The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [177]
Tears rolled down the old man's cheeks and flashed in the lamplight, and Ash said weakly: ‘Don't be an owl, Cha-cha. Of course I know you. For heaven's sake stop playing the fool and give me something to drink.’
But it was Gobind Dass, hurriedly aroused from sleep, who finally gave him a drink. Presumably one with a drug in it, because Ash fell asleep again, and when he awoke for the third time it was late afternoon.
The tent-flaps had been thrown back and through the open door he could see the low sunlight and the long shadows, and far away across the dusty plain, the faint line of the distant hills, already tinged with rose. There was a man squatting by the tent door and idly throwing dice, left hand against right, and Ash, watching him, was thankful to see that Mulraj at least had managed to avoid crashing into the nullah. The fog had lifted from his brain at last and he could remember what happened; and lying there he attempted to assess the extent of his injuries and was relieved to discover that his legs were not broken, and that it was his left arm and shoulder that was bandaged and not the right – proof that he had managed to fall on his left shoulder after all. He could remember thinking as The Cardinal plunged over into the nullah that he could not afford to lose the use of his right arm and must throw himself to the left, and there was a crumb of comfort in the fact that he had evidently managed to do this.
Mulraj gave a grunt of satisfaction at the fall of the dice, and glancing over his shoulder, saw that Ash's eyes were open and lucid.
‘Ah!’ said Mulraj, gathering up the dice and coming to stand beside the bed. ‘So you are awake at last. It was time. How do you feel?’
‘Hungry,’ said Ash with the ghost of a grin.
‘That is a good sign. I will send at once for the Rao-Sahib's Hakim, and it may be that he will permit you to have a little mutton broth –or a bowl of warm milk.’
He laughed at Ash's grimace of disgust and would have turned away to call a servant, but Ash reached out with his uninjured arm, and clutching a fold of his coat, said: ‘The boy. Jhoti. Is he safe?’
Mulraj appeared to hesitate for a moment, and then said reassuringly that the child was well and Ash need not trouble his head about him. ‘All you have to think of now is yourself. You must get well quickly; we cannot move camp until you have regained your strength, and we have already been here for nearly a week.’
‘A week?’
‘You were without your senses for a full night and day, and for the best part of the next three you raved like a madman. And since then you have been sleeping like a babe.’
‘Good lord,’ said Ash blankly. ‘No wonder I'm hungry. What happened to the horses?’
‘Jhoti's horse, Bulbul, broke his neck.’
‘And mine?’
‘I shot him,’ said Mulraj briefly.
Ash made no comment, but Mulraj saw the betraying flicker of his eye-lids and said gently: ‘I'm sorry. But there was nothing else that I could do. He had broken both forelegs.’
‘It was my fault,’ said Ash slowly. ‘I should have known that I couldn't turn that horse of Jhoti's. It was too late…’
Another man might have uttered consoling denials, but Mulraj had taken a liking to Ash and so he did not lie. He nodded instead and said: ‘One makes these mistakes. But what is done is done, and there is no profit in bewailing what cannot be undone. Put it behind you, Pelham-Sahib, and give thanks to the gods that you are alive; for there was a time when we thought that you would surely die.’
The last words reminded Ash of something, and he frowned in an effort to remember what it was, and then said abruptly: ‘Was there a woman in here one night?’
‘Surely. The dai. She is one of the Rajkumaries' women and she has come every night; and will come for many more, being skilled in massage and the healing of torn ligaments and strained muscles. You owe her much – and the Hakim Gobind even more.’
‘Oh,’ said Ash, disappointed. And closed his eyes against the low sunlight.
Considering all things, he made a remarkably