A Royal Affair

by Preethi Venugopala

  In the morning, her uncle and aunt came to relieve them of their role as the carers. At home, Jane rested a few hours before returning to the hospital again in the afternoon. The pattern continued for the next few days. She had taken a few days of emergency leave from the channel.

  Luckily for them, Grandpa Bill was soon well on his way to recovery. Though he had to stay in the hospital for observation, he was back to being the joking, jovial person they all loved. It was on a sunny, bright afternoon, three days later that Grandpa Bill made an unusual request to her, one that Jane hadn’t seen coming.

  He had made her sit next to him on the bed and taken her arms in his. Dressed in the stark white hospital robe, he had looked like a fragile, scared and lost infant. She had squeezed his palms to reassure him.

  “I heard you are being offered an assignment in India and you are considering whether or not to take it. I know why you don’t wish to. But, accept it for the sake of this old man, child. And while there, find my Daniel. I promise you, I will hang on till you find him.”

  “Grandpa!” Jane had tightened her hold on his palm.

  “I know it is hard to find one man from among a billion people. But promise me that you will try to bring him home. Please, my child. Think of this as my final wish.” The last few words had been barely audible. His eyes, cornflower blue like her own, had welled with tears.

  Jane had nodded, unable to utter a word. She would do anything for his happiness. Even if it meant having to face Vijay again. She shouldn’t worry, Jane told herself, because the probability of meeting Vijay while she was there was extremely low. She didn’t even know which part of India he lived. She didn’t even want to know.

  Chapter 3

  Sravanapura, April 2, 2009

  The skin around his platinum engagement ring had started itching within an hour of the ceremony. Did his finger know he was entering into the relation half-heartedly? The palace doctor had advised him not to wear it again. Now seated in his sister’s room, he was listening to her rants, which had begun immediately after they had returned home.

  “It is an omen, I say. This relationship is doomed to fail. I don’t like your would-be bride. Can’t you see that she is a faker to the core? I don’t know what father saw in her. I can’t even imagine her with you!”

  Kritika flung her pearl necklace into the jewellery box and sat in front of the dresser scowling at Vijay’s reflection in the mirror. When her brother failed to reply, she started ranting again.

  “What is wrong with you? How can you sit there calmly? You should have told father you were not ready for this.”

  Vijay’s heart was buzzing in agreement with Kritika but his mind hummed, whispering sense to him. He did not believe in love. Not anymore. He had done it once and didn’t wish for the same heartache yet again. He had to be pragmatic.

  And then, wasn’t the idea of marrying for love a rather dubious western idea? He had nurtured it once, during university days when he was head over heels in love. With Jane. Was? Was he over Jane even now? She still arrived unannounced in his dreams and vanished without a trace after trampling all over his bleeding heart. Love, the most treacherous and ephemeral emotion, left in its wake only broken hearts and tears. No, he wouldn’t go there. It was a bad idea.

  “Why are you fuming? You aren’t the one marrying her, are you? I am okay with this match. She seems like a sensible person,” said Vijay.

  “Sensible, my foot! Cunning, that is what she is. She and her whole family.”

  “Cool down. It is done. We don’t go back on our promises. When it is time for you to get married, marry the one you love. Okay?”

  “Yes! I won’t allow our father to arrange my marriage to another greedy royal who has nothing to recommend him other than his stinking ancestry.”

  “Tejaswini is a bright management student and her father is a businessman with an ever-expanding business, a partner in many of our business ventures.”

  “Yes, that is why I say what happened today was not the beginning of a relationship between two individuals. There were no emotions involved. It was a business merger. And what about Jane?”

  Vijay glowered at her. He didn’t want to be reminded of his failure all over again.

  “What about her? She left me three years ago. Even after my best efforts, I couldn’t win her back. It is a closed chapter.”

  “Perhaps if you had been honest with her from the beginning, you wouldn’t have been betrothed to that faker today.” Kritika probably regretted what she had said because she slumped in her chair and buried her face in her hands.

  Vijay stomped out of the room, banging the door shut, leaving it shivering in its hinges. It hurt him that Kritika knew nothing about the matter and yet she was judging him.

  Back in his room, with a muttered curse, he plonked on his bed and raked his fingers through his hair. After fighting the urge for one full minute, he opened the drawer of his bedside table. With trepidation, he pulled out an album that had been opened so many times before.

  Jane looked up at him from its pages with her impossibly blue eyes. Her dark-blonde hair fell in waves over her shoulders, framing her heart-shaped face. He yearned to run his fingers through her curls and bury his face in them. He longed for her company, the long talks and binge eating. The photos poured out memories.

  One of the photos was of both of them bleary-eyed and raising a toast. Vijay couldn’t remember who or what it was that they were toasting. But then, what did undergraduates do on a holiday? Eat, drink and party. And Vijay and Jane had been no different. Noisy parties, dancing, and karaoke.

  A smile blossomed on his face when he saw the photo of him and Jane on stage, singing a duet on a karaoke night. She had been good and he had been terrible. He was never an expert in remembering lyrics anyway. Halfway through the song, he had made up some ridiculous ones. An amused Jane had joined him by inventing equally scandalous lyrics. It had turned into a laugh-riot.

  Another photo had them seated in front of plates piled high with food.

  “If we eat like this, you’re gonna dump me,” Jane had said looking longingly at the food.

  “Why would I?”

  “I might become fat and shapeless. You won’t, as you are a fitness freak. Would you love me even then?” she had asked.

  “I will love you even more,” Vijay had declared. Jane had rewarded him with a sloppy kiss.

  He was smitten by her charming personality and attractive appearance when he first saw her at the Oxford University Hindu Society party. Her interest in India and how much she knew about his country had surprised him completely. He had never seen an Indophile like her. Needless to say, he had fallen head over heels in love with her. However, Jane had taken a while to warm up to him. The incident with Isha, his Indian classmate, had given him an opening to confess his true feelings to her.

  Vijay had grabbed the opportunity and transformed their relationship from friendship to love. When he had kissed her, she had melted in his arms that day. Her hesitant fingers had trembled and then clutched at the lapels of his coat, as though she didn’t want it to end. They had tiptoed around each other thereafter, scared whether they had done the right thing.

  Then on a starlit night later that summer, they had crossed that invisible line of restraint while they had camped on the banks of the river Wey. He had seen the stars reflected in her eyes when he had kissed her tentatively. Her soft moans, as his lips branded every inch of her skin, were the sweetest sounds he had ever heard. They had loved each other with a careless abandon, celebrating every touch and caress. It had been splendid. Afterwards, they had lain awake talking, cuddled in each other’s arms, even after the campfire had died down, sharing dreams and body heat. They had greeted the dawn with silent prayers for togetherness.

  They rarely fought. If they did, Vijay was the first to apologize. He valued her more than anything in the world. Even more so because he feared he would lose her if she came to know who he really was. Jane openly loathed
any kind of restrictions; she was a free bird. But in his case, rules, traditions, and protocols governed his life. He wanted to be with her like the commoner she thought he was, without the trappings of wealth or title. Also, there was the case of privacy. If the news spread that the scion of the royal family of Sravanapura, the richest among the Indian royals, was in love with her, the media would have hounded her day in and out.

  Another photo showed him dowsed in foam, flour, and eggs, swigging champagne directly from the bottle. The photo had been taken during his ‘trashing’, the annual Oxford tradition where Oxford graduates celebrated the end of the final exams by spraying each other with foam, flour, and confetti.

  He had blurted out his identity while bottles of wine and champagne were being cracked open around him.

  "Look at me now, who will believe I am a Prince," he had said, grinning wide and regretting the words immediately.

  "Of course, you are my Prince and I am the Queen of England," Jane had said, flashing a goofy smile. She had then straightened her crown, a popcorn container covered with sticky fluid and confetti. Raising her chin, she had strutted around looking down upon them and wrinkling her nose. His truth had drowned in laughter and nobody had remembered it afterward, much to his relief.

  Vijay had made elaborate plans to reveal his identity to Jane, two days after his graduation ceremony. That evening, he had booked a table at the best hotel in Oxford, ensuring absolute privacy. He had rehearsed to explain the reasons that had made him keep his identity a secret.

  When he was about to leave his room, his chief of security had appeared by his side, much to his displeasure. They had always been told to keep their distance. Never even once while in college had they given him any trouble.

  "Your Highness, sorry to interfere but a situation has come up that needs urgent attention."

  The news had been terrible and had devastated him. Kritika, who was a student in one of the boarding schools in London, had been kidnapped during a school trip. How her kidnapper knew her identity was still a puzzle. The family had revealed her identity only to the school management.

  Vijay had hidden her presence in England from all his friends and acquaintances, including Jane. Sticking to the original version of his lie that he was the only son of an Indian businessman, which he had fed the others had seemed the best.

  Luckily, one of the securities assigned to her had given a chase, shot the kidnapper and rescued her. When he reached the site of the shooting, Vijay used his influence with the local royals and authorities to defend his staff.

  The press had arrived and the whole story had been splashed all over the papers, not much in their favour. They had been portrayed as savage Indian royals who took the law into their hands. The kidnapper, a local, had been named as Kritika’s secret lover. He still remembered gathering his pale and shocked sister to him and snapping at the press photographers, while she repeatedly told him she didn’t know the man.

  The damage done by the press proved to be irrevocable. Jane had cut him off completely. It had been so unlike her. She didn’t reply to his emails or messages. Despite repeated requests, she didn’t give him a chance to explain himself.

  Her family refused to let him enter their house again. They said she was an adult and they respected her decision. Grandpa Bill was the only one who had sympathized with him.

  "I like you, young man. But we are ordinary folks. She will not fit in your world." Those were his words when Vijay had gone to her house determined to apologize and win her back. He had almost lost his mind after losing her love.

  A knock sounded at his door, bringing him back to the present, and he quickly pushed the album back into the drawer. Kritika stood at the door, with her usual apologetic look.

  "Don’t be mad at me. I am sorry. I shouldn’t have said that."

  Silence rang in the room. Vijay ignored her and picked up his laptop from the nightstand. Leaning back against the headboard of his bed, he fired it up and began checking his emails. He should tell her it was okay, he knew. But he couldn’t. Her words had forced open a treasure chest of memories that had strangely tied his tongue and scrambled his brain.

  He couldn’t blame Kritika though. He knew that underneath her rants and anger, there was love and concern for him. But his father had not thrust the relation on him. Vijay had met Tejaswini before agreeing to the match. He had not sought love, just a tolerable companion.

  "Come on, your Highness. Don’t show me your princely attitude. I apologised."

  Kritika frowned as she approached him and sat near him on the bed. A sly smile appeared on her face instantly and Vijay wondered what caused it. She pulled the drawer open, which he hadn’t shut fully in his haste, and found the album. She, of course, knew what it contained. The culpable sleuth. Her eyes twinkled with mischief when they met his.

  "Oh, so I interrupted this, huh?" she mumbled, laughing.

  Vijay grabbed the album from her hands. "Out. This moment." He spat out.

  "Okay! Who wants to stay anyway? I have a feeling that you will soon seek out the girl you are hiding in that album and show that bloody faker the door." With that declaration, she fled from the room. Vijay had all the mind to go behind her and box her ears.

  But one glance at the album and the frown lines on his forehead disappeared. Vijay started leafing through it again and allowed himself to get lost in the intricate tapestry of memories. A while later, he closed the album and wandered into his walk-in wardrobe. He propped himself up on a stool, opened the uppermost shelf and pushed the album inside. It would rest there along with the other memorabilia from his college days. It shouldn’t have a place in his bedroom anymore.

  Chapter 4

  Bangalore, April 10, 2009

  Tracing a lost person in a land of 1.3 billion people was not easy. Jane was realizing this the hard way.

  Roadblocks populated her path. How could one find a man who had gone missing decades ago? The only possible clues were under lock and key in various government controlled archives. But she could not involve the authorities. It might endanger Daniel’s life.

  Jane’s local contact, George was on the phone, explaining the various problems he had encountered in the search for Daniel. Even after days of sleuthing around, he hadn’t found any significant success. He had got her permission to access some of the British Indian Army archives in an around Karnataka. Yet, there was no reassurance that she might find what she was looking for. In George’s opinion, this was a mission that was doomed to fail.

  Jane didn’t want to listen to his sceptic talks. She had all the mind to throw the phone or ask him to shut up. She didn’t want to leave any stone unturned and was ready to spend hours in any dusty archive to dig for vital clues.

  Jane squeezed the phone between her ears and shoulders and opened the windows of her suite. Fresh, cool air entered and she took a deep breath. The air had an enchanting scent that seemed to originate from a flower bush beneath her window.

  “Do send me those papers as soon as you can. I don’t have much time at my disposal,” Jane said, fast losing her patience.

  “Ma’am, I have already sent them through a personal staff to the hotel this morning. You might receive it any moment. Your hotel is at about an hour’s distance from here,” said George.

  It was funny how people measured distance in terms of time. Wasn’t distance measured in metres? But she had to agree, the traffic in Bangalore made measuring distance using the good old measurements a thing of the past. You could remain stuck in traffic for hours and still travel only a few metres.

  Jane sighed and cut the call. Now the only thing she could do was wait.

  The channel had put her up in a hotel apartment in a five-star hotel situated in one of the most tranquil parts of Bangalore, away from the hustle and bustle of the town. Her colleagues hadn’t joined her yet as their project would begin only a week later. Jane had come to India early to complete her personal mission. To find Daniel.

  The hotel was
impressive and had an old-world charm to it. It was located on the bank of a lake and greenery surrounded it on all sides. The landscaping was done without disturbing the beauty of the natural settings. The interiors with its clean line designs, paintings, and ornamental chandeliers were treats for the eyes.

  Her one-bedroom apartment was clean and comfy. The service was impeccable, speedy and personalized.

  If it were not for the multiple numbers of switches and lights in the bathroom, she would have agreed to live here forever. If the channel took care of the bills, that is.

  The intercom in the room let out a shrill ring and she grabbed it.

  “Yes, I will be there in a minute. Thank you.” Jane kept the phone down and punched the air with glee. The courier had arrived.

  She sincerely hoped the many phone calls, requests and follow-ups she had done during the last few days would take her further on her quest. She had to find Daniel.

  Humming a tune, she walked through the corridor that led to the lobby of the main hotel. The floor was lined with beautifully inlaid marble from one end of the corridor to the other. It looked like it belonged in a palace and for a moment, she felt like a queen. A queen set out to straighten out the messy affairs of her state. Except, dressed in her prim business suit, her dark blonde hair pinned into a bun at her nape, and her blue eyes twinkling with excitement, she looked more like a corporate honcho.

  A young couple, seated on a bench in the garden outside and wrapped in each other's arms, were kissing, completely oblivious to their surroundings. A strange kind of longing gripped her and her heart began to trouble her. She looked away and decided to apply the five-second rule her friend Susan had taught her.

  Easy. Just count backward from five and make a statement to yourself.

  Jane did the countdown mentally.