The Taj Conspiracy Read Online Free PDF Page A

him politely.
    ‘It’s mystifying,’ he managed to reply, mystified that he had managed to speak despite feeling tongue-tied.
    ‘What is?’ Noticing his incomprehension, she elaborated, ‘What is mystifying?’
    ‘Oh! The porcelain,’ he shrugged.
    She burst into laughter before regaining her composure, and responding, ‘Yeah?’ Only her teeth biting her lower lip showed that she was laughing at something.
    It was then that Papa decided to brazen it out. ‘Look, why don’t you spill the secret so I can join in the laughter, and then I would like to ask you out for lunch.’
    Maadar swore that line had come out at jet speed, though Papa always maintained that, while internally quavering, he had affected calm. Nevertheless, the result of it was a long lunch, a brief courtship and a quick marriage—the prospect of a Sikh-Muslim wedding equally unappetising to both sets of parents. Massoud Abgashi was Maadar’s cousin, an eccentric genius who, when unhappy with his work, hurled pots of paint at it. These canvases Maadar rescued and displayed in her gallery. They amplified the artist’s ‘abstract’ compositions, thereby enhancing his prestige. Uncle Massoud, whom Mehrunisa had not met for several years, was now in retirement while the value of his work continued to skyrocket.
    Mehrunisa felt like sobbing, as she often did on such reminiscences; told herself No !, and proceeded to shut her eyes tight. With Maadar’s passing, she had decided to come to India to her godfather Professor Kaul, in whose Delhi home she had spent many summer vacations as a child.
    It was Maadar who had divulged how the professor, who was neither family nor colleague, had become a close friend of Papa’s. When Harinder Singh Khosa joined Intelligence, he was sent to Professor Kaul for lessons in Persian culture and language. Later, when he became romantically entangled with Maadar, he sought out Kaul to learn the nuances of Persian culture, and a friendship had developed between the two men. When they married, Kaul was the person Maadar conversed with in Farsi, and when Mehrunisa was born, with both their families still sulking at the undesirable marriage, it was inevitable that he’d be their daughter’s godfather. As Papa became increasingly involved in his work, which kept him away from home for extended periods, Mehrunisa started to spend summers with Professor Kaul where her father could zip in and meet her—it was also where her father knew she could get exposure to Indian culture.
    Since she’d moved to Delhi, Professor Kaul had taken her under his tutelage, and she’d begun work on her project researching Indo-Persian linkages. It was a conscious effort to connect with her roots, the legacy of a Persian mother and a Punjabi father. Of course, she was still figuring her way in the antipodal environment she had moved to. She bemused her countrymen: half Muslim-half Sikh, decidedly Non-Resident-Indian in her bearing. To Mehrunisa, however, these were all irrefutable parts of her self, a self she was attempting to comprehend. Nevertheless, the answers she was looking for continued to be elusive. She was aware of a persistent sense of disquiet and loss.
    Still, her project gave her comfort, as did assisting Kaul uncle with his ongoing work on the Taj Mahal. It hadn’t taken her long to feel at home working on the world-famous monument. The Taj was like her: of mixed parentage—built on Indian soil by a Mughal emperor, its architecture and design reflected its hybrid heritage— Persian, Islamic and Indian; and a monument to loss— built by an emperor in memory of his lost love.
    Yes, the Taj Mahal and she were rather congruent.
    On that comforting thought, she noticed the grey dawn light of winter outside the window. An hour back, she had woken up from some dreadful rehash of the day’s ordeal and sought the reassurance of her godfather’s presence.
    Now she looked in the direction of her saviour, her godfather Professor