Amitav Ghosh - Flood of Fire

Raju could not sleep, and in a while, hearing a rustling sound, he peered out from under his sheet and saw a shadow slipping out of the tent.

Beside him, Dicky too was awake. ‘You know where that bugger’s going?’ he whispered.

‘Where?’

‘Bet he’s going to have a dip. I heard the bhistis have found a pond nearby. Let’s follow him, men; we can also cool off a little.’

‘But what if Bobbery-Bob …?’

Raju remembered that the fife-major had said that he’d flog anyone who was found outside the tent.

‘Balls to bloody Bobbery-Bob,’ hissed Dicky. ‘I’m going, men.’

With a twist of his body Dicky slipped under the tent-flap. A second later Raju followed.

A red-rimmed moon was shining dimly through a pearly haze. In the faint light they caught a glimpse of the bhisti’s crouched figure darting past the nearest picket, heading towards an incline where a body of water could be seen shimmering in the darkness.

They followed slowly, staying low and keeping their eyes on the bhisti as he crept ahead to the water’s edge. Having made sure that nobody was around, the man stripped off his ungah and his pyjamas, and slid quietly into the pond.

‘It’s safe, see?’ said Dicky. ‘Come on, men, let’s go.’

They took a few more steps forward and were only a short distance from the water when they saw the bhisti coming out and reaching for his clothes.

Then something else caught Dicky’s eye and he ducked under a bush, pulling Raju down with him.

Peering through the leaves, they saw that three shadowy figures had crept up behind the bhisti as he was pulling on his ungah. Before he could push his head through the neck-hole the shadows lunged at him; with his face still swaddled in the garment, the bhisti was pushed down on to his knees.

All this happened very quickly so that the bhisti’s single cry for help — Bachao! — was still hanging in the air when a blade flashed in the silvery moonlight. Then the man’s decapitated trunk tumbled forward and the ungah was whisked away, with the head still inside.

The bundle of white cloth seemed to float off into the darkness as the three figures melted back into the shadows.

A voice called out from the picket — Kaun hai — who goes there? — and then the guards went running past. Somewhere in the distance an alarm bell began to ring, causing a stir in the camp.

‘Come on, men.’ Dicky gave Raju’s arm a tug. ‘Follow me and stay low.’

The camp was in an uproar now so nobody noticed the two boys as they slipped back into their tent.

Once they were under their sheets Raju whispered into Dicky’s ear: ‘We should tell someone what we saw, no men?’

‘Fuck off, bugger!’ Dicky hissed back. ‘Mad or what? Bobbery-Bob will stick a tent-pole up your chute if he hears you were out there. And mine too.’

Raju tried to close his eyes but found that he was shivering, despite the heat. Through the chattering of his teeth he caught the sound of metal tools biting into the soil — somewhere nearby a grave was being prepared for the decapitated bhisti.

In a while Dicky whispered into his ear: ‘You know why they took his head?’

‘Why?’

‘Must be for the reward, no?’

‘How do you know?’

‘What else? Don’t you wonder, men, how much they’d get for your head or mine?’

*

At dawn, when the reveille was sounded, the air was still hot and heavy. The men and boys of B Company were drenched in sweat even before the morning hazree — and as luck would have it they were served the item they hated most: potatoes.

As they were eating an alarm bell began to ring: Chinese soldiers had been spotted in the distance, issuing from the city’s northern and western gates.

Kesri had barely drained his mug of tea when Captain Mee came striding over. He told Kesri that B Company and the 37th Madras would be the first units to move out of the camp; General Gough wanted to study the enemy’s movements and they had been detailed to accompany him to a hillock, a mile or so away.

The sepoys fell in hurriedly and marched out of the camp with drums beating and fifes playing. But once they entered the rice-fields it became impossible to keep good order: just as Kesri had thought, the paddies were flooded. The men were ordered to fall out and advance in single file, along the bunds.

Soon all pretence of marching was abandoned; to keep their footing was as much as the sepoys could do. Churned up by their feet, the clay turned into a slippery slurry; the sepoys had to plant their musket-barrels in the mud to steady themselves. But even then some could not keep their balance and toppled over into the paddies. Once down, pinioned by their knapsacks and constrained by their tight, heavy uniforms, they could do nothing but flail their limbs until they were pulled out.

The officers had an even harder time of it: unlike the sepoys, who were in sandals, they were shod in heavy boots and were reduced to shuffling along sidewise, with their arms spread out for balance.

The Jangi Laat himself was only a short distance ahead of Kesri: a tall, mournful-looking man with a walrus moustache, General Gough — or Goughie, as he was spoken of by the officers — usually held himself stiffly upright. But now he was teetering along as though he were walking a tightrope, with his arms extended and his shako skewed dangerously to one side. His son, who was also his principal aide-de-camp, was right behind, trying to steady him by supporting his elbow. But he was himself wobbling precariously and it was almost inevitable that something untoward would occur. Sure enough, just as they were approaching the hillock, the general and his son both tumbled over into a rice-field. A halt was ordered while they were pulled out and wiped down.

The pause gave Bobbery-Bob an opportunity to berate the boys, many of whom were tittering and giggling. ‘You buggers think this is a joke, eh? I’ll teach you to laugh at the general-sahib! You just wait and see, men; you’ll soon be laughing out of the wrong hole.’

Raju was not among those who had found the incident amusing; nor, unlike the other boys, had he enjoyed the walk across the rice-fields. While Dicky and the others were sliding and slithering along the paths, Raju’s mind was elsewhere: thoughts and images that had never visited him before now kept passing through his head. How did it feel to be speared in the neck, or the chest? What was it like to be bayoneted in the groin? What happened when a bullet hit you? If it struck a bone were there splinters?

When the column began to move again Raju was slowly overtaken by nausea. On reaching the hillock, when the boys were given permission to relieve themselves, he went aside and vomited up a slew of potatoes and bile.

Dicky fetched some water, from a bhisti, and whispered urgently in Raju’s ear: ‘What’s the matter with you, bugger? Have you been thinking about what happened last night? I told you to forget it, no?’

‘It’s just the heat,’ said Raju quickly. ‘I’ll be all right now.’

*

On the other side of the hillock Kesri was surveying the ground with Captain Mee. The four hilltop fortresses were shimmering in the haze, straight ahead. The slopes below them were dotted with detachments of Chinese troops; to the rear of the fortresses lay the walls of the city, stretching away for miles, pierced at regular intervals by soaring, many-roofed gates.

The fortresses’ guns had been shooting intermittently since daybreak but now the rhythm of the firing picked up, gradually intensifying into a full-scale barrage. The distance was too great for the guns to do much damage, yet the cannonade was more spirited, and better directed, than any they had faced before.