Helen Simonson - Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

“She is used to a certain independence,” the Major said.

Dave shrugged. “She is coming around. She has stopped suggesting to my poor wife new ways to run our inventory systems. Instead, she is obsessed with getting her own library card.”

“A library card?” asked the Major.

“Personally, who has time to read?” he said. “But if she wants one, I tell her she is welcome to it. We are very busy right now, what with the wedding and opening a SuperCenter next month, but my wife has promised to help her establish proof of her residency and then she will be able to sit home and read all day.”

They were interrupted by a commotion in the hallway. The Major couldn’t make out any of the words, but he heard a familiar voice cry out, “This is ridiculous. I will go in if I please,” and then the door opened and there she was, Mrs. Ali, still wearing a coat and scarf and carrying a small bag of groceries. Her cheeks were flushed, either from the argument or from having been outside, and she looked at him as if she were hungry to see all of him at once. Behind her, the young pregnant woman whispered something that made Mrs. Ali flinch.

“It’s fine, Sheena, let her come,” said Dave, getting up and waving as if to dismiss her. “It will do no harm to greet an old friend of your uncle Ahmed’s.”

“It is you,” she said. “I saw a hat in the hallway and I knew at once it was yours.”

“We did not know you were back from your errands,” said Dave. “The Major is passing by on his way to Scotland.”

“I had to come and see you,” said the Major. He wanted desperately to take her hand but he restrained the impulse.

“I was just telling the Major how much you enjoy your reading,” said Dave. “My brother used to tell me, Major, how Jasmina was always buried in reading. ‘So what if I have to do a little more so she can read. She is an intellectual,’ he would say.” His voice twisted with an unmistakable sarcasm at the word “intellectual” and the Major was gripped with an intense dislike of the man. “I’m only sorry he worked himself so hard,” added Dave mopping with his handkerchief again. “Taken so early from us.”

“That is despicable even for you,” said Mrs. Ali in a low voice. There was a pause as they looked at each other with equally locked jaws. “Sheena told me you had a business meeting,” she added.

“Sheena is very cautious,” said Mr. Ali, addressing the Major. “She worries about protecting everyone. Sometimes she even makes people wait in the street for me.”

“Grace wanted me to come and see you,” said the Major to Mrs. Ali. “I think she was expecting you to write.”

“But I did write, several times,” she said. “I see I was right to worry when I received no reply.” She gave her brother-in-law a look of mild disdain. “Is this not strange, Dawid?”

“Shocking, shocking-the post office is very bad these days,” agreed her brother-in-law, pursing his lips as if he did not like being addressed by his real name in front of an outsider. “And I speak as someone who has three sub post offices. We can only put the mail in the bag, but after that we’re not responsible.”

“I would like to talk to the Major for a few minutes alone,” said Mrs. Ali. “Should we speak here, or should I take the Major on a walk to show him the neighborhood?”

“Here will be fine, just fine,” said Dawid Ali in a hurried tone. The Major saw, with a mixture of amusement and hurt, that he was appalled at the thought of them promenading in front of the neighbors. “I’m sure the Major has to leave very soon, anyway-the afternoon traffic is so bad these days.” He went to the frosted doors and slid them open. “So we will leave you to chat about old times for a few minutes.” In the back room, a television played low and an old lady sat in a wing chair, a walking frame positioned in front of her. She looked half dead, slumped in the chair, but the Major saw her black eyes swivel toward them. “If you don’t mind, I will not ask Mummi to turn out of her chair. She will not disturb you.”

“I don’t need a chaperone,” said Mrs. Ali in a fierce whisper.

“Of course not,” said Dawid. “But we must allow Mummi to think she is useful. Don’t worry,” he added to the Major, “she’s as deaf as a post.”

“I must thank you for your hospitality,” said the Major.

“I doubt we’ll see you again, clean break and all that,” said Dawid Ali, holding out his hand. “It was a pleasure to meet such an acquaintance of my brother and an honor that you should come so far out of your way.”

After Dawid Ali had whispered a few words to his mother and left the back room, the Major and Mrs. Ali moved as far away as possible from the open doors and sat on a hard bench in the bay window. She still held her shopping bag and now she placed it under the bench and shrugged off her coat. It fell carelessly behind her.

“I feel as if I’m just dreaming that you’re here,” she said.

“I don’t think they’d like it if I pinched you,” he replied. They sat in silence for a moment. It seemed to the Major that it was necessary to break out of the usual kinds of small talk and make some declaration, some demand, but for the life of him he could not find the words to begin.

“That stupid dance,” he said at last. “I never got the chance to apologize.”

“I do not blame you for the rudeness of others,” she said.

“But you left,” he said. “Without saying goodbye.” She looked out of the window and he took the opportunity to study again the curve of her cheek and the thick lashes of her brown eyes.

“I had allowed myself to daydream,” she said. “A fleeting sense of wonder.” She smiled at him. “I woke up to find myself a practical woman once more and I realized something else.” Her smile faded and she looked serious, like a swimmer who commits to dive in, or a soldier to whom the order to open fire has just been given. “I threw in my lot with the Ali family a great many years ago and it was time to pay that debt.”

“When you sent back the Kipling, I thought you despised me.” He was aware that he sounded like a wounded child.

“Sent it back?” she asked. “But I lost it in the move.”

“Abdul Wahid handed it to me,” he said, feeling confused.

“I thought it was in my small bag with all my other valuables, but after I got here I couldn’t find it.” She widened her eyes and her lips trembled. “She must have stolen it from me.”

“Who?”

“My mother-in-law, Dawid’s mother,” she said, nodding toward the back room. The Major tried to share her outrage, but he was too happy to discover that she had not meant to return his book.

“Your letters go missing, you are kept from your nephew’s wedding, you are asked to leave your home,” he said. “You cannot stay here, my dear lady. I cannot allow it.”

“What would you have me do?” she said. “I must give up the shop, for George’s sake.”

“If you’ll allow me, I will take you away from here right now, today,” he said. “Under any conditions you like.” He turned and took both her hands in his. “If this room were not so ugly and oppressive, I would ask you something more,” he said. “But my need to get you out of here is more important than any considerations of my own heart and I will not burden your escape with any strings. Simply tell me what I have to do to get you out of this room and take you somewhere where you can breathe. And do not insult me by pretending that you are not suffocating in this house.” His own breath came heavy now and his heart seeming to knock about in his chest like a trapped bird. She turned on him eyes wet with tears.

“Are we to run away to that little cottage we once talked about? Where no one knows us and we send only cryptic postcards to the world? I should like to go there now and be done with everyone for a while,” she said. He gripped her hands tightly and did not turn when he heard a wail from the other room, which was the old lady gabbling in Urdu and calling “Dawid! Come quick!”