That evening at sundown the two girls sat huddled up by the latticed window of the outer vestibule, while Mytâb watched at the door of the men's court which, with that of the women's apartments, opened into this shadowy entrance. By putting their eyes close to the fret-work they could see up and down a narrow alley where a central drain, full of black sewage, usurped the larger half of the rough brick pavement.
"Look, Feroza! look!" cried Kareema in a choked voice. A white umbrella lined with green, a huge pith hat tied round with a blue veil, a gingham dress, a bag of books, white stockings, and tan shoes,--that was all. They watched the strange apparition breathlessly till it came abreast of them.
Then Kareema's pent-up mirth burst forth in peals of laughter so distinctly audible through the open lattice that the cause stopped in surprise.
Feroza started to her feet. "For shame, Kareem, for shame! He says they are so good." And before they guessed what she would be at, the wicket-gate was open, and she was on the bare, indecent doorstep.
"Salaam! mem sahib, salaam!" rang her high-pitched, girlish voice. "I, Feroza Begum of the house of Meer Ahmed Ali, barrister-at-law, am glad to see you."
Before Kareema, by hanging on to Mytâb's scanty attire, lent weight enough to drag the offender back to seclusion, the English lady raised her veil, and Feroza Begum, Moguli, caught her first glimpse of a pair of mild blue eyes. She never forgot the introduction to Miss Julia Smith, spinster of Clapham. Perhaps she had reason to remember it.
"I might have believed it of Kareem," whimpered the duenna over a consolatory pipe, "but Feroz! To stand out in the world yelling like a hawker. Ai, Ai! Give me your quiet ones for wickedness. Phut! in a moment, like water from the skin-bag, spoiling everything."
"'Twas Kareem's laugh burst the mashk, nursie," laughed Feroza. She and her sister-in-law seemed to have changed places for the time, and she was flitting about gay as a wren, while the former sulked moodily on her bed.
Yet as the days passed a new jealousy came like seven devils to possess poor Feroza utterly.
What was this wisdom which inspired so many well-turned periods in the Meer's somewhat prosy letters? Beauty was beyond her, but women even of her race had been wise; passionate Nurjehan, and even pious Fâtma--God forgive her for evening her chances with that saintly woman's! The thought led to such earnest study of the Koran that old Mytâb's wrath was mollified into a hope of permanent penitence. And all the time the girl's heart was singing pæans of praise over the ease with which she remembered the long strings of meaningless words. Buoyed up by hope she confided her heart's desire to Kareema.