The Moghul Part 15

Then he realized it had been concealed in the decorations on the wall.

When he did not move, the porters surrounded him.

No, they're not porters. They're the guards who held back the crowds from the steps. And they're armed now.

"I think you will find your lodgings suitable." The Shahbandar watched Hawksworth's body tense. "My men will escort you. Your chest will remain here under my care."

The Shahbandar returned again to his gurgling hookah.

"My chest will not be subject to search. If it is to be searched, I will return now to my s.h.i.+p." Hawksworth still did not move. "Your officials will respect my king, and his honor."

"It is in my care." The Shahbandar waved Hawksworth toward the door. He did not look up from his pipe.

As Hawksworth pa.s.sed into the midday suns.h.i.+ne, he saw the Shahbandar's own palanquin waiting by the door. Directly ahead spread the city's teeming horse and cattle bazaar, while on his right, under a dense banyan tree, a dark-eyed beggar sat on a pallet, clothed only in a white loincloth and wearing ashes in his braided hair and curious white and red marks on his forehead. His eyes were burning and intense, and he inspected the new _feringhi _as though he'd just seen the person of the devil.

Why should I travel hidden from view, Hawksworth puzzled?

But there was no time to ponder an answer. The cloth covering was lifted and he found himself urged into the cramped conveyance, made even more comfortless and hot by its heavy carpet lining and bolster seat. In moments the street had disappeared into jolting darkness.

CHAPTER SIX

He felt the palanquin drop roughly onto a hard surface, and when the curtains were pulled aside he looked down to see the stone mosaic of a garden courtyard. They had traveled uphill at least part of the time, with what seemed many unnecessary turns and windings, and now they were hidden from the streets by the high walls of a garden enclosure. Tall slender palms lined the inside of the garden's white plaster wall, and denser trees shaded a central two-story building, decorated around its entry with raised Arabic lettering in ornate plasterwork. The guards motioned him through the large wooden portico of the house, which he began to suspect might be the residence of a wealthy merchant. After a long hallway, they entered a s.p.a.cious room with clean white walls and a thick center carpet over a floor of patterned marble inlay. Large pillows lay strewn about the carpet, and the air hung heavy with the stale scent of spice.

It's the house of a rich merchant or official, all right. What else can it be? The decorated panels on the doors and the large bra.s.s k.n.o.bs all indicate wealth. But what's the room for? For guests? No. It's too empty. There's almost no furniture. No bed. No . . .

Then suddenly he understood. A banquet room.

He realized he had never seen a more sumptuous private dining hall, even among the aristocracy in London. The guards closed the heavy wooden doors, but there was no sound of their footsteps retreating.

Who are they protecting me from?

A servant, with skin the color of ebony and a white turban that seemed to enclose a large part of his braided and folded-up beard, pushed open an interior door to deposit a silver tray. More fried bread and a bowl of curds.

"Where am I? Whose house . . . ?"

The man bowed, made hand signs pleading incomprehension, and retreated without a word.

As Hawksworth started to reach for a piece of the bread, the outer door opened, and one of the guards stepped briskly to the tray and stopped his hand. He said nothing, merely signaled to wait. Moments later another guard also entered, and with him was a woman. She was unveiled, with dark skin and heavy gold bangles about her ankles. She stared at Hawksworth with frightened eyes. Brisk words pa.s.sed in an alien language, and then the woman pointed to Hawksworth and raised her voice as she replied to the guard. He said nothing, but simply lifted a long, sheathed knife from his waist and pointed it toward the tray, his gesture signifying all. After a moment's pause, the woman edged forward and gingerly sampled the curds with her fingers, first sniffing and then reluctantly tasting. More words pa.s.sed, after which the guards bowed to Hawksworth almost imperceptibly and escorted the woman from the room, closing the door.

Hawksworth watched in dismay and then turned again to examine the dishes.

If they're that worried, food can wait. Who was she? Probably a slave.

Of the Shahbandar?

He removed his boots, tossed them in the corner, and eased himself onto the bolsters piled at one end of the central carpet. The wound in his leg had become a dull ache.

Jesus help me, I'm tired. What does the Shahbandar really want? Why was Karim so fearful of him? And what's the role of the governor in all this? Will all these requests and permissions and permits end up delaying us so long the Portugals will find our anchorage? And what will the governor want out of me?

He tried to focus his mind on the governor, on a figure he sculpted in his imagination. A fat, repugnant, pompous bureaucrat. But the figure slowly began to transform, and in time it became the Turk who had imprisoned him in Tunis, with a braided fez and a jeweled dagger at his waist. The fat Turk was not listening, he was issuing a decree. You will stay. Only then will I have what I want. What I must have. Next a veiled woman entered the room, and her eyes were like Maggie's. She seized his hand and guided him toward the women's apartments, past the frowning guards, who raised large scimitars in interdiction until she waved them aside. Then she led him to the center of a brilliantly lighted room, until they stood before a large stone pillar, a pillar like the one in the porters' lodge except it was immense, taller than his head. You belong to me now, her eyes seemed to say, and she began to bind him to the pillar with silken cords. He struggled to free himself, but the grasp on his wrists only became stronger. In panic he struck out and yelled through the haze of incense.

"Let . . . !"

"I'm only trying to wake you, Captain." A voice cut through the nightmare. "His Eminence, the Shahbandar, has requested that I attend your wound."

Hawksworth startled awake and was reaching for his sword before he saw the swarthy little man, incongruous in a white swath of a skirt and a Portuguese doublet, nervously shaking his arm. The man pulled back in momentary surprise, then dropped his cloth medicine bag on the floor and began to carefully fold a large red umbrella. Hawksworth noted he wore no shoes on his dusty feet.

"Allow me to introduce myself." He bowed ceremoniously. "My name is Mukarjee. It is my honor to attend the celebrated new _feringhi_." His Turki was halting and strongly accented.

He knelt and deftly cut away the wrapping on Hawksworth's leg. "And who applied this?" With transparent disdain he began uncoiling the muddy bandage. "The Christian _topiwallahs _constantly astound me. Even though my daughter is married to one." One eyebrow twitched nervously as he worked.

Hawksworth stared at him through a groggy haze, marveling at the dexterity of his chestnut-brown hands. Then he glanced nervously at the vials of colored liquid and jars of paste the man was methodically extracting from his cloth bag.

"It was our s.h.i.+p's physician. He swathed this after attending a dozen men with like wounds or worse."

"No explanations are necessary. _Feringhi_ methods are always unmistakable. In Goa, where I lived for many years after leaving Bengal, I once served in a hospital built by Christian priests."

"You worked in a Jesuit hospital?"

"I did indeed." He began to sc.r.a.pe away the oily powder residue from the wound. Hawksworth's leg jerked involuntarily from the flash of pain. "Please do not move. Yes, I served there until I could abide it no more. It was a very exclusive hospital. Only _feringhi _were allowed to go there to be bled."

He began to wash the wound, superficial but already festering, with a solution from one of the vials. "Yes, we Indians were denied that almost certain entry into Christian paradise represented by its portals. But it was usually the first stop for arriving Portuguese, after the brothels."

"But why do so many Portuguese sicken after they reach Goa?" Hawksworth watched Mukarjee begin to knead a paste that smelled strongly of sandalwood spice.

"It's well that you ask, Captain Hawksworth." Mukarjee tested the consistency of the sandalwood paste with his finger and then placed it aside, apparently to thicken. "You appear to be a strong man, but after many months at sea you may not be as virile as you a.s.sume."

He absently extracted a large, dark green leaf from the pocket of his doublet and dabbed it in a paste he kept in a crumpled paper. Then he rolled it around the cracked pieces of a small brown nut, popped it into his mouth, and began to chew. Suddenly remembering himself, he stopped and produced another leaf from his pocket.

"Would you care to try betel, what they call pan here in Surat? It's very healthy for the teeth. And the digestion."

"What is it?"

"A delicious leaf. I find I cannot live without it, so perhaps it's a true addiction. It's slightly bitter by itself, but if you roll it around an areca nut and dip it in a bit of lime--which we make from mollusk sh.e.l.ls--it is perfectly exquisite."

Hawksworth shook his head in wary dissent, whereupon Mukarjee continued, settling himself on his haunches and sucking contentedly on the rolled leaf as he spoke. "You ask why I question your well-being, Captain? Because a large number of the _feringhis_ who come to Goa, and India, are doomed to die."

"You already said that. From what? Poison in their food?"

Mukarjee examined him quizzically for a moment as he concentrated on the rolled leaf, savoring the taste, and Hawksworth noticed a red trickle emerge from the corner of his mouth and slide slowly off his chin. He turned and discharged a mouthful of juice into a small bra.s.s container, clearing his mouth to speak.

"The most common illness for Europeans here is called the b.l.o.o.d.y flux."

Mukarjee tested the paste again with his finger, and then began to stir it vigorously with a wooden spatula. "For four or five days the body burns with intense heat, and then either it is gone or you are dead."

"Are there no medicines?" Hawksworth watched as he began to spread the paste over the wound.

"Of course there are medicines." Mukarjee chuckled resignedly. "But the Portuguese scorn to use them."