Barbara Cleverly - The Palace Tiger

Breaking free from the hypnotic fascination of the barrel, Joe looked along it to the small brown hand holding it so unwaveringly steady. Beyond that, an impish face looked back at him with scorn. A boy of ten or eleven, Joe guessed, dressed in a white silk buttoned coat, white trousers and a blue and white striped silk turban.

‘And you’re supposed to be a policeman, they tell me!’

‘And what are you supposed to be?’ said Joe, annoyed. ‘A burglar? The palace dacoit? No, I know what you are — you’re one of those thieving monkeys that break into guests’ rooms and steal their hairbrushes! Well, you left the window open, monkey!’

Surprised, the boy looked sideways at the window and opened his mouth to make a rude reply, distraction enough for Joe to knock his hand away, grasp his wrist and with a quick heave, flip his slight frame over the bed, grabbing the gun from him as he rolled.

‘Get up, monkey, and sit down in that chair!’ Joe snapped. The boy picked himself up, straightened his turban and sat down, eyes fixed on the gun.

‘Never point a gun at someone unless you intend to kill him,’ said Joe, ‘even if, like this one, it is unloaded! And never pause to have a conversation with your victim. It shows you’re not serious. Anyone who needs to hold a gun to a feller’s head to make him listen is likely to bore his target to death rather than fill him full of lead.’

The boy swallowed, glared at Joe and said haughtily, ‘As you are speaking to me at some length, though I would hardly call it a conversation, I assume that you have not been sent to murder me?’

‘Sent to murder you?’ Joe was stunned. ‘Who are you? And, perhaps more important, just what do you take me for?’

‘My name is Bahadur Singh. I am the son of Maharaja Udai Singh. The third son,’ he said with a pride that could not be concealed even by his obvious terror. ‘Bishan is dead and now Prithvi is dead. I am the next son. I think you have been sent to kill me.’

‘Why on earth should you think that?’ said Joe, putting the gun down on a small table by the door.

‘I searched your luggage and found the gun hidden. Who but a hired assassin would hide his gun?’

‘Is it a custom of yours to go through guests’ things?’

‘Yes, of course,’ said the boy, puzzled. ‘How else can I decide who I am going to like? Shall I tell you,’ he said, relaxing now that the gun had been put out of reach, his tone changing to one of confidence, ‘what Sir Hector Munro has in his smallest black bag?’

‘No!’

‘Well, then, what Mr Troop keeps in his shaving kit?’

Joe was ashamed that his second ‘No!’ was a betraying split second slow.

‘And besides,’ the boy went on cheerfully, ‘you have the face of a killer.’

Joe must have registered dismay at being so described because the boy hurried to add, ‘Oh, it’s a nice face. A very nice face but you look as though you are accustomed to fighting. Like Yashastilak.’

‘Yasha who? Who’s that?’ Joe felt he was beginning to lose the thread and the initiative in this exchange.

‘Yashastilak. My father’s favourite fighting elephant. He is old and ugly with many scars but he has won a hundred fights!’

‘Well, that’s something, I suppose,’ said Joe. He grinned, sat down on the bed and put his hands on his knees in an unthreatening posture. ‘And you’re not far wrong. I was a soldier, Bahadur, in the recent war in Europe. A piece of shrapnel — that’s the casing of a shell — sliced through my face. . here.’ He touched the unsightly scar which cut through his eyebrow and skewed the left side of his face. ‘And now I have to be careful not to scare the horses but that doesn’t make me a killer. I’ve killed men. But I’m no threat to boys who behave themselves. I’m here, if anything, to protect you. Sir George Jardine sent me and he asks to be remembered to you.’

‘Sir George! I have only met him once when he visited my father last year but I know he is my friend,’ said Bahadur. ‘I wish he would come again. He knows nearly as much about astronomy as I do and he taught me conjuring tricks.’

‘Ah, yes,’ said Joe drily, ‘he does that to us all!’

‘And he is very jolly!’ Bahadur went on with enthusiasm. ‘And full of mischief, my nanny says. He took a pot of treacle and a pot of honey to the top of the palace and poured them both out into the courtyard. He made me stand below and note what happened. The treacle won the race. It fell on to my turban! The purdah ladies in the zenana were watching and laughing. I told them it was a scientific experiment but they thought it was just a bit of fun.’

‘No reason why it can’t be both,’ said Joe.

There was a catch in the boy’s voice as the memory of the past faded and the seriousness of his present situation came back to him. ‘I think I would feel safer if Sir George were here! You say you are his friend but how am I to know that is true?’

‘Sensible of you to ask the question,’ Joe remarked. ‘Look, I’ve got something in my bag for you. George sent it and he’s signed his name in the front.’ He unbuckled his bag and produced a book. One Thousand and One Cunning Card Tricks for Clever Boys , was its whimsical title.

It seemed to work its magic as Bahadur’s next question was, ‘If it’s not you, then is it Edgar Troop who’s going to kill me?’

Joe could only guess at the depths of insecurity, the loneliness and the fear behind the question, and his sympathy and his heart went out to the boy. Soon he would be fatherless — did he know that? — and he would be surrounded by people out to manipulate him, perhaps even get rid of him. What reassurance could Joe give — a stranger in the palace? A ferret being thrust down an unexplored rat-hole where any menace might lurk? The next Heatstroke Express might be ferrying a hired gun to the palace, though he might well be already in place. And, Joe supposed, there was no lack of home-grown talent who might oblige.

‘Not Edgar,’ he said. ‘No, not Edgar. He works for Sir George too. We’re both here to help you and to find out what happened to your brothers. I’ve no idea yet what’s going on here in Ranipur but there is something wrong. You seem to have the run of the palace,’ he added speculatively. ‘Help me to find out what’s happening as far as you can — without putting yourself into danger, that is. Breaking into strangers’ rooms and sticking a gun in their face is a good way to get yourself killed!’

He was struck by a worrying thought. ‘Bahadur, tell me, whereabouts do you live in the palace? Have you got, er, safe living quarters?’

The boy shook his head. ‘This is a problem for me. I will tell you that there is nowhere that is safe. I have been living, as do all young boys of the princely family, in the zenana but I do not like it and I have left that place. My mother has her own apartment there but it is very crowded. The maharanees also have their apartments in the zenana. Their sons sit higher on the carpet than I do and they despise me. When Bishan died his mother, First Her Highness, was heard to say that it was unfair that her son, the rightful heir, the Maharaj Kumar, had died when “that little low-born, crawling insect” was still alive. She was speaking of me. And now Second Her Highness will say the same thing. Their Highnesses are not friendly with each other in normal times but I think that now they have both lost sons their hatred will combine and fix on me. They will do whatever is in their power to keep me from sitting on the gaddi.’

‘Gaddi?’

‘You would say throne. The ceremonial cushion the ruler sits on.’

‘But would ladies of their station — maharanees both — stoop to kill a child?’