‘Was he killed?’ asked Gwilliams.
‘No – he survived. Some of his men were shot, I believe.’
Later, when King had recovered enough to totter along with them, assisted by Gwilliams, they set out for the tower. It was indeed in a dilapidated condition. However, Jack managed to haul King to the top, despite the rotten timbers, and from there one could see over the tops of the tall shrubs. King gauged their compass direction from the position of the sun, but that way lay a large expanse of forest. He could not be sure, but in the far distance westwards, he could see a faint line running through the trees, like the shadow of a long snake.
‘Sir,’ he said, ‘that could be a river. That line out there. Do you see it?’
Jack stared. Indeed, he could make out a fine wriggle in the pattern of the trees about a half a mile west.
‘Are you sure? That it’s a river?’
‘No, sir – not certain – but I can’t think what else it could be.’
‘Any idea which river?’
‘No, sir,’ replied the sergeant truthfully.
‘Well, rivers often have settlements along them – looking the other way . . .’ He sighed. ‘I just don’t like it.’
Jack and his men left the tower behind and struck westward. They were soon back in the dense forest. Somehow they managed to keep a fairly straight line and at noon they reached a fast-flowing, dangerous-looking river. King had recovered somewhat from his fever, but Raktambar was now looking the worse for wear. He had to be supported between Jack and Gwilliams as they first tried to make progress along the east bank. However, there was too much debris – driftwood tangled on the banks – which impeded their progress. Finally Jack ordered a raft to be built. They used vines and some of their clothes as ropes to bind together bamboo poles to make a rickety vessel. The only way to stay afloat was to lie full length on the raft. If one tried to stand the poles parted and feet and legs went through. Spreading bodyweight was the only answer.
They passed at least two villages at such a rate they could not paddle the raft to the shore. Then there came a point when the river widened and turned, and they were able to get nearer to the bank. When they next rounded a meander they crashed into a loosely built jetty which broke up the raft. Gwilliams immediately grabbed Raktambar and dragged him to the shore, while King was left clutching at one of the support poles from the jetty. Jack struggled through the current, his legs thrashing away madly to counteract the fact that he had only one hand for swimming. However, since his disability his right arm had grown in strength – and his left forearm was not completely without power. Still, it was all he could do to save himself, without concerning himself with others.
‘Help! Sir!’ King cried, as Jack struggled past him in the foaming torrent. ‘I can’t hold on!’
The sergeant’s eyes were full of panic and terror as he reached out and tried to grip at Jack’s clothing.
Jack reached the shallows but was spent, having had to swim with only one good hand. Gwilliams got to his feet and tried to totter towards the jetty pole, but his legs gave out under him. Fortunately by now villagers were appearing. Two men ran down and risked their own lives to wade out far enough to reach King. With the current ripping at all three men, the rescue pair pulled him to the safety of the shore. More villagers arrived and a great chatter began as they surveyed the wondrous flotsam that the river had tossed up on their banks. Three white men and a tall aristocratic-looking Indian. It was true they did not look much in their present condition, but the villagers knew well that all white men were rich and rewards would be forthcoming.
Raktambar was in no state to talk, but Jack’s Hindi had improved with every month in India. He soon sorted out who was the headman, asked that they might be given food and water, for which he promised to pay in coin. The headman, a Hindu, said that payment for the basic needs of life would not be necessary. He explained that his village was not a poor one, since many of the village youths were matchlock men for a British plantation owner who grew opium poppies.
‘Not in the jungle, surely?’ said Jack in Hindi.
‘No, no, sahib,’ said the headman, bobbing and smiling, ‘in fields to the west.’
However, Jack insisted the headman take a gift on behalf of his people. The silver coinage was gratefully received.
By the time evening came round the four men were in semi-comfort, on bamboo and rattan beds, having been given fish soup, vegetables and bread. They wore dry clothes for the first time in a week.
King asked to see the two villagers who had saved his life. At first they refused to attend, but the headman was asked for and King insisted he had to meet his saviours. When the men came they seemed very shy. Jack noticed they were taller than the rest of the villagers: from their features and bearing they seemed of different stock. Raktambar confirmed that their accents indicated they came from the north, rather than from Central India.
‘What do you think that means?’ asked Jack.
‘Perhaps, sahib,’ Raktambar stated, ‘they are two of the men we have been seeking?’
‘Guerrillas?’
‘I am sure of it.’
This left Jack with a huge dilemma. All but Gwilliams had lost their Enfields in the river. Gwilliams had strapped his rifle to his back and so had managed to retain it. Jack still had his five-shot Tranter revolver, but his ammunition was wet and useless. There were hunting knives on most of the four and Jack was sure Raktambar would have weapons secreted about his person. However, there was no saying King’s two saviours were not alone. There might be others with them. They would certainly be armed. Arresting the two men could be very dangerous. Then there was the fact that they had saved King’s life at risk of their own. If Jack did manage to arrest the two, they would at best be hanged or shot, at worst they’d be strapped to a cannon and blown to pieces. Certainly they would be executed.
Yet Jack was an officer of Her Majesty Queen Victoria and was expected to put duty before feelings. He was the law in India. Allowing rebels to escape was, he did not doubt, punishable by death. In these violent and passionate times no court martial would take into account an act of bravery on the part of the prisoners. It would indeed be a foolhardy officer who would not harden his heart and bring the rebels to justice, especially when there were other ranks as witnesses.
If Wynter had been there, Jack would not have contemplated letting the men go. King was dead to the world and so would know nothing about it. Gwilliams? Who knew the mind of this wild man from the Western frontiers, with his squared copper beard and his brain full of ancient history. Nevertheless, Jack trusted Gwilliams’ loyalty to him. The North American certainly did not think a great deal of the British Army as an entity and Jack doubted he would betray him to authority, even if he suspected Jack of what he was about to do.
‘Raktambar,’ said Jack in Urdu, ‘I want you to go the headman and tell him it might be best if the two men we’re talking about left the vicinity fairly quickly, before the Soldier Sahib regains his strength.’
The Rajput nodded in approval. ‘Yes, sahib. You do the right thing.’
‘I’m not sure it’s the right thing. I don’t know what is, under the circumstances. But I certainly can’t do else.’
‘Yes, sahib.’
Raktambar rose from his bed and left the palm-leaf hut.
Gwilliams rolled over. ‘Where’s he goin’?’
‘Call of nature,’ replied Jack.
‘What were you two jabberin’ about in that tongue?’
‘Urdu. We were speaking Urdu. Nothing much. Just going over the day’s events. I don’t have to account to you, Corporal.’
‘Jeez!’ exclaimed Gwilliams. ‘Just curious, that’s all.’
‘All right. But get some sleep. We need to get out of here as soon as we can. Those rebels may be around here and we’re now poorly armed and badly equipped.’
‘Too right – my cartridge is a sodden mess.’
Later, Raktambar came back and nodded
at Jack, who then tried to get some sleep himself. He must have nodded off, because the next thing he knew the cock was crowing on the maidan. A short time after a grey grisly dawn entered the glass-less window the headman came to see them. He told Jack a moorpunkey was coming down river.
‘What’s a moorpunhey?’ Jack asked Raktambar. ‘It mean’s peacock’s wing, doesn’t it?’
‘It is the name given to pleasure boats of important personages, Sahib Crossman. It would resemble the war boats of the Burmese, sahib. A large craft, certainly.’
‘What in God’s name is one of those doing coming down this dirty old river at the back end of nowhere?’
When asked this very question, the headman explained that merchants had purchased this boat from a local zamindar, a land-owner impoverished by the recent ‘disturbances’ to transport maize flour to villages along the river. Gwilliams immediately got up and roused King. Raktambar too was soon on his feet. The four men stumbled down to the jetty just as the moorpunkey’s crew was throwing out mooring lines.
The captain of the exotic but now beggarly craft, a small wizened man in a filthy turban, kurta and pantaloons, agreed to take them along to the next sizeable town. Jack and his men said their farewells to the headman and his villagers, who crowded to see them off. It was not often four such exotic people landed up in their backyard. However, as they were going up the gangplank to board, a naked man suddenly appeared on the deck and started shouting at them in a shrill voice.
‘What’s this?’ asked Jack, eyeing the Indian, whose skin was marked all over with yellow river clay. The fellow’s hair was stiff and stood on end in matted bunches, and it too was thick with the same ochre clay. There was black mascara ringing his eyes, giving him the appearance of a wild animal. Over his shoulder he carried a pole with a knotted piece of cloth attached, which appeared to contain his belongings.
The captain went to speak with this strange lean character, then returned to Jack and made a helpless gesture.
‘He says you will bring the river demons down upon my boat, sahib, so I have to ask you to disembark.’
Jack growled, ‘Who says?’
‘The Holy Man, sahib.’
Jack could see the captain was upset with the whole affair and wanted it resolved as soon as possible.
‘Who says he’s a Holy Man?’
The captain turned and gestured. ‘You can see it, sahib. Look how his eyes roll in his head. Listen to the harshness of his voice. The gods have entered his body. He has divine dreams. He tells me he dreamed you brought destruction on my little wooden boat.’
‘Listen, Captain,’ Jack said, firmly planting himself on the deck, ‘you’d better cast off those mooring lines right now, because me and my men are staying right here. I am not a civilian. I am a lieutenant in the British Army. These men with me are soldiers of Her Majesty, Queen Victoria. We are not in uniform because we do not wish to be at this moment in time. You think we’re going to be abandoned out here in the wilderness because some madman thinks he is a prophet and has bad dreams? Not a chance, Captain. I will hear no more arguments.’
The Indian captain looked from the determined man in front of him to the crazy man behind him, shrugged, and then finally gave the order to cast off. At this the so-called Holy Man went berserk. He ran up and down the deck several times, throwing his arms in the air and screeching at heaven. When he could see this was having no affect on the intruders he put his thumb in his mouth, but instead of sucking on it like an infant, he blew. What came out was the shrillest whistle Jack had ever heard. It hurt his ears and he found himself covering them up. The Holy Man was delighted and continued blowing until he ran out of breath.
‘Let me hit him over the head?’ implored Gwilliams. ‘I could do it in a moment.’
The moorpunkey continued downriver. Jack believed they were heading vaguely towards Cuttack on the east coast. However, he intended to get off before they reached anywhere near that far downstream. Green jungle slid away on the either side of them, fresh at the edges, dark beyond. Jack felt satisfied that the worst was over: they had beaten the jungle, albeit they had not got their quarry. There would be explaining to do, but only to senior officers who understood the problems of a small unit sent out into the wilderness. Colonel Hawke and Major Lovelace were not exacting men, who needed their subordinates to provide every small detail of an expedition.
Throughout that day and into the night, the Holy Man kept up his persecution of the soldiers. When he was not trying to rally the crew and the rest of the passengers to his cause, he was directing those ear-piercing whistles towards his enemies. Jack was beginning to wonder whether this creature was a victim of the recent uprising. Perhaps the man had seen such terrible atrocities he had lost his reason? It was this consideration which kept him from releasing the fury of Gwilliams on that clay-covered head. Gwilliams would have brained him for certain.
The mutiny, and the retribution, had changed the people of India for good, and altered the attitude of the British Government towards the army of the East India Company. Jack could not see the Indian Army surviving under this momentous event. It had failed on all accounts. It had failed to see the mutiny coming, though the signs had been plain. It had failed to stamp it out when it was a mere campfire. It had failed to stop it spreading into a raging wildfire. Its officers could now be accused of being negligent, lazy and complacent. It had only survived by a whisker because the nationals were fractured into various sets of people who were rivals and enemies of each other, and some saw fit to remain loyal to the East India Company. It had survived by default.
He was sitting on a box of ropes on the deck when Raktambar came to him that evening. A white-breasted kingfisher, a beautiful bird, had been perched on the boat’s rail and Jack had been observing it closely. Jack was not a great one for God’s wild creatures but he had inbred in him the natural curiosity of a gentleman of his time. The birds of India were far-ranging and various, many of brilliant plumage, and it was difficult not to be impressed. Bee-eaters swept along gorges, brahminy kites littered the skies, flameback woodpeckers rattled at trees, and shrikes, bulbuls and oriols peppered the bushes of shrubland and forest. How could one ignore such sights and sounds in this strange and interesting land?
And it was not just the birds, or the sambur deer, mongooses, wild boars and tigers – it was people too. Such new and astonishing experiences. After Delhi had been taken, Jack had been passing through a bustling marketplace and had seen an elderly man painting. He had stopped, not just because the picture was worthy of a look, but because he was amazed by the delicacy of the brush the artist was using and the glittering permanency of the paint. His own father had been a very good artist, but he had never seen brushes such as this man was using. It had but one hair! On enquiry he learned that the brush was fashioned from the single eyelash of a camel. The paint, he was told, was made from the powder of ground-down gems: being precious stones the colours never faded.
Such wonders in this turbulent country!
The Rajput sat down beside him, saying nothing at first, but Jack could tell the man wanted to talk.
‘Your wife can see those same stars, sahib,’ said Raktambar, wrongly assuming that Jack was contemplating the swathe of sparkling gems in the heavens, ‘even though she is many miles away.’
Raktambar, like a lot of Hindu men of his time, had not travelled beyond the shores of India. It was one of the grievances which had caused the revolt, the fact that the army required its soldiers to board boats and leave the sacred Indian soil in defiance of the rules of their caste. Raktambar had no idea of great distances. He could not know that Britain was still in daylight and would not have a view of the stars for a few hours yet.
‘Yes,’ he said in reply, ‘that is a comfort.’
‘Sahib,’ said Raktambar, getting down to business, ‘why did you let those two men go free?’
Jack knew he meant the men he’d suspected of being rebels.
‘It seemed churlish
to do otherwise – they saved King’s life.’
‘Churlish?’
‘Wrong.’
‘But were we not also wrong to let them go?’
Jack nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘So, where is the right?’
‘Sometimes there is no black and white, only grey. I don’t know what the answer is. I did what my impulses told me to do. I could be court-martialled for such a decision.’
Raktambar’s expression showed that he did not think this likely.
‘Who will tell?’
‘It is the duty of men like Gwilliams and King to do so.’
‘They know I would kill them first.’
Jack raised an eyebrow. ‘Would you?’
‘Of course. It is a point of honour. If they did such a terrible thing, they would have lost theirs. They would be dregs.’
Jack knew this would be the opinion of many.
‘Well, I’m sure it won’t come to that. . .’
At that moment Jack heard a splashing sound, down below on the river. There was a bump, as if the boat had hit a log, followed by a grunting sound. Both men rose and went to the side, looking down at the water. There was a glowing circle in the darkness below caused by a lantern which was being held up by the hand of a boatman. Its light showed a man in a European broadcloth coat leaving the boatman’s canoe and climbing up a scrambling net which hung over the side of the moorpunkey. When the man reached the top, and he leaned over the rail, a ‘wideawake’ hat fell off his head and on to the deck. The man swung himself easily over and landed lightly on his feet, picking up his hat before he straightened. He placed it back on his head and stared into Jack’s eyes.
‘A European gentleman? Good evening, sir. I am Reginald Lee.’
Rogue Officer Page 22
