Child of Spring by Farhana Zia

Author:Farhana Zia [Zia, Farhana]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781561459728
Publisher: Peachtree Publishers
Published: 2016-08-24T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

I heard Lalla-ji’s booming voice even before I saw him. The grain merchant sat cross-legged on the white cotton floor-spread, barking orders to his men: “Oi! Put the rice in this corner! The wheat goes there! The barley next to the millet!” In response, they grunted and scurried about like ants.

He held a scale that teetered and tottered as he added or took away each iron weight. Behind him, a dozen bins filled with lentil and grain were lined up like docile children. The goddess of wealth, bathed in flowers and incense, smiled from her pedestal.

I greeted him, my palms joined together. “Ram Ram, Lalla-ji.”

“Ram Ram,” he called back. “What brings you here at this hour?” His eyes twinkled behind spectacles that were halfway down his nose. His belly spilled over his lap under a see-through muslin shirt.

“We are running low on rice, you see.”

“Hanh.” Lalla-ji nodded sympathetically. “It’s near the end of the month, after all.”

People’s supplies of rice, lentils, and flour often ran out this late in the month, and they lined up at his shop with cloth bags, eager to fill their pots again.

The grain merchant set the dipper down. “Is everyone well at home?”

“They are well, Lalla-ji.”

“Did your mother send you for the rice?”

“She doesn’t know that I am here,” I said quickly.

“Oh?”

“I want to surprise her, you see.”

The merchant chuckled. “I will measure out as much as you can carry back safely,” he said. “Did you bring money with you?”

“No. But I have something better.” I held out the ring.

Lalla-ji peered over the rim of his spectacles. “What’s this, my girl?”

“You can keep it,” I said. “It will pay for the rice.”

It was the only thing of value I had to bargain with, the only thing that would make Lali’s dreams sweet again.

The merchant turned the ring over in his hand. “Hmm. Where did you get this?”

“It’s mine, Lalla-ji,” I answered. “Honest.”

Lalla-ji scratched his bald pate. “I don’t know …”

I didn’t know why Lalla-ji sounded so unsure. Did he think the ring was a fake? Or perhaps he was worried that I had stolen it?

“It’s a very nice present from my Little Bibi,” I said, “and you won’t be sorry to have it, I promise.”

The merchant swatted at a fly and sent it humming.

“Please, Lalla-ji?”

The grain merchant mopped his neck and brow with the cloth. “Uff oh!” he groaned. “Today this heat will surely kill me!”

A rickety fan turned weakly, like an old lady looking this way and that. The breeze made Lalla-ji’s muslin shirt billow out. Tick, tick, tick. I waited for his decision.

“Accha,” he said at last. Grunting, Lalla-ji scooped rice from his sack with a measuring tin and poured it into a bag. He placed the bag on the scale. “Two ser,” he said. “Carry it carefully.”

I was so happy I wanted to shout. Two ser of rice would carry Vimla Mausi through until her wages flowed again. I held the bag in the crook of my arm and turned to go.

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