Page 36 - Personal Column (Charles Belgrave)_Neat

Families in the Gulf were formidable and important personages. The Another old lady, who was slightly mental but not mad enough to
mother of a Shaikh on the Trucial Coast used to take an active part in put in the asylum, which was always full, was the bane of many Political
politics and trade. She dealt in pearls on a large scale. When pearl mcr- I Agents. A long law case in the Agency court had affected her mind, like
chants visited her she sat in an inner doorway in her house with a curtain
Miss Flytc in Bleak House. She got to know whenever a Political Agent
suspended between her and the merchant with whom she was bargaining, visited Muharraq, where she lived. She used to lie in wait tor him in some
and a merchant described to me how sometimes in che excitement of the narrow lane and rush out when he appeared, flinging her arms around
transaction she would pull aside the curtain. She drove as hard a bargain him and scattering her ‘documents’ over the road. This was before the
as any man.
causeway connecting the two towns had been built. Finally I had to warn
Off the Bahrain coast, sometimes in deep water, there arc many fresh­ the police to keep the old lady out of sight when the Political Agent
water springs rising from the sea bed, a phenomenon which I have never
visited the town, but she was wily and elusive and occasionally tracked
heard of elsewhere. Before the days of artesian wells men went out in her victim to the door of the Agency. She was known in Bahrain as
boats to the springs, dived down to the sea bed with leather water-skins, 'Onun al Kooti’—‘Mother of the Agency’.
which they filled at the source and then surfaced, holding che mouth of
My office was on the ground floor of the house with a door opening
the water-bag tightly closed. The water was sold in che bazaar. An old
on to a wide veranda; beyond it was the garden which I could enjoy
Arab lady, distantly connected with che Ruling Family, used constantly
i looking at from my office chair. It was accessible from the road, as in the
to visit me to discuss an elaborate scheme for harnessing the water from daytime there was no sentry. Arabs used to sit at the doorway, which had
a submarine spring, on the shore near her property, and piping it to her swinging shutters on the upper part, or, sometimes when I was alone,
garden. Eventually, with the help of the oil company’s engineers, her
they would walk into the office. This accessibility had some disadvan­
scheme was tried out, but unfortunately when the spring had been en-
tages, for my office seemed to become a magnet for slight mental cases—
cased the water bubbled up elsewhere. Although quite uneducated she
and there were quite a number of them in Bahrain—including one little
was extremely intelligent.
old man who was also obsessed with an imaginary case in the courts. He
I often gave interviews to ladies from important families who came
used to creep noiselessly under my half-shuttered door and hurl on to the
chaperoned by several women servants, who sat on the floor of my small
floor a handful of old envelopes and pieces of paper. When visitors were
office. Sometimes they came to ask advice about their property, usually
with me they were often quite alarmed by his performance. He then
mistrusting the person who was supposed to be looking after it, or to
scuttled away, gibbering like a monkey, pursued by some of the small
discuss their rights in some estate, or just to complain about their husbands.
black office boys.
There was always an old servant who took a leading part in the conversa-
The office boys were sons of men in the police whom I nicknamed
tion; she would produce from the folds of her voluminous garments tin
‘the sparrows’ because they used to sit on a bench in the passage outside
cylinders containing documents concerning the affair. These old family
the office waiting for the bell, chattering and chirping like birds. They
servants, who were usually of slave descent, were the loyal confidantes of were called ‘the sparrows’ by everybody. Sometimes I would get a note
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their mistresses and were often more intelligent and possessed more know­
from my head clerk such as the following: ‘The head sparrow, Abood, is
ledge than the mistresses. It was difficult to end these interviews in reason­
applying for leave, we have enough sparrows to carry on without a
able time, the ladies enjoyed the outing and time to them meant nothing.
substitute. Will Your Excellency approve of his being given leave?’ If in
Sometimes there were embarrassing incidents. One very old-fashioned the dim future any of these office notes are unearthed from the files they
lady visitor arrived in a taxi with a large goat, which she proposed to give
may well cause astonishment.
me as a present. As usual I refused to accept a gift, but the horrible creature
Another man, tall, thin, black and silent, used to appear at my door
escaped and began to rampage over my flower beds, nibbling my All­
every morning for about twenty years, raising his hands in salutation and
woodii carnations which were coming into bloom, pursued with heavy
then disappearing as quietly as he had come. He never spoke to anyone
steps over the flower beds by most of the office staff* and by several elderly in the office and nobody knew who he was or where he lived. If I tried
black ladies who had come to support the petitioner.
to speak to him he beat a retreat. After I left, however, he seems to have
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