Nevertheless, the boy being only some nine months old when he was suddenly carried off by one of those mysterious diseases common to Indian children, she wept profusely, and told Burfâni--who, as in duty bound, came round decently swathed in a _burka_ to offer condolence on hearing of the sad event--that some childless one had doubtless cast a shadow on him for his beauty's sake, seeing that--thank Heaven!--all her children were beautiful. There was always a militant flavour underlying the politeness of these two, and even the presence of the quaint little overdressed dead baby awaiting its bier on the bed did not prevent attack and defence.
"They favour thee, sister," replied Burfâni, suavely. "In mind also, to judge from what I see. Therefore I shall await God's will in the future ere I choose one to educate."
Lâzîzan tittered sarcastically, despite her half-dried tears.
"'Tis my choice first, nevertheless. The best of this bunch in looks--ay, in brains too, perchance--marries my brother's son, according to custom. Sure my mother chose thus, and I must do the same, sister."
She spoke evenly, though for the moment the longing to strangle something had transferred itself to the saffron-coloured sugar-drop all spangled with silver which had emerged from its chrysalis of a _burka_. What business had the poor thin creature with such garments when _her_ beauty was hidden by mere rags?
Burfâni laughed in her turn; an easy, indifferent laugh, and stretched out her slim henna-dyed palm with the usual friendly offering of cardamoms.
"Take one, sister," she said soothingly, "they are good for spleen and excessive grief. _Hai! Hai!_ thou wilt be forlorn, indeed, now thy occupation is gone."
Lâzîzan, with her mouth full of spices, tittered again more artificially than ever. "I can do other things, perchance, beside suckle babes. Maybe I weary of it, and am glad of a change."
The saffron-coloured sugar-drop, seated on a low stool in front of the white-sheeted bed with its solemn little gaily-dressed burden, looked at its companion distastefully through its long lashes, and the slender, henna-dyed hand, catching some loops of the jasmine chaplets it wore, held them like a bouquet close to the crimson-tinted lips.