1 a vizier's daughter - Hazara.net

88
A VIZIER’S DAUGHTER – A TALE OF THE HAZARA WAR
there, but the great bulk of all that crowd consisted of women and
children who, now that they had got well on the road, marched for the
most part in silence, except where a child’s wail or the fretful cr y of an
infant made itself heard.
On, on they marched. The night wind softened down to a pleasant
morning breeze, and that in its turn disappeared and the sun broke out
in all its strength, but still the molted crowd marched on. They had
only halted twice, chiefly, it seemed to Gul Begum, to let the soldiers
have some food, but they had been kind to her, and had let her have a
piece of bread now and again, which she had at once given to her little
sisters, and more than once the y had pointed out to her a spring of
fresh clear mountain water at which she had slaked her thirst.
The sun, as it rose higher and higher, streamed down on the white
stones and sand, and baked them as though they had just come out of
an oven, scorching the fugitives’ feet. It streamed on their heads, and
made them draw their shawls more closely round them. Gul Begum was
accustomed to roam the mountains barefo ot, but that had been at her
leisure and at the hour she herself had chosen. This constrained march,
barefoot on those burning stones, became very wearisome, and when
the mid-day halt was called under the shade of some mulberry trees by
a running stream, she was thankful to dangle her poor aching swollen
limbs in the cool water.
The children ate the fallen mulberries ravenously, then stretched their
wear y limbs and slept in the refreshing shade.
“Shake down some more,” Gul Begum had said to one of the soldiers.
“Do, for the love of Heaven. See how hungr y the little children are,”
and he had not only shaken the tree, but had climbed up, and, after
eating as may as he could contain himself, had brought her down a
handful. She ate them hu ngrily, and wished that at any cost she had
seized some of the bread she had baked overnight, and which lay in
piles on a shelf in the house she had been so suddenly forced to quit.
How easily it might have been brought – and now they were so short of
food.
So many mulberries to children unaccustomed to them could not be
anything but harmful, but still they must eat something. Presently she
feel asleep, and when she woke the shadows had lengthened by many
feet and the evening breeze was beginning to rise again.
“Where are we to sleep to-night?” she asked.
“You will see,” was all the answer she received. “How soon shall we
be in Kabul?” she asked again.
“Khuda me danad” (God knows), the soldier answered, “to-morrow, or
the next day, or a week or two hence. How can I tell?”