Flashman and the Mountain of Light. George Fraser MacDonald
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have a little law, myself.’ I’ll lay you do, thinks I, bracing myself. Sure enough, out came the legal straight left. ‘I have been asking myself what difficulty might arise, if in this Soochet business, it should prove that the widow had a coparcener.’ He smiled at me inquiringly, and I looked baffled, and asked how that could possibly affect matters.
‘I do not know,’ says he blandly. ‘That is why I ask you.’
‘Well, sir,’ says I, puzzled, ‘the answer is that it don’t apply, you see. If the lady were Soochet’s descendant, and had a sister – a female in the same degree, that is – then they’d take together. As coparceners. But she’s his widow, so the question doesn’t arise.’ So put that in your pipe and smoke it, old Cheeryble; I hadn’t sat up in Simla with towel round my head for nothing.
He regarded me ruefully, and sighed, with a shrug to Fakir Azizudeen, who promptly exploded.
‘So he is a lawyer, then! Did you expect Broadfoot to send a farmer? As if this legacy matters! We know it does not, and so does he!’ This with a gesture at me. He leaned forward. ‘Why are you here, sahib? Is it to take up time, with this legal folly? To whet the hopes of that drunken fool Jawaheer –’
‘Gently, gently,’ Bhai Ram reproved him.
‘Gently – on the brink of war? When the Five Rivers are like to run red?’ He swung angrily on me. ‘Let us talk like sane men, in God’s name! What is in the mind of the Malki lat?fn2 Does he wait to be given an excuse for bringing his bayonets across the Sutlej? If so, can he doubt it will be given him? Then why does he not come now – and settle it at a blow? Forget your legacy, sahib, and tell us that!’
He was an angry one this, and the first straight speaker I’d met in the Punjab. I could have fobbed him as I had Dinanath, but there was no point. ‘Hardinge sahib hopes for peace in the Punjab,’ says I. He glared at me.
‘Then tell him he hopes in vain!’ snarls he. ‘Those madmen at Maian Mir will see to it! Convince him of that, sahib, and your journey will not have been wasted!’ And on that he stalked out, by way of the bedroom.20 Bhai Ram sighed and shook his head.
‘An honest man, but impetuous. Forgive his rudeness, Flashman sahib – and my own impertinence.’ He chuckled. ‘Coparceners! Hee-hee! I will not embarrass you by straining your recollection of Bracton and Blackstone on inheritance.’ He heaved himself up, and set a chubby hand on my arm. ‘But I will say this. Whatever your purpose here – oh, the legacy, of course! – do what you can for us.’ He regarded me gravely. ‘It will be a British Punjab in the end – that is certain. Let us try to achieve it with as little pain as may be.’ He smiled wanly. ‘It will bring order, but little profit for the Company. I am ungenerous enough to wonder if that is why Lord Hardinge seems so reluctant.’
He tooled off through the bedroom, but paused at the door.
‘Forgive me – but this Pathan orderly of yours … you have known him long?’
Startled, I said, not long, but that he was a picked man.
He nodded. ‘Just so … would it be forward of me to offer the additional services of two men of my own?’ He regarded me benevolently over his specs. ‘A needless precaution, no doubt … but your safety is important. They would be discreet, of course.’
You may judge that this put the wind up me like a full gale – if this wily old stick thought I was in danger, that was enough for me. I was sure he meant me no harm; Broadfoot had marked him A3. So, affecting nonchalance, I said I’d be most obliged, while assuring him I felt as safe in Lahore as I would in Calcutta or London or Wisconsin, even, ha-ha. He gave me a puzzled look, said he would see to it, and left me in a rare sweat of anxiety, which was interrupted by my final visitor.
He was a fat and unctuous villain with oily eyes, one Tej Singh, who waddled in with a couple of flunkeys, greeting me effusively as a fellow-soldier – he sported an enormous jewelled sabre over a military coat crusted with bullion, his insignia as a Khalsa general. He was full of my Afghan exploits, and insisted on presenting me with a superb silk robe – not quite a dress of honour, he explained fawning, but rather more practical in the sultry heat. He was such a toad, I wondered if the robe was poisoned, but after he’d Heeped his way out, assuring me of his undying friendship and homage, I decided he was just dropping dash where he thought it might do good. A fine garment it was, too; I peeled down and donned it, enjoying its silky coolness while I reflected on the affairs of the day.
Broadfoot and Jassa had been right: I was receiving attention from all kinds of people. What struck me was their impatience – I wasn’t even here yet, officially, and wouldn’t be until I’d been presented in durbar, but they’d come flocking like sparrows to crumbs. Most of their motives were plain enough; they saw through the legacy sham, and recognised me as Broadfoot’s ear trumpet. But it was reassuring that they thought me worth cultivating – Tej Singh, a Khalsa big-wig, especially; if that damned old Bhai Ram hadn’t shown such concern for my safety, I’d have been cheery altogether. Well, I had more news for Broadfoot, for what it was worth; at this rate, Second Thessalonians was going to take some traffic. I ambled through to the bedside table, picked up the Bible – and dropped it in surprise.
The note I’d placed in it a bare two hours earlier was gone. And since I’d never left the room, Broadfoot’s mysterious messenger must be one of those who had called on me.
Jassa was my first thought, instantly dismissed – George would have told me, in his case. Dinanath and Fakir Azizudeen had each passed alone through my bedroom … but they seemed most unlikely. Tej Singh hadn’t been out of sight, but I couldn’t swear to his flunkeys – or the two little maids. Little Dalip was impossible, Bhai Ram hadn’t been near my bedside, nor had Mangla, worse luck … could she have sneaked in unobserved while I was with Dalip, beyond the arch? I sifted the whole thing while I ate a solitary supper, hoping it was Mangla, and wondering if she’d be back presently … it was going to be a lonely night, and I cursed the Indian protocol that kept me in purdah, so to speak, until I was summoned to durbar, probably next day.
It was dark outside now, but the maids (working tandem to avoid molestation, no doubt) had lit the lamps, and the moths were fluttering at the mosquito curtain as I settled down with Crotchet Castle, enjoying for the hundredth time the passage where old Folliott becomes agitated in the presence of bare-arsed statues of Venus … which set me thinking of Mangla again, and I was idly wondering which of the ninety-seven positions taught me by Fetnab would suit her best, when I became aware that the punkah had stopped.
The old bastard’s caulked out again, thinks I, and hollered, without result, so I rolled up, seized my crop, and strode forth to give him an enjoyable leathering. But his mat was empty, and so was the passage, stretching away to the far stairs, with only a couple of lamps shining faint in the gloom. I called for Jassa; nothing but a hollow echo. I stood a moment; it was damned quiet, not a sound anywhere, and for the first time my silk robe felt chill against my skin.
I went inside again, and listened, but apart from the faint pitter of the moths at the screen, no sound at all. To be sure, the Kwabagh was a big place, and I’d no notion where I was within it, but you’d have expected some noise … distant voices, or music. I went through the screen on to the little balcony, and looked over the marble balustrade; it was a long drop, four storeys at least, to the enclosed court, high enough to make my crotch contract; I would just hear the faint tinkle of the fountain, and make out the white pavement in the gloom, but the walls enclosing the court were black; not a light anywhere.
I found I was shivering, and it wasn’t the night air. My skin was crawling with a sudden dread in that lonely, sinister darkness, and I was just about to turn hurriedly back into my room when I saw something that brought the hair bristling up on my neck.
Far down in the court, on the pale marble by the fountain, there was a shadow where none had been before. I stared, thrilling with horror as I realised it was a man, in black robes, his upturned face hidden in a dark hood. He was looking up at my balcony, and then he stepped back into the shadows, and the court was empty.
I