Page 39 of The Henna Artist

She turned to Malik. “Young man, what’s your favorite sweet?”

The bird mimicked, “What’s your favorite sweet?”

Malik scrunched up his face and looked again at the ceiling.“Rabri,”he said.

“Marvelous! We must tell Chef,” the maharani said, “to make yourabriat once.”

My face grew warm and I lurched forward to the sofa’s edge. “Your Highness. We’ve come to do your bidding, not for you to do ours.” Makingrabriwas tedious and time-consuming, requiring constant attention while the milk cooked and the water evaporated over a low flame for two hours, leaving only the cream. It was impertinent to ask the palace for it!

The maharani opened her eyes wider. “But it would give Madho Singh the greatest pleasure. Would it not?”

The bird blinked. “I love sweets.”

Malik darted his eyes at me, the slightest smile on his lips, as if asking what game we were playing, and if he might be allowed to join.

I protested. “Your Highness,rabritakes so long to make—”

“Precisely.” She turned to the door and another attendant came forward. She instructed him to take Malik to the kitchen and not to return until the boy had had his fill ofrabri. “Make sure Chef doesn’t send the boy off to one of the other kitchens. And take Madho Singh with you.” To me, she said, “He loves sweets.”

Malik’s eyes were huge as he turned to look at me. I lifted one shoulder slightly. Who was I to argue with a maharani? As if he had understood the maharani perfectly, the parakeet flew off of the divan and settled on the white-coated shoulder of the attendant.

“I love sweets,” Madho Singh repeated as Malik followed bird and attendant out the door.

I turned back to the elder queen, who was trying, and failing, to suppress a laugh. “Chef is odious,” she said. “He never flavors food the way I like. He was my late husband’s favorite and now resents the fact that he must serveme. It will annoy him to slave over a hot stove to feed yet another mouth.”

My shoulders relaxed. Like my ladies, the maharanis had devised their own rules of gamesmanship.

The maharani turned over a six of diamonds and placed it on a seven of clubs. “So...you know Parvati Singh. Her father and my mother were cousins.” She looked at me with a becoming smile. “It’s her husband I find irresistible. Perhaps because Samir sends the most fitting presents. Did you know?”

Puzzled, I replied, “No, Your Highness.”

“You should,” she said, her expression cagey. “I believe you’re his supplier.”

The sachets?Impossible!

“My hair has never been thicker.” She shook her head; her hair flowed gracefully from side to side. Samir bought a case of mybawchihair oil every month, but I’d assumed it was for his mistresses.

I smiled. “It’s beautiful, Your Highness.”

“So when Samir says you work miracles, I believe him.” She threw a shrewd glance in my direction. “Doyoubelieve you perform miracles?”

“I have that reputation.”

“Let me see your head.”

I hesitated, surprised by her request. But when she gestured with a finger for me to remove thepallu, I uncovered my head. Her dark eyes took in my hair (freshly washed and oiled), the sprig of jasmine at the top of my bun, my naked earlobes. She twirled her finger and I turned my head around so she could see the back of it. When I faced her again, she nodded, once.

“I like a well-shaped head,” she said.

A bearer entered with a silver tea service. The porcelain was decorated in a pattern similar to Parvati’s. On a plate rimmed in gold were paper-thin tea biscuits, their centers embedded with slivers of pistachios and spikes of lavender. The bearer poured the tea. With a tap of her manicured fingernail, the maharani indicated that her tea should be placed next to her cards. She did not, however, pick up her cup.

“My late husband was very fond of tea. I knew him to take five, six cups a day with heaps of sugar. All that sugar should have made him a sweet man.” She paused. “It didn’t.”

Her Highness’s bluntness was unexpected, but curiously, I found it agreeable. Perhaps all royals were eccentric, I reasoned, and, for once, allowed my back to rest against the sofa cushion. I took a leisurely sip of tea, which was creamy, sweet and scented with cardamom and cinnamon.

“He was selfish to the end,” Her Highness continued. “To his concubines he gave sixty-five children because, well, who cares about the illegitimate? To his five wives, myself included, he took great care to give none. Do you know why?” She was holding a card between her forefinger and middle finger in midair the way a man held a cigarette, waiting for a response.

I inclined my head politely.

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