Page 135 of A Thousand Painted Hours

When I answered the knock on my door, Sughra, Channan’s maid, stood there. In Hindustani, she said, “Maharaja Sahibasks that you dress English for dinner. Thesahibwill stay overnight because of the rains.”

“Willmaharani-jijoin us as well?”

“No,memsahib. Two meals in one day would be many for her.”

“I understand.”

“Do you wish help dressing?”

I looked at my hands, spattered with paint, and my apron. “I’ll need to wash first. Return in a half hour. The buttons are impossible without help.”

She gave a short bow.

If Tanveer wanted me in English dress, I should have to bring my Lady Turner self to table. It had been weeks, but I dutifully bathed, and scrubbed the paint from my fingers, brushed my hair into a short bun, and applied makeup, what little I had—powder and lipstick and the small cake of kohl I’d purchased in Cairo. When I stood in my shift, waiting for Sughra, I stepped back to check my look in the mirror.

And I couldn’t believe the difference in myself in just a couple of months. The sharp angles of shoulder and elbow had been enveloped in a layer of soft flesh, and my cheeks no longer looked so haggard. My eyes held a spark I had not seen in a long, long time.

I have never known this Tanveer,Channan said.

I had not seen this me. Not in years and years, not since the day he’d left England with Topaz in a basket. Whatever other thing was in Channan’s mind, what mattered to me was being able to stay, to grow and live here in Talwarpur, where I felt loved and accepted.

Where I felt at home.

Sughra knocked and I let her in. The dress I’d chosen was pale green, beaded with tiny silver flutes that shimmered over breast and hip. The back was low and met just above my waist, and fastened with buttons all the way down. I’d had it for years and worn it countless times to various functions and dinners and balls, and tonight, I was glad to own it as it fell down over my body. A thin chain hung with small square emeralds and diamonds draped down my spine.

Sughra exclaimed, “So beautiful!”

I swayed to make the beads dance on the hem. “Thank you. It’s long been my favorite.”

As she headed toward the door, my painting caught her eye, a tiger with stars overhead. Not quite a real tiger, but the one from my childhood imagination, the version of a tiger who would have befriendedme and ridden off into the night with me and Tanveer on her back. I had not yet painted the children, but they were sketched in thin lines. On the sidelines Gurdaya stood, arms crossed and worried. “You should paint the tigers here,” Sughra said.

“Yes. I shall.”

As I walked toward the small dining room where we would eat, I heard the colonel’s voice. “You’ve got to root them out, man. These cells are going to rot the empire.”

I slowed, listening.

“They are harmless,” Tanveer said, and I knew he did not believe that. He had warned me several times about straying too far from the palace without escort. British citizens had been killed across the Punjab, including women, some of whom had been targeted directly. “If you spend too much of your enforcement upon them, the problem will only grow worse.”

“The crown has noticed your complicity, Singh. It is well known that you have hosted radicals in your own home.”

“Those radicals would be my old school chums, Colonel, who come to share stories of their lives, not their politics.”

“Look around you, man. This palace is falling down. How will you keep it up if you lose the support of the British?”

Smoothly, I entered the room, as if fresh out of the bath. “Good evening, gentlemen. I hope I’m not interrupting.”

The colonel, dressed in black tie, bowed. “Good evening, Lady Turner.”

Tanveer greeted me with prayer hands, one raised brow acknowledging my timing. “You look splendid tonight.”

I gave a slight curtsy, setting the beads on my hem alive. “As do you,Maharaja-ji.” He had donned his high court turban and coat. Emeralds and rubies the size of lozenges shone on his long fingers, andthe turban was draped and crusted with more jewels than I’d ever seen him wear—strings of pearls and an enormous diamond brooch and lesser colored stones pinned in the folds.

An impressive display.

“Lady Turner is staying with us to paint a portrait,” Tanveer said. “My wife asked for her specifically. She’s known for her work around the world.”

“Is that right?” The colonel’s nose was red with drink. “Anything I would know?”