‘Badshah Salamat,’ he replied in the rustic accent of Bihar. ‘I am no jurnail-vurnail. I am only a subedar. But I have ten thousand Ghazis with me. And we ask for nothing more than the honour to shed our blood for Your Majesty.’

It had been reported to us that Bakht Khan had been acclaimed by our troops and citizens, both Muslim and Hindu. ‘Bakht Khan, we make you General and Commander-in-Chief of our forces,’ we said to him. ‘May Allah crown your sword with victory!’

‘Arre Bhai, Badshah,’ he said without decorum. ‘Your name is Japhar, isn’ t it? Japhar means victory, doesn’t it? You will be Japhar. Anyone can take any bet with me,’ he said putting out his hand in challenge.

With Bakht Khan came the monsoon. A short spring came to the autumn of our garden. For a while we let Bakht Khan take over affairs of war. We spent our days in the monsoon pavilions, Sawan-Bhadon, that we had raised in Hayat Baksh Garden behind Moti Masjid. Between these two pavilions was a large reservoir in the centre of which was another stone pavilion which looked as if it were afloat on the water. We had a small boat to take our guests to it. Our subjects named it after us, Zafar Mahal. Here we used to hold symposia of poets, entertained our friends with song and dance. That year we organized a small mushaira in honour of Taj Mahal Begum, younger sister of Zeenat, whom she had persuaded to join our harem. With Zeenat’s consent we did honour to her virgin sister and had her share our couch for several nights.

For some days we did not hear the sound of guns; only the growling of black clouds, the pitter-patter of raindrops and the jingle of dancers’ bells beating time to tabla drums. We spent the mornings flying our pigeons.

Then came the Flower-Sellers’ festival. We took our beloved Zeenat Mahal and Mirza Jawan Bakht with us to pay homage to the tomb of Qutubuddin Bakhtiyar Kaki at Mehrauli.

We rode on our favourite elephant Maula Baksh out of Lahori Gate and down Chandni Chowk. We alighted at Ballimaran to pay our respects to our spiritual mentor, Kale Khan Sahib. At the mosque of Begum Fatehpuri we turned left to Lal Kuan where Asad Quli Khan (Zeenat Mahal’s father) presented nazar and a basket of mangoes. We passed on through the prostitutes’ quarters in Qazi-ka-Hauz. These ladies sprinkled flowers on us from their balconies.

We went out of the city through Ajmeri Gate. We went past the village of Paharganj and Raisina. At the observatory of Raja Man Singh known as Jantar Mantar, the gardeners of Talkatora orchards, which we had gifted to Zeenat Mahal, presented us with another basket of mangoes. We made a brief halt at the mausoleum of Safdar Jang to inspect the mosque and the madrasa. Our next halt was at Yusuf Sarai where we sampled the mangoes presented to us and took our siesta. When we rose the noon was well advanced and the southern horizon was heavily overcast with rain-clouds. Our mahout quickened the pace of Maula Baksh.