The Palace Tiger

Chapter Twelve

Lal Bai hurried down a dark corridor of the Old Palace, red skirt swirling, sandalled feet crunching over shards of broken jewellery. A pile of cheap glass bangles ceremonially broken in grief at the death of the Yuvaraj annoyed her and, impatient, she kicked them out of her way. Gewgaws! Her own jewels were safely hidden away in the toshakhana and there was no chance that she would be expected to sacrifice them according to custom. Lal Bai lived and survived by her own rules.

Why should the women of the zenana give up their pretty things in honour of a man who never visited them? They’d had little time, in any case, to restock their trinket boxes after the funeral of the first son. And Prithvi was not popular. That Angrez wife of his had kept him well away from the harem and even his mad old mother complained she had hardly seen her son since his marriage.

Now his body was being prepared for the burning ghat by the bai-bands. Before the sun set the Jats would carry the bier to the pyre of sandalwood. They would kindle the flames and feed them with cotton oil and camphor and remain in attendance at the samshan until the fire had burned itself out. Then they would remove what was left of the body and throw it into the river. Lal Bai pictured the scene in all its satisfying detail. Prithvi Singh would go to join his brother. Lal Bai smiled in triumph, hastily flicking the tail of her dopatta over her face. So near her goal she could risk no report of disloyal conduct. There were eyes everywhere in this maze and not all were dimmed by tears. She could imagine the relish disguised by false regret in the voice of a treacherous eunuch as he gained audience with the ruler: ‘How it pains me, hukham, to speak of such a matter — and you will tear out my tongue if it runs away with me — but on the very day of the funeral of the Yuvaraj, your servant Lal Bai was observed laughing and dancing in the palace. .’

She bowed her head and went on her way. Her behaviour had been correct and in accordance with her low status. She had crept in to look at the corpse, had scattered rice and marigolds over it and had even thrown in a token glass bangle or two. The room where the body was displayed was hot and uncomfortably full of women weeping and ululating. Musicians beat out a sombre hymn for the dead, drugged heads nodding in time with the insistent, repeated tune. All the palace women had passed through except for his wife. The widow should even now be cutting off her hair, putting on black clothes and preparing to retreat into an obscure room in a distant part of the palace where she would eat meatless dishes from tin thali for the rest of her life — if anyone remembered to feed her. But where was the Angrez?

Going to parties in the Old Palace with the rest of the unclean. Sharing the bed of the latest ferenghi to arrive. A spasm of hatred made her slim shoulders quiver. She would never be able to understand the tastes of these foreigners who were made so welcome at the palace. This tall dark one with the gaze like a lance and the body of a Rajput, the police-sahib whose arrival she had observed through a slatted window, had rejected the attentions of Padmini. Well-named Padmini — the Lotus, the girl she had herself trained in the arts of pleasure. Zalim had been angry but Lal Bai had defended the girl. If the foreigner preferred the company of a drunken white whore to that of the most talented girl in the kingdom he was not worth their attention. They could discount him.

And the she-camel who had spent the night in his room — what was she to make of her? While the body of her husband grew cold and stiff. Shameless whore! Unholy! Lal Bai resolved to speak to Udai Singh about this behaviour as soon as she saw him again. And, after the mourning was over, she was sure she would see him again.

She was the mother of his one remaining son, after all — a girl of fifteen when Bahadur was born. Not a wife but worthy of consideration. And still worthy of his attention. Lal Bai was well aware that she remained youthful and as beautiful as any Padmini. Surely now he would see that he was wasting his time — his precious remaining time — with that gawky girl who was neither truly Hindu nor truly Angrez. The girl had no breasts, no swelling hips, and Lal Bai had laughed discreetly when a palace guard had said that the only thing Third Her Highness liked to feel between her thighs was a polo pony.

Lal Bai pattered on, enjoying the cool of the northern verandah. She had come far from her apartment on the eastern side of the zenana but there was something she was eager to see before she returned to perform puja. She had dismissed her attendant, Chichi Bai, to prepare the incense and offerings for her morning ceremony. She would make puja on this day with gratitude to her family goddess. Mahakali was due her praise. Lal Bai’s prayers had been answered and now there were no more obstacles to the fulfilment of the prophecy. Soon after the birth of Bahadur, she had paid many rupees to the fortune teller and she had every day repeated every precious word he had said to her. ‘The ruler will be succeeded by his third son. But that third son will be the last ruler.’

The second part of the prophecy sounded alarming but Lal Bai had put it out of her mind. So long as the first part came to pass — that was all that mattered. She had kept it to herself, fearful of arousing jealousy, but for years she had watched the ruler’s wives for signs of a late miraculous pregnancy, fearing that one of them might produce a third legitimate heir. She had bribed the maharanees’ maids to bring her news each month that all was well and, with time and nature, the threat had died out. But then Udai had married a third wife. A young wife with many child-bearing years before her.

Lal Bai had been distraught. Left alone in her quarters in the zenana while her lord spent his time with his new bride, she had passed her hours in strenuous prayer and it seemed the goddess had listened to her pleading and granted her request. Month followed month and no announcement of a forthcoming royal birth was made.

And now the first two sons were gone and her lord was growing weaker each day. Surely soon he would announce his successor? Why was he delaying? It was fitting that Bahadur should become maharaja. He had been reared with that intention. Always his father’s favourite, he had been quick to learn the tasks his father had set him. He had learned languages and manners from foreign tutors, he had accompanied the maharaja on his tours of the villages learning the workings of law and taxation as well as farming and irrigation. He had learned the traditional warrior skills of a Rajput prince. It had been obvious to everyone — perhaps too obvious — that Udai favoured Bahadur and Lal Bai had had to work hard behind the scenes in the zenana, paying out many rupees to informers to ensure her son’s safety. And more than rupees. She had given away many of her much-loved rubies to buy his safety but the sacrifices, the scheming, the plotting against his enemies had brought success.

Now she was to have her reward. With Bahadur on the gaddi, even though it would be six more years before he would rule alone, she would be secure. The maharaja’s mother commanded respect, whoever she was. Her son was twelve years old, after all. He had reached the age of the warrior. Time for Lal Bai to ease her vigilance. Time for Bahadur to repay his debt.

She rounded a corner with anticipation and stopped to stare, shielding her face from sight with a fold of her silken scarf. She was aware that her expression of envious longing would not be misinterpreted by any onlooker. Her slight body quivered with the intensity of her desire as she gazed. At her feet lay a swathe of gardens laid out in patterns as complex as the richest embroidery, a representation in flower and shrub of the four rivers of Paradise, but Lal Bai’s paradise was further off and of this world. She was looking beyond the garden, to the shore of the lake where, sheltered by the dark green canopy of a grove of neem trees, the white marble columns of an elegant small pavilion rose up, seemingly from the water itself. Balconied windows with fretted white screens overhung the lake. Lal Bai pictured herself there, breathing in the cool air rising off the water, watching the animals that crept down to drink at sunset, summoning with a clap of her hands her evening meal served on a gold thal.

Bahadur would give her the pavilion.

Lal Bai’s single exposed dark eye narrowed with determination. Yes, the Maharaja Bahadur would give his mother the pavilion.

When it had been cleansed of the presence of the widow, Shubhada.