Golden Afternoon

by M. M. Kaye

  Once safely out of sight and range, the shikaris held a hasty conference, as a result of which another four excessively makeshift machans were hurriedly constructed and strung up in the trees on the far side of the hill from the original ones. There were fewer trees on this side, and Mother and I were finally helped to scramble up into a rickety arrangement of rope and branches of dead wood that strongly resembled a crow’s nest, and was not all that far off the ground. But then, as the shikari explained (not very comfortingly), since neither of us would be carrying a gun, we could use our hands to hold on to the main trunk of our spindly young dâk tree.

  We couldn’t see Tacklow, for although there were many more trees on this side of the hill few of them were of any great size, and their foliage, which had seemed so scanty below, was at its thickest at eye level. As for the other guns, they too were out of sight; and when the sounds of their departure could no longer be heard, the heat and silence of midday descended upon the jungle, and we had nothing to do but wait for the signal that would tell the beaters that everyone was in place. It seemed to go on for ever, and Mother and I, getting bored and more and more uncomfortable, began to talk in whispers. I for one was quite sure that if the tigers had any sense at all, they would have walked out at one end or the other of the line of machans long ago and vanished into the open country. I couldn’t believe that the creatures would hang around after being disturbed at their lunch. But Mother said that all tigers must be so used to seeing the odd villager or two walking through their territory, that the sight of us wouldn’t have bothered them in the least, especially as we had turned tail and retreated as soon as we saw them. Only if the cubs had been a lot younger would we have been in trouble, for then the tigress would probably have charged us on sight.

  We had begun to wonder if my first guess had been right, and the tigers had cleared off and the beat been cancelled, when someone not so far away fired a shot. It was evidently a signal, for immediately, from somewhere very far away — so far that if it had not been for the windless silence of that torpid afternoon we would never have heard it — came a faint noise that in these days could have been the throb of an aeroplane’s engines or a tractor reaping and cutting in a distant hayfield, but at that time and place could only mean that the beat had begun and that a mile or more away a long line of men and boys had begun walking towards us, shouting and hallooing as they beat the grass and the scrub with their lathis, banged enthusiastically on drums and tin cans, blew on cow-horns and occasionally fired off some antiquated fowling-piece lent for the occasion by a village headman or shikari.

  At first that distant hullabaloo was hardly more than a throb of blood in one’s eardrums, but it gradually increased until at long last it became disturbing enough to upset the siesta-ing wildlife, and presently the shadowy thickets of thorn-scrub, lantana and dried grass began to give up a variety of jungle creatures which would appear suddenly and, despite the carpet of fallen leaves, for the most part silently. Gorgeous peacocks, their splendid tails folded and held high, and accompanied by their harems of demure and dowdy wives, were the first to appear, picking their way across the forest floor at a pace that showed that they were not seriously alarmed, and passing directly below us to disappear into the forest behind us. A mongoose — there were several of these — and a thoroughly irritated porcupine, rattling its quills crossly as it hurried past, was followed by a jackal; and there were also a family of pigs and a grey wolf — one of the kind who made up the wolf pack in The Jungle Book. That was a terrific thrill, because I had never seen one before, and I was only to see one other* in all my life. It looked exactly like the drawings of Akela in the Mowgli stories, and it too made hardly a sound as it trotted past us over that layer of fallen leaves.

  As the noise of the beat got louder and nearer, the animals that ran before it did so at greater and greater speed. Flustered jungle-cocks and a large variety of birds, a few black-buck, at least a dozen chital (the small spotted forest deer of central India) and several more pigs. And then at last, with the beaters already pouring down the hillside in front of us, the sound of a rifle-shot from Tacklow’s machan, followed less than a minute or two later by the arrival of the beaters, swarming around the foot of the tree in which Mother and I had our machan. I began to scramble down so that I could find out whether Tacklow had shot the tiger, and Mother yelled at me to get back for heaven’s sake and not to take risks. But I couldn’t see how there could possibly be any risk; not with a mob of beaters surging around between the tree-trunks. I had actually got one foot on the open ground when the tigress stood up and roared.

  There followed one of the funniest sights that anyone could hope to see — if they were looking at it from a safe place: the inside of a tank or armoured car for preference. At the time it wasn’t in the least funny to anyone who was there. For my part, I was up that tree so quickly that, like a famous character of the immortal P. G. Wodehouse, I ‘almost met myself coming down’. I have never been so scared or moved so quickly. As for the beaters, every one of them flung away whatever weapon they had been beating with, and made a frantic attempt to climb the nearest tree.

  Unfortunately, there were not nearly enough trees to go round, for apart from the ones that, for lack of anything larger, had been lumbered with our machans, the remainder of those within reach were either saplings or the occasional spindly kikar-tree. The result was like one of Gustave Doré’s illustrations to The Flood, which depicts swarms of terrified and scantily clad humans clinging like bees to the tops of trees and anything that floats, as the rising water gets down to drowning the world. I only wish I had thought to photograph it, but at the time I was every bit as scared as they were.

  What had happened was that, towards the end of the beat, one of the cubs had lost its nerve and, instead of sticking with its more experienced parents, had streaked up the hill by itself, and was running down the opposite side, in between the scrub and the saplings. The shikari, glimpsing it and deciding that it was the tigress, clutched at Tacklow’s arm and said, urgently, ‘Marol Sahib — mam!’ (kill). It was a difficult shot, because all Tacklow could see was something orange and stripy bounding towards him between grass and lantana bushes, and as he was the first to admit, he was not a good shot with a rifle. However, he was that day. The shot killed the cub, and its body catapulted down the hill and fetched up behind a clump of bushes, where even with the help of his binoculars he could not tell which tiger he had shot, for all that he or the shikari could see was a small glimpse of orange-coloured fur.

  Since there is a hard and fast rule that states that once a beat begins no one moves until it is completed and the beaters have reached and passed the machans, there was no way of verifying which tiger had been shot until every member of the beat was accounted for. But what no one knew was that the tigress had taken the same route as that cub and, looking down from higher up on the hillside, had presumably spotted Tacklow’s machan and its two occupants and lain down to watch them in a shallow cavity under an outcrop of rocks. Lying there unseen, she had allowed the beat to go past her — some of them actually across the very rock under which she was lying — and the shikari’s theory was that it must have been the smell of her cub’s blood that had made her stand up among the rocks and roar.

  Tacklow, quite as startled as everyone else, pulled off another brilliant shot that brought her body sliding down across the rocks and the steep side of the hill below, to come to rest almost at the foot of his machan. No one saw what happened to the other cub. But quite a few of the beaters got an excellent view of the tiger. They said it obviously knew all about beats and how to deal with them, because it hadn’t even been hurrying. Apparently it had merely strolled off in a leisurely manner, parallel to the line of beaters, who halted abruptly the minute they saw it (for tigers have been known to charge a line of beaters with fatal effect), merely intensifying their yells and drum-banging and waiting prudently until it disappeared from view.

  Tacklow did not discover tha
t he had shot one of the cubs until the shikari spoke to the shaken beaters and learned that there was no danger of the tiger suddenly appearing among us, as the tigress had done. Only when the shikari announced that we could all come down did Tacklow verify that his first shot had killed a cub, a discovery that ruined his day, for one did not shoot tiger cubs: it was one of those things that was ‘not done’, and I have seldom seen him more upset.

  The shikari, however, took a different view. He simply could not understand why the Sahib was so downcast when even he, the shikari, had thought what he saw was the tigress, and had urged the Sahib to shoot — which he had very sensibly done, and with the greatest skill considering that he was aiming at a moving target of which they could get only brief glimpses between the lantana bushes and the tall grass. In the opinion of the shikari the Sahib should be congratulating himself for pulling off a magnificent double. And anyway, it was clear that the cubs were already weaned (it was surprising that their father had not already turned on them and attacked them!) and in a few months’ time both would have been preying on young calves themselves. These Sahib-log who sentimentally refused to kill tiger cubs and pregnant tigresses did not know — or care! — what it was to be a poor villager whose livelihood frequently depended upon the yield from a single cow and its milk and droppings, and, hopefully, its calves — and who would be left destitute if their cow was taken by a tiger.

  I have to admit that I saw the shikari’s point, though I too was sorry that one of those cubs had been killed, and glad that the tiger had escaped. Though not for long, poor creature, because only a few months later it finally fell to the gun of one of the neighbouring princes, who was not only a superb shot but had already accounted for the deaths of a long list of tigers and made several previous abortive attempts at shooting this one, since it was rumoured to be of record size for that part of Rajputana. And was, too.

  It was late afternoon by the time we trudged back to where the cars and an increasingly large number of interested villagers awaited us. Tacklow may have been annoyed with himself, but he was clearly regarded as a hero by the assembled crowd. Garlands of marigolds, jasmine buds and tinsel appeared out of nowhere and were hung around his neck to the accompaniment of cheers and congratulations, and there tottered out of the crowd an old, old man, wearing nothing but a dhoti and a large, untidy turban, and supporting himself on an iron-tipped lathi, who clutched at Tacklow’s arm and inquired in a quavering voice if it were true that he had shot a tigress, and when Tacklow admitted it, asked if there had been a scar on its forehead.

  Tacklow said he was afraid he hadn’t noticed, and inquired why the question had been asked. The ancient replied that he only wanted to know because the year before, while he was tending the cattle, a tigress had sprung out of the bushes and attacked a cow. And since it happened to be his cow, he had rushed at the tigress, whanged her over the head with his lathi, and driven her off. She had yelped and run away, bleeding profusely, which made him believe that if the tigress the Sahib had shot was the one that had attacked his cow, she would still bear the scar. And she did! I couldn’t believe it. But when at last a couple of beaters appeared carrying the tigress between them, hanging head down by her paws, which were tied together and slung over a stout length of bamboo, we all rushed to look. And there it was. A year-old scar on her forehead that had only just missed her eye. There it is still, because her worn and battered skin lies on the floor of my son-in-law’s study; and looking at it I find it difficult to account for the incredible bravery of that lone old man, armed only with an iron-tipped bamboo stave, going for a tigress almost twice his size and certainly weighing over three times what he did, and actually driving her off. Had it been me, I would have abandoned the herd and run like a rabbit.

  We had a problem over the corpse of that tigress, for although it was no great distance by car back to camp, it was a long trudge on foot for two men carrying the dead weight between them. Since there was not enough room in the cars for the bodies of the tigress and her cub as well as the original passengers, it was decided to let the elephant carry them back to camp. An obvious solution, had the elephant agreed to it, which she did not. The moment she realized that these dangerous creatures were about to be put on her back, she swung her ears forward and, starting back in the manner of an elderly spinster who has found a burglar under her bed, gave a loud screech and took off for the wide blue yonder, her mahout (who had unfortunately dismounted and was standing beside her chatting to some friends) in frantic pursuit, shrieking alternate orders and imprecations as he ran. But it is a well-established fact that elephants, when they choose, can move at an astonishing speed — Kipling says of them, if an elephant wished to catch an express train, it would not hurry itself, but it would catch that train.

  Watching this one practically vanish over the curvature of the earth’s surface, I congratulated myself on having had the sense to turn down that ride, for if it reacted like this at the sight of a dead tiger, heaven only knew what it would have done had it caught sight of a live one — probably been half-way back to Tonk city by now! We didn’t see the rest of the drama, because at that point we were loaded into the cars and driven away to the camp, leaving the head shikari and his friends to sort it all out. The elephant was back in her old place next morning, looking, I thought, rather subdued. Though that could have been imagination, for I had been feeling a bit sorry for myself of late.

  * Correction: three others. But only one more in the wild.

  Chapter 29

  Three days later we were back in Tonk, and it was some time during that cold weather that Tacklow received an invitation for all of us to attend some celebration or other connected with the College of Princes at Ajmer, where the heirs and younger sons of India’s ‘royals’ were — and still are — educated. This glittering shindig would last for several days and be graced by the presence of the Viceroy and Lady Reading, and include such gilded functions as a prizegiving and cricket match, a garden party and a state dinner. Mother, who adored any form of party and festivity, was delighted at the idea, but Tacklow was not in favour — largely, I suspect, on account of the expense, because I overheard him one evening explaining patiently to Mother that the exchequer was in very low water; even such seemingly ‘free’ holidays as the Christmas camp were anything but free, for in addition to the enormous number of people who expected to be, and must be, adequately tipped, there were always extras. And when those were added up, the total was always more than one expected — or had hoped. Besides, he had of late been granted a more than generous amount of leave, and it was high time that he settled down to steady work again. So no more junketing. We couldn’t afford it.

  The Nawab, however, had other ideas. He had not been too well of late and he said that he did not feel up to attending the festivities at Ajmer. His heir, Saadat, with Nunni-mia and their respective entourages, would of course be going; but he would like Tacklow to represent him, and he had already made arrangements for him and the Lady-Sahib and her daughters to stay at Tonk House in Ajmer. Most of Rajputana’s royals kept a house in Ajmer, complete with a skeleton staff, for just such an occasion as this. I don’t think that the old Nawab had used his for years. Nor do I remember if Saadat and Nunni and their personal staffs used part of it during the few days we stayed there. But I don’t think they can have done so, because Nunni was rather a friend of Bets’s and mine, and surely I would have remembered if he had been living in the same house — it wasn’t a very big one! However, I don’t remember much about the whole visit and had it not been for the disaster that it led to, I probably wouldn’t have remembered anything at all.

  What I do remember is that my darling Tacklow, whose idea of purgatory would, if admitted to, be a perpetual round of garden parties, receptions, state balls, banquets and similar functions, did his best to wriggle out of this; on the grounds that if anyone should act as stand-in for His Highness, it should be Saadat. But it did no good. His Highness wanted to be represented by Tackl
ow, and he wouldn’t budge from that, even when the Assistant to the AGG Rajputana unexpectedly came out strongly on Tacklow’s side — not, as I would have expected, because he too thought that the Heir Apparent was the proper person to represent his father, but for a more altruistic reason …

  He wanted to save Mother, Bets and me from boredom and disappointment and, worse, from feeling snubbed. Even though we had all three been invited to the celebrations, we would find that this did not mean we would be able to attend the more glittering and exclusive functions. For instance, the only functions that Bets and I were likely to be asked to were the garden party and the cricket match (or was it polo? I can’t remember). We would certainly not be asked to the state banquet. And it was more than likely that Mother would not be either. It was, you see, all a matter of precedence. Now that Tacklow had retired and was no longer in the service of the Government of India, but had ‘gone private’, his place, according to the Raj’s rule-book of precedence, was a lowly one and would debar him and his family (particularly his daughters!) from attending the more glittering and exclusive functions, and leave only those that were designed for the hoi polloi.