The Gallant (38 page)

Returning to the quayside in the carriage that had brought him to Government House, he had no eyes for the ordered beauty of his surroundings, as he attempted to bring to mind the map of India. Delhi was hundreds of miles to the northwest of Lucknow, he thought, and Sitapur … Ranpur-devil take it, why couldn’t he remember the address Jenny had given him? At all events,

William’s native regiment formed part of the garrison of an outstation, fifty or sixty miles from Lucknow, and there were surely British troops, a British regiment, in Lucknow. It was the capital of Oudh, with-yes, had not William said that Sir Henry Lawrence had been appointed chief commissioner of Oudh, with his headquarters in Lucknow?

Sir Henry was a man Will had appeared greatly to admire.

“He is held in high esteem by both Indians and British,

was Will De Lancey had said.

“If any man can reconcile the adherents of the old King to the annexation of his kingdom, that man is Lawrence.

…”

Red learned more during the meal to which he entertained Captain Fergus Maclaren on board the Galah.

The Royal Engineer officer was a tall, dark-haired man of about thirty-four or comfive, with a grave manner and the soft, lilting accent of a High

land Scot. It turned out that he had served for seven years in India, two of those years in a military station fifty miles from

Lucknow-Cawnpore, on the Ganges River.

He was able to locate Ranpur and, as befitted his profession, drew an excellent sketch map of the area, offering illuminating comments as his pen moved deftly across the paper. He noted place names, roads and rivers, and the site of the proposed railway, which, it seemed, had been planned during the time he had been stationed in Cawnpore.

“The Ganges River and the Great Trunk Road are the principal means of communication between the port, of Calcutta and the northwest,” he explained. “As yet the rail system covers barely a hundred miles-the railhead is here, at Raniganj, d’you see, sir? After that, all troop reinforcements going inland to Benares and Allahabad will have to proceed by river steamer, or by elephant or bullock stage, or they’ll have to march … and that takes time. There is a proposed rail link between Allahabad and Cawnpore, further inland, but to the best of my knowledge it ends here, at Lahonda-forty miles from Allahabad. It had just been started when I left to go to Scotland on furlough. And you’ll realize the distance between Calcutta and Lucknow is seven hundred miles by road and about a thousand by water. And in the monsoon, when the rivers flood and the roads become well-nigh impassable for wheeled traffic, delays are inevitable.”

“What have you heard of the present situation in Delhi and Meerut?” Red asked. “From what the governor and Colonel Pooley told me, that’s where the mutiny began. And the mutineers took Delhi almost a month ago.”

The engineer officer shrugged. “H.e. is probably in possession of more up-to-date information than I am, Captain Broome. But Delhi is, of course, likely to become the focal point of any uprising-if it’s not that already. I imagine that every conceivable effort will be made to recapture it. But not from Calcutta-the distance is too immense. I understand that there’s a force being assembled at Ambala, which is here-was He pointed to the map. “It’s in the hills, near Simla, where the commander in chief, General Anson, has his hot-weather headquarters. But again, sir, transport will be the problem. An

William Stuart Long

army, even a relatively small army, on the move in India requires a vast number of coolies, beasts of burden, carts, ammunition tumbrils, tents, water tankers. Stores have to be carried, forage for the animals, and-was He repeated his despairing shrug. “It will, I fear, be a good long while before Delhi can be retaken. And until it is once again in British hands, there’s just no knowing what will be the effect on the sepoy troops throughout India and particularly in Bengal. Oudh could go up like a powder keg when a naked flame is applied to it!”

He talked on, giving the facts as he knew them and continuing to illustrate his words by recourse to a swiftly sketched map.

Returning to the situation in Oudh, he laid stress on the dangers where most outstations were garrisoned exclusively by sepoy troops.

“Cawnpore had the Queen’s Thirty-second when I was there, Captain Broome, but I

understand the regiment has been posted to Lucknow-which augurs well for Lucknow but badly for Cawnpore, which will be left with three native regiments and” -Maclaren made a wry

grimace-“the so-called Nana of Bithur, claimant to the throne of the Mahrattas.”

“What of him?” Red questioned. “He’s an Indian prince, isn’t he-a rajah?”

“A very embittered one, I fear-although he affected great friendship for our countrymen in the garrison when I was there. In fairness to him, I have to concede that he has reason for bitterness. He was the adopted son of the last Maharajah, Baji Rao-the Peishwa-but because he was not related by blood, the title and the old Peishwa’s very lavish pension were denied him, in line with the former governor general’s policy, of which you’ve no doubt heard. Annexation and lapse, it was called.” He went into brief detail, an odd little smile curving his lips.

“It sounds like barefaced robbery,” Red exclaimed.

“It was indeed, sir,” Maclaren agreed cynically.

“Under Lord Dalhousie’s governorship, the East India Company added something like two hundred and fifty thousand square miles to British-Indian territory in eight years. We-the

British-have something to answer for, I’m afraid. The Nana made numerous appeals to the East India Company’s Court of Governors, but

all were dismissed. All he inherited from Baji Rao were his debts-which were considerable-his palace at Bithur, a private army, and a host of retainers and aging dependents, said to number about fifteen thousand. Frankly, sir, if there

is

an uprising and the Army of Bengal does mutiny, I’d repose no trust whatsoever in the Nana.

He has nothing to lose and everything to gain if he throws in his lot with the sepoys.”

It was logical, Red reflected, his anxiety for his sister and her husband in no way assuaged by the picture Fergus Maclaren had painted. Poor little Jenny! God grant that she would not live to regret her decision to accompany Will De Lancey to India. Uneasily, he questioned Maclaren as to the likelihood of mutiny breaking out in the Oudh outstations, which, like Ranpur, had entirely native garrisons.

“It’s impossible to predict, sir,” the engineer officer answered flatly. “Every Company officer I’ve met believes heart and soul in his own regiment’s loyalty, and it remains to be seen if their faith in their men will be justified. A lot depends on individual officers and the relationship they’ve built up with the men they command. But even before I went on furlough, attempts were being made to stir up sedition among the native troops.

Hindu priests were secretly visiting the sepoys, warning them that the Company policy was to convert them to Christianity by destroying their caste system. And it was rumored that they had revived an old prophecy, which forecast the end of the Company’s rule on the hundredth anniversary of the Battle of Plassey.

Which-was Maclaren swore, and brought his clenched fist down on the mess table in sudden alarm. “For God’s sake, that’s today, isn’t it? Today’s the twenty-third of June, and Clive’s victory was exactly a hundred years ago, unless my memory’s at fault. June the twenty-third, 1757!”

Red stared at him, startled by his vehemence.

“No,” he corrected. “Today is the

twenty-fifth.”

“Then the day will have come and gone. There was some talk of a comet that was to be seen in the night sky-I wonder if it was? And

if the

uprising was timed for the twenty-third?”

“They did not wait for any damned comet in Meerut,” Red reminded his guest. “Well, I suppose we shall soon find out, my friend. We’ll sail as soon as your detachment is embarked, and William Stuart Long

granted fair winds, we should be setting you ashore in Calcutta within a couple of weeks.

Less, if we pick up a decent wind in the Straits of Malacca-which is not beyond the bounds of possibility.”

Red’s forecast proved to be accurate. A strong and favorable wind was picked up in the Straits of Malacca and carried all the way to the mouth of the Hooghly River. On July 8, the

Galah

anchored for the night in Diamond Harbor, and the next day, under the direction of a Bengal marine pilot, she proceeded slowly up the dull and muddy waters of the great river. There was thick, luxuriant jungle on either bank, broken by mudflats and innumerable small islands, which, with their tangled vegetation and basking crocodiles, looked anything but inviting.

As they neared the city of Calcutta, the east bank of the river comknown as Garden Reach-became more attractive, with its well-kept gardens and pleasure grounds and white-painted bungalows, occupied, the pilot said, by officials and well-to-do merchants, who appeared to live in considerable style. On the opposite bank, stone-built temples stood at the head of long flights of stone steps, which were crowded with a motley throng of natives, bathing and filling their earthenware chattis

with water, which the women, in colorful saris, bore away on their heads. All paused to stare at the ship, and a few waved in greeting. A little later, while passing beneath the gun batteries and green slopes of Fort William, the

Galah

was loudly and excitedly cheered by the fortress’s redcoated guardians.

At five o’clock, she dropped anchor off the Esplanade after firing a nineteen-gun salute, and scarcely had she done so than a resplendently uniformed aide-de-camp came on board, with a summons for Red to repair at once

to Government House, where Colonel Birch, the military secretary, was anxious to speak with him.

“His Excellency Lord Canning is at Barrackpore, sir,” the young officer explained.

“But we are expecting him back this evening for dinner-to which, of course, you and the officer commanding your military detachment will, I am sure, be invited.”

A carriage was waiting-a much more luxurious equipage

than the one furnished by the governor at Singapore-drawn by two fine matching bays, with a coachman and a scarlet-uniformed footman, in addition to an escort of two splendidly mounted troopers of the governor general’s bodyguard. In its cushioned interior, Red, accompanied by Captain Maclaren and the young aide, took in with interest the colorful scene about them as they left the dockside, with Fort William’s castellated heights above, and drove across the green, tree-shaded expanse of the park called the Maidan. At this hour, it was thronged with the evening parade of Calcutta’s wealthy society, seated in their stylish conveyances or astride well-groomed hacks, with a military band playing lively airs in a wrought-iron bandstand bedecked with flowers, about which were grouped white-painted tables and chairs, beneath the shade of brilliantly striped awnings.

It looked quite unlike a city threatened by anarchy and rebellion, the Europeans going about their pleasurable business seemingly without a care in the world. But, the young aide asserted gravely, Lord Canning was deeply concerned, for the news reaching him from upriver was almost daily more alarming. He did not dwell on this, however, leaving the harrowing details to his military superior, and when the carriage drew up outside the imposing entrance of Government House, he hurried them through the great, marble-paved hallway and up a side staircase to the military secretary’s office on the first floor.

Colonel Birch, thin, gray-haired, and bewhiskered, received both Red and his passenger warmly.

“You are the answer to prayer,” he stated, with evident sincerity, when Fergus Maclaren introduced himself. “And your men worth their weight in gold at this critical time, believe me! I will arrange for you to go upcountry first thing tomorrow, to place yourself under Colonel Neill’s command at Allahabad. The colonel is leading a relief force of his regiment to Cawnpore, which is under siege by an estimated seven thousand mutinied sepoys under the treacherous Nana Sahib of Bithur.”

Maclaren exchanged a swift glance with Red, as the military secretary went into details of the siege. Just as the engineer captain had prophesied, the last of the Mahrattas had betrayed William Stuart Long

the trust reposed in him by the commander of the Cawnpore garrison, General Sir Hugh Wheeler.

“Sir Hugh is one of our most esteemed general officers,” Colonel Birch added, with tightlipped restraint. “But at Cawnpore he has, I fear, made two disastrous errors.

Firstly, of course, he depended on the Nana’s loyalty and seeming friendship. Then, instead of occupying the magazine-which would have been impregnable-he chose to set up his defenses at a site close to the Allahabad road, behind a mud wall, with only two substantial buildings on it, in the belief that reinforcements would be sent to him from here.”

He sighed heavily. “Well, we endeavored to send him reinforcements, but I gravely fear that Colonel Neill will be unable to reach Cawnpore in time. Close on a thousand of our people-almost half women and children-have been under siege for almost three weeks, and with every hour that passes, our fears for their continued safety increase.”

Observing the look of stunned dismay on Maclaren’s face, the colonel broke off, to eye him from beneath frowning gray brows.

“You know Cawnpore, Captain Maclaren? You have friends there?”

Fergus Maclaren nodded wretchedly. “Indeed I have, sir-a great many. I was stationed in Cawnpore before I went on furlough.” He and the military secretary went into lengthy discussion, to which Red listened in appalled silence, as the desperate situation in which the Cawnpore garrison had been placed slowly became clear to him. By comparison with that of Lucknow-where, it appeared, Sir Henry Lawrence, the commissioner for Oudh, had made careful preparations to withstand attack by rebel forces-Cawnpore’s fate seemed virtually sealed, the garrison’s only course a humiliating surrender unless relief could reach them very soon.