“Imagine if it’s a girl,” I said.
“Shhh,” Jhalkari cautioned severely. “No one should say that. It has to be a son.”
Later that evening, the rani finally summoned me to her chamber. I hoped I might run into Arjun there, but two men I’d never seen were guarding the doors.
The sun had dipped below the horizon, and the chamber walls were burnished orange. I expected to see the rani tucked into her bed, buried in half a dozen covers this late in December. But instead, she was pacing near open windows, her long blue robe flowing behind her like a stream and opened to reveal her very round stomach. She had grown prettier in the time I was gone, softened by the extra weight of her child.
“Sita,” she said as soon as she saw me, and from the way she spoke my name, I knew she regretted sending me from Jhansi. “Oh, Sita.” She closed her robe and walked toward me.
I made the gesture of namaste and touched her feet. “It is an honor to return to your service, Your Highness.”
There were tears in her eyes. I had not expected to see the rani in tears, and certainly not over me. She took my hands in hers and then guided me to her bed. She drew the covers over her chest and indicated the padded stool so that I could sit near her. “Tell me about your father and grandmother and little sister.”
“Father, Grandmother, and Anuja are all very well, Your Highness.”
Her face brightened. “Your sister must be preparing for her marriage.”
“Yes. Because Your Highness was gracious enough to accept me as a Durgavasi, I’ll be able to provide her with a dowry fortune. Father made a very suitable match while I was home, and the engagement ceremony will take place next month.”
“I should never have sent you and the other women away. My physician was either incompetent or deluded. I suppose you heard there were never any messengers from Delhi?”
“Yes. Jhalkari told me what you discovered.”
“Well, my doctor has been dismissed,” she said, “and Dr. Bhagwat has taken his place. Kahini arranged it all. She interviewed new physicians—”
“And Your Highness thinks this is a wise decision?” I blurted.
The rani’s expression changed. She looked disappointed with me. “Sita, Kahini grew up at court. Our childhoods were very similar. And no one”—she emphasized the words no one—“is better suited to understanding what a rani requires in a physician than she is.”
I lowered my head in shame.
We sat in silence. Then the rani took a stack of letters from her bedside table. “Deliver these to Gopal,” she said. “Make sure to convey them as soon as you leave this chamber.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“And Sita, be careful of assuming too much.”
I was dismissed. Outside the rani’s chamber, Arjun had replaced one of the guards. As soon as he saw me, he grinned.
“I heard you were back.” He searched my face, and I knew I should say something about his book.
“It was a long time to be gone,” I admitted, “but Rumi was a great help in passing the time.”
“Then you read his poetry?”
“Yes.”
“And what did you like best?”
I knew he would ask this of me, so I had already thought of my answer. “The last page. Someone wrote their favorite expressions in the back. Was it you?”
“No. I bought it that way.”
One of the expressions written suddenly came to me, and now I quoted it for him. “ ‘Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.’ ” I should never have been so forward with the rani. Now, perhaps she would never forgive me.
Arjun blinked slowly. “That’s one of my favorite lines, too.”
As we were speaking, I had moved closer to him. So close, in fact, that I could reach out and touch his smooth face. Immediately, I stepped back. “Can you direct me to Gopal-ji’s chamber? I’m to deliver these to him.” I held up the letters the rani had given me. “She wants me to do it at once.”
“Up the stairs, at the farthest end of the hall.”
As I left, Arjun called, “Can you be in the courtyard tonight? I have something I want to give you.”
I hesitated. “I can’t continue accepting gifts. How will it look—”
“These aren’t gifts.” Arjun laughed. “I expect to be repaid.”
I’m sure my mouth was hanging open.
“I introduced you to Rumi. Now it’s your turn to introduce me to a great writer,” he said.
I flushed, since that wasn’t what I’d assumed he meant. “But you don’t read English—”
“How do you know?”
“Well, do you?”
“Enough to read a little poetry.”
I was stunned. “Why didn’t you say so?”
“You never asked.”