The Architect's Apprentice (6 page)

She regarded him for a moment. ‘You are a strange boy. How old are you?’

‘Twelve.’

‘I’m older than you,’ she said. ‘I know better.’

Still bowing, Jahan could not help but smile. She had not said the obvious: that she was noble-born and he, a no one. She had said she was older, as though they were, or could someday become, equals. As she turned back on her heel, she demanded, ‘What’s your name?’

He blushed. Somehow saying his name felt awkward, almost intimate. ‘The elephant’s name is Chota, your Highness. Mine is Jahan. But my mother –’

‘What about her?’

This he had not told anyone and didn’t know why he was doing so now, but he said, ‘She named me Hyacinth.’

Mihrimah laughed. ‘What a funny name for a boy!’ Realizing he was offended, she added, more quietly, ‘Why?’

‘When I was born, my eyes were a strange purple. Mother said it was because she had eaten hyacinths while she was heavy with me.’

‘Hyacinth eyes …’ she muttered. ‘And where is your mother now?’

‘No longer in this mortal world, your Highness.’

‘So you are an orphan,’ she said. ‘I feel the same way sometimes.’

‘Your noble parents are alive, may God grant them long life.’

Just then a woman’s voice was heard from behind. ‘I have been looking for you everywhere, Excellency. You really shouldn’t have come here on your own.’

A stocky woman appeared. She had a florid complexion, a penetrating gaze and thin lips pursed in disapproval. Her jawline was strong and sharp, giving the impression of clenched teeth. Without so much as a glance at either the elephant or at the mahout, she
marched by as if there were nothing in this vast garden of flowers and animals to rest her gaze upon, even for an instant – save the Princess.

Mihrimah turned to Jahan with an impish delight. ‘My nursemaid,’ she said. ‘
Dada
is always worried about me.’

‘How can I not worry when my beloved is full of light and the world is so dark?’ the woman said.

Mihrimah laughed. ‘My
dada
doesn’t like animals, unfortunately. Only one of them. She is fond of her cat, Cardamom.’

A glance was exchanged between them: subtle, elusive and impenetrable. Suddenly Mihrimah seemed troubled. ‘Has My Lady Mother inquired about me?’

‘Indeed, she has. I told her you were in the
hamam
, taking a bath, your Highness.’

‘Aren’t you my saviour?’ said Mihrimah, smiling. ‘What would I do without you?’ She raised her hand, as if to wave an imaginary handkerchief. ‘Farewell, Chota. Perhaps I’ll come again to see you.’

Thus expressing her good wishes to the elephant, but without a word to the mahout, the Princess, with the nursemaid hard on her heels, strode down the garden path. Jahan was left behind. He stood there for a moment, forgetting where he was and what he was doing. Unasked questions in his mind, a perfume in his nostrils and a jolt in his chest he had never known before.

Jahan thought she would never come again. She did. Along with her smile she brought treats for the elephant – not pears and apples but royal delicacies: figs with clotted cream and violet sherbet, marzipan topped with rose-petal jam or honeyed chestnuts, the last of which, Jahan knew, cost at least four aspers an okka. Whenever the ways of the seraglio displeased or daunted her, she came to see the white beast. She watched Chota in amazement, as if wondering how a creature this mighty could be so docile. The elephant was the Sultan of the menagerie, yet so unlike her own father.

There was no pattern to her visits. At times she wouldn’t be seen for weeks on end and Jahan was left wondering what she was doing in that treasure chest of secrets that was the harem. Then she would appear almost every afternoon. Always, her
dada
, Hesna Khatun, waited by her side. Always, the nursemaid looked perturbed that the Princess showed such interest in an animal. Though the woman clearly disapproved of Mihrimah’s affection for the elephant, she was also careful to keep it a secret.

A full year passed. Then came a sweltering summer. Jahan was hoarding what little he had pilfered: a silver rosary (from the Chief Gardener), a silk handkerchief with golden embroidery (from a new eunuch), jars of almonds and pistachios (from the royal pantry), a golden ring (from a foreign envoy who had visited the menagerie). He knew they were only knick-knacks, not enough to satisfy Captain Gareth. He had still not been able to learn where they kept the Sultan’s gems, and the truth was, as time went by and he got used to life in the menagerie, he thought less and less about it. He had not heard from Captain Gareth since that day, though the man still appeared in his dreams, a menace who jumped from out of the shadows. Why he had not shown up, Jahan could not fathom. For all he knew he might have gone on a voyage and met a wretched end.

Almost all the words that the Princess and the mahout exchanged were about Chota, who was thriving, expanding in height and weight. Hence Jahan was taken aback when one day, out of the blue, Mihrimah asked him about his life back in Hindustan and how he had ended up here. And this is the story that he told her the next day – she seated under a lilac tree, he on his knees; she observing him, he not daring to glance up; she so close he could smell the scent in her hair, he unable to forget there were worlds between them.

In the great and rich land of Hindustan there lived a poor boy named Jahan. His home was a shack, a stone’s throw away from the road that the soldiers trampled en route to and from Shah Humayun’s palace. He slept under the same roof as his five sisters, his mother and his stepfather, who also was his eldest uncle. Jahan was a curious boy, who loved putting together things with his hands. Mud, wood, stone, dung or twigs, all would be made use of by the boy. Once he built a large furnace in the backyard that pleased his mother immensely, because, unlike anything she had possessed before, it did not emit dark, dizzying smoke.

When Jahan was not yet six his father – for he had once had a father – vanished into thin air. Each time he asked his mother his whereabouts, she gave the same answer: ‘He’s gone by water.’ On board a ship, destined for a city of lights and shadows, far away – where they had another shah or sultan, and treasures beyond imagining.

Another boy would have seen through her fib. Not Jahan. It would take him years to make sense of the fine and flimsy lies his mother had woven around him, like wispy spider webs, there and not there. Even when his mother was married off to his uncle – a man who constantly sneered at her – the boy refused to accept that his father was not coming back. In helpless anger he watched his uncle sit in his father’s chair, sleep in his father’s bed, chew his father’s betel leaves
and not utter a word of gratitude. Nothing his mother did satisfied the man. The fire she lit was not warm enough, the milk she touched curdled, the
puris
she fried tasted no better than soil, and the body she gave to him every night served no purpose since she still had not gifted him with a son.

When he wasn’t grousing or swearing, his stepfather raised war elephants. He taught these peaceful animals how to charge and to kill. Jahan’s sisters helped him, though never Jahan. Such was the boy’s hatred of his stepfather that he steered clear of the man and his beasts. Except for one – Pakeeza.

A thousand days into her pregnancy, Pakeeza had yet to give birth. Three autumns and three winters had gone by, and it was spring again. The amaltas tree down the road had blossomed gold; the slopes were swathed in wildflowers; snakes had awakened from their darkest sleep – but the baby had not been born. Pakeeza had gained so much weight that she could hardly move. Every day she would mope, her eyelids as heavy as her heart.

Every morning Jahan would bring Pakeeza fresh water and a bucketful of fodder. Laying a hand on her crinkled skin, he would murmur, ‘Maybe today is the big day, huh?’

Pakeeza would lift her head, a slow, reluctant gesture, yet enough of one to show she had heard him and that, despite her weariness, shared his hope. Then the sun would inch its way across the sky, paint the horizon in streaks of crimson, and another day would be over. It was the last few weeks before the wet season, the air muggy, the moisture unbearable. Secretly Jahan suspected something might have happened to the calf in the womb. It even occurred to him that Pakeeza was suffering from a bloated tummy, and that behind her swollen flesh there was nothing but emptiness. Yet, whenever he placed his ear on her huge, sagging belly, so low it almost touched the ground, he heard a heartbeat, timid but steady. The little one was there but, for reasons obscure to everyone, he was biding his time, waiting, hiding.

Meanwhile, Pakeeza had developed an appetite for the strangest
things. With gusto she licked muddy puddles; smacked her lips at the sight of dried clay; gobbled down cow-dung bricks. Whenever she had a chance she chomped the flakes off the barn’s lime-washed walls, inciting Jahan’s uncle to whip her.

Pakeeza’s family dropped by every other day to see how she was faring. Leaving behind the forest, they ambled past in single file, their eyes fixed on the dusty path, their steps beating to a rhythm only they could hear. Upon reaching the place, the males fell silent while the females drew closer, calling out in their ancient tongue. Inside the yard Pakeeza pricked up her ears. Occasionally she answered them. With what little strength she had, she told them not to worry for her. Mostly she stayed still – whether numbed by dread or soothed by love, Jahan could not tell.

People came from far and wide to see the miracle. Hindus and Muslims and Sikhs and Christians swarmed around their shack. They brought garlands of flowers. They lit candles, burned incense and sang airs. The baby must be blessed, they said, his umbilical cord stuck in an unseen world. They tied scraps of cloth on the banyan tree, hoping their prayers would be heard by the skies. Before they left, the visitors made sure to touch Pakeeza, promising not to wash their hands until their wishes had been granted. The most impudent tried to pluck a hair or two from her tail; for them, Jahan kept a lookout.

Every so often a healer appeared at their gate, either out of a desire to help or sheer curiosity. One of them was Sri Zeeshan. A gaunt man with flaring eyebrows and a habit of embracing trees, rocks and boulders to feel the life within them. The year before he had lost his balance and toppled down a cliff while trying to enfold the sunset in his arms. He had remained in bed for forty days, unspeaking and unmoving, except for a nervous twitch behind his eyelids, as if in sleep he was still falling. His wife had already begun to mourn him when, on the afternoon of the forty-first day, he scrambled to his feet, wobbly but otherwise fine. Since then his mind moved back and forth, like a saw at work. Opinion was divided as to the result of the accident. Some believed it had propelled him to a higher realm no
other sage had ever reached. Others said that, having lost his wits, he could no longer be entrusted with the sacred.

Either way, here he was. He put his ear on Pakeeza’s belly, his eyes closed. He spoke in a low, husky voice that sounded as though it came from the bottom of that precipice he had tumbled into, saying, ‘Baby’s listening.’

Jahan held his breath, awed and thrilled. ‘You mean, he can hear us?’

‘Sure. If you shout and cuss, he’ll never come out.’

Jahan flinched as he recalled the many times there had been cursing and chiding in the house. Clearly, his brute of an uncle had scared the young one out of his wits.

The healer waved a gnarled finger. ‘Hear me out, son. This is no ordinary calf.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘This elephant is too … sentimental. He does not want to be born. Comfort him. Tell him it’ll be all right; this world is not such a bad place. He’ll come out like an arrow from a bow. Love him and he’ll never leave you.’ With that he gave Jahan a wink, as though they now shared an important secret.

That afternoon, as Jahan watched the sky grow dark, he racked his brains. How could he persuade the baby this world was worth being born into? Rumbling, bellowing, roaring, elephants conversed all the time. Even so, it was a task beyond his powers. Not only because he didn’t speak their tongue, but also because he didn’t have anything to say. What did he know about life beyond these walls, beyond his eggshell heart?

Lightning in the distance. Jahan waited for a thunder that didn’t come. It was in that lacuna, as he was expecting something to happen, that an idea rushed through his head. He didn’t know much about the world, true, but he knew how it felt to be afraid of it. When he was a toddler and got scared he would hide under Mother’s hair, which was so long it reached down to her knees.

Jahan ran into the house, to find Mother washing her husband in a wooden tub, scrubbing his back. His uncle loathed bath times and
would never agree to them were it not for the fleas. He would emerge from the water, the colour of his skin having changed, but not his character. Now he was lying in the tub, eyes closed, while the camphor oil worked its wonders. Jahan gestured at Mother, begging her to follow him into the yard. Next he whisked his sisters – all of whom had inherited Mother’s hair, though not quite her pretty looks – out of the house. In a tone he hadn’t known he was capable of, he asked them to stand beside Pakeeza. To his relief they did, holding hands, unsmiling, as if there were nothing queer in any of this. They inched closer, as he instructed them, their copious hair billowing in every direction. With their backs to the wind, and their heads bent forward, their hair caressed Pakeeza’s enormous belly. Together they made a mantle that hung halfway in mid-air, like a magic carpet. Jahan could hear his uncle bellowing from inside the house. No doubt Mother heard him too. Even so, they didn’t budge, not one of them. There was something beautiful in the air, and if he had had the word for it back then he might have called it a benison. In that passing moment the boy whispered to the calf in the womb, ‘See, it’s not bad out here. You might as well come now.’

Afterwards his uncle beat his mother for her disobedience. When Jahan tried to interfere, he received his share of the blows. He slept in the barn that night. In the morning he woke up to an uncanny stillness. ‘Mother!’ he yelled. Not a sound.

He was standing beside Pakeeza, who looked the same as she did on any other day, when he saw her midriff convulse, once, then twice. Noticing that her rear was swollen, he called out to Mother again, and to his sisters, though by now he had understood there was no one in the house. Pakeeza began to trumpet as her pouch twitched and quivered, expanding horribly. Jahan had seen animals give birth before, horses and goats, but never an elephant. He reminded himself that this was her sixth calf, and she knew what to do; however, a voice inside his head, a wiser voice, warned that he should not trust nature to take its course and that he should lend a helping hand – whether now or later, the voice didn’t say.

A sac emerged, wet and slimy as a river stone. It fell on the ground, sending forth a gush of fluid. Astonishingly fast the calf was out, bespattered with blood and a sludgy substance so pale as to be translucent. A boy! Dazed and frail, he looked worn out as if he had come a great distance. Pakeeza sniffed the baby, nudging him gently with the tip of her trunk. She chewed the glassy sac. Meanwhile, the calf clambered to his feet, blind as a bat. There were ivory wisps of hair all over his body. It was his size and his colour that perplexed Jahan. In front of him was the tiniest elephant in the empire. And he was as white as boiled rice.

Pakeeza’s son was almost half the size of other newborns. Like them, his trunk being too short, he needed to use his mouth to drink his first milk; but, unlike them, his head did not even reach his mother’s knees. In the next hour Jahan watched the mother elephant prod the baby, at first mildly, soon with growing impatience, pleading with him to come closer, to no avail.

Convinced that he had to do something, the boy sprinted towards the back of the barn, where they kept all kinds of oddments. In one corner stood a rough-hewn barrel, half filled with the fodder they fed the animals in winter. A rat scurried past when he moved it aside. His feet now dredged with a layer of ancient dust, he emptied the barrel and rolled the clumsy thing to where the mother and baby stood. Then he ran to the house to fetch a stewpot. Lastly, he shoved the barrel as close to Pakeeza as he could and climbed up on it.