The Moghul

by Thomas Hoover

CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Nadir Sharif studied the pigeon as it glided onto the red sandstone ledge and rustled its feathers in exhausted satisfaction. It cocked its white-spotted head for a moment as it examined the prime minister, then waddled contentedly toward the water cup waiting just inside the carved stone pigeon house.

  He immediately recognized it as one of the birds he kept stationed in Gwalior, his last pigeon stage en route to Agra from the south. The cylinder bound to its leg, however, was not one of his own. Imprinted on its silver cap was the seal of the new Portuguese Viceroy of Goa, Miguel Vaijantes.

  Nadir Sharif waited patiently for the pigeon to drink. He knew well the rewards of patience. He had waited patiently, studying the feringhi, for a full week. And he had learned almost all he needed to know.

  The Englishman had been invited to durbar every day since his arrival. Arangbar was diverted by his stories and bemused by his rustic gifts. (The only gift that had not entertained Arangbar was the book of maps he had wheedled out of the Englishman, which upon inspection showed India as something far less than the greatest continent on the globe. But Arangbar found the map's rendering of India's coastline to be sufficiently naive to cast the accuracy of the entire book into question.) This was the first feringhi Arangbar had ever met who could speak Turkish and understand his native Turki, and the Moghul rejoiced in being able to snub the Jesuits and dispense with their services as translators.

  But most of all, Arangbar loved to challenge the Englishman to drinking bouts, as night after night they matched cups in the Diwan-i-Khas until near midnight. As Arangbar and the Englishman drew closer, the Jesuits had grown distraught to near madness. The hard-drinking Englishman bragged of the East India Company and its bold plans for trade, of the old Levant Company and its disputes with Spain over Mediterranean routes, of English privateer­ing in the West Indies. Of everything . . . except when the next voyage would come.

  Nadir Sharif had listened closely to their expansive talk all those nights, and he had finally deciphered to his own satisfaction the answer to the question uppermost in Arangbar's mind.

  The Englishman is bluffing. England has no fleet. At least no fleet that can ever hope to threaten Portuguese control of the Indian Ocean. There'll be no more voyages, and no more presents, for at least a year. The Englishman is living a fool's dream.

  When his European presents are gone, and he's spent what's left of his money buying jewels and gifts for the Moghul, he'll be dropped from court. Arangbar plays him like a puppet, always hinting the firman will be ready tomorrow. But there'll be no firman unless Arangbar can be convinced the English king is powerful enough to protect Indian shipping from Portuguese reprisals at sea. And this the English clearly cannot do. At least not now, not without a fleet. The Englishman is living on borrowed time.

  And I'm beginning to think he suspects it himself. He drinks more than a man in his place should. He's always able to stay in control, but just barely. If Arangbar were not always drunk himself, he would have noticed it also.

  Nadir Sharif glanced at the silver cylinder and smiled to himself. So His Excellency, Miguel Vaijantes, is worried. Undoubtedly he's demanding I contain the Englishman, isolate him from Arangbar.

  It will hardly be necessary. The Englishman is destined to be forgotten soon. How much longer can he hold the Moghul’s attention? A month? Two months? I know his supply of trifles for Arangbar is already half depleted.

  But why burden the Viceroy with this insight? Bargain with him. Let him pay enough and I will guarantee with my life that the sun will rise tomorrow morning. The end of the Englishman is no less sure.

  Nadir Sharif stroked the pigeon lovingly as he began to unwind the silk binding holding the cylinder, and it reminded him again of the Deccan.

  Still no pigeons from Mumtaz. How curious that her one dispatch in the last month, the one brought by the Rajput, was merely to request that small accommodation for the Englishman. Who knows why she asked it? Perhaps it was a joke of the prince's.

  Nadir Sharif congratulated himself on how easy it had been. The Englishman had never known.

  And it was obvious the woman Kamala had changed him, smoothed him. Was the prince grooming him for something? If so, why send the request through Mumtaz? Whatever the reason, it had been a pleasure to grant this one favor for the daughter he doted on. He also realized it might well be the last favor he could ever do for her.

  It was clear now that Prince Jadar would be banished from Agra forever. The events of the next four weeks were inexorable.

  Today Arangbar's birthday celebrations begin. Next week Allaudin will be guest of honor at a shikar, a royal hunt. Two weeks after that, the wedding formalities begin, and the following week is the wedding itself. Four weeks and Jadar will be finished. Even if he returned to Agra today, he could not forestall the inevitable.

  Nadir Sharif took the pigeon on his wrist and offered it a few grains of soaked dal from his own hand as he gently slipped off the silver cylinder. When the bird was pecking contentedly he eased it onto the ledge, twisted away the silver cap of the cylinder, and settled against the rooftop divan to translate the cipher.

  The morning wind from the Jamuna grew suddenly chill against his skin. Then, as the message slowly emerged, the wind from the Jamuna became ice.

  Nadir Sharif translated the cipher again, to be sure. But there could be no mistaking what it said. Or what it meant. He would have declared its contents an absurd hoax, perhaps even a hoax inspired by the Englishman, had not the message been intercepted by the Portuguese, by capture of one of Jadar's own pigeons.

  The cipher did not say so, but doubtless a copy had also been sent to Arangbar. Even had it not, the Moghul still would hear the news within the day. His own intelligence network was the best in India, after that of the queen.

  He closed the door of the pigeon house, picked up a small silver bell beside the divan, and rang lightly. Almost before he had replaced the bell, a eunuch was waiting.

  "Your pleasure, Sharif Sahib."

  "The Englishman. Where is he now?"

  "In the garden, Sharif Sahib. He's always there at this time of day, with the Hindu woman."

  "What's he doing there?"

  "Who can say, Sharif Sahib? All we know is he goes into the garden every day around noon—I think the Hindu woman may be teaching him to play the sitar there—before going to durbar in the Red Fort. But he will be leaving soon now, as you must, to be present for His Majesty's birthday weighings."

  "The English feringhi was invited?" Nadir Sharif was momentarily startled.

  "He received an invitation, Sharif Sahib."

  "Bring him to the reception room. I will see him now, before he leaves."

  The eunuch snapped around and was gone. Nadir Sharif paused to translate the cipher one last time before ringing for his turban.

  "Ambassador Hawksworth, please forgive my preoccupa­tion these past few days." Nadir Sharif was bowing, it seemed, unusually low. "We're not always privileged to entertain our guests as we might wish. Preparations for today's birthday ceremonies have kept me rushing about the palace. But please, be seated."

  Hawksworth's gaze swept the room. It was cavernous, hung with thick tapestries on every wall, and lightly perfumed with rose incense. Before he could reply a bowing servant was proffering a chalice of Persian wine. As Nadir Sharif watched a glass being poured, his voice continued, silken.

  "Have you found anything here to pass the time? They tell me you've developed an interest in the sitar. A marvelous instrument really. And in my garden. Tell me, what do you think of it?"

  "I can't decide." Hawksworth felt his caution rising automatically, as it did any time he found himself alone with Nadir Sharif. "It reminds me of some of the Tudor gardens connected with English castles, but still it's different. I like the precise geometry of the walkways and hedges, and the running water. It's a soothing place to sit and practice."

  "So you find the Persian garden soothing? It is Persian, you kn
ow. The whole idea of a symmetrical garden comes from Persia. Not from this barbarous wasteland." Nadir Sharif motioned him to a bolster, and paused until he was seated. "Yes, it's soothing. I agree with you. But of course, that's one of the purposes of a garden." Nadir Sharif eased himself against a bolster and accepted a glass of sharbat. "It pleases me that you enjoy my garden. You see, Ambassador, to a man in the desert, an oasis, a spot of water and green, is like a paradise. So we sometimes believe we are creating a bit of Allah's Paradise when we create a garden. You know, the Holy Quran itself tells us that Paradise will be something like a garden."

  "But whose idea was it to build Persian gardens here?"

  "When the first Moghul conqueror arrived in India, almost a century ago, he declared the land here around Agra to be particularly barren and depressing. So he immediately built a Persian garden. But we must all do our share, so today there are many gardens, all over India. The garden, you see, is our tribute to nature."

  "But why so geometrical? Your garden uses water, stones, and plants to create designs that seem almost like the marble floors of your palace."

  "Mathematics, Ambassador, principles of law. Islam is the rule of law. Why do you think we have so many mathematicians? I deliberately designed this garden with calculated geometric divisions. It provides me great satisfac­tion to impose order on the willfulness of nature."

  "But why are the stone pathways all elevated above the level of the garden? In English gardens they're at ground level and lined with shrubs."

  "But surely that's obvious as well. Our gardens are really concealed waterways, with water constantly flowing from one end to the other. We must put the walkways above the water." Nadir Sharif waved his hand. "But all of that is merely mechanics. The garden is where we find peace. It's where we wait to greet the spring, whose arrival we celebrate at the Persian New Year."

  Nadir Sharif strolled to a window and looked out on the garden. "Spring in India seems to come up from the south. It's said that buds appear each day a few kos farther north, like a tender army on the march. But we Persians believe that spring must have a haven if she is to stay. And that's another reason we build gardens."

  "I don't understand."

  "There's a famous poem in Persian, by the poet Farrukhi, about gardens and spring. He once wrote of a place where spring always arrived feeling lowly and despised, because there was no land for her save desert, a place of rocks and thistles. But then a rich man—actually the patron of Farrukhi, whom he was writing to flatter—built a garden for her and the next year spring came forth from the south and found a home there." Nadir Sharif smiled. "In fact the poem begins by comparing spring's original arrivals to that of a bankrupt feringhi's, who appeared with no carpet, no livelihood. But after spring discovered the garden, she brought from the south turquoise for the willows, rubies for the rose."

  Nadir Sharif smiled. "What do you think of Farrukhi's poem, Ambassador?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Curiosity. I was wondering what are the chances that spring will come again from the south this year? Did the 'bankrupt feringhi merely come to see if the garden was ready? Was the first arrival of spring false, with the real arrival yet to come?"

  Hawksworth studied Nadir Sharifs face. "I don't under­stand what you're trying to say. But I would like to know if you've spoken to His Majesty about the firman."

  "Please believe I mention it daily. I think now he'll soon agree to terms."

  "Then there's nothing yet?" Hawksworth set down the glass of wine. "I assumed that was why you wanted to speak to me. But you just wanted to talk about Persian gardens and Persian poets."

  "Ambassador, I'm not a man for idle talk. Surely we know each other better than that." Nadir Sharif turned and banished the servants and eunuchs with a wave of his hand.

  "Tell me. I know you met Prince Jadar once. Give me your honest opinion. Do you think he's a clever man?"

  Hawksworth nodded noncommittally.

  "I can assure you, Ambassador, that he's very clever indeed. Even his staunchest detractors would agree on that. And he's also resourceful. Not many here are aware he has a full intelligence network of his own. He does not, of course, have access to the dispatches of the official court reporters in the provinces, the wakianavis, or the dispatches of His Majesty's confidential reporters, the harkaras." Nadir Sharif paused. "At least we do not think he has access to their reports. But in a way he doesn't really need them. You see, he has his own system of reporters, which we know he began creating over two years ago. Spies whose identity is carefully guarded. We do not know any of their names, but we do know he calls them his swanih-nigars, and they prepare detailed information on anything in the provinces he asks them to. His network is extensive and, I understand, quite effective."

  Hawksworth suddenly found himself remembering Shirin, the papers in the observatory, and wondering . . .

  "Naturally he has agents along the southern coast. But at times they can be a bit too careless about the information they gather. For example, a cipher intended for the prince— sent by one of Jadar's secret swanih-nigars stationed in Cochin, on the far southern end of the Malabar Coast—was just intercepted by a Portuguese shipping agent at the port of Mangalore, down the coast south of Goa. The message was of great interest to the Portuguese, and they saw fit to forward it to me. What do you suppose the message contained?"

  Hawksworth pulled himself alert.

  "I have no idea."

  "Tell me, Ambassador. The East India Company does trade on Java, am I correct?"

  "Six years ago the Company established a factory . . . a trading station . . . at Bantam, the main port on the island."

  "Was there a voyage to Bantam this year?"

  "The Discovery was bound for Bantam this year, with cargo from Surat."

  "Ambassador, the time for games is over. Your charade has made things very difficult for those of us who would try to help you." Nadir Sharif studied Hawksworth deliberately, almost sadly. "It would have been helpful if you had told me everything sooner. It's embarrassing that I must receive my information through captured intelligence, when I'm authorized to serve as your agent. I'm sure it will not surprise you that the Portuguese Viceroy, His Excellency, Miguel Vaijantes, is most disturbed at the news. There will be consequences."

  "What are you talking about?"

  "The cipher for Jadar. You could have told me sooner of your king's plans. It would have made all the difference." Nadir Sharif stared coldly at Hawksworth. "There's no longer any need to pretend you don't know. The fleet was sighted off the Malabar Coast, by coastal fishing barks, only three days ago. Four armed frigates, showing English colors, with a course north by northwest, which means they will stand to sea and avoid the Portuguese patrols along the coast. It was only by the slightest chance that they were seen. And then another accident that the cipher intended for Jadar was intercepted. Otherwise no one would have known. It was very resourceful of your East India Company, Ambas­sador, to have a second fleet sail up our west coast from the English factory at Java. Unless the Portuguese had intercepted and decoded Jadar's cipher, they would have been taken completely by surprise. Now they estimate the English fleet is scheduled to reach Surat within the month. Unless they are met and engaged . . . which they most assuredly will be."