Free Lance Page 19

  Drums ruffled and flammed. The companies rallied, tumbled into the trenches, rammed and loaded. Amaury turned to Vedvyas.

  That signal,’ he said bleakly, ‘you will never give.’

  He tugged a pistol from his sash, thrust the muzzle on Vedvyas’s chest and pulled the trigger. The rain-damped priming failed to spark. Vedvyas recoiled, half turned and raised an arm. ‘Hold him!’ Amaury snapped.

  Sepoys grappled the mirasdar. Amaury thumbed the hammer, dried lock and pan with a handkerchief, dribbled from an ivory horn fresh powder into the pan. His movements were unhurried and precise. Vedvyas watched the preparations, eyes widening in dismay.

  Amaury cocked the pistol. ‘Are you ready to die?’ he inquired.

  Vedvyas filled his lungs, exhaled slowly. ‘Is this the Fringee chivalry our minstrels extol? Will you kill a beaten enemy, held and helpless?’

  ‘Indeed. And then,’ said Amaury in an iron voice, ‘I shall cut off your head, display it to your bodyguard on a lance - and ask them if they think the trophy worth their precious lives!’

  Amaury touched the muzzle to his chest, stared him in the eyes. Vedvyas let his shoulders sag.

  ‘I am ready to parley.’

  ‘A wise decision,’ said Amaury sternly. ‘Mount and come with me.’

  He gestured Vedvyas ahead, followed close behind, pistol levelled at his back. They rode in file to the crest. ‘You will tell your men to throw down their lances, dismount, and lead to my cannons’ muzzles. There they will halt and wait my orders.’

  Vedvyas said over his shoulder, ‘You ride alone to the lion’s jaws. What if I refuse?’

  ‘You die.’

  ‘You also, in a twinkling - skewered by two hundred spears.’

  ‘A risk, Vedvyasjee, I am prepared to take - believing in your honour.’

  The mirasdar turned in the saddle, met Amaury’s look and laughed, teeth white in an oak-brown face. ‘I have heard of your feats in battle, and proved your reputation on my sword. You are a brave man, Umree Sahib. I will play no foolish tricks, for I think we shall, in the future, do very well together.’

  Amaury tucked the pistol in his sash, touched a spur to Hannibal’s flank, drew level with his prisoner. Across the saddle bow he clasped Vedvyas’s hand.

  ‘You read my mind, brother. It was fortunate my pistol missed its fire.’

  The monsoon’s raging overture diminished to a grumble. Thunder growled and muttered, and retreated in the distance. The rain was a drifting veil that hovered, thinned and vanished. The clouds momentarily parted and uncovered a snippet of sky like a pale blue rag. Vedvyas, an arm round Amaury’s shoulders, drew rein and addressed his troops.

  ‘ ‘Tis impossible!’ said Marriott. ‘The men have marched thirty miles, fought a battle and have not slept. Surely they must rest. Look at them!’

  Sepoys in soaked uniforms clustered round muskets piled like spidery stooks of corn. Some were asleep, supine, forearms flung across eyes. Sentries drooped on firelocks, nodded standing into slumber, woke with a jerk of the head. Vedvyas’s cavalrymen, commanded by the guns, idled by their horses and tried to kindle fires from saturated wood; the wind whipped into nothingness the slender coils of smoke. At the gun emplacements the crews slept round their pieces; only Welladvice himself, hollow-eyed and vigilant, watched the cavalry suspiciously and breathed on his portfire.

  ‘It is absolutely necessary,’ Amaury asserted, ‘that we march to Hurrondah at once. Word of Vedvyas’s defeat will travel fast, and someone may be left to organize resistance. The town is like a fortress - and you could hardly avow our two six-pounders provide an adequate siege train.’

  Vedvyas sat a little apart, arms wrapped round his knees, eyes flicking from face to face, trying to follow a discussion in an alien tongue. The storm had washed a coolness into the air: Marriott shivered in soggy clothes, and reflected on the certainty of ague. He pointed to the valley.

  ‘I have counted above six hundred enemy dead. Many more were wounded, all have fled. They are by no means calculated to test our strength again.’

  Todd said, ‘I am perfectly satisfied, Hugo, my men are unfit to march another thirty miles directly. No great advantage is proposed by it, for we hold this rascal hostage against his followers’ proper conduct. Sundown is an hour away: let us camp here, rest the night and resume the march at dawn.’

  ‘It is no bad notion,’ Marriott said. ‘I own I am very much to your way of thinking, Henry.’

  Amaury rolled on his back, linked fingers behind his head and stared at the clouds. ‘You endanger the fruits of victory. However, Charles, all authority is yours, and what you say must rule. I dare say you have considered how we may guard through the night a squadron of cavalry, despite their being disarmed. Our gunners, in the dark, will not see if they misbehave.’

  Todd rubbed his eyes. Weariness and battle strain graved lines on the youthful face. ‘A vexing problem, I allow. None the less my companies cannot--’

  ‘Cannot?’ said Amaury equably. ‘A word no diligent soldier entertains. One day, Henry, you will learn. Let us put the point to Vedvyas.’ He propped himself on an elbow and addressed the mirasdar - quick Hindi sentences, question and reply. Todd listened frowning, features stiff in disapproval. Amaury rolled once more on his back, and cradled head in hands.

  ‘All is arranged. The squadron is under my command, and will obey faithfully my orders. Welladvice and his gunners may sleep sound tonight.’

  ‘You trust this native’s word?’ Marriott asked incredulously.

  ‘Entirely. He seems a very civil fellow.’

  ‘Too civil by half!’ Todd snapped. ‘A smooth, unprincipled rogue, like all his kind. Whatever the disadvantage, Hugo, I shall mount a guard on his men at dusk.’

  Amaury turned his head and looked the ensign in the eye. ‘You will do no such thing, Henry. Vedvyas’s erstwhile bodyguard is delivered to my charge - not yours, not the Company’s. Those are his terms, which I accept - as I accept also the responsibility.’

  ‘Are you,’ inquired Marriott sarcastically, ‘enlisting a private army?’

  ‘It would seem so, would it not?’

  Amaury smiled benignly at the sky.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Hurrondah was a fortress town perched on a craggy hill which climbed a hundred feet from the plain, the slopes a scree of boulders big as wagons. Cultivated fields, grassland and copses skirted the bluff in a counterpane patched ochre and green and dun. From the foot a stony desolation slanted up to bastioned walls: a bleak, forbidding coronet that surrounded fiat-roofed houses. Tentacles of cloud brushed Hurrondah's summit, and a curtain of rain sheened the grim grey walls.

  Fugitives from the fight had announced defeat, a disaster quickly confirmed by an ultimatum Vedvyas wrote, under Marriott’s dictation, to the nephew he had left as the town's custodian. Marching at daybreak, the column and its captive cavalry reached Hurrondah by mid-afternoon. Vedvyas, escorted by Marriott, Amaury and a file of sepoys, climbed a boulder-strewn track to the open gates.

  Bastions and battlements were all deserted. They passed through crooked streets where faces peered from high barred windows, crossed squares devoid of life except for goats and donkeys, and arrived at a petty palace that crowned the hill, a two-storied L-shaped building embracing an open courtyard littered with the evidence of panic-stricken flight: boxes and corded bundles, burdened bullocks patiently waiting, chattels spilling from half-filled carts. In a stone-floored audience chamber where sculptured pillars supported a painted ceiling, a solitary official cowered behind the throne of cushions.

  ‘Where,’ Amaury demanded, ‘are all your people?’

  Vedvyas spread his hands. ‘Some have fled; the rest are hiding. They fear, sahib, the Company’s vengeance. When,’ he inquired affably, ‘will you start the sack?’

  Amaury translated. Marriot said angrily, ‘Does the fellow think us savages? Tell him, Hugo, to send criers about the town, promising security for property and life. We re
quisition only room and victuals for our troops - and pay for what we take.’ Amaury reassured Vedvyas. ‘You must remember, sirdar sahib, that Hurrondah - and indeed all Bahrampal - is henceforth under Company protection. We do not plunder what we guard.’

  Vedvyas smiled. ‘I heard differently when Tippoo Sultan died.’

  ‘Seringapatam,’ said Amaury, returning his smile, ‘resisted and was stormed, and so by the custom of war was given to sack - a distinction of which you are well aware, my friend. Now, where will you offer us quarters?’

  ‘The house is yours.’ He pointed to a wing which flanked the courtyard. ‘My family and my women live there. If you will give me time--’

  ‘Do not disturb them. The remainder of the palace is enough.’

  Marriott, watching the gestures, caught the meaning. ‘We accord this rogue enormous courtesies,’ he grumbled. ‘I am persuaded we insist--’

  ‘Until we have decided what shall be done with Vedvyas it would be impolitic to offend him further. His offices on our behalf could still be useful.’

  ‘I foresee nothing for him beyond a lengthy term in prison! Directly he has convinced the people we intend no harm he had better be clapped in jail.’

  Amaury took Marriott’s arm and led him out of earshot. ‘I entreat you, Charles, to handle the man discreetly, for this is your first test of government. Vedvyas for years has wielded influence and power in Bahrampal; the mirasdars have obeyed him, become accustomed to his edicts in conducting their affairs. If you remove him you lose your communications. You will be groping in a void, since the mirasdars, released from Vedvyas’s hold, will not easily nor instantly submit to the Company’s rule. Why should they believe us less extortionate than Vedvyas?’

  ‘Upon my conscience!’ said Marriott indignantly. ‘Do you propose he should become regent under the Company?’

  ‘No - but employ moderation in your victory. Though Vedvyas must of course relinquish all the districts he has seized, I earnestly beseech you to leave him Hurrondah. Then, in gratitude, he will use his influence on our behalf.’

  Deep in thought, Marriott paced the floor. He returned to Vedvyas, and said formally, ‘You have for years imposed an illegal rule on lands you seized by force, and have enjoyed revenues belonging properly to the Company. Our moderation alone induces us to abstain from that rigorous course which your conduct amply justifies. However, because the Company’s authority was not visibly apparent in Bahrampal during the period of your transgressions we are pleased to assume you acted more in ignorance than defiance. Therefore, while surrendering everything else, you may remain mirasdar of Hurrondah, subject to the Governor’s approval.’

  The rotund official phrases made Amaury grin. Rapidly he translated. Vedvyas bowed, joining fingertips to forehead, furrowed face impassive.

  ‘I expected death at the worst, imprisonment at best. Your clemency shall not go unrequited; the Company will find in me a loyal and industrious servant.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Marriott briskly. ‘He may prove his fidelity promptly by providing barracks for the men, stabling for horses, victuals for both and bullocks to bring in the guns. Then he will recall the people who have fled, allay the fears of those who remain and restore the town to normal life and business.’

  Amaury instructed the mirasdar, who left the room. Marriott said, ‘Hugo, I have done as you advised. I trust we are not deceived.’

  ‘Vedvyas,’ said Amaury thoughtfully, ‘is a native. Deceit is natural to him as the air he breathes. But because it serves his interests I think he will be loyal.’

  Marriott decided that Hurrondah should become the seat of the Company’s government in Bahrampal; and the Europeans made their quarters in the palace. He stated his intention, when the monsoon ended, of building a residence in the plain below. ‘The Collector should not cower behind fortifications. We must declare plainly, by our behaviour, that Bahrampal is secure.’

  Followers and transport were summoned from Gopalpore. Marriott let Vedvyas send a party to the battleground to bury or burn his dead. The Company’s casualties were slight: a gunner killed by the premature charge, three sepoys and a hircarrah dead. Welladvice asked permission to requisition bullock teams and retrieve the enemy guns. ‘Yer never knows, sir - they might be better’n they look, and we can use the metal anyways.’ He hauled the cannon to the gun park and walked round them with a speculative eye. Both pieces disappeared inside a foundry he established in the metal-workers’ quarter of the town.

  Marriott sent letters to mirasdars and village headmen, calling them to durbar - ‘a speedy show of authority, while our victory is fresh in their minds.’ Over the days the chiefs arrived, accompanied by retinues conforming to their standing. Marriott anxiously awaited Gopal Rao because, remembering the old man’s vow, he was uncertain whether Gopal would confront the enemy who, although defeated, was still very much alive.

  On a morning sluiced by rain Gopal rode through the gate. Marriott gently separated the mirasdar from his companions, seated him in the audience hall and removed the patriarch’s sopping cloak. With his banian as interpreter he said, ‘I hope you have assumed your rightful place as mirasdar of Gopalpore.’

  ‘I obeyed your summons, sahib, as is courteous and proper. You can expect no more. I cannot rule a district whose capital I may not enter. My son Srinivas wears my mantle, and awaits your bidding.’

  ‘Srinivas is unfriendly. The Company will not bestow an important town on one they cannot trust. I beg you, Gopaljee, to reconsider.’

  ‘And break my oath?’ The thin lips twisted in a bitter smile. ‘Only Vedvyas’s death will release me - and you let him live!’ Houcca-bearers brought pipes, blew on the charcoal, tendered mouthpieces. Gopa Rao sucked smoke, inhaled and released a cloud. Marriott said carefully, ‘The man who forged your chains can also break them.’ Before the mirasdar could reply he sent a messenger to summon Vedvyas.

  They waited in silence, puffing smoke, Gopal’s face inscrutable. Vedvyas entered, his powerful muscles straining the stitches of a long brocaded coat, a flat embroidered turban on his head. He bowed to Marriott, and regarded without expression the wizened features of the man he had maimed. Gopal looked at him once, resumed his thoughtful contemplation and drew deeply on his houcca. Abstractedly he plucked his robe, and the stump he habitually kept concealed slid plainly into view.

  Marriott said, ‘I request a favour, Vedvyas Sahib. You once under duress compelled my friend Gopal Rao of Gopalpore to forswear his town as long as you lived. Now I ask you to release him from his oath.’

  Vedvyas stroked his drooping moustache. ‘That pledge he made to the gods, not me. Who am I to break a sacred vow?’

  ‘The alternative, should you refuse, is death. I shall hang you like a dog!’

  Vedvyas looked searchingly at Marriott, and read the resolution in his face. ‘Very well. For what it is worth, I willingly release him. Are you satisfied, Gopal Rao Bahadur?’

  Gopal lost his pensive air; the fierce old face grew coldly furious. ‘You throw your dispensation in my teeth, like a rajah flinging buksheesh to a beggar! Does it compensate for this?’ He thrust his cauterized stump under Vedvyas’s nose. ‘Will your lordly charity restore my sword hand? Kneel at my feet, Vedvyas Daulat Ram, as once I knelt at yours - restore my oath and honour in ceremonial form!’

  Although the rapid Hindi defeated Marriott he hushed the banian’s whispering translation: the men’s gestures and expressions carried the sense. Vedvyas said contemptuously, ‘Humiliate myself to one I trod beneath my heel? Rather would I sacrifice my limbs!’ He bared an arm and thrust it out. ‘I offer recompense. For the hand I lopped I give you mine. Draw your scimitar, Gopal - hack it off!’

  A savage grin bared the old man’s yellow teeth. His hand crept to the hilt, his sword scraped loudly from the scabbard. Marriott, astounded, saw the mirasdar totter erect, rest the edge on Vedvyas’s wrist, lift the blade. He jumped to his feet.

  Gopal, smiling icily, sheathed his sword.


  ‘You have courage, Vedvyas - you did not flinch. What will it profit me to take a limb for a limb? I accept remittance from my vow.’ He turned to Marriott, and said formally, ‘Collector Sahib, if it pleases you I shall resume my proper place in Gopalpore.’ Hostility smouldered in Vedvyas’s eyes; he sent Marriott a ferocious look. ‘Your order is obeyed, sahib. May I go?’

  Gopal’s eyes followed the haughty figure stalking to the door. ‘You have blackened his face on my behalf, and made an enemy. Was it wise?’

  Marriott sighed.’

  ‘It cannot be helped. I shall keep Vedvyas under my eye; and hope that in the jagir there are men who can be trusted by the Company which rules them.’

  The durbar assembled in the audience hall, some two hundred natives who wielded influence in Bahrampal. Todd urged an impressive array of scarlet sepoys lining the walls, and a guard at the Collector’s back.

  ‘No, Henry. Bahrampal is under civil rule; the military presence must be used with moderation lest the natives doubt we think ourselves secure.’

  Marriott allowed the customary handful of uniformed peons, replaced the throne by a wooden chair - ‘I am a Company servant, not a Hindoo princeling’ - and proclaimed the treaty terms of 1766 which asserted imposition of the Company’s authority and enumerated in detail the taxes, tolls and duties formerly paid to the Nizam and now belonging to the Company. From the expressions of surprise and relief it was obvious that Vedvyas, during his supremacy, had exacted very much more.

  Which reminded Marriott, sitting idly during the lengthy translation - the banian spoke Hindi, Persian and Urdu in turn, ensuring all the listeners understood - where now was the mirasdar’s treasure? Presumably still in his coffers, two decades’ accumulated plunder. Was it not, he reflected, studying the rows of brown, attentive faces, strictly the Company’s property? He must make discreet inquiries, and compel the rogue to disgorge.