Companions of Paradise (18 page)

“And the six-pounders,” Fitzgerald went on, “were no use at all in that cramped space. Even properly trained gunners could not have aimed them at the rooftops at such short range. They were fired only once, into some houses in front, where the road turned, but that was all. Worse, both guns were abandoned, with only one of them spiked and disabled. The other one is in enemy hands—”

His voice trailed away.

“Has Brigadier Shelton gone to the Bala Hisar yet?” Uncle Adrian asked.

“Yes.” When Fitzgerald dropped his voice, Mariana pressed closer to the door. “When I met him on the road with his troops, I found him in a terrible state. He seemed almost beside himself, not knowing how to act when he got there. He asked
me
what to do.”

“He asked
you?
But he is our
second-in-command.”

Fitzgerald sighed audibly. “When I said that if it were up to me, I would enter the city at once, and rescue Burnes, he replied quite sharply that his force was inadequate, and that I did not seem to understand street firing.”

“What
is
the matter with everyone?” Uncle Adrian murmured.

“At least General Elphinstone is reinforcing the garrison at the commissariat fort.”

Mariana had almost forgotten that foolhardy lack of planning— storing all the food supplies and much of the army's ammunition outside the cantonment walls, in an unoccupied fort across the road from a walled garden that would make a perfect staging ground for a siege.

“Sir William has called for General Sale to return with his brigade and the rest of our guns,” Fitzgerald added. “With his help we will easily defeat the insurgents.”

“I am glad to hear that.”

A chair scraped back. “I must beg your leave to return to my duties,” the lieutenant said heavily, “as I have been charged with seeing to our defenses. But I want to extend the younger officers’ thanks to you and Mott for stating our case so eloquently this morning. Although I am certain we shall hold out until General Sale returns,” he went on quietly, as a second chair creaked, “I cannot help feeling concern for you, Mrs. Lamb, and Miss Givens. I wish there were a way to spirit you and your family back to India before things become worse.”

“You are very kind, Fitzgerald,” Uncle Adrian replied grimly, “but I have my duty to perform. As for my wife and Miss Givens, as much as I would like to do so, I cannot imagine a safe way to send two British ladies anywhere.”

Fitzgerald's footfall was perilously near the door. “I understand your feelings, sir,” he said, as Mariana poised, ready for flight. “If I think of a way to remove the ladies, I shall tell you immediately.”

THAT NIGHT she sat on her bed, a lamp burning on a table beside her, Haji Khan's little roll of paper open on her knees.

You have more to decide than who is to be your husband
, he had declared, as if the whole business of her marriage were only a minor footnote or a punctuation mark in the story of her life. But what could be more important than whom she married? Did not that decision carry with it whole worlds to gain or to lose?

Perhaps it did, but at this moment she also wondered if she, Uncle Adrian, and Aunt Claire would survive the insurgency.

Haji Khan had told her that if she recited the durood, she would receive the answers to all her questions. She tried to recapture his face, to read his expression in retrospect, but could conjure up only the irritation in his voice.

“Heavenly Father, please forgive me if this is wrong,” she whispered. “But I do not know what else to do.”

She closed her eyes and began.

“In number as many as the numerous things created,”
she concluded a moment later.

Nothing happened. No answer appeared. No picture rose in her mind's eye, not even a quickly vanishing image. But, she wondered, had she detected a lessening of her fears, a subtle hint of new confidence in the face of peril?

She must recite the durood for ten more days. Who knew what would have occurred by the time she finished, but if Haji Khan had meant what he said, she would know more than she did now. Whether this new information would concern her future marriage or something more serious, only time would tell.

LATE THAT night, a group of shrouded male figures crept along the alley behind Burnes's still smoldering house, torches flickering in their hands. When they reached the vicinity of its low back door, Burnes's Afghan friend Naib Sharif spread a cloth on the packed earth of the lane. Retching as they worked, he and his men found the remains of Burnes's poor, dismembered body, and gathered them one by one, onto the cloth.

“I will see to your burial, my dear, foolish Eskandar,” Sharif vowed in a whisper as he and his men carried their reeking burden away into the darkness.

November 6, 1841

W
e must pack at once.” By the light of her candle, Aunt Claire's face was gray with fright. “A messenger has come from the cantonment with orders to evacuate the Residence compound.”

Mariana sat up, blinking. “What time is it?” she asked.

“It's nearly five-thirty in the morning. We are to leave the Residence compound by nine o'clock. They are saying we are not safe here.”

Two braids hung down beneath Aunt Claire's lace nightcap. Mariana had not realized how thin her aunt's hair had become.

“The Macnaghtens are to stay with Lady Sale,” Aunt Claire added over her shoulder as she shuffled away, the lamp swaying in her hand. “We are to occupy officers’ quarters.”

Half an hour later, Dittoo backed through Mariana's door with her coffee tray. He was close to tears. “What has happened, Bibi?” he cried, the coffee things clattering as he put the tray down with trembling hands. “Why must we leave our house?”

“I don't know, Dittoo,” she replied. “I can only say that we must do it.”

“But they are saying that your Munshi Sahib and the rest of us must live in tents.” His voice broke. “I want to go home to India, Bibi. It is so cold here—”

“I will see that you all have warm quilts,” she interrupted hastily, fearing her own feelings might show. “And now, go downstairs and help with the kitchen things. And do not forget to pack the sheets and towels,” she called after him.

When he was gone, she sat on the edge of her bed and dropped her head into her hands.

What had become of her people, the bravest, most sensible people on earth? How had they failed to recognize the terrible danger of interfering with people they did not understand? Now, faced with the violent consequences of their actions, why were they so weak-kneed?

And why could they not see that innocents like Dittoo and her poor, terrified aunt would be forced to pay the unfair price of their folly?

She forced herself to her feet and began to pack.

They would all be lucky, she thought, as she tucked Haji Khan's paper securely into her bodice, if that price were no more than the misery of living in a barracks, or a tent in the snow.

“Captain Sturt was stabbed in the face yesterday, by a courtier at the Bala Hisar,” her uncle told her two hours later, as they stood waiting for their horses. “His tongue and face were paralyzed. For hours he could neither swallow nor speak. Lady Sale and her daughter have nursed him all night. Thank God, he is now expected to recover.”

Uncle Adrian looked puffy-eyed, as if he, too, had not slept. “It seems that the Afghans are gathering in large numbers. The road between here and the city is full of armed villagers on their way to join the uprising. Please say nothing about this to your aunt. I cannot wait for General Sale and the First Brigade to arrive.”

The horses had come. Yar Mohammad led Mariana's mare to the mounting steps, his demeanor as calm and watchful as always. He must have worn that same expression as he led her safely from Haji Khan's house, his long kukri knife ready in his hand.

He had been her faithful protector for two years: a bony-faced mountain villager who never seemed to hurry, but whose quick action had once saved her when she was bitten by a snake, and who had guarded her from the child thief who had come all those months ago to steal Saboor.

Every time Mariana looked at Yar Mohammad, or at blunt, faithful Ghulam Ali, she thought of Lahore, and Saboor, and of Hassan Ali Khan.

She ducked her head to hide the tears gathering in her eyes. Please let nothing ill happen to them now….

Followed by a train of laden donkeys, they pushed their way through the gate in the rampart wall that divided the Residence compound from the military cantonment.

Looking about her, Mariana saw that everything had changed.

When she had last seen it, the open parade ground had been occupied by groups of red-coated soldiers practicing intricate drills. It was now home to rows of tents, piles of cannonballs, and sprawling heaps of baggage. The sounds of thudding hammers and rasping saws came from what remained of the parade ground's open space.

A white blur of distant tents had appeared along the cantonment's southern rampart. The native bazaar, it seemed, had been brought inside the cantonment's protective walls.

An excited crowd of Indian men, women, and children milled about near the barracks. As Mariana watched, several British officers appeared and herded them out of the way.

Near the gate, red-coated infantrymen climbed ladders to the parapet, to stand guard behind its toothlike fortifications.

When one of them pointed south, toward the city, Mariana noticed a rent beneath the arm of his coat.

Were all the soldiers as unkempt as that man? She frowned as half a dozen native lancers rode past her. They were indeed, she concluded, observing their patched trousers and threadbare coats. They must not have been issued new uniforms for a year at least.

Accompanied by heavily bearded Indian gunners, a team of horses pulled an artillery piece toward the main gate, its long barrel pointing backward, while a mounted British officer barked orders beside them.

No one had taken any notice of Mariana and her family.

“Why are we stopping? Why are they putting me down?” cried Aunt Claire from her palanquin when Mariana and her uncle reined in their horses, looking for someone to show them their new quarters.

“I think,” Uncle Adrian said, pointing toward a walled compound just visible past the tents and baggage, “it would be wise to go to Lady Sale's house for now, until things are calmer here.”

Half an hour later, they, Lady Sale, and a subdued Lady Macnaghten sat on high-backed chairs in the Sales’ spartan drawing room, while bustling footfalls overhead told them of the continuing effort to care for the wounded Captain Sturt.

Attending all night to her son-in-law had done nothing to reduce Lady Sale's accustomed forcefulness. “This insurrection has been mismanaged from the beginning,” she said bluntly, as she took a glass of sherry from a tray. “We have only the supineness of our own command, and their silly fantasy of our security to blame for these attacks.”

“Exactly.” Mariana opened her hands, delighted to find someone who agreed with her. “And I cannot imagine why we have not avenged Sir Alexander's murder. After all, it was four days ago. If we were Afghans—”

“Murder? Four days ago?”
Lady Sale's rangy body came to immediate, stiff attention. “How
dare
you say such a horrible thing? And who are
you
to claim knowledge of Sir Alexander's fate?”

Mariana shrank into her chair, her heart thudding. Although the room was cold, she felt hot moisture seeping down her back. She did not dare look at her uncle.

“But we all know he has taken refuge with friends in the city!” Lady Macnaghten's hand trembled as she reached for her sherry. Her hair, Mariana now noticed, was the tiniest bit untidy, and her gown less than perfectly ironed. “We all know he has only a minor leg wound.”

“Miss Givens is only guessing,” Uncle Adrian assured her. “My niece is a
very
foolish young lady,” he added, glaring at Mariana.

“And a disrespectful one at that,” Lady Sale added nastily. “She has no right to remark upon the policies of Her Majesty's appointed officials. If there is anything I cannot abide,” she sniffed, “it is a
croaker.

“We have no more than three days’ worth of food within the cantonment walls,” she went on, exempting herself from any such charge. “All the rest of our stores are in the commissariat fort. If we lose it, we shall have lost more than the vital food and medical stores inside it. The insurgents will also have gained control of the Kohistan Road, and cut our contact with the city.”

“The city?” Aunt Claire frowned. “But why should we want contact with Kabul? Is it not full of Afghans?”

Lady Sale stared at her. “The city, my dear lady,” she said loudly and slowly, as if to an imbecile, “is where
everything is.”

“I am sure,” Lady Macnaghten put in with forced brightness, “we shall all manage somehow. My husband is very skilled at talking to the Afghans. He speaks Persian, you know….”

Her voice faded. Mariana tried to catch her eye, but she looked away.

Uncle Adrian cleared his throat. “Let us talk of something else,” he said firmly. “I understand, Lady Sale, that Captain Sturt is now able to speak. You must be very relieved.”

“I am indeed.” Lady Sale offered him a narrow-lipped smile. “He appeared to have been dreadfully wounded at first, but he is now sitting up and asking for soup.”

UNCLE ADRIAN and his family had been assigned the shared quarters of three junior officers: three cupboardlike bedrooms and an ill-furnished sitting room with a fireplace and two windows looking toward the infantry barracks. As soon as they arrived at the low, ugly building, Mariana shut herself into her room, a tiny, ice-cold chamber that seemed, from articles that still remained, to have belonged to a Lieutenant Cowperthwaite.

She would listen to her aunt's complaints later.

Where was Fitzgerald? She opened her large trunk and surveyed its contents, hoping he was not out in the open, being shot at by Afghans. But he must be, for he had not sent them so much as a single message.

It was no use wondering what had become of Hassan.

“It is all
your
fault that we have not been invited to dine with Lady Sale,” Aunt Claire trumpeted accusingly from her palanquin that evening, as they wove their way across the dark parade ground on their way to dinner.

She was, of course, correct. And as a worried-looking subaltern showed them to a makeshift table in a corner of the British cavalry officers’ mess, Mariana saw that as disagreeable as dinner at Lady Sale's might have been, this one promised to be even worse.

They were not alone. Sharing their table were two silent officers’ wives and their seven collective children, all of whom seemed too dispirited to eat. But worse than their lackluster companions, and Mariana's feeling of being an interloper in that martial setting, was the general atmosphere of the dining room.

The officers at their long table were festively enough dressed, in elaborate mess kits covered in gold braid and epaulettes, and the room was candlelit and full of regimental silver, but the conversation was subdued, and the faces around the table, young and old, fresh and weather-beaten, looked sullen and angry.

The food, when it came, consisted of soggy rice and stringy boiled chicken. As she pushed it about her plate, Mariana listened to the sounds around her—the hushed voices of the children, the scrape of knives and forks against china, and an occasional, barked order for more wine.

There was no laughter, no joy in that room.

It was no wonder, Mariana thought, that the officers preferred drinking to talking. It was widely known that two thousand gunmen could be seen waiting on the nearby hills, but for all that and for all the reports of a steady stream of armed villagers heading for the city, no orders had come from General Elphinstone to launch a proper attack.

“May I trouble you for the salt?” whispered one of the wives.

Mariana could offer the woman only a half-smile.

“Only time will tell what lies ahead,” her uncle said glumly, as they braved the cold walk back to their quarters, with Aunt Claire's palanquin bearers puffing behind them.

Half an hour later, someone knocked at Mariana's door.

“It is Charles Mott, Miss Givens,” said a muffled voice. “May I speak to you for a moment?”

He wore no coat. He shivered in the narrow passageway, his top hat in his hands. “I apologize for intruding at this late hour,” he said rapidly, “but I fear greatly for your safety. I know that Mr. Lamb will never desert his post, but I feel I must tell you that there is a way for you and Mrs. Lamb to get away from here before it is too late.”

“Too late?” She frowned into his earnest face.

“Yes.” He glanced over his shoulder. “I cannot go into it, but you must go to one of the Afghan chiefs and ask him for asylum for yourself and your aunt.

“Asylum is an unwritten law of the Pushtuns,” he added. “You will be perfectly safe in their custody. Of course Mr. Lamb would never avail himself—”

“Panah?” she interrupted. “You want me to ask for panah?”

He nodded. “You have heard of it. I should have known. Please do it, Miss Givens. It is your only hope. I could not,” he added, his face filled with painful longing, “bear it, if anything were to happen to—”

“Thank you for your advice, Mr. Mott,” Mariana said hastily. “I shall keep it in mind.”

He must be mad, she thought, as she prepared for sleep. No circumstances, no matter how dire, would force her to seek protection from her enemies.

SHE WAS startled awake at dawn by the thudding of artillery. As she sat up on Lieutenant Cowperthwaite's string bed, her quilt to her chin, Dittoo appeared with her coffee tray. “The tents are very cold, Bibi,” he offered from between chattering teeth, “and there is only enough coffee for one more day.”

Hoping the sound of the guns indicated some positive action, she gulped her cooling coffee, buttoned herself into her warmest gown, pushed her curls into the first bonnet she found, and opened her door.