Tiger Claws (24 page)

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Authors: John Speed

BOOK: Tiger Claws
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“I shall wander the roads, a naked sadhu. I shall die in the Ganges,” he says, raising his eyes to the heavens.
“No, uncle, please stay, I beg you.” Shivaji presses his forehead to the floor, and Dadaji closes his eyes, mollified.
“Still, why not let her stay?” asks Hanuman. “I think it’s wrong to sell her.”
“You answer,” Dadaji says to Shivaji.
“Very well, uncle: You would have me say that she is dangerous because she is valuable. She has been stolen from powerful men. Next you would have me say that she is dangerous because of her nature. She is beautiful and desirable. A wise man hides such a treasure. Besides, our city is poor and the money she would fetch could help much.”
Dadaji looks at him proudly. “Now you answer as a man worthy of being a prince.”
“Even so, uncle,” Shivaji says, “I will not sell her. I mean no disrespect. I must be a man before I am a prince. No man could bear to see her sold. I regret I suggested it.” Dadaji’s answering glance is withering.
Trelochan speaks. “But Shahu, look at what she’s done to your friends, to your house. Even to you! If you won’t sell her, at least send her away.”
“What about taking her back to Ranjangaon temple?” Tanaji suggests. “She’s a devadasi. She belongs dancing in a temple.”
“Dangerous,” says Shivaji. “Too close to Khirki and that dharmsala. Too busy, too. Someone might recognize her.”
“What about Adoli temple?” Bala says. “It’s just a few miles from Welhe. That’s Iron’s place. Remember Iron? He was a great friend of Shahji.”
“It’s a little village,” Hanuman says. “Same sort of trouble will get stirred up there as here, don’t you think?”
“She’ll be in the temple, not the village. A Bhavani temple. There’s a dancing school. Maya could help.”
“They’ll find her,” Hanuman says. “She’s worth a lot, a girl like that. Just because Shivaji has some honor …”
“Iron will protect her. He is a real man,” Dadaji says firmly. “A devadasi he will keep safe.”
“But the road to Welhe will be dangerous,” Hanuman insists.
“Do it carefully, then,” Tanaji says. He lifts his chin, pointing to the sky. “In a week or two monsoons will start. You won’t find anybody traveling those roads then, not even bandits. Wait until it rains.
“Can’t use a cart though, not on those roads, not in the rain,” Tanaji realizes. “They’ll have to learn to ride.”
“I’ll see to it,” Hanuman says, unable to disguise his pleasure.
This final plan meets mumbled approval. The mood at last is pleasant.
Except for Dadaji. Dadaji considers Shivaji. Measuring him, the way a man measures the beam he lays on a foundation, wondering if it will serve.
And except for Lakshman. Unnoticed, he has moved into the shadows on the other side of the courtyard. He waits there as Maya comes out of the bathing house, like a flower blossoming in the morning still wet with dew.
Watching.
 
 
As the monsoons approach, the days grow darker. The sky changes. For a while, the sun peeks through the haze. Then the haze becomes thick, and there is only a glow where once the bright sun shone.
It will only be days, perhaps hours before the rains come to Poona. The air grows dense with moisture; sweat hangs on the skin, clothing will not dry, mold grows on sandals and mildew stains walls.
 
 
Jijabai finds Shivaji sitting on the verandah, looking at a stack of papers. For a moment, she remembers herself as young woman, scarcely more than a girl, carrying him in her belly in all that heat, holding him to her nipple as he suckled, carrying him on her hip through these forests as they first came to Poona. What hopes she had.
Now she is hopeless. Looking down she doubts that he will ever achieve anything. He is truly his father’s son, she thinks. So she stands over him rather than sit beside him.
Jijabai scowls. “The girl,” she says at last.
“You wanted her gone. She’s going. We’ll leave when the rains start; in a day or two. Isn’t that what you wanted?”
“What about the ransom?” she says, choking out the words.
Shivaji bobs his head noncommittally. “No ransom, mother.”
“Why should you throw away the fortune that the gods have placed in your hands?” Jijabai stamps her foot. “Dadaji has told me. The treasury is nearly empty yet you will give away your prize! Have you gone mad?”
“There is plenty. In fact I will take a thousand rupees to the temple as
bhiksha
…”
“A thousand!”
“There’s plenty in the treasury, mother. Dadaji—”
“How dare you ignore your uncle and adviser!”
Shivaji doesn’t look up. “It is wrong to ransom her.”
“That’s not what you said before! This is her doing. You’ve been manipulated. She’s leading you around by your lingam. You and all your men—like dogs smelling a bitch!”
“Mother,” Shivaji whispers.
But Jijabai doesn’t care if her voice carries up the stairs. Let her hear! “She is no fragile flower, Shahu. Her yoni is no unopened bud. I’m sure you’ve found that out. Under your own roof, with your son not twenty feet away!” She bites her lip, determined not to weep. “Oh, Shahu,” she moans. “What will become of us? I won’t die poor. I won’t!”
“Mother, such talk! Who says you will be poor?”
“The treasury is nearly empty. How will we live?”
“There’s plenty left, mother. Plenty for many months.”
“Not enough if the Bijapuris demand a larger allotment.” She watches with satisfaction as Shivaji considers this. Now, maybe, he understands the reason she is so upset. “You must raise the tax. If only to appease the Bijapuris.” She ignores Shivaji’s puzzled look. “Of all the jagirs in their realm Poona has the lowest taxes. Why do you think so many farmers are moving here? Don’t you think it attracts their notice? How long can you expect them to ignore us? Soon they will come in anger!”
“But they made a treaty with my father,” Shivaji protests.
“Oh, you are a child,” she sighs.
 
 
In a small fenced ring, Jyoti and Maya trot their ponies in an easy circle. In the center of the ring stands Hanuman, from time to time flicking the the ponies with a long willow branch.
Hanuman smiles to himself. If they go in the rain as Tanaji plans, when will they even find a place to trot? When will they do anything but slog through a river of mud? Still it is enjoyable to teach them.
Sometimes Jyoti’s pony will suddenly break into a canter and when this happens, she laughs. Hanuman notices the way Jyoti responds, enjoying the sudden roughness and surprise. He finds himself thinking thoughts that have nothing to do with horses.
Maya on the other hand is quiet as she rides. But she is a much better rider: calm where Jyoti is excited, still where Jyoti bounces. Already the horse and Maya move as one.
“You’re both doing very well today!” Hanuman calls out. “You’re ready for the trip, I think.” He looks at the sky, squinting, sniffing the air. “Rain tonight. So we’ll leave tomorrow or the day after. You’ll do fine.”
“You are too kind, dear sir,” Jyoti says with too much formality. “That makes us feel much better than yesterday.”
Hanuman frowns. “What about yesterday?”
Jyoti laughs. “Yesterday you were not so pleased. Yesterday you shouted at us both, and insisted on giving Maya private instructions.”
Hanuman frowns. “I gave you no lesson yesterday.”
Maya’s face changes: first laughter, then shock, then horror.
Jyoti just laughs, not noticing her mistress. “Of course you gave us lessons. I have the stripe on my backside where you missed the horse!”
“No,” says Maya quietly, studying his face. “No. It wasn’t him.”
 
 
Tanaji has decided to take twenty-five men along to Welhe. He has two worries: the girl and the gold.
Everyone in Poona knows about the thousand pieces of gold they carry. And Poona buzzes with the tale of Maya’s price of seven lakh hun. If Poona knows, everyone knows. And someone might try something. And the girl is like some witch’s charm that lures men to lust. He has felt that charm; he has seen it at work on Shahu, and on his sons. It seems the whole town has become bewitched. If he takes along enough men, he reasons, the effect might be diluted. They can’t all be smitten at once.
Besides the girl, there is the gold: Shivaji, as Tanaji expected, wants to take a casketful of gold to the temple. There is nothing like giving gold to the
shastri
to improve your welcome. But gold, Tanaji knows, has a voice; it calls out as it travels, and villains hear its call.
Outside, he hears nervous, prancing hoofbeats, and a grating voice with a horrible accent.
It’s O’Neil.
There at the gate of the compound, arguing with the gatekeeper, riding Shivaji’s fine black Bedouin, with the other Bedouin tethered behind him.
“I never thought we’d see you again!” Tanaji calls.
“See, don’t I tell you I good friend Shivaji?” O’Neil calls back. “Look: I am bringing here your Bedouins see? Like promise, I do.”
“Very good, Onil,” Tanaji says. “I never thought we’d see you again, to tell the truth.”
“Where Shivaji? Must talk Shivaji. Where that girl?” O’Neil asks, looking around the courtyard.
Tanaji looks from the
farang
to the lowering sky. “Don’t unpack,” Tanaji says.
 
 
In a cave on the edge of Poona is a temple, carved from the living rock. Thick black columns form its wide colonnade. In the heart of the cave a temple to Shiva has been carved from the basalt, and in the center of that small temple is a shivalingam.
Sai Bai steps into the darkness of the inner temple. She rings the dark bronze bell that hangs from the ceiling. It peals deeply, and a rich, low hum reverberates in the heavy air. She likes this dark place, its coolness and its silence, the ancient temple and the more ancient cave. She comes here when her heart is troubled.
There are no priests here, only the lingam and a tiny butter lamp: it is quiet, cool, and dank. She walks once around the lingam and stands before it, adoring it, quieting her heart. Then she whispers her prayer.
The lingam itself is only about a foot tall. And maybe by design or by the ravages of time, it is not smooth; it seems almost to have veins carved into the black stone. It glistens in the darkness. At its base are flower petals, bits of incense, and a few coins.
She says her prayer, then she waits for a sign that the gods have heard.
In a moment a drop of water forms on the dark ceiling and falls onto the lingam with a plop.
 
 
Leaving the temple, she sees him in the shadows, meditating cross-legged on a wide platform of rock, in a part of the cave where the carving was never completed. His head nearly touches the low-hanging ceiling. His eyes are closed and his hands are on his knees.
When she was a child, her auntie told her the story of Karna, the foundling child of a charioteer, really the son of the sun god. When she met Shivaji she thought of that son of the sun: his skin always golden, his face radiant, his eyes like jewels.
She wishes she were enough for him.
Shivaji’s face brightens when he sees Sai Bai. “Did the gods answer?”
“Husband, do you have some trouble on your mind?”
“Maybe some money trouble. Taxes and allotments. Mother thinks Bijapur may raise our allotment, even attack us.”
“What will you do?” He tells her so little about his life outside the palace. But Sai Bai picks up pieces and assembles them in her heart.
“I trust that the path of dharma will be clear. I’ll do what I must.”
She can no longer hold back. Here in the silence of this cave, as the storm gathers round them, she cannot be silent. “I see your heart. I see the madness that you plan.”
Shivaji stares at her. “This is not like you.”
“You must not do it, husband. I see on every side around you blood and death and grief. You must not do this thing.”
“Why not?” he shouts, and his words echo in the cave.
“Because it is the path of darkness. And you …” She cannot finish. “Give up, husband,” she says abruptly. “I have prayed for the courage to say this, so, please, dearest, don’t interrupt me.” Sai Bai takes a deep breath, staring into her husband’s eyes. “Let me care for Sam and Jijabai. Go away from here. She is so beautiful and her heart is pure and she loves you, dearest. She doesn’t know this, yet, but she does. Trelochan says you are already married. So leave these troubles. Give up your mad plan. Take her to some sweet valley in the forest and live lives of pleasure.”

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