The Moghul

ghats behind him still seared in his lungs. Only when he reached the top of the steps could he force himself to look back. Scavenger birds wheeled in the sky above and small barks with single oarsmen plied the muddy face of the Jamuna. Along the banks were toiling washermen, Untouchables, who wore nothing save a brown loincloth and a kerchief over their heads. They stood in a long row, knee-deep at the water's edge, mechanically slapping folded lengths of cloth against stacks of flat stones. They seemed unconcerned by the nearness of the funeral ghats, stone platforms at the river's edge that were built out above the steps leading down into the water. As he silently surveyed the crowd around him, from somewhere on the street above a voice chanted a funeral litany: Ram Nam Sach Hai, the Name of Ram Is Truth Itself.
    It had taken four days for Kamala to die. The morning after she had danced, she had begun to show unmistakable symptoms of the plague. She had called for Brahmin priests and, seating herself on a wooden plank in their presence, had removed her todus , the ear pendants that were the mark of her devadasi caste, and placed them together with twelve gold coins on the plank before her. It was her deconsecration. Then with a look of infinite peace, she had announced she was ready to die.
    Next she informed the priests that since she had no sons in Agra, no family at all, she wanted Brian Hawksworth to officiate at her funeral. He had not understood what she wanted until the servants whispered it to him. The Brahmins had been scandalized and at first had refused to agree, insisting he had no caste and consequently was a despicable Untouchable. Finally, after more payments, they had reluctantly consented. Then she had turned to him and explained what she had done.
    When he tried to argue, she had appealed to him in the name of Shiva.
    "I only ask you do this one last thing for me," she had said, going on to insist his responsibilities would not be difficult. "There are Hindu servants in the palace. Though they are low caste, they know enough Turki to guide you."
    After the Brahmins had departed, she called the servants and, as Hawksworth watched, ordered them to remove all her jewels from the rosewood box where she kept them. Then she asked him to accompany them as they took the jewels through the Hindu section of Agra, to a temple of the goddess Mari, who presides over epidemics. They were to donate all her jewels to the goddess. Smiling at Hawksworth's astonishment, she had explained that Hindus believe a person's reincarnation is directly influenced by the amount of alms given in his or her previous life. This last act of charity might even bring her back as a Brahmin.
    Two days later she lapsed into a delirium of fever. As death drew near, the Hindu servants again summoned the priests to visit the palace. The plague was spreading now, and with it fear, and at first none had been willing to comply. Only after it was agreed that they would be paid three times the usual price for the ceremonies did the Brahmins come. They had laid Kamala's body on a bed of kusa grass in the open air, sprinkled her head with water brought from the sacred Ganges River, and smeared her brow with Ganges clay. She had seemed only vaguely conscious of what they were doing.
    When at last she died, her body was immediately washed, perfumed, and bedecked with flowers. Then she was wrapped in linen, lifted onto a bamboo bier, and carried toward the river ghats by the Hindu servants, winding through the streets with her body held above their heads, intoning a funeral dirge. Hawksworth had led the procession, carrying a firepot with sacred fire provided by Nadir Sharifs Hindu servants.
    The riverside was already crowded with mourners, for there had been many deaths, and the air was acrid from the smoke of cremation pyres. On the steps above the ghats was a row of thatch umbrellas, and sitting on a reed mat beneath each was a Brahmin priest. All were shirtless, potbellied, and wore three stripes of white clay down their forehead in honor of Vishnu's trident. The servants approached one of the priests and began to bargain with him. After a time the man rose and signified agreement. The servants whispered to Hawksworth that he was there to provide funeral rites for hire, adding with some satisfaction that Brahmins who served at the ghats were despised as mercenaries by the rest of their caste.
    After the bargain had been struck, the priest