Chapter 2
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Two
Less than half an hour later, the private carriage jerked to a halt at another station. The platform was remarkably busy.
Padma handed the last of her correspondence to Mr. Mahjoud as she rose and headed for the door. One of the purple-and-gold-liveried servants opened it for her from the outside.
Constance snatched up her fashionable blue hat, throwing it on over the elegantly pinned waves of her ebony hair. She hurried after her grandmother, eager to set her kid boots down on yet another part of India.
Ellie put on her straw boater, then hesitated by the stairs, glancing at Adam and the lanky gold dog panting by his feet. “Might it not be a good idea to put Kalb on a lead?” she tactfully suggested, her mind filled with visions of the animal attempting to chase down another train.
“Naw,” Adam returned easily. “I’ve been training him.”
He gave the dog’s head a vigorous rub. Kalb absorbed the gesture with obvious relish.
“If you’re sure…” Ellie trailed off with a skeptical look at the animal.
“He’ll be fine,” Adam assured her.
Kalb skipped the stairs entirely in favor of leaping from the carriage to the platform, where he shook himself with alacrity.
Warm, humid summer embraced Ellie as she stepped outside.
The scent of well-spiced food cooking somewhere nearby mingled with the honeyed sweetness of the flowering bushes that lined the tracks.
The air buzzed thickly with the sound of myriad distant voices, punctuated by the pulse of dull drumbeats.
Kalb stiffened at the sight of a lizard perched on the platform wall, sunning itself with a lazy blink of its yellow eyes.
“Drat,” Ellie burst out—and the dog bolted after the reptile, which moved from napping to a frantic scurry with remarkable aplomb.
“He’s just stretching his legs.” Adam set a hand to her waist, steering her over to join Constance, Neil, and Padma.
A gentleman strode forward to greet them with bright, quick energy.
He was followed by a quartet of men dressed in the same purple and gold tunics that distinguished the servants in their private carriage.
As he reached them, the stranger pushed back the brim of his white hat to reveal the features of a man of roughly forty with burnished amber skin and an elegantly shaped mustache that accented his gleaming white smile.
His eyes were a lighter brown that danced with sparks of gold, and he was dressed in an exquisitely tailored suit of white linen with a dashing purple cravat.
The gentleman’s English was Eton polished with just a touch of Indian warmth. “There you are! And not a moment too soon. Who knows how long I could have hung about while remaining incognito?”
A tall, lean man with a hawkish nose followed him at a more sedate pace, dressed in sober charcoal. “You cannot be incognito if you are dragging a liveried retinue about with you,” he pointed out dryly.
“They aren’t all in uniform.” The dashing gentleman jabbed a finger across the platform at a young man who leaned against the wall in a white shirt and wrapped Indian trousers known as dhotis. “Just look at Dharmendra.”
“I suppose everyone will be,” his companion sighed with a note of affectionate exasperation, “now you’ve been so kind as to point him out.”
Padma pressed her hands together and gave the purple-scarfed gentleman a graceful bow. “Good morning, nephew.”
With a jolt of surprise, Ellie realized it was the first time she had seen Constance’s grandmother make a gesture indicating that she was in the presence of someone who outranked her.
Which meant that the grinning gentleman in the dashing white suit was the Maharaja of Nandapur.
“Uncle Vijay?!” Constance burst out.
“And you must be Constance!” the maharaja exclaimed with obvious delight. “The last time I saw you, you were in nappies—and just look at you now, you splendid thing! Come here!”
He pulled her into a hug, which Constance enthusiastically returned, bouncing on her heels with excitement.
“But why are you here? Why are we here? What’s going on in Puri? And why are you incognito?” Constance demanded in quick, happy succession.
Padma turned to Vijay’s more sober companion. “Nawaz Chowdhury. I suppose I should not be surprised to find you here.”
“An honor to see you again, Maharajkumari.” Mr. Chowdhury bowed. “Felicitations on your return to India.”
His accent was flawlessly English without even a hint of the foreign warmth that distinguished the words of the maharaja. Listening to it, Ellie might have thought she was on Bond Street.
“Mr. Chowdhury is your uncle’s solicitor and close adviser,” Padma explained to Constance—with an odd glint in her eyes.
“And very dear friend.” Vijay emphasized the remark with an affectionate clasp of the stern lawyer’s shoulder. “Nawaz has been at my side since our days at Oxford together.”
“Is that your dog?” Mr. Chowdhury placidly inquired.
Ellie suppressed a wince.
Kalb was sprinting back and forth along the wall after the remarkably agile lizard, which turned on the dog with a hiss.
The lanky canine skidded to a halt, pulling his tail between his legs with a whine of alarm.
“Over here, buddy!” Adam called easily.
Kalb sprinted across the platform and barreled into the group, nearly taking Ellie out by the knees.
She glared at the dog. He returned the look with a wide brown gaze of unmitigated adoration, tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth.
“Let me fill you in while we walk,” Vijay ordered.
The maharaja led them through the small station building, his distinctly attired servants opening doors and clearing their way. As they stepped into the street, the noise Ellie had been hearing since leaving the train rose into the distinct clamor of a crowd.
Ladies in bright-hued saris hurried past the storefronts, chattering excitedly.
Children in loose gowns and sandals raced after a bare-chested ascetic.
Young men laughed together with flower garlands draped around their necks, faces painted with ritual marks in saffron or vermilion.
Most of them moved in the same direction, toward the source of the now-clear drumbeats.
Vijay pointed to Ellie as they plunged into the thick of it, heading up the road. “You must be Miss Mallory, archivist and historian.” His attention shifted to Neil. “And this would be Dr. Neil Fairfax—though you’re younger than I expected.”
Neil gave a tired sigh. “I’m not, actually. It’s just…” He waved a helpless hand at his admittedly boyish features. “I did try to grow a mustache.”
“It was terrible,” Constance helpfully added.
Vijay’s attention shifted to Adam, who was reluctantly shrugging into his coat. Kalb loped innocently at his heels as though he hadn’t just been trying to devour an unsuspecting reptile. “And you must be the surveyor.”
“Adam Bates. Your… Highness?” Adam finished uncertainly with a polite tip of his battered flat-brim fedora.
Mr. Chowdhury arched a fine black brow. Mr. Mahjoud, following Padma in his excellently tailored suit, made a sigh of long-suffering disappointment.
“That’ll do,” Vijay returned with an amused twinkle in his eye.
They rounded another corner, the crowd growing thicker. Vijay’s servants plowed through it with practiced ease.
“I believe Auntie Padma told you that we’ve been chasing rumors of the reemergence of a lost astra,” Vijay prompted.
“She has.” Ellie hurried along behind him, the racket of music and voices from ahead of them growing louder.
“We’ve been reading up on it. I’m currently on the third volume of Mr. Nutt’s English translation of the Ramayana, though I must say the text raises as many questions about the artifact as it answers. ”
“All of which I will be happy to address once we’ve sorted out a slightly more immediate difficulty,” Vijay assured her.
“Which is?” Neil prompted, nervously adjusting his spectacles.
The maharaja and his solicitor exchanged a significant look.
“There are certain persons of interest here in India that Nawaz and I keep tabs on as a matter of course.” Vijay’s tone was careful.
“Persons of interest?” Adam echoed significantly.
Mr. Chowdhury answered him. “One does not survive as an autonomous state in a land ruled by a British imperial viceroy without constant vigilance.”
He punctuated the remark with a pointed look at Vijay.
For the last century, the Indian subcontinent had been dominated by the British—first under the East India Company, and then under the Raj, a form of direct rule by the government of the United Kingdom where a viceroy served as the queen’s royal representative.
Within the Raj’s vast territory lay several hundred smaller kingdoms. Known as “princely states,” they possessed varying degrees of independence from the crown.
Nandapur was one such kingdom, technically owing fealty to the viceroy and the empire he represented while retaining some level of control over its own lands.
Ellie could imagine that such a position came with complications.
Vijay sobered. “One of the more troubling individuals that Nawaz and I have been monitoring is Colonel Charles Borthwick, the General Superintendent of the Thuggee and Dacoity Department.”
“Thuggee and Dacoity Department?” Constance pressed, hurrying along at her royal relative’s side.
“A prettier way of referring to the Raj’s secret police,” Padma explained flatly.
“What kind of secret police are we talking about?” Adam demanded.
“Legally, Borthwick can detain any Indian he chooses for questioning indefinitely,” Mr. Chowdhury elaborated. “Along with their families.”
Outrage snapped through Ellie. “Their families? Indefinitely? How is that legal?”
“Because it ensures the security of the empire, of course.” The solicitor’s words were edged with irony.
“Nor are Borthwick’s methods of interrogation known for being over-gentle,” Vijay added in what Ellie could already tell was an uncharacteristically grim tone.