At the stream, Mariam waited by the spot they had agreed on the day before. In the sky, a
few gray, cauliflower shaped clouds drifted by. Jalil had taught her that gray clouds got
their color by being so dense that their top parts absorbed the sunlight and cast their own
shadow along the base. That's what you see, Mariam jo, he had said, the dark in their
underbelly.
Some time passed.
Mariam went back to the kolba This time, she walked around the west facing periphery of
the clearing so she wouldn't have to pass by Nana. She checked the clock. It was almost one
o'clock.
He's a businessman, Mariam thought. Something has come up.
She went back to the stream and waited awhile longer. Blackbirds circled overhead,
dipped into the grass somewhere. She watched a caterpillar inching along the foot of an
immature thistle.
She waited until her legs were stiff. This time, she did not go back to the kolba She rolled
up the legs of her trousers to the knees, crossed the stream, and, for the first time in her life,
headed down the hill for Herat.
Nana was "wrong about Herat too. No one pointed. No one laughed. Mariam walked
along noisy, crowded, cypress lined boulevards, amid a steady stream of pedestrians,
bicycle riders, and mule drawn garis, and no one threw a rock at her. No one called her a
harami. Hardly anyone even looked at her. She was, unexpectedly, marvelously, an
ordinary person here.
For a while, Mariam stood by an oval shaped pool in the center of a big park where pebble
paths crisscrossed. With wonder, she ran her fingers over the beautiful marble horses that
stood along the edge of the pool and gazed down at the water with opaque eyes. She spied
on a cluster of boys who were setting sail to paper ships. Mariam saw flowers everywhere,
tulips, lilies, petunias, their petals awash in sunlight. People walked along the paths, sat on
benches and sipped tea.
Mariam could hardly believe that she was here. Her heart was battering with excitement.
She wished Mullah Faizullah could see her now. How daring he would find her. How brave!
She gave herself over to the new life that awaited her in this city, a life with a father, with
sisters and brothers, a life in which she would love and be loved back, without reservation
or agenda, without shame.
Sprightly, she walked back to the wide thoroughfare near the park. She passed old vendors
with leathery faces sitting under the shade of plane trees, gazing at her impassively behind