When the Maharaj Kumar reached the palace, the guards on duty saluted him. Should he dismount? Why had he come home anyway? Befikir stood patiently while he tried to figure out what he was doing at the gates of his own home at three in the morning. He was hopelessly confused. All he wanted was to go to the carpenter’s workshop, pick up a long sharp saw, come back and lie in his bed. When he had settled down comfortably, he would take the saw and, starting from just above his eyebrows with steady, even strokes go all the way round his head. When the top one-third of his head along with his brains had fallen off, he would finally be able to sleep peacefully. No more thoughts, no more questions, never mind his wife and her tiresome romance and to hell with this terrible blight called life.
‘Sire, Your Highness,’ the sergeant major asked him, ‘do you wish me to leave Befikir in the stables?’ Why send Befikir to the stable, he wondered. The horse had more sense than he did. Befikir knows where his home is, who his master is, he understands technical terms like trot, canter, gallop and stop. He obviously knows his dharma. He was the Maharaj Kumar and he didn’t know why he was at his doorstep. And having got there, what he was expected to do. Well, there was nothing to do but get down and climb the stairs to his wing and sit down on his bed and resolve what he was to do with his life next.
He was about to fall on his bed when he heard his wife’s voice. Who could she be talking to? He had given strict orders the previous evening that the doors of her rooms were to be locked in perpetuity from the outside. Kumkum Kanwar could cook for her, bathe her and do whatever else her mistress wished but whatever happened, even if a fire broke out, she was not to be let out. The eunuch outside her door was fast asleep. He had a soft downy snore. When he exhaled, his mouth worked furiously to grab the air and eat it. Was he the one who was talking? No, he was far too busy eating some ambrosial stuff of which he could not have enough. The Prince could hear his wife’s voice better now. It seemed unlikely that she was conversing with this corpulent dead weight through a locked door. Not bad looking though. Must have cut a fine figure when he was young and despite the absence of extended genitalia, was sure to have been popular with the queens. The Prince was not quite sure about the institution of eunuchs. Granted, they could not beget and procreate but barring that, no royalty had as much time and opportunity to make out with some of the most beautiful and aristocratic women in Mewar. That voracious mouth had kissed and known and slept with God knows how many of the Maharaj Kumar’s mothers. Men are strange. They prefer to make believe that people make love only at night and that only the act of penetration is sex. The tongue, a truly penetrating instrument if ever there was one, and the rest of the human body, hands, lips, ears, the insides of thighs, toes, the belly button – was there any accounting for taste and erogenous sites – were discounted.
For some reason, the thought of touching that genderless flesh was repulsive. The Maharaj Kumar had to grit his teeth when he bent down and slipped his hand in the eunuch’s pocket. It took some time and trying for the Prince to figure out which of the two dozen or so keys fitted the lock on his wife’s door. He opened the latch softly. Her bed was made as his own had been on the night of the wedding. Flowers were strung from the four posters and lay crushed on the mattress. She was lying on her back, not a shred of cloth on her. Her clothes were thrown helter-skelter as if someone in a rush of indelicate impatience had disrobed her. He stepped over the eunuch and lightly closed the door behind him. When he turned round, he froze. She was staring at him. What was he going to say to her? Just dropped by to see if you were all right? No, honest-to-goodness, I had a terrible nightmare and was a little unnerved and was wondering if I could sleep in your bed, no hanky-panky, promise. He realized then that she was totally oblivious of him. When she slept, her eyelids came down only three-quarters of the way. That left her eyes slightly ajar with white crescents showing at the bottom, so that you had the uncanny feeling that she was watching you with hooded eyes.
Against the opposite wall was a low, red stool barely three inches from the ground. In front of it was a gold thali filled to overflowing with all manner of food, most of it sweets and pastries made from milk and curds. No, he said to himself, it didn’t look as if the meal was laid out for him. In one corner of the room she had drawn an incredibly elaborate painting with rangoli powder of the Flautist and herself dancing the raas on the banks of the Jamuna.
He could not take his eyes off her. Her head stretched back pleasurably as if someone was running his fingers through her open tumbling hair. Suddenly she twisted and jerked away. ‘No, no, no, no, no, you are tickling my ears. Please, stop it. Are you going to listen to me? Anytime I ask you to do something you do exactly the opposite. Stop being perverse. Let go of me. Or I’ll pull your hair hard.’ He knew she was all alone but he also knew exactly what her lover was up to. He was caressing the inside of her outstretched arm, the peacock feather in his hand was now in the dip of her armpit and flowing down her left breast and across her navel while he was nibbling at the nape of her neck. She was kissing him now. Her hands were wound tightly around air. She called out to him, two of the god’s thousand names. ‘Girdhar Lal. Ghanashyam.’ There was such longing and love in her voice, it pierced the Prince’s heart.
Get out, leave while you can and while you have an iota of dignity left in you. But he couldn’t move and he didn’t want to either. It was torture and it tore him up and he didn’t want it to stop. He had always thought that sensuousness was an over-inflated word, but she made him feel its force and flooding rapture and its place at the heart of the arcana of pleasure. He remembered the first time he had heard her sing. There was no withholding, nothing halfway, she gave it her all. She was doing the same now, staking everything she had.
The ecstasy her face and body radiated brought him up short. Even as a child he had not known anything so complete and profligate. She seemed to be the fountainhead of joyousness. Whence her abandonment and exuberance? How could a mere human being be capable of such consuming rapture that she was not even aware of the world around her? She was a closed and complete circle in which he had no place. She and the Flautist were sufficient unto themselves. It was impossible to break in. He was excluded. Out.
He was struck then by a terrible realization. So far, however much things had gone wrong, at least he was in control of himself. The Flautist was his enemy. He hated him with a passion that went-well beyond an obsession. His hate was the only polestar and steadfast beacon in a world that had turned topsy-turvy on him. But the truth was, he didn’t give a damn about the past, all the humiliation and pain he had suffered, not even the shameless exhibitionism of emotion he had witnessed today.
He wanted in.
He closed the door quietly and slipped the keys back into the eunuch’s pockets.
I felt exhausted and empty. How could a bare twenty-four hours pile up so many upheavals, calamities and tragedies? It didn’t stand to reason. A curse upon you, Bahadur. We had lost you. Only God, Kausalya, and the Bhil shaman and I know how far gone you were. But we managed to bring you back from the clutches of Yama. If only fate or I had let you die. Damn you, Rajendra. You are no more but look at the havoc you’ve wrought. Mewar had spent months forging ties with the Shehzada Bahadur even as we were fighting his father and the Gujarat armies. Why? Because if there’s no chance of a clean-cut victory, let alone the conquest and annexation of an entire kingdom, then it makes better economic, political and military sense to make peace with your neighbours and live amicably with them. And then you throw wisdom and caution to the wind, dump all that careful work and nurturing down the gutter and wipe the slate clean. Now you’ll not be with me when I need you on my campaign. The honour of the venerable elders of our society is deeply wounded and if they could, they would be happy to have my head along with Bahadur’s. What honour are we talking about? Surely Mewar is larger and more important than a personal slight delivered many moons ago by a Prince and guest who had imbibed too much.
You were going to avenge the death of three thousand Rajputs by telling the Prince that the dancing girls at the Deep Mahal were the Ahmednagar qazi’s daughters. Bravo. Your thirst for vengeance must be shallower than the foreskin of your genitals. If you had had a little patience, not to mention an iota of brains, you would have stuck around with me and I would have made sure that you got your three thousand heads at least twice over. I loved you, cousin, and I’ll miss you but I don’t need adolescent hotheads with me on my first campaign. One last thing. I was wrong, you didn’t wipe the slate clean. It was clean when Bahadur rode in through the Suraj Pol that first morning. We didn’t know each other. We were at best and at worst indifferent to each other. All his life now the Shehzada will recall his utterly disproportionate, hasty and immature final act in Mewar with loathing and disgust. He will never be able to forgive himself for paying back so much warmth, affection and kindness with blood and death. Infinitely worse, he’ll never forgive me for saving his life twice. Mewar will stick in his side like a festering thorn and he’ll bide his time to destroy a fond memory gone irretrievably sour.
‘Stop thinking about Rajendra Simha and the Shehzada, my Prince. Rest awhile,’ Kausalya patted my head.
I cannot leave the subject well enough alone and return to it as to a scab on a wound that must be teased and prized open. Why can’t I be a good Rajput and see things simply, in black and white? There’s no gainsaying that a swift and just trial will earn me a high profile and much popularity. But surely, statecraft is a little more complicated than that. Bahadur is not the Sultan, at least not yet. His father is. If Bahadur is put to death in Chittor, not only will the honour of his father, Sultan Muzaffar Shah be wounded, the people of Gujarat will be affronted. That may prove to be dangerous. The inexorable logic of retribution and national pride will demand satisfaction and roll its armies towards Mewar. But aren’t we already at war? Yes. But the battle for Idar is a matter of territorial influence, that’s all. Neither Gujarat nor Mewar are fighting for their life or land. We are backing different claimants to the throne of Idar and are skirmishing on foreign soil. A war on our home ground is a different matter altogether. We may perhaps even inflict a terrible defeat on Gujarat. But at what cost to Mewar? Villages, towns and cities will be razed, a year’s crops burnt, the economy will be in shambles and tens of thousands of our people, farmers, artisans, traders, not to mention our soldiers, will lose their lives and be maimed. Spare the Shehzada and we’ll at least have a grateful father who might just remember that he owes us a favour, a very big favour.
And yet, I ask myself, is it really reasons of state that demand a more mature and wise response? Or am I just out of touch with reality and my people? In my preoccupation with larger issues, have I lost sight of a simple truth? No leader can afford to scoff at populist measures without forfeiting his constituency.
‘Sunheria’s waiting for you at the Chandra Mahal,’ Kausalya told me as I changed into the white of mourning. ‘She’s been coming every day the past four days. See her today. At least talk to her or she’ll think you didn’t care to say goodbye to her before you left.’
I marvel at Kausalya. She’s as possessive as they come but she never allows her biases to interfere with what she sees as her duty. I am the Maharaj Kumar. I need variety, change, a new face. She knows about Sunheria and over the past few months, has made it a point to be out of the way when the laundress has turned up. She wants my marriage to work. She’s one of the least religious women I know but she has undertaken three sets of the most rigorous fasts without telling me. Even now she doesn’t eat on Mondays and Thursdays. All this so that my wife will bear me a son and heir.
‘Are you really going, Maharaj Kumar?’ This was unlike Sunheria. She was not one to be easily depressed, certainly not by my departure. She had always, subtly but pointedly, asserted her independence with and from me.
‘Yes. His Majesty is waiting for me to take over command. I thought I explained it to you the last time we were together.’
‘May I come with you? You’ll want company. I’ll try and help you forget today’s terrible tragedy.’
‘That is thoughtful of you. But I’m going to war. What will you do there?’
‘I’ll wash your clothes. I’ll do anything you ask of me.’ She would not look up.
‘What is it, Sunheria? There’s something else on your mind.’
‘How blind you are.’ She had spoken simply, without any rancour. ‘I love you, Prince.’
And I thought I could read people.
I thought both of us, but especially Sunheria, had made it a point to treat our affair casually and disclaim all emotional involvement.
‘Don’t be alarmed, Prince. I’m not about to cling to you. You were the first person who treated me as a human being and did it as if it was the natural thing to do. But it’s not gratitude I’m talking about.’
‘I am coming back, Sunheria.’
‘I’ll pray every day for your safe return. But I doubt it if you will return to me.’ As always she hid her rough, working hands with her chunni.
I reached Lakshman Simhaji’s house at five forty-five in the morning. I should have gauged the mood of the crowd on the lawns when it took its own time to part and let me in. Inside Rajendra had been placed on a raised bier. I waited for everybody to leave so that I could be alone with him. He was wearing the saffron robes that a Rajput warrior wears on his last battle and journey. He still had the look of fatal surprise he had on his face when the Shehzada drew his dagger and plunged it in. In a few moments he would be buried under five or six feet of flowers. I took his hand in mine. My eye fell upon the gold kada on his right wrist. I had completely forgotten about it. I had given it to him the year we completed our studies. I slid it off. There was a legend carved on its inner wall: “We’ll grow battle-scarred and old together, my friend.” And all these years I had believed that affectionate words cannot pierce and kill. I wanted to swing his arm to the ceiling and back and shake him awake. Get up, get up, get off your arse, you lazy wastrel, get dressed and let’s make a move. There’s a war waiting to be fought. It was not as civilized as that. It was a string of dirty words from our Gurukul days. I had certainly shaken him up. His left leg was bent at the knees and his torso was no longer aligned with his head. But it was no use. He was not about to budge. I let go of his hand. It flopped awkwardly outside the bier and rested on the floor. I put the kada back.
I came out and stood on the steps of the house. According to protocol it was the signal for the rest of the family and all the other mourners to say goodbye to him. Over a thousand people were waiting outside. They pressed forward menacingly. Someone set up a chant. ‘Blood for blood. Mewar’s honour calls for Bahadur’s blood.’ Soon everybody had picked it up. It was obvious that if they didn’t get what they wanted, they would be willing to settle scores with me. ‘Free Prince Vikramaditya and lock up the traitor Maharaj Kumar.’ It was not difficult to guess who had inspired this novel idea. The calls for my imprisonment rose by the moment. Good move, Mother Karmavati. Where the hell was that Mangal? Nowhere in sight. But I was in luck. If the situation seemed close to hopeless a second ago, it was now utterly beyond repair and redemption. Instead of Mangal Simha, God Almighty help me, the Shehzada was walking towards the mob. The bloody fool, as if he hadn’t caused me enough trouble. Was it a case of belated conscience or, as I suspected, he couldn’t forsake his theatrical bravado even now?
‘Leave the Maharaj Kumar alone.’ He had a resounding voice and he used it to magnificent effect. ‘You want me, here I am. I am ready to sacrifice my life for the honour of Gujarat and Islam. Only cowards will attack a single man, ten to one, hundred to one or as you are now, a thousand to one. If you have the courage, come forward, one at a time and fight the fair fight. Let the righteous win.’
The crowd was now roaring alternately for my head and that of Bahadur’s. The men had smelt blood, it didn’t matter whether it was mine or the enemy’s, they were not going to be deprived of it.
‘Perhaps you are under the impression that you are at the amphitheatre watching competitions. And soon the wrestling matches will start.’ It was such a low voice, it was a wonder anybody heard it but heads turned slowly and listened to Lakshman Simha. ‘I would, however, like to remind you that my eldest son Rajendra is dead and but for your antics, we would be at the burning ghats by now.’
After the funeral I bathed in the Gambhiree and went to the Eklingji temple. I prayed hard. It was but recently that I had shifted my allegiance from the Flautist to our family deity. I begged him to embrace the slain Rajendra and free him from the cycle of reincarnation. As for myself, I asked for light and wisdom and the greater glory of Mewar. The head priest suggested that Rajendra’s death could be an ill-omen and it might be a good idea to leave a week later; ten days would be even better since that was an auspicious day. On some other occasion I may have been in two minds but fortunately I had no choice in the matter. You don’t keep His Majesty waiting.
The sun was already halfway to the top of the dome. If things had not gone awry, we would have left by six thirty in the morning. I wanted to hurry but I was not leaving without going up to the Victory Tower. There’s no need to be melodramatic about war. But it is reasonable to accept that a warrior cannot afford to put too much trust in return journeys. I make quick jottings. The Digambara temple which the Minister of the Exchequer, Adinathji, visits every morning was originally, they say, a Vishnu Temple. I have never understood how temples switch religions or worship one god for centuries and then overnight change to someone else. Next to it is the Tower of Fame, another Jain landmark. The merchant Jija Bagairwal Mahajan built it in the twelfth century to commemorate his visit to the shrines of the twenty-four tirthankars. It is about seventy feet high and has seven storeys. When my great grandfather Kumbha built the Tower of Victory, it was to upstage the Tower of Fame. The Jain tower is shorter and does not have any carvings inside.
I concentrate on the Chaturang Maurya Talab next. The Shiv Mandir at the centre of the lake has such strong Buddhist features, I suspect that here again there has been a change in divine tenants. Rao Ranmal’s house. Badshah ki Baksi where, local lore holds, the Sultan of Gujarat was imprisoned in Rana Kumbha’s time. Rampur Bhanpura’s palace from around the same time. The Bhanpuras are today old nobility without old money. Rani Padmini’s Palace with its Jal Mahal, the miniature jewel of a water palace that Queen Karmavati so often commandeers for her ladies’ get-togethers. Kalika Temple. Haath Kund where our royal elephants are washed. Behind Rani Padmini’s Palace is the Khatan Rani Palace. No queen this, but a lowly woman from the carpenter caste who caught Rana Khshatra Simha’s eye and became his favourite concubine. The Sas-Bahu Kund, the only place where mothers and daughters-in-law meet on an equal footing since both come to bathe here. Its springs are a mystery to this day since nobody knows their source nor the secret of their perpetual waters. Sattabees Devari or the twenty-seven tiny Jain temples built in the eleventh century. Last stop on my panoramic whirlwind tour of Chittor is the complex of the royal palaces where I have lived all my life.
I feel like a camel greedily stocking up at a water hole. Not very discriminating, I’m afraid. But I’m not looking for elegiac or epiphanic moments, just snatches and fragments of the life and rhythms of Chittor. Look at that group of women sitting in a circle with piles of cloth. They take little pinches of the cloth, tie knots around them with pieces of string and soak them in vats of dyes. Behind them extend row upon row of crossed bamboos with ropes stretched between. Any moment now bands of tight-rope walkers will climb the poles and walk nonchalantly on the taut ropes. Instead a woman hangs the ‘tie and dye’ cloths on them to dry. The wind fills the flamboyantly coloured sails and there’s a full-scale regatta five hundred feet above sea-level. Down on the terraced slopes a pair of bullocks and a farmer walk backwards. I can hear the distant splash of the buckets hitting water in a well. Now they go forward and the water wheel empties the buckets into shallow channels. My eyes track the Gambhiree and come to a stop at the dhobi ghat. She is so far away but there’s no mistaking her. That easy, unselfconscious grace of limb and movement could belong to no one but Sunheria. What did she mean by that cryptic remark early this morning? Is she a clairvoyant? Why won’t I come back to her? Is this campaign which has begun so badly going to claim my life too? Her arms and hands swing up and the dhoti or sheet she’s washing does a double loop and crashes on the wet black rock. Her arms don’t look muscular but they must be made of corded steel to beat hundreds of clothes effortlessly hour after hour. Then it hits me, the black bruises on her back and her legs, the welt on her back, the missing bangle on her left arm and the swelling on the bridge of her nose which she said she got from a fall in her house seven days ago. She is right. I’m not just blind but dumb too. Her old man can’t make it with her or anyone else for that matter, but that’s all the more reason to beat her up with a stick. Why didn’t she break his bones? She surely has the strength. Those hard adamantine palms of hers which she’s so conscious of and is forever trying to hide, one whack from them and her husband won’t be able to get up for a week or two. I’m talking rubbish. For all her independence and willfulness and although she does a man’s work, Sunheria is tradition-bound and will not retaliate.
The custard apple trees are weighed down with fruit. Not yet ripe but I must take a few dozen along with me. Nowhere, at least nowhere I have been to, do you get custard apples like the ones from Chittor.
I called Mangal over when I got down from the Victory Tower. ‘Put the fear of the devil in Sunheria’s husband. If he touches his wife again we’ll put him in solitary for assault and battery. I know you are discreet but let him not know the source of the threat.’
Leelawati, the royal household, the Queen Mother and all the other queens, Adinathji, the Pradhan and the gentry and denizens of Chittor were waiting at the parade grounds. I had asked my uncle Lakshman Simhaji to rest and not come to the ceremony for the presentation of the colours. Did I really expect him not to come? I had appointed his younger son, Tej, in Rajendra’s place and he stood at the head of the contingent I was taking along with me.
Leelawati waited solemnly under the pavilion. No throwing herself at me or hugging me this time. She stood there like a little queen. She was wearing a bandhani ghagra-choli with a Dhaka chunni. My troops and I marched past the whole congregation and came to a halt in front of Leelawati. I executed a left turn and held out my spear. She unfurled the pennant she had embroidered for me and slipped it up the brass shaft. A maid passed her the gold thali with a lamp and kumkum and turmeric powder in it. Leelawati did the arati and put a thumbful of red and yellow powder on my lowered forehead. ‘The honour of Mewar is in your hands, Maharaj Kumar, preserve it. Conquer the enemy and return unconquered. God speed. Jai Eklingji.’ I stood up straight and saluted the pennant with the Sun-god.
We were on our way. But not before I had performed one small errand. Something about Sunheria’s strange words kept bothering me. I dropped in at the office and with Mangal and another clerk as witnesses, transferred two villages from my own property to Sunheria and sent the deed along with a note to Kausalya. The elite Guard brought the Shehzada and his companions to the main gate and handed them over to me. Neither Prince Bahadur nor I were unaware of the ironies of the occasion. Months ago, the Shehzada had ridden in, asking Mewar for asylum from his own father. He was leaving now under escort because his new friends did not care for his company any longer. He was as much an enemy of Mewar’s as his father’s now. We would part company at the border of our kingdom. What he did then was his business. It was possible that instead of going home to Ahmedabad or Champaner he would join the Gujarat forces and we would meet in hand-to-hand combat in the next few weeks.
