The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [287]
‘There is one,’ said Ash quietly.
Anjuli's face crumpled like a hurt child's, and she turned sharply away from him and said in a suffocated whisper: ‘I know… But that cannot be, and therefore… you will tell any who ask that I will not go back to Karidkote and that no one can make me do so. And that if I cannot stay in Bhithor as my sister's co-wife, I will stay as her servant. That is all I have to say. Except… except to thank you for warning me, and for all…’
Her voice failed, and she moved her head in a small, helpless gesture that was more pitiful than words, and with shaking hands began to draw the bourka back into place.
For a moment – for just as long as a tear might take to gather and fall – Ash hesitated. Then he reached out and grasped her shoulders, and snatching away the bourka, pulled her round to face him. The sight of her wet cheeks sent a physical pain through his heart and made him speak with more violence than he had intended:
‘Don't be a fool, Juli! Do you imagine for a moment that he will not bed you if you stay here as Shu-shu's servant instead of his wife? Of course he will. Once you are under his roof you will be just as much his property as if he had married you, but without the status of a Rani – or any status at all. He will be able to do exactly as he likes with you, and from what I have seen of him it will probably appeal to his vanity to use the daughter of a Maharajah as a concubine, having rejected her as a wife. Can't you see that your position would be intolerable?’
‘It has often been that,’ returned Anjuli with more composure. ‘Yet I have borne with it. And I can do so again. But Shu-shu –’
‘Oh, damn Shu-shu!’ interrupted Ash explosively. His grip tightened and he shook her so savagely that her teeth chattered. ‘It's no use, Juli. I won't let you. I thought I could, but I hadn't seen him then. You don't know what he's like. He's old – old. Oh, not in years, perhaps, but in every other way: in body and face, and in evil. He's rotted with vice. You cannot mate with a creature like that – a hideous, heartless, hairless ape who has shown himself to be without honour or scruples. Do you want to breed monsters? because that is what you'll do: misshapen monsters – and bastards at that. You cannot risk it.’
A spasm of pain contorted Anjuli's wet, tear-streaked face, but her voice was soft and steady and inflexible. ‘I must. You know why. Even if you should be right about his vanity, it will surely satisfy him to be able to treat me as a servant without troubling himself to use me as he would a concubine, and my life will not be too unhappy. I shall at least be of help to my sister, whereas back in Karidkote there would be nothing for me: only disgrace and sorrow, for Nandu would vent his anger on me even more than he will on all those who will be returning there.’
‘You speak as though you had no other choice,’ said Ash. ‘But that is not so, and you know it. Oh, my love – my Heart's-delight' – his voice broke - ‘come away with me. We could be so happy, and there is nothing for you here. Nothing but servitude and humiliation and – no, don't say it, I know that Shushila will be here – but I've told you before that you are wrong about her, that she's a spoilt child who has learned that tears and hysteria will get her almost everything she wants, and so she uses them as weapons, selfishly and ruthlessly to gain her own ends. And she won't even need you after a time, or even miss you – not when she is Rani of Bhithor with a host of women at her beck and call, or when she has children of her own