Nadir Sharif leaned uneasily against the rooftop railing of his
sprawling riverside palace, above the second-floor _zenana_, and
absently watched his Kabuli pigeons wing past the curve of the Jamuna
River, headed toward the Red Fort. They swept over the heavy
battlements at the river gate and then veered precisely upward, along
the sheer eastern wall of the fort, until they reached the gold minaret
atop the Jasmine Tower, the private quarters of Queen Janahara. They
circled her tower once, then coalesced into a plumed spear driving
directly upward toward the dawn-tinged cloud bank that hovered over
Agra from the east.
Imported Kabuli pigeons, with their flawless white eyes and blue-tipped
wings, were Nadir Sharifs secret joy. Unlike the inferior local breeds
of the other devoted pigeon-fliers along the west bank of the Jamuna,
Agra's palace-lined showplace, his Kabulis did not flit aimlessly from
rooftop to rooftop on their daily morning flight. After he opened the
shutters on their rooftop grillwork cage, they would trace a single
circle of his palace, next wing past the Red Fort in a salute to the
queen, then simply disappear into the infinite for fully half a day,
returning as regally as they had first taken wing.
Nadir Sharif was the prime minister of the Moghul empire, the brother
of Queen Janahara, and the father of Prince Jadar's favorite wife,
Mumtaz. Even in the first light of dawn there was no mistaking he was
Persian and proud. The early sun glanced off his finely woven gauze
cape and quickened a warm glow in the gold thread laced through his
yellow cloak and his pastel morning turban. His quick eyes, plump face,
and graying moustache testified to his almost sixty years of life,
thirty spent at the Moghul court as close adviser to Arangbar and,
before that, to Arangbar's father, the great empire-builder Akman. In
power and authority he was exceeded only by the Moghul himself.
Nadir Sharifs palace was deliberately situated next to the Red Fort,
just around the broad curve of the Jamuna. The Red Fort, home of the
Moghul, was a vast, rambling fortress whose river side towered over a
hundred feet above the western curve of the Jamuna. From Nadir Sharifs
rooftop the view of the river side of the fort and Arangbar's _darshan_
window was unobstructed.
Darshan was the dawn appearance Arangbar made daily at a special
balcony in the east wall of the Red Fort, next to the river gate. It
was strict custom that the chief officials of Arangbar's court also
appear daily, on a high platform just beneath the _darshan_ balcony,
where along with the Moghul they greeted the well-wishers who streamed
in through the river gate and provided visual confirmation that India's
rule was intact.
The square below the balcony--a grassy expanse between the side of the
fort and the river wall, where Arangbar held noontime elephant fights
and, on Tuesdays, executions by specially trained elephants--had already
filled almost to capacity. Agra's most prominent noblemen were there,
as prudence required, and today there also were clusters of important
visitors. Several Rajput chieftains from the northwest, astride
prancing Arabian horses, passed regally through the river gate and
assumed prominent positions. Then a path was cleared for a large
embassy of Safavid Persian diplomats, each of whose palanquins was
borne by four slaves in gleaming velvet liveries; next several desert
Uzbek khans in leather headdress rode into the square; and finally
three Portuguese Jesuits in black cassocks trooped through the river
gate and moved imperiously to the front of the crowd.
Nadir Sharif watched as his pigeons were swallowed by the morning haze
and then settled himself onto a canopied couch to observe _darshan_.
The eunuchs of the _zenana_ had whispered that this morning would be
different, that there would be a precedent-shattering occurrence. For
once a _zenana_ rumor seemed all too plausible, and late the previous
evening he had sent a dispatch through a _qazi_, a high judge, pleading
illness and excusing himself from _darshan_. And now he had stationed
himself to watch. How would the court officials react? Had they too
heard the rumors? And what of those who had gathered below to salute
Arangbar with the traditional _teslim_.
Most importantly, what of Nadir Sharif? This day could well be a
turning point in the course of India's history . . . and in the three
decades of his preeminence at court. If the rumors were true.
Nadir Sharif was easily the most accomplished courtier in India, a
skill that had earned him the most splendid palace in Agra after the
Moghul himself. His position brought with it not merely a palace, but
also the _mansab_ rank and _jagir_ wealth required to maintain it. Only
enormous wealth could sustain the hungry host of slaves, eunuchs,
concubines, musicians, dancers, and wives who thronged his Agra palace.
Success for Nadir Sharif had always seemed so effortless, so
inevitable, he often marveled that so few others had ever grasped the
elementary secret. His simple formula for longevity, in a court where
favorites daily rose and fell, was first to establish with certainty
which side of a difference would inevitably triumph, and then to unveil
his own supporting views.
He had made a lifelong habit of seeing everything. And saying almost
nothing. He understood well that thoughts unsaid often served better
than those voiced too hastly. Whereas the way of others might be flawed
by a penchant for the _zenana_, or jewels, or those intoxicants the
Prophet ha so futilely prohibited, Nadir Sharifs sole worldly obsession
was power--from which nothing, absolutely nothing, had ever turned his
head. For a decade he had ruled the Moghul empire in all but name,
forwarding to Arangbar only those petitions he favored, holding in
advisement any he opposed, counseling the Moghul at every turn--but
always through other, unsuspecting voices if the advice was anything
save disguised flattery.
His meticulous attention to affairs at court did not exclude foreign
trade. For years his voice had been raised against any who counseled
Arangbar in directions adverse to Portuguese interests. This attention
did not pass unnoticed in Goa, and when a kingly jewel was sent to
Arangbar, another of only slightly inferior dimensions always found its
way into the hands of Nadir Sharif.
The first rays of sun struck the hard ocher sandstone of the Red Fort's
east wall and suddenly it glowed like an inflamed ruby, throwing its
warmth across the face of the Jamuna River. Moments later the
heightening sun illuminated the rooftops of Agra, a sea of red tile and
thatch that spread out in a wide arc west of the fort.
Agra, the capital of Moghul India, was one of the great cities of the
East. It was home to over half a million, more than lived in any
capital of Europe, and some said a man on horseback could scarcely
circle it in a day. Yet most of the city was far from grand. It was a
jumble of two-story brick and tile merchant houses, clay-faced homes of
Hindu tradesmen, and a spreading sea of mud and thatch one-room hovels
that sheltered the rest.
But along the river on either side of the Red Fort had been created a
different world. There glistened the mansions of Moghul grandees like
Nadir Sharif, magical and remote, behind whose walls lay spacious
gardens cooled by marble fountains and gilded rooms filled with carpets
from Persia, porcelains from China, imported crystal from Venice. Their
_zenanas_ thronging with exquisite, dark-eyed women, and their
tapestried halls with hosts of slaves and eunuchs.
Nadir Sharif inhaled the clean air of morning and surveyed the palaces
on either side along the riverbank. They were all sumptuous, but none
more than his own. A vainer man might have swelled with pride at such a
moment, but Nadir Sharif knew from years of court experience that
vanity always led, inevitably, to excess, and finally to debt and ruin.
To keep one's place, he often told himself, one must know it. He also
knew that to hold one's ground, one must know when to shift.
His reverie was abruptly dispelled by the noise of shuffling feet, and
then a hesitant voice.
"A man is at the outer gate, Sharif Sahib, asking to see you."
Nadir Sharif turned to see the eunuch's spotless white turban bowing
toward him. He flared inwardly that his orders for absolute privacy had
been ignored, and then, as always, he waited a few seconds for
composure before speaking.
"I'm too ill to receive. Have you already forgotten my orders?"
"Forgive me, Sharif Sahib." The eunuch bowed ever lower and raised his
clasped palms in involuntary supplication. "He has demanded an
audience. He claimed he has arrived last night from the Deccan. He was
with the prince . . ."