“You don’t say,” says I. By George, I hadn’t realised our political arrangements were as ramshackle as this. “That, Captain Skene, is the man I’m here to kill – so if any of your … sharp men have the chance to save me the trouble, they may do it with my blessing.”
“Oh, of course, sir. Oh, they will, you know. Some of them,” says he, impressively, “are Pindari bandits – or used to be, that is. But we’ll know in good time, sir, before any of these Ruski fellows get within distance.”
I wished I could share his confidence. “Calcutta has no notion what the Russian spies were up to down here?” I asked him, but he shook his head.
“Nothing definite at all – only that they’d been here. We were sure it must be connected with the chapattis going round, but those have dried up lately. None have passed since October, and the sepoys of the 12th N.I. – that’s the regiment here, you know – seem perfectly quiet. Their colonel swears they’re loyal – has done from the first, and was quite offended that I reported the cakes to Calcutta. Perhaps he’s right; I’ve had some of my men scouting the sepoy lines, and they haven’t heard so much as a murmur. And Calcutta was to inform me if cakes passed at any other place, but none have, apparently.”
Come, thinks I, this is decidedly better; Pam’s been up a gum-tree for nothing. All I had to do was make a show of brief activity here, and then loaf over to Calcutta after a few weeks and report nothing doing. Give ’em a piece of my mind, too, for causing me so much inconvenience.
“Well, Skene,” says I, “this is how I see it. There’s nothing to be done about what the Prime Minister calls ‘those blasted buns’ – unless they make a reappearance, what? As to the Russians – well, when we get word of them, I’ll probably drop out of sight, d’you see?” I would, too – to some convenient haven which the Lord would provide, and emerge when the coast was clear. But I doubted it would even come to that. “Yes, you won’t see me – but I’ll be about, never fear, and if our one-eyed friend, or any of his creatures, shows face … well …”
He looked suitably impressed, with a hint of that awe which my fearsome reputation inspires. “I understand, sir. You’ll wish to … er, work in your own way, of course.” He blinked at me, and then exclaimed reverently: “By jove, I don’t envy those Ruski fellows above half – if you don’t mind my saying so, sir.”
“Skene, old chap,” says I, and winked at him. “Neither do I.” And believe me, he was my slave for life, from that moment.
“There’s the other thing,” I went on. “The Rani. I have to try to talk some sense into her. Now, I daresay there isn’t much I can do, since I gather she’s shown you and Erskine that she’s not disposed to be friendly, but I’m bound to try, you see. So I’ll be obliged to you if you’ll arrange an audience for me the day after tomorrow – I’d like to rest and perhaps look around the city first. For the present, you can tell me your own opinion of her.”
He frowned, and filled my glass. “You’ll think it’s odd, sir, I daresay, but in all the time I’ve been here, I’ve never even seen her. I’ve met her, frequently, at the palace, but she speaks from behind a purdah, you know – and as often as not her chamberlain does the talking for her. She’s a stickler for form, and since government granted her diplomatic immunity after her husband died – as a sop, really, when we assumed suzerainty – well, it makes it difficult to deal with her satisfactorily. She was friendly enough with Erskine at one time – but I’ve had no change out of her at all. She’s damned bitter, you see – when her husband died, old Raja Gangadar, he left no children of his own – well, he was an odd bird, really,” and Skene blushed furiously and avoided my eye. “Used to go about in female dress most of the time, and wore bangles and … and perfume, you see –”
“No wonder she was bitter,” says I.
“No, no, what I mean is, since he left no legitimate heir, but only a boy whom he’d adopted, Dalhousie wouldn’t recognise the infant. The new succession law, you know. So the state was annexed – and the Rani was furious, and petitioned the Queen, and sent agents to London, but it was no go. The adopted son, Damodar, was dispossessed, and the Rani, who’d hoped to be regent, was deprived of her power – officially. Between ourselves, we let her rule pretty well as she pleases – well, we can’t do otherwise, can we? We’ve one battalion of sepoys, and thirty British civilians to run the state administration – but she’s the law, where her people are concerned, absolute as Caesar.”
“Doesn’t that satisfy her, then?”
“Not a bit of it. She detests the fact that officially she only holds power by the Sirkar’s leave, you see. And she’s still wild about the late Raja’s will – you’d think that with a quarter of a million in her treasury she’d be content, but there was some jewellery or other that Calcutta confiscated, and she’s never forgiven us.”
“Interesting lady,” says I. “Dangerous, d’you think?”
He frowned. “Politically, yes. Given the chance, she’d pay our score off, double quick – that’s why the chapatti business upset me. She’s got no army, as such – but with every man in Jhansi a born fighter, and robber, she don’t need one, do she? And they’ll jump if she whistles, for they worship the ground she treads on. She’s proud as Lucifer’s sister, and devilish hard, not to say cruel, in her own courts, but she’s uncommon kind to the poor folk, and highly thought of for her piety – spends five hours a day meditating, although she was a wild piece, they say, when she was a girl. They brought her up like a Maharatta prince at the old Peshwa’s court – taught her to ride and shoot and fence with the best of them. They say she still has the fiend’s own temper,” he added, grinning, “but she’s always been civil enough to me – at a distance. But make no mistake, she’s dangerous; if you can sweeten her, sir, we’ll all sleep a deal easier at nights.”
There was that, of course. However withered an old trot she might be, she’d be an odd female if she was altogether impervious to Flashy’s manly bearing and cavalry whiskers – which was probably what Pam had in mind in the first place. Cunning old devil. Still, as I turned in that night I wasn’t absolutely looking forward to poodle-faking her in two days’ time, and as I glanced from my bungalow window and saw Jhansi citadel beetling in the starlight, I thought, we’ll take a nice little escort of lancers with us when we go to take tea with the lady, so we will.
But that was denied me. I had intended to pass. the next day looking about the city, perhaps having a discreet word with Carshore the Collector and the colonel of the sepoys, but as the syceb was bringing round my pony to the dak-bungalow, up comes. Skene in a flurry. When he’d sent word to the palace that Colonel Flashman, a distinguished soldier of the Sirkar, was seeking an audience for the following day, he’d been told that distinguished visitors were expected to present themselves immediately as a token of proper respect to her highness, and Colonel Flashman could shift his distinguished rump up to the palace forthwith.
“I … I thought in the circumstances of your visit,” says Skene, apologetically, “that you might think it best to comply.”
“You did, did you?” says I. “Does every Briton in Jhansi leap to attention when this beldam snaps her fingers, then?”
“Shall we say, we find it convenient to humour her highness,” says he – he was more of a political than he looked, this lad, so I blustered a bit, to be in character, and then said he might find me an escort of lancers to convoy me in.
“I’m sorry, sir,” says he. “We haven’t any lancers – and if we had, we’ve agreed not to send troop formations inside the city walls. Also, since I was excluded from the, er … invitation, I fear you must go alone.”
“What?” says I. “Damnation, who governs here – the Sirkar or this harridan?” I didn’t fancy above half risking my hide unguarded in that unhealthy-looking fortress, but I had to cover it with dignity. “You’ve made a rod for your own backs by being too soft with this … this woman. She’s not Queen Bess, you know!”
“She thinks she is,” s
ays he cheerfully, so in the end of course I had to lump it. But I changed into my lancer fig first, sabre, revolver and all – for I could guess why she was ensuring that I visited her alone: up-country, on the frontier, they judge a man on his own looks, but down here they go on the amount and richness of your retinue. One mounted officer wasn’t going to impress the natives with the Sirkar’s power – well, then, he’d look his best, and be damned to her. So I figged up, and when I regarded myself in Skene’s cracked mirror – blue tunic and breeches, gold belt and epaulettes, white gauntlets and helmet, well-bristled whiskers, and Flashy’s stalwart fourteen stone inside it all, it wasn’t half bad. I took a couple of packages from my trunk, stowed them in my saddle-bag, waved to Skene, and trotted off to meet royalty, with only the syce to show me the way.
Jhansi city lies about a couple of miles from the cantonment, and I had plenty of time to take in the scenery. The road, which was well-lined with temples and smaller buildings, was crowded into the city, with bullock-carts churning up the dust, camels, palankeens, and hordes of travellers both mounted and on foot. Most of them were country folk, on their way to the bazaars, but every now and then would come an elephant with red and gold fringed howdah swaying along, carrying some minor nabob or rich lady, or a portly merchant on his mule with a string of porters behind, and once the syce pointed out a group who he said were members of the Rani’s own bodyguard – a dozen stalwart Khyberie Pathans, of all things, trotting along very military in double file, with mail coats and red silk scarves wound round their spiked helmets. The Rani might not have a army, but she wasn’t short of force, with those fellows about: there was a hundred years’ Company service among them if there was a day.
And her city defences were a sight to see – massive walls twenty feet high, and beyond them a warren of streets stretching for near a mile to the castle rock, with its series of curtain walls and round towers – it would be the deuce of a place to storm, after you’d fought through the city itself; there were guns in the embrasures, and mail-clad spearmen on the walls, all looking like business.
We had to force our horses through a crowded inferno of heat and smells and noise and jostling niggers to get to the palace, which stood apart from the fort near a small lake, with a shady park about it; it was a fine, four-square building, its outer walls beautifully decorated with huge paintings of battles and hunting scenes. I presented myself to another Pathan, very splendid in steel back-and-breast and long-tail puggaree, who commanded the gate guard, and sat sweating in the scorching sun while he sent off a messenger for the chamberlain. And as I chafed impatiently, the Pathan walked slowly round me, eyeing me up and down, and presently stopped, stuck his thumbs in his belt, and spat carefully on my shadow.
Now, close by the gate there happened to be a number of booths and side-shows set up – the usual things, lemonade-sellers, a fakir with a plant growing through his palm, sundry beggars, and a kind of punch-and-judy show, which was being watched by a group of ladies in a palankeen. As a matter of fact, they’d already taken my eye, for they were obviously Maharatta females of quality, and four finer little trotters you never saw. There was a very slim, languid-looking beauty in a gold sari reclining in the palankeen, another plump piece in scarlet trousers and jacket beside her, and a third, very black, but fine-boned as a Swede, with a pearl headdress that must have cost my year’s pay, sitting in a kind of camp-chair alongside – even the ladies’ maid standing beside the palankeen was a looker, with great almond eyes and a figure inside her plain white sari like a Hindoo temple goddess. I was in the act of touching my hat to them when the Pathan started expectorating. At this the maid giggled, the ladies looked, and the Pathan sniffed contemptuously and spat again.
Well, as a rule anyone can insult me and see how much it pays him, especially if he’s large and ugly and carrying a tulwar.c But for the credit of the Sirkar, and my own face in front of the women, I had to do something, so I looked the Pathan up and down, glanced away, and said quietly in Pushtu:
“You would spit more carefully if you were still in the Guides, hubshi.”d
He opened his eyes at that, and swore. “Who calls me hubshi? Who says I was in the Guides? And what is it to thee, feringheee pig?”
“You wear the old coat under your breastplate,” says I. “But belike you stole it from a dead Guide. For no man who had a right to that uniform would spit on Bloody Lance’s shadow.”
That set him back on his heels. “Bloody Lance?” says he. “Thou?” He came closer and stared up at me. “Art thou that same Iflass-man who slew the four Gilzais?”
“At Mogala,” says I mildly. It had caused a great stir at the time, in the Gilzai country, and won me considerable fame (and my extravagant nickname) along the Kabul road – in fact, old Mohammed Iqbal had killed the four horsemen, while I lit out for the undergrowth, but nobody living knew that.f And obviously the legend endured, for the Pathan gaped and swore again, and then came hastily to attention and threw me a barra salaamg that would have passed at Horse Guards.
“Sher Khan, havildarh lately of Ismeet Sahib’s company of the Guides,7 as your honour says,” croaks he. “Now, shame on me and mine that I put dishonour on Bloody Lance, and knew him not! Think not ill of me, husoori, for –”
“Let the ill think ill,” says I easily. “The spittle of a durwanj will not drown a soldier.” I was watching out of the corner of my eye to see how the ladies were taking this, and noted with satisfaction that they were giggling at the Pathan’s discomfiture. “Boast to your children, O Ghazik-that-was-a-Guide-and-is-now-a-Rani’s-porter, that you spat on Bloody Lance Iflass-man’s shadow – and lived.” And I walked my horse past him into the courtyard, well pleased; it would be all round Jhansi inside the hour.
It was a trifling enough incident, and I forgot it with my first glance at the interior of the Rani’s palace. Outside it had been all dust and heat and din, but here was the finest garden courtyard you ever saw – a cool, pleasant enclosure where little antelopes and peacocks strutted on the lawns, parrots and monkeys chattered softly in the surrounding trees, and a dazzling white fountain played; there were shaded archways in the carved walls, where well-dressed folk whom I took to be her courtiers sat and talked, waited on by bearers. One of the richest thrones in India, Pam had said, and I could believe it – there were enough silks and jewellery on view there to stuff an army with loot, the statuary was of the finest, in marble and coloured stones that I took to be jade, and even the pigeons that pecked at the spotless pavements had silver rings on their claws. Until you’ve seen it, of course, you can’t imagine the luxury in which these Indian princes keep themselves – and there are folk at home who’ll tell you that John Company were the robbers!
I was kept waiting there a good hour before a major-domo came, salaaming, to lead me through the inner gate and up a narrow winding stair to the durbar room on the first storey; here again all was richness – splendid silk curtains on the walls, great chandeliers of purple crystal hanging from the carved and gilded ceiling, magnificent carpets on the floor (with good old Axminster there among the Persian, I noticed) and every kind of priceless ornament, gold and ivory, ebony and silverwork, scattered about. It would have been in damned bad taste if it hadn’t all been so bloody expensive, and the dozen or so men and women who lounged about on the couches and cushions were dressed to match; the ones down in the courtyard must have been their poor relations. Handsome as Hebe the women were, too – I was just running my eye over one alabaster beauty in tight scarlet trousers who was reclining on a shawl, playing with a parakeet, when a gong boomed somewhere, everyone stood up, and a fat little chap in a huge turban waddled in and announced that the durbar had begun. At which music began to play, and they all turned and bowed to the wall, which I suddenly realised wasn’t a wall at all, but a colossal ivory screen, fine as lace, that cut the room in two. Through it you could just make out movement in the space beyond, like shadows behind thick gauze; this was the Rani’s purdah screen, to keep out
prying heathen eyes like mine.
I seemed to be first man in, for the chamberlain led me to a little gilt stool a few feet from the screen, and there I sat while he stood at one end of the screen and cried out my name, rank, decorations, and (it’s a fact) my London clubs; there was a murmur of voices beyond, and then he asked me what I wanted, or words to that effect. I replied, in Urdu, that I brought greetings from Queen Victoria, and a gift for the Rani from her majesty, if she would graciously accept it. (It was a perfectly hellish photograph of Victoria and Albert looking in apparent stupefaction at a book which the Prince of Wales was holding in an attitude of sullen defiance; all in a silver frame, too, and wrapped up in muslin.) I handed it over, the chamberlain passed it through, listened attentively, and then asked me who the fat child in the picture was. I told him, he relayed the glad news, and then announced that her highness was pleased to accept her sister-ruler’s gift – the effect was spoiled a trifle by a clatter from behind the screen which suggested the picture had fallen on the floor (or been thrown), but I just stroked my whiskers while the courtiers tittered behind me. It’s hell in the diplomatic, you know.
There was a further exchange of civilities, through the chamberlain, and then I asked for a private audience with the Rani; he replied that she never gave them. I explained that what I had to say was of mutual but private interest to Jhansi and the British government; he looked behind the screen for instructions, and then said hopefully:
“Does that mean you have proposals for the restoration of her highness’s throne, the recognition of her adopted son, and the restitution of her property – all of which have been stolen from her by the Sirkar?”
Well, it didn’t, of course. “What I have to say is for her highness alone,” says I, solemnly, and he stuck his head round the screen and conferred, before popping back.
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