The Far Pavilions (51 page)

By using all the guile and diplomacy at his command he contrived to convey the impression that the whole scheme was in reality Kaka-ji's own idea from start to finish, and that all he, Ash, had done was to agree with it. With the result that later that evening, after consulting Gobind (who had agreed that the effect of exercise in moderation could be as beneficial as tonics and purges), the old gentleman had produced it to Mulraj as his own solution to the problem, and charged him with procuring suitable mounts for the brides and making any other arrangements that might be necessary.

Jhoti had been delighted at the prospect of showing off to Shushila, and was only too willing to instruct her. The plan had been put into effect on the very next day and been a success from the start; particularly from Ash's point of view, for the evening rides were an enormous improvement on those gatherings in the durbar tent, as they allowed far more latitude for private conversation and were free from the observant eyes of waiting-women.

The
ruth
would be stopped a mile short of the selected camping site, and Ash, with Jhoti, Mulraj and Kaka-ji, would ride back to meet it, taking two spare horses for the girls; a slow, sedate and well-mannered animal for Shushila-Bai and a more mettlesome one for Anjuli.

Sometimes they would bring hawks with them, and sometimes a shot-gun if there was a chance of game. But mostly they rode for exercise and pleasure. And as Shushila preferred to keep to a walk, or at most a gentle trot, while Jhoti, in the role of instructor, stayed close beside her with Mulraj to keep an eye on them both, and Kaka-ji was usually too tired by a day in the saddle to do more than jog along behind, Ash and Anjuli-Bai found it the easiest thing in the world to ride ahead and explore the countryside together without arousing any comment. Once again it became possible for them to talk freely, and this time without any fear that what they said might be overheard; for out in the open country they were safe and Ash could watch Juli's face as she talked, instead of only listening to a voice that whispered in the darkness from behind the folds of a bourka.

Jhoti had insisted on Shushila wearing male attire, as no one, he declared, could possibly manage to ride comfortably – let alone well – while swathed in a sari. And though Kaka-ji had protested at this, he had been over-ruled, for Shushila was enchanted at the prospect of dressing up, and Mulraj, who also considered a sari an impossible garment to ride in, pointed out that it would arouse less curiosity in any strangers they might happen to pass, if they gave the appearance of being a party of men out for an evening canter.

Dressed in borrowed clothing, Shushila made a charming boy and Anjuli a handsome young man. And even Kaka-ji had to admit that their costume could hardly be considered immodest, and was certainly more sensible; though he failed to notice that this change of dress resulted, inevitably, in an easier and far more informal atmosphere – a phenomenon that can be observed at any costume ball, where the mere donning of a false moustache or a farthingale seems to convince the wearers that they are no longer recognizable, and enables them to lose their inhibitions and frolic in a manner that they would never dream of doing on any other occasion.

The fact that his nieces were wearing what to them was fancy-dress made it possible for Anjuli-Bai to ride off with Pelham-Sahib in pursuit of a jackal, or to see what lay beyond a ridge of higher ground, without anyone, including himself, thinking that there was anything undesirable in it. For without the flowing lines of a sari to remind him of her sex, his elder niece seemed to shed her identity and become only an anonymous young person who could safely be allowed a certain amount of freedom. Harmless freedom naturally, for was not he there himself to keep a close eye on them all?

Kaka-ji congratulated himself on the success of his plan, because there was no doubt that the health and spirits of both girls had greatly improved. Shushila had already lost the wizened look that had so alarmed him and would soon be as pretty as ever, and her women assured him that her appetite was returning and her nerves were far better of late. He could also see that she enjoyed the riding lessons almost as much as Jhoti enjoyed giving them, and as he listened to his nephew's shrill little voice shouting advice and encouragement, and Shushila's answering laughter, Kaka-ji felt a glow of satisfaction at his own ingenious solving of a troublesome problem.

Much the same could be said of Ash, who had only one fault to find with the present situation: the fact that the evening rides were all too short and far too quickly over. The nights and the long, dusty days became no more than a preparation for that single hour in which he could be with Juli, even though he could not expect to spend more than a portion of the time with her, since caution and good manners forced them both to ride and talk with the others for at least some part of it. Nor was it always an hour, for like Ash, Jhoti and Mulraj and Kaka-ji had also ridden all day, and sometimes they too were tired – not that Ash, for one, would ever have admitted it. When that happened the hour would be cut by a quarter, or a half. But Ash was still grateful for every minute of it.

As the camp crawled southward across Rajputana like a vast and colourful circus procession (or, as it often seemed to Ash, an insatiable horde of locusts) the weather became warmer and he realized that the time would soon come when it would be too hot to march when the sun was high. But there was no need to start planning for that yet, as the temperature was still tolerable even at noon, and the nights remained mild.

The days slid into weeks almost without his noticing it, and he enjoyed every one of them: though it was far from being an idle time, for each day brought its own crop of difficulties, ranging from the routine ones of provisioning (which included dealing with claims for damages to crops and grazing-grounds by irate village headmen) to arbitrating in a wide variety of disputes within the camp, and, on more than one occasion, helping to beat off an attack by armed raiders. These and a hundred other matters kept him fully occupied. But he would not have changed places with anyone in the world, for he found the constant and varying demands upon him stimulating, while the fact that there had been a serious attempt to murder young Jhoti – and would probably be others – added a spice of danger to the journey that offset any element of tedium. And at the end of each day there was always Juli, and riding beside her in the quiet hour before sunset he could relax and forget his responsibilities to the camp and to Jhoti, and become Ashok again instead of ‘Pelham-Sahib’.

It was on one of these evenings – a hot, still evening at the end of an even hotter day – that he heard for the first time the story of how Hira Lal had accompanied Lalji and the old Rajah to Calcutta, and had vanished from his tent one night and never been seen again taken, it was said, by a tigress, a notorious man-eater who was known to roam the district and had already accounted for more than a dozen villagers. The proof of this had been a fragment of Hira Lal's blood-stained clothing, found among the bushes. But there had been no pug-marks and no trace of the drag, and a local
shikari
(game hunter) had tactlessly insisted that he did not believe that this was the work of the man-eater – an opinion that was later borne out by the news that the tigress had killed a herdsman near a village some twenty-five miles away on the very night that Hira Lal disappeared…

‘No one in the Hawa Mahal believed it either,’ said Anjuli, ‘and there were many who said he had been made away with by order of the Rani – though they did not say it out loud, but only in a whisper: very small whispers. I think, myself, that they were right; everyone knew that she had been enraged when she learned that my father had decided to take Lalji with him when he travelled to Calcutta to lay claim before the Viceroy to the throne of Karidarra, and it was no secret that it was Hira Lal who had persuaded him to do so – perhaps because he did not trust her not to bring about Lalji's death as soon as my father's back was turned. She was always jealous of Lalji.’

‘And I imagine she made away with him in the end,’ observed Ash grimly. ‘ Lalji and Hira Lal both. It almost makes one hope that there may be a hell after all; with a special section reserved for people like Janoo-Rani who do their murdering at second-hand.’

‘
Don't
!’ said Anjuli in a low voice, and shivered. ‘You do not have to wish for that. The gods are just, and I think she paid in this life for all the evil she did – and more. Much more, for she did not die an easy death, and towards the end she shrieked out that it was Nandu himself who had poisoned her, though that is something I will not believe; no son could have done such a thing. Yet if she believed it, how terrible it must have been for her to die thinking that. There was no need for a hell after death for Janoo-Rani, for she found it here; and as we know that those whose conduct is evil attain an evil re-birth, she will also have to pay in her next life, and perhaps for many lives afterwards, for every ill deed that she committed in this one.’

‘ “
Take what you want,” says God. “And pay for it,
” ’ quoted Ash. ‘Do you really believe all that, Juli?’

‘That we must pay for all we do? Of course.’

‘No: that we are born over and over again. That you and I, for instance, have already lived many lives and will live many more.’

‘If one has been born once, why not again?’ asked Juli. ‘Besides, the Upanishads
*
tell us that this is so, and according to that teaching it is only those who attain to the knowledge of the identity of the Soul of Brahma who reach “the way of the gods” and do not return to earth. Therefore it follows that you and I have not yet freed ourselves from the cycle of re-birth; and as I do not think either of us are seekers after holiness – or anyway, not yet -we shall surely be born again.’

‘As a worm or a rat, or a pariah dog?’

‘Only if we have committed some terrible sin in this life. If we are kind and just, and give to the poor -’

‘And the priests,’ interjected Ash derisively. ‘Don't forget the priests.’

‘And the priests also,’ amended Anjuli gravely, ‘then – who knows? -we may even be born as great ones. You a king or a famous warrior; or even a Mahatma. And I a queen – or a nun.’

‘The gods forbid!’ said Ash with a laugh.

But Anjuli did not smile and her face was suddenly sober as she said slowly, and almost as though she were speaking to herself: ‘But I had forgotten… I will soon be a queen in this one. The Junior Rani of Bhithor…’

Her voice died out in a whisper and they rode on without speaking, until presently Ash reined in to sit watching the sun go down. He knew that Juli had drawn rein beside him, but though he would not look at her, he was acutely aware of her presence – of the faint fragrance of dried rose-petals that clung about her and the fact that he had only to move his hand a little way to touch hers. The sun slid below the horizon and was gone, and from the shelter of a patch of high grass a peacock called mournfully into the silence. Ash heard the girl beside him draw a slow breath and let it out on a sigh, and he said abruptly, still without looking at her: ‘What are you thinking about, Juli?’

‘The Dur Khaima,’ said Juli unexpectedly. ‘It is strange to think that I shall never see the Dur Khaima again. Or you either, once this journey is ended.’

The peacock cried again, its harsh call a loneliness in the gathering dusk. And like an echo of that sound came Jhoti's high-pitched voice calling to them that it was time to go back, and there had been nothing for it but to turn their horses and rejoin the others.

Ash had been noticeably silent as they rode back to the camp, and that night for the first time he took stock of the situation, and made a serious attempt to sort out his emotions and decide what, if anything, he meant to do about Juli. Or could do.

To the consternation of Gul Baz, he announced that he was going to take a long walk and would not be returning for some hours; and having brusquely refused to allow anyone to accompany him, he strode off into the darkness, armed only with a stout, iron-bound
lathi
(staff) such as country folk carry.

‘Let him be, Gul Baz,’ advised Mahdoo. ‘He is young, and it is too hot for sleeping. Also I think there is something that troubles him, and it may be that the night air will serve to clear his mind. Go to bed, and tell Kunwar that I will be
chowkidar
tonight. There is no need for us both to wait up for the Sahib.’

The wait had proved much longer than Mahdoo expected, for the Sahib did not return until shortly before dawn; and long before that the old man fell asleep at his post, secure in the belief that Ash must arouse him in order to re-enter the tent, and untroubled by any serious fear for the safety of one who had learned caution on the Border and was well able to take care of himself. Any anxiety he felt was solely on the score of his Sahib's state of mind, which the old man had divined with far more accuracy than Ash would have given him credit for – or appreciated.

‘Unless I am greatly mistaken, and I do not think I am,’ mused Mahdoo, communing with himself before sleep overtook him, ‘my boy is in love… and with someone he sees daily yet cannot win – which can only be one of the two Rajkumaries. Unless it is one of their women – that could well be. But whoever it is, there can be nothing in it but danger and disappointment for him; and let us hope that he has realized this, and that his night-walking will serve to cool his blood and permit prudence to prevail before matters go too far.’

Ash had not only realized it. He had seen the danger from the beginning and had not underrated it, but for one reason or another he had put off thinking about it. Stubbornly refusing to look ahead and see where all this was leading, or where it would end – perhaps because at the back of his mind he knew only too well, yet could not bring himself to face it.

He had, in effect, been indulging in a form of mental sleep-walking, and Juli's reminder that she would soon be a queen – ‘Junior Rani of Bhithor’ – had acted as a dash of ice-cold water thrown in his face, awakening him at last to the discovery that the path he was on was no wide and level one, but a narrow ledge on the face of a precipice.