Read Online In the City of Gold and Silver by Kenizé Mourad, Anne Mathai in collaboration with Marie-Louise Naville - Free Book Online Page B
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new year for Shia Muslims, fall on the same day: Friday, March 21st. Throughout India there are continuous festivities.
In Lucknow though, a sense of mourning is tangible. The streets are silent, the marketplaces deserted and most of the shops shut. The king has been gone for eight days and no one feels like celebrating. People stay indoors lamenting, remembering happier times, neighbours visit each other to exchange scarce and uncertain news, but above all, everyone is concerned about the future that seems overshadowed by danger and threats.
In the palaces the atmosphere is gloomy, life seems to have come to a standstill, and the women drift about aimlessly. Without the kingâs visits to look forward to, they while away the time, having their hair done and being massaged with perfumed oils for hours on end. But now, these previously joyful rituals have a bitter taste: whom are they making themselves beautiful for? The very idea seems absurd, even shameful. These women existed for âthe beloved,â for a glance, a word, a smile from him . . . From now on, for whom and for what exactly are they living?
Hazrat Mahal no longer leaves her apartments. She could never abide all the gossip and backbiting anyway, let alone the whining. And while her sworn enemy, the first wife, has gone, she has also lost her protector, the Queen Mother. She now realises how much the latter had done to smooth her way. The cutting remarks and treacherous innuendos she suffered after the kingâs departureââYou poor darling, he did not want to take you . . . How strange, we all thought you were so close to him . . . !ââwere more surprising than painful. She did not know how jealous the others were of her.
Nevertheless, thinking about it, she has to acknowledge that the women in the zenana react very much like her young companions from the time she was a part of Amman and Imamanâs household, and that possibly it is her attitude that provokes them. She is never unpleasant, but she does nothing to nurture the easy relationships that make life in such a confined atmosphere more bearable. She prefers to spend her time alone, reading or composing poems, rather than participating in games and chatter she considers childish. Even if she is always polite and even-tempered, her indifference incites bitterness and resentment. Anyway, she has long abandoned the adolescent illusion of wanting to be loved by everyone. After all, what is the point of being appreciated by people one has not much regard for? Obviously, living this way implies a certain isolation, but apart from the few months of happiness spent with her husband, the king, until he moved on to others, solitude has been her most precious companion for a long time now.
Her son? Birjis Qadar, the apple of her eyeâfor whom she would give her life a thousand times overâshe almost never sees him since he had been entrusted to the tutors.
Lost in her thoughts, Hazrat Mahal has not heard Mammoo enter.
âHuzoor?â The eunuch coughs discreetly. âHuzoor?â
Smiling, she watches him approach. After eleven years in her service, he has not changed much, apart from a slight plumpness and prematurely whitened hair that he dyes with henna, leaving a carrot-like tinge of questionable taste, whichâgiven his oversensitivityâshe refrains from commenting on.
âHuzoor, I have just returned from the great mosque. Something terrible has happened! Can you imagine, after the morning prayer, His Majestyâs brother, Prince Mustafa Ali Khan, gave a speech inciting the faithful to disobey the foreigners. The people applauded him, but guards waiting at the exit forcibly led him away to the chief commissionerâs 38 headquarters. The crowd tried to intervene, but the guards had their rifles trained on them, so the people could do nothing but shout insults against the Angrez.â
âMay Allah protect the poor prince! He
In Lucknow though, a sense of mourning is tangible. The streets are silent, the marketplaces deserted and most of the shops shut. The king has been gone for eight days and no one feels like celebrating. People stay indoors lamenting, remembering happier times, neighbours visit each other to exchange scarce and uncertain news, but above all, everyone is concerned about the future that seems overshadowed by danger and threats.
In the palaces the atmosphere is gloomy, life seems to have come to a standstill, and the women drift about aimlessly. Without the kingâs visits to look forward to, they while away the time, having their hair done and being massaged with perfumed oils for hours on end. But now, these previously joyful rituals have a bitter taste: whom are they making themselves beautiful for? The very idea seems absurd, even shameful. These women existed for âthe beloved,â for a glance, a word, a smile from him . . . From now on, for whom and for what exactly are they living?
Hazrat Mahal no longer leaves her apartments. She could never abide all the gossip and backbiting anyway, let alone the whining. And while her sworn enemy, the first wife, has gone, she has also lost her protector, the Queen Mother. She now realises how much the latter had done to smooth her way. The cutting remarks and treacherous innuendos she suffered after the kingâs departureââYou poor darling, he did not want to take you . . . How strange, we all thought you were so close to him . . . !ââwere more surprising than painful. She did not know how jealous the others were of her.
Nevertheless, thinking about it, she has to acknowledge that the women in the zenana react very much like her young companions from the time she was a part of Amman and Imamanâs household, and that possibly it is her attitude that provokes them. She is never unpleasant, but she does nothing to nurture the easy relationships that make life in such a confined atmosphere more bearable. She prefers to spend her time alone, reading or composing poems, rather than participating in games and chatter she considers childish. Even if she is always polite and even-tempered, her indifference incites bitterness and resentment. Anyway, she has long abandoned the adolescent illusion of wanting to be loved by everyone. After all, what is the point of being appreciated by people one has not much regard for? Obviously, living this way implies a certain isolation, but apart from the few months of happiness spent with her husband, the king, until he moved on to others, solitude has been her most precious companion for a long time now.
Her son? Birjis Qadar, the apple of her eyeâfor whom she would give her life a thousand times overâshe almost never sees him since he had been entrusted to the tutors.
Lost in her thoughts, Hazrat Mahal has not heard Mammoo enter.
âHuzoor?â The eunuch coughs discreetly. âHuzoor?â
Smiling, she watches him approach. After eleven years in her service, he has not changed much, apart from a slight plumpness and prematurely whitened hair that he dyes with henna, leaving a carrot-like tinge of questionable taste, whichâgiven his oversensitivityâshe refrains from commenting on.
âHuzoor, I have just returned from the great mosque. Something terrible has happened! Can you imagine, after the morning prayer, His Majestyâs brother, Prince Mustafa Ali Khan, gave a speech inciting the faithful to disobey the foreigners. The people applauded him, but guards waiting at the exit forcibly led him away to the chief commissionerâs 38 headquarters. The crowd tried to intervene, but the guards had their rifles trained on them, so the people could do nothing but shout insults against the Angrez.â
âMay Allah protect the poor prince! He
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