Jani and the Greater Game (The Multiplicity Series Book 1) (10 page)

Jani found herself unable to reply, moved that her father, ill and facing the end, had thought of what his death would mean to his faithful household staff.

She moved to her father’s desk and picked up his fountain pen, its ivory shaft worn by his thumb and forefinger. “Where is my father now, Anand?”

“He is taking a bath, Janisha-ji, but he will be finished presently. He was told what time you would arrive, and asked me to give you a drink on the verandah.”

“That would be lovely. Do you have any of Zeena’s homemade lemonade?”

Anand beamed. “She made some especially for you, Janisha-ji.”

She moved out onto the verandah overlooking exquisitely manicured lawns on which peacocks strutted.

Her father had saved the tousle-haired Anand, an orphan, from the streets when he was three and Jani five. Until Janisha left for boarding school in England at the age of eight, she and Anand had been like brother and sister, inseparable. They had played with the peevish monkeys on the lawn, despite her father’s repeated warnings, and ineptly knocked croquet balls into the head-gardener’s prize herbaceous borders.

She leaned back against the cushions of the wicker settee as Anand poured her a tall glass of iced lemonade. He settled himself on the lacquered floorboards at her feet and asked, with downcast eyes, if she would tell him all about her time in England.

He listened to her with wide eyes, marvelling at her stories of Buckingham Palace, the river Thames, and Cambridge.

“Oh, Jani-ji, it is my dream one day to travel the world. First I would like to see my country, all India, north and south, east and west – and then I would like to take an airship to Europe and visit Great Britain!”

“And one day, Anand, you will do that.”

He regarded her with his massive chestnut eyes. “Do you really think so? Do you think I might become an engineer or an inventor like Mr Clockwork and earn enough to travel far and wide!”

“If you apply yourself, Anand, study and work hard, then you can do anything.”

“And you?”

“Me?” She sipped her lemonade.

“When... when you leave India, and go back to England and complete your studies... what then?”

She held the ice-cold glass and stared across the perfect lawn. “Then... I am not sure what I will do, Anand. A part of me would like to return to India, to work as a doctor among my own people, but...”

“But... you have met someone special in England, yes?”

She looked at the young boy, wondering at his perspicacity – or was he merely voicing his fears?

“There is someone, yes. A young man of twenty.” She shrugged. “But I don’t know where that might lead.”

“Do you love him?”

She sighed. “I think I do, Anand. That is, when I’m with him I feel safe, secure, and when I am not with him I wish to be... So perhaps, yes, I do love him.” She sipped her lemonade. “And you? Is there a young girl in Delhi who has won your heart?”

Anand coloured to the roots of his midnight hair. “Well, there is a servant girl at Mr Clockwork’s workshop. She is my age and very, very sweet. Her name is Vashi and we have met once for chai on Rabindranath Road. I call her burfi, my nickname for her because she is so sweet.”

Jani felt an inner glow, and it was as if she had never been away, much less spent years on the far side of the world.

The double doors onto the verandah opened, and a huge man like a genie appeared on the threshold. He wore baggy white trousers and a vest, in which the globe of his stomach hung like a sack of chapatti flour.

“Mr Vikram,” Anand whispered, “your father’s new nurse. He does not like me and is always shouting this and that.”

Mr Vikram called out now, ordering Anand to make tea for papa-ji and, modulating his tone to address Jani, went on, “Your father will see you now, Miss Chatterjee. He is in his study.”

Janisha clutched Anand’s hand as he scrambled to his feet. “I will see you again, ah-cha. I will buy you chaat on Connaught Circus, yes?”

Anand beamed and scurried off.

Mr Vikram led Jani through the silent house. He opened the door to the study and stood aside, and Jani stepped through to greet her father.

A small, shrunken old man stood beside a desk in front of the French windows, the cascading sunlight illuminating his frail figure. As she hurried forward, Jani told herself that her father was only in his late fifties, hardly any age, and did not deserve the torture of the disease that was eating away at him little by little.

She came into his arms and they embraced, and he was light, no weight at all, and she found herself sobbing – a strange and welcome relief to be able to unburden all the pent-up emotion she had kept in check for weeks since learning of her father’s illness.

“Jani, Janisha-ji! My beloved... You are here, here at last, despite all that fate does to conspire that we might never meet again.”

She pulled away, and stared into the watery eyes, the whittled-down face, and saw his love for her shining through his pain at her distress.

He moved to his favourite leather armchair, walking with the aid of a stick, and sat down, wincing with pain. Once, he had dominated the armchair like a king enthroned; now the chair dominated him. He appeared tiny in its embrace, almost like a child in his trim white homespun suit and worn carpet slippers.

She told her father about the flight, and the Russian attack, but felt as though she were avoiding talking about what was really on her mind: his illness and the prognosis. The telegram from his secretary six weeks ago had merely stated that her father was gravely ill, and that she should come home to be with him in his final weeks.

Anand arrived with a tray bearing a silver teapot and two fine china cups. She poured, and added a little milk to her own – her father preferred his Darjeeling black – and thanked Anand as he hurried from the room.

“Is it not ironic, Jani-ji, that the problem that should be taxing my department most of late – the security of the north-western frontier – should be that which almost allowed the Russians to rob me of my daughter? I would take the shame with me to my grave. As it is, with the loss of the airship and so many lives...”

“Papa-ji...” She clutched his thin hand. “There was nothing you could do.”

He looked pained, and Jani could not tell whether it was at his illness or the thought of the security breach. “For twenty-five years I have worked to keep my country secure. The job has become more and more difficult. If the enmity of the Russians was not bad enough, now we face the rise of the Chinese. We have enemies on every side.” He smiled. “Well, perhaps I exaggerate. I am thankful that to the south of our great country there is only ocean.”

Her father had created headlines, twenty-five years ago, by being the first Indian national to be elected to the government cabinet. The appointment of an Indian minister – in the security post, no less – had caused much adverse comment on Fleet Street. Those in power in Delhi, however, knew the worth of the man, his trustworthiness and unswerving loyalty to the Crown.

He caressed her hand. “My days might be short, Jani-ji, but I am content with the knowledge that I am leaving India stronger than it has ever been in all its long and illustrious history. The Russians might make incursions to the north, but these are minor irritations, a gnat biting the hide of a buffalo. And the Chinese might be marching into Tibet – but we can deal with all this.”

She sipped her tea and smiled; he was sounding like the politician he was, issuing proclamations that would appear as headlines in the next day’s newspapers.

“And you,” he asked, “are you still passionate about independence as you were last year?”

She smiled and lowered her gaze from his. When he had visited London last summer she had – tentatively at first – voiced her thoughts that perhaps India would be better off, eventually, as an autonomous, self-governing entity with strong links to Britain, but with self-rule.

He had listened with tolerance, where many a father would have shouted her down or dismissed her. Instead he had replied, “It is a problem I have been wrestling with all my adult life,” and they had debated the pros and cons long into the night.

She said now, “But I have been hearing rumours in London, papa-ji.”

“Rumours?” He lowered his tea cup and smiled. “But you know what rumour is, my dear – rumour is the smoke from the fire of lies that obscures the truth.”

“But they say that there is no smoke without fire.”

He laughed. “And what are these rumours?”

She raised her gaze and looked into her father’s old, mahogany eyes. “They say that Annapurnite was discovered not by a British prospector in Nepal, but by an Indian. They say that Annapurnite should belong to the Indian nation, not to Britain. By rights,” she went on, feeling passion rise within her chest, “it should be India that is ruling three quarters of the globe, not the British; it should be India ruling the waves, not Britain waiving the rules!”

He threw back his thin head and laughed at the cheap wordplay. “You have the turn of phrase of a young politician in the making, Jani-ji, but take my advice and stick to medicine, ah-cha?” He patted her hand, and Jani felt a moment’s fury, soon quelled.

“But am I not right? Annapurnite should belong to India.”

He pursed his thin lips, contemplating. “Do you know what I think, my dear? I think that Annapurnite, and the power conferred by Annapurnite, is something of a cursed blessing. I acknowledge the many technological benefits brought about by... by its discovery, the advance on many scientific fronts that was the corollary, but I see also the terrible escalation in conflict that it has engendered. We – and I speak here of the British and Indian nations combined – have enemies where before we would not, even though the British have an unhappy knack at fomenting enmity.”

“But I say that we should be the true and only possessors of Annapurnite and the power, and wealth, that it confers,” she said.

“Do you know, I honestly think that it is right and proper that it should be the British to whom the dubious gift of Annapurnite fell. We would have all the enemies we have now, if we were sole possessors of the gift – but without the support of the British. And imagine the substance in the hands of the Russians or, fate forbid, the bloody Chinese, excuse my English. Imagine the state of the world if these nations were to wield the power now enjoyed by the British! You saw yourself what the Russians did to the survivors of the airship attack.”

She stared at him. “You know?”

“Of course I know. I might be ill, my dear, and I might have given up many of my responsibilities, but my secretary keeps me well informed.” He patted her hand. “You saw yourself the depravity of the Russians, and believe me, the Chinese are no better.”

“But,” she said, gesturing helplessly, “what about the massacre at Amritsar – and the quelling of the Nationalist riots last year in Lucknow? The British can be just as barbaric, no?”

He smiled, sadly. “Humans, Jani-ji, have a terrible and innate propensity for barbarity. It is the social systems that a society, a race, puts in place to keep a tight rein on this propensity which allow it to be judged civilised, or not. Amritsar and Lucknow were the responsibility of bad leadership and panic in the ranks – reprehensible, but not a sign of the greater corruption of the system. I would contend that, while the British are not perfect, they are the only race in the world who might harness the power conferred by... by Annapurnite with some measure of humanity.”

Her gaze fell to her knotted hands, on which her father’s hand rested like carved oak, his old skin worn to smoothness over the years. She murmured, “What you have just said is a terrible indictment of India and its people, papa-ji.”

He drew a deep sigh, and Jani interpreted this as impatience. “My dear, believe me, there are those within the political set of our country who, if they were to rise to power, would make the Russian excesses seem like the misdemeanours of children. The Hindu extremists are, you must admit, an element to be reviled.”

“I do not deny this, but I would contend that they are a minority greatly outnumbered by more fair-minded Indians, Hindu, Moslem and Buddhist alike.”

“I speak here from experience, Jani-ji, when I say that the power wielded is often disproportionate to the numbers of those who wield it. It takes only a small fraction of fanatics to turn a nation. The metaphor of bad apples springs to mind.”

Jani smiled to herself. It was often impossible to argue successfully with her father; he was, after all, a wily politician.

He said, “But all this talk of nationalism! Where is the little girl I packed off to boarding school all those years ago?”

“She grew up, papa-ji, became educated, read and experienced and talked to people.”

“You have changed much in the last year.”

“I...” She hesitated, then went on, “It may sound trite, but I have seen how the other half live.”

“Ah, Sebastian.”

She found herself blushing. Sebastian’s family, the Consetts, owned a vast swathe of Warwickshire, with a great stately home and a host of servants. “I thought I lived a life of privilege here in India, but it was as nothing compared to the Consetts’ wealth...” She smiled. “And while Sebastian is sweet, he is also ignorant in the ways of the world.”