The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [577]
A visit to the village of Bemaru, scene of the outbreak of the Kabul disaster of 1841, had inspired a particularly tedious epic, and Ash had wasted a precious afternoon listening in growing frustration while Wally strode to and fro reciting lines that only the author himself or his doting family could possibly have regarded as serious poetry –
‘Though all is changed,’ declaimed Wally, ‘yet
remnants of the past
Point to the scenes of bloodshed, and, alas!
Of murder foul; and ruined houses cast
Their mournful shadow o'er the graves of grass
Of England's soldiery, who faced a lot
That few, thank Heaven! before or since have shared; –
Slain by the hand of Treachery, and not
In open Combat…’
There had been more to the same effect, and the poet (who had put in a lot of hard work on it and was not displeased with the result) was disconcerted when Ash had merely remarked thoughtfully that it was curious that the four Europeans in the Residency should think and speak of themselves as ‘Englishmen’ when one was a Scot, two were Irish, and the fourth was half Irish and half French. A comment that showed he had been thinking of something else and missed the finer points of the poem.
All the same, Wally drew more comfort than he would have cared to admit from the knowledge that his friend spent a large part of each day in a house that backed on the Residency compound. It was consoling to know that he need only glance up at a certain window to confirm whether he was there or not, for each morning, when Ash came to work, he would place a cheap blue and white pottery jar with a spray of flowers or greenery in it between the two centre bars of his window, as a sign that he was still there and had not left Kabul.
Yet even without the information he received from Ash, Wally could hardly have avoided being aware that the situation in Kabul was deteriorating daily. He knew – he could hardly fail to know – that neither the servants nor the men of the Escort any longer went singly, or even in pairs, to bathe or wash their clothes in the river, but preferred to go in groups – and armed; that even the Mussulmans did not care to venture alone into the city now, while as for the Sikhs and Hindus, it was as much as their lives were worth to be seen in the streets at all, so that except when on duty they stayed within the compound. What he did not know was that Ash had already taken action in one small sphere to defuse some of the ill-feeling that was being generated against the foreigners.
It was a minor matter, and one that invited more risk than Ash had a right to take. But it had had its effect. He had taken part in the mounted sports, riding a borrowed horse and disguised as a Gilzai tribesman, and had won several events – to the delight of the Kabulis, who had been resentful of the prowess shown by the Guides, and had become convinced that the contests were designed to demonstrate the superiority of the ‘Sahibs' Army’ over their own.
Ash's skill at this particular type of sport had helped redress the balance a little. But he had not dared to repeat the experiment, even though the muttered comments of the spectators continued to worry him – as did the talk in the bazaars. The latter to such an extent that eventually he approached the Sirdar's Hindu friend (who, as the Sirdar said, ‘knows the ins and outs of what goes on in the houses of great men’) to beg him to call at the Residency and speak to Sir Louis Cavagnari of the increasingly virulent attitude of the citizens towards the presence of the foreign Mission in their midst.
‘For His Excellency,’ explained Ash, ‘has so far spoken only with Afghans. And who can say how much truth they have told him, or whether it is to their advantage to make him believe that all will be well? But you, being a Hindu, and one whose son is in the service of His Highness the Amir's own brother, he may listen to with attention; and believing what you say, take measures to protect himself and his followers.’
‘What measures?’ inquired the Hindu sceptically. ‘There