The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [324]
Compared with these stirring adventures, Wally declared that his own doings during the same period had been deplorably tame. He had, predictably, fallen in and out of love with several charming young women, written a vast amount of bad poetry, broken his collar-bone playing polo and lost a month's pay in a single evening at poker. But his most important piece of news had been kept until the last.
Having finally passed for his Lieutenancy, he had been offered, and accepted, a commission in the Guides, and would be joining the Corps in August.
Wally added, after congratulations, that he had delayed putting in for joining leave in the hope that Ash would return in time for the two of them to spend it together. ‘Because of course you must be due for some too. You haven't had any since last summer, so it stands to reason they'll give it you without a murmur if you ask for a couple of months off now.’
This was something that had not occurred to Ash, largely because he had felt himself to be enjoying a glorified form of leave during a good two thirds of his time with the Karidkote camp, and to demand more now smacked of extortion. But taking into account the fact that the Adjutant General's Department appeared to have no orders for him and Major Boyle was still on the sick-list, he could see no harm in asking. They could only refuse, and might even welcome the chance of getting rid of him for a further spell.
He therefore immediately put in for six weeks' leave, and far from being refused, was told that he could take eight – the extra two being in the nature of a bonus, in consideration of the fact that he had been constantly on duty for a period that included the New Year, the Christian holidays of Christmas, Whitsun and Easter, the Hindu festival of Diwali, and the Moslem celebration of Id-ul-Fitre.
He was not particularly grateful for the extra two weeks once he discovered that the ban on his entry into the North-West Frontier Province was still in force, because it meant that he would not be able to visit Mardan and that unless Zarin could manage to get a few days' leave and ride over to Rawalpindi, he might not see him for another year – possibly even longer, should the Commandant of the Guides decide that it would be wiser to extend the ban for a further period.
Ash returned to the bungalow to tell Wally the news and to write three letters: one to the Commandant, Colonel Jenkins, asking to be allowed to return to his unit, another to Wigram Battye, begging him to put in a good word on his behalf, and the third to Zarin. Colonel Jenkins had been away on leave and unable to reply, but his Second-in-Command wrote to say that Ash's request had been noted and would, he felt sure, receive the Commandant's sympathetic consideration as soon as he returned to Mardan, while Wigram, in a friendly letter full of regimental news, promised to do all he could to speed Ash's recall. Zarin did not write, but he sent a verbal message by an itinerant horse-dealer, well known to them both, making an assignation to meet Ash at a certain house on the outskirts of Attock.
‘The Resaidar’ (Zarin had been promoted) ‘cannot take his chutti at this time,’ explained the horse-dealer. ‘But as it is permitted that he absent himself for a day, he will set out at nightfall on the coming Friday, and if all goes well should reach Attock by midnight. If this should not be convenient, the Sahib has only to send a tar.’
The messenger salaamed and was about to leave when he remembered something and turned back: ‘Chut! I had almost forgotten: Zarin Khan called after me to say that if the Sahib wishes to bring Ashok with him, all can be arranged. Would that be one of the Sahib's syces? I have heard that many down-country men make good horse-boys. My own…’ Here he embarked on a discussion of the merits and demerits of horse-boys in general, thereby saving Ash from the necessity of answering such