Page 25

Samarth ran a hand down the buttoned collar of his polo shirt and glanced at the closed wooden door in front of him.

Then behind him. The street was bustling with its mid-morning affairs, Devgadh’s people going about their business.

Cows were walking down the tight street, women were running out to pat their backs and feed them rotli with godd, bikes tilting off to let them pass happily.

Their car had been parked in the next lane and they had walked their way here. He might look out of place but not too much with Harsh’s kurta and jeans.

“Huuu,” Harsh patted his shoulder. Samarth startled. He took a deep breath, raised his knuckles and knocked on the door.

Samarth blinked out of the momentary shock that froze his system. No going back now. He was doing this.

“ Hu Samarth. Samarth Sinh Solanki, Kaki. [21] ”

She frowned, the smile still on her face. Her Gujarati saree was simple cotton, her hands adorned with the usual thin gold bangle on each wrist — just like their women in Nawanagar. Samarth noted her smile slowly drop as her eyes peered and began to recognise him.

“ Nawanagar na Kunwar saheb [22] ?”

He nodded.

If his nod staggered her back, she did not show it. Her throat worked, a smile pushed to her face — “ Aavo, Kunwar saheb, aavo, [23] ” she moved aside to usher him in. But her open, happy, welcoming tone had altered from that first question she had asked a stranger.

That’s what Samarth was here to change.

“ Tara Devi ghare chhe? [24] ” He asked.

She stilled. “ Tame Tara ne malva aavya chho? [25] ”

“ Agar e ghare hoye toh… [26] ”

“ Hu bolavu choo ene. [27] ”

“ Kon chhe, Meena? [28] ” Her father came walking out to the courtyard, stopping by the flat swing suspended by old-school chains jingling in the wind. Her father recognised him immediately and Samarth folded his hands — “Jai Dwarkadhish, Kaka. I am…”

“Samarth Sinh Solanki saheb, Kunwar saheb,” he completed. “Please come inside, Kunwar saheb…”

As Samarth walked inside the courtyard, he noted the look that Tara Devi’s father gave her mother. Their confusion was palpable. But if Samarth empathised with their reaction to his ambush, he wouldn’t be able to go forward.

“Please sit,” he ushered him on the patio furniture in the middle of the courtyard, his wife rushing inside.

“Thank you for accepting me inside. I came without informing, Kaka, I apologise,” Samarth folded his hands again, the words, the tone, the manners ingrained into him from his upbringing and his Papa’s etiquette.

“No, no, please don’t say that. You are always welcome in this house, in all of Devgadh. I saw you at the palace when you were small. You’ve grown up to be an impressive young man.”

Samarth smiled, looking down at his feet — “Not a man yet in my Papa and Dada Sarkar’s eyes though.”

Kaka laughed — “Children never grow up for their parents.”

“And yet you want us to study and do all the growing up too,” Samarth complained. That made Kaka’s polite laugh turn into a chortle, as if he was used to listening to such complaints regularly.

“ Me dhokla muki didha chhe, Kunwar. Dhokla khaso, ne? [29] ” Kaki came with a tray of steel glasses. She looked at Harsh standing in the corner behind him — “ Beta tame pan beso ne. [30] ”

From her reaction, Samarth assumed Harsh had done his head shake that looked as polite as it could with his height, build and that hard face.

“ Tame beso, Kaki [31] ,” Samarth urged. She glanced at him a moment, as if startled. Then took a seat beside her husband, setting the tray of steel glasses filled with water down. The couple’s eyes were on him though, baffled but amused.

“What happened…?” Samarth looked from one to the other.

“Nothing,” Kaki shook her head. “You reminded me of our Yuvraj saheb… now Kunwar Maan.”

“He used to come to demand Meena’s farsan all the time,” Kaka reminisced. “Samosa, cutlet ane aamli ni chutney.”

Samarth’s face brightened. He hadn’t brought his trump card out but if Kaka had opened the topic, he wasn’t above using it to his advantage.

“Maan bhai eats all the junk food and still manages to win every game!” He chimed. “At least, until he played, that was the norm. I once went to his game in Baroda and he treated me to cheese puff after the game. I won’t mention the number of cheese puffs he ate.”

Kaka’s polite face split into an indulgent grin.

“I have seen only one game of his, right here in Devgadh. The entire town came out that day. The stands were full, people occupied the sides of the ground. Remember, Meena…?”

Samarth sat upright, listening to him reminisce. He had some of his own stories. And even if he had come prepared to use Maan bhai’s influence on them as a last resort, as Kaka kept talking about Maan bhai — his idol, Samarth didn’t think twice before diving in.

————————————————————

“It was the last chukker, no goals scored on either side,” Samarth recounted.

“Last one minute, and then Maan bhai’s mallet snapped into half.

Like right there while he was scoring left and right!

” He built it up, that iconic game in Delhi.

Samarth had been sitting in the shed of Devgadh’s team — the grooms, the spare horses, the doctors — everybody on the edge of their seats, including his Papa, who stood on one side.

It had been his Papa’s treat for his 10th birthday, taking along all his friends for Maan Sinh Devgadh’s Polo match.

“I thought he would stop. But…” Samarth chuckled, trying and failing to hold back his laugh, “he stole the mallet from his opponent by his side and kept going.”

Kaka’s eyes widened.

“That’s not the end. His opponent was Vaasudev Raje, 5 foot 7. Maan bhai is 6 foot. The mallet was too short for him, so now he is playing hunched over his horse.”

Samarth held his arms apart to show the difference in mallet sizes, making Kaka laugh out loud.

“He won. And then when they refused to give him the trophy and declared it a tie, he just turned to us kids and said — ‘At least I taught Raje how to hit goals with his mallet.’”

Noise at the door broke their laughter. Samarth turned.

And saw Tara Devi at the threshold. For a long second, bordering indecent, he kept staring at her.

His Papa had chosen her. And Samarth couldn’t look away from the lady who had made his Papa so happy.

She looked just as miserable as him, in fact — more so.

Her curly hair was loose around her shoulders, her white kurti fluttering in the breeze cutting into the house from the open door. She stared at him, confused.

Samarth got to his feet.

“Jai Dwarkadhish, Tara Devi,” he folded his hands to her. “Do you remember me?”

She blinked, probably trying to place him.

“We met last year in the orange orchard here in Devgadh’s palace. During the resolution meeting…”

“Of course I remember. Kunwar saheb,” she folded her hands and bowed her head. He bowed his head too. For a second, his tongue was tied. This was a woman. A lady. How could he talk something like this directly with her? He wasn’t averse to talking to girls. But this was…

No. Samarth bolstered himself. For Nawanagar. For Papa.

“I was just telling Kaka and Kaki about Maan bhai’s polo matches,” he started with the easier topic. “I was so small but I remember each one of them.”

She smiled. And like her mother, her smile was just as small, soft, and kind. “I have seen just two, and those were his practise sessions here in the palace grounds.”

Her voice was soft, even though her demeanour looked like that of a warrior.

“I always loved polo,” Samarth continued the thread of conversation, finding it easy to go on with her.

As a prince, from a young age, he had been taught to talk to people of all ages, backgrounds, beliefs.

With her parents, Maan bhai’s topic had been easy to breach their walls.

Strangely, with her, his own topic seemed easier.

After all, they had talked that night freely, even if shortly.

“I don’t know how,” he pointed. “My Papa tried to make me love cricket but it didn’t stick, so he finally surrendered me to Maan bhai to learn.”

She was listening to him intently until he mentioned his Papa’s name.

“Please, sit, Kunwar saheb,” she offered, her gaze going to her parents. That was when Samarth knew he had to come to the point.

“I was waiting for you to come,” he said, stepping towards her. She stilled. Samarth took a deep breath, said Jai Dwarkadhish under his breath and opened all his cards.

“My father is a man of others,” he stated, eyes on her. “He has given his life to Nawanagar and then to me. For the first time, he had something for himself. And even that he gave up.”

“What do you mean, Kunwar saheb?”

“You would think I should be embarrassed while I ask this, but when it comes to my Papa, I am not embarrassed. Tara Devi, I have come here to ask you to come and marry my Rawal.”

She frowned, glancing at her parents behind him.

Samarth followed her gaze, turned around, and stepped towards her parents, folding his hands together.

If they had a problem with him being a problem, which they certainly did, then he had come here prepared to make this promise — “I, Samarth Sinh Solanki of Nawanagar, promise you that Tara Devi will come to Nawanagar as our Maarani, will be treated with respect, love and adulation, and that Tara Devi’s heir will rule Nawanagar. ”

“Kunwar saheb, no!” Tara Devi’s shocked voice stopped him. “You cannot make such a promise…”

“I can make any promise that is in my power to give as my father’s son. The three promises I have given you are alone in my power to fulfil.”

“Does Rawal saheb know about this?” Kaka asked.

“He will know once Tara Devi and you agree.”

“Kunwar,” Kaki’s soft whisper again cut him off. “Don’t make such a promise. No father will do that to his son. It will not be good.”