A Mauryan Adventure

by Subhadra Sen Gupta

  By then the two girls had wandered out into the garden. ‘One day, Princess, I’ll take you to the market,’ whispered Madhura, ‘just you and me, and we’ll buy flower garlands and wrap them around our hair, eat spicy vegetable fries with hot chutney and chew paan!’

  Sanghamitra gave her a disbelieving look and laughed. ‘We’ll get caught,’ and she clicked her fingers, ‘like that!’

  Madhura’s work was usually over an hour after noon, when another girl took her place. She and her mother would eat lunch in the servants’ kitchen and then head home. Madhura left the princess’ room and walked across the courtyard to the corner chambers where Queen Mahadevi stayed. Peering in, she saw that her mother was still busy, so she went outside.

  She sat on a veranda, leaning against a pillar, looking around dreamily. Right in front was a park and beyond that a gate that led out into the main palace area. She could see the soldiers and officials hurrying about. In the park a gardener was using a scythe to cut the grass, his arm swinging high into the air. She absently watched two squirrels run up a tree trunk as birds called from the canopy of leaves above her. She wished her mother would hurry up as she was feeling very hungry. All she had eaten that day was a bowl of puffed rice and some cucumbers early in the morning.

  Suddenly Madhura frowned. Who was that? Across the park, in the main palace area, a man in a blue turban was standing at the door of a building with bright red pillars; she knew this building had offices. He looked like Kartik. She wasn’t sure because she was far away and as she squinted, trying to see better, the man went inside.

  ‘Was that Bhai? What is he doing here?’ she wondered. ‘That part of the palace has the offices of ministers . . .’ Then she remembered the words she had heard the night before and her frown deepened. ‘Is Bhai really working for the king . . . Then why does he say he is a trader?’ Far away the man in the blue turban came out of the room and quickly walked away.

  After lunch as they walked home, Madhura turned to her mother and said, ‘I think I saw Bhai.’

  ‘Kartik? Where?’

  ‘He went into that building with the red pillars.’

  ‘That is across the park and outside the gate, how could you see? Did you go out of the women’s quarters, Madhu?’

  ‘No, I did not! I saw him from the veranda where I was sitting, and it looked like Bhai.’

  ‘You are mistaken. That is the office of a royal minister and only important people are allowed to meet him. What would Kartik be doing there anyway? It must have been some other man.’

  Madhura shrugged. She knew that if her mother did not want to tell her something, there was no way to make her talk. When they got back home she went looking for her brother and found him in the back room, fast asleep.

  ‘Ah well,’ she thought. ‘Looks like I was wrong’.

  2

  A Queen and a Monk

  A few weeks later, Kartik left the house one morning saying he had work in the market and would be back only by dinner time. Madhura did not like what she heard. Later as she and her mother were walking to the palace, she said glumly, ‘Bhai is planning to leave again, isn’t he Amma?’

  Her mother turned to look at her, ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘When he starts staying at the market all day, it means he is loading his carts with goods and soon he’ll be off again to some far-off place.’

  ‘That is what he does, Madhu . . . He’s a trader.’

  ‘He goes to such interesting places: Kashi, Taxila, Purushapura, Tamralipti . . .’ she said dreamily. ‘I wonder where he is going this time.’

  That morning the princess was bored and not in a good mood at all. As she said glumly to Madhura, just how much time can you spend dressing up anyway? And as her companion, it was Madhura’s job to keep her entertained.

  ‘Want to do some embroidery or weaving?’

  ‘No! Kani makes me stitch all the time.’

  ‘I could call the teacher and we can read stories from the palm leaf books.’

  ‘I did that yesterday after you left; it made my eyes ache,’ the princess frowned.

  ‘You could go for some music lessons then . . .’

  ‘I can’t really sing, you know that! My mother says I have the voice of a crow.’

  ‘Very true! And when we sing together,’ Madhura giggled, ‘it is two crows!’ And then she had a brainwave. ‘Oh, let’s play chaturanga! You promised to teach me the game, remember?’ Finally the princess smiled.

  They sat on an open terrace, basking in the mild winter sun. Madhura opened out the wooden board with the sixty-four black and white squares, and Sanghamitra showed her how to place all the pieces—the king, the chief minister, the elephant, camel and soldiers. Each moved differently; some went straight, others at an angle, and the horse jumped two straight and one sideways.

  Madhura giggled, ‘What’s wrong with the horse? Has it become lame or what?’ Then she watched as Sanghamitra threw the dice. ‘I like this game. It’s about battles and warriors, and I want to be a soldier too.’

  ‘A soldier? You? I thought you wanted to run a paan shop in the market.’

  Moving a soldier forward by one square Madhura looked up, ‘You really want to go to the market and have paan, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes! But how? I can’t become invisible . . .’

  ‘Kani goes away once you’ve had your breakfast, so we could sneak off after that and come back before she comes with your lunch.’

  ‘Sneak off?’ the princess stared at her. ‘How? There are guards at the gate, remember? We’ll be caught immediately!’

  ‘I’ll think of something,’ Madhura waved an optimistic hand in the air. ‘There are ways.’ Then she banged down her chief minister before the princess’ king. ‘Watch out, your king is in trouble, My Princess!’

  Sanghamitra immediately cut Madhura’s chief minister with a swipe of her camel and said, ‘You never think before you play. Now your king is dead!’

  That night over dinner Madhura asked Kartik, ‘So where are you going this time, Bhai?’

  ‘Oh! You guessed, did you? Not too far, just to Ujjaini. So if things go well, I’ll be back in a couple of months or so. I just have to deliver a load of cloth and pottery, and I’m back.’

  ‘Short trip . . . mmm?’ Madhura asked and Kartik nodded. ‘Then I can come with you, no?’

  He stared at her, ‘Girls don’t travel in caravans. The roads are dangerous, there are highway robbers . . .’

  ‘On the road from Pataliputra to Ujjaini? Don’t joke Bhai! I’ve heard in the palace that it’s the safest highway in the kingdom and is guarded by the army. That is because Queen Mahadevi’s hometown is in Vidisha near Ujjaini. She travels from Vidisha to Pataliputra by that road, and when she goes to stay there, the king visits her too.’

  Kartik grinned at her and said to his mother, ‘She has an answer to everything, doesn’t she?’

  ‘Too clever for her own good,’ their mother smiled back.

  ‘Even then I’m not taking you,’ Kartik said firmly. ‘I can’t manage a naughty girl like you when I have work to do. You always get into trouble.’ As Madhura opened her mouth to argue, he added a little roughly, ‘No, don’t argue. You have to stay with Amma, so get used to it Madhu.’

  Madhura bit into a slice of carrot, wrinkled her nose and said thoughtfully, ‘Maybe I’ll run away then.’

  They stared at her and her mother said, ‘Once you are married you can bully your husband to take you travelling. Now leave Kartik alone.’

  ‘And then your mother-in-law will beat you for disobeying her,’ he teased.

  ‘Kartik is right. Do you know of any girl who travels in a trader’s caravan?’

  ‘Fine, I’ll stay home! Amma you always support Kartik anyway!’ she pushed away her brass plate with a clatter, sprang up and thumped away. ‘Let him do the washing up tonight!’

  Kartik grinned and then without a protest helped his mother with the washing up; that made Madhura feel sort of
apologetic. Why did she have such a quick temper? She always felt really sorry after throwing a tantrum; now she had been so rude to Kartik and he was leaving soon. Why couldn’t she be like him, always calm and cheerful? He really was such a kind and loving brother. In apology, Madhura made all their beds and lighted the lamps.

  Lying in bed, she thought, Ujjaini . . . They say it’s a beautiful city and on the way is the town of Vidisha, where Queen Mahadevi used to live when she met a Mauryan prince called Ashoka. Kani had come from Vidisha to Pataliputra with the queen when Ashoka became king, and she had heard the story from her so many times. Madhura gave a dreamy sigh; it was such a romantic tale . . .

  In those days, King Bindusara ruled over Pataliputra and he sent one of his younger sons, Prince Ashoka, to Ujjaini as the governor of the province of Avantika. On the way Ashoka stopped at the town of Vidisha, where he was invited to a feast by the rich merchants of the town. At the feast he met the beautiful daughter of a merchant; she was called Mahadevi Sakya Kumari, and Ashoka fell in love and married her. Or as Kani always said, ‘One look at her lovely face and our prince was spinning like a top, madly in love!’

  The first time she heard the story it had puzzled Madhura. ‘A merchant’s daughter . . . so Her Highness is a commoner?’ She was still trying to sort out the many royal women in the harem. ‘But she is the queen, isn’t she Kani?’

  ‘She is one of the queens,’ Kani corrected her. ‘She is a commoner but as she is his first wife and is the mother of his eldest son, she has the title of a queen. My Lady thought she would spend her life in Ujjaini with her family. She had married a younger son of Bindusara and never thought her husband would become the king one day. She was happy in Ujjaini.’

  ‘If Lady Mahadevi is his first wife then why do they call Lady Asandhimitra as the agramahisi, the Chief Queen?’

  ‘Because Lady Asandhimitra is a princess and of royal blood, and so she sits on the throne beside the king on formal occasions.’ Kani sighed. ‘It is complicated. Take the Queen Mother Subhadrangi; she is also a commoner but now because her son is the king, she rules over the harem. The royal family has all these complicated rules of etiquette, and that is why My Lady Mahadevi does not like living here and she often goes to stay at her palace in Vidisha.’

  ‘And every time she goes to Vidisha, she takes the princess with her,’ thought Madhura. ‘Next time they are going I’ll get the princess to take me along. Who wants Bhai’s help? I’ll do my own travelling.’

  Next morning Madhura’s head was full of plans. As they entered the palace through the back gate, she studied everything carefully. She marked the spot where the guards stood, how they checked everyone going in; most of them were women going to work in the women’s quarters. Some had veiled their faces by pulling down their uttariyas and the guards did not always ask them to raise the veil and show their faces. They just waved them through. Then she realized that none of the women going out were checked by the guards.

  Her mother stared suspiciously at her, ‘Why are you grinning?’

  ‘Nothing!’ Madhura looked serious again.

  ‘I never know what goes on inside your head. One moment you are throwing a tantrum and the next you are smiling for no reason.’

  So Madhura decided not to frown or smile. She just shrugged.

  Later that morning as Madhura was combing Sanghamitra’s hair, she said softly, ‘I have an idea about how to get out of the palace . . .’

  Sanghamitra curved her head to look at her, ‘You do?’

  Kani, who was working at the other end of the room, stared at them, ‘What are you two whispering about?’

  ‘Nothing!’ they said together.

  Kani was old. You could not tell her anything because she would not understand. She used to be Queen Mahadevi’s companion and then took care of her two children. She thought young girls had to be disciplined. They had to wear proper, old-fashioned clothes, walk slowly with their heads bent, talk softly and be obedient to older people. Once when the girls had climbed a mango tree, she had immediately complained to the queen and got them scolded. Then when they had worn a new style of antariya with a low-slung belt that showed their belly buttons, she had made a huge fuss till the queen told her to calm down.

  Kani thought Madhura was a bad influence on the princess and did not trust her at all. Now she stood watching critically as Madhura worked on the princess’ hairdo. She plaited it carefully and then wrapped a fragrant string of jasmines around it. On top of her head she put golden hair clips with tiny bells and a pearl and ruby medallion shaped like a star.

  ‘You are learning,’ Kani said grimly.

  ‘Thank you, Kani,’ Madhura said meekly. ‘You are too kind.’

  ‘Someday soon I’ll let you do the lac designs on her hands and feet.’

  ‘Oh that would be so lovely, Kani!’ and she noticed that Sanghamitra’s head was bent low and her shoulders were shaking a little.

  Kani left the room and the two girls collapsed into giggles. ‘Oh thank you Kani . . .’ Sanghamitra gasped. ‘You’re too kind Kani . . . You are so naughty Madhu!’

  Madhura was about to tell her about the plans for escape when there was a commotion at the door and Queen Mahadevi swept into the room. The girls sank to their knees, bowed their head and greeted her with a namaskar. ‘Your Highness!’ they chorused, and she held up their faces and kissed their cheeks.

  ‘You girls are ready? Good! You are coming with me.’

  Sanghamitra sprang up in excitement, ‘Where are we going, Mother?’

  ‘To the monastery. I have some work there and we can also meet Mahendra and have lunch with him.’

  Any chance to leave the harem and Sanghamitra became very excited. Moreover, the prospect of meeting her beloved brother made her eyes shine with happiness. In a minute the girls had wrapped themselves in uttariyas so thin and light they floated behind them when they walked, slipped on their slippers and were ready to go. Kani, Madhura’s mother and the other maids were waiting outside, carrying large baskets filled with food and clothes for the monks.

  ‘Ah well . . .’ thought Madhura, ‘I’ll just have to postpone my plans for the outing to the market.’

  A row of covered bullock carts waited for them at the gate and as they moved out into the main road, soldiers on horseback rode beside them. The queen and the princess were in the biggest cart, where they sat on a soft mattress, leaning on cushions. Madhura was in the second cart with her mother and the baskets of fruits and sweets. She was already feeling hungry, and would have loved to steal a banana or a sweet, but her mother was watching.

  As the cart swayed along the road Madhura thought, this was the first time she would see Prince Mahendra; or as he was now called, Bhikshu Mahendra, a young apprentice monk. Queen Mahadevi belonged to the same clan of the Sakyas as the sage Gautama Buddha, and she had always been a follower of his teachings. In the beginning King Ashoka had not been interested, and it was only after the battle at Kalinga that he became serious about the teachings of Buddha. In fact Sanghamitra called him the Sakyamuni, the sage of the Sakyas.

  After the battle of Kalinga, where Ashoka saw the death and pain suffered by his soldiers, he realized that war was evil, that not only do the soldiers suffer but even their families were ruined. So now he worshipped the Buddha and followed his teachings. He also built this great monastery at Pataliputra. He decided to live in peace with the other kingdoms instead of trying to conquer them, and had vowed never to fight another war again. Kartik said that he now spent all his time running the kingdom and thinking of the welfare of his subjects. He said King Ashoka had changed; he was no longer that ambitious warrior any more.

  Madhura and her mother had never been inside a monastery before. Madhura turned to her mother, ‘Why did the prince become a monk, Amma?’

  ‘Kani says he was always a thoughtful, quiet child and was never interested in weapons or fighting. I also think he did it to please his parents.’

  ‘So all the me
mbers of the royal family have to worship the Buddha?’

  ‘No, only if they want to. His Majesty gives them full freedom to pray to the Buddha or to the old gods like Vishnu or Shiva. I hear that some of the old queens of King Bindusara still go to temples. Now Queen Mahadevi is building a vihara near Vidisha and His Majesty will build a stupa nearby.’

  ‘What’s a vihara? And a . . . what . . . stupa?’

  Her mother frowned, ‘I know the Buddhist monastery is called a vihara but I’m not too sure what a stupa is. You know we still worship the old gods.’

  ‘I know you pray to Vishnu and Durga, and Bhai likes going to the Shiva temple by the river.’

  ‘Ask the princess about a stupa, even I would like to know.’

  ‘If the prince is a monk, Amma, then he won’t become a king, would he?’

  ‘No, he won’t. But the king has other sons.’

  ‘I think Sanghamitra would make a very good king. She’s really smart. Have you seen her play chaturanga? She beats me in six moves!’

  Her mother laughed, ‘Where do you get such strange ideas? You’ll become a soldier and the princess will become the king!’

  ‘And Bhai can wash the pots and boil the rice . . . Hee heee!’

  ‘In your dreams!’

  By then the carts were turning in through the gates of the monastery and Madhura stuck her head out to look around. The vihara of Pataliputra was the biggest in the land and had many buildings made of bricks and wood. There were prayer halls, dining halls, rows of rooms where the monks lived, classrooms where the monks listened to lectures by teachers, kitchens, orchards and ponds. The largest building was a high-ceilinged hall with walls covered in beautiful paintings depicting the life of the Buddha. The hall was redolent with the fragrance of flowers, the air filled with incense smoke and echoing to the ringing of bells.

  ‘That’s the chaitya,’ Sanghamitra explained. ‘It’s the temple where we worship the Buddha.’