like this?" he asked.
"Of course not!" she answered, shocked.
"Beautiful woman should have beautiful things. I buy you," he declared.
"No! Absolutely not!"
"Absolutely yes," he insisted, apparently offended by her response. "I have money. I have money, my own. I can buy. I can buy retail."
Muna was too mortified and dumbfounded to even speak. Fortunately she was saved from the necessity of doing so.
"Maloof!" her father called from the outside doorway. "You must get the rest of the wagon loaded and be on your way."
"Yes, I must go," he agreed respectfully.
It was then that her father apparently noticed what he held in his hand.
"Don't spend your time going through the ladies' wear," Nafee told him. "Muna just adores the pretty things and always takes care of the stock personally."
Maloof gave her one more questioning look before hurrying after her father.
Muna could still fee
l herself blushing; she was jittery and off balance. Surely he hadn't ... he hadn't imagined her wearing the lingerie. When they married he would actually see her in her homesewn drawers. It didn't bear thinking about. But it seemed that she could think of nothing else. This strange, unfathomable man was going to be her husband.
Muna looked up startled as Princess Calhoun swept through the curtain-covered doorway and pulled her into a warm hug.
"Oh Muna, isn't it all so wonderful? Isn't he wonderful."
It was a statement not a question. For an instant Muna was bewildered, thinking her friend spoke of Maloof. Then she recalled vividly catching her in an indiscreet embrace with a stranger. Muna's expression momentarily turned stern and disapproving.
"I don't suppose you are talking about old man Wycoff out on the porch?" she said.
"Oh you!" Princess scolded with exasperation. "I mean Gerald, isn't he so ... so perfect?"
"Well you seem to think so anyway," Muna replied, holding her friend at arm's length and looking at her.
"You don't?"
"I hardly spoke to the fellow," she answered. "He's certainly attractive. And he seems so taken with you."
The dreamy expression on her friend's face turned serious.
"Do you think so?" Princess asked. "Do you really think so?"
Muna shook her head. "It doesn't matter what I think. What do you think?"
"I think ... oh Muna, I more than think." Her tone dropped to nearly a whisper. "I know, I know that I am in love. I am truly in love, at last."
Princess wrapped her arms across her chest as if needing to hold in the feelings of her heart.
"It was just as I thought it would be, Muna, just as I dreamed. I saw him across the distance of the lawn and I knew, I knew instantly that he was the one."
Princess closed her eyes as she pleasurably relived the moment.
"Gerald apparently felt exactly the same," she said with a soft sigh.
"Sometimes our feelings can be deceiving," Muna said, thinking of her own emotional confusion. "I don't think that we can always trust our initial impression of people."
"What? Don't be silly, Muna," she said. "If we can't trust ourselves to know people, what can we trust at all?"
Muna might have replied, nothing. But she held her tongue. She and Princess Calhoun were closer than sisters. They had grown up together in the half dozen oil boom towns between Pennsylvania and Topknot. They shared all and everything and swore to tell each other the truth.
"Oh Muna, it felt exactly as I always knew that it would," she said excitedly. "I love Gerald. I loved him that first minute and I will love him always."
"Oh Prin." Muna sighed.
"I saw him and I knew, I knew instantly."
"How did you know? How could you know?"
Princess laughed and shrugged. "I can't explain it," she admitted. "It was almost otherworldly. I just knew immediately. It was almost as if I recognized him."
"Like you recognized him?"
"Yes . . . but no, not really. In fact he didn't look at all as I expected."
"You were hoping for a blond man with blue eyes?"
"No, not really. I thought . . . well, I thought that he would not be so dreadfully handsome."
Muna nodded. "That's a good choice of words. He is dreadfully handsome."
"You know what I mean. I didn't expect such a man, such an attractive man, to be attracted to me."
"Oh Prin," Muna scolded.
"No Muna," she said determinedly. "If there is one thing I am clear about it is my plainness. To get one's bossy disposition and one's ordinary looks from King Calhoun is not a thing that young ladies would voluntarily line up for."
"You are beautiful on the inside, Prin," Muna insisted. "You have nice eyes and a friendly face."
"But the truth is, Muna, most men under the age of fifty don't even know that there is an inside to women. They know only what they see and that is all they expect or intend to get. But Gerald doesn't feel that way."
Muna sighed heavily. "Are you sure?" she asked.
Princess had been staring wistfully into space and was startled back into the present by her friend's words.
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"Oh Prin," Muna whispered, her voice concerned. "I don't think you should get your heart set on this one."
"What?"
"I'm not sure ..." she hesitated. "I'm not sure, Prin, if he's truly the one for you."
"Why ever would you say that?"
Muna shook her head as if she was hesitant to answer. "I just think that he's . . . he's . . . well Prin, he's very good looking."
Princess laughed. "You say that as if it were a flaw in his character."
"No, no, I didn't mean that," she insisted quickly. "It's just . . . well Prin, if he is such a sophisticated gentlemen, so wealthy, so wonderful a catch, then why hasn't some other woman already got him?"
Princess looked at her friend as if she had lost her mind. "Because he was waiting for me," she said.
"Oh Prin, I just think . . ."
"You just think what?"
"Something about him just doesn't seem right," Muna answered. "I think maybe . . ."
"You think maybe what?"
Princess looked at her friend for a long moment. Muna's expression reflected worry and she bit nervously at her lower lip. Finally she shook her head and shrugged.
"I want you to be happy for me, Muna," Princess said.
"Oh well, I am so happy for you," Muna declared determinedly.
Princess appeared skeptical. "Okay, Muna, what's wrong?" she asked her. "What is it?"
"I am happy for you," Muna managed to get out. "I am so happy for you. I just worry, I suppose. You are so young."
"Young?" Princess was momentarily surprised. "Muna, we are the same age."
"Yes, I know but, but you . . . you still believe in love. You think you are in love."
"I'm in love," Princess said with certainty and then gazed at her friend, puzzled. "What do you mean I believe in love. You've gotten yourself engaged! I can't believe you didn't even tell me. You kept it all a secret and—"
"I'm engaged, yes," Muna interrupted her. "But I'm not in love."
Princess hesitated, disbelieving. "You don't love him?" The question was a whisper.
"I don't even know him," she answered
"Then why . . ."
"He's my father's choice, not mine," Muna admitted. "Baba says that he is dependable and hardworking and that he will take good care of the business and always provide for me."
"But there has to be . . . there has to be love," Princess insisted.
"Baba says that security is more important than sentiment," Muna answered. "And Mama agrees with him. She says we will learn to love each other in time."
"Learn to love each other?" Princess was aghast. "That's not how it works, Muna. You know that. We've talked about this a million times. A person either loves somebody or they don't. You can't choose the right person for marriage and then fall in love with them later."
"I know that's what we always said," Muna agreed. "But then we were just children. We are women now, Prin, and it is not at all what we thought."
"Muna, it is exactly as we thought. Love is a ... an elemental force, like lightning," Princess said. "We never know where it's going to strike, and there is no why. It just happens. The ancients thought of it as Cupid arbitrarily shooting an arrow through the heart. You can't choose when or who. You simply recognize when it happens and then live happily with the results."
Muna shook her head. "I felt nothing when I met Maloof," Muna admitted. "No arrow through my heart. Not even a tug of attraction. Nothing. And I'm sure it was the same for him."
"Then you cannot possibly marry him," Princess stated flatly.
Muna started to protest but Princess held up a hand to silence her.
"Choosing the person you should marry is serious," Princess said. "It is not a game for children. The decision is made sob
erly and with an eye toward the future. But love is an elemental part of it."
"Mama says all our talk about love is just girlish nonsense," Muna told her. "She says that Maloof and I will learn to love each other."
"Well, that shows clearly how little your mother knows," Princess assured her. "People fall in love, they don't learn to love."
Muna was thoughtfully mute for a long moment. "But I have to listen to Mama and Baba," she said. "They think he will be a wonderful husband for me."
"He seems like a nice man, Muna," Princess said firmly. "But I am telling you that if you don't love him you can't marry him."
"Our marriage will be based on mutual respect and understanding," Muna said. "Mama says that is much more important than love."
Princess looked at her sternly. "Do you believe that?"
"I don't know what I believe, Prin," Muna told her. "What I don't believe is that a man who never met you or talked to you can see you across the lawn and fall in love with you forevermore."
"That's a good deal more likely than marrying a man you don't love and learning to love him later," Princess said.
"I don't love Maloof Bashara," Muna told her. "But I do love my Mama and Baba. They love me and they trust him."
"But he doesn't love you," Princess pointed out.
"No," she said. "He doesn't. He is not pretending something he doesn't feel; he is honest with me so I'm going to marry him."
"What do you really even know about this man?" Princess asked.
"What do you know about this stranger you are going to marry?" Muna shot back. "I know that he's come all the way from Tarablos, half a world away to marry me. I know that his father and mine have been friends from boyhood. I know that Baba is making him a partner in the business. And I know that he wants the best for me. I know that he thinks ... he thinks God has rewarded him by giving him to me."
"Oh, Muna," Princess said to her quietly. "You just can't marry this man if you don't love him."
"I can, Prin, and I will," she said firmly. "I know you enjoy telling me what to do, but this time I must decide for myself."
"We've talked about this so much," Princess continued. "We've giggled and daydreamed and speculated about how we would meet the man we were to love. How we would see him and know him."
