The Tigress of Mysore

by Allan Mallinson

  Then why had he not just told the commissary to bring charges, and let the major refute them and a court martial decide?

  The answer was, in truth, that in his heart he feared the accusation was true, and that it might amount to a crime, and he simply couldn’t bring himself to let such a friend as Garratt be brought down, and on account of a merchant who was himself corrupt enough to have bribed in the first place. He told himself it was prudential judgement; but he feared that St Helena was a stratagem of evasion.

  The die was cast, however, and for the time being he had back with him a man he could trust to command the regiment in his absence, first during his exploration in Chintal, and then when he took command of the field force. For he’d done so, admirably, in Coorg. Ought he not to have told him, though, about St Helena? Yes, in the ordinary course of things, but …

  ‘And so tomorrow you’ll hang another half a dozen, Major?’

  Sleeman was somewhat taken aback by Somervile’s bluntness, if only because there were ladies present and the khitmagars were still serving.

  ‘I shall indeed, Sir Eyre, the very worst of a Sabar band from Odisha – a thoroughly criminal tribe – brought five days ago on account of an approver. And thanks to your Captain Vanneck’s troop, Colonel Hervey.’

  Hervey, sitting opposite and to Somervile’s right, nodded appreciatively. ‘But not the worst of Ghufoor Khan’s band yet, Major Sleeman?’

  ‘Their time will come, Colonel, I assure you,’ he replied firmly.

  ‘But not the very worst, I fancy: Khan himself.’

  ‘With respect, Colonel, we have discussed this already, and at some length. I must choose the greater good.’

  Somervile, warming to the discussion, decided to press him. ‘So, Sleeman, you play God.’

  ‘I fear, Sir Eyre, that from time to time we must do so.’

  The governor tapped the table. ‘I heartily concur. That indeed is our burden. I myself would declare the entire thuggee caste – for a caste apart is what it is – outlaw, and then there’d be an end to the elegant points of what our American cousins are wont to call “due process of law”. No honest Hindoo I’ve met in all my years – and they’re mostly honest, in their own way at least – would ever object to such methods.’

  Hervey had no argument with that, or indeed with Sleeman’s doctrine. He wished only for retribution for the murder of Bunda Ali and his family, the more so since hearing Fairbrother’s account of finding their remains.

  He glanced towards the end of the table to see how Georgiana was faring – if she was listening indeed – and saw both she and Annie were quite oblivious to the talk, and instead engaged in diverting conversation, Georgiana with St Alban, and Annie with the aide-de-camp. Except that whereas St Alban managed wholly to engage Georgiana’s attention, Annie’s eyes were still able from time to time to take in the rest of the table.

  He smiled to himself; she really was a most diligent governess.

  ‘So this Ghufoor Khan, Hervey, will have to fall prey to a hungry tiger, or to one of his own band, except that Sleeman here will’ve hanged ’em all,’ concluded Somervile, taking up a spoon to his soup.

  ‘I’ve no hesitation in saying “Amen” to that, however profane,’ replied Hervey.

  Somervile nodded. ‘By the bye, I gave my travelling chef licence to surpass himself this evening, for I fancy you’ve been on meagre fare these past weeks.’

  Hervey smiled again, but this time not to himself. Somervile’s delight in the pleasures of the table would surpass that of the hungriest cornet.

  ‘Potage à la Julienne, gentlemen. Not St Sulpice’s best soup, but lobsters are not too many to be had, if at all, this side of the Krishna.’

  He smiled again. When first they’d met, not long after the French wars, Somervile had called himself a Hindoo, and damned the eyes of those setting themselves apart from the country – those who on every occasion insisted on ‘the roast beef of old England’ instead of curry and rice. John Bull himself would have eaten curry and rice were he to have come to India, said Somervile. Yet here he was, now, ‘Frenchified’.

  Somervile had his reasons, though, as he’d already explained. If it came to the removal of the Ranee of Chintal, as it must, the manner of her exile would be of the first importance. There was already disquiet in London over the annexation of Coorg, and if that were so, the tendency would be to even greater revulsion in the case of a helpless female. He would therefore receive the Ranee not as a captive, but as an honoured guest. He intended somehow crafting a tale of deliverance from evil, of rescue indeed. She would doubtless receive a considerable pension (Fort William had yet to inform him of the terms). An Elba or St Helena did not await her. Rather did Monsieur St Sulpice’s cuisine.

  Whatever the case, he was determined that he himself would not be made a scapegoat. Nor, indeed, would he have his old friend made one either.

  So in that great cause of diplomacy, Somervile’s guests proceeded through a menu of sardines brought from Marseilles by means that could scarcely be imagined, broiled partridge and quail shot on the plain west of the Ghats three days before, ‘Madras venison’ – wether mutton (or more probably goat) fuddled and rubbed with allspice and claret – and then blancmanges and sweetmeats; and all with the finest burgundy and sweet white wine. The Bodyguard’s little band played airs throughout, and the conversation was plentiful.

  When the cigars had been smoked and the brandy imbibed for digestion, and thanks to the host offered and leave taken of him, Hervey got into the gharry hired for the evening with Georgiana and Annie to drive the half-mile or so to the haveli. There was a moon, and the walk would have been easy as well as pleasant, but he wouldn’t risk it. Sthambadree was a peaceable place, with a good native police inspector, but beyond the pale of a garrison town it was never wise to be too certain. The Sixth had stirred up a good deal of trouble these past weeks, and Serjeant Acton had been adamant – riding even now close behind with carbine and pistols primed.

  Georgiana was smiling yet. (Was it her first dinner in state?)

  ‘How did you find Mr St Alban this evening, Georgiana? You appeared to be in quite animated conversation.’

  ‘Oh, Papa, he is so learned in everything. He has such decided views on all manner of things: the new Act – the India Act, I mean – and the government at home, and so much more. And he has just read, for the second time, Mr Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire!’

  She continued for several minutes, keen to retell what was St Alban’s opinion on this and that and everything.

  Annie sat silent, but content-looking, as if pleased for her charge.

  At length, courtesy alone required that Hervey say something to her. ‘You found the dinner and the company agreeable, Miss Gildea?’

  Annie smiled, almost as if to laugh. ‘Oh, it was delightful, Colonel.’

  ‘Really? How so? The aide-de-camp appeared to me to be a little earnest.’

  ‘Oh, Colonel, do you know that in the Third Madras Light Cavalry, the lieutenant-colonel is not called the commanding officer but the commandant; and that the officer’s sword has one half of one inch less curvature than the sowar’s; and the peak of the officer’s shako is made of sealskin whereas that of the sowar is made of goatskin; and a lieutenant’s sleeve braid has four ounces more silver bullion thread than a cornet’s; and—’

  Hervey began to laugh; and then Georgiana – and Annie.

  Part Three

  * * *

  CHINTAL

  XVI

  A Nine-Gun State

  Ten days later

  They’d passed through the customs post at Kothapore two days earlier without hindrance. The papers had been sent to Chintalpore a month ago, and in any case there was little that a few customs officers could do to bar the way to a half-troop of cavalry. But since then they’d hardly seen a smiling face, even a child’s. Sullen, wary, or else resigned (whatever it was), the face of the Chintalee ryot was not that of his cousin in the
Circars.

  Whether they themselves – his dragoons – were the reason, Hervey couldn’t tell. No doubt the unexpected appearance of soldiers from the Company – or elsewhere for that matter – didn’t bode well for a ryot. If he were, say, in some manner connected with thuggee, it might mean his livelihood was about to be taken away; and if he were an honest man he could scarcely expect to profit from war, for both sides would trample his crops without remorse and take his livestock, such as it was, and probably his womenfolk too.

  But it was hardly his, Hervey’s, business. Fort William had decided that Chintal must be annexed, and he therefore must make a plan of campaign; and as the Duke of Marlborough said, no war could ever be conducted without good and early intelligence.

  ‘I’m intrigued to see what the palace has become, how the Ranee’s spent her rubies. It was a rather delightful affair, as I recall, a jumble of styles, Hindoo and Mogul, all domes and pyramids jostling along side by side – rather like the people. Much marble and alabaster, too, with a vein of red I hadn’t seen before, nor since. Most attractive. But that was the late rajah’s time. I fancy the Ranee has her own tastes; and, rather more to the point, the means to indulge them.’

  Annie didn’t think she’d ever seen a ruby, but thought to keep that to herself. Besides, it was the least of her concerns. If this Ranee, who was clearly a woman of intrigue, were to receive them, she’d be at pains to flatter, and probably therefore to pay Georgiana great attention, which would mean she’d probably keep her – Annie – at a distance. Yet Georgiana was her charge. How could she exercise it if this Ranee thought she was just a servant? A princess was surely going to know she’d risen from nowhere; women had instincts about these things, Hindoo women especially, for ‘caste’ seemed to be everything in this country, or so they said. And, in truth, Colonel Hervey had spoken of her with evident admiration – ‘she has much intelligence, and her English is quite excellent’ – and he’d thought her, then, perhaps eighteen or nineteen; so now, she reckoned, this admirable princess would be grown to the full attraction of womanhood. It made her uneasy, for no matter how much she herself observed and imitated, and read, she knew it could never be the same …

  She was pleased, at least, that Mr St Alban had assigned two packhorses to her, so that she could bring some silks. She’d no jewellery though, just the pearl necklace given her after the business of the cobra (even now she shuddered each time she put it on, minded of that terrifying encounter with Eternity), and she supposed the Ranee would be spangled with all manner of precious stones.

  In truth, at that moment she’d have been glad to return to Madras and take up embroidery.

  Except that Georgiana was thoroughly enjoying the adventure, and she herself wanted very much to see a real palace. Besides, Colonel Hervey had asked them to be his eyes and ears when he couldn’t see and hear for himself.

  No; she’d not just be Dorcas again.

  They reached Chintalpore towards the middle of the afternoon, exactly as he’d planned: it was cool, and there were four hours of daylight left. Worsley’s lieutenant, with half a dozen dragoons and the Guntoor baboo as translator, had ridden ahead to make the arrangements, and found quarters laid out for them by the Ranee’s bodyguard in the old zenana (the women’s quarters) on the edge of the city, a place of security with its high-walled gardens running down to a canal which took water from the Godavari to the palace half a mile to the west.

  They’d had a good view of the palace as they approached, and all agreed it was a sight to behold. Hervey told them how it had been built two centuries before to celebrate the birth of the rajah’s great-grandfather, whose own father had visited the water gardens of Italy and had wished for fountains of his own. But the Moguls, although they’d always prized the play of water, hadn’t been able to achieve the height of the fountains of Rome, and so he’d brought home with him a Venetian engineer.

  The palace sat prettily on a shallow hill. There were several higher ones, but the engineer had chosen the site to produce the most spectacular cascades. It was imposing, therefore, rather than dominating, and when he, Hervey, had first taken up his sabre, the rajah had rued the compromise, for it was overlooked by three hills within cannon range. Since then, however, the palace had been much fortified, with bastions, a curtain wall and a vast moat.

  He, himself, was not to be quartered in the old zenana, however, but as the guest of the Ranee, at the palace. He could hardly decline the hospitality, though he’d considerable qualms about accepting it while at the same time taking advantage to calculate how best to deprive her of her inheritance: The hand that mingled in the meal / At midnight drew the felon steel, / And gave the host’s kind breast to feel / Meed for his hospitality!

  True, he’d done the same in Coorg. But at least in Coorg it had been a clear-cut affair: the rajah was an oath-breaker, a usurper, a tyrant, a murderer. He was yet to understand how the Princess Suneyla he’d known had become ‘Queen of Thugs’. Was there a single shred of evidence that an English court would accept; only the word of ‘approvers’ – thieves and murderers turned King’s Evidence to save their own skin? And whence, indeed, came this intelligence of her claim on Mysore? The more he thought of it, the more his unease.

  Except that in this land, nothing was beyond belief. Suneyla had once told him of Ravana, the great King of Lanka, who on finding the mountain of Kailasa barring the way of his chariot, asked the mighty peak to step aside for him; and when the mighty peak, as the abode of Shiva, refused, he climbed from his chariot and of his own strength lifted the mountain clear. And when he, Hervey, replied that it was a fine mythos, she’d protested that it was truth.

  So he must trust in the lord at Fort William, and do his duty. And as soon as he’d satisfied himself that Worsley and his half-troop were quartered safely and comfortably, therefore, he’d set off for the palace with the largest party he dared – Georgiana and Annie with their two ayahs, Serjeant Acton and Corporal Johnson, Fairbrother and St Alban, with the baboo, two orderly dragoons and half a dozen bearers and syces.

  As that first time, when he’d worn the aiglets of an aide-de-camp and the two Bath stars of a captain, they were met by the rissaldar of the Ranee’s bodyguard at the foot of the droog, the great earth ramp that led – over the drawbridge – to the inner bailey. Here they dismounted to be borne ceremoniously by palanquin to the turreted gates commanding the ascent, where, as also on that first occasion, they observed the customary propitiatory offering to Pollear, the protecting deity of pilgrims and travellers. One of the bearers silently unwound his turban, gave one end to the other bearer, and then they stood either side to bar entrance. Hervey placed some silver into their palms before passing over the lowered cloth and through the portals into the courtyard.

  He’d no more idea now than when he’d first been carried up, why it was the custom, and imagined that neither had the rissaldar or the bearers. Things were done in India because they’d always been done, and anything that involved silver passing from one hand to another was doubly cherished.

  The rissaldar spoke no English – by choice or otherwise he couldn’t tell – but the baboo was at hand. The Ranee had been visiting with the Raj Kumaree of Nagpore, he explained, and would be returning tomorrow. Meanwhile the household was at the service of her guests, adding that he and the other officers of the rissalah, the bodyguard’s cavalry troop, would be hunting pig soon after sunrise and that Hervey and his guests were most welcome to join them. Hervey thanked the rissaldar in as much Hindoostanee as he could fluently muster – he knew it was a besetting fault of his, to be averse to making mistakes – and said he’d be delighted to. The khansamah and a small army of servants showed them their quarters, arranged baths and told them of their evening’s fare and entertainment.

  They were being treated royally, of that there was no doubt. Hervey wondered if it were by command of the Ranee herself or by her dewan. Perhaps it didn’t much matter; an embassy from the Company would hardly be treated w
ith discourtesy, no matter how ill-disposed the host.

  Had he met this Ashok Acharya, the first minister, that time before? Then, it had been Kunal Verma who’d been dewan, and who’d met his end by an unknown hand (an end that few could not have welcomed, so thoroughly corrupt was he). Somervile had said he was surprised that the politicals, both his own and those at Fort William, knew so little of Acharya, and voiced his disdain for the late agent, who ought to have been reporting every detail.

  In any event, their quarters were light and cool – high, airy rooms with fretted windows opening on to the water gardens. He couldn’t recall which had been his the first time, but Johnson said he thought they were the same – just with more gilding (doubtless the bounty of the rubies).

  ‘And them,’ he added, pointing to two lattice gratings high in the walls.

  Hervey looked.

  ‘Eh, bien vu!’

  ‘Colonel?’

  Walls had ears – the ‘ears of Dionysius’ – just as before. He made a sign of appreciation. Johnson understood.

  Then it was time to bathe; and afterwards to dine, which they did in a room furnished in the European style (and, again, with ‘ears’); just the five of them – Hervey, Fairbrother, St Alban and ‘the ladies’, although Acton insisted on being present, upright in a corner resting on his sword throughout (though he did concede to hospitality by not drawing it from its scabbard). Later he would keep guard in the corridors with the two dragoons, catching a little sleep when he could. A coverman’s capability was judged in one way only, the safety of his principal. Success would bring promotion, failure oblivion. It was a powerful spur to vigilance.