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82<br />
A VIZIER’S DAUGHTER – A TALE OF THE HAZARA WAR<br />
“Ghulam Hossain has joined the soldiers. He is not here. Do you want<br />
him?” Gul Begum asked composedly, stepping outside and moving<br />
towards the spot from whence the shrieks has proceeded. The black<br />
clouds were still chasing one another across the sky, and the wind was<br />
so high as almost to blow her off her feet, but the moon shone clear<br />
and the shrieks directed her to the spot where a little crowd had<br />
collected on the far side of the shed near the tower.<br />
“I tell you I tracked the man here the day before yesterday, and after<br />
sending you the messenger have never ceased watching his every<br />
movement. He could not have left the house without my seeing him. I<br />
have sat in this shed all night watching the door until I heard the sound<br />
of your horses’ feet coming up the hills, when I joined you. He is<br />
there, you have but to make a thorough search and you will find him,<br />
no matter how well he may be hid. Ah, let me go, let me go, it is<br />
useless all this torture. There is no sense in it at all. I would tell you al<br />
I could without any torture. If you break my feet, of what use can I be<br />
to you? If you will only release me I will serve you right faithfully.<br />
Undo my feet, the y are breaking.”<br />
“The dog speaks the truth,” one of the soldiers said authoritatively.<br />
“Undo the man. Those women have got that devil in here hiding<br />
somewhere. I’ll make them produce him.”<br />
Gul Begum had pressed forward, her shawl well pulled over her head,<br />
and was just in time to see Mohamed Jan released. He was sitting on<br />
the ground, his legs stretched out before him, his feet, from which the<br />
blood seemed oozing in every direction, securely fastened between the<br />
divided sides of a bamboo that had been split and driven into the<br />
ground. Beside him stood a soldier with a great club in his hand, and<br />
much as she loathed the sight of the man who sat before her in an<br />
agony too great to notice her, she shivered when she thought of the<br />
torture each stroke of that mallet on the end of the bamboo must inflict<br />
on the poor wretch who sat there, the sharp edges of the wood driven<br />
ever deeper and deeper into the almost bursting flesh of those poor,<br />
wretched feet, squeezing the bones almost to crushing point as the<br />
bamboo was driven further and further into the ground.<br />
Another cr y of pain – it was when the bamboo was removed – and then<br />
the blood flowed freely.<br />
“Give me some water,” the suffering traitor pleaded. Gul Begum<br />
instinctively turned to get him some, but a feeling of revulsion came<br />
over her; she went into the house, and sat down beside her little s ister<br />
in a heap on the floor. She could not return to face that loathsome<br />
sight, nor could she urge herself to take him the water he was craving<br />
for. He was her own most bitter enemy, who had insulted her and<br />
abused the confidence placed in him by her father. But he was worse<br />
than that, he was not only false to his countr y, but a spy to lead the<br />
enemy to the haunts of the <strong>Hazara</strong> chiefs. What worse could he be?
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