The Lion's Den

by Philip McCutchan

  Corton shook his head. ‘That’s a stupid thing to say, and I’ll not argue it now. Let me tell you about the measures I’ll need to take.’ He paused. ‘Are you listening, James, or are you still sunk in some treacly pool of obstinate melodramatic thoughts?’

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘Good! Well now, there’s a bullet lodged in the man just below the left lobe of the lung. The wound’s a mess, full of suppuration, and the poison’s spreading too fast — and that’s in spite of all Miss Gilmour did so splendidly, and I mean splendidly. If she hadn’t done what she could to keep the wound clean, the man’d be dead by this time. But I have to get that bullet out, James, and that’s a fact.’

  ‘You mean you’ll have to operate?’

  ‘Operate’s a rather grandiose term for what I have to do. I have to extract the bullet — and—’

  ‘When?’

  ‘I was just going to say, now. Tonight. Delay would be dangerous. I was hoping to avoid the necessity, but now I see there is no alternative.’

  ‘Why come to me, Doctor?’

  Gorton said deliberately, ‘Because I need the authorisation to perform what could be called an operation on the march. That is, I need the authorisation in this particular case — which you’ll agree isn’t a routine case of wounding.’ He paused. ‘I need something else, too.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I need four men, four good strong Scots, James. He’ll have to be held down, you see. There’ll be a lot of pain.’

  ‘But you have anaesthetics! ‘

  ‘No, James, that’s where you’re wrong. I haven’t any at all. The mule-cart containing them has become a casualty of the march. It fell into a gorge during the afternoon.’

  ‘Rum, then, or brandy?’

  Gorton shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not. There’s a little brandy, but by no means sufficient to be of any help. I’ve had to use most of it already, on the other sick and wounded. You must remember, you brought me a very large sick parade, James, larger really than emergency medical comforts on a march can be stretched to cover. No, this must be done without any such aids at all. I’m sorry; but there it is. I’m asking you to detail four reliable men — men who won’t be squeamish when they have to listen to screaming, or when they see blood produced not by battle but by the surgeon’s knife. There’s a difference, believe me!’

  Ogilvie sat up straight, staring at the doctor. ‘For God’s sake,’ he said, ‘why not let him die?’

  ‘I can’t possibly, and you know that very well. What I can do, that I must do. I have a duty to my own ethic, my own training, as well as to my Colonel. You speak of God’s sake. If I also may be allowed to invoke Him — I have a duty to God as well! James, I am going to extract that bullet, whether you like it or not, and you are going to give me your authorisation — you know in your heart you have no choice. Now, please let me have that detail: four strong men, and as soon as possible!’

  ‘You can’t do it now, Doctor: there’s no light! Why didn’t you bring this up earlier — while there was daylight?’

  Corton shrugged and said, ‘There’s an element of danger in the excision, so close to the lung. I hoped we’d get away with not having to do it until we reached Peshawar. Now I see that we can’t. As to light...we have storm lanterns—’

  ‘Which will make it very easy for any tribesmen to pick us off, Doctor!’

  ‘Now, James, I’m not inexperienced in the ways of the Khyber. I’ve practised medicine, aye, and surgery too, in these parts long before you joined the regiment! When I was attached to the Seaforths I took off a man’s leg in the Khyber, and by the light of storm lanterns at that. All we need to do is to bring two of the commissariat carts together, and rig blankets over to form a tent of sorts. That’ll be fine. So now, James, I’d be obliged if you’d give the orders to prepare me an operating theatre. Will you do that?’

  Slowly, reluctantly, Ogilvie gave a nod. ‘Very well, if you’re really convinced we’ll be doing the right thing.’

  ‘Of course I’m convinced, though I see you’re not. But think, man, think — and use a little sense! Would you like to feel you’d let a man die when medical effort could have saved him? Would you like to be made the man’s executioner?’

  ‘Is that really how you would see me?’

  Corton gave a short laugh. ‘I make no moral judgments, James. No, I doubt if I would see you like that...I understand the way you’re thinking. But I believe that’s how you would come to see yourself, and I believe you would not march easy through the Khyber again, and past this spot! Come now, do your part, James, and I’ll do mine.’

  Surgeon-Major Corton turned away abruptly and strode off. Ogilvie watched him vanish into the darkness. Still reluctant to initiate the playing out of what he considered a farce, a farce that involved a man’s life and suffering, he called for Bandra Negi.

  The havildar was there in an instant. ‘Sahib?’

  ‘Bandra Negi, Lal Binodinand’s life, which apparently hangs on a thread, is to be saved by the Doctor Sahib. There will be much to do. Blankets, commissariat carts, lanterns, melted snow — perhaps many other others. See to this, and consult the Doctor Sahib as to all he needs.’

  ‘It shall be done, Sahib.’ Bandra Negi’s right hand snapped to the salute.

  ‘One more thing, my Colour-Sar’nt to provide four privates, the biggest and most reliable men he has, to assist the Doctor Sahib. Also tell Renshaw Sahib that I wish all the other men to be constantly alert and watchful, to remain standing-to until the Doctor Sahib has finished.’ He made a dismissive gesture. ‘That is all, Bandra Negi.’

  ‘Sahib!’ With another salute, the havildar turned away. Within the next few minutes Ogilvie heard the sounds of preparation, the subdued voices, the orders of Bandra Negi and Colour-Sergeant MacTrease, the creaking of the cartwheels as they were drawn across the snow-covered ground of the pass. Dimly just before the last of the light went he saw the blankets being carried to the makeshift operating theatre, saw four of his Highlanders waiting to lay strong hands on the four corners of Lal Binodinand once the man was positioned on his blanket on the ground between the carts. It was to be a primitive business and a horrible one, for Lal Binodinand would surely know why he was being so conscientiously kept alive, and Ogilvie was certain that, were the man to be asked, he would choose to be allowed to die now. In any case it would be a miracle if he survived; Ogilvie wished he had put the point to Surgeon-Major Corton. There must be many poisons, here in the Khyber Pass, that could enter a man’s body by way of the cutting and probing that Corton was about to do.

  Within twenty minutes all was ready; Ogilvie heard the voice of Colour-Sergeant MacTrease, ordering the privates to duck under the tent of blankets. There was a glow from the lanterns as the men moved the covering, then once again total darkness. Knowing what he was going to hear, Ogilvie was still shaken to the core when he heard it : the terrible cries, the screams of a man in agony from the steely probings of Corton’s instruments, the desperate callings upon his Gods, and then a nerve-wrenching sobbing that rose and fell, rose and fell, while Ogilvie’s nails dug ferociously into his palms and he, in his turn, called loudly upon his own God to bring this fearful business to a speedy close.

  *

  It seemed hours later when he heard Colour-Sergeant MacTrease giving an order to the four privates: ‘Get the blood off yersel’s, quick — wash in the snow, lads. Hurry now!’ There seemed to be an inference that native blood might be sullying.

  Ogilvie called, ‘Colour-Sar’nt!’

  ‘Sir!’ MacTrease came up, halted and saluted.

  ‘How’s the...the patient, Colour-Sar’nt?’

  ‘It’s for the doctor to say, sir, but to me he looks bad enough.’

  ‘But he’s alive?’ He spoke stiffly, through sore, cracked lips.

  ‘Aye, sir, he’s alive.’ MacTrease looked hard at Ogilvie.

  ‘You don’t sound too good yersel’, sir, if I may say so.’

  ‘
Oh, I’m all right, Colour-Sar’nt.’ In truth, Ogilvie felt physically sick. ‘That’s all, thank you. Carry on.’

  ‘Sir! ‘ MacTrease saluted and turned about. As he marched away, Surgeon-Major Corton came up.

  ‘How is he?’ Ogilvie asked in a flat voice.

  ‘Oh, he’ll do! He came through it well.’

  ‘What if a fresh infection sets in?’

  ‘Well, if it does, we should reach Peshawar in time to get him all the aids and comforts of the base hospital.’

  ‘I hope so,’ Ogilvie said shortly. It was true there was not far to go now, but Ogilvie was consumed with impatience to leave the Khyber’s conditions behind him. Corton, he thought, sounded extremely pleased with himself. But for most of that night Ogilvie lay awake in his ice-cold bivouac and listened to the pitiful moans and cries of a man still in great pain.

  FOURTEEN

  Lieutenant-General Francis Fettleworth awoke with a start in the comfortable double bed in his residence at Peshawar.

  ‘What the devil! ‘ he said. ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Grassbrook, sir—’

  ‘How dare you! ‘

  ‘Sir?’ Captain Grassbrook sounded surprised.

  ‘Bursting into my bedroom — my wife’s bedroom to boot! It’s scarcely the duty of an aide-de-camp to—’

  ‘Sir, the matter is most urgent, or so he says—’

  ‘Says? Says?’ Fettleworth sat up straight, red and rumpled in silk pyjamas. ‘Who says, for God’s sake, Captain Grassbrook? Who says what?’

  ‘An officer, sir, who has come through the Khyber with an urgent despatch, a most urgent despatch—’

  ‘Come in person, Grassbrook — come here, do I understand you to mean?’

  ‘Yes, sir. He—’

  ‘What’s his rank, and what’s his name?’

  ‘Sir, I—’

  ‘Rank and name, damn you to hell.’

  ‘A Second Lieutenant Taggart-Blane, sir—’

  ‘Second Lieutenant? A bloody subaltern having the damned effrontery to present himself here to me, in person? Good God, what’s the Service coming to, I should like to know? Hell and damnation. Tell him to go where he should have gone in the first place — to Brigade, if his own blasted Colonel isn’t good enough—’

  ‘Sir!’ With considerable courage in the circumstances, the A.D.C. burst through the walls of his General’s tirade. ‘Sir, I really must stress the importance of Taggart-Blane’s despatch. His Colonel, sir, has marched through the Khyber on your orders — Colonel Lord Dornoch of the 114th. Taggart-Blane, however, comes from Kunarja and is representing Major Gilmour, killed in action in the Khyber. Taggart-Blane brings a document setting out terms of a settlement as tentatively agreed with the rebel, Jarar Mahommed.’

  Fettleworth’s mouth had sagged a little open; now it shut with a snap. ‘Why the devil didn’t you say so, then?’ he barked. ‘I’ll deal with this immediately, Grassbrook. Bring this young man to me in my study.’ Getting out of bed and feeling for his slippers, he glanced back at his wife. She was still fast asleep, which was what he should be, he thought with irritation. He pulled on his dressing-gown.

  *

  Taggart-Blane and his sepoy guide had come through a degree of hell, not from tribesmen — they had in fact seen none — but from the terrible weather in the early stages, at least, of their journey. Fearing attack along the route, Taggart-Blane’s guide had suggested taking a different way to Jamrud, a way that led across the mountains through a narrow, dangerous, and little-used track, a track with constant perils of snow-filled declivities, gorges and chasms, and jagged rock. And cold — icy terrible, wicked cold from the keen wind shouting all the way down from the mountains around Kabul.

  But they had made it.

  More dead than alive, Taggart-Blane felt, they had reached Jamrud. At Jamrud they had found no communication : the field telegraph line had been cut, apparently by marauding tribesmen. Taggart-Blane had set off again, to make the last few miles into Peshawar — snow-free miles now that they were eastward of Jamrud; and they had one slice of luck in so far as they made contact with a British patrol a couple of miles to the east of Jamrud, after which they were literally carried into Peshawar. Taggart-Blane took time off for a meal and a quantity of hot drinks before reporting his urgent mission to the Divisional Commander: he felt he owed that much to himself. Bloody Francis, by all repute, was worse than the enemy to deal with, and he needed strength.

  ‘Why, boy, you look quite done,’ Fettleworth said as the subaltern was ushered in by the A.D.C. Taggart-Blane blinked in surprise; he had not expected this, and was much relieved.

  ‘I’ve come a long way, sir,’ he said, swaying.

  ‘You must have a doctor look at you.’

  ‘I’ll be all right, sir, until I’ve given you my report.’

  ‘H’rrmph.’ Fettleworth sounded dubious. ‘Sit down, then. What’s your name again?’

  ‘Taggart-Blane, sir, of the 114th Highlanders, attached 99th Rawalpindis who are currently held as hostages in Kunarja.’ He sat in a comfortable chair, feeling sick and dizzy now. Reaction, he felt, was setting in; but his mission was not complete yet. ‘Sir, I come with—’

  ‘Yes, I know what you’ve come with, my boy.’ Fettleworth glanced at Captain Grassbrook. ‘Rouse out one of the blasted leeches,’ he said. ‘This young man needs attention, and quickly.’ When the A.D.C. had departed, he turned again to Taggart-Blane. ‘I understand you have the terms in writing?’

  ‘I have, sir.’ Taggart-Blane unfastened his filthy clothing and produced Gilmour’s envelope, handing it to Fettleworth with shaking fingers. The General opened it and brought out the document; he read it carefully and slowly, muttering to himself about the damned rebel and his impertinence. There was, however, a crafty and calculating look in his eye when he had finished.

  ‘You’ve done well, Mr. Taggart-Blane,’ he said. ‘Very well indeed splendidly! I shall not forget this, nor, I hope I may say, will the Raj, my dear boy. Have you anything further to report — of your own accord, I mean? In regard to your journey out, which must have been a terrible one?’

  ‘It was terrible enough,’ Taggart-Blane said almost to himself. ‘Terrible enough ...’ He pulled himself up. ‘Sir, Captain. Ogilvie is attempting to march through the Khyber for Peshawar with one company of sepoys, but was under ambush at the time I left. Major Gilmour and his wife are dead. This was why I came with the terms...Major Gilmour had intended bringing them through himself. I don’t know who we were attacked by...to me, they were simply Pathans.’ Again he felt dizzy and light-headed, and he began to laugh. ‘There were others killed, too,’ he said unsteadily. ‘I killed a man.’

  ‘Your first?’

  ‘Certainly my first, sir—’

  ‘You’ll get used to it, my boy, you’ll get used to it. Killing’s never pleasant, of course, but it has to be done, and after a while it becomes much easier.’

  ‘General, you don’t understand—’

  ‘Nonsense, of course I understand,’ Fettleworth said briskly, ‘Why, I’ve killed plenty of men, damn it! Plenty! I know it affects different men in different ways, but don’t let’s have any stuff-and-nonsense about God. I think I may say, God also understands. I...’ His voice tailed away in amazement. ‘May I ask, Mr. Taggart-Blane, what you’re laughing at?’

  ‘At your very wide knowledge, General.’

  ‘Hey? What? My wide knowledge about what?’

  ‘About God. My apologies, sir. You really haven’t understood at all, but honestly, I haven’t the strength to go on. Have I your permission to sleep, sir?’

  Fettleworth blew out his cheeks. The young man was in a bad way, certainly, and had done an immensely courageous thing, but that didn’t excuse a subaltern going to sleep, which Taggart-Blane was all too clearly now doing, in his Divisional Commander’s study. Fettleworth, however, was saved the unpleasantness of having to wake and eject a hero. There was a knock at the door and Captain Grassbrook brought i
n Fettle-worth’s Staff Surgeon.

  Fettleworth gestured at the sleeping subaltern. ‘Poor boy’s damn near dead,’ he said. ‘Wandering in the head a little, too, and I don’t wonder. Come all the way from Kunarja with an urgent message — most brave! Do all you can for him, Doctor — all you can.’ He waved a hand towards Captain Grassbrook. ‘My compliments to Brigadier-General Lakenham. I wish to see him immediately.’

  When he was alone, Fettleworth sat drumming his fingers on his desk and staring across the study towards a photograph of Her Majesty sitting in an open carriage and being drawn along the Mall behind a Captain’s Escort of her Household Cavalry. Fettleworth had obtained this photograph through the good offices of the Illustrated London News, whose photographer had taken the original. The Queen-Empress was in fact scarcely visible above the sides of the carriage, but the little black bonnet and the white hair were quite unmistakable enough to act as a spur and an inspiration to Bloody Francis Fettleworth. Gazing at the photograph now, the Divisional Commander pondered on Jarar Mahommed’s terms and began to see in them a means of extending, even by a very little, the sway and rule of the little old lady in black. If he could do that, she would be delighted; and in the not too distant future he, Lieutenant-General Fettleworth, might receive the bestowal of her favour, expressed in terms of honours and promotion. For, impertinence though of course it was for a rebel even to think about terms, much less state them so categorically, those terms did indeed represent progress for the British Raj in so far as the rebel had offered positive safeguards for the British in Kunarja, peace in his area, and constant safe passage of the Khyber that would turn his roving levies into friends rather than enemies. If all this could be agreed during his, Fettleworth’s, acting tenancy of the Commissionership in Peshawar — if thereby the ‘forward policy’ of the ever-expanding Raj could be advanced — fewer British lives need be lost and the way might be insidiously opened for Jarar Mahommed and his powerful sphere of influence to be welcomed much more positively beneath the genial, overall umbrella of the Raj. Much more positively...