‘Kamran Iqbal said that Ismail Khan broke through the guard cordon between you two to attack me. Why did you fail in your duty? Why couldn’t you stop him? He wasn’t a powerful man, after all.’ Neither man responded. ‘Speak or I will have the torturers heat their irons.’
Suddenly Majid Beg blurted out, ‘I felt Hari Singh move a little away from me just before Ismail Khan slipped between us despite my very best efforts to prevent him.’
So that was it, thought Shah Jahan, eyes turning to Hari Singh. He had retained a loyalty to Shahriyar, just as Ismail Khan had acted to avenge Jani and Khusrau. ‘What have you to say for yourself?’
Hari Singh looked directly at Shah Jahan. ‘Majesty, I did not shrink back, I swear. I tried to protect you … to prevent Ismail Khan getting through. I almost succeeded in knocking his heels together to bring him to the ground, as other comrades will bear witness.’
‘And what about Majid Beg? Did he do his best as he claims?’
‘I cannot say. Besides, he is my comrade.’
‘It looks bad for you, Hari Singh. You must speak.’
Before Hari Singh could say anything more Shah Jahan saw the captain of his guard approach across the dry parade ground, from which the breeze was raising puffs of red dust. ‘What is it?’
‘As you ordered, we searched these men’s military chests in their barracks and we found this in one of them.’ As he spoke the captain up-ended a green velvet bag he held in one hand. Out into the dust tumbled several gold mohurs.
‘Whose chest?’ asked Shah Jahan.
‘Majid Beg’s.’
Taken aback that it wasn’t Hari Singh’s, Shah Jahan said nothing for a moment then demanded, ‘What are they, Majid Beg? Your reward for treachery?’
‘No, my savings.’ Majid Beg remained impassive.
‘That cannot be true, Majesty,’ said the captain. ‘One of the other guards told me Majid Beg is well known as a gambler and has been trying to borrow money for his daughter’s dowry. He is guilty.’
‘Come, Hari Singh, now you must speak,’ urged Shah Jahan.
‘I cannot condemn a colleague without being entirely sure, but he moved away from me, I’m almost certain.’ Hari Singh spoke quietly, his eyes this time on the ground. As he did so, Majid Beg made a desperate lunge as if to run, but then as guards closed around him his whole body sagged.
‘Majid Beg, it was you.’
‘Yes, Majesty.’
‘Who approached you?’
Majid Beg was close to breaking down. ‘Ismail Khan himself. He said he had heard of my need for money from a guard who used to be one of his family retainers.’
‘Were others involved?’
‘No … Not to my knowledge, Majesty.’
‘Like Ismail Khan you will die, Majid Beg, but unlike him, because you tried to divert blame on to an innocent comrade, you will die beneath the elephant’s foot. Bring forward the execution elephant.’
Slowly a large elephant, the edges of its ears tattered with age, was urged forward from the shade of the fort walls by the equally elderly mahout sitting on its neck. At the same time bodyguards roughly spreadeagled Majid Beg on the granite execution stone and tied his wrists and ankles to the steel rings embedded in each corner. At first he did not resist, seemingly resigned to his fate. However, as the execution elephant reached the stone, casting its shadow over him, and began slowly to raise its right forefoot above his abdomen, he started to struggle, bucking and writhing. ‘Remember my past service, Majesty! Pardon me!’ he shouted hoarsely.
‘I cannot,’ said Shah Jahan. ‘Proceed with the execution.’
At a tap on its head with the steel rod the mahout held in his hand, the elephant brought its foot down on to Majid Beg’s abdomen. His screams rose to an animal pitch and there was a crunch as his pelvic bones broke, crushed against the hard granite. A pop of air followed as his stomach wall burst and the stench of human faeces rose as his intestines ruptured. After a few moments he ceased both his screams and struggles. At another command from its mahout, the elephant raised its foot, turned and slowly plodded back towards the fort, more orange dust adhering to its bloodied right forefoot with each step.
‘So perishes another traitor,’ Shah Jahan shouted as once again the crowd roared. Then he turned to Hari Singh. ‘You are free, and for your refusal — even at peril to your own life — to implicate Majid Beg before you were certain of his guilt, take those gold mohurs spilled in the dust there. Let Majid Beg’s pay for his treachery become your reward for loyalty.’
As guards cut Hari Singh’s bonds and he bent to retrieve the coins, Shah Jahan turned towards the fort, brushing aside the good wishes of courtiers eager to congratulate him on his escape and to assure him of their loyalty. He must go to Mumtaz in the haram. While his injury was being treated he had given orders she was not to be told of the assassination attempt. It would alarm her less if she heard about it from him and saw with her own eyes that he was safe. But also, she might have tried to persuade him to pardon Ismail Khan. Jani’s horrible end — she had swallowed a hot coal on learning of her husband’s killing — had long preyed on her mind. But though he loved to make Mumtaz happy, for once he would not have been able to agree to her request.
‘No … no … Roshanara …!’
‘Majesty, what is it?’
Mumtaz woke, body shaking and forehead damp with the perspiration that Satti al-Nisa, her strong-featured Persian lady-in-waiting, was already wiping away with a yellow silk handkerchief. ‘I dreamed that the emperor and I were crossing the swollen Mahanadi river in a bullock cart when one of the animals slipped, tipping the wagon over … the torrent ripped Roshanara from my arms … I tried to swim after her but couldn’t reach her … I knew she was drowning but the water was choking me … closing over my head, filling my nostrils … I couldn’t breathe.’
‘Hush. Nothing is amiss, madam. You’ve been having bad dreams again. Roshanara is with Jahanara. I saw your daughters together barely half an hour ago.’ Satti al-Nisa’s voice was as gentle and soothing as if she were speaking to a child rather than an empress aged almost forty. Lying back, Mumtaz willed her body to relax, but some minutes passed before her heart ceased its hectic thumping. She had fallen asleep just after the midday meal but the room was now in shadow. Surely she hadn’t been asleep that long? Glancing around she realised that while she had dozed servants had covered the arched windows with tattis — screens filled with the roots of scented kass grass — to filter out the harsh summer sun. A dripping noise told her they had also begun trickling rosewater down the screens — a trick to create fragrant draughts of air. Perhaps the sound of the running water had prompted her sleeping mind to relive the moments when her younger daughter had nearly drowned.
Mumtaz turned on her side to watch the pricks of sunlight penetrating the screen create small, dancing pools of light on the rich Persian carpets around her couch. Shah Jahan had rescued Roshanara from the river that day — she would never forget his harrowed look as he had placed their daughter — sodden but still breathing — into her arms. Simply staying alive as they had been hunted across India by Shah Jahan’s vengeful father, the Emperor Jahangir, was all that had mattered then. How strange that now she was empress, living in luxury and security, those bleak years should so often haunt her. Sometimes she wondered if Roshanara, young as she’d then been, retained some memory of the incident. More than any other of her children she seemed to need the reassurance of her mother’s presence and love, hating to be alone for long.