Amitav Ghosh - Flood of Fire

Ji, Kaptán-sah’b.

Now that all the preparations were in place Kesri was anxious for the attack to begin. No matter what the dangers, it would be better to fight than to spend another night in this hell-hole of a fortress.

But it was not to be. A white flag appeared above the city’s northern gate just as the brigade was mustering.

‘The devil take me!’ cried Captain Mee. ‘I’ll be damned if it isn’t talkee-time again.’

The troops were told to stand down and the officers spent the rest of the morning shuttling back and forth between the fortress and headquarters.

Later Captain Mee told Kesri that the mandarins had sued for peace and the Plenipot had agreed to an armistice on condition that an indemnity of six million silver dollars was handed over immediately and all Chinese troops were withdawn from the city.

As so often before the mandarins had agreed — but the officers were to a man convinced that nothing would come of it and the sweat and blood they had spent in seizing the fortresses would be wasted. General Gough for one was eager to press on with the attack but his hands were tied: Captain Elliot had insisted that the Chinese authorities be given time to meet the conditions of the armistice. The force would probably have to remain in the fortresses for a while yet, possibly several days.

As the hours passed the heat continued to mount and vast swarms of flies, midges and stinging gnats invaded the fortresses, drawn by the smell of rancid sweat and overfilled latrines. Soon supplies dwindled to a point where water and food had to be strictly rationed. The only spot of good news was that a few clouds had at last appeared in the sky, scudding in from the south.

In the afternoon, Captain Mee was summoned to headquarters for yet another meeting: it had been called, he explained later, to address the shortages of food and water. The high command had authorized the four brigades to send out foraging parties. They were to operate under a strict set of rules: nothing was to be taken by force; they were to go from house to house asking for donations of rice, vegetables and livestock. Every household that made a contribution was to be given a placard to put over their doorway so that no further contributions would be asked of them. Under no circumstances were civilians — men, women or children — to be molested or harmed. Infractions of these rules would be severely punished.

‘Do you understand, havildar?’

Ji, Kaptán-sah’b.

Captain Mee took out a chart and pointed to a road that led to a village called San Yuan Li. Kesri was to put together a foraging party and head in that direction. As for the captain, he was planning to join a group of fellow officers who were on their way to explore some of the nearby pagodas and temples.

‘And listen, havildar,’ said the captain, directing a stern glance at Kesri. ‘I don’t want anyone making any trouble. No looting, no pinching, no monkeying about with the local woman. Do you understand?’

Kesri snapped off a salute: Ji, Kaptán-sah’b.

*

Assembling a foraging party was no easy task: to make sepoys carry loads was difficult at the best of times for they baulked at anything that hinted of manual labour. Nor were there many camp-followers left to choose from — their numbers had now dwindled to fewer than twenty. In the end Kesri had no option but to include the fifers and drummers — they too hated to serve as porters but their protests were not hard to override.

Once all the available mussucks, chagals, sacks and other recap-tacles had been gathered up, the party set off with the sepoys guarding the flanks and Kesri in the lead.

The path to San Yuan Li ran down a steep slope. On reaching the plain the path joined a road that led northwards. Marching up this road they passed a good number of people who were fleeing the city. They were families for the most part and took fright easily; the mere sight of the sepoys sent them running into the fields.

The heat was so unrelenting that the party soon began to tire: Kesri was glad to spot a group of Madras sepoys at the entrance of a pagoda: they were lounging in the shade of a sweeping, red-tiled roof. Kesri decided that it was time for a rest-break; he sent the men to sit under a tree and went over to talk to the Madras sepoys. They told him that they had come to the pagoda with Captain Mee and some of their own officers. There was a graveyard at the back and the officers had gone to inspect it, leaving them on guard outside.

What are they doing in a graveyard? said Kesri.

At this the sepoys shot sidelong glances at each other. One of them inclined his head at the gate: Go in and see.

Kesri stepped inside and after making his way through a succession of courtyards and incense-scented hallways he came to a corridor that led outside. He could see the officers through a doorway; they were in the adjoining graveyard, issuing orders to a squad of sepoys. Kesri went a little closer and saw that a pink-cheeked young lieutenant was directing the sepoys in digging up a tomb. Several graves had already been broken open; the lieutenant was examining their contents and scribbling in a notepad.

In the distance a crowd of local people had gathered and were being held back at gunpoint by a line of sepoys.

Kesri caught a whiff of putrefaction: evidently some of the exhumed graves were quite new. A shiver — brought on by both disgust and fear — went through Kesri. The idea of disturbing the dead filled him with dread; his instincts told him to get away from there as quickly as possible.

With a hand over his nose Kesri spun around but only to find Captain Mee coming towards him, down the corridor. The captain’s eyes went from Kesri to the graveyard and back again.

‘Don’t get the wrong idea, havildar,’ said the captain. ‘Nothing is being taken from these graves. Lieutenant Hadley over there’ — he nodded at the officer with the notepad — ‘is a scholar of sorts. He’s making a study of Chinese customs and practices. That’s all.’

Ji, Kaptán-sah’b.

‘You’d better be on your way now.’ The captain dismissed him with a nod.

*

As the foraging party marched away from the pagoda Kesri spotted a bank of dark clouds moving towards them, trailing sheets of rain. This was not the long-awaited storm, he guessed, just a preliminary shower: it would pass soon.

A short way ahead lay a compound that looked as though it belonged to a family of farmers: a small dwelling and several storehouses were grouped around a paved courtyard and a well. There was no placard at the gate to indicate that the house had already been visited: it seemed as good a place to start as any.

Seeing no one around, Kesri sent the followers to the well, to fill their mussucks and chagals. The main doorway was to the left: Kesri rapped on it several times without receiving an answer, although he knew that there were people inside — he could see their eyes glinting behind a crack in a window.

Kesri was thinking of what to do next when one of the followers came running up to tell him that two men had been found in one of the storehouses. Crossing the courtyard, Kesri went to the open door: inside were two terrified men, cowering in a corner. Beside them lay several sacks of rice and baskets of freshly picked bananas, green beans and a vegetable that looked like karela — it was a plumper, smoother version of the bitter gourd that was so beloved of the sepoys.

The two men were dressed in threadbare tunics and pyjamas; Kesri decided they looked like servants or field-hands. When he stepped into the storehouse they began to whimper in fear, rocking back and forth on their heels. It was clear that they were frightened half out of their minds; their faces were twisted into almost comical masks of terror.