The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [401]
‘He no longer knows me,’ said Gobind. ‘Or anyone else. Wherefore his priests and his own physicians, who have always deeply resented me, have seized their opportunity and had me expelled from his sick-room. They have also prevailed upon the Diwan, who has no love for Karidkote, to forbid me to set foot again in the palace. Believe me, they will see to it that I do not return, so you cannot use me as a cover for any attempt to enter the Rung Mahal yourself. And if you think to shoot your way in you are mad; kings are not permitted to die alone and in peace, and tonight there will be more guards and many more wakeful people in the palace than ever before, since all now know that the Rana is dying. Every passage-way and courtyard will be thronged with men who wait to hear that he has drawn his last breath, and because there is much of value in the palace, the Diwan has ordered extra guards on every door of every room – fearing, so it is said, that various trifles such as jade vases and ornaments made of gold and ivory might vanish before he himself has had time to abstract them. That last may be only slander, but I can tell you that any attempt to enter the palace by force of arms will fail.’
Ash said nothing but his face spoke for him, and Gobind said gently: ‘Sahib, I am not so wedded to my life that I would hesitate to risk losing it if I thought that there was even the smallest chance that your plan would succeed. It is because I know there is not that I would restrain you from it. And also because if it fails, as it must, the very ones whom you hoped to save may be suspected of complicity in the plot and condemned to an even worse death than the fire. Whereas if you wait and do nothing rash, it is possible that even at the eleventh hour the Sirkar may move to prevent the burning – Yes, yes, Sahib! I know that it does not appear likely. But how do we know that they too have not laid their plans? We cannot be sure, and if we throw away our lives needlessly – killing many in that fight, as we should do, and further endangering the Ranis – it may well prove we have, as they say, “lost Delhi for the sake of a fish”.’
‘He is right,’ affirmed Sarji abruptly. ‘If he can no longer enter the palace there is no hope of our being admitted, and to attempt to force our way in would be madness. I may be foolish, but I am not mad – nor, I hope, are you.’
Ash's mouth twitched in a parody of a smile, and he said: ‘Not yet, but – but I still cannot bring myself to believe that there is nothing I can do, and that I must resign myself to seeing…’
He stopped with a shudder and fell silent again, and Gobind, observing him with a professional eye, decided that madness might not be so very far off. The Sahib, it was plain, had endured much during the past week or two, and the accumulated effects of strain, fear and anxiety – and a stubborn refusal to despair contending with the gradual death of hope – had stretched his nerves almost to breaking point. In his present mood he was a danger to them all, and the next thing he would suggest was sure to be some wild scheme for snatching the Ranis as they walked through the crowds on their way to the burning ground, relying on surprise, and hoping to escape under cover of the uproar and confusion that such an act would create among a milling and unmanageable mass of sightseeers.
Gobind himself had, in fact, already given some thought to this particular line of action; but on consideration he had been forced to reject it, realizing that the crowd itself would wreck any such enterprise, for the people of Bhithor would be worked up to a high pitch of excitement and anticipation, and the threat of being robbed of the spectacle they had gathered to see would turn them in an instant into a raving mob. They would tear the impious intruders to pieces, and there would be no hope of escaping from them. Gobind knew this even if the Sahib did not, and he could only hope that he would be able to convince him that any such attempt would be worse than useless. But he was not called upon to do so,