Amitav Ghosh - The Glass Palace

‘Is it Sayagyi?’

‘No.’ There was a sob again. ‘My parents.’

‘Alison. I’m so sorry. What happened?’

‘They were on holiday. Driving. In the Cameron Highlands.

The car went over an embankment. .’

‘Alison, Alison. .’ Dolly couldn’t think of what she was going to say next. ‘Alison, I’d come myself, if I could, but Rajkumar isn’t well. I can’t leave him. But I’ll send someone— one of the boys, probably Dinu. It may take a few weeks but he’ll be there. I promise you. .’ The line went dead before she could say anything else.

The day before Arjun’s twenty-third birthday he and Hardy borrowed a jeep and drove down to Delhi for the weekend. Walking through the arcades of Connaught Circus, they ran into an acquaintance, Kumar, a debonair and famously fun-loving contemporary of theirs from the academy.

Kumar belonged to the 14th Punjab Regiment and his battalion was currently stationed in Singapore. He was in India only briefly, attending a signals training course. Kumar appeared distracted and preoccupied, very different from his usual high-spirited self. They went out for lunch, and Kumar told them about a very strange incident — something that had caused a lot of unease at headquarters.

At Singapore’s Tyersall Park Camp an Indian soldier had inexplicably shot an officer and then committed suicide. On investigation it was discovered that this was no simple murder-suicide: there were undercurrents of unrest within the battalion. Certain officers of this battalion had been heard to say that Indians should refuse to participate in this war: that this was a competition for supremacy among nations who believed it to be their shared destiny to enslave other peoples — England, France, Germany. There was much concern at headquarters: more than half the troops in Malaya were Indian and it was clear that the colony could become indefensible if unrest were to spread. Despite the incendiary nature of these rumours, the high command had decided on a judicious and measured response. All that was done by way of disciplinary action was to send one of the battalion’s junior officers back to India.

It so happened that the officer who was singled out for censure was a Muslim. When news of his punishment reached his battalion, a company of Muslim soldiers proceeded to lay down their weapons, in a show of sympathy. The next day many of the battalion’s Hindu soldiers also laid down their arms.

At this point the incident assumed a new gravity. For generations, the British Indian army had operated on the principle of maintaining a careful balance between the troops. Every battalion was constituted of companies drawn from different castes and religions — Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Jats, Brahmins. Each company had its own mess, run strictly according to the dietary rules of the group from which the troops had been recruited. As an additional safeguard, infantry divisions were so composed that Indian troops were always balanced by a certain number of Australian or British units.

That Hindu and Muslim troops could act together to support an Indian officer came as a shock to the High Command. No one needed to be reminded that nothing of this kind had happened since the Great Mutiny of 1857. At this point half-measures were dispensed with. A platoon of British soldiers from the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders was sent in to surround the mutinous Indians.

Thus far into the story Kumar had told them neither the name of the battalion concerned nor that of the officer who was to be punished. When at last he mentioned these, it became clear that Kumar, like the good raconteur that he was, had been saving his punchline for the last. It turned out that the battalion in question was a brother unit of the 1/1 Jats — a part of a Hyderabad infantry regiment. The officer who was being sent home was someone they had all known well at the academy.

Kumar concluded the story with an offhand observation: ‘Going overseas has disturbing effects on the troops,’ he said, shrugging his shoulders. ‘On officers too. You’ll see.’

‘Perhaps it won’t happen to us,’ Hardy said hopefully. ‘There’s no certainty that we’ll be sent abroad. They’ll need forces here too, after all. .’

Arjun was quick to challenge this. ‘And what would that do for us?’ he said. ‘For you and me? We’ll sit out the war and our careers will be dead on their feet. I think I’d rather take my chances abroad.’

They walked away in silence, not knowing what to make of this conversation. There was something about Kumar’s story that defied belief. They both knew the officer who’d been punished — he was a quiet kind of man, from a middle-class family. He needed his job if nothing else. What had made him do what he’d done? It was hard to understand.

And if the story was true — and they were by no means sure of this — then the incident had other implications too. It meant for example that the other ranks were now taking their cues from their Indian officers rather than the High Command. But this was worrying — to them no less than to the High Command — for if the men were to lose faith in the structure of command, then the Indian officers too would eventually be rendered redundant. Only by making common cause with their British counterparts could they hope to prevent this. What would happen if there really were to be a fissure? How would the men respond? There was no telling.

Disquieting as the subject was, Arjun felt oddly exhilarated: it was an uncommon responsibility to be faced with such questions at the age of twenty-three.

That night they changed into kurtas and churidar pyjamas and went to a dancer’s kotha near Ajmeri Gate. The dancer was in her forties and her face was painted white, with eyebrows that were as thin as wires. At first glance she looked stony and unattractive, but when she stood up to dance the hardness in her face melted away: her body was supple and lithe and there was a marvellous lightness in her feet. As the tabla’s tempo increased she began to spin, whirling in time to the beat. Her gauzy knee-length angarkha corkscrewed around her, in tight spirals. The aureoles of her breasts stood outlined against the thin, white cloth. Arjun’s throat went dry. When the tabla sounded its climactic stroke, her index finger came to rest on Arjun’s forehead. She beckoned to him to follow her.

Arjun turned to Hardy in astonishment and his friend smiled and gave him a nudge. ‘Go, yaar, it’s your birthday isn’t it? Jaa.’

Arjun followed the dancer up a flight of narrow stairs. Her room was small, with a low ceiling. She undressed him slowly, picking at the drawstring of his cotton churidar pyjamas with her nails. When he reached for her she pushed his hand away with a laugh.

‘Wait.’

She made him lie face down on the bed and massaged a handful of oil into his back, her fingertips tripping over the knuckles of his spine in imitation of the rhythms of a dancer’s feet. When at last she lay down beside him she was still fully clothed. He reached for her breasts and she pushed his hand away: ‘No, not that.’ She undid her drawstring and guided him into her body, watching with a smile, as he lay on her. When he was done she slipped quickly away, and it was as though nothing at all happened: even her drawstring seemed instantly back in place.

She put a finger under his chin and tipped his head back, puckering her lips as though she were looking at a beautiful child.

‘So young,’ she said. ‘Just a boy.’

‘I’m twenty-three,’ he said proudly.

She laughed. ‘You look sixteen.’