Rebel Queen

by Michelle Moran

  He glanced at Kahini, but his gaze didn’t linger. His dark eyes turned to the rani, and I wondered how many women he’d seduced with those eyes.

  “Your sentence will be life in prison. I do not believe you understood what you were aiming for when you came to Jhansi looking to take my throne. You should have remained in Unao.” She nodded, and a pair of guards led him away.

  He was strangely composed, bowing and thanking the rani for her mercy. He didn’t look at Kahini, and Kahini didn’t make any further scene. It was as if her hysterics had never taken place. How had Kahini convinced the rani to spare a traitor’s life? But if Sadashiv was a traitor, so was Kahini. I possessed the ring to prove it. Only how could I be sure? And how could I ever go to the rani unless I was certain?

  The rani rehired the thousands of soldiers she’d been forced to dismiss, and their first order of business was to arrest every Kutwal who had helped enforce the British’s Circular Memorandum. The Temple of Mahalakshmi was to be reopened; the butchery next to it shut down. Most significantly, the Union Jack was to be removed from the south tower and the rani’s red flag, with the whisk and kettledrum, was to be restored. As soon as the rani was finished in the Durbar Hall, we made our way to the Durgavas to change from our formal angarkhas to simpler ones. The other women threw questioning glances at Kahini, but even Rajasi kept her silence.

  I waited until the other women had left for the queen’s room before confronting Kahini.

  “I know you have my ring,” she said as she slipped her pink angarkha to the floor. She was even more beautiful naked than she was dressed. Was this how she had persuaded Gopal to deliver her letters? “I’d like it back.”

  “I saw you give it to Gopal.”

  Her shoulders tensed. She bent and picked up a soft cotton angarkha to replace the one she was wearing, then she held it out in front of her, as if to examine whether she liked it or not. Finally, she put it on. “Is that all?”

  “No. I was there when Sadashiv gave it back to you. And I saw the letter he wrote asking if you were in any danger and whether he should come.”

  “You’ve been stealing my letters?” I had finally surprised her. “Rajasi!” she called, and I reached for the dagger on my thigh.

  “Oh, don’t worry. Your precious life is safe.”

  Rajasi came in from the queen’s room.

  “Sita believes I’m conspiring with Sadashiv to overthrow the rani.” She made the idea sound as if it were silliest, most inconsequential thing. But even Rajasi had her doubts now.

  “Why did you ask to save his life?”

  Kahini became livid. “Are you implying that I’m a traitor as well?” When Rajasi didn’t say anything, she crossed the room to my father’s statue of Durga. “Well then, maybe we should take a look at the secrets our little ganwaar has been hiding.” She nodded at me. “Show us what’s in the compartment.”

  I’m sure I looked just as confused as Rajasi.

  Kahini went ahead and twisted the head off my murti. Inside, where my father’s prayer beads should have been, were dried green leaves and white flowers. I stepped forward to have a better look, and Kahini thrust them at me. “Hemlock!” she accused. “I know a murderess when I see one.”

  Rajasi looked at me. Then she said, “You had this murti fixed, Kahini. I don’t know what game you’re playing, but these are dangerous times.”

  Kahini’s voice grew unnaturally low. “Maybe I should question what you’re hiding as well, Rajasi. Because this is poison.”

  I grabbed the murti from her hands and shook the contents out the window. “And now it’s gone,” I said, “just as mysteriously as it arrived.”

  Rajasi and I left Kahini in the Durgavas, but I was scared. Kahini had placed hemlock in my murti. I thought of Kahini profaning my image of Durga in this way and a hot rage rose up inside of me. I wanted to expose her for the traitor I thought she was. Then I remembered the rani’s reaction the only time I had ever criticized Kahini to her. I’d been afraid of what kind of doctor Kahini had chosen for the rani. At the time, my fears had been misplaced. How could I be certain they weren’t misplaced now?

  When I finally found a moment alone with Jhalkari that evening, I asked her what the symptoms of hemlock might be.

  “I don’t know. Moti could probably tell you,” she said. “So what do you think about Kahini?”

  “I think she can’t be trusted.” I didn’t explain any further. I immediately went to Moti and asked her what she could tell me about hemlock. Next to her, a musician was lazily strumming the veena. Over the sound of her voice, no one could hear us.

  “It’s a strong poison,” Moti said. “A person could use it to kill someone over time and no one would ever suspect it. There’d be a great deal of vomiting. A strange heartbeat. Finally, there’d be paralysis and then death.”

  I thought of the way little Damodar had died, and then it occurred to me that the raja’s death hadn’t been much different. What if it was possible that Kahini was more than just a traitor?

  That evening, Jhalkari made several attempts to persuade me to talk, but I told her, “Not now. There’s too many people.”

  Finally she said, “Come under my covers. No one will hear us.”

  I crawled into her bed and she put the blanket over our heads. If Kahini wasn’t asleep, then she would guess what we were talking about.

  “I think Kahini’s a murderess,” I whispered. Then I told her everything, from Gopal to the ring to the hemlock Kahini had discovered in my murti.

  I could feel Jhalkari go very still. “Have you told this to anyone else? To Arjun?”

  “Of course not. What if I’m wrong?”

  “You aren’t. Arjun has guard duty tonight outside the rani’s chamber. Go now.”

  I dressed myself and in the light of the full moon I could see that Kahini’s bed was empty. Where had she gone? Was she with the rani, trying to poison her before I could give her away? The sound of my sandals slapping against the marble woke several guards, who were supposed to be on duty. But in front of the rani’s chamber, Arjun was awake.

  “What is it?” he asked immediately.

  “Kahini? Is she inside?”

  “Not tonight. Why? Is something the matter?”

  I paused to catch my breath, then led him away from the rani’s door to a niche with a statue of our god Shiva dancing in an aureole of gold flames. I told him what I had told Jhalkari, adding that now Kahini was missing. “Do you think I could be wrong? Before her marriage, a servant discovered her with a letter to a lover. That’s why she became a Durgavasi. Two days after the servant exposed Kahini, he was found floating in the Ganges. . . .” Had she been a murderess even then?

  “It doesn’t take much to imagine Kahini plotting out a life for herself as the rani and Sadashiv as the raja,” Arjun said. “Or perhaps she plans to poison Sadashiv as well, once he’s on the throne. A widowed rani who doesn’t commit sati has a great deal of freedom.”

  Kahini had killed Damodar. She had killed the raja, her own cousin. An image of my grandmother taking me to the Temple of Annapurna to sell me as a devadasi entered my mind. “When do you stop trusting family?” I said.

  “When the proof is irrefutable. If Kahini is wise, she’ll realize that people are watching her now. She was foolish to expose hemlock in your murti and think Rajasi would accept that it was yours.”

  I was sharing a chamber with a woman who killed the Raja of Jhansi and his child—Damodar had only been a few months old. The most innocent creature on earth . . . how different life would be if not for Kahini! Instead of Damodar’s ashes being scattered into the Ganges, he would be alive, delighting his mother. And the little boy who was now living in his place? He would be safe with his real mother, snuggling at her breast. I thought of all the lives Kahini had ruined. Why hadn’t she tried to poison me as well?

  Two m
en on the stairs interrupted my thoughts. One was a guard, the other a messenger. Arjun and I stepped away from each other, and I hated to think how we looked to them.

  “News from Kanpur,” the guard said. His face was grim, as if someone had taken the edges of his lips and pulled them down with tiny weights.

  “The rani is sleeping,” Arjun told him.

  “Wake her. What this man has to say is important.”

  Arjun knocked until Sundari answered. It was obvious she’d been sleeping as well.

  “A messenger from Kanpur,” Arjun said. “Tell the rani it’s urgent.”

  “Letters from Kanpur,” the messenger said. “From Saheb.”

  A few moments later the rani appeared.

  The messenger stepped forward to touch the rani’s feet with his right hand, then straightened and handed two envelopes to her. In the flickering light of the oil lamps, she unfolded the first one and frowned. “I don’t understand why he is in Kanpur,” the rani said. “He was going to march to Delhi to return the former emperor, Bahadur Shah, to his throne.”

  The rani continued to read. Saheb had stopped on his march to Delhi. He had decided to retake the city of Kanpur from the British. The siege of Kanpur had taken three weeks.

  The rani stopped reading, unable to go further, and handed the letter to Arjun, who read: “There was a massacre and three hundred British men, women, and children were killed.”

  Saheb claimed he had arranged for the safe passage of British citizens to the city of Allahabad, in the north, and that what ultimately happened was the fault of Azimullah Khan.

  Saheb sent the British to the banks of the Ganges, which was in full flow. Forty boats awaited, but they had trouble launching in waters so rough. Azimullah Khan became impatient and shouted that if the British didn’t leave at once they would all be killed. Panic ensued, and in the chaos that followed, shots were fired. Saheb’s general, Tatya Tope, ordered all the British men killed; the one hundred and twenty women and children were taken as prisoners.

  They were taken to a villa called Bibighar, meaning House of the Ladies, a house for prostitutes. The British women would be used as prostitutes. And why not the children? Weren’t there soldiers who would enjoy a British boy? Or generals who might like a young British girl?

  Azimullah Khan disagreed: he wanted all of the prisoners killed. When the men refused, he threatened them with death.

  “The only thing I heard clearly above the gunfire,” Saheb wrote, “were shouts of ‘mummy,’ but the mothers couldn’t protect their children. I couldn’t protect them. Allah forgive me, Manu. I hope you will forgive me as well. Azimullah and Tatya Tope wish to drive the British from our land by whatever means necessary. You must know I would never have condoned this. But I’m afraid we’ll all suffer for their actions.”

  I imagined the terror the children felt as they looked to their mothers, searching their eyes for signs of reassurance that never came.

  The letter seemed to have no end of horror. Saheb reported that some of the women and children survived the shooting. But they were not allowed to live. A prostitute favored by Azimullah Khan gathered several butchers, who carved up the survivors, removing their genitals and breasts.

  None of us spoke when Arjun finished reading. Was it possible we lived in a world where such things could happen?

  “Your Highness,” the messenger said, “I ask that you read the second letter as well.”

  With trembling hands, the rani opened the envelope.

  In it, Saheb detailed the British retaliation. When the Company’s soldiers reached the site of the massacre, they discovered that none of the British dead had been buried. Their mutilated bodies had been dragged into a well and the stench was unbearable. The hair of the victims had lodged itself in the trees, caught on shrubs, and still blew about in the wind. Several witnesses attested to the fact that three of the women and children had survived the massacre and the butchering by hiding beneath dead bodies. The next morning they were thrown into the well alive, alongside the corpses of their friends.

  When the British commander, General Neill, heard of this, something in him must have broken. He began arresting every man he could, even men who had never been to the House of the Ladies. They were forced to clean the blood from the floors with their tongues. The Muslims who were arrested were sewn into pigskins and hung. The Hindus were executed by Dalits. The remaining prisoners were tied across the mouth of cannons that were then fired. This, we learned, was how Azimullah Khan’s soldiers had killed the men they had taken hostage. A nearby village protested the deaths of the innocent civilians at Kanpur as inhumane and was set on fire. Anyone who tried to flee was shot and killed.

  “They’ve taken up a new cry,” the rani read. “ ‘Remember Kanpur!’ The British newspapers cover nothing else, Manu. They’re calling you the Rebel Queen, since it was under your rule that the sepoys rebelled. Be ready for anything. Azimullah Khan and his general have given the British every excuse they need to wage war on India.”

  The rani looked ill. “Is that it?”

  The messenger looked tremendously sorry for himself. “No. The rebellion in Delhi has failed. Yesterday, Delhi was retaken by the British.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  1858

  Be it known to all people belonging to, or residing in the Government District of Jhansi, that owing to the bad conduct of the sepoys in Kanpur, valuable lives have been lost, and property destroyed. But the strong and powerful British Government is sending thousands of European Soldiers to places that have been disturbed, and arrangements will be made to restore order in Jhansi.

  Until our soldiers can reach Jhansi, the Rani will continue to rule in the name of the British Government and according to the customs of the British Government. I therefore call on all great and small to obey the Rani and to pay their taxes to her, for which they will receive credit.

  The British Army has retaken the city of Delhi and has killed thousands of rebels. We will hang or shoot all rebels wherever they may be found.

  The British government was sending soldiers. The rani’s advisers believed that this was the English government’s way of saying that the Company had been wrong to remove her, that the rani would now rule again, only this time with the British government’s blessing.

  “Nowhere does it say that,” Moropant corrected them. “Until our soldiers can reach Jhansi,” he read. “Until then.”

  Men’s voices rose in the Durbar Hall. The rani drowned them all out by saying, “I will write and ask them to clarify my position. In one breath, they’re calling me the Rebel Queen. In another, I’m administering justice with their approval. So let them tell me where I stand.”

  A man arrived in the Durbar Hall claiming he was a messenger from the rani’s secret admirer. He said these last words in English, leading me to believe the man whose message he was carrying had to be British. At this, the rani’s cheeks turned very pink.

  “Hand my Durgavasi the letter,” she said, and the old man gave me a thick note sealed in a large blue envelope. I sliced the paper open with my finger. The first line read, “For the Rani of Jhansi, from Major Ellis.” I handed her the letter, and she read the contents and passed it to her father, who said, “It’s settled then.”

  “The British have no intention of keeping me on the throne of Jhansi,” the rani said, and I could hear the pain in her voice. “The warrant for my arrest still stands.” She lowered her head as if something heavy was pressing it down. “They have no intention of coming peacefully. Major Ellis warns us to look at Lucknow as an example of what’s to happen here.”

  Lucknow was burned to the ground; its women raped, its men and children slaughtered. The rani covered her eyes with her hand. This treachery by the British was too much. Then I glanced at Kahini and wondered what the rani would think if she knew how deep the treachery spread.

  It
took several moments for her to recover, but when her voice was steady she went on. “We will issue our own proclamation now. Let it read that men and rajas of all faiths must come together to rebel. The British are not coming peaceably.”

  Calls were made for volunteers, and in Jhansi alone fourteen thousand men came forward to be trained as soldiers. And if you have ever poured water into an anthill and watched the ants scurry to save themselves, this is how our city looked over the next few weeks. Both day and night, you could hear the rumbling of carts as they passed through the streets. People were moving families, guns, food, anything you could think of. Temples and treasuries were emptied, and the money used to buy weapons. I was there when two hundred pounds of gunpowder arrived from Gwalior, a neighboring kingdom that was too cowardly to stand against the British, but too greedy to resist selling us their ammunitions and arms. A magazine was constructed down the road from the palace in order to house so much gunpowder and ammunition. Meanwhile, guns, swords, arrows, and knives began filling up the armory. Six new cannons appeared, along with eight gunners from Kalpi, a neighboring city where the British had chosen one girl from every house to be used as a comfort woman. The men brought with them the knowledge of manufacturing brass balls, and the production went on all day and all night.

  The rani also reached out to farmers, telling them to burn their fields, poison their wells, and chop down any tree that grew on their land. There would be nothing for the British when they arrived, not even water. The farmers themselves would have to survive on whatever they could stockpile or hide.

  As a carryover from our days in the Rani Mahal, Arjun and his guards spent their evenings with us in the queen’s room, and no one protested.

  “I heard the British left their wounded soldiers to die while they plundered the temples in Nagpur,” Mandar said. She moved closer to the brazier. It was the first night we’d needed a fire. “Nagpur is only a three-day ride south.” Meaning it wouldn’t be long before they were doing the same in Jhansi. I thought of Barwa Sagar and what might happen there, but Barwa Sagar was a tiny village. Surely the British had no business in such a place.