Amitav Ghosh - Flood of Fire

Much to my disappointment the walk was a short one, allowing barely a glimpse of the walled city: the temple where the meeting was to be held was just three hundred yards from the gate. The entrance to the complex was blocked off by soldiers, but a large and noisy crowd could be seen behind the ranks, jostling for a glimpse of the foreigners.

The venue of the meeting was at the rear of the temple complex. After crossing several courtyards we found ourselves in a large hall that looked like a library, being packed with books and scrolls. At the far end was a raised alcove where chairs had been placed for the Commissioner and a couple of other top officials.

The Commissioner’s arrival was heralded by gongs. Everyone in the hall knelt when he entered — all but the foreign merchants who bowed but did not kneel. The Commissioner is stocky in build and was dressed rather plainly in comparison with the members of his entourage. He is of middle age, vigorous in his movements, with a brisk, unceremonious manner. His voice is pleasant and his face good-humoured, with bright, sharp eyes and a wispy beard.

All in all, I have to say that my darshan of the Commissioner was strangely anti-climactic. I’d heard so much about him that I’d imagined that he would be somehow out of the ordinary. But of all the mandarins present he was perhaps the least exceptional, at least in appearance. Where other high officials go to great lengths to create an impression of splendour and pomp, he seems to exert himself in the other direction: this perhaps is the most extraordinary thing about him. His manner is almost grandfatherly — he even patted the English boy on his head and talked to him for several minutes.

Unfortunately the rest of the proceedings offered little of interest. It appears that Commissioner Lin had sought the meeting because he wanted to persuade the Englishmen of the justice of his cause. To this end he had brought along several books and pamphlets on the subject of opium and the harm it is doing to China (some of these had been brought to his attention by none other than Compton and myself). On the Commissioner’s instructions a passage was read out from a European treatise on international law to show that the banning of the opium trade was perfectly compatible with universally recognized legal principles.

The Englishmen listened politely but seemed puzz led that the Commissioner should appeal to them: after all it is not as if they are the kind of men who have their hands on the helm of Empire.

Compton too thought that the meeting was nothing but a waste of time.

Later, when we were back in the print-shop, Compton said that the Yum-chai’s chief failing is that he places too much faith in reason. He thinks that if only ordinary Englishmen could grasp the reasoning behind his policy there would be no dispute. In his heart he doesn’t believe that any sensible group of men would want to go to war for something like opium. This is why he wanted to meet the se survivors: he now thinks that his best hopes lie in reaching out to ordinary Englishmen. He has lost faith in Captain Elliot and other British officials, he thinks they are corrupt, self-seeking officials who are deceiving the people they are meant to serve.

I suspect he believes that ordinary Englishmen, like the survivors of the wreck of the Sunda , can petition their government, as people do in China. He doesn’t understand that it isn’t the same in England; these men cannot petition their government or do anything to affect official policy.

I suppose everyone finds the despotisms of other peoples hard to comprehend.

Only after his abrupt departure from Mrs Burnham’s boudoir did Zachary realize that they had not settled on a date for their next meeting. He cursed himself, not only for leaving so precipitously, but also because he could not understand why the thought of being banished from her boudoir should fill him with panic. He knew, after all, that this connection — whatever it was — would have to end soon. Yet he was powerless to silence the part of him that kept crying out: ‘Not yet, not yet!’

Fortunately he did not have long to wait: within a few days a message arrived, hidden inside another weighty tome.

When he next appeared at the door of Mrs Burnham’s goozle-connuh it was clear from the ardour of her greeting that she too was regretful that they had parted on an acrimonious note.

‘My dear, dear Mr Reid,’ she said, wrapping her arms around him. ‘I am so glad you came — I thought you might not.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I think I may have mis-spoken when I saw you last. I’ve always been a dreadful buck-buck-wallee you know. My tongue has a way of running away with me — a flying jib, Mr Doughty calls it — and you must make allowance for it. Am I forgiven? Tell me, am I?’

He smiled. ‘Yes, my dear Beebee — you are.’

‘Thank you!’ She pressed her hips against his and gave a cry of delight. ‘Oh, and better still, I see that our sepoy too is full of forgiveness — and I warrant that he shall rise to even greater heights of bawhawdery when he sees the present I have bought him.’

She helped Zachary peel off his clothes and led him to the bed, which was covered with towels. When he was lying on his back, with his head propped up against a bank of pillows, she turned to her bedside table and picked up a small bowl. Placing it on his chest, she said: ‘Careful now, Mr Reid — you mustn’t move or there’ll be a dreadful spill.’

Zachary saw that the bowl was half-filled with perfumed oil, amber in colour. Submerged in the oil was something that looked like a child’s stocking, except that it was made not of cloth but of a transparent material, and was fitted with a ribbon of red silk at the open end. The ribbon had been artfully arranged to hang over the lip of the bowl so that it hung free of the oil.

Now, pinching the ribbon between her fingertips, Mrs Burnham lifted the sock out of the bowl and held it up so that the oil dripped off the tapered end in a thin trickle, pooling between the ridges of Zachary’s abdomen.

‘Do you know what this is, Mr Reid?’

His eyes widened. ‘Is it …? Could it be …? A French letter?’

She boxed his ear playfully. ‘Oh you are too coarse, Mr Reid! Let us call it a capote — a topcoat for our brave sepoy, so that he shall never again have to suffer the ignominy of shooting his goolies into the air.’

She stooped to give Zachary a long, slow kiss. ‘I know how hard it has been for you, my dear, to so often deny yourself a proper spending. Your sacrifice has weighed heavily on me, and you cannot imagine how glad I am that you will not have to do it again.’

Zachary was touched, as much by the tenderness in her voice as by her gesture. ‘That is thoughtful of you, Mrs Burnham. Was the capote hard to get?’

‘Exceedingly, because I had to be so very discreet. Suffice it to say that on Free School Street there lives an Armenian midwife who is now considerably the richer.’

‘It was expensive then?’

‘Capotes are only a shilling apiece in England but here they cost twice as much — a whole rupee for one. And I got a few dozen of them so that they will last us awhile yet. Have you ever used one before?’

He shook his head. ‘Mere mysteries cannot afford such luxuries, Mrs Burnham,’ he said. ‘I’ve heard of them of course, but I’d never seen one till now.’

‘Nor have I any experience of them,’ she said, ‘but I will do my best to fit it correctly — you can help by lying on your back and holding your sepoy at attention.’

Crawling across the bed, she climbed over his leg and positioned herself between his thighs.

‘I am told that capotes are made from lambs’ intestines,’ she said, as she dipped her fingers into the bowl. ‘Is it not diverting, Mr Reid, to think that the animal that fills our bellies with mutton-gosht at dinner can also offer us this other service at night?’