The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [340]
He turned the scrap of paper over and discovered on the reverse side part of an exercise in Persian. Wally had evidently been translating a passage from Genesis into that language, and it occurred to Ash that this crumpled fragment of paper provided an accurate sketch of the boy's character, in that it bore evidence of his piety, his attempts to write verse, his light-hearted philandering, and his dogged determination to pass the Higher Standard in Languages with Honours. The translation proved to be a surprisingly good one, and reading the graceful Persian script, Ash realized that Wally must have been studying even harder than he had thought –
... set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him. And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the East of Eden…
Ash shivered, and crumpling up the scrap of paper into a ball, flicked it away as though it had stung him. Despite his upbringing, he was not over-given to superstition and a belief in omens. But Koda Dad had talked of trouble in Afghanistan and been disturbed by the possibility of another Afghan war, because the Frontier Force Regiments would be the first to become involved; and Ash knew that among men of the Border country, and throughout Central Asia, it is believed that the plain of Kabul is the Land of Cain – that same Nod that lies to the east of Eden – and that Cain's bones lie buried beneath a hill to the south of the city of Kabul, which he is said to have founded.
The link was far fetched, and the fact that Wally had selected that particular passage for translation could hardly be termed a coincidence, for he had recently been reading the memoirs of the first Mogul Emperor, Barbur the Tiger, and on learning of that legend, had obviously been sufficiently interested to look up the story in Genesis, and later use it as an exercise in translation. There was nothing in the least remarkable about it, decided Ash, ashamed of that superstitious shiver. But all the same, he wished that he had not read the thing; because that part of him that was and always would be Ashok saw it as an ill-omen, and not all the Western scepticism of the Pelham-Martyns or those years at an English public school could wholly succeed in convincing him that this was absurd.
A second gust of wind whisked the little ball of paper under the flapping chik and across the verandah into the dusty waste of the compound beyond, and the last trace of Wally's occupancy had gone. And as Ash closed the door against the whirling dust the first drops of rain splashed down, and in the next moment the day was dark and full of the roar of falling water.
34
The downpour lasted over the weekend. It laid the dust and lowered the temperature, and flooded out the snakes who lived in holes below the bungalow and among the tree roots, and who now took up residence in the bathrooms and between the flower pots on the verandah – from where they were evicted by the servants to the accompaniment of much shouting and noise.
Unfortunately it had not been possible to evict Captain Lionel Crimpley, who moved into the bungalow on the Monday in place of Wally, for there happened to be a severe shortage of accommodation in Rawalpindi at the time, and if it had not been Crimpley it would have been someone else. Though Ash was of the opinion that almost anyone else would have been preferable.
Lionel Crimpley was a good ten years older than Ash, and he considered that his seniority should have entitled him to better quarters. He deeply resented having to share half a bungalow with a junior officer, and made no secret of the fact – or that he disliked everything about the country in which he had elected to serve, and regarded its inhabitants as inferiors, irrespective of rank or position. He had been genuinely horrified when a few days after his arrival he had heard voices and laughter coming from Ash's room,