Abbas trembled for a moment, as if tremors had passed through his body, and then he was calm again.
Molla Aman said, “Yes, and he’s gone so far as to invite himself to dinner as well.”
“Dinner? Where? Here?”
“No, at your future son-in-law’s.”
Mergan raised her voice. “He’s a fool if he’s invited himself! That pathetic beggar. And everywhere he goes, he expects a reception.”
Molla Aman said, “He says he has witnesses who say that Soluch is dead.”
Mergan replied, “Fine! If he’s dead, he’s dead. God rest his soul. But what’s it to him?”
“Maybe Soluch owed him money?”
“He can take the debt to the grave. I’m too busy with my own affairs to be caught up with the little chirp-chirps of the likes of him. I’ve moved on, and it has nothing to do with me. Let him run after other people’s bad luck. I don’t need to take on something that will put me in a cage with a wild dog!”
“But if Soluch is in fact dead …”
“My worries are that I have two sons to care for. What am I to do with them? And with one in the state you see him in! Can’t you see him?”
Molla Aman looked at Abbas and said, “He’s not asking to marry your sons. He wants to take you to his house.”
“And how does he propose to help my sons? Wasn’t he just saying they need a guardian?”
“That was just talk. Your daughter’s going to go to her husband’s home. And your sons are almost old enough to leave the nest on their own. And so you would go to his home.”
“His home! You’re a real simpleton, aren’t you? You know he’s living out in the storage shed. Which home does he expect me to go to? I even hear that there’s trouble between Salar Abdullah and his wife. Because she’s being tortured by this black-mouthed, big-bellied, old man hanging around their house. You really believe him? You’ll see, in two days he’ll be slithering over here with a blanket to shed his skin in!”
Molla Aman said, “You know what’s going on better than I do. I’m just telling you what he’s said. I’ll leave it in your hands from there.”
Mergan rose and said, “I don’t want a husband. Maybe Soluch’s dead, and maybe he’s still alive. But I’m too busy with my own work now!”
* * *
The evening stretched out. If Mergan began her errands now, they’d take until the dusk call to prayer to complete. She’d taken Hajer to the baths. Now she had to do the rest. She had purchased a bit of rouge and face powder. But she had to pluck the hairs on Hajer’s face first. She brought out an old broken mirror in a wooden frame and set it by the door against the wall. Then she brought over a box and set it by the mirror and took her daughter’s wrist and sat her by the mirror as well.
“Nothing to be afraid of! Every bride has her face hairs plucked!”
She had laid out the threads to use for the task beforehand. She hooked the threads onto her fingers and began running them in a cross pattern across Hajer’s small face. The girl pulled her head away from the threads that were ruthlessly tugging at the skin on her cheeks. Mergan berated her and told her to hold still for a little. Hajer tried to stay calm, but the pain and burning she felt on her face was too much. She was just about able to stay still, but couldn’t hold back the tears, which slowly filled her eyes. But Mergan showed no mercy and kept tugging at and burning the girl’s dry skin with the threads, and Hajer’s face became more and more scarlet from the friction, as if she had been slapped, or even as if she’d been bruised.
“All the better! You’ll have a bit of life and color in your face now. You can’t go over there looking like a corpse!”
Mergan was clearly distracted. Her only worry was to find the nonexistent little hairs on her daughter’s lips and face and to eradicate them. So what if it hurt!
“The first time always hurts. All the girls feel the same burning when they thread their faces for their wedding!”
“It’s burning me, mama. It’s burning!”
“Now, that’s better.”
Megan pulled Hajer’s face into the light and examined it closely. There was nothing left; her entire face was now scarlet and irritated. Like a beet, nearly bruised. It was time for Hajer to splash some water on her face.
“Now, get up and quickly wash and come back!”
Hajer ran outside. The bucket was half full of water. Hajer thrust her entire face into it.
Molla Aman rose and made as if to leave. He stood by the door and said, “If you want the truth, I’ve heard myself that Soluch is dead, God have mercy on him.”
He didn’t wait to hear Mergan’s reply; he stepped out and left. Mergan had nothing to say; she just felt numb and dizzy. But she gathered her wits quickly and cried out at Hajer, “Are you taking a bath out there? Come back, it’s getting late!”
Hajer thrust her face into the bucket one last time, then rose and returned to her mother.
Mergan had prepared the rouge and face powder. Her look had become softer, gentler. As if she’d just remembered not to snap at her daughter — it was her wedding night, after all. Why direct her anger with Karbalai Doshanbeh at her daughter instead? Hajer was innocent, even though Mergan did not reckon herself a culprit either. It was just that they wouldn’t let her rest for even a second. She would escape from the cage they set for her like a wild animal, and before she’d realize it she’d have bit some person — her children were the most common victims of her anger. And this would in turn only distress her more.
And now, what had happened to Abbas came to be the greatest blow yet. His sudden aging, his injuries, his silence had all affected her terribly. Her hands had begun to tremble, and her eyes would dart from place to place. She would say one or two words and then be choked by tears that were welling in her eyes. It was as if she had lost her self-control. She’d go into a rage over nothing. She was sleepless and distracted. Her thoughts tormented her, depressed her — thoughts about Hajer’s wedding, which deep down Mergan knew better than anyone was an ill-considered, inopportune deed. Thoughts about losing the bit of land they had had, about her sons having turned on her, and now, about the pain Abbas was in. Add to that the marriage proposal from Karbalai Doshanbeh and Mirza Hassan’s skill at taking their land … and now, Soluch’s death!
But could it be true? Was Soluch dead?
* * *
“Oh yes … look at that! Look at that!”
It was Ali Genav, whose body blocked the light. He was smiling. Hajer turned away and covered her eyes with the edge of her headscarf. Ali Genav pursed his big lips and looked at Mergan, who gestured at him to leave. She didn’t want Hajer to be affected by her fear of him.
Ali Genav turned to go, unhappily but still happy. Mergan finished applying the rouge to Hajer’s face. She rose, filled a cup with water, and set it beside her. Raising Hajer’s headscarf, she wet a comb in the water and drew it through the girl’s hair. Her hair was clean, thin, and fine, and it shone with its blackness.
Mergan combed her daughter’s hair with a hint of sadness, and the girl rested her head on her mother’s arm and looked at the ground with a deeper sadness. She stared at the earth. She was engaged now! That’s that. Marriage!
Hajer could not help but think about how easily everything had been handled when they went to town. The cost of making the engagement legitimate was even clearer to her than to her mother: the pair of red shoes, two silk scarves, a shirt, and a chador for praying. After the purchases, they took her from the bazaar into the alleys and through the alleys to the caravanserai. There, Ali Genav bought some bread and sweets. They sat by the walls of the cavanserai looking toward the coffeehouse and ate the food. Then Ali Genav went over to the coffeehouse and brought three large teas back to them. They drank the teas. Then Ali Genav went to the caravanserai stables and put a bit of food out for his donkey there. Then it was time to go, so they left. The alley behind the caravanserai connected to the central mosque. The lower door of the mosque led into the courtyard, which they crossed and exited through the higher door. Ali Genav led them across a street and back into narrow alleys. They passed by a cistern and entered a very narrow alley: Twisting and turning, it became more and more narrow. So much so that Hajer began to feel dizzy. All she remembered was that the surface of the ground was cobblestone, which she could remember from the sensation of the stones pushing at her feet through her leather shoes. At the end of the alley, they stopped beside a low door, lower than the alley’s surface. You had to descend three steps to the door, through which you reached a small courtyard. Next to the shallow pool in the center of the courtyard, there were six pomegranate trees. Ali Genav took the women up a set of stairs onto a veranda. They had Hajer sit there by a door while Ali Genav and Mergan went inside. Hajer never saw the cleric; she only heard his voice, which was interrupted by his constant coughing. He sounded old. He asked Hajer to say “I do,” which she did, and the job was done. Now Ali Genav could take her hand in his, which he did and he brought her down the veranda stairs. Then they returned in the same way: alley, street, mosque, alley to the caravanserai.