The Strangler Vine (21 page)

Before us, an elephant was staggering across the grass. Its mahout,
riding on its neck holding a short metal pole, was quite unable to command it.

Out of the trees, perhaps fifteen yards from us, the tiger launched itself so fast that the line of its body seemed almost liquid. It was as if the jangal’s dappled shadows had turned themselves to flesh. One moment a ripple of breeze and shade, the next a snarling beast. It flung itself on to the elephant’s hind legs, as a cat climbs a curtain, and sank its great jaws into the hide to gain purchase.

The elephant wheezed and trumpeted in panic, its legs skittering and hopping, its little eyes popping. The howdah on its back lurched unsteadily, and the two occupants clung to its sides. The tiger released itself from the elephant’s hide, and the huge grey creature staggered forward and then began to topple, precipitating to the ground the mahout, who rolled clear of the creature, as well as the howdah. The two men were thrown wide of the collapsing elephant, their headgear shaken from their heads, swords tangled between their legs, guns knocked from their hands. As they scrambled to their feet, the tiger sprang towards them with a mighty leap. But the mahout flung himself between the monster and its quarry, and the tiger brought him down instead. The man screamed – a horrible, high-pitched mewing, as the tiger buried his jaws in his face and the back of his neck, and placed itself on top of him chest to chest, leaving me with a sight of its whole side. I fell to the ground, found my position, aimed and shot. I knew it was good even before the tiger shivered, reared slightly and tumbled sideways. The force with which it did so seemed to make the ground shake.

The mahout continued to scream. I stood up and ran into the clearing. I was dimly aware that Blake was behind me. As I ran, I saw that one of the two men was the Rao. He was sitting on the ground looking dazed. Behind him his companion, a lavishly dressed sardar, was leaning on his gun. The elephant, half-crazed, pulled itself up and hurled itself towards the trees. Blood oozed bright from the claw marks on the animal’s grey haunches. From those trees came a crashing of grasses and leaves. The elephant sheered off to the right. The sardar was so startled he almost leapt
into the air. He lifted his rifle and aimed – somewhat wildly – into the trees. Nothing appeared, but the sounds beyond the trees continued.

The sardar, still unaware of us, still standing behind his Rao, his weapon still primed, straightened and took aim at a target I should never have expected. I acted without thought. I turned to Blake and he gave me his musket – I had had no time to reload my own. As the butt fitted into my shoulder my head became clear. I could tell the sight and the barrel were not perfectly matched, and made what allowance I could. Blake shouted in Hindoostanee. The Rao turned. The sardar looked up. As the Rao apprehended with horror the muzzle pointed at his head, I shot and the sardar fell into the dirt.

‘Reload!’ said Blake, putting a hand upon my shoulder. He ran forward and scooped up a handful of earth and pebbles and threw them at the tiger. Satisfied it was dead, he rushed over to the still-whimpering mahout and endeavoured to prise the man’s head out of the dead tiger’s jaws.

From the other side of the meadow came distant shouts. The Rao subsided on to the ground. I went to help him, passing the fallen sardar. From the corner of my eye I saw that the bullet had entered under his arm and gone into his chest, for he had been standing sideways to me. I retrieved the Rao’s turban and the
sarpech
, which gleamed red and gold among the grasses, and made to help him up, offering my hand under his elbow. He looked up at me, grimaced, drew his elbow back and regained his feet alone. I remembered that such high-caste Hindoos abhorred the touch of a European. I thought I might laugh out loud. ‘I do apologize, sir,’ I said, then remembered he would not understand me.

I scrabbled for a few words.

‘
Mujay maaf kijiye
Maharaj
,’ I said haltingly.

I held out his turban and the jewel. I made to bow, but my legs seemed to buckle and instead I found myself on one knee. It seemed, nevertheless, the correct thing to do. The Rao smiled imperially and, without actually touching my hand, took them delicately from me.
I have at last performed an almost heroic deed
, I
thought.
And I have killed another man
. Behind the Rao, Blake had removed his jacket and was proceeding to tie it tight round the mahout’s face. I saw him look past the Rao at me and give me a quizzical half-smile.

‘Come here, Avery, and hold this man’s head. There is something I must do.’

I stood up, bowed to the Rao and walked over. My movements were jerky; I did not quite have mastery over my own limbs. The mahout was alive, but he had fainted. Blood poured from his face, and I endeavoured to hold his head steady, but my hands were shaking. Blake strode towards the Rao, whose expression had regained its characteristic haughtiness. Blake bowed.

‘Maharaj!’ he began, and then issued a stream of quite unintelligible words in which I thought I identified the word ‘gun’. The Rao, who was using his as a crutch, stared at Blake as if he were mad. ‘Maharaj!’ Blake ventured again. The Rao glanced behind him. His courtiers and servants were some distance away. Quickly, he lifted his gun. It was a beautiful thing, inlaid with silver filigree. He opened the barrel and looked into it. He nodded. From within it he fished out a wad of blackened cotton with his long, delicate fingers and let it fall on the ground. Quickly, Blake bent over, picked it up, put it in his pocket and took several steps back.

Within minutes the Rao was surrounded by
shikaris
and sardars. I could not really hear what they said, and I have a vision of Blake fending them off in that quiet, stubborn way that I imagined they would find infuriating. Someone came and spirited off the mahout. We stood waiting for mounts. I was extremely thirsty and my wound hurt but had not reopened. The sardar’s body was thrown across a horse. Rao and his entourage were borne off on elephants. Against the dirt and tufts of thick green grass the tiger looked impossibly bright and powerful, even in death. Its head was huge. It had whiskers and a kind of moustache and several of its teeth were broken. A small rosette of red had spread across the hide where my shot had pierced its hide and rammed into its heart. The
shikaris
stretched the body out and eventually a couple of sapling trunks were brought and its legs were tied to them and it was carried away.
I wondered idly what had become of Mir Aziz and Sameer and the Resident’s party. I later learnt they had long since been taken back to the safety of the tents. At last the Rao’s soldiers conducted us back past the beaters. Blake rode close to me, and when we reached our tents, there was Mir Aziz on my other side. Neither spoke, but I had the feeling they believed they were protecting me. The thought mildly exasperated me. The soldiers gathered up our tents – they looked small and poor indeed next to the Rao’s city of tents – and we rode up to the riverside palace, where I was given a large, airy room. Noisy native servants kept arriving with boxes and food, and demanding things I couldn’t understand. My head hurt. People wished to talk to me. Blake closed the door on them. I was, I recall, extremely tired.

When I woke there seemed to be an army of barbers and bearers carrying a tub and pitchers of hot water, and
khitmatgurs
with coffee and platters full of breads, fruits and dahls. Sameer stood at the foot of the bed, unsure whether to send them away or order them in. I was starving. I took a bath and then ate until I could fit in no more. When I was done, Blake arrived, dressed in a pure white kurti and churidars. Mir Aziz and Sameer had, he said, been offered various grand dishes, but had insisted upon cooking their own meal.

‘I sent back the jewels and the silks. There were some very large rubies,’ he said.

‘I should have liked a ruby,’ I said. ‘Just one. How is the mahout?’

‘It seems he might live. Lost a lot of blood, and he’ll never be pretty, but he might come through. The
shikari
who tried to save the Resident will not. The Major General, who has temporarily taken on the late Resident’s duties, has offered us hospitality in the Residency. He is loud in his praises of your brave deeds and would be only too pleased if we join him, not least, I suspect, so he can put a first-hand description in his despatch to Calcutta. I’m told he said it was “a very palpable hit for the Company”.’

‘But not so good for the Resident.’

‘No. I declined his offer. He’s more of a … well, I declined his offer.’

I laughed.

‘It was well done, Avery,’ he said. ‘And the Company will make something out of it: the Lieutenant who saved the native prince from tiger attack and assassination.’

‘It was certainly strange. The machan collapsing, and the tiger and the elephant, and the sardar,’ I said.

‘The elephant had been cut before and the machan was supposed to come down. If the Rao had survived the attack, a machan populated by Europeans collapsing would certainly have provoked an incident with the Company. The Rao has determined enemies. The sardar must have expected to lose his life, but he tried to kill the Rao anyway. The tiger was an unforeseen addition. Still, your two shots have got us a private interview with him. When I returned the gifts, I asked for an audience. It has been agreed. I’m indebted to you.’

It occurred to me that Blake had traded my chance to pay off my debts and marry Helen for a few words with a native prince.

‘You couldn’t have kept them,’ he said. ‘But you should know that for a chance to speak to the Rao alone, I would have given them up even if you could have kept them.’

‘Why should you imagine that my desire to find Mountstuart is any less than yours?’ I said. I was irritated now. ‘He has been my idol. I do not know what he is to you. Moreover, Colonel Buchanan made it quite clear that my future depends upon our success or failure.’

‘Did he? And what else did he say to you?’

‘He said that if we failed he’d send me to a hole in the Mofussil and keep me there until I went mad or died of the cholera.’

‘And if we find him?’

I looked away. ‘I can go home.’

‘Is that what you want?’

‘I no longer know. I hated Calcutta so much, all I could think of was home. But what I chiefly missed was the place and my sister, Louisa. If I were to return now, the rest of my family would regard me as a failure. Certainly my father would. We do not see eye to eye. There is little for me there.’

‘What about your sister?’

‘She is the best person I know.’

‘Not married?’

‘He will never let her marry. She is to be the crutch of his old age.’

‘Well,’ he said. ‘I think those two shots may have placed you beyond Buchanan’s reach.’

I fidgeted. ‘So,’ I said brightly, ‘we have given up a raja’s treasure for a few minutes in which to make him even more annoyed with us than he was before.’

‘That’s the ticket, Avery. We’ll make a Special Inquiry Agent of you yet.’

The room was high and bright. Small windows, set in a painted frieze of brightly rendered birds and flowers high in the walls, ushered in the light. Below the painted frieze there were glazed bookcases stuffed with leather-bound volumes along one wall. I could not quite make out the titles, but I was sure some were in English. On a stand in one corner of the room an enormous green and red parrot delicately ate a nut, and on the floor beneath it was a gold-enamelled huqqa. In another sat a
punkah-wallah
, and in another a musician on a cushion plucked single notes from a sitar. On various intricately patterned occasional tables were a globe, a telescope, a sextant, a chess set. There were also four extremely large, bearded and heavily armed guards, whose hands never left the jewelled scabbards of their tulwars.

In the elaborate garden outside, in which the white tiger paced up and down a shaded cage, our clothes and persons had been minutely searched by more burly guards.

The Rao stood behind a long mahogony desk, poring over a pile of papers with two elderly, bearded companions. The desk was covered with a number of tiny perfect objects: small boxes inlaid with enamel, inkwells encrusted with tiny rubies, a magnifying-glass. He wore a simple pleated robe of white muslin, and over it a pink silk coat embroidered in gold, and over that he was once again garlanded with row upon row of pearls. There was another spray of precious stones attached to his turban.

We waited, barefoot of course. Eventually the Rao tilted his head and looked at us. He dismissed his companions, who shot us curious glances as they bowed low and backed out of the room. The musician departed too. The Rao looked over our heads and began to speak, a great flood of Hindoostanee poured from his lips. After a minute or two, he stopped. Blake bowed low. I did the same. Blake replied in kind. After two or three sentences the Rao waved his hand impatiently.

‘Yes, yes, Mr Jeremiah Blake,’ he said, ‘let us dispense with the florid addresses. I expect it from my own subjects, but it sounds absurd coming from an Englishman of the Company, and besides, it bores me.’

I am ashamed to say that I goggled in a rather impolite fashion.

‘Yes, Lieutenant William Avery, my English is very good, is it not?’ said the Rao. He seemed rather pleased at my surprise. ‘I do not choose to use it often these days, but I have not lost it. Now, let me say again, I thank you for saving my life. It was most impressive marksmanship. A difficult shot, I believe. It will be the talk of my court for a thousand years. I am indebted to you. Your Hindoostanee is quite dreadful, by the way. Now come, come.’

He beckoned me over. From a gold box he drew out a black bag tied at the top by a drawstring. From it he poured out a handful of precious stones, which clicked satisfyingly against each other in his hand. He held them out to show me.

‘Sir, Your Majesty, Maharaja, you know I cannot accept them,’ I stuttered.

He sniffed. ‘Yes. The Company has rules about such things. I wish you to know that I am grateful, and am sensible of your courage and skill, and I wish to be magnanimous. But Mr Blake has asked for an interview. I will be honest and say I wish you had chosen something else. The letter you brought was, you must know, insulting, for all that your own words dripped with honey. Your story of an attack outside my walls I cannot but regard as a provocation. But you have saved me from beast and assassin and I am grateful. Nevertheless, I shudder to think of the uses to which the Company will put this story. Now, please to be quick.’