The Mountain of Light (14 page)

Emily reddened. “Lady Cowper talked to you about it? It was none of your business.”

“Ah,” Fanny said, throwing back her head and laughing, “but it was, my dear. If you married that old stodge, I would have George to myself. I was
immensely
interested. And you wouldn't tell me anything, so I had to go searching for the other woman in Melbourne's life. You know, you could have been the wife of the Prime Minister of England today; imagine that, being received by the Queen”—she waved her hand in a slow circle—“none of this trucking through the rain and mud to meet a native woman who styles herself as such. None of this being commanded by one of them.”

“We haven't been commanded,” Emily said automatically.

But Fanny wouldn't stop. “But we have been, my dear. Else we wouldn't be in this forest, me wet, you miserable, both of us thinking about that comely Monsieur Avitabile, with his fluid French ways, the masses of roses he grows in his greenhouses in Peshawar.”

“He wouldn't have done, you know,” Emily said finally. Her horse had come to a halt, its nose bowed doggedly into the earth. She urged it on, prodded its sides, rattled her reins, until Fanny's cool hand, in its lace fingerless glove, came on its head and she said,
“Chalo.”

They were riding in a single line now, the path had narrowed even more, and the branches of the trees came quickening down upon them. Emily was in front, Fanny's mare a short hand span behind.

“Melbourne?” Fanny asked.

Emily sighed. “Yes, Melbourne.” When she thought at all about it, this last proposal of marriage when she was thirty-five years old, it wasn't with a tumbling regret.

When Melbourne had come to her, his first wife had been dead for four years; it was the summer they had spent at Lady Cowper's country house. Humming rumors had said that he was the next man to be prime minister; it would have been a good marriage. There was really nothing against it, nobody but herself to consult—Lady Cowper had encouraged it; George would have been mildly happy; and Fanny would have been ecstatic at, as she put it, having George to herself.

“What was wrong with him?” Fanny asked.

Emily turned to speak sideways into the air. “I don't know. Nothing. Perhaps everything.” Her mouth twisted in a wry downturn. “I thought too, you know, of my . . . our . . .
my
life with George, and then the one I could possibly have with Melbourne. It wouldn't have done.”

“You're too fastidious, Emily. It was his first wife you were thinking of and the glorious scandal, and that he stood by her despite it.”

“Perhaps . . .” Emily had read Galt's
The Life of Lord Byron
also, as had all of London, inquisitive about a man she'd met only once, but more curious about what had been his immense charm. For Lady Caroline Lamb had made an absolute ass of herself over Byron, and she had left her husband to do so; and her long-suffering husband, who had taken her back after the violent end of the affair, was none other than Lord Melbourne. Emily had not thought much of Lady Caroline Lamb, who was beautiful, though in an untidy way with those quantities of wispy hair, that constant look of openmouthed surprise, that flighty mind.

“We are so unlike,” Emily said slowly. “That, I suppose, is what stopped me. I couldn't imagine a man who had once been in love with
her,
to be in love with me.”

“Were
you
in love with him?”

“Perhaps . . .” Emily said again. “I could have been. Maybe . . .”

“It didn't stop him from becoming prime minister though,” Fanny said.

“People forget.”

A parrot shrieked, and they both looked up, startled.

Fanny pointed her whip at the bird, and it moved on the branch, muttering, its head slanted to one side and then the other as it gazed at them with its beady eyes.

“We should hurry, Miss Eden,” Mr. Taft called out from behind them. “We must not keep the Maharajah's wife waiting.”

They moved out from the shelter of the grove into open land. Here, the eye stretched into the vast distance, flat everywhere, a few rocks and boulders to break the monotony of the landscape. The rain had slackened into a gentle mist, speckling the waters of the Sutlej with tiny circles. Under the shade of her bonnet, Emily felt sweat gather in her hair, curve rivulets down the sides of her face. She mopped her skin with a handkerchief, and then tucked it back between the third and fourth buttons of her gown. She felt hot, and heavy, sluggish.

For the past few days, since their arrival at the river, during the setting up of the camp and the settling in, Avitabile had sent her baskets of roses and little notes. He didn't say much of consequence—he, and she, had never said much, for what was there to say, after all? They had met a few times at Calcutta, they had talked, he had sent her roses then, as now, and he had remembered his promise of shawls and gowns from Kashmir, ordered them, supervised the work, had them packed carefully and delivered to their tent.

Mr. Taft, worrying the face of his watch by looking at it too many times as he rode beside them, had been lingering outside, notebook in hand to take an inventory of the
gift from Avitabile. Four shawls and four gowns of the finest wool and silk embroidery, perhaps six months of painstaking work by at least two embroiderers—everything had been registered, the price assessed after he had calculated the labor, the material, the cost of living in Kashmir. And then he had looked up at Emily, expressionless, his skeletal, white face immobile, only his pinched nostrils flaring in and out as he breathed. I'll pay for them all, she had said. They are expensive, Miss Eden. All right, Emily had said, reaching for her purse, how much?

They had reached a small makeshift pier on the southern bank of the Sutlej. Here, the river narrowed as two spits of sand and rock pushed their way inward on both sides. Through the haze of rain, Emily and Fanny saw a royal tent in red set up on the northern spit. It was a small tent, with crimson screens erected around, and the main tent pole flew the triangular flag of the Punjab Empire—amber yellow, embroidered in black with a double-edged sword, two other daggers curving left and right around it, the center of the sword encircled by something that looked very much like the quoits, the thin bands of steel that the Akalis used as their weapon.

“It must mean that the Maharani is in residence,” Fanny said at Emily's elbow.

They dismounted and waited as the barge was readied with a barrage of shouting and cursing. The women went down the rocks carefully and were hauled aboard.

“The roses didn't come today,” Fanny said.

Emily turned, and for a moment her face crumpled with distress, an emotion she had never shown before to Fanny. “No.” She could barely say the word.

They had neither of them really known George until their mother died and they moved in with him. He had already left for school when she was born. And yet, even growing up together, Fanny and Emily had kept apart—they were so dissimilar, just how much they'd realized only when they went
to George. Because Emily and George always had something to talk about; when Emily had fallen ill ten years ago, it was George, not Fanny, who had come home from work every day, fed her beef broth, wiped her brow, read to her at night until the candle guttered in the saucer.

At Government House in Calcutta, Fanny and Emily had chosen rooms in opposite wings—Emily's room was next door to George's; Fanny's was down the corridor, some twenty yards away. They met at the table; they went together to visit the ladies of the cantonment sometimes, and to church. That was all. And, for the first time—with that brief conversation about Lord Melbourne, six years after the event—Emily had let Fanny see what was in her heart.

“Tell him to come and see you, Em,” Fanny said, reaching out and touching her sister's thick-gloved hand. “And take that off, it's too hot here.”

“It would not be proper,” Emily mumbled.

Mr. Taft gestured to them from the barge and they picked their way over, holding up the hems of their dresses so that their boots and ankles showed. Emily realized with a mild shock that Fanny was not wearing her stockings. The Company clerk averted his head, although he held out his hand, and the boatmen stared, stony-faced. The boat was nothing but a flat piece of wood, with no seating, water lapping over the edges. They stood clustered around the middle. Half-naked boatmen, clad only in loincloths, their feet bare, rain streaming over their muscular bodies, ran up and down the length of long poles that they used to propel the flat over the Sutlej.

Maharani Jindan Kaur met them under a gold awning, her back straight, her hands clasped in front. Of her face, they could see little; a veil swung over her head and fell almost to her feet in a swathe of shimmering white seed pearls.

They bowed to each other. A man standing near her, Fakir Azizuddin, murmured greetings on behalf of his queen, Mr. Taft translated for them, and then they went inside.

Within, Azizuddin and Taft were banished to the far corner, behind a chintz screen, both scrunched uncomfortably into a small space. Of Mr. Taft, Emily could see nothing—the screen swallowed his figure, but the heron feather on Fakir Azizuddin's turban bobbed above as he shifted around.

They all sat in a tight circle. It was close inside the tent, even though the cloth was rolled up over the white mesh screens; the mesh itself was clogged with drops of rainwater. Servant girls brought goblets of pomegranate sherbet, palely pink, shards of ice clinking against the glass. There were trays of sweet
burfis
sprinkled with shavings of coconut, made of wheat flour, glistening with
ghee
. Fanny took off her gloves and ate everything; Emily sat on her divan, her knees drawn up to her chest, and took small sips of only the sherbet.

The Maharani could not speak English, so whatever she said, Fakir Azizuddin translated from behind the screen, his voice booming over the confines of the tent, his language ungrammatical, incorrect, but still comprehensible.

They talked thus, complimenting each other, welcoming each other, and saying nothing much. Then, Jindan leaned back and whispered something into the ear of one of her ladies-in-waiting, who rose and went to a small table in the corner and brought back a tray covered with a white cloth.

“The Maharani is pleased to welcome her British sisters to the Punjab,” Fakir Azizuddin said, “and she begs that you will consider these paltry gifts and wear them with joy.”

Jindan whisked away the cloth, and revealed two perfect diamond and emerald necklaces lying shimmering on the dark wood.

McNaghten's wife sucked in a breath, and they all leaned forward.

One of the Company's clerks had gone on the East India Company's business to . . . somewhere, some native raja's kingdom, to talk about water rights of a river that flowed through the Company's lands, which were downstream from the raja's.
Emily couldn't remember much about the actual business, but the clerk's wife had come back to Calcutta with stories of entertainments at the raja's harem, and boasted of a shawl, a gold necklace, earrings, and bangles that the principal queen had given her. When she had displayed them at the next ball at Government House, Emily had pitied the poor woman. The gold was real, all right, but so chunky, so unimaginatively constructed, good enough only to be smelted into something new. Even Mr. Taft—or rather his counterpart in the Company—had disdained to snatch the jewelry from the clerk's wife.

“One for each of you,” Aziz said. “Miss Eden and Miss Fanny Eden.”

These pieces were impeccable, rose-cut diamonds, embedded in shining gold, emeralds with the heart of a forest in the rain, luminously green and radiating a wet light.

Fanny nudged Emily. “Taft is probably hopping around behind there.” She took out her handkerchief from her right sleeve, wiped her hands on it, and laid a gentle finger on the stones. She laughed with pure wonder, and they heard Mr. Taft clear his throat many times, meaningfully.

A little girl had been standing beside the Queen, her arm around Jindan's shoulder, half-leaning on the older woman. She was a pretty little thing, with solemn, light-colored eyes and a stoic face. Now, a smile curved her mouth upward, and she bent to Jindan and whispered something in her ear.

Jindan held her hand out to Fanny, and when Fanny reciprocated, she shook her head.

“Her Majesty would like to see your handkerchief, Miss Fanny.”

“This?” Fanny asked in surprise, and then she knelt on the carpet and smoothed out the piece of fabric, with its lace edging.

“Does anyone else have one?” Fakir Azizuddin asked.

“We all do,” Fanny said. She reached into Emily's dress and took out her handkerchief, then signaled to the other
women to give her theirs. Each square she laid carefully on the carpet, and they all watched as the Maharani and her ladies crowded over, exclaiming about the lace, dabbing reverently at the cloth. The girl moved the handkerchiefs around, gazing at the Maharani with delight.

“Could we leave these with you, your Majesty?” Fanny asked.

Jindan Kaur nodded, and Aziz said, “It would give my Queen a great deal of pleasure; she thanks you very much.”

A baby cried from somewhere at the back of the tent, and Maharani Jindan Kaur rose hurriedly, as though that wail had coiled outward and tethered onto her. The little girl had already run out to the back, and Emily saw her standing there, almost bowed under by the weight of the child in her thin arms. The baby was the Maharajah's son, so much McNaghten, or perhaps Bill, had mentioned to her. But who was this little girl in the lushly embroidered
ghagara
and
choli,
her hair plaited behind her back, almost down to her knees, the medallion of solid gold around her neck. Who was she?

Another figure blotted out the child's at the back flap of the tent, and Emily realized that Jindan Kaur was leaving.