The Moghul

expensive to obtain, it cost only a few rupees, but because it funneled every ounce of commodity traded in the Arabian Sea through a Portuguese tax port.
    And it is the Portuguese taxes, Mirza Nuruddin told himself, not just their galleons, that the English will one day drive from our ports. And on that day, our merchant ships will again lade the best cargo, sail the richest routes, return with the boldest profits.
    "There seems nothing further then, Mr. Elkington, I can do for you." The Shahbandar smiled and bowed his small, ceremonial salaam. "Save wish you a fair wind and Allah's blessing."
    So it's over, Hawksworth thought as they turned to leave, the last time I'll ever see you, and thank you very much, you unscrupulous deceiving son of a whore.
    "Captain Hawksworth, perhaps you and I can share a further word. You are not, as I understand, planning to depart India. At least not immediately. I'd like you always to know my modest offices remain at your behest."
    Elkington paused, as did Hawksworth, but one of the Shahbandar's officials took the merchant's arm and urged him firmly toward the door of the chamber. Too firmly, Hawksworth thought.
    "I think you've done about all for us you can." Hawksworth made no attempt to strain the irony from his voice.
    "Be that as it may, I've heard rumors that your trip to Agra may be approved. Should that happen, you must know you cannot travel alone, Captain. No man in India is that foolhardy. The roads here are no more safe than those, so I hear, in Europe. All travelers inland need a guide, and an armed escort."
    "Are you proposing to help me secure a guide? Equal in competence, may I presume, to the pilot you hired for the Resolve ?"
    "Captain Hawksworth, please. God's will is mysterious." He sighed. "No man can thwart mischance if it is his destiny. Hear me out. I have just learned there's currently a man in Surat who knows the road to Burhanpur like his own sword handle. In fact, he only just arrived from the east, and I understand he expects to return when his affairs here, apparently brief, are resolved. By a fortuitous coincidence he happens to have an armed escort of guards with him. I suggest it might be wise to attempt to engage him while you still have a chance."
    "And who is this man?"
    "A Rajput captain with the army. A soldier of no small reputation, I can assure you. His name is Vasant Rao."

    *
    Mukarrab Khan reread the order carefully, scrutinized the black ink seal at the top of the page to assure himself it was indeed the Moghul’s, and then placed it aside. So at last it had come. The prospect of English presents was too great a temptation for the acquisitive Arangbar, ever anxious for new baubles. The Englishman would be going to Agra. No one at court could have prevented it.
    But that road—east through bandit-infested Chopda to now-threatened Burhanpur, then north, the long road through Mandu, Ujjain, and Gwalior to Agra—was a journey of two hard months. The Moghul’s seal meant less than nothing to highwaymen, or to servants and drivers whose loyalties were always for sale. It's a long road, Englishman, and mishaps on that road are common as summer mildew.
    He smiled to himself and took up the other silver-trimmed bamboo tube. It had arrived by the same runner. The date on the outside was one week old.
    It always amazed Mukarrab Khan that India's runners, the Mewras, were actually swifter than post horses. This message had traveled the three hundred kos south from Agra to Burhanpur and then the remaining hundred and fifty kos west to Surat—a combined distance of almost seven hundred English miles—in only seven days.
    Runners were stationed at posts spaced five kos apart along the great road that Akman had built to link Agra to the seaport of Surat. They wore an identifying plume at their head and two bells at their belt, and they gained energy by eating postibangh , a mixture of opium and hemp extract. Akman even conceived of lining the sides of the road with white stones so his Mewras could run in darkest midnight without lanterns. There were now some four thousand runners stationed along India's five main arteries.
    The only things swifter, Mukarrab Khan had often told himself, are lightning . . . and a blue, white-throated Rath pigeon. A distance requiring a full day for a runner could be covered by a pigeon in one pahar , three hours, given good weather. Arangbar kept pigeons all over India, even in Surat—but then so did everyone else at