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Now it is told that, on a certain night in summer, when the moon is full, a man who lingers by the straight water, where the cypresses stand over their own image, may see a strange marvel may see the Palace of the Taj dissolve like a pearl, and so rise in a mist into the moonlight; and in its place, on her dais of white marble, he shall see the Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal, the Chosen of the Palace, stand there in the white perfection of beauty, smiling as one who hath attained unto the Peace.
So, making not the Profession of Faith, and what need, since all her life was worship, the Lady Arjemand turned into his arms like a child. And the night deepened. Morning, with its arrows of golden light that struck the river to splendour! Morning, with its pure breath, its sunshine of joy, and the koels fluting in the Palace gardens! Morning, divine and new from the hand of the Maker!
Now it was the dawn of a sorrowful day when the pains of the Lady Arjemand came strong and terrible, and she travailed in agony. The sweat ran on his brows, the knotted veins were thick on his temples, and his eyes, sunk in their caves, showed as those of a maddened man.
For those who have seen this Arjemand crowned with the crown the Padishah set upon her sweet low brows, with the lamps of great jewels lighting the dimples of her cheeks as they swung beside them, have most surely seen perfection.
So on a certain day it stood completed, and beneath the small tomb in the sanctuary, veiled with screens of wrought marble so fine that they might lift in the breeze, the veils of a Queen, slept the Lady Arjemand; and above her a narrow coffer of white marble, enriched in a great script with the Ninety-Nine Wondrous Names of God.
And of all the wives of the Mogul Emperors surely this Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal -the Chosen of the Palace was the most worthy of love. In the tresses of her silk-soft hair his heart was bound, and for none other had he so much as a passing thought since his soul had been submerged in her sweetness. Of her he said, using the words of the poet Faisi,
Now, when those steps were heard, a faint colour rose in the cheek of the Lady Arjemand; but she did not raise the heavy lashes, or move her hand.
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