The Passage to India

by Allan Mallinson

  Johnson winced, but made no sound.

  ‘Accha,’ said the daffadar, putting down the probe and taking up a bullet-extractor. He spread the wound wide with his fingers, peered closely at it, prompting a sharp intake of breath from Johnson, and in less than a count of five had the ball out.

  Johnson had made no other sound.

  Next a pair of forceps, the wound spread wider still … and almost as fast, out came a tiny twist of blue and white.

  Hervey nodded admiringly. It was one thing to remove a ball – a solid object, in one piece, unmistakable – and another to extract the debris with it, so that the wound mightn’t fester.

  ‘Bahuta accha, daffadar-sahib!’

  The daffadar bowed, then took the brandy and poured it into the wound.

  They bedded him down in the shade of a plum tree, wrapping him well and under a mosquito net, with Corporal Melia keeping watch. In a few minutes he was asleep. Hervey sighed: Johnson had gone through the French wars with barely a scratch, and now here of all places he’d had to submit to the surgeon’s probe – a native surgeon at that (deft though he was). The Preacher – A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace. Was it so for Johnson too?

  ‘Tell me, Neale,’ he said afterwards, as they walked to the deewah’s empty tent, ‘how a Mussulman approves of brandy.’

  Neale smiled. ‘It is very simple, Colonel. The Koran does not forbid alcohol absolutely. It says only that in alcohol there is both harm and good, but that the harmful effects exceed the good. In this case, the daffadar saw no harm and only good.’

  ‘Then I am all admiration, even more.’

  ‘The rissaldar is having a tanga got up for Corporal Johnson. It won’t have springs, I don’t suppose, but filled with grass it should be comfortable enough. I am supposing we shall leave tomorrow morning, Colonel?’

  ‘Yes. And extra vigilance tonight, please.’

  They’d got down the beanstalk in one piece, but the beanstalk still stood, and the ‘giant’ might come down it – but it was a metaphor he preferred to keep to himself.

  ‘By the bye, Neale, tell me: what is the Kanarese for “water” – “huli”?’

  Neale looked at him quizzically. ‘No, Colonel: “water” is “niru”; “huli” is “tiger”.’

  Hervey groaned.

  PART THREE

  A TIME OF WAR

  For by wise counsel thou shalt make thy war: and in multitude of counsellors there is safety.

  PROVERBS, 24:6

  XXI

  ‘To Your Duties’

  12 July 1833

  ‘’PON MY WORD, Hervey: as fine a sight as ever I saw. Fine men, fine horses. I’d crowns resign to call them mine! Or even just a squadron. They do you great credit, sir!’ There was ever a part of Somervile that was the soldier manqué.

  Hervey had just ridden off parade, the first muster of the regiment complete. The last detail – fifty men of E Troop – had landed in the middle of March; and the RM had warranted the last remounts a month later. Hervey had given his captains time to work up their troops, and now it was time for regimental drill.

  ‘Handsome is as handsome does, though,’ he replied, yet certainly pleased with appearances too. ‘We shall now put away the red for the season and put on something more workaday. Come and see us in a month in the hills yonder.’

  ‘I shall. But it’s a fine thing to be up betimes … What is the time, indeed?’ (He took out his watch.) ‘’Pon my word – a quarter past seven! And your trumpeter sounded the first call at six. Where has the hour gone?’

  Hervey had had a good look at each troop, purposely taking long to see how steady they could remain. Now, however, the heat would begin to try the horses, which was why he wanted them back to the shade of the stable and the relief the punkahs brought. ‘I would ask you to breakfast with us, but I know you have an audience this morning.’

  ‘Box wallahs, yes, for the Steam Fund. I tell you, Hervey, short that my time here may be, I’m determined we shall have steam to Suez.’

  ‘Admirable.’

  ‘But first, Mysore secured. I wouldn’t have any successor take from me a sack of ferrets. That wretch at Coorg … By the bye, how does Kezia bear the heat? Emma thought her tired yesterday.’

  ‘She’s well, thank you. Very well. But next year I’ll want to take the regiment to Vellore for these months. But …’ (he smiled in somewhat bashful satisfaction) ‘I believe she may be brought to bed even as we speak.’

  ‘’Pon my word, Hervey: ought not you to be with her?’

  ‘To lend my considerable obstetric skill?’

  His old friend recovered his senses. ‘Quite. Besides, you have your parade.’

  ‘Just so. Though I must say, I have at last a major in whom I can place the utmost trust. He’s diligent without being excessively active.’

  Somervile nodded. ‘Yes, you have a good man there. You’re fortunate; I’ve seen some rum exchanges in regiments come to India.’

  Major Garratt, a bachelor four or five years older than Hervey, was an officer content with just a little soldiering and otherwise the pleasures of the table – including cards. He’d been a lieutenant at Waterloo, however – in the sand pits with the Ninety-fifth (or the Rifle Brigade, as now they must be known) – and a month ago had astonished all ranks by outshooting Serjeant Acton at the regimental sports. He too had been as unaccustomed to wearing a red coat as any in the Sixth, but was now as content as they were. Indeed, even Hervey had begun thinking the King might yet be right in demanding it of all his cavalry, not least that Kezia professed to liking it – all the ladies, indeed.

  If, that is, they could have something more serviceable for the field.

  ‘If you’ll excuse me, Somervile – or “with your leave”, I should say – I’d like to see them back.’

  ‘Of course; of course. And you’ve much else to occupy you.’

  Hervey smiled. ‘You may tell Emma she need have no fear.’

  ‘I shall indeed. But one last: when is your lancer coming?’

  ‘I expect him any day.’

  ‘Capital. I would meet him as soon as may be.’

  Hervey frowned. ‘After first he pays respects to General O’Callaghan.’

  ‘Of course; of course. I don’t wish to interfere in military affairs.’

  That wasn’t true, and both knew it. Somervile had a shrewd mind for campaign matters; it was just that his enthusiasm to see things for himself sometimes exceeded his capability. More than once in South Africa he’d nearly ended up ‘vulture meat’, as the dragoons liked to say.

  Hervey did, though, look keenly to the arrival of Lieutenant Neale. As soon as Somervile told him the governor-general had approved in principle the annexation of Coorg – or something very much its like – he’d asked for him to be his major of brigade. As yet the Coorg Field Force was but a paper design, known only to a very few, but when the time came for its embodiment, Hervey wanted no delay on account of a deficient staff. At first he’d thought about St Alban too, as a supernumerary, but then thought better of it, for he was too valuable to the regiment, which Hervey intended should play the major part; and in any case, when the hurly-burly was done, he himself would return to command, and he didn’t want the administration of the Sixth to have fallen off in the meantime.

  In the bright sunshine, the red was undeniably impressive. The route to barracks was lined with Madrasis of every age, both male and female, and their looks – so far as the looks of any native of this land revealed the truth – were of esteem; even of awe. Hervey was as much concerned to observe them as he was the squadrons themselves. The major did have a tolerably good seat on parade, though, which he had indeed wondered about before. It would be the better for slightly less weight bearing down on his charger’s back, but he wagered that was only a matter of time. The hot months in India had a way with excess flesh.

  But it was good to be able to give the order ‘To your duties, Dismiss!’ and to know
he could then turn his back, sure in the knowledge that there was such an eye – and an ear – as Garratt’s abroad.

  Half an hour later he sat in his office with his first cup of coffee of the morning. The punkah was not yet in motion, for it was better to bear the heat for as long as possible, to become accustomed to it, and it would be another hour before all but the half-naked sweepers found it a trial. In the distance a cuckoo called, not exactly as the English bird, but a cuckoo, distinctly, nevertheless. It was as well to be prompted to home thoughts from time to time – to Wiltshire, perhaps, where Georgiana too would be hearing the cuckoo (and in time, he hoped, here). The cuckoo comes in April, / And sings her song in May. / In June she lays her eggs, / And July she flies away.

  Happy morning indeed. And as soon as orderly room was done he’d take a few mozhams of jasmine for Kezia, or for Annie to give her if she were in labour …

  ‘Colonel, may I have a word?’

  St Alban didn’t usually presage business this way. Nor as a rule did he look uneasy.

  ‘By all means,’ said Hervey, putting down his coffee. ‘Is something amiss?’

  ‘Colonel, I regret to inform you that I intend sending in my papers.’

  Hervey’s spirits began to sink – and from such a high peak.

  ‘Sit down, Edward.’

  ‘I am in every way content in the regiment – and it goes without saying, I trust, that I’m equally so in being your adjutant; I’m honoured, indeed, to be your adjutant – but I’m troubled by what we’re about to do at Coorg, I mean.’

  ‘Indeed?’

  ‘And with much else that goes with that. I’m sorry to tell you of it at this time, particularly, but I made up my mind some weeks ago, and I would have counted it a deception to continue without telling you.’

  ‘I am grateful for that. But so that I might fully understand, what, precisely, is your objection to what is intended in Coorg? The man is a monster, is he not, and in breach of his treaty with the Company?’

  ‘Undoubtedly, Colonel. My objection is to the whole situation of the Company in India, and we, in effect, but mercenaries. The search for a casus belli for Coorg only suggests that the enterprise is discreditable.’

  Hervey might have bridled at the suggestion he was about to embark on something discreditable, but instead he nodded. He’d heard as much before, in many a place and many a time. Years ago he’d read Burke’s speeches on the trial of Warren Hastings, which were enough to put off any man of sensibility. And yet, the world was as it was, and he reckoned its improvement was but a gradual thing at best, and that meanwhile there was many an ‘accommodation’ to make. He admired men like Wilberforce, but for the most part, the choice was between the lesser of two evils.

  ‘For my part, Edward, I don’t doubt that we aid corruption and help line the pockets of unworthy men, but I ask myself – as I did the first time I came to India – is our presence in the main beneficent? Would India without us be a better place – in particular for the poor devils who live on dust and whom we pass by without a word? I believe not.’

  ‘I know that you believe that, Colonel. There were some at Hounslow – as you very well know – convinced that you saw only opportunity for glory in India, but I could never believe it. There is room for honourable differences.’

  Hervey knew perfectly well that there’d been dissent in Hounslow. There was nothing wrong with seeking glory; for a soldier, indeed, it was quite the reverse – though true glory did not come of dishonour. ‘And your position is undoubtedly honourable, Edward. But I must say frankly, I shall count it a great personal loss. I’ve been most fortunate in both my adjutants; and I’ve taken much delight in your company.’

  St Alban looked suddenly concerned. ‘Colonel, I’ve not expressed myself well. With your leave, I don’t intend sending in my papers until the business in Coorg is done. I couldn’t send them in in the knowledge that the regiment is to see action. If one dragoon were killed – if any man, indeed – for want of something I might have done, especially after my time spent in reconnaissance there, I could not in conscience rest.’

  If puzzled, rather, by what seemed excessive scrupulosity, Hervey was nevertheless gratified. ‘For this relief, much thanks, Edward.’

  He did not add that when, in due course, the Honourable Edward St Alban rose to speak in parliament, as one day – and sooner rather than later – he surely would, it would be with all the greater moral authority for such a decision.

  St Alban stood up. ‘With your leave, then, Colonel?’

  Hervey opened the drawer of his desk – the old battle-scarred writing table that had come home from India with the regiment after Bhurtpore. Lord Holderness had replaced it with a fine French piece, but Lincoln, being of the school that believed ‘disposals’ were an affront to the quartermaster’s art, had placed it in his stores, whence Collins had shipped it.

  He took out a printed sheaf. ‘Will you do me the favour of reading this, at your leisure?’

  ‘Of course, Colonel.’

  A Bill for effecting an arrangement with the India Company, and for the better government of His Majesty’s Indian Territories.

  ‘It’s an early draft, by Somervile’s account, but in essence that which will go before parliament – may indeed be already before it. I think you’ll find it … encouraging.’

  ‘Colonel.’

  Hervey poured himself more coffee when the door closed, though managing to spill a deal of it in his disappointment. Who on earth might take St Alban’s place when the time came?

  The door opened again.

  ‘Colonel, the surgeon …’

  Hervey sprang up.

  Milne came in, grave and saluting.

  ‘What—’

  ‘Colonel, Mrs Hervey is safely delivered of a healthy son at ten minutes before seven. May I offer my congratulations.’

  And he smiled – so rare a thing that Hervey began to laugh.

  ‘A son – at ten before seven, just as we got on parade!’

  St Alban was just as relieved. Fearing the worst, he’d already sent for Armstrong.

  ‘My dear Milne, take some coffee – brandy, whatever … I’ll go at once. Kezia, she is well, you say.’

  ‘I’ve never seen better, Colonel.’

  Allegra, a child of rising seven, strong-willed and under regulation of a fine governess, had not yet been admitted to the happy parturiency. Sarah, Kezia’s lady’s maid, having bathed her mistress abed, was at work now with the hairbrush, and although the surgeon had been gone for half an hour, there was still much to-ing and fro-ing by the females of the household, including Allegra’s governess, who had once been a nursery maid and whose assistance was therefore called on to supervise the newly engaged ayah. And Annie had been maid-of-all-work for two full hours while Mrs Stray endeavoured to keep some semblance of order in the residence of the commanding officer of the 6th Light Dragoons. Serjeant Stray himself had done his morning rounds of the outdoor servants – the chowkidar, the mali, and the syces who looked after the ponies and the tanga and the chukree – then sent away the houseboys on various errands, and retreated to what he preferred to call his ‘store’ (the silver room) to do the accounts. The receipt of babies was not something that had previously exercised him in his many years of quartermastering.

  Allegra was determined to take full advantage of her release from the schoolroom, and of the sudden freedom of the house. There were sweet things to be had. But the cooks were about the kitchen yet, so she sneaked instead to the stillroom. It was always nice and cool there, for the air seemed to move of its own accord (the ventilator louvres set both high and low), and there might be chikki, which she liked best. She loved crunching the nuts, the almonds especially, and letting the jiggery melt in her mouth. No one would find her there.

  She was right – about the chikki at least. There was a whole tray of it in the middle of the big table, in nice little pieces she could reach for easily – pink, green and golden brown. She filled
her hands and sat under the table, just in case one of the hubshis, as Corporal Johnson called them (although she didn’t think they had woolly heads at all), came in. She thought she might stay there all morning in fact, until it was time for her nap, when Miss Ames would come looking for her for sure.

  It was so quiet.

  And it stayed quiet all morning. In truth, ‘all morning’ was only about twenty minutes, but she’d had several handfuls of chikki, and given some to her doll, and it seemed like all morning …

  And then Annie heard her – the plaintive little ‘Ohhh …’

  She’d been taking the short cut to the dhobi house with a bucket of soiled bed linen, but she had a sharp ear, and the ‘Ohhh …’ didn’t sound right. She knew it was Allegra – or else a very clever myna bird. But how could a myna have got in the stillroom?

  She put down the bucket and gently opened the door.

  She gasped. ‘Stay still, Miss Allegra. Stay still. Don’t move. Mick!’

  Serjeant Stray heard her distress. He could always move with speed even when the fattest corporal in the regiment. Now he was like lightning.

  Long years of storemanship stood between him and his days in a troop, but not his skill with the sabre. It hung on the door, but was out of its scabbard before he was upright.

  Seconds only to the stillroom, but … ‘Christ!’

  No word of warning, no ‘Stay still!’ No guard and no time to loft the blade. He just sprang.

  The cobra – massive beyond any he’d seen in the bazaar – struck like a whiplash.

  How had he known? How could his sabre move so fast? Neither cut nor thrust – no time, no space – just a flick of the wrist. The tip of the blade – two, three inches at most – barred its way.

  The head fell at his feet, hood spread wide. What remained writhed so much that he struck at it twice – reflex.

  He took a deep breath and pretended all was well – that all had been well. ‘It’s all right, Annie love. It’s dead ’n’ gone. You can come out now.’