A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini [73]
“I . . . I don’t want this,” Mariam said, numb with contempt and helplessness.
“It’s not your decision. It’s hers and mine.”
“I’m too old.”
“She’s too young, you’re too old. This is nonsense.”
“I am too old. Too old for you to do this to me,” Mariam said, balling up fistfuls of her dress so tightly her hands shook. “For you, after all these years, to make me an ambagh.”
“Don’t be so dramatic. It’s a common thing and you know it. I have friends who have two, three, four wives. Your own father had three. Besides, what I’m doing now most men I know would have done long ago. You know it’s true.”
“I won’t allow it.”
At this, Rasheed smiled sadly.
“There is another option,” he said, scratching the sole of one foot with the calloused heel of the other. “She can leave. I won’t stand in her way. But I suspect she won’t get far. No food, no water, not a rupiah in her pockets, bullets and rockets flying everywhere. How many days do you suppose she’ll last before she’s abducted, raped, or tossed into some roadside ditch with her throat slit? Or all three?”
He coughed and adjusted the pillow behind his back.
“The roads out there are unforgiving, Mariam, believe me. Bloodhounds and bandits at every turn. I wouldn’t like her chances, not at all. But let’s say that by some miracle she gets to Peshawar. What then? Do you have any idea what those camps are like?”
He gazed at her from behind a column of smoke.
“People living under scraps of cardboard. TB, dysentery, famine, crime. And that’s before winter. Then it’s frostbite season. Pneumonia. People turning to icicles. Those camps become frozen graveyards.
“Of course,” he made a playful, twirling motion with his hand, “she could keep warm in one of those Peshawar brothels. Business is booming there, I hear. A beauty like her ought to bring in a small fortune, don’t you think?”
He set the ashtray on the nightstand and swung his legs over the side of the bed.
“Look,” he said, sounding more conciliatory now, as a victor could afford to. “I knew you wouldn’t take this well. I don’t really blame you. But this is for the best. You’ll see. Think of it this way, Mariam. I’m giving you help around the house and her a sanctuary. A home and a husband. These days, times being what they are, a woman needs a husband. Haven’t you noticed all the widows sleeping on the streets? They would kill for this chance. In fact, this is . . . Well, I’d say this is downright charitable of me.”
He smiled.
“The way I see it, I deserve a medal.”
LATER, in the dark, Mariam told the girl.
For a long time, the girl said nothing.
“He wants an answer by this morning,” Mariam said.
“He can have it now,” the girl said. “My answer is yes.”
30.
Laila
The next day, Laila stayed in bed. She was under the blanket in the morning when Rasheed poked his head in and said he was going to the barber. She was still in bed when he came home late in the afternoon, when he showed her his new haircut, his new used suit, blue with cream pinstripes, and the wedding band he’d bought her.
Rasheed sat on the bed beside her, made a great show of slowly undoing the ribbon, of opening the box and plucking out the ring delicately. He let on that he’d traded in Mariam’s old wedding ring for it.
“She doesn’t care. Believe me. She won’t even notice.”
Laila pulled away to the far end of the bed. She could hear Mariam downstairs, the hissing of her iron.
“She never wore it anyway,” Rasheed said.
“I don’t want it,” Laila said, weakly. “Not like this. You have to take it back.”
“Take it back?” An impatient look flashed across his face and was gone. He smiled. “I had to add some cash too—quite a lot, in fact. This is a better ring, twenty-two-karat gold. Feel how heavy? Go on, feel it. No?” He closed the box. “How about flowers? That would be nice. You like flowers? Do you have a favorite? Daisies? Tulips? Lilacs? No flowers? Good! I don’t see the point myself. I just thought . . . Now, I know a tailor here in Deh-Mazang. I was thinking we could take you there tomorrow, get you fitted for a proper dress.