The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [402]
Ash had done so; but only to come to the same conclusion as Gobind. He too was aware that a crowd keyed to a high pitch of excitement can be more dangerous than a wounded leopard or a charging elephant – and that a mob is hydra-headed. If there was a way of saving Juli, it was not that one.
He rose to his feet stiffly, as though it was an effort to move, and said in a flat, formal voice: ‘There does not seem to be anything else to say. If either you or Manilal can think of any plan that might succeed, I would be grateful if you would let me know. I will do the same for you. We still have a few more hours of daylight and the whole of the coming night in which to think of one, and if the Rana's hold on life is stronger than you suppose, we may even have another day and another night as well; who knows?’
‘Only the gods,’ said Gobind soberly. ‘Let us pray to them that tomorrow the Sirkar will send us a regiment, or at least a Political-Sahib from Ajmer. If you will take my advice, Sahib, you will try to sleep tonight. A tired man is apt to make errors of judgement and you may have need of all your wits and your strength. Be assured that I will send Manilal to you if there is any news, or if I should see any way out of this tangle.’
He bowed gravely above his lifted hands, palms pressed together, and Manilal saw them out and barred the door behind them.
‘Where are you going?’ demanded Sarji suspiciously, as Ash turned left into an alleyway that led in the opposite direction to the quarter of the town where they lodged.
‘To the Suttee Gate. I must see the way that they will come, and the road they will take. I would have done so before if I had not been so sure that the Sirkar would step in before it was too late.’
The alleyway skirted that side of the Rung Mahal where the Zenana Quarter lay, and presently they came to a narrow gateway cut through the thickness of the palace wall. It was an unobtrusive gate, barely wide enough to take two people walking abreast, and decorated with a curious formal pattern that on closer inspection proved to be made up of the prints of innumerable slender hands, the hands of queens and concubines who down the long centuries had walked through that gate on their way to the fire and to sanctification.
Ash had seen and noted it on his previous visit to Bhithor, and now he did no more than glance at it as they passed. His interest was not in the gate but the route that the procession would take from there to the pyre. The burning-ground lay some distance from the city, and as the city gates would be closed within an hour of sundown there was no time to waste, and he hurried Sarji forward, taking note as they went of every turn and twist and alleyway between the Suttee Gate of the Rung Mahal and the Mori Gate, which was the nearest of the city gates.
Ten minutes saw them out in the open country and walking along a dusty road that led straight as an arrow towards the hills. There were no houses here, and no cover, but there was a good deal of traffic on the road, mostly pedestrian and all of it moving towards the city. Presently Ash said: ‘There should be a path leading off to the right somewhere here. I used to ride across this bit of country, but I never actually visited the memorial chattris and the burning-ground. I did not think then that…’ He left the sentence unfinished to stop a herd-boy who was driving his cattle back to the city, and inquire the way to the burning-ground.
‘You mean Govidan? Are you strangers that you do not know where the burning-ground of the Ranas lies?’ asked the boy, staring. ‘It is over there – where the chattris are. You can see them above the trees. The path is no more than a stone's throw ahead of you. Are you holy men, or do you go to make arrangements for the Rana's burning? Ah, that will be a great tamarsha. But he is not dead yet, for when he dies the gongs will beat, and my father says they can be heard as far as the Ram Bagh, so that all…’
Ash thrust an anna into the boy's hand