The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [323]
In the compound of Wally's bungalow the giant neem tree was grey with the dust of the scorching plain, and when the hot wind blew, its leaves did not rustle but clicked instead like dice in a leather shaker, or rattled like dry bones: nor could Ash any longer see the hills, for they were hidden by the dust-clouds and the heat haze.
‘How does it feel like to be a lowly Lieutenant again after eight months of peacocking about as a lordly Captain in command of countless thousands?’ asked Wally curiously.
‘Dull,’ said Ash. ‘Dull but peaceful. How many pairs of socks do you think I'd better take?’
The best part of a week had passed since Ash's return from his travels, and he was preparing to move again, but this time on leave. He had duly presented himself at Army Headquarters, where he had given a brief report of his mission and a detailed account of the Rana's misbehaviour to a Colonel Dorton, whose habit of falling asleep during office hours had earned him the nick-name of Dormouse. The Colonel had run true to form and sat through the interview with closed eyes, only opening them (after Ash had been silent for a full two minutes) to stare vaguely into the middle-distance and remark that Mr Pelham-er-Martyn had better report to the Adjutant General's Department, where Major Boyle would assign him to some new duty.
But the prediction made by the District Officer at Deenagunj proved correct. There had been no special reason for Ash's recall. Major Boyle had gone down with a severe attack of dysentery and no one else in the Adjutant General's department appeared to have heard of Lieutenant (lately Captain) Pelham-Martyn, let alone have any orders for him. On the face of it he might just as well have stayed away, for apart from demoting him from the honorary rank he had held for the past eight months (and sending an immediate memo to this effect to the Pay Department) no one seemed to know what to do with him. Ash had asked to be allowed to return to his Regiment, but had been told somewhat tartly that this was a matter for the Commandant of the Guides, who would send for him when he thought fit.
All in all, it had been a depressing home-coming, and but for Wally, he might well have resigned his commission on the spot and set off to explore Tibet or enlist as a deck-hand on a cargo boat – anything that would take him away from the monotony of cantonment life and let him work off the gnawing restlessness that had possessed him ever since his last sight of Juli outside the Pearl Palace in Bhithor. The speed of the journey back across Rajputana and the Punjab to Deenagunj had temporarily assuaged it, but here in Rawalpindi where there was little or nothing to do it returned to torment him, and only Wally's cheerful presence and lively interest in every detail of the Karidkote-Bhithor venture kept it within bounds.
To Wally, Ash retold the story that had aroused so little interest in the somnolent Colonel Dorton, but this time in more detail and leaving less out, though he held back the truth about Juli, and, oddly enough, did not mention the fact that Karidkote had turned out to be the Gulkote of his childhood. Even to this close friend he would not – could not – talk about Juli, and if he could have left her out of the story altogether, he would have done so. That being impossible, he referred to her only when he must, and as though she were less an individual than an abstract problem that had to be solved between the ruler of Bhithor and himself. Though why he should have remained silent on the other matter was something that he could not explain even to himself. It was, after all, the most surprising thing about the whole affair, and Wally, who already knew the saga of those early years in Gulkote, would have been enthralled to hear that the State of Karidkote was the self-same place that Ash had described to him over a year ago on a moonlit night among the ruins of Taxila.
Yet Ash had kept back that vital piece of information, and without it the tale of Biju Ram's death lost