The Moghul

through the world, outside its great cycles of time."
    Hawksworth picked up his wineglass and drew on it. "To tell the truth, I find your Hindu symbols a trifle abstract."
    "But they're not, really. They merely embody truths already within us. Like the life force. We do not have to think about it. It's simply there. And we can reach out and experience this force when woman and man join together in union. That is our lila , our play. That's why we worship Lord Shiva with dance, and with kama ."
    As Hawksworth watched, sipping his wine and scarcely understanding her words, he realized he had begun to desire this bizarre woman intensely.
    "You haven't told me what kama is."
    "That's because I'm not sure you can understand." She scrutinized him professionally. "How old are you?"
    "I'm closer to forty than thirty."
    "Time, I think, has treated you harshly. Or is it the spirits you drink?"
    "What's wrong with a bit of grog now and then?"
    "I think you should not drink so much. I drink nothing. Look at me." She pushed back the hair from both sides of her forehead. Her face was flawless. "You know most Muslims despise their women after thirty, usually before, but many young officers still ask to visit me. Can you guess how old I am?"
    "A woman only asks that if she thinks she looks younger than she is."
    "I'm over fifty." She examined him directly, invitingly. "How much over you must only speculate."
    "I don't want to. I'm still trying to figure out what exactly happened tonight." He studied her. "But whatever it was, I'm not sure I care anymore."
    Hawksworth shoved aside his plates of lamb and rice pilaf and watched as the servants began hastily clearing the carpet.
    In the quiet that followed he reached behind him to his chest, opened the latch, and took out his lute. Kamala watched with curiosity.
    "What instrument is that?"
    "Someone in Surat once called it an English sitar."
    Kamala laughed. "It's far too plain for that. But it does have a simple beauty. Will you play it for me?"
    "For you, and for me." Hawksworth strummed a chord. The white plaster walls echoed back the wave of notes, a choir of thin voices. "It brings back my sea legs when I'm ashore."
    "Now I do not understand you. But I will listen."
    He began a short, plaintive galliard. Suddenly his heart was in London, with honest English faces, clear English air. And he felt an overwhelming ache of separation. He played through to the end, then wistfully laid the lute aside. After a moment Kamala reached for his wineglass and held it for him, waiting.
    "The music of your English sitar is simple, young Ambassador. Like the instrument itself. But I think it moves you. Perhaps I felt something of your loneliness in the notes." She paused and studied him quietly. "But you yourself are not simple. Nothing about you comes easily. I sense you are filled with something you cannot express." She looked at him a moment longer, and then her voice came again, soft as the wine. "Why did you say what you did to Arangbar tonight? I was nothing to you. You violated my dharma . Perhaps it is true, as many tell me, that I have mastered the arts of kama more fully than any woman in Agra, but still there is less and less pleasure in my life. What will you do now? Perhaps you think I belong to you, like some courtesan you have bought. But you are wrong. I belong to no man."
    "You're here because someone wanted you here." Hawksworth glanced around them. The room was empty now save for Kamala's two musicians. "I don't know why, but I do know you're the first person I've met in a long time who was not afraid of Arangbar. The last one was a woman in Surat." Hawksworth paused suddenly. "I'm starting to wonder if you know her."
    "I don't know anyone in Surat." She swept him with her eyes. "But what does some woman in Surat have to do with me?'
    "Perhaps someone thought I should meet you."
    "Who? Someone in Surat? But why?"
    "Perhaps she thought I needed . . . I don't know exactly."
    "Then tell me what you mean by 'need'? That's an odd phrase, a feringhi expression. Perhaps you mean our meeting is part of your dharma ?”
    "You mean like it's a Rajput's dharma to be a warrior and kill?"
    " Dharma can be many things. It's what each of us must do, our purpose."
    "That's something I've heard before."
    "But do you know what your dharma is?"
    "I'm still trying to find it. Maybe it's to be here . . ."
    "And then what?"
    "I'm . . . I guess I'm still working out the rest."
    "Well, for Hindus