Like my Kayastha forefathers, I was trained to be a scribe. A pandit taught me Sanskrit and Hindi. Through my father’s influence I was admitted to a madrasa to learn Arabic, Turki and Persian. At first I was treated roughly by the Turkish boys and the sons of Hindu converts to Islam. But when I learnt to speak Turki and dress like a Turk, they stopped bullying me. To save me being harassed, the Maulvi Sahib gave me a Muslim name, Abdul. The boys called me Abdullah.

I was the only child of my parents. I had been betrothed to a girl, one of a family of seven who lived in Mathura. We were married when I was nine and my wife, Ram Dulari, only seven. Four years later, when I was old enough to cohabit, my parents sent the barber who had arranged my marriage to fetch my wife from Mathura. For reasons I will explain later, her parents refused to comply with our wishes. Then tragedy struck our home. My father died and a few days later my mother joined him. At thirteen I was left alone in the world.

The Kotwal Sahib was very kind to me. When he came to offer his condolence, he also offered my father’s post to me. It was at that time that my Muslim friends suggested that if I accepted conversion to Islam my prospects would be brighter; I could even aspire to become Kotwal of Mehrauli. And I would have no trouble in finding a wife from amongst the new converts. If I was lucky I might even get a widow or a divorcee of pure Turkish, Persian or Afghan stock. ‘If you are Muslim,’ said one fellow who was full of witticisms, ‘you can have any woman you like. If you are up to it, you can have four at a time.’

A Turk for toughness, for hands that never tire;

An Indian for her rounded bosom bursting with milk;

A Persian for her tight crotch and her coquetry;

An Uzbeg to thrash as a lesson for the three.

There was something, I do not know what, which held me back form being converted to Islam. I suspected that the reason why my wife’s parents had refused to send her to me was the rumour that my parents had adopted the ways of the Mussalmans. If I became a Muslim, they would say, ‘Didn’t we tell you? How could we give our daughter to an unclean maleech?’