The Faraway Drums

by Jon Cleary

  Magda lavished perfume on herself. Though she sat on the other side of the Nawab from me, I still got a very strong whiff of her. “What a lovely perfume!” said the Nawab, sniffing as if he had a cold. “Is it French?”

  “Bulgarian,” said Magda, and seemed to send out another wave of it. It was like being down-wind from a rose-syrup factory. “My husband has it specially made for me. Do you like your ladies perfumed, Your Highness?”

  Oh my God! But the Nawab seemed to revel in the direct assault. “Of course. I noticed you aren’t wearing any, Miss O’Brady.”

  “I couldn’t find my eye-dropper.”

  Magda laughed. She was like her husband: you couldn’t dent her with an axe. “Miss O’Brady prefers the subtle approach. But one only needs that with men who are afraid of women. And you’re not afraid, are you, Your Highness?”

  Suddenly, perversely, I liked her. She was an old campaigner from the battles of the sexes; she had won her medals, perhaps by losing her honour, but she had certainly won them.

  I wondered how Clive, who did not have a subtle approach with women, was faring with the Nawab’s youngest wife. Then we heard the shot from over behind the zenana tents.

  End of extract from memoirs.

  II

  Farnol had seen Bridie go down to sit with the Nawab and at once he had made his way discreetly, using the long line of tethered elephants as a screen, towards the zenana. The two tents housing the wives had been set well apart from those of the main party; two armed men from the Nawab’s escort guarded them. But a latrine shelter had been put up in a stand of bamboo behind the tents, and Farnol, standing by the last of the elephants, had seen one of the older wives go towards it without any interference from the guards. He stood and waited and two or three minutes after the first wife had emerged from the shelter the youngest wife came out of one of the tents and walked towards the bamboo. Once behind the screen of bamboo she moved quickly across to join Farnol.

  “My name is Ganga, but you mustn’t mention it to my husband.” She spoke in Hindi, her voice just a whisper behind her veil. “I do not know what he would do to me if he knew I had spoken with you. He can be very cruel with his tongue sometimes.”

  “What is it you wanted to tell me?”

  “The other Englishman—Major Savanna?” The girl was trembling; Farnol could smell the fear in her. “The gossip is that you do not know why he was at Prince Mahendra’s palace.”

  Farnol did not wonder how the gossip had reached the zenana: Indian ears, he knew, could hear whispers in a cyclone. “Do you know why he was there?”

  “To see Prince Sankar.”

  It took Farnol a moment to understand whom she meant. “Your husband’s cousin?”

  “Yes. The Rajah of Pandar. He was there at the palace the night we arrived. I saw him with Major Savanna.”

  “Was Major Savanna all right when you saw him? I mean, was he ill?”

  “I don’t think so. He was very angry. He and Sankar were arguing—it was a very fierce argument.”

  “Could you hear what they were saying?”

  “Only a word or two. They were in a courtyard below our rooms, but on the other side of it. I heard Major Savanna say your name.”

  “Did you hear what he said about me?” Jesus God Almighty, could Savanna have been in the plot to assassinate him?

  “No. I said, they were too far away. But once Major Savanna almost shouted your name, he was so angry.”

  “Did any of the other wives see them?”

  “No, I was at the window on my own.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” He wanted to believe her; but she could be lying to him for her own ends. Or someone else’s.

  She was silent. In the darkness she was a presence rather than a shape; it struck him that if she passed him in daylight without her veil he would not recognize her. All he knew of her was her eyes and her voice; the voice sounded like that of someone very young, a schoolgirl. Behind them the wall of elephants stirred restlessly; a mahout called out for them to quieten down. The night breeze rustled drily through the bamboo and over by the kitchen tent a cook screamed at some bumble-footed coolie. Dinner would soon be ready, he must be getting back to join the others before he was missed.

  “I do not like being one of the wives—”

  “Your husband must love you—” He didn’t really believe that.

  “He tells me he loves me more than the others. But he tells that to all of us—”

  He wanted to laugh. It was like some joke from Punch, if Punch went in for jokes like that.

  “I want to leave the zenana.” He had to lean forward to hear her; she smelled of some musky perfume that her sweat of fear heightened. “Perhaps you could help me—”

  Farnol saw the tiny red flash in the darkness in the instant that he heard the shot. Ganga fell forward into his arms and he dropped to the ground with her, waiting for the second shot. Behind him an elephant screamed and out of the corner of his eye he saw the long line swaying against the stars like a mountain range heaving in an earthquake. Christ, they’re going to break loose and stampede! Careless of whether there would be a second or third shot, he scooped up Ganga, got to his feet and staggered away from the elephants, plunging blindly into some bamboo and crashing through it as if it were no more than sticks of celery. He could hear the mahouts shouting as they tried to quieten the elephants, but the huge beasts were screaming and trumpeting and, faintly behind their clamour, there was also the terrified neighing of the horses.

  He stumbled through some bushes, avoided a cactus tree more by instinct than because he saw it, and staggered out into the open beside the zenana tents. The panic was subsiding in the elephant and horse lines, the mahouts and syces gaining control. He stopped and laid Ganga on the ground, knowing as he did so that she was already dead. He was kneeling beside her when the Nawab loomed over him.

  “What happened?”

  Farnol stood up slowly, feeling for the first time the scratches and cuts from his crashing through the bamboo. People were crowding in behind the Nawab; the other wives, servants; but so far he had seen none of the Europeans nor the Ranee and Mahendra. For the moment he was in the Nawab’s territory, like someone trapped in an alien embassy.

  “She is dead. Someone shot her.”

  A bearer raised a paraffin lamp on a stick as the Nawab dropped to one knee beside his dead wife. It was as if he had not recognized the limp shape at Farnol’s feet; but now the yellow glow of the lamp showed her face with its veil torn away. Farnol was surprised how young she looked; she could not have been more than sixteen. Young and beautiful, but dead; the Nawab suddenly bent his head and gave a strangled sob. The other wives all began to weep then, as if they had been waiting for their husband to lead them by example. The servants looked neither sad nor curious, as if a death in the zenana could never touch any of them.

  “I’m sorry, Bertie.”

  Farnol walked quietly away, the wives and servants opening up their ranks to let him through. He came out into the open to see Bridie and the others standing in a group outside the dining-tent.

  “One of Bertie’s wives has been shot,” he told them.

  There was a gasp from the women and murmurs of concern from the men. But Farnol was watching Mahendra, the only one who showed no expression at all. In the pale yellow light from the paraffin lamps in the dining tent, the young prince looked as if he might have been alone, lost in contemplation that had nothing to do with the tragedy of a moment ago.

  “Who shot her?” said the Ranee. She sounded angry; but she could have been afraid. “Why?”

  “Clive—” The Nawab had come up, stood on the edge of the group. “I’d like to talk to you. Alone.”

  Farnol glanced at Bridie, wondering how successful she had been in distracting the Nawab’s attention before the shooting. But the light was not good enough for him to read any glance she gave him; he turned away and followed the Nawab down to the edge of the river. He was sickened an
d shocked by what had happened to Ganga, the effect doubled by the thought that he, and not she, had been the real target.

  “What were you doing with Ganga?”

  There was no point in lying: the girl was safe from any punishment Bertie might inflict on her. “She wanted to see me about Major Savanna.”

  “She should have minded her own business. She’d still be alive if she had. What did she know about Savanna?” But the question seemed rhetorical; his voice broke. “She was the one I truly loved, Clive. But she never believed that.”

  That’s always a problem when you have five other wives: but one couldn’t say that without sounding flippant. Still, he was surprised at the sincerity of Bertie’s grief; the man had never shown himself to be anything but self-centred. “How old was she?”

  “She would have been sixteen next week.”

  A child, by his own standards: but then he had always been more interested in older women, whether English or Indian. “I never dreamed I was exposing her to any danger by talking to her. Except from you—I thought you might be angry with her if you knew.”

  “I’d never have hurt her.” Bertie waved a hand at the night: “But who would kill her?”

  “Bertie—I think whoever it was, was trying to kill me. In the dark I think he was off target.”

  “You should not have talked with her,” the Nawab said stubbornly, as if there were some hope that death could be rescinded.

  Below them the river hissed and whispered and out in midstream a fish splashed, a large one, perhaps a mahseer. It seemed to Farnol, his mind still askew, that the sounds were sinister. Abruptly he wondered if Bertie had brought him down here to make him an easier target for that second shot. The moon came up over the valley’s rim like a yellow explosion in slow motion and he knew how clearly he must be outlined against the suddenly bright river.

  “She told me your cousin Prince Sankar was at Mahendra’s palace the night before last, that he was with Savanna before Savanna became ill.”

  The Nawab stared out at the river, sighed heavily. “I did not know that. I haven’t seen Sankar in, oh, almost a month.”

  “What has he to do with all this?”

  “All what? Nothing, as far as I know. Why should he?” But Farnol knew the Nawab was lying.

  He had never met the Rajah of Pandar. The State of Pandar was neighbour to the States of Serog and Kalanpur; once it had been the only State in this region, till tribal chieftains, long before the British came, had fought the ruler of Pandar and set up their own principalities. But Pandar was still the biggest and richest of the three States and till six months ago had been ruled by an elderly recluse who had never encouraged visitors, least of all officers of the British Raj. Perhaps Savanna had visited him on courtesy calls, but Farnol would have to wait till he got down to see George Lathrop before he could check that. The ruler had died and his only son and heir, Prince Sankar, had come home from Europe, where he had lived for ten years, to become Rajah. The State had had a reputation for stability and the British, not wanting to stir quiet waters, had never interfered more than was necessary.

  Farnol himself sighed, decided he was going to get nowhere with the Nawab. And it was time he found a background other than the silver river, made himself a much less exposed target. “Righto, Bertie, we’ll leave it at that. I don’t believe you and I want you to know it. So we’ll both know where we stand from now on. But with the murder of your wife, I thought you might be forthcoming. Just for her sake.”

  “Goodnight, Clive.” The Nawab went up the bank and across to his tent.

  Farnol was left alone, outlined against the bright silver background. He shivered, waiting for the bullet to hit home; then he went up the bank and across to the dining-tent. It took great effort not to run.

  No one ate much, the talk was desultory and Farnol was glad to escape from the table. Bridie followed him out into the night and at once he was concerned for her.

  “You shouldn’t be near me. You saw what happened to that girl.”

  “I can’t keep avoiding you all the way down to Delhi. Let’s sit down here.” There were two canvas chairs outside Farnol’s and the Baron’s tent. “I’ll sit apart from you, if it’ll make you feel any easier.”

  He went into the tent, turned out the paraffin lamp so that they would not be silhouetted against it. Then he came back and sat down beside her, not bothering to move his chair apart from hers. He felt comforted, which was something he had not felt with a woman in a long time. He had certainly never felt comforted by Mala.

  “Bertie seems genuinely upset. He says he loved her.”

  “How old was she? She was very young, wasn’t she?”

  “Not quite sixteen.”

  “Oh my God! And he’s—what? Forty?”

  “They marry young in this country.”

  “But the difference in their ages!” She knew of elderly men back home who had young mistresses; but that was different. The girls were always free to leave, they would have laughed at the thought of marriage unless a huge settlement was written into the marriage contract.

  “I thought it happened a lot in Ireland. Old men marrying young girls. I remember reading once that Sir John Acton, who was the Prime Minister of Naples in Nelson’s day, was sixty-four when he married his thirteen-year-old niece.”

  “Disgusting!”

  But they were both just making words. He put out a hand and took hers, forgetful of targets and snipers. “It’s better, of course, if you’re much the same age. How old are you?”

  “Old enough.” She turned her hand over, linked her fingers in his. “But I still say, that poor girl. Bertie’s wife. Not just that she died the way she did, but that her life was already decided for her. Women should have more—more freedom than that.”

  “I agree.” But he would have agreed with anything she said that evening. Anything to be comforted.

  III

  The youngest wife, Ganga, was cremated early next morning beside the river. Farnol insisted that the caravan move on, but he stayed behind with the Nawab and the four escort guards. A pyre had been built and the body already laid on it before the sun came up. The caravan moved off and only Magda and the Baron, riding backwards in the coach, looked back.

  “Don’t cremate me, sweetheart.” Magda shivered and looked up at her husband riding beside the coach. But she couldn’t resist torturing herself, singeing herself with flames not yet lit. She said to the Baron, “Do you want them to make ashes of you, Herr Baron?”

  “I am a Catholic, Madame. We only burn our sinners.”

  “Catholics,” said Lady Westbrook to the Ranee. “They think they own Hell as well as Heaven.”

  By the river Farnol divided his attention between the pyre and the surrounding hills. He knew he was exposing himself once again to risk, but he felt he owed it to Ganga to be there. She had lost her life because of him.

  “I should take her back to my palace,” the Nawab said. “But that bridge going down—it would mean going back up the main road, it would take so many more days—I’d miss the Durbar—”

  “You’d be excused. It isn’t a command performance, is it?” But all at once the Nawab’s grief and love for his dead wife looked spurious.

  And he seemed to realize it: “It’s not just being there to honour the King. I have business—there are things I must do—”

  Now was not the time to interrogate him. Later perhaps, but not now. He said sympathetically, “I don’t think she would mind going all the way down to Delhi. Not if you take her ashes home afterwards.”

  “I’ll do that.” The Nawab nodded absently, as if the idea had not occurred to him. “But it takes time for the body to become just ashes. You mustn’t stay, Clive.”

  He seemed to bear no animosity this morning; or perhaps he was still genuinely wrapped in grief. His face was pale and strained, his eyes red-rimmed. Farnol could not imagine his weeping all night, but it looked as if it might have been so. He took a torch from one of the g
uards and put it to the paraffin-soaked dead wood of the pyre.

  The flames leapt high and at once some of the branches fell in on themselves; the body slipped, seeming to flinch away from the flames. Farnol had witnessed dozens of cremations, but he could never reconcile himself to the sight of the fire devouring the body. He closed his eyes, tried to imagine what the girl had looked like alive; but he had seen her face for only a moment and she had been dead then. He smelled the sweet, sickening odour of burning flesh and he tried to shut his nostrils against it. He opened his eyes and saw the shroud turning to flaking ash, saw the lovely face for an instant, then the flames wrapped it hungrily and he shut his eyes against the horror.

  He turned away, keeping his eyes averted. “I’m going on, Bertie. You should catch us up when we stop for lunch.”

  The Nawab nodded, but said nothing, just continued to stare at the fire devouring what might have been his one true love. Farnol went across to his horse, mounted it and set off at a canter down the road. He put the thought of any sniper out of his mind; if he were going to be murdered this morning, the shot would already have been fired. He reined in the horse a quarter of a mile down the road and looked back. The pyre was a mass of leaping flames, bright red and yellow in the early morning light; a wreathing column of smoke climbed straight up through the still air. He had noticed that the smoke from pyres almost invariably turned black, as if the bodies flew their own mourning flag. He wanted to weep for the dead girl, but he hadn’t known her well enough for that sort of grief. But he felt sadder for her than he had for Rupert Savanna.

  He caught up with the caravan several miles down the road, fell in for the moment beside Karim and Ahearn riding at the rear. “That sniper is still with us. He was trying for me last night, not the Nawab’s wife.”