The Serpent's Tooth

by Alex Rutherford

  A few moments later she was in his familiar apartments overlooking the Jumna. Shah Jahan was on the terrace where he often stood at night, gazing across the river at Mumtaz’s mausoleum by the light of an almost full moon.

  ‘What is it, Roshanara?’ He looked tired, but there was no reproach in his voice for disturbing him so late.

  ‘I thought you should see this, Father.’ She held out the piece of paper.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘A letter from Jahanara to Nicholas Ballantyne. Yesterday Jahanara asked her attendant Nasreen – the one I spoke about to you before – to take it secretly to Nicholas’s lodgings. However, anxious that her mistress seemed to be conducting a clandestine correspondence with this man and afraid that she might be blamed for helping, she brought it to me unopened. At first I wasn’t sure what to do. Then I remembered that when I told you Nicholas had visited my sister in her mansion you said I’d been right to tell you … I opened the letter, hoping and believing I would find it was nothing, but I confess the contents shocked me. I knew it was my duty to bring the letter to you at once.’

  ‘What does Jahanara say?’

  ‘You should read it yourself, Father. Here.’

  Shah Jahan took the letter and moved closer to a torch burning in a sconce. The flickering orange light danced across the page as he read. At first he couldn’t believe what he was reading, the words jumping before his eyes, jumbled up and making no sense. He took a deep breath to steady himself and looked again. This time his daughter’s elegant script – written in the pale blue ink she always used – stood out only too clearly, though the hand in which he was holding the letter was beginning to tremble. How can a woman living such a protected life as I understand fully what is in men’s hearts – their thoughts and feelings, their true desires … Please, I must see you …’

  Shah Jahan shook his head. Could this be anything but a letter from a woman to her lover? How could Jahanara bring shame on herself and her dynasty like this? He closed his eyes but all he saw was his daughter’s face as it had been before the fire, smiling at him just as Mumtaz had used to smile. He had lost the dearest thing to him on earth – his wife – and now by her own thoughtless and disgraceful acts he was losing Jahanara … For a moment he pressed his knuckles to his eyes as if by so doing he could drive away the images in his mind.

  ‘Father, are you all right?’

  Shah Jahan struggled to speak but his emotions choked the words. Shock and doubt whirled in his head but as the letter’s contents sank in he felt something else – a scalding anger such as he’d not felt for many years, perhaps not since the time when Mehrunissa had demanded two of his sons as hostages. In those days he had been forced to submit to what could not be helped but no longer – he was an emperor whose word was life or death to a hundred million people. No one – not even a much-loved daughter – could escape his anger when they had transgressed.

  He opened his eyes again to see Roshanara standing before him with a half-smile on her face. This was nothing to smile at. He took her none too gently by the shoulders and pulled her towards him so that her face was only inches from his. ‘Does anyone else know the contents of this letter?’

  She shook her head, her smile banished. ‘No. Only I read it and I told no one.’

  ‘Good. So it must remain. I’ll not have your sister’s reputation dragged through the mire of court gossip any more than I can help. Return to your apartments and act as if nothing had happened. Do you understand?’

  ‘I understand.’ Roshanara was trembling in his grasp. She had expected her father to storm and rage but his voice was so quiet it was almost a whisper and there was a coldness in his eyes. For the first time she realised how merciless he must have looked on the battlefield, or as he was about to pronounce death on a traitor in the court of justice. She almost regretted what she’d done. She’d wanted to see Jahanara humbled in their father’s eyes and to pay her back for her disparagement of Aurangzeb. Now she wondered what she might have unleashed on her sister.

  ‘Highness, please, you must wake up.’

  Jahanara opened startled eyes to see Satti al-Nisa bending over her, lined face anxious. ‘What is it? Has something happened to my father?’

  ‘No, it’s not that. It concerns you. Someone has betrayed you. As soon as it’s light the emperor intends to summon you to the fort to account for yourself.’

  ‘What do you mean? You speak as if my father suspects me of some crime.’ Jahanara sat up and pushed her long hair back from her face as she struggled to make sense of Satti al-Nisa’s words.

  ‘He does, Highness. If what I heard tonight in the haram is true he has come by a letter written by you to the Englishman.’

  ‘My letter to Nicholas Ballantyne? How did my father get it?’

  ‘One of my oldest friends told me your attendant Nasreen claims you gave her a letter to take to him but that instead she made sure it found its way to the emperor. She is saying that he is your lover and boasting she’s to receive a rich reward.’

  ‘My lover …’ Jahanara gasped and gripped Satti al-Nisa’s arm. ‘But it’s not true. How could anyone think such a thing … there was nothing in that letter. All I said was that I wanted to talk to him about Aurangzeb … to understand more about the northern campaign and what caused my brother to act as he did.’ Still dazed, Jahanara got up. Though the night was warm, shock and dismay chilled her as for the first time she considered how others might interpret her words. How could she have been so careless? But she had never expected one of her servants to be so deceitful. Anyway, she tried to comfort herself, when her father understood that only anxiety about her brother had made her write in that way surely he would forgive her … After all, what was there to forgive?

  ‘I must go to my father at once and explain.’

  ‘No! Be careful, Highness. Though I have admired your father for many years – even before he became emperor – I can’t be blind to his faults. His bitterness against the world since your mother’s death still eats away at him. He has turned in on himself and does not always react rationally. Of all his children he loves you and Dara the most – that is common knowledge – but if he feels that one of you, his special ones, has let him down, his rage will be all the greater. Remember you have further to fall than either of your sisters.’ Satti al-Nisa took Jahanara in her arms. ‘After Mumtaz’s death, while you were trying to be a mother to your brothers and sisters, I tried to be a mother to you. And it is in that role that I came here tonight – to counsel as well as to warn you. Do not rush to the fort. Allow your father’s anger time to cool and give yourself time to think what you will say.’

  Satti al-Nisa was right, Jahanara thought, as the older woman comfortingly stroked her hair in the way she had done when Jahanara was a child. But suddenly she jerked away as a new and terrible thought struck her. ‘If my father is angry with me, how will he feel towards Nicholas Ballantyne? He’ll have him killed … I must warn him.’

  ‘Yes, but no more letters, Highness. Let me be your messenger. Now that I have told you all I can I will return to the fort and go to his apartments. He knows me of old and will listen to what I say.’

  ‘Tell him to leave Agra immediately and to do so in disguise – to get as far away as he can, perhaps even to take ship for his homeland from the English settlement at Surat.’ For a moment she saw Nicholas’s frank open face beneath that unruly golden hair as he spoke his reluctance to communicate with her before he left for the north. He had become a familiar and trusted part of all their lives, yet by her thoughtlessness she had put his life at risk. ‘And tell him I am sorry … none of this is his fault. Go, Satti al-Nisa. Go now! I pray it’s not already too late.’

  ‘Approach no further!’ Shah Jahan was seated on a silver chair in his Hall of Private Audience beneath the green silk, pearl-sewn canopy. His stiff embroidered robes, the strands of emeralds and rubies round his neck, the jewels glittering on his fingers, told Jahanara how carefully he had prepared
for this interview. She knew him well enough to realise that at his most distressed or vulnerable he retreated behind the magnificence of his imperial image. Though they were entirely alone with all the doors tight shut she felt as if the eyes of all the court as well as her father’s were watching her in judgement.

  ‘Father, you don’t understand …’

  ‘Silence! You will not speak until I give you permission.’ Jahanara was close enough to see the taut skin around his unblinking eyes and pursed mouth, the rapid rise and fall of the jewels on his chest and the tightness with which his hands gripped the lion’s head arms of his chair. Taken aback by the vehemence of his words and expression, she looked down at the floor.

  ‘Well may you bow your head in shame before me. I’ve known for some time that you once invited Nicholas Ballantyne to your mansion. Because I trusted you I assumed it was for innocent reasons. I refused to think badly of you and pushed the incident from my mind. Now I discover I was wrong. For two years at least letters have been passing between you and the Englishman and they were not innocent!’

  Reaching inside his robe, Shah Jahan pulled out her latest letter and flung it to the ground. ‘You, an imperial Moghul princess, the First Lady of the Empire, write to a man of feelings and desires … In our ancestors’ days on the steppes you would have been killed at once for shaming our house. Jahanara …’ his voice cracked a little, ‘I trusted you, gave you everything you could desire … even your own mansion … and this wantonness is how you repay me.’

  Jahanara wanted to shout out ‘It is only you who ever behaved wantonly, not I’ but knew she must not. In the effort to keep silent, she dug the nails of her manicured right hand into the palm of her left.

  ‘All night I sat up in my apartments wondering what punishment would fit the crime – and a heinous crime I consider it. One thing and one thing only has made me stay my hand from harsh measures – the knowledge that the physical scars you bear are my fault. My actions robbed you of some of your beauty and that loss has perhaps caused you to forget yourself and seek the touch of a man, however dishonourable and improper. At least that is what I have tried to tell myself as I struggled – still struggle – to find excuses for your immorality. Until I have considered further you will be confined in the imperial haram within this fort. As for Nicholas Ballantyne, this morning at dawn I ordered his arrest, but when my guards went to his lodgings he had fled … hardly the act of an innocent man. But I promise you this – he will be found and brought back to Agra where I will have him castrated before wild horses rip him apart.’ Shah Jahan rose from his chair and descending the shallow dais took a few steps towards her, his face an expressionless mask. ‘Now I have said what I wished to say, you may speak.’

  Jahanara opened her mouth, but the will to defend herself and Nicholas was draining from her. What was the point? That her father could treat her like this hurt with a pain more deep-seated than that of her burns had ever been. He was judging her as arbitrarily and distantly as if she and Nicholas were strangers dragged before him, and what was more using the standards of his own moral weakness to do so. She’d done nothing to be ashamed of; just the reverse. Rather than indulging in selfish desires she had been trying to hold his family together. She would not stand abject before him. Neither, having done her best to secure Nicholas’s escape, would she plead with him. If he had so little trust in her, let him do with her what he would. Whatever happened she would keep her pride and her honour and one day her father would once more beg her forgiveness. She straightened her back. ‘I have done nothing to dishonour you or our family or – most important – myself. I swear so before God, my immortal judge. Do with me as you will.’ Jahanara’s eyes flashed defiance. ‘But before you do there is one thing I must know. Who was it who brought my letter to you?’

  ‘Someone with more regard for our family’s honour than you. Their identity is no concern of yours. Now go.’

  As father and daughter turned stiffly away from each other both had tears in their eyes – in each case tears of righteous anger, betrayal and loss.

  Chapter 16

  Shah Jahan leant against one of the columns of the pavilion in his mahtab bagh, his moonlight garden across the Jumna from Mumtaz’s tomb. Here, among the waxy white champa flowers and orange trees, was one of the few places he could find peace. On nights like this he could almost imagine Mumtaz herself was beside him. What would she have said about the state of his relationship with their children? But that was a foolish question – if she’d lived their children would never have drifted so far away from him or apart from each other, and they themselves might have turned out differently.

  As so often in recent days his thoughts returned to Jahanara. His initial anger had blunted a little over the week since he had confined her to the imperial haram, but he couldn’t forgive her behaviour with Nicholas Ballantyne. Of all his children she was the one he’d thought he’d understood the best, believing they had recreated the bonds that had existed before the incident leading to the fire. Clearly he had been deluding himself, seeing what he wanted to see rather than the reality. Wasn’t that what men often did as old age claimed them? Her duplicity had hurt him far more than if it had been Roshanara or Gauharara. Though his younger daughters were affectionate enough they’d never meant the same to him. He missed Jahanara … her daily visits, her companionship and wisdom.

  At least Dara would soon return from his inspection of the new fortifications on the great trunk road near Gwalior. What would he make of the scandal that had enveloped his sister? As for his other sons, he’d not seen any of the three for many months. Aurangzeb was still in the Deccan. Despite his stubborn pride and confidence in his rigid view of the world, he was at least showing himself a diligent and effective administrator even if his reports were short and uninformative. Taxes from the wealthy south were flowing smoothly into the Moghul treasuries and for the moment the empire’s southern borders seemed quiescent. He was glad that his third son appeared to have at last put the humiliation of the northern campaign behind him. He must find some important honour to confer on him and summon him to court to receive it. Aurangzeb’s claim that he had never loved him still lingered … it wasn’t true and he would prove it to his prickly son …

  He might also recall Shah Shuja to court to reward him for his management of Bengal which too seemed prosperous and peaceful, although his despatches were as terse as Aurangzeb’s and even less frequent. Shah Shuja’s hard-working officials probably deserved the real credit but it would be good to see his son again. As for Murad, he must certainly soon summon him to Agra. Unlike his brothers, he was not performing well as a governor. Only last week a private report from Gujarat’s loyal and honest revenue minister, Ali Naqi, had informed him—respectfully but unambiguously – that even though Shah Jahan had personally ordered Murad to levy higher dues on the rich English traders of Surat, the foreigners had easily bought off the prince with rich gifts which he was squandering without a thought for remedying his province’s dilapidated finances. Would Murad take his strictures to heart? All the evidence suggested that he remained shallow and vain and – if his letter attempting to excuse his behaviour over the Surat merchants was anything to go by – full of bluster when challenged about his inadequacies just as after the failure of his northern campaign.

  Shah Jahan closed his eyes, feeling weary as he now quite often did. A few hours hunting or hawking exhausted him. The days when he’d galloped hundreds of miles yet still had energy to wield his ancestors’ sword Alamgir in battle were long gone. Perhaps that was to be expected now he was in his mid-sixties. Soon he would hand the sword to Dara – it was fitting that his eldest son should have it, especially since he himself was now the father of promising sons. Suleiman was a fine horseman and marksman but also a thinker and scholar like his father. Young Sipihr closely resembled their Moghul mother Nadira, sharing her charm and intelligence. The dynasty’s blood ran strong and vigorous through their veins.

  Shah Shuj
a, Aurangzeb and Murad also had sons though he scarcely saw them. If they arrived at court tomorrow he would barely recognise them. That was a pity. He would like to know them better so that they could learn from him, just as he had from his own grandfather, Akbar. That thought made him especially pleased that Dara, who had always seemed to him to resemble Akbar in so many ways, would not be away too much longer.

  Hearing the hooting of an owl, Shah Jahan opened his eyes to see the bird’s dim shape soaring into the sky. How bright the star-dusted heavens, so loved by his great-grandfather Humayun, looked. He took a few steps away from the pavilion the better to appreciate their beauty. But as he did so, the world began spinning around him. The stars were whirling at his feet while the sky sprouted flowers and fountains. Was it an earthquake? He reached out for something to hold on to but his hand seemed to extend into nothingness and he felt himself falling forward … He could hear voices, but faint and far away. Dark mists enveloped him.

  ‘What do the hakims say? Tell me everything, please, Roshanara …’ Jahanara’s heart thumped as she scrutinised her sister’s face.

  ‘They’re not yet sure what the problem is but they say he’s exhausted, both in mind and in body. Of course they blame his onerous responsibilities, the time he must spend in the Hall of Public Audience administering justice … the long hours he has to spend privately with his counsellors and commanders. But of course recently he’s had other worries …’

  Jahanara flushed but said nothing. This was the first time Roshanara had visited her since she’d been confined to the fort’s haram. At first she’d wondered whether Shah Jahan had forbidden her sisters to see her but Satti al-Nisa had assured her it wasn’t so. Doubtless her sisters didn’t wish to associate themselves with her disgrace. Now that Roshanara had finally come, she didn’t want to say anything that would send her away, at least not until she had learned everything she could about their father’s health. ‘How serious is it? How long do they think it will take him to recover? He will recover, won’t he?’