The Moghul

after twenty.
    One by one the server ceremoniously removed the silver lids from the bowls. Beneath them the contents of the dishes had been arrayed in the colors of a rainbow. On beds of rice that ranged from white to saffron to green, and even purple, was an overwhelming array of meats, fish, and birds of all sizes. There were carved baked fruits; tiny balls of meat flaked with spice and coconut; fried vegetables surrounded by silver cups of a pastel green sauce; large flat fish encased in dark baking shells flecked with red and green spices; and a virtual aviary of wild fowl, from small game birds to plump pea hens.
    The server dished hearty helpings from each bowl onto separate porcelain plates, together with mounds of almond rice and jellied fruits. As he started to pass the first plate to Hawksworth, Mukarrab Khan roughly arrested his hand. "This ill-bred kitchen wallah will serve in the stables after tonight." He seized the serving spoons and, with a flourish of traditional Moghul etiquette, personally laded extra portions from each of the dishes onto Hawksworth's plates. The server beamed a knowing smile.
    Hawksworth stared at the food for a moment, dazzled, and then he gingerly sampled a meatball. The taste was delicious, yet hardy, and he caught the musky flavor of lamb, lightened and transmuted by a bouquet of spice. He next pulled away the side of a fish and wolfed it, before realizing the red and green flecks on its surface were some incendiary garnish. He surveyed the room in agony, praying for a mug of ale, till an alert eunuch signaled a servant to pass a dish of yogurt. To his amazement, the tangy, ice cold liquid seemed to instantly dissolve the fire on his tongue.
    He plunged back into the dishes. He had never eaten like this before, even in England. He suddenly recalled with a smile an episode six months into the voyage. After Zanzibar, when he had become so weary of stale salt pork and biscuit he thought he could not bear to see it again, he had locked the door of the Great Cabin and composed a full English banquet in his mind—roast capon, next a pigeon pie larded in bacon fat, then a dripping red side of roast mutton, followed by oysters on the shell spiced with grilled eel, and finally a thick goose pudding on honeyed ham. And to wash it down, a bottle of sack to begin and a sweet muscadel, mulled even sweeter with sugar, to end. But this! No luscious pork fat, and not nearly cloying enough for a true Englishman. Yet it worked poetry. Symmes was right. This was heaven.
    With both hands he ripped the leg off a huge bird that had been basted to a glistening red and, to the visible horror of the server, dipped it directly into one of the silver bowls of saffron sauce meant for pigeon eggs. Hawksworth looked up in time to catch the server's look.
    Does he think I don't like the food?
    To demonstrate appreciation, he hoisted a goblet of wine to toast the server, while he stretched for a piece of lamb with his other hand. But instead of acknowledging the compliment, the server went pale.
    "It's customary, Ambassador, to use only one's right hand when eating." Mukarrab Khan forced a polite smile. "The left is normally reserved for . . . attending to other functions."
    Hawksworth then noticed how Mukarrab Khan was dining. He, too, ate with his fingers, just as you would in England, but somehow he managed to lift his food gracefully with balls of rice, the sauce never soiling his fingertips.
    A breeze lightly touched Hawksworth's cheek, and he turned to see a servant standing behind him, banishing the occasional fly with a large whisk fashioned from stiff horsehair attached to a long stick. Another servant stood opposite, politely but unnecessarily cooling him with a large fan made of red leather stretched over a frame.
    "As I said, Ambassador, your requests present a number of difficulties." Mukarrab Khan looked up and took a goblet of fruit nectar from a waiting servant. "You ask certain things from me, things not entirely in my power to grant, while there are others who make entirely different requests."
    "You mean the Portugals."
    "Yes, the Portuguese Viceroy, who maintains you have acted illegally, in violation of his law and ours, and should be brought to account."
    "And I accuse them of acting illegally. As I told you, there's been a Spanish ambassador in London ever since the war ended, and when we return I assure you the East India Company will . . ."
    "This is India, Captain Hawksworth, not