Behind the Purdah

I

A straggling building with a spiked gateway, sadly out of repair, and needing manipulation in the opening, as it led through a bare courtyard to a portico that did its best to be imposing,—such was your introduction to the royalty of Balsingh Rai, of an Indian principality. And if indeed the iron and mortar had failed to impress you, there was always the chance that the ill-dressed, ill-drilled guard would excite what was lacking in sentiment.

But there was time for a regular series of impressions to lounge through your unoccupied mind. The opium-eating courtiers around his magnificent Highness believed in admitting you to the presence in—detachments. The more abject you felt, the more likely was it that you would appreciate their pinchbeck glories; and you sat on, in the darbar vehicle, the two lean horses foaming with the drive from the guest-house, under the weight of a not too modern chariot and a harness patched up with strips of soiled rag or old packing-cord.

Along the unwashed stone verandahs were disposed darzis (tailors) of varying capacity. Their overseer sat holding some cheap Manchester print between the toes of his right foot, the while he clicked the unerring steel of the workman whose craft had come to him, like his existence, from his immediate antecedents. Curious garments they were which he cut—loose, shapeless coats with tight interminable sleeves; and he threw them now to this, now to that subordinate, who whipped a long piece of cotton off a small white ball, and requisitioned both toes and fingers while he helped the creation of the coats through the next stage—in preparation for the large important man at the sewing-machine. Yes! a veritable sewing-machine it was, and the colony and the state were rightly proud of it.

Before you look further, you should note the way the men work. ’Tis non-Western, topsy-turvy, the needle pulled away from you, and travelling therefore, from left to right of the seam, instead of vice versa. In a group by themselves sit the gold and silver embroiderers—lean men with keen faces and bent backs. They sit on the floor cross-legged, and the most beautiful designs grow under circumstances and with the aid of implements primitive in simplicity. Beside each worker lies the bullion (gold and silver in tiny spangles or delicate wire lengths) in some rough receptacle an old newspaper, perhaps, or the contents of your waste-paper basket. The design is chalked out on the velvet or satin; and he sews the bullion on to this, running the sharpest of needles through the wire, which he has first snipped to the size required. The manipulation of that mass of glittering gold and silver becomes fascinating,—But here is Chunelal the herald. Miss Rebecca Yeastman, the lady-doctor, through whose sun-spectacles we have been looking, is summoned to the darbar-room.

Tall is Miss Rebecca, and spare, and angular. As she alights, her chatelaine jingles ominously. Have you ever noticed how much personality there is in a jingle? There is the cheerful jingle of the maiden of seventeen—an inviting tintinnabulation, saying, “I am coming, play with me, laugh with me, waste as many precious minutes as you dare!” There is the decided resonant clash of the elderly matron: “I have come,” it says, “to set things straight;”—don’t you hear the sound? Then, lastly, there is the mean between the two—the confident, active jingle of the woman of business, not enticing, but yet not jarring, just pleasantly negative. “I know not what your work may be, but I’ve come to do mine, and to do it well;” and at the sound all idlers despise themselves, and slink into unseen corners.

In India there is a further jingle, the jingle of the domestic—“rings on her fingers, bells on her toes;” but her ditty is, “This is my bank! my bank! In this showy, noisy form I carry my savings.”

Rebecca Yeastman was of the third category, and the tailors did instinctively sit the more upright as she passed them, while sleepy Hari in the corner rubbed his eyes, and cracked his toes, and fell vigorously to his tacking.

Not a whit bashful was she, as she followed her guide up the marble staircase; the outlook was improving, but her environment very seldom affects a woman of Rebecca’s calibre. For so self-possessed, brisk a person, her walk was a surprise; ’twas rather like a camel’s, head protruding, steps long and halting—but it did, nevertheless, suggest dogged steadfastness of purpose; and she was a thoroughly good creature, every faculty of her, of that you might be certain.

“Lady sahib will wait here,” said the man. “Ranee sahib have not yet had permission to receive. Rajah sahib has the white mark on his forehead, will not finish the service of the holy Vishnu for an hour or more. No one will disturb the lady.”

An hour or more! The practical soul of the woman of business abhorred the long vacuity; however, she had resources within possible reach. From a capacious pocket she produced some feminine filigree occupation, and ran the ivory bobbin in and out under the vigilant pince-nez.

Presently it occurred to her that it might be as well to put together her impressions of the room. A comprehensive glance sufficed. “Plush and broken crockery!” she said, with her characteristic grunt, and as her eyes wandered back to the bobbin, she intercepted the steady scrutiny of a pair of black eyes. They were not by any means a nice pair of eyes—long, narrow, a little quizzical, wholly wily and untrustworthy, hall-marked spy! Rebecca Yeastman was certainly not sensitive, or she would have realized earlier that behind almost every curtain lurked some such watcher, soft-footed, noiseless, wakeful. However, this particular inspection in no way disconcerted her—neither annoyance nor curiosity, even of the most fleeting, varied the immobility of her face; and, though she knew it not, it was to this fact that she owed the termination of her vigil. The old harridan, who directed affairs behind the purdah, carried back a favourable verdict. “She’ll do,” she said. “She’s as ugly as the toad which croaks in the pond yonder; and she can keep a secret, or may the Gods forever still my lying tongue!”

It was this old woman, Parbathi herself, who went back for her; and she led her through such dark, intentionally devious passages, that Rebecca, though excellent at locality, could never tell whether or not the room she finally entered was in the same building as the one she had left.

The sight which greeted her was sufficiently new and engrossing. The room was large and square with windows too high for purposes of outlook, and closely barred against all use as ventilators. On the floor was a gaudy Western carpet, stamped, literally as well as intrinsically, as cheap German merchandise. In the centre of the room stood a high silver bedstead, hung with opaque curtains, which were evidently not intended as security against mosquitoes, for those musical creatures buzzed among the heavy folds with appreciative contentment. On the floor sat women of varying ages, some shaven and without ornament, others caparisoned gaily enough, all in the rich dark reds and blues of the Kathiawad saree. They were moving their bodies to and fro to a monotonous Gregorian wail, which did not cease for the entrance of the intruder. Parbathi pointed to the bed, and Rebecca approached, being constrained to submit for lack of language, else her initiatory activities would certainly have been devoted to the extrusion of the noise and the introduction of some fresh air.

When her eyes had adapted themselves to the want of light, what she saw in no way alarmed her medical instincts. Among tumbled bedclothes, rich silks, and cheap cotton sheets, lay, folly dressed and bejewelled, a smug, sleek, decently featured Indian lady. Her skin was beautifully smooth, and under her lashes were the accustomed artificial shadows, the material absit omen of the nation. One plump hand lay lazily across the clothes, and you saw that the nails were well-kept and dyed with the brilliant menhdi; the other hand grasped pettishly the short thick throat.

“Bilious!” said Rebecca. Parbathi did not understand, but she saw that the doctor was not impressed by the heinousness of the disease, and she poured out volleys of jargon, waving her hands in wild gesticulation. Then, growing helpless at the sight of Rebecca’s calm and sane proceedings,—the matter-of-fact feeling of the pulse, the unceremonious lift of the eye-lid, the business-like production of tablet and pencil for the composition of a suitable tonic—it dawned on her that a communicating tongue was what she wanted; and she darted out to secure old Prabhu Das, the domestic secretary, and the one male, save the Rajah, who was allowed access to this end of the palace. Prabhu Das was just behind the door, watching, and was therefore soon produced. He was a spare, fleshless Hindu, clad in flowing robes over which he wore a long white coat. On his head was a slight black cap, from out which had escaped the wiry grey top-knot, the sign occipital of his Brahminism; and as he bowed and genuflected to the lady, this odd little termination bobbed in the most ludicrous way against the rest of his clean-shaven head. For you must know that Brahmins grow a capillary oasis there alone, where most Westerners are innutritive in old age.

“Your honour,” he said, “your Monstrosity, your Magniloquence, learned in the English Aesculapianisms! in this poor house we, prince of the people, are your dusty slaves!”

Here he paused, to leer deprecatingly and express facially his grovelling obsequiousness.

“Humph!” said Rebecca “you know English, I suppose? Well then, this lady has nothing the matter with her which cannot be cured by bestirring herself. She is bilious—that is all—the rest is imagination. Here is a tonic, and I have also noted directions as to diet, air, and exercise. These windows ought to be open, and ah these howling women turned out. Do you hear?”

Prabhu Das was the most delightful pantomime possible. There he stood, slightly inclining forward, his hands clasped in agonized supplication, his eyes blinking twenty to the second, and at every few words spoken he jerked his head towards the doctor, opening his mouth in a gape which was meant to convey a combination of assent and astonishment. Then he spoke; the occasion was serious, and his speech matched it.

“Lady not diagnosticate good, right way. Ranee sahib not bile; ranee sahib poison. You see, old Mother Thakrani wear widow’s cloth. She cobra-minded, breeze in her brain. She make poison ready. Cook sweetmeats—in sweetmeats hide poison. Ranee eat sweetmeat, now sick, to-morrow die. Rajah sahib carry her on litter, make her ashes. Mother Thakrani too much wicked. Doctor-lady give certificate, write Ranee sahib die poison.”

He gasped, exhausted with such direct speaking, for his mind was tortuous.

“Nonsense!” was the retort. “The lady is no more poisoned than I am when I eat too much dinner.” But Prabhu Das’s next move was more practical. The doctor was presented with a quantity of food, alleged to have been eaten by the Ranee. Neatly bottled was it, and sealed in accordance with local police instructions on the subject—what an amount of study those rules had cost the old man!—And, albeit denying any connection between the food and the royal lady, Rebecca promised to investigate and report the next day. She chuckled gleefully as she carried off her prize; poisons were her special subject, and she had hardly dared to hope that an introduction to the Indian type would be made thus early in her career. The report she wrote before she slept, in the large chandelier-lighted drawing-room of the guest-house.

It was brief enough; the food contained poison sufficient to have extinguished instantly the entire nine lives of the most vital cat. She added an unsolicited rider on the impossibility of the Ranee’s having partaken of this confection, and of the equal absurdity of connecting the thakrani with the deep-laid scheme of which she was suspected.

But the perspicuity of her arguments appealed not to the Darbar. There was poison in the food—so much was certain; therefore the old thakrani (who had not even the most remote connection with the royal kitchen) must be treated as a criminal at the domestic tribunal.

II

Not far from Gower Street station, in a comparatively quiet corner of the city of London, stands a great block of modern red brick. You are back again in the haunts of civilization now, and you press the button to summon the accustomed porter. He comes promptly, and you follow him up a flight of steps, which beam upon you in the unmistakable cleanliness of English soap and water.

“Miss Marion Mainwaring? This way, No. 17,”—says the stout custodian of the Women Students’ Chambers, Chenies Street; and he retires with a salute, leaving you to your own resources.

It certainly does look like a student’s room, and a woman’s—this! Prints of Rubens and Nicolas Poussin, of Cuyp and William Hunt, of Burne-Jones and Rossetti, Madonnas and bacchanal orgies, Dutch sunsets and beggar-boys, hang, in impartial selection and appropriate setting, against the Morris-papered walls. One end of the room is lined with deep-browed tomes, of a scientific and medical aspect; a writing-table in the spacious bow-window betrays an air of recent requisition; softly cushioned lounges invite to unstudious repose; within easy reach are picture-papers and the latest poem. The mantelpiece is laden with the pretty yellow jonquil; and a copper kettle is just beginning to simmer on the pleasantly crackling fire, beside which sits the tall, dark, strong-featured owner of these varied tastes. She reads sheets of closely written foreign paper, and you,—you creep behind her and look over her shoulder.

I

Kathiawad, November 1896

Well, Marion, for all brainless unjust atrocities, commend me to sleek globulous Rajahs of Indian principalities! You will remember the story of the poisoned comfits, and how excited I was at the possibility of investigating an Indian poison so early in my life here? I had such visions of collecting useful data for the old octopian in the dear laboratory round which my affections still hover. But, alack, my pride is turned to remorse! The immediate result of my report is that they suspect a poor old widowed ex-queen of an attempt to poison one of her grandson’s wives; and she is expelled the palace, bereft of all that might, by any possibility, help her to keep herself in fairly decent comfort elsewhere. I expect the fact was that the young Ranees disliked the old one, and plotted this device for ridding themselves of her supervision. They tell me she has taken refuge in the house of a former maid, and I mean to go and see her, and hear more of her history.

No! I have not plagued myself with vain regrets, as you’d have done; not, at least, after a quiet sane consideration of the matter. Why should I prick my fingers with the thorns which other people gather? You will know, however, that I did not omit my best persuasions with the prince, useless as I could not help feeling that they were, at the time. Meanwhile to me, personally, the Rajah has been kindness itself. This is only a moderately sized state, and it is not very remarkable for natural or artificial charms.

The country round about is cotton-picking and flat. I rather liked seeing the small sparely clad children (wearing nought but their hair, you know), helping their mothers pick cotton under the bright Indian skies.

But the cotton factories, with their tall unpicturesque chimneys, are an unpleasantly civilized suggestion. Among the arrangements planned for my amusement was a play by a strolling company. The palace has a theatre, but the night was so sultry that the performance transferred itself to an impromptu stage out in the open. It was a strange unforgettable sight, lighted as it was by flaming torches, burning weirdly under the glowering sky. In the foreground sat the Rajah on his gemmed throne, richly jewelled and gaily robed; behind was a throng of fierce black-mustachioed attendants, and closing up round the royal personage an impenetrable guard. Even among his own people he is not safe. They say that at night he sleeps, literally, under drawn swords, two particularly trusty servitors keeping guard, like angels with extended wings, at the head of his bed.

The stage arrangements were rough enough, and the play was, in parts I am told, quite impossible; but ignorance of the language stood me instead of an expurgated edition. It was a pantomimic skit on the administration of justice by the young civilian. A florid Englishman (the mask was really good) sits at a camp-table, holding his migratory court upon a criminal charged with murdering his wife. As he does not yet know the language, he works through an interpreter.

Magistrate. How old was your wife?

Criminal. Ten years.

Interpreter. (fearing that the minority of the victim might heighten the heinousness of the crime, to a civilized mind.) He says, sir, she was an old woman, of some sixty-five years.

Magistrate. An old woman! Where’s the corpse?

Interpreter. Now burnt, some twelve months since your Honour’s last visit to this Zillah. Prisoner keeping in gaol all the time. But ashes in Prisoner’s wallet. Your Honour Inspect?

Magistrate. How old is the Prisoner?

Criminal. Twenty-five years.

Interpreter. (Interpreting again to fit his own ideas of what is best.) Prisoner same age as late corpse, your Honour, but looking very young. Vishnu—God, salt preserve his life.

Magistrate. (Whose eyes are opened by this blatant falsehood.) Hang the man,—to-morrow, five a.m.!

The moral of it all seems to be, when you do stoop to lying, take care that the lies have at least some semblance of plausibility.

The second half of the evening was devoted to conjuring tricks, at which local jugglers are really wonderful. I hear that these jugglers are a caste by themselves, and are a most interesting people, clannish and unapproachable.

To their own caste they are exceedingly kind. A juggler’s portionless widow becomes the care of the whole community, his daughters are married at their joint expense, and his sons are taught the trade by the cleverest juggler among them. As a result, the woman is oftenest in best case when widowed. Is it not strange that this should happen in the country where widowhood has always been shown us in the saddest colours? Truly is this a land of anomalies?

But to return: a custom which you would have enjoyed was the evening lamp-lighting. When the sun drops, the torch-bearers congregate at the palace gates, and run in a body, bearing flaring pines in their hands, to salute, at the chief entrance to the palace, the reigning king. He is called by all the titles which his country and the empress bestow upon him, and by all the high-sounding flatteries which the Eastern tongue and loyal subjects can devise. Then the chief torch-bearer lights the lamps in the entrance-hall, till which is done not a single spark must relieve the darkness of the palace. Should there be a prince living in his own separate residence, the ceremony is repeated for him; the same burning pine being carried to light the filial abode! It was all so strange and Oriental, I think it is one of my nicest memories of this place.

I hear that I may visit the old thakrani to-morrow, so you shall have news of her when next I write.

P.S.—What do the ladies do all day, you ask? Quarrel? No, they are too lethargic for any such activity. Most of them turn over and fondle their lovely jewels and silk garments. One Ranee has taken a violent passion for the harmonium. She has dozens of them in all sizes, and by all makers, but refuses to be taught how to handle the instrument in the conventional way. As she is energetic about playing (with one finger and both pedals going furiously!), you can imagine the consequence. I no longer wonder that about half a mile divides the king’s apartments from the zenana.

II

Kathiawad, December 1896

Oh, my dear Marion, such a hovel it is which houses the poor old thakrani! A great gateway, built for offence and defence does indeed frown threateningly at the public road, and is officered by a custodian equally forbidding and imposing. But, oh! the sordid poverty behind the wicket! Two small rooms are all the house contains. In one live the maid and her family, all devoted to the thakrani, and counting themselves happy to be serving her; the other is at the thakrani’s own disposal, but she lives mostly on the little verandah. Here I found her, dressed in a spotless white cloth, seated on the floor, poring with the bedimmed vision of her eighty-four years, over an illumined Sanskrit text. The little gray squirrels ran about her unabashed, hiding in the folds of her draperies, and perching on her shoulder,—a striking contrast! But, ugh!—the mice ran about too, equally privileged, and you will understand how apprehensive these made me feel. In the yard just beyond are tethered the great unsightly buffaloes, and the dwarfed Indian cows, which provide not only the chief food, but also the only income of the small household. The incarnate pathos of it rises to your mind as you look at the old woman. I wish one could help her. She takes things with a large equanimity, however, saying, as they all say in this country, “It is my fate!”

Her jewels have long since been transmuted into coin, one beautiful uncut diamond alone remaining. Should nothing else happen to help her, she will use this to accomplish the final journey of her life. It is such an odd idea. When she feels death near (her horoscope will date the feeling), she will start, however feeble, on a pilgrimage to the sacred Ganges, which is many hundred miles distant from this place. She will take with her the ashes of her son and daughter, having vowed that these should mingle with the sacred fluid.

“If I reach the Ganges,” she explained, “after throwing in these two little bags, and saying the necessary prayers, I will lay me down on the bank and die. Sabibree, my faithful maid, will see that all that is necessary is done for my poor frame. This alone is now my care in life.”

Of the Rajah she speaks with reluctance. Yet she did tell me how he wrested from her all her possessions, and indeed he still withholds her allowance, month by month, as it falls due, but she is quite sure that, with the gods, there will be retribution for him, and she wastes no human vengeance.

Her ejection from the palace must have been picturesque. It was intended that this should be a final translation; and to this end, with some show of an attempt at reconciliation, was sent her the loveliest of garments. But the old maid, skilled in the poisons of native States, warned her, only just in time, that to wear it would be to prepare her body against cremation. I have a piece of it now, a valued possession. Failing fraud, they had recourse to force. Imagine it all! The breathless, dark night; the swift stealthy steps of the harridan, as she comes to bind her victim, preventing all possible outcry by a tent-peg wedged in between the poor, toothless jaws; the noiseless race (tyranny against helplessness!) through the deserted streets; the secretive palanquin revealing nothing concerning its burden—and, finally the ruthless desertion outside the city gates!

Here she would have fared very badly indeed, but that a kind-hearted palanquin-bearer had given up his place at the poles to the ubiquitous maid, who took her to the house where I found her. . . And to think that all this time the Rajah was entertaining me, to lull my suspicions and keep me off inquiry! I am an oaf, and could weep with vexation!

III

Kathiawad, May 1897

Do you remember the old thakrani, and her pitiful story? I have just heard that a few months after I said good-bye to her, she felt the death-call and went her pilgrimage. Her vitality lasted the distance of the sacred river, and she omitted nothing of all she had vowed. But that was a week ago, and she lies in a trance now, on the treeless sand-banks, responsive to neither the fierce sun by day, nor the brilliant stars by night. Can’t you see it all? And the eternal river flows by, cold, majestic, unheeding!