Fazl-e-Umar — Page 217
Fazle Umar 217 their illnesses…I promised her at the time that Maryam! If you raise these motherless children I promise that I shall love you very much. And I fervently turned to Allah with tear soaked prayers that He may create love in my heart for her and He heard my prayers. I started to care for her after that day. All my feelings of dullness were removed and my heart became reconciled with her. Those very features which appeared unsightly to me suddenly became the most beautiful and attractive in the whole world. Her carefree attitude which once bothered me now seemed to be her birthright…on certain Fridays after I delivered a sermon on some important subject, I would rush into the house with the conviction that Maryam’s face would be lit up and she would lavish praise on me the moment I entered the door. She would tell me that she really enjoyed the sermon and my presumption was rarely wrong. I would find her waiting on the doorstep and she would be trembling slightly with excitement… my sweetheart worked alongside me and never once complained of fatigue… In 1921 she travelled to Kashmir with me. This was in the rainy season. I would try and veer her towards serious, solemn matters while she took refuge in joviality. The result was that neither solemnity remained nor joviality. Like the downpours of the rainy season, tears of laughter streamed down from our eyes all the way home…She did not get along with my wives. She did not argue like an uncultivated person but she did have a temper. She always wished to be given preferential treatment in some or other affair. And as I could not do this because of the commandment of God and His Messenger, she was convinced that I did not love her and loved the other wives more than her. “Sometimes during our private moments together she would ask me who I loved the most and I would tell her that God forbids me to answer that question…She was extremely hospitable…Sometimes she over burdened herself so much that