It was in a little lath-and-plaster house down by the river that it
all happened. The veriest confection of a house, looking for all the
world as if it were a Neapolitan ice. Strawberry and vanilla in
alternate stripes, with shuttered windows of coffee, and a furled
wafer of an awning over the filagree chocolate balcony. And it rested,
so to speak, against a platter of green plantain-leaves, bright as any
emerald. No doubt the trees belonging to the leaves grew somewhere to
the back or the side of it, but from the wide street in front you
could see nothing but the green leaves surrounding the ice-cream.
For the rest it was a three-storeyed house outwardly; inwardly a
two-storeyed one; or to be strictly accurate, it consisted of a storey
and a half, since the further half of the ground floor and the whole
of the middle storey belonged to a different house, having a different
entrance in a different street, which lay in a different quarter. A
very respectable quarter indeed, whereas the less said about the
morals of the wide street down by the river the better. They were so
bad that the modesty of the middle storey did not permit of a single
window whence they could be seen. And this gave the house a queer,
half-hearted look, for the top storey, and that half of the lowest one
which belonged to it, were full of windows and doors opening on to the
broad path leading to destruction. There were five, with fretted
wooden architraves filling up the whole of the ground floor, so that
you could see straight into the long, shallow hall whence there was no
exit save by a narrow slit in the middle, showing a dim, steep
staircase. It was always empty, this hall, though it was carpeted with
striped carpets, and painted elaborately in flowery arabesques of a
dull, pale, pink and flaming crimson; an odd mixture reminding you
vaguely of bloodstains on a rose-leaf. And there was a red lamp over
the centre door, which sent a rosy redness into the growing dusk; for
it was lit early.
So was the pale--the palest of green lights--on the top storey which
you could see swinging from the roof when the coffee-ice shutters were
thrown back as the evening breeze came down the river. It was pale,
yet bright like the first star at sunsetting.
And sometimes, but not often, if you watched in the early dusk you
might see the owner of the ice-cream house flit across the open
window. She was like a sugar-drop herself, rose or saffron decked with
silver leaf, a slender scrap of a creature who tinkled as she walked
and gave out a perfume of heavy scented flowers. But this was seldom;
more often you only heard the tinkle, either of silver or laughter,
since Burfani--for that was her name--was of those who barter the one
for the other. It was in truth her hereditary trade, though neither
her father nor her mother had practised it; their role in life having
been that of pater and mater-familias. A very necessary one if the
race is to survive, and so in this generation, also, her brother had
undertaken the duty of marrying his first cousin. The young couple
being now, in the privacy and propriety of the second storey, engaged
in bringing up a fine family of girls to succeed to the top storey
when Burfani's age should drive her to a lower place in life. In the
meantime, however, she allowed them so much a month; enough to enable
idle Zulfkar to fight quail in the bazaars and keep his wife Lazizan
in the very strictest seclusion--as befitted one filched from the
profession of bartering smiles in order to fulfil the first duty of a
woman--the rearing of babes.
Thus, in more ways than one, the house was conglomerate. On the side
overlooking the broad path there was the stained rose-leaf hall,
empty, swept, and garnished, and the dark stair leading up and up to
the wandering star of a lamp twinkling out into the sunset amid the
sound of laughter and money. On the side giving upon narrow
respectability a hall full of household gear and dirt where the little
girls played, and a dark stair leading to a darker room where Lazizan
sat day after day bewailing her sad fate; for, of course, life would
have been much gayer over the way, since she was a beautiful woman.
Far more beautiful in a lavish, somewhat loud fashion, than the lady
belonging to the ice-cream house with her delicate, small face; but
that was the very reason why she had been chosen out from many to
carry on the race as it ought to be carried on. Burfani, of course,
was clever, and that counted for much, but it never did in their
profession to rely on brains above looks. Nevertheless Lazizan, when
in a bad temper, was in the habit of telling herself that if she had
been taught to sing and dance, as the little lady had been taught, she
could have made the ice-cream house a more paying concern than it
was--to judge by the pittance they received from it! And this angry
complaint grew with her years until as she sat suckling her fourth
child, she felt sometimes as if she could strangle it, even though it
was a boy, and though as a rule she was an affectionate mother. In
truth the sheer animal instinct natural to so finely developed a
creature lasted out the two or three years during which her children
were hers alone; after that, when they began crawling downstairs and
playing in the hall where she might never go, she became jealous and
then forgot all about them.
Nevertheless, the boy being only some nine months old when he was
suddenly carried off by one of those mysterious diseases common to
Indian children, she wept profusely, and told Burfani--who, as in duty
bound, came round decently swathed in a _burka_ to offer condolence on
hearing of the sad event--that some childless one had doubtless cast a
shadow on him for his beauty's sake, seeing that--thank Heaven!--all
her children were beautiful. There was always a militant flavour
underlying the politeness of these two, and even the presence of the
quaint little overdressed dead baby awaiting its bier on the bed did
not prevent attack and defence.
"They favour thee, sister," replied Burfani, suavely. "In mind also,
to judge from what I see. Therefore I shall await God's will in the
future ere I choose one to educate."
Lazizan tittered sarcastically, despite her half-dried tears.
"'Tis my choice first, nevertheless. The best of this bunch in
looks--ay, in brains too, perchance--marries my brother's son,
according to custom. Sure my mother chose thus, and I must do the
same, sister."
She spoke evenly, though for the moment the longing to strangle
something had transferred itself to the saffron-coloured sugar-drop
all spangled with silver which had emerged from its chrysalis of a
_burka_. What business had the poor thin creature with such garments
when _her_ beauty was hidden by mere rags?
Burfani laughed in her turn; an easy, indifferent laugh, and stretched
out her slim henna-dyed palm with the usual friendly offering of
cardamoms.
"Take one, sister," she said soothingly, "they are good for spleen and
excessive grief. _Hai! Hai!_ thou wilt be forlorn, indeed, now thy
occupation is gone."
Lazizan, with her mouth full of spices, tittered again more
artificially than ever. "I can do other things, perchance, beside
suckle babes. Maybe I weary of it, and am glad of a change."
The saffron-coloured sugar-drop, seated on a low stool in front of the
white-sheeted bed with its solemn little gaily-dressed burden, looked
at its companion distastefully through its long lashes, and the
slender, henna-dyed hand, catching some loops of the jasmine chaplets
it wore, held them like a bouquet close to the crimson-tinted lips.
"It is a virtuous task, my sister," quoth Burfani, gravely sniffing
away at the heavy perfume, as if she needed something to make her
environment less objectionable. "Besides, it is ever a mistake to
forsake the profession of one's birth--"
"And wherefore should I?" interrupted Lazizan, seizing her opportunity
recklessly. "Hast thou forsaken it, and are we not sisters?"
Again a cold, critical look of dislike came from the long, narrow eyes
with their drowsy lids.
"Such words are idle, sister. Forget them. Thou wouldst not find it
easier--"
"How canst tell?" interrupted Lazizan once more. "As well say that
thou couldst put up with my life."
The saffron and silver daintiness shifted its look towards the bed,
and the henna-dyed hand straightened a wrinkle in the sheet softly.
"God knows!" she said with a sudden smile. "Anyhow, sister, 'tis not
wise to change one's profession as one grows old."
As one grows old! This parting shot rankled long after the decent
_burka_ had slipped like a shadow through the swept and garnished
hall, and so up the dark stairs to the wandering starlight shining
feebly out into the sunset; long after the preacher and the bier, and
the family friends had carried the gaily-dressed baby to its grave,
leaving the mother to the select and secluded tears of her neighbours;
long after the little girls, wearied out with excitement, had fallen
asleep cuddled together peacefully, innocent of that choice in the
future; long after Zulfkar, full of liquor, tears, and curses, due to
a surplusage in the funeral expenses allowed by Burfani, to parental
grief, and to bad luck at cards, came home, desirous of sympathy. He
got none, for Lazizan, despite her seclusion, had never lost the
empire which he felt she deserved as the handsomest woman he knew.
'Twas his own fault, she said curtly; he could marry another wife,
have more liquor, and gamble as much as he liked if he chose. It was
but a question of money, and if he were content to put up with
beggarly alms from his sister, that ended the matter.
Whereupon, being in the maudlin stage of drink, he wept still more.
It must have been fully three months after the baby's funeral
procession had gone down the respectable street, and so by a side
alley found its way into the broad path leading alike to destruction
and the graveyard, that Burfani went round to her sister-in-law's
again. This time she was in pink and silver, like a rose-water ice,
and her words were cold as her looks.
"Say what thou wilt, Lazizan, the youth lingers. Have I not windows to
my house? Have I not eyes? And such things shall not be bringing
disgrace to respectable families."
Lazizan tittered as usual: "Lo! what a coil, because an idle stranger
lingers at the back instead of the front, 'Tis for thy sake doubtless,
sister, though thou art unkind. I wonder at it, seeing he is not
ill-favoured."
"So thou _hast_ seen him! So be it. See him no more, or I tell
Zulfkar."
"Tell him what? That thou hast cast eyes on a handsome stranger, and
because he comes not to thy call wouldst fasten the quarrel upon me?
Zulfkar is no fool, sister, he will not listen!"
"If he listen not, he can leave my house--for 'tis mine. And mark my
words, Lazizan Bibi, no scandal comes nigh it."
Caesar's wife could not have spoken with greater unction, and in good
sooth she meant her words, since in no class is seclusion bound to be
more virtuous than in that to which Burfani belonged.
So, as the motes in the sunbeam of life danced along the broad path in
front of the ice-cream house, and drifted up its dark stair, the
painted and perfumed little lady under the pale green lamp kept an eye
upon the virtue of her family. Thus ere long it came to be Zulfkar's
turn to listen to his sister's warning, and as he listened he sucked
fiercely, confusedly, at the inlaid hookah which stood for the use of
approved visitors; for in good sooth there had been more money to
spend of late, and Lazizan was discreet enough save to those watchful,
experienced eyes. The sound of his hubblings and bubblings therefore
was his only answer, and they filled the wide, low, white-plastered
upper storey, frescoed round each coffee-shuttered window with flowery
devices, until Burfani lost patience, and began coldly:
"Hast been taking lessons of a camel, brother?" she asked, rustling
the tinsel-decked fan she held; and then suddenly she seemed to grasp
something, and the contemptuous indifference of her bearing changed to
passionate anger. Her silver-set feet clashed as they touched the
floor, and she rose first to a sitting posture, finally to stand
before the culprit, the very personification of righteous wrath.
"So! thou hast taken gold! This is why thou canst ruffle with the best
at Gulabun's--base-born parvenu who takes to the life out of
wickedness--as _she_ hath done, bringing disgrace to the screened
house where thy mother dwelt in decency. But thou dwellest there no
longer--thou eatest no bread of mine--I will choose my pupil from
another brood."
"Nay, sister, 'tis not proved," stammered Zulfkar.
"Not proved!" she went on still more passionately. "Nay, 'tis not
proved to thy neighbours, maybe, but to me? Mine eyes have seen--I
know the trick--and out thou goest. I will have no such doings in my
house, and so I warned her months ago. But there! what need for
railing? Live on her gold an thou wiliest, it shall not chink beside
mine."
She sank back upon the silk coverlet again, and with a bitter laugh
began to rustle the tinsel fan once more. And Zulfkar, after
unavailing protests, slunk down the dark stairs, and so along the
street to a certain house over the liquor-seller's shop, about which a
noisy crowd gathered all day long.
And that night screams and blows came from the second storey, and
unavailing curses on the mischief-maker. But if the latter heard them,
she gave no sign to the approved visitors drinking sherbets in the
cool upper storey with the windows set wide to the stars.
It was Zulfkar beating his wife, of course, because she was so
handsome primarily; secondly, because she had been foolish enough to
be found out; thirdly, because even in liquor he was sharp enough to
recognise that Burfani would keep her word.
And she did. The supplies stopped from that day. Within a week the
second storey lay empty, while Lazizan wept tears of pain and spite in
a miserable little lodging in the very heart of the city. It is
difficult even to hint at the impotent rage the woman felt towards her
sister-in-law. Even Zulfkar's blows were forgotten in the one mad
longing to revenge herself upon the pink-and-saffron daintiness which
would not spare one crumb from a full table. For so to Lazizan's
coarse, passionate nature the matter presented itself, bringing with
it a fierce delight at the perfections of her own lover. He had
deserted her for the time, it is true, but that was the way of lovers
when husbands were angry; by-and-by he would come back, and there
would be peace, since Zulfkar must have gold.
So ran her calculations; but she reckoned without a certain fierce
intolerance which the latter shared with his sister; also somewhat
prematurely on an immediate emptying of his pockets. But luck was not
all against him; the cards favoured him. And so, when a few days after
the flitting from the second storey, she, being sick to death of
dulness, thought the time had come for self-assertion, she found
herself mistaken. Zulfkar, still full of Dutch courage, fell upon her
again, and beat her most unmercifully, finishing up with an
intimidatory slash at her nose. It was not much, not half so serious
as the beating, but the very thought of possible disfigurement drove
her mad, and the madness drove her to a corner where she could plan
revenge while Zulfkar slept heavily--for he was more than half drunk.
And _this_, too, was the fault of the saffron-and-rose devil in the
upper storey, who had her amusement and spied upon other women's ways.
And _this_ meant days more ere she, Lazizan, would be presentable,
even if she did not carry the mark to her grave, and all because that
she-devil was jealous--jealous of _her_ lover!
Oh for revenge! And why not? The door was unlatched, since Zulfkar had
forgotten it in his anger; the streets were deserted. Even the broad
path down by the river would be asleep, the green light gone from
above, only the red lamp swinging over the outer door, sending a
glow.... Fire! The thought leapt to her brain like a flame itself. Why
not? Zulfkar had purposely kept--all unbeknown to the she-devil--a
second key to that empty second floor, and he was in a drunken sleep.
If she stole it--if she took the bottle of paraffin--if she set fire
to the wooden partition separating the stairs--if she broke the red
lamp and pretended that was it--
She did not stop to think. She had begun the task almost before she
had thought out the details, and was fumbling in Zulfkar's pockets as
he lay. And there were two bottles of paraffin in the corner; that was
because he had brought one home, and the market-woman another by
mistake. So much the better, so much the bigger blaze. Then out into
the street, not forgetting a box of safety matches--strange companions
to such a task. She knew her way well, having wandered free enough as
a child before the lot was drawn, the die cast which sent her to
suckle babes. Yet, being a woman beset by a thousand superstitious
fears, it needed all her courage ere she found herself face to face
with the thin wooden partition surrounding the steep stair leading
upwards. How many times had she not listened to feet ascending those
unseen stairs, and heard the tinkle of laughter as the unseen door
above opened?
Well, it would blaze finely, and cut off at once all means of escape.
A devilish plan indeed, and the leaping flames, ere she left them to
their task, showed the face of a fiend incarnate.
And so to wait for the few minutes before the whole world must
know that the saffron and the rose daintiness was doomed. No more
laughter--no more lovers--that would be for her, Lazizan, not for the
other with her cold sneers.
A licking tongue of flame showed for an instant and made her pray
Heaven none might see it too soon. Then a crackle, a puff of smoke,
next a cry of fire, but, thank Heaven, only from the broad path. And
what good were the running feet, what good the shouts of the crowd in
which her shrouded figure passed unnoticed, unless the upper storey
had wings? For the stairs must be gone--hopelessly gone--by this time.
More than the stairs, for with one sudden blaze the lath-and-plaster
house seemed to melt like ice itself before the sheet of flame which
the soft night wind bent riverwards.
And still the top storey slept, or was it suffocated? No! there was
some one at the window--some one gesticulating wildly. A man--not a
woman.
"Throw yourself down!" cried an authoritative foreign voice, "'tis
your only chance."
Surely, since the ice melted visibly during the sudden hush which fell
upon the jostling crowd.
"Throw yourself down!" came the order again; "we'll catch you if we
can. Stand back, good people."
"Quick! it's your last chance," came the inexorable voice once more.
Then there was a leap, a scream--a crash, as in his despair the man
overleapt the mark and fell among the parting crowd. Fell right at
Lazizan's feet face uppermost.
And it was the face of the handsome stranger--of her lover.
Her shriek echoed his as she flung herself beside him. And at the
sound something white and ghostlike slipped back from the window with
a tinkle of laughter.
"Burfani! Burfani!" shouted the crowd. "Drop gently--we'll save you!
Burfani! Burfani!"
But there was no answer; and the next moment with a roar and a crash
Vice fell upon Virtue, and both together upon the swept and garnished
hall and the hall where the little girls had played.
The ice-cream house had become a blazing pile of fire.