Sary and the Maharajah's Emeralds

by Sharon Shipley

  Diverted, he took a sip of tea, “Oh! Same mother! I favor her—the most beautiful woman in all India.” A devastating cleft in his cheek showed. I noted he softened at the mention of his mother.

  “My father found and married her after scouring every province and goat herder’s village. But yes, my mother tended pigs, not goats. She far prefers her present job,” he said dryly.

  “My brother takes after our father, in case you were wondering.”

  I lowered my lashes.

  “My brother is not—how do you say? Every young maiden’s dream? However”—his eyes mocked—“you are not a maiden.”

  He had switched again.

  “I didn’t mean to…insult you.” It sounded contrite.

  In a pig’s eye.

  “We were—are close. My brother and I have a…” He hesitated. “How do you say, a checkered history.” He looked off, seeing another time. “I protected him, as a boy. Others tormented, tortured him, even though he was a future raj.” He gestured. “Tripping on the playing field, the cricket bat in the stomach, secret pummeling in the baths. All behind doors, of course. It did not help one of his names was Aadalarasu.”

  At my questioning look, he explained, “King of the Dance.” He flashed white teeth. I could not help laughing aloud.

  “A poor excuse for brutality and greed.” I spoke more softly than before. “He was born your brother, with a silver spoon. Though in his case, it must have been an entire gold soup ladle in his mouth.”

  His turn to smile. I saw him press his lips. We were becoming quite cozy. Then he had to spoil it all.

  “They do not behead people in Great Britain, but I am not certain he has such…compunction. Beheading, or worse, is not unheard of for treason, and he decides that which is treason. Your insult to his person, your reckless escape, could be construed as treason in the most lenient court. Fortunately, he has…” His hesitation was barely there. “He has forgotten you for the moment.”

  I missed the easy humor. He stood, taking a final sip. Perhaps he too regretted it. “Enough. Take care of your words. Net them. Guard them judiciously before more rubbish escapes that pretty mouth of yours or you take flights of fancy—or any other flight.”

  It was said with the solid clang of metal falling on cement from a great height.

  Then, with a gaze melting me to my bones, he searched my face. “So as you don’t lose that pretty head,” he said softly. “Or find yourself in the maharajah’s special prison, never again to see light of day. Or turn to brittle parchment, blowing as ashes in the wind. And I would hate that,” he whispered softly.

  His lips were very close. He smelt of cloves and bay rum.

  “Above all, never forget, Sarabande, that truth belongs to the House of Bharatpur. Our gharials do need to be fed. Not to mention panthers.” He bit the words as wire snips clipping ten-penny nails.

  I shivered inside. He had changed again. Surely, he was tormenting, joking, or trying to frighten me. However, I saw his face. Sweet Jesus. He meant it.

  “Your pet lizards!” I bit off, drawing him back.

  He shrugged. “Not mine. But yes. The gharial is rare and found only in India,” he said with some pride.

  “Abominations.”

  ‘True. I see how you might think that.” Without a hint of a smile, he fell back in the chair, dragging fingers through long gleaming hair. I was awkwardly standing. Then he pulled me—reluctantly, I might add—to him. I had no choice but to plunk onto his lap.

  I fidgeted off. He yanked me back. I was tired. I stayed. Besides, I was curious to see how much deeper he dug his well.

  “What I am attempting to instill, Sary, is fear—for my sake. Drugs, his excesses. My brother attempts differing solutions. Exotic stuff. Some flown to him. Yes, are you surprised? We have an aero-plane. Concoctions from China or Africa. Shiva knows what is in them. Powdered rhinoceros horn! Monkey glands in wine! Venom from horned toads, some of which understandably makes him very ill.”

  “It wouldn’t make a difference. You, him, or the lowest beggar in the streets—I desire none of you.” At last, I pulled away, limping to the small balcony outside my sickroom, overlooking a service alley and the distant lake. The jasmine and honeysuckle perfuming the humid dusk might as well be burning rubbish. The rajah set down his refreshed teacup so hard behind me the porcelain shattered, spilling tea like thin blood.

  “We aren’t through here.”

  “With all respect,” I gritted, “we are. He is unnatural. So are you. And I—I am tired.”

  “Yes, forgive me. You yet recover.” I looked for sarcasm and found none.

  I turned back. “But why me?” The thought jelled in my tired brain. “There are hundreds of willing and more desirable women in the hareem, more’s the pity—more coming in every day, it seems. I am…old, compared to them. I’m—damaged.”

  He leaned on the parapet and cast a wry glance over the black tapestry of the lake with the sparkle of moon threading its ripples.

  “Perhaps you find us ignorant, twelfth-century barbarians. Why you? For no reason other than new blood, mayhap. We are not as backward as you suppose! We study genetics and the perils of an inbred, weakened lineage. There is talk of Queen Victoria and her grandson, the Russian prince with the bleeding disease. Hemo-something. Perhaps a strong, healthy female such as you, used to work, unlike the women of the hareem, spoiled raajkumaari, or eager peasants parading their lovely daughters”—his mouth turned down—“before my brother would suit all Rajasthan best. What do you think?” Then he added quietly, “Besides which, I—he—saw you.” He looked away but not before I saw the set of his jaw and reddening of his cheekbones.

  I spoke carefully. “There is more than that. You are not telling me all.”

  “No,” he agreed simply. “And I may never.” After a moment of silence, he went on. “So you see, as despicable as you might think me, am I not more agreeable? And you would not have had to force your way through that disgusting tunnel.” From my sideways glance, I saw a smile tug at his lips.

  I gripped the rail.

  “I am as any man,” he continued. “I wanted you for—you.”

  I clenched the rail harder.

  “Best do as our physician says,” he continued oddly.

  Expecting reproof, I looked up to see him nodding at five yellow eyes of raw eggs staring back at me from a platter that a servant of the doctor’s had quietly padded in with.

  I looked balefully at the glistening yellow-and-white islands on a plate.

  White teeth flashed as he indicated the eggs. “Best get at them.”

  I tossed the eggs off the parapet. I heard a yelp from below. Wonderful!

  When I looked around, I was alone.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Poor Boy

  Square bundles of steaming shondesh, shrimps, and other savories, but mostly sweets in tempting array. Bowls of shrikhand, which I knew was honeyed yoghurt, and glistening balls of sohan papdi, sukhdi, and cherry bright gulab jamon. Plain laddoo, of course, and mounds of nuts, figs, dates, oranges—and milk.

  Milk?

  Enough to feed a bloody orphanage, offered my imp.

  I sipped sticky chai and tried not to wonder why I was here. Still in the robe of a patient, I caught the rajah gazing at my linen wrap, open slightly.

  He frowned. “Cover yourself.”

  What? I looked down at my plain wrap concealing all but my neck.

  “My stars! I’m practically bundled for winter! Compared with the flimsy garb I’m usually given…” Soft hesitant footsteps approached.

  With a welcoming smile showing all forty or fifty of his perfect white teeth, the rajah extended a hand toward a drapery.

  A frail boy of undetermined years slipped through, silently presenting himself. His lovely elfin smile flicked like a beacon on a foggy shore.

  To me, the boy seemed a novice actor who hadn’t learned his lines, thrust onto the stage alone and unrehearsed, staring out at a hostile au
dience.

  I smiled wide in welcome.

  Raising a pointed chin, the child tried to straighten. My heart lurched.

  He was perhaps eleven. Could be as young as eight, though, given his frail figure. Then I saw the incipient mustache valiantly growing above his thin lips. Twelve, then. I looked askance at the rajah. The boy was royal, by his raiment—gathered gold lamé ankle skirt over tight puttees on skinny legs, gilded pointed slippers, a choker, the ubiquitous pearls, even on one so young. A red-and-gold turban cupped his narrow head, topped by a royal crescent and egret spray.

  I now recalled his thin ghost at the birthday party, half-hidden by the maharani.

  The boy studied me with intelligence. I smiled at the small dagger in his sash. The thin face changed as he raised big sad eyes to the rajah. No, not sad but fatigued from standing and holding a head on such a tender stalk.

  I flashed a question. Yours? Some semblance lay in the strong brows and deep eyes, the lad’s loveliest feature.

  No, not mine, he flashed back and held out his arms. “You, my fine fellow, are not too big to sit on my knee.” The rajah’s eyes were dark with meaning—and you need not stand.

  The boy shook his head so vigorously I feared it would snap off, and he flung himself into the rajah’s arms crying, “Too big! Too big!”

  There followed a whispered chat, the boy giggling. The rajah chucked his chin. “Not big! Now, eat, eat!”

  The boy shrugged as if at a chore quickly done to please an adult, nibbled a laddoo, took a bite or two of savories, and pushed the food around with a finger. Even this wearied him, but he drank his goat’s milk. Good boy.

  “May I speak?”

  The rajah nodded, echoed by the young princeling.

  “Namastey,” I tried shyly. “My Hindi is not good. Kyaa aap angrézee mein baat kar saktey hain?”

  “Yes, I understand—a little English, English lady,” he answered my question.

  “What are you called? Aapka naam kyaa hai? Mine is Sarabande.”

  “Meraa naam—” He raised his chin. “Kiran of the house of…” and a long string of names. “Lady Sarabande.”

  I couldn’t help myself. “Oh, how sweet you are, Kiran!”

  “Keeran,” he corrected my pronunciation. “I am a prince. My name means prince! And someday I shall rule Bharatpur and be the greatest maharajah of all…”

  He drew up, as I looked over his head.

  “Play time!” The rajah clapped his hands, then set the boy down and kneeled, giving him a choice of hands. The boy chose something, evidently delighting him. Slapping him on the back, but gently, the rajah watched him slowly climb the steps.

  As the curtain parted, I saw a hovering female. Kiran departed with a shy backward glance.

  “What a lovely child! What did you give him?”

  “A wish.” He glared at the splendid night view.

  Shamefully hungry, waiting in the awkward silence, I perused the sweets, dropping the sohan papdi when he barked, “That was the son, the only son of the house of my brother. We come from an illustrious line, back to the eighth century. We won, in battle, furlongs of fertile pastures, scores of villages, a mountain range, vast rubber, tea, and almond plantations, and a mining operation larger than one of your pitiful European countries.”

  “Is that right? How wonderful for you!”

  “Though my brother sired fifteen daughters, none was particularly well-disposed, comely—or intelligent, though with females it is hard to say,” he offhanded. “The interests of you women are so limited. Mostly sweets and adornment.”

  I dropped the laddoo I had selected and bit down so hard my teeth clicked.

  “The eldest is six.”

  “I’m—sorry,” I managed. “If this is meant to influence me, I’ve had sufficient of your kindness and your offenses. If I may take my leave?”

  “You are riled; I believe that is the expression, though spirit is good. No, of course not.”

  I opened my mouth to give him a bit more of my spirit.

  “However, no sons,” he resumed. “No heirs. No strapping males to carry his lineage and legacy, save that shining example.”

  “The boy can’t help it! And what of you? You are—male, a direct descendant. Why don’t you wive? Plus,” I snapped, “we have had this conversation!”

  “Ahh.” He threw his rare charming smile.

  “But I am a dilettante, as mentioned, if you paid attention. Strolling the Seine from l’Arc de Triomphe to the Notre Dame, visiting Monte-Carlo, summering on Como, attending my Arabian horses at Deauville. At times I ride the cups and attend matches around the world.”

  “Good for you, a dilettante, no less. What an accomplishment, being absolutely useless!”

  “I do see that.” He wagged a finger. “You lead me deliberately off track.”

  “We are on a track?”

  “I do love the boy.”

  “I see that too.” I softened. “I heard of a gentlewoman who taught the King of Siam’s many brood. Anna something. A widow. Perhaps she might help.” I halted. “Perhaps the lad is overindulged in sweets, cossetted, or never let out to play.”

  “You know nothing.”

  “How sickly?” I finally asked.

  “None have lived beyond his age. My brother has lost twenty-three sons.”

  “Twenty-three! Heavens, doesn’t he know when to quit?” I lowered my lashes. “I’m sorry. Unseemly.”

  “I am used to your unseemliness.” He studied me as if I were a bug in a killing jar. He turned to the lake with such intensity I thought a siren must have risen from the waters.

  “What I don’t see is why I am here.” Meaning this room, meeting the boy.

  “I merely wished you to understand. We are not completely barbaric.”

  “And that is why you keep me here—a prisoner?”

  “We shall speak again. Do you play chess?”

  “Apparently!”

  “My brother loves chess.”

  He nodded once and strode out.

  What the Sam Hill did he mean by that?

  Chapter Sixteen

  Checkmate

  The room I entered with a sinking heart was tent-like—its billowing silk ceiling wafted gently from cooling breezes off the lake, the same body of water I had noted from other levels—a picture postcard between slender columns.

  Apparently, the rajah supposed he had tugged my heartstrings into doing the maharajah’s will by showing me the boy. Never had I felt so deceived.

  The room was oddly absent of the malodorous reek of before, sparsely decorated, airy, modern after the overbearing opulence elsewhere.

  I rushed to an ivory-and-silver telephone, picking up the receiver-mouthpiece. Yet who would I call? I replaced it and examined a cabinet shortwave radio with a multitude of dials and glass bezels.

  At a sound, I whirled. Servants toted in fruit, cheeses, bread, and brandy, followed by a frosted bucket of Champagne. I was drawn toward the liquor. Somewhere, I had developed a taste for the harder stuff—a flash of a clay jug stuck in my mind.

  Downing a quick glass, I found it burned like an old friend.

  I poured another, pacing, peeking behind curtains, searching out exits.

  I peered over the balustrade. Quite high. Tantalizing bits of streets and dusty buildings were visible over a far wall. Sipping brandy, I wandered to a filmy curtain and pulled it aside, revealing a low table with a chess set, surrounded by pillows large enough to swallow me whole.

  To sit clenched and nervous, playing against a sweating monster? I looked about, frantic. Nowhere to hide in this sterile modern place. No fruit knives.

  Distracted by the board, I studied it.

  Expecting minarets, elephants, and turbans, I saw tiny American Indians. War horses are knights, while the bishops must be shamans. Teepees are castles, Indians with war bonnets are kings, and the sitting prairie dogs must be pawns.

  The queens, oddly enough, were ivory and ebony buffalos. I recall
ed from somewhere that White Buffalo Woman was an American Indian deity. “How peculiar.”

  Do I know how to play?

  Somehow, I thought I did. Automatically selecting a chief in headdress, I was well into a fantasy game…

  ****

  Dozing, aided by the brandy, curled deep in pillows, I dreamed warm palms stroked my nape and trailed down my back under my loose sari.

  Opening my lips, I sighed, arching and curving pleasurably into the hands. The warm palms cupped the curve of my hips. My lids sprang open.

  I still clutched a game piece, tensing, conjuring the fat man’s peculiar odor as one whose servants never properly attended to his immense size. I hurled the chess piece blindly. It shattered on an ornate statue—a Hindu deity, it too, fragmented.

  A voice between baritone and tenor poured over me like warm honey. “You do realize it is an affront to destroy anything of value belonging to the maharajah? He or I could have you beaten with a barbed whip, trampled by elephants, or used as tiger bait tied to a tree.”

  “You already did that. That panther thing,” I taunted back. “Wouldn’t that bore you?”

  His chuckle was a deep rumble.

  The rajah poured champagne into two crystal brandy cups. “My bad attempt at humor. I see you already indulged. Nevertheless—as peace offering.”

  I reached with humiliating eagerness for the ice-frosted goblet, holding it against my cheeks, then eyed him over the rim.

  How vain. The rajah was devastatingly appealing, as always, in his loose white silk caftan with simple gold embroidery about a deep slit neck. It billowed in the humid breeze off the lake. Worse for my composure, the filmy silk floated against his body, revealing all his manly attributes, plus a smooth bronzed chest. His hair, unbound, hung sleek and black as that of any pirate or Cornish brigand. He even owned a dratted dimple playing hide-and-seek in his bluish jaw, which I had never before noted. Damnation but he was handsome!

  Flushing, I averted my eyes, placing the frosted cup on my neck.

  Oh, how I hated him!

  I sucked my palm where the game piece had bit in. He set the cut glass tumbler on the table and turned my hand over.