Wiping her cheeks with the back of her hand, she slowly made her way back to her room. The last couple of months had been harrowing. Her emotions had swung like a yo-yo and now she felt drained. Would it ever end? Would life ever get back to normal again?
Chapter Twenty-Eight
SALIM
A cold wind was blowing from the Himalayas down to the plains of Lucknow. It was a moonless January night in 1858. The Kaiserbagh Palace was plunged in darkness, the strong breeze having blown out most of the candles.
‘There’s bad news from everywhere,’ Salim heard Nayansukh say as he warmed his hands over the coal brazier. ‘Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar has been defeated. Delhi has been recaptured. Nana Sahib’s also been beaten.’
Salim ran his hand up and down his arm as he paced his room. He looked at the dark gloomy shadows thrown by the crystal chandeliers and walked up to where Nayansukh and Ahmed sat. ‘What are these Englishmen made of? There were over forty thousand of us, forty thousand. Yet we couldn’t vanquish a handful of firangis from the Residency.’ He absent-mindedly rubbed the spot on his head where he had been hit during the fight in Sikanderbagh. ‘Since Delhi’s recapture, soldiers have been pouring into Lucknow. It’ll be a disgrace if we still can’t win.’
Ahmed wrapped his qaba tightly around his shoulders. ‘Salim mia, it’s true we’ve got all these men. But they’re also a problem. How do we feed these extra mouths? And if Her Majesty is unable to pay them, they go about looting and rioting.’
‘Hmm. Ammi has already sold all her jewellery to build the wall around the city. Raja Jia Lal has gone out to arrange for some funds. Let’s hope he—’
‘Just one,’ Ahmed said to Nayansukh as he held out a paan to him. ‘Even paan has to be rationed these days.’
Salim remembered the time RayChal had insisted on eating paan. He shook his head. Ya Ali. Everything reminded him of her these days.
‘Don’t worry, Salim bhai, we’ll defeat the firangis this time,’ said Nayansukh in a muffled voice, his mouth full of betel juice. ‘You’ve seen all the preparations. The digging of the mines …’
Yes, that was true. Since the firangis had left Lucknow two months back – well, most of them had left anyway, except for a small band of soldiers under the command of Outram in Alambagh – there had been frantic preparations in the city for the inevitable attack. The entire city had been converted into a battlefield. Mines had been dug in seven key locations including Chattar Manzil, Chaulakhi Palace and Kaiserbagh. Several military posts had been set up at Alamganj, supported by a second line of defence. There were loopholes in most of the houses, from where they could fire at the firangis. All the streets had been barricaded. Trenches had been dug across the roads in Aminabad, Hussainganj and Hazratganj. A deep moat had been dug around Kaiserbagh.
Hazrat Ammi personally supervised the work being done. Salim was amazed at her energy and zeal. Riding her elephant, she would be with the workers one moment then turn up at the talukdars’ homes the next. She’d chide them for their indifferent stance, then hold court in Chaulakhi or give an inspiring speech to the sepoys.
Ahmed cut into Salim’s thoughts. ‘When life gets back to normal again, Salim mia,’ he said, ‘one of the first things I’m going to have is mutton biryani and siwaiyaan with lots of balai.’ He gave a long sigh. ‘Just the thought of them makes my mouth water.’
Salim smiled briefly. ‘I doubt if life will ever be normal again.’ Yes, it had been a long time since he had smelt the pungent smell of garlic being peeled, of onions being fried and mutton roasting on the grill; the hissing sound of the flames as they licked the fat.
He looked out of the window. It was a dark, moonless night and he could see nothing. He could merely hear the footfall of the nightwatchman as he marched across the palace grounds and his familiar chant of ‘Stay awake’. They were awake all right.
He turned back to Nayansukh and Ahmed.
Nayansukh twirled the ends of his moustache and spoke solemnly. ‘Don’t worry, Salim bhai. They killed my brother-in-law, then my sister. We will avenge their deaths. We’ll throw these cow-eating firangis out of our country.’
‘Inshah Allah we will,’ Salim replied.
It was the middle of March, exactly two years since Abba Huzoor had left for Calcutta. Salim had not seen him since. He wondered how he was. He had been imprisoned in Fort William in Calcutta since the outbreak of the war in Lucknow in 1857. Imprisoned when he was in mourning over the death of his mother and brother. Once a sovereign, now a prisoner. The more Salim thought about it, the more frustrated he felt.
He let out a long sigh and tied his cummerbund. His thoughts flew to Rachael and his Adam’s apple moved. He remembered the first time he had met her in Bade Miyan’s shop and her hand had touched his hand, nay, his very soul. The first time he heard her playing the piano, her fingers doing Kathak on the keyboard and how he’d been enchanted by her music.
He thought of the first time he saw her in a sharara, a blue sharara that matched the glint in her blue eyes. He recalled the monsoons, the way she had swung around when he called her name, her wet hair flying, a few wet strands plastered to her cheek. And as the maid lit the chandeliers a hundred RayChals had stared back at him, lips quivering, raindrops glistening on her ivory skin.
Salim closed his eyes. He could hear her laughter, smell the light lavender perfume she wore. How soft and delicate her skin was, just like muslin. And her lips felt like a lychee dipped in sweet mango chutney. He shook his head. Why, oh why, did these memories keep clinging to him like a shadow?
He bent down to put on his boots. He thought of the last time he saw her in Dilkusha. How her lovely blue eyes had turned cold as she spat out the words, ‘I hate you, Salim.’ How he had flinched when she said those words, as though she had slapped him.
Grimacing, Salim felt the tip of his sword with his finger, then put it back in its sheath. Today’s battle was going to be crucial. In the last two weeks the firangis had managed to capture Dilkusha, Chakar Kothi, Martiniere, Sikandar Bagh, Shah Najaf, Qadam Rasul, Moti Mahal, Tehri Kothi, Farhat Baksh and Begum Kothi. Today they were bound to attack Kaiserbagh. After all, it was the stronghold of Ammi, the queen regent.
Whatever happened, they could not let Kaiserbagh fall into the hands of the firangis. He picked up his rifle, fitted the bayonet and put it firmly on his back, adjusting the strap.
He felt something hard in his pocket and pulled it out. It was a silver bracelet. He smiled as he remembered how RayChal had dropped it when she had come to the palace for the first time to learn music. She was late and was hurrying down the steps when she dropped it. Just like Cinderella. Salim kissed the bracelet and put it back in his pocket.
He put on his turban. Ya Ali, why did he feel as though someone was twisting his stomach in a thousand knots? He had faced enemy fire several times these last few months, so why this fear? Why this chill running down his spine? He looked heavenward before stepping out of his room, raised his arms, closed his eyes and muttered, ‘Allah, be with me.’
Salim put his head on Daima’s lap and closed his eyes. She gently massaged his forehead and gradually the creases disappeared. He abruptly pulled her hands away from his forehead and looked at them. They looked like a roti left in the open all night – dried, mottled, crumbly. But hands that gave the best massages in all the land. He kissed them, closed his eyes and put his head back on her lap again.
‘We’ve been beaten, Daima. All’s lost.’ His voice was anguished, defeated, tired. ‘The firangis will be here any moment now.’
Daima patted the hair that had fallen over his forehead. He turned his eyes towards the window. He could hear muskets being fired in the distance.
‘We fought as hard as we could, Daima. Men and women – every single one of them. There was not a tree in the garden that did not have soldiers hidden among the branches. But it was in vain.’
‘You want to cry?’
He got up hastily. ‘Ya Ali, no. Remember w
hat you said to me as a child, Daima? Whenever I came crying to you? “You’re a man,” you’d say. “And a man cannot cry.”’
‘Salim mia.’ Ahmed and Nayansukh rushed into the room, panting. ‘They’re here. We’ve got to run.’
‘Outram’s forces are killing even the innocent civilians, raping girls. They didn’t even spare Darsh Singh’s eight-year-old daughter,’ Nayansukh said.
Salim drew out his sword.
‘No, mia,’ said Ahmed, raising his hand. ‘They’re too many. We’ve got to escape to safety with Her Majesty and Birjis.’
‘Give me a moment,’ Salim uttered and went into his khwabgah. He looked at the faded red kite that hung on the wall. Its tail was slightly torn. It was the first kite he had captured from his opponent. Ahmed and he had run over half a mile to retrieve it.
Next to the kite hung the sword that Abba Huzoor had given him when he had turned sixteen. He touched the jewels studded on the hilt. He looked at the silver platter that stood in a corner; the platter on which his dinner had been served when he kept his first fast of Ramzan. He looked around at the room that had been a mute witness to his childhood, his coming of age, his falling in love. He closed his eyes for a split second, swallowed, pushed the curtain aside and walked out.
He looked at Nayansukh. ‘Let’s go,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Ahmed and I will leave the palace first. You follow in ten minutes with Daima.’
Nayansukh nodded. ‘Yes, Chote Nawab. And we’ll meet at our usual place. At the edge of the Gomti.’
As he quietly scrambled towards the stable with Ahmed, he noticed a handful of pink roses blooming in the garden. Not pink – greyish pink. As though the wind blowing from the cemetery had dusted them with a film of ash. He jumped onto Afreen’s bare back and shouted, ‘Come, sweetheart, run for your life.’
Once they were outside the palace complex, he looked back at his home, his palace, his Kaiserbagh. He could still hear the firangis revelling over their loot and the sounds of destruction. Like a pack of hyenas fighting over the lion king’s leftovers.
They passed bodies of sepoys recently killed. Some of them were holding swords raised over their heads, some held rifles as though about to shoot. They looked alive, as though they had been frozen in time. There were others with severed arms or legs. The putrid smell of death and decay was everywhere. Salim stepped over the body of a sepoy who had been cut into half and almost shrieked. He covered his ears as the agonised screams of sepoys being tortured rent the air.
‘Ya Ali, I can’t bear this anymore. I’m going back,’ he said.
‘Don’t be foolish, Salim mia,’ Ahmed said. ‘They’ll chop you up like a vegetable. There are hundreds of them. What’ll you do alone?’ He looked over his shoulder at Salim. ‘Let’s proceed to the Gomti and wait for Daima and Nayansukh and news of Her Majesty.’
Soon they were on the banks of the Gomti. Salim looked at its waters. They were red. And this time he was sober. It was indeed blood. Numerous bloated dead bodies floated down the river. He covered his face with his hands and sank to the ground. He wept. He could not stop his tears anymore. His body was racked with sobs.
‘Salim mia, get a hold on yourself.’ Ahmed’s arm slid around his shoulder comfortingly. ‘Daima will be here any minute.’
‘I’m not a man, Ahmed. That woodcutter was right. RayChal’s father was right. I’m a coward.’
‘No, Salim mia. You fought like a lion. We were simply outnumbered. And outsmarted.’
‘This is not what we wanted. I just wanted to win back my father’s kingdom. Where did we go wrong?’ He swiped the tears from his face with the back of his hand. ‘Abba Huzoor knew all along this would happen. He loved Lucknow too much to see it destroyed. That’s why he abdicated quietly. If only I’d understood.’
‘Sal—’
Ahmed and Salim looked at each other as they heard the sound of approaching horses, then turned slowly in dread to see who it was. They were his own men.
‘Have you any news of Ammi?’ Salim asked them.
‘Yes. We heard she has escaped with His Majesty, Prince Birjis.’
Salim turned to the sepoys, his hand leaning against the trunk of the tree. ‘Is that true?’
‘Yes, Chote Nawab. She walked all the way to Ghasyari Mandi. The prince had been wrapped in a carpet and sheets. We heard that her father was carrying him. She then went in a palanquin to Ghulam Raja’s house.’
Salim did not say anything. He merely looked at the sepoys thoughtfully.
‘Don’t worry, Chote Nawab. There are still at least a hundred thousand of us. We will defeat the firangis yet.’
‘Chote Nawab,’ someone called out in a high-pitched voice. It was Daima. She came running to him, crying hysterically, and fell at his feet. ‘Chote Nawab, they’ve taken him … Please save my son, I beg of you … they’ll kill him.’
Chapter Twenty-Nine
RACHAEL
Rachael sat on the windowsill, overlooking the gardens of Alambagh. Well, it couldn’t be called a garden anymore; what with all the trenches ripping it apart, and machines and cannons strategically placed, it looked more like a battlefield. Why, it was a battlefield.
Although it was spring, there was still no sign of life. Most of the trees and shrubs had been destroyed. No sparrows’ nests or baby mynahs chirping for more food. Not a single green leaf or shoot in sight. Just decaying flesh and broken bones. The smell of mogra and roses had been replaced by the smell of death. No matter how many bodies the soldiers burnt or buried, the smell of rotting bodies just didn’t go away. She saw Ayah lighting a fire using cow-dung pancakes. She hastily turned away from the window as smoke and the foul smell of the cow dung fire wafted into the room.
She thought of Salim. She missed him, missed him as a soldier misses a limb once it’s been amputated. She had tried to hate him but she couldn’t. No matter what he did, no matter who he was or whose side he fought on, she would continue to love him. He wasn’t even aware she was still in Lucknow. She worried about him. She had heard that Kaiserbagh had fallen. And that all the rebels had either been killed or fled. What if he had also been killed? No, no, she mustn’t think like that. Oh God, please don’t let anything happen to him.
She heard some soldiers talking and laughing in the adjoining room.
‘Hush, someone’s approaching,’ she heard Christopher say.
Then the thud of the cartridge and the sound of rifles being loaded.
‘Hey, relax, it’s not a rebel. Just a servant,’ said another soldier.
‘Let’s have some fun,’ said Christopher.
Some loud shouts and shrieks made her look out of the window again. She watched grimly as a few soldiers hiding behind windows and pillars pelted handfuls of stones and pebbles between the native servant’s feet.
The poor servant, thinking he was under fire from the enemy, ran helter-skelter, his arms raised in the air, muttering, ‘Jai Shri Ram, God save me, save me. I no sepoy. I humble servant. Please no kill me.’ The soldiers guffawed and jeered.
‘Why, it’s Ram Singh,’ Rachael exclaimed under her breath and ran outside.
‘Stop it, stop it all of you,’ she shouted.
Ram Singh ran to her and fell at her feet. ‘Oh, missy baba, I so glad to see you. I thought I going to die.’
She held his arms and helped him to his feet. He was still shaking. ‘Don’t worry, Ram Singh. They were just playing a prank on you.’
‘Prank? I almost die of fright! You know, baba, I risk my life to come here. I risk my life every day taking care of your house in the cantonment. I sleep hungry but make sure your dog has eaten. Still we treated badly. Parvati tell me one soldier slap her and make her lick his boots clean.’
‘What?’
‘They say Indian dog spill English blood. As she also Indian, she has to pay for that sin.’
‘But she didn’t even take part in the revolt.’
‘Yes, the reward we get for being loyal.’ Shaking his head, Ram Singh sat
down on his haunches. ‘I never tell you till now, but when you a baby, Parvati nurse you.’
‘Yes, Ayah did mention it to me a couple of times.’
‘We also have baby. Baby boy. Parvati feed him after feeding you. But not enough milk for two babies.’
‘Oh!’
‘Yes, not enough milk for Kartik. He die.’
Rachael covered her mouth in disbelief. ‘And yet she loves me so much? Not once has she been bitter towards me.’ Her voice was thick with emotion. She was horrified. Ayah lost her baby because of her. Her baby died so she could live. And despite all that, Papa and Mother were so rude to her. Treated her and Ram Singh like slaves!
She remembered the story Ayah and Ram Singh had told her when she was little, about Panna Dai, the maidservant of Prince Udai Singh, who was just a baby then. Or maybe she was his wet nurse. Rachael wasn’t sure. But she remembered the story clearly. Her eyes had brimmed with tears and disbelief when she first heard it.
Rana Sangram Singh, the ruler of Chittor, had been killed in battle. His brother Banbir wanted to usurp the throne and came charging into the palace to kill baby Udai Singh, the heir to the throne. Panna Dai, hearing the news, quickly put her own baby in the royal cot, and kept Prince Udai Singh in her arms. Thinking the baby in the cot was the prince, Banbir drew his sword and killed him. What agony, what pain must Panna dai have gone through as she watched her own baby being slain!
Rachael’s eyes filled with tears. Ayah was her Panna Dai.
‘Baba?’
‘Yes, Ram Singh?’
‘I forget. I come to tell you I finished repairing outhouse. You can come there today. It not comfortable, but better than this.’
The World Beyond Page 22