The Command

by Christopher Nicole

  Shere Khan’s capital, Murdoch thought, and wondered if Chand Bibi was down there, looking up at him. If she was alive, and in India, she would know who the new general officer commanding in the province was. He wondered what she would think about that.

  He had been more or less warned not to go near her. But he was his own boss up here.

  They flew on for another hour, and swooped low over the camp at Razmak. This was a camp, with neat rows of white tents stretching for almost a mile, although Murdoch could also make out the foundations for the permanent buildings which would, hopefully soon, be completed. The soldiers mustered to wave at the plane, a lone emblem of Britain’s might, and then they returned to Peshawar for lunch.

  ‘It certainly gives you a different concept of time and space,’ Murdoch confessed as he stepped down and patted his wind-numbed cheeks. ‘How far did we travel?’

  ‘Three hundred miles,’ Eccles said. ‘It’s about a hundred and fifty down to Razmak, as the crow flies. Or an aeroplane. That’s actually about the safe limit for this one. We’re just about out of fuel.’

  ‘I’m glad you didn’t mention that earlier,’ Murdoch said. ‘One hundred and fifty miles, in two hours. How long do you think it would take this command to march that, Eccles?’

  The Squadron Leader shrugged. ‘As you saw, there are virtually no roads, once you get any distance away from Peshawar. I don’t think you could allow more than three miles a day for a foot force.’

  ‘One month, to reach Razmak?’

  The airman grinned. ‘That, sir, is if you weren’t opposed.’

  *

  At the end of the week the regiment arrived. Murdoch took the salute, and it seemed the entire city turned out to admire the dragoons and listen to the march from Aida played by the regimental band. Several prominent Indian citizens told Murdoch at the reception after the parade how they remembered the Westerns here in 1906, and how respected they were. Murdoch thought it a shame that Billy hadn’t stayed with them for such a relative homecoming.

  But they weren’t there for show; as far as he was concerned they were a major component of the only reliable troops he had — and their commanding officer was the only true confidant he had, as well, apart from Manly-Smith.

  ‘The first thing we have to do,’ he told Peter Ramage, ‘is get your fellows absolutely fighting fit. Then we are going to take a tour of the whole province. If we are here to overawe, then we are damned well going to overawe. It’s certainly our best chance of keeping the peace.’

  ‘Give me a fortnight,’ Peter asked. The combination of the long sea voyage and the train ride up from the coast had left the men, and the horses, soft and lazy, but he set to work with a will, and Murdoch greatly enjoyed watching them riding, and shooting, themselves into top form — he noted that they were also watched by both the rest of the garrison and large numbers of civilians.

  Their presence introduced an immediate complication, as Lee decided to throw a large garden party to introduce herself, Jennifer Manly-Smith, Linda Ramage and Coralie Rostron to the locals. ‘Do I invite Mr Yeald?’ she asked.

  ‘Good Lord, no,’ Murdoch said.

  ‘Won’t he be insulted?’

  ‘He’ll be relieved. I don’t think the fact that he is Jennifer’s father should be publicized.’

  ‘Isn’t that rather hypocritical? It’s sure to become known.’

  ‘Of course. But we will by then have established a pattern. There is nothing hypocritical about it. Jennifer has married above herself, and has to live the part. Yeald knows this, and accepts it.’

  Lee accepted his decision, although she was clearly unhappy about it. But Jennifer fitted well into the social whirl of the cantonment.

  A further complication arose when Murdoch announced he was taking the regiment on a grand parade through the entire province. This didn’t actually happen until October, because the rains set in soon after the regiment arrived and the locals told him the hill country would be quite impassable until they stopped. But when they did, Lee was immediately interested.

  ‘I am coming with you, I hope,’ she said.

  He considered. He hadn’t really thought of it, and his initial reaction was rejection. But then he changed his mind. He had to display to the Pathans at once the panoply of a famous warrior and the confidence of a man who had never been defeated; that was his sole reason for being in India. Besides, he had every intention of calling in on Shere Khan; it might be very necessary to have Lee along if Chand Bibi was still there. Chand Bibi, he reckoned, would be in her thirties now — but he didn’t suppose she would be any the less compelling a woman. As for safety, he was travelling not as a lieutenant commanding a patrol, but as a general accompanied by six hundred of the best fighting men in the world. As Chand Bibi would know. He did not consider safety came into it. On the other hand, he was deceiving Lee as to the real purpose of the parade.

  ‘If you would really like to, I should love to have you along,’ he agreed. ‘It’ll mean living rough. And maybe, seeing rough,’ he added, having been reading various reports.

  ‘I’ve been looking forward to that for years,’ she said. ‘There is also a fair chance that by the time we get back it’ll be pretty chilly, according to the experts,’

  ‘I’ll have you to snuggle up to,’ she reminded him.

  *

  Jennifer of course could not leave the baby for what might be a two-month jaunt, and Linda Ramage was not keen on the idea, so in fact Lee was the only woman to ride out of the cantonment with the regiment. In her khaki breeches and jacket and brown boots and with her khaki topee strapped beneath her chin, she looked very nearly as military as the troopers. She rode a mare named Calliope, while Murdoch was on his new horse, Brutus, who had replaced the ageing Mars.

  There actually was a fairly good road south from Peshawar through the Kohat Pass to Kohat, and then south-west to the Bannu Pass and on to Tochi. The cavalry made a steady ten miles a day, and reached Tochi in a fortnight.

  It was a fascinating journey. They rode north-west to begin with, up the Bazar Valley to inspect Jamrud Fort, only a few miles from Peshawar, and the real defence of the Khyber Pass, and then on to the pass itself.

  ‘Can’t we go through it?’ Lee asked, gazing at the huge, overhanging cliffs above them.

  ‘I’m afraid not,’ Murdoch said. ‘Just a few yards over there is Afghanistan.’

  Lee had been reading her history. ‘Well, what about Jellalabad? Isn’t that where the sole survivor of the massacre rode into, in 1842? Let’s go look at that.’

  ‘Jellalabad is north of the pass,’ Ramage told her. ‘To go there really would be an invasion of Afghanistan.’

  As it was they were attracting a great deal of attention from watchers posted in the hills above them, and Murdoch could make out the flashes of heliograph signals being dispatched north. He was quite happy about that; he wanted to let the Afghans know he was there as well.

  But his purpose lay in Waziristan, and he turned the column south-west. Even after they left the vicinity of the famous pass, the land was never less than six hundred feet above sea level, and so the nights were cool enough for blankets, especially under canvas. The scenery was wild in the extreme, and always they were conscious of the looming mountains to either side; Murdoch, indeed, treated it as a reconnaissance in hostile territory and had a squadron out as advance guard, another as rearguard, and flankers. This thrilled Lee, who could imagine she was actually taking part in one of the campaigns she had only ever read about in books or the newspapers.

  She was equally thrilled by the relics of British rule, various hill fortresses, either abandoned and crumbling into dust, or garrisoned by a dozen sepoys and a havildar or sergeant, just keeping an eye on the tribes. Murdoch rapidly concluded that these men were useless, as being assimilated into the society they were supposed to watch.

  The Pathans themselves also turned out en masse to watch the famous regiment ride by, and the first time they camped by a villa
ge invitations were sent to Murdoch and Ramage, Lowndes and Rostron, Destry, Manly-Smith and Bryan to dine with the local khan. Murdoch caused a considerable sensation by informing the khan, on the first of these occasions, that he would be attended by his begum. Of course Lee was accepted, watched by whispering, veiled ladies from the back of the room in which they ate. Murdoch had explained that not all the food might be to her taste but that it all had to be eaten, and she coped splendidly with sheep’s eyes and goats’ testicles, although afterwards she confessed that she had nearly been sick on more than one occasion.

  What was more important to Murdoch, at the next village, and all of them from there on, the invitations included the general’s lady. Obviously the various Pathan tribes were in closer communication than an ordinary day’s ride for his cavalry.

  Lee found other reasons for nearly being sick. Whenever they camped near any Pathan village, they had to accept the risk of pilferage; this was carried out by naked young men, whose bodies were greased to enable them to slide silently through the night in their search for, preferably, rifles and cartridge belts. When shot at, and occasionally hit, they made distressing sights. Even more distressing, however, were the women the regiment occasionally came across. Like their men, the Pathan women were fair-skinned and handsome, but no women can be handsome with her nose cut off.

  ‘They have been unfaithful to their husbands, memsahib,’ Manilal, their head guide, explained. ‘It is the recognized punishment for infidelity.’

  ‘Gee,’ Lee whispered to Murdoch. ‘Remind me to think twice before jumping into bed with anyone but you, lover.’

  Tochi was a large town, to reach which they had to ford the Kurram itself, along which one of the brigades of troops were encamped. Murdoch cast a long look up the hill country to the north, but there was no one who truly understood his interest there.

  In Tochi they were welcomed and invited to make use of apartments in the town itself, but Murdoch preferred to camp with the garrison by the river, although he and his officers and the colonel in command, Gwyn Evan-Jones, and of course Lee, accepted the invitation of the khan to dine and to attend an entertainment. Lee squeezed Murdoch’s hand as the bare-breasted nautch girls postured in front of them, and as she took in the richness of the drapes and carpets, and conversed with the khan, who spoke excellent English.

  ‘I had no idea soldiering could be so much fun,’ she whispered to Murdoch.

  Murdoch managed to have a few words with the khan himself. ‘You have Mahsuds to the south of you,’ he remarked.

  ‘That is so, General,’ the khan agreed.

  ‘How are your relations with them?’

  ‘Excellent, General. We are all good friends up here.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it. But you have also Mahsuds to the north.’

  ‘Ah. Terrible people. Their khan is a bandit. But this is well known.’

  ‘Do you have much trouble with them?’

  ‘No no. Shere Khan is an old man now. He has a white beard. All he wishes is to live in peace.’

  *

  From Tochi it was necessary to climb some four thousand feet, or five thousand above sea level, to reach Razmak. Now for the first time the going grew really rough, and the nights truly cold. Although the distance was only about twenty-five miles, it took them a week, most of the time on foot leading their horses.

  ‘Gee, I’d hate to have to do this and fight as well,’ Lee remarked, panting at Murdoch’s side.

  ‘You are echoing the thought of every man in the regiment,’ Murdoch assured her.

  But at Razmak they were made welcome, with a roaring fire to keep out the chill, and a magnificent lamb korma to warm their stomachs.

  ‘It has all really gone off rather well,’ Colonel Cormack told Murdoch. ‘There was that spot of bother eighteen months ago, but really the Mahsuds seem to have learned their lesson.’

  ‘Including Shere Khan’s bunch,’ Murdoch remarked.

  ‘Even them. In fact, they have been the quietest of the lot, recently.’

  ‘Don’t tell me. Shere Khan is now an old man with a white beard.’

  ‘Well, yes, sir, that is a fairly accurate description. I have no doubt the old adrenaline still flows from time to time, and will be doing so now, when he hears the Royal Westerns are in the area, but that son of his, Abdul, is a sensible fellow and has no wish to take on machine guns and bombing aircraft. I think we have these people sorted out.’

  Murdoch felt he was being unduly sanguine, especially after inspecting the garrison. The British battalion, the Cheshires, was everything he could have wanted, and there was also a battalion of the famous Guides, the regiment raised by Lawrence in the previous century, sepoys who had time and again proved their worth in battle. The other four battalions were Pathans. They looked the born soldiers they were, in their smart turbans and puttees...but they were the brothers and sons and cousins of the people they were meant to overawe.

  Murdoch would have left Lee in Razmak while he made the last part of the journey south, but she wanted to come along, and so they proceeded to the fortress at Wana. This was a further thirty miles, and was a fairly easy journey there, as it was downhill, but it would involve the climb back up.

  All was well with the Wana garrison, and the return journey was commenced. They regained Razmak a week later in a blizzard, as icy winds swept down from the mountains of Afghanistan.

  ‘Good idea to remain here over Christmas, sir,’ Cormack suggested. It’s going to be a bitter journey back.’

  ‘It’s a journey I may have to make, some time, Colonel, in these very conditions,’ Murdoch told him. ‘So I’d better get used to it.’

  The weather improved after a couple of days and they set off again, descending to Tochi. ‘I think,’ Murdoch told Ramage, ‘that instead of heading straight back to Kohat, we’ll follow the border round a bit.’

  ‘You want to take a look at the other Mahsuds,’ Ramage said.

  ‘Why, yes, so I do. They’re old enemies of the Westerns.’ ‘You don’t think we might stir things up?’

  ‘I don’t see why we should. They’re supposed to be the most peaceful of the hill tribes, at this moment. But if our presence is going to stir things up, then the sooner we find out about it the better, as we’re going to be here for some time.’ But he didn’t intend to take any risks. He got Sergeant Denning to raise Peshawar on the radio, and tell Squadron Leader Eccles that six of his bombers were to make a run over the Kurram Valley one week hence at fifteen minutes past noon. But what he had seen had changed his mind about taking Lee into the lair of Chand Bibi.

  ‘We’re going to take a swing through some very rough country,’ he told Lee, ‘and the weather isn’t getting any better. I propose to detach a troop to return direct to Peshawar and would be very happy if you’d accompany them.’

  ‘Why are you detaching a troop?’ she asked.

  ‘Well...I...’

  ‘To escort me. For heaven’s sake, Murdoch. I’m not afraid of a little cold. I used to go skiing in Vermont every winter as a girl.’ She peered at him. ‘Or do you think there’s going to be trouble?’

  ‘Well, since you ask, I’m intending to pay a visit on Shere Khan. He’s supposed to be old and peaceful, nowadays, but less than twenty years ago he was a bitter enemy of the Westerns.’

  ‘This I have got to see,’ she told him. ‘Forget about the troop going back to Peshawar. If they do, they can go without me.’

  *

  Once again he accepted her decision, actually with some relief. It was a march of about thirty miles to the Mahsud town, but it was fairly easy country compared with what they had just left. Their only problem lay in fording the Kurram, which had swollen with the snow of the previous week; they all got thoroughly wet.

  By now their progress was being overseen by watchers in the hills, as they could tell easily enough by the heliograph signals being exchanged. On the fifth day the advance guard of Lieutenant Winton sent back word that Mahrain was in
sight. Murdoch himself rode forward to inspect the area, and chose to camp on a wide pasture about half a mile to the east of the walls. The regiment came up, and the usual precautions were taken; a perimeter was set up and guarded by the Lewis guns, the horses were tethered in long, straight lines, the tents were pitched and sentries posted.

  All of this was watched by an interested crowd of men and boys. It was now fairly late in the afternoon, and the mountains were lost behind the sweeping clouds. ‘Do you think we’ll have an invite, here?’ Lee asked.

  ‘I’m damn sure we will,’ Murdoch said.

  They had just sat down to supper when the messengers arrived, bowing low when Murdoch and Lee left the command tent to meet them.

  ‘Great General,’ their leader said. ‘My master, the mighty Shere Khan, sends to inquire the purpose of this invasion of his lands.’

  ‘As your master well knows,’ Murdoch told him, ‘I am the new commander-in-chief of the British army in the North West Frontier Province. I am thus engaged in inspecting the country which is my responsibility.’

  The man bowed again. Clearly he had known what the answer was going to be. ‘Then my master, the mighty Shere Khan, invites the great English general, and his officers...’ his gaze flickered over Lee, ‘and his lady, to eat with him tomorrow, at the hour of noon.’

  ‘Tell your master we shall be pleased to do so,’ Murdoch said.

  *

  ‘I’m quite nervous,’ Lee confessed. ‘Is he really as formidable as people say?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ Murdoch said. ‘I have never met him.’

  ‘But the regiment fought against him, in the old days.’

  ‘Yes,’ Murdoch said. ‘And gave him a damned good thrashing. Let’s hope he, and his family, remember that.’

  There were eight of them in the party that rode up the shallow hill to the town the following morning, accompanied by Sergeant Matheson and twelve troopers. Lee had wondered if she should wear the one dress she had brought with her, but Murdoch preferred her to remain in khaki. They were welcomed at the gate by the same man who had delivered the invitation, and inside the wall, where there was a large crowd gathered, there was also a guard of honour of some hundred men, very smart in short red jackets and white turbans and breeches, and armed with Lee-Enfield rifles, waiting to be inspected. There had been similar guards of honour in several other places where they had stopped, and of course in the British cantonments, but these were about the smartest of the lot.