by K. T. Tomb
On his hours off, John often eschewed running to his bunk in favor of taking in more of the wondrous sights of the Indian Ocean. The bunks were in any case perpendicular to the keel, so he found that when he did try to sleep, the rolling of the ship pushed the sailors to and from with a regularity that was at once hypnotic and completely disconcerting. Unlike the sailors on his watch, John had not spent the requisite time at sea to ignore this pendulous effect, so he slept only when his body forced him into unconsciousness. If he was on watch during the day, he found that as the least skilled of the body of unskilled sailors—which Captain Sykes dubbed “beef on a rope,” much to the chagrin of the first mate who as a Hindu considered cows sacred—John was usually on the toughest end of the seemingly unending rope, hauling and mast climbing. The respite after his four hours were rung off the ship’s bell was to eat of the fine Indian food cooked by Montgomery. Montgomery, assisted by a tiny Indian man by the name of Raj, seemed never to sleep. Below decks, he worked tirelessly, creating dal and rice and even Indian flat breads. The Indian crew members were overjoyed with having food from their own nation, and John felt that the British Navy could certainly learn a trick or two in the culinary aspect of life at sea. On the long voyage on the troop ship Magdalena four years previously on his way to India, the diet had been water, rum and dry oat cakes. Following the daily meal with his watch, John walked the top deck, or if the ship had come across any sea creatures, he would watch them. On more than one occasion, great whales were spotted, and all the crew, including their sole passenger Dr. Pikeham, clamored to the prow of the ship to see the giant beasts breaching. On other days there were shoals of fish that flew through the air, and schools of dolphins in pursuit, using the wake from the Nannie Dee to leap through the air, snatching at the fish apparently as much for sport as for pleasure. If there was any way for life aboard ship to be an idyll, it was surely nowhere closer than that on board the little tea clipper out of Mangalore.
On the sixteenth day at sea, John found himself at his usual spot, overlooking the figurehead of the ship, a carved bust of the Irish witch for which the ship had been named. Unlike other days, when he had been left alone with his thoughts, he was joined after a short while by the doctor who, despite the lack of shade, was still persisting in dressing for high tea in Cambridge rather than high noon on the ocean.
“Doctor,” John said as greeting. He didn’t look up to see the man, more saw him through his peripheral vision. His attention was on the dark fin of a shark cruising off the port bow. There must be a shoal of fish to attract the huge predator to the surface.
“Good day, Mr. Lee,” said the doctor. “I was wondering if I might have a moment of your time, if you are not too busy.” John was clearly not engaged in any activity whatsoever, and was amused. Had he really been so far removed from the company of Englishmen that he had forgotten the stilted, overly polite conversational style?
“Of course, Dr. Pikeham. What is it that I can do for you?” John said, his English accent slightly tinted from speaking Hindi exclusively for several years, save for his negotiations with Captain Sykes back in Mangalore. Pikeham fidgeted with his pocket watch for a moment.
“I know you were in the Army, and I do apologize if I caused you any distress when we were in port. I’m afraid my mouth sometimes runs away from me, so to speak. I meant no offense.”
John cocked his head. “None taken. I have been wondering, though, how it was you knew me to be a former soldier. I don’t quite look the part anymore.”
Pikeham smiled, with glittery eyes as one who knows a secret is wont to have. John disliked the look. The yogi he had studied under had told him that the god, Chitragupta, wrote down the stories of every living man, and deciding on his death whether to send him to heaven or hell, or to condemn the soul back to earth, reincarnated in another body. Therefore, the yogi contended, it was not in our interests to keep secrets, as they belonged to Chitragupta alone. Pikeham’s eyes betrayed a man who kept many secrets, and guarded them jealously.
“It was your bearing, when encountering a gentleman. The deference you showed me was more than the mere politeness of Englishmen meeting abroad; it was as you were trained. Therefore I deduced that you were military, and of a low rank. If you were in India, and looking as you do, then you must be a deserter—oh no, my dear man. I won’t say a word.” Pikeham had clearly seen John about to, well… John wasn’t sure what he was about to do. He couldn’t easily push Pikeham over the side of the ship to keep his secret. Not only would that be a great sin, it would merely trade the crime of desertion for that of murder. Of course, both would carry the death penalty, but if John Lee was to die on his return to England, he would rather it be the less shameful of the two. In any case, Pikeham had no proof, and John had the documents from the real, deceased John Lee in his pack, stowed below deck.
Pikeham spoke again, as John fixed him with a brow-shaded glare. “My dear fellow, you really have nothing to fear from me. I am not the army, and nor am I Queen Victoria. I have no quarrel with you. In fact, I wish to offer you an opportunity.”
“An opportunity?” John said. “What kind of opportunity would a botanist have for a man such as me? I am no scholar.”
“No, you are not. But you are clearly a clever man, and a resourceful one. You have evaded capture in The Raj for quite some time. I am to visit several islands on our way to China, which I am sure you know by now. I humbly request that you accompany me on these islands, as my personal aide. In case there is any… trouble. Wild animals and such. I take it you can shoot, being a rifleman in your past life?” Pikeham smoothed his mustache and stumbled a little as the ship crested a wave.
“I’d advise you two things, Doctor. Firstly, I would thank you not to talk about past lives on board this ship. The wheel of life is no joking matter to the Indian, nor to me, for that matter. Secondly, hold onto the balustrade or you will surely knock yourself cold talking to me this far afore,” John said. “In answer to your question; aye, I can shoot. I have no rifle, but I can shoot and fight. What’s it worth to me? Your silence about my past?”
Pikeham took John’s advice and gripped the iron bar that ran around the prow of the ship. “My dear Mr. Lee, I would not use such skulduggery as to hold you in bondage with a threat. I say, it is no business of mine who you are or what you have done in the past. I beg your forgiveness for bringing it up. I have an excellent rifle and shot in my cabin, which I will happily lend you. I will also compensate you with the sum of a guinea per day, for every day that we are on land. Do we have an accord?”
A guinea a day. Fifteen times at least what he had earned with the army as a basic rate, although of course they would not be on shore for long, he imagined. A guinea was a good rate of pay for a jeweler or a skilled smith in England. To imagine paying such a sum to a simple man such as himself, John reasoned, surely implied that Pikeham not only suspected there might be danger, but that he was sure of it. There would be men from this ship about whom Chitragupta would soon cease writing about, of that he was sure. He met Pikeham’s clever eyes without another word, and offered his hand to seal the agreement. If there truly was danger ahead, John would like to be armed before he faced it, and may the Lord Ganesha give him guidance on where the evil was to strike down, and where the good were to protect. As to which Pikeham was, he did not know. Possibly neither, he was a man of science, after all. Pikeham smiled, and shook John’s hand, before turning and walking away, back below decks. John turned to the sea, and saw the shimmer of land on the horizon at the same time as Little Gupta, the lookout, yelled from the crow’s nest. It looked like John would earn his first guinea a little earlier than anticipated.
Chapter Three
“On the banks of the Sarayu River stood the beautiful city of Ayodhya, the capital of Kosala. In the city there were magnificent palaces decorated with precious stones. Spires of great temples rose above the city as if to touch the sky. For protection, the city was surrounded by a great moat. The people of A
yodhya were peace-loving and happy. No one was ignorant or poor. Everyone had faith in God and read the scriptures daily. Each person knew his or her role in society. The brahmins devoted their lives to studying the sacred texts. The rulers and warriors governed and protected the city. The farmers and merchants fed and clothed the citizens. Yet, all was not well in Ayodhya. Dasaratha, the king was unhappy. Although he was very old, he had no son to inherit his throne.
One day the king called upon his priest Vasistha. "Vasistha," he said. "I am growing old. I long for a son, a son who will take my place on the throne."
—Ramayana
***
A Different Animal
The island was idyllic and, according to the captain, a good five kilometers across at the longest point, and three at the narrowest. John’s services had clearly been sequestered in a conversation between Pikeham and Sykes long before, as he was immediately assigned to assist the good doctor with his apparatus. Little Gupta, all five feet of him, struggled manfully under the weight of the easel as Pikeham, John and First Mate Mandeep splashed ashore from the rowboat that had transported them to the pure white sands of the island shore. Their arrival was not unseen by the island’s inhabitants. Parrots of a wide variety of hues looked down upon them from the branches of tropical trees, and a commotion in the woods that began only a hundred feet from the shore and obscured all attempts at looking through them suggested that there were some kind of prey mammal living here. Pikeham suggested that it might be some kind of wild pig, as apes would move through the trees by choice.
John followed Pikeham and Little Gupta up the beach toward the tree line, the long rifle Pikeham had bestowed upon him bouncing as it lay slung across his shoulders. It was some kind of variety on the British-made Enfield, clearly a descendent of the smoothbore musket he had borne with the fusiliers company during the Indian uprising. Not only that, it was the same kind of rifle that had contributed so much to the Indians’ revolting. The cartridges for the weapon, paper wrapped powder and shot were greased with a mixture of beef tallow and lard. Any fool could have predicted that the Indian Sepoy troops would be enraged by this, but it seemed that the commanding officers were entirely indifferent to the religious concerns of the Hindu and Muslim troops under their command. John had seen the mutiny begin. Indian troops made their own projectiles using ghee as a lubricant, and used their new British rifles to gun down their commanders who had introduced the profane ammunition to them. The memory of gunning down soldiers who, the previous day had been sequestered to his own unit, brought shame to him as he stood in glorious sunshine with a pouch of ammunition that may well be contaminated with the same unholy lubricant that sparked so much death in his past. I’m sorry, all of you. I didn’t know. Brahma protect me. The musket John carried would, if he was fast enough about the reloading, fire about four rounds a minute, provided he had not lost the skill in his three years away from firearms. In any case, in the event they were set upon by some animal—not that there could possibly be tigers or wild elephants on an island this small—it would surely be enough to let off a single round and let the tremendous noise of the gunshot scare the animal away.
The first day passed without incident and the following day, Captain Sykes allowed the crew to disembark to the island for some well-earned rest, much to the distress of Dr. Pikeham. Pikeham argued that the introduction of the crew—the full complement of thirty souls, less one who remained on board the Nannie Dee to keep watch, and would be relieved the next day—would surely scare off the fauna that he had brought the ship here to study in the first place. Sykes would brook no argument however, and Pikeham grumbled his way a little into the woods, as far from the crew as he felt comfortable. The sailors busied themselves collecting as much of the fruit from the trees as they could, and indeed, they did scare up a menagerie of birds, fruit bats and lizards as they did so. Pikeham had to content himself with studying the flora of the little island instead. The third day, after a quiet evening spent eating the collected fruit and enlivened by a whirling display of insectivorous bats in the twilight, came quietly, with cloud creeping in through the darkness bringing a light rain. Pikeham released John from his duties; not that he had found anything to do, nor had been asked to do anything other than stand within twenty feet of Pikeham at all times. John didn’t actually mind being in the doctor’s company. He was quiet when he was working, clearly an excellent scientist and despite the feeling that he was, contrary to his words, always looking to attain an advantage or leverage, quite pleasant in conversation. That being said, John felt relieved to walk through the thick forested heart of this island while Pikeham ordered Little Gupta to run around as fast as his legs could carry him, collecting items of scientific equipment and samples of leaves. Pikeham did this from beneath the cover of a large umbrella that was really designed for keeping pale skin under shade, and was rather inadequate for the task of keeping one’s head dry. John didn’t mind the rain. Over the years in India he had, like the locals, come to welcome the thunderous monsoons that signalled the end of the baking dry seasons. Water trickled through the leaves, misting in the warm air. He had barely left sight before he heard his name, and the familiar rolling undulation of spoken Hindi.
“John! John, my friend, I’m coming too!” It was Rajeev, his crew master on the ship. John turned and smiled at him as he leapt through the undergrowth to join him.
“Rajeev, my friend, you don’t know where I’m going. I might be going to take a dump, for all you know.” Rajeev laughed, shaking his long and flowing black hair.
“That’s a lie; you take a crap in the sea like everyone else. Where are you going? I’m bored of sitting on the beach and Mandeep will make me fix a sail or patch a leak on the ship if I stand around much more.” Rajeev smiled broadly. He was no shirker despite his words, and in fact seemed to work twice as hard as any other sailor on board the Nannie Dee. John welcomed the company. He had spent so long wandering alone through India that the familial, structured environment of the ship’s crew reminded him of being at home as a boy, for the few years he had been able to go to school. It also reminded him more than a little of the military, but he suppressed the memories of that time, and smiled back at Rajeev instead.
“Alright, Rajeev, come with me. I was going to explore this little jungle, maybe I can see if there are any good game birds in here,” John said as he patted the long rifle.
“Great! Just remember that Mandeep follows Mohammed, and if you bring back a wild pig, he’ll have you scrubbing the decks with your tongue for a month!” The two men easily fell into the playful mockery of friends as they penetrated deeper into the verdant green island, and had soon covered a mile or more with Rajeev hacking vines down with his machete to ease their passage. The island seemed to be almost the shape of a pyramid, although much less steep on the inclines, and much longer on two sides due to the irregular shape of the island. John was sure that it was not quite a pyramid, that there would be a name for the geometric shape, but his education did not allow for it. As they passed over the highest point of the island, the rain clouds parted for a moment and the sun came through, refracting through the rain, through the water droplets that had collected on every leaf. From their standpoint high above the tree line and looking down toward the sea, the universe glowed with rainbow light. Neither man said a word, although John could think of only one. Paramdhama, the realm of eternal bliss where Vishnu reigned. He felt as if he had attained enlightenment, moksha, but of course, he was unworthy to truly achieve that. The momentary bliss he felt passed after a moment, when the clouds moved on the wind to cover the earth again.
“John, look! Down there!” Rajeev was pointing away from where he was looking, to the northern point of the island where the land tapered away and formed a natural harbor from a long sandbar. There was a ship resting at anchor, with no flag displayed and row boats filled with men splashing ashore.
“I see them, Rajeev,” John said. “Who do you think they are? I don’t recogniz
e that type of ship.”
Rajeev shaded his eyes, squinting. “I don’t know. Look at the men in the boats. They’re armed, and their hats aren’t like the Europeans. Maybe Chinese? I don’t think the Japanese would come this far. Could be Siamese, I suppose.” He seemed unconcerned. John tried to think.
“Why would men come so armed to an uninhabited island like this?” he said.
“Why do you ask that? You’re armed. You have that rifle.” Rajeev said, with a half-smile on his face.
“You fool, Rajeev; I’m only one man, and I wouldn’t be carrying this thing about if I could avoid it. We’ve walked across half this island, and nothing is here except birds and bats and insects.” The men were disembarking from their rowboats, some of them immediately heading to the east, round the island closer to where John and Rajeev were, while some headed southwest. They had split up, which to John’s mind could only mean one thing, and when he saw the rowboats being rowed back to the larger ship, he knew it to be true.
“Rajeev, we have to get back to the ship.” John turned and started back the way he had come, back over the crest of the island. Rajeev had to run to catch up, so long his strides were.
“What’s happening? Who are they?” Rajeev said, as John broke into a jog, the rifle bouncing.
“I don’t know, Rajeev, but I do know that we’re under attack. They know that the Nannie Dee is here, and those men are planning on mischief for us. See how they set off in different directions to circle the island? Armed men would only do that if they had a reason to, or feared attack themselves. We know they can’t be fearing attack themselves, or they would have stayed aboard their ship.”
