1 a vizier's daughter - Hazara.net

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A VIZIER’S DAUGHTER – A TALE OF THE HAZARA WAR
treat you well because they will love you and because you will have
shown them cause why they should value you.”
Gul Begum had nothing to sa y. She felt that such ad vice a year ago
might have stood her in good stead, but that now it was useless. It was
too late. A fierce enmit y against the man who had insulted her rose up
in her heart, and she felt she could neither conciliate him nor the
women who had mocked her in her trouble, but she said little. She felt
that if her father could not realise the depths of degradation to which
she had been subjected from her description of that terrible interview
with Mohamed Jan, when he had snatched the letter from her, then
explanations and remonstrances were indeed useless.
The fact was Ghulam Hossain did not quite believe all his daughter had
told him. He understood her proud spirit well, and knew how bitterly
she would resent the slightest insult. Moreover, he was very busy and
did not give the mater his full attention; besides Gul Begum was
naturally reticent on so delicate a subject. Eastern women of any
position alwa ys are. So the poor girl was borne ignominiously back to
the house from which she had fled in such terror and mortification.
Mohamed Jan professed to be much offended at the way in which Gul
Begum had treated him, admitted that he had raised his hand against
her one day when she had exasperated him beyond words, apologised
and promised that there should be no cause for such complaints in the
future.
“With what part of our army did you serve last year?” Ghulam Hossain
asked, when the subject of Gul Begum’s complaints and also of the
rewards that were to be bestowed on Mohamed Jan had been thoroughly
discussed.
Thus interrogated, the man shuffled about, made two or three attempts
to speak, but said nothing. Ghulam Hossain repeated his question.
“How could I both serve with the arm y and obey your orders as to
protecting your daughter?” Mohamed Jan replied evasively.
“That means, I suppose, that you served nowhere,” the Vizier remarked
severely. “That seems to me a poor account for a patriot to give of
himself in such times as these. Speak up, man.”
Absolutely run into a corner, the villager thought he had better make a
stand and put himself in the right if he could. “The fact is,” he said, “I
am not at all in sympathy with this war. Our people are labourers and
poor, with no knowledge of warfare. How can they ever hope to stand
up against the trained soldiers of the Ameer of Kabul?”
“Ah, I see,” Ghulam Hossain said bitterly. “You have had one of the
Ameer’s emissaries here, and you have learnt to quote his words most
accurately. Deeply do I regret that I ever placed my daughter in the