A Call to Arms mh-4

by Allan Mallinson

  ‘Have you spoken with the military authorities of this?’ tried Hervey, uneasily.

  Somervile was very temperate in his reply. ‘Sir Edward Paget profoundly disagrees with me. He believes we should fortify our borders and take no offensive action.’

  Hervey took a deep breath. The commander-in-chief was a fighting general of the Peninsula. ‘What is his principal objection?’

  ‘That the country would kill an army without the Burmans needing to fire a shot.’

  Hervey shuddered at the thought.

  ‘Shall we have our partridge now, Eyre?’ said Emma, thinking the conversation had reached as far as it should.

  Hervey looked across at her. Somervile was indeed a fortunate man.

  When they had finished the perfumed curds and candied sweets which the cook had laboured over for a good part of the day, Emma rose and said she would retire. ‘Good night, Matthew. Let us hope that Eyre will find the time soon so that we may ride to Manikpur.’ She stood on her toes and kissed her husband’s forehead. ‘Not too long, my dear.’ And she drew her fingers lightly down his arm, a gesture of intimacy which jerked deep at Hervey’s vitals.

  They remained at table for perhaps a quarter of an hour after Emma had gone. Somervile declined more port, unusually, and changed subject three or four times, almost distractedly. At length he put down his glass, and stood. ‘Hervey, my dear fellow, you must excuse me. I have not the appetite for our usual diversions this evening. Stay, though. Take some more of this port. It’s a deuced fine vintage and there’s plenty laid down. And there are newspapers from Calcutta there, too,’ he said, gesturing towards the drawing room.

  ‘Do not trouble in the slightest, Somervile. It’s exceedingly good of you both to extend such frequent hospitality to me. Retire, do. My day’s been easy compared with the affairs you must address yourself to.’

  ‘Ay, perhaps. Well then, I’ll bid you good night. Until tomorrow evening.’ Somervile took his leave, brushing the crumbs from his waistcoat.

  Hervey let the khitmagar pour him more port and then went to find the Calcutta papers. He saw half a dozen of the Journal on a sideboard, and settled himself into a low, comfortable armchair by an empty fireplace. He sipped appreciatively at his wine as he turned the pages of the most recent, a week old, but he could find nothing to detain him. He reached for another, and found the same. Perhaps there truly was nothing of moment — mere gossip only. But perhaps his attention was not to be had for the persistent image of Somervile going to Emma, his friend’s contentment the very reverse of his own agitation. He put down the paper and the glass. It was the comfort of the embrace he missed as much as anything. He got up. He could not decently remain there.

  Next day he sent a note of thanks to the Somerviles, as he had on every occasion he had dined with them. But this time he also sent a note for the babu, in English, for it was not long and its content was straightforward.

  Within the hour, a note came back saying that a boy would meet him at the Suhrawardi gate at three o’clock. Hervey would have preferred the evening, of course, but he would then have had to make his excuses with the Somerviles. He bathed and then dressed, inconspicuously as if intent on a buying visit to the bazaar, and slipped away from his bungalow unobserved except for the chowkidar, who made low namaste but did not speak.

  In less than half an hour Hervey reached the Suhrawardi gate and met the boy. It was the sleeping time, and the Paterghatta was uncrowded. He felt awkward, but no one seemed to take any notice as they walked purposefully through the gate and along drowsy streets to a house like any other, distinguished only by a blue door. The boy pushed it open and gestured him on. Hervey gave him a few annas and muttered a thank-you.

  Inside seemed dark after the bright sun. An old woman appeared from behind a painted screen, looked at him and then beckoned to a young woman to come from behind it. Even in the dimness Hervey could see she was as promised, a handsome girl, clean and shapely. And he could see what she was not: nothing which recalled Henrietta, the only thing he had really feared.

  They sat awhile drinking tea, speaking a little English and even less Bengali. When there was nothing more to say, they rose and she led him up rickety stairs to a small room with white walls, long muslin curtains at the shuttered windows and a bed with clean white linen. Her skin was lighter than the Madrasi girls he had so admired, but her eyes were darker. And they were big. She was perhaps twenty. He said nothing, though his heart hammered, and she likewise made not a sound. With a modesty that only increased his desire, she began taking the slides from her hair.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN. RUMOURS OF WAR

  Next day

  Hervey stood at the front of his bungalow taking in the glories of another Bengal daybreak, fuller in promise, perhaps, than any he had known elsewhere. A sun low but already warming, a mist in the distant hills, the civil lines coming slowly to life — there were gentlemen at home in England, he considered, whose crabbed lives would be made immeasurably the better for just one of these mornings.

  He felt better than he had expected to. Maybe the guilt would come later. The girl had been tender to him, and for a while he had not been quite so alone. He wondered how long the feeling would last, how long it would be until he had to renew it, and whether guilt would overtake it before then.

  ‘Mornin’, Cap’n ’Ervey, sir.’

  Hervey returned Johnson’s salute and took the reins from him. He sprang easily into the saddle, compensating for Gilbert’s habitual sidestep as he did so, and collected him onto the bit. How good it was to be able to ride with a simple snaffle, for relaxed though the regimental regime was in comparison with its predecessor, a bridoon was still the regulation. ‘I thought we’d ride over to see Skinner’s Horse at exercise. I heard they were tentpegging this morning.’

  Before Johnson could reply, the orderly serjeant hailed them from across the maidan. ‘Captain Hervey, sir!’ There was just a note of urgency in it. Corporal Mossop was doubling, but that said nothing: an NCO would not keep an officer waiting on any account.

  ‘Nothing serious, I hope, Corporal Mossop?’ said Hervey with a smile, as the orderly serjeant came to a halt before him.

  ‘Not that I’m aware of, sir. Mr Somervile sends his compliments sir, and asks if you would call on him at once.’

  Serious or not, it was clearly urgent. ‘Very well, Corporal Mossop. Thank you. Come on, Johnson; we’d better see what agitates the lieutenant-governor.’

  Somervile did not so much look agitated as troubled. ‘Come in, Hervey, come in,’ he said, hardly looking up from his desk as he wrote. ‘Take a seat, call for some coffee. I’ll be finished in a moment.’

  Hervey did as he was bid. There was no sign of Emma, just the babu and a bearer. When the coffee came he took his cup and asked Somervile if he wanted any.

  ‘No. Later perhaps,’ he replied briskly, waving a sheet of paper about. When the ink was dry he gathered up the other two sheets and put them unfolded into a large envelope, which he sealed with wax and placed in a leather despatch case, locking it with a key attached to his watch chain. ‘The hircarrah, Mohan. He should still be in the cantonments,’ he said simply, handing the case to the babu. Then he rose, dismissed the bearer and moved to the other side of the table to sit in the armchair next to Hervey.

  ‘I take it that something’s amiss?’

  Somervile shook his head and raised his eyebrows. ‘I can scarcely believe it. Bagyidaw must be insane!’

  ‘He’s marched into Cachar?’

  Somervile shook his head again. ‘No. He’s making threats against here. He’s sent a letter to the Governor-General demanding we send back all the Arakanese who have fled into East Bengal. And, it seems, laying some sort of claim to sovereignty.’

  ‘Sovereignty in Chittagong?’

  ‘Yes. I had a despatch from Calcutta in the early hours by Governor-General’s messenger. He’s taking back my assessment. I just don’t understand why Bagyidaw sees it opportune now to make su
ch threats. Assam ought next to be his objective — as I said last night.’

  ‘Do you think he’s testing the Company’s resolve, then?’

  ‘That is what I’ve suggested to Calcutta, although we can’t proceed on such a supposition alone. I’ve asked for a brigade at once. We must at least make a show.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Hervey, standing up and going to the map on the wall. ‘That much would serve both needs. Where should they best go?’

  ‘I was going to ask your opinion of that,’ replied Somervile, frowning.

  Hervey was a little taken aback. ‘My purlieus these past months have been the exercise ground. I could only hazard an opinion from the map.’

  ‘My own knowledge is not extensive, Hervey, and your opinion from a map will be better than mine.’

  Hervey returned to his chair. ‘Do we know anything of Burman dispositions? Or their equipment and how they fight?’

  ‘I don’t believe my office does, no. But the Arakanese will. It goes against the intent of my own mission here, but we shall have to enlist their support — at least, their intelligence. I wish their Chin Payan were still alive, for all the trouble he gave us.’

  ‘How long do you suppose it will take for Calcutta to despatch a brigade?’

  ‘I’ve asked for immediate advice in that respect. I have a fear it will not be as prompt as is necessary. There’s no standing force in East Bengal at present, as far as I know; they’re all deployed.’

  Hervey had thought it might be the case. He knew his own brigade would be in the field still. ‘Colonel Piven will be back next week. That’s something.’

  ‘He has a very good knowledge of the frontiers; that much is certain. He would have an idea about where to strengthen our patrols, I suppose.’ Somervile sighed. ‘What I need is two brigades of cavalry and horse artillery. If we surprised the Burmans with a prodigious amount of fire we might well drive them back.’

  Hervey nodded. ‘That relies on very fine intelligence. We were humbugged at Waterloo — and that was with some of the best officers at work.’

  ‘We had better make a start, then. I’ll send word for the leaders of the Arakanese here in the city to come at once; and the more distant ones we shall have to see as they show. Let us meet here again at noon.’

  Johnson waved his hand violently across his face. ‘Bastard flies! These are worse than them in Madras.’

  Hervey agreed. What their provenance was he could not conclude: there was not a living thing in miles on this plain. ‘Let’s trot again,’ he sighed. ‘Perhaps they’ll give up this time.’

  They had come a good way from the lines, but it had been worth it to see the sowars of Colonel Skinner’s regiment of siladar cavalry. Their skill with the lance was breathtaking, equalled only by their horsemanship. Both Johnson and Hervey admitted they had never seen the like. But they had been paying the price since with the flies.

  This time, however, the flies were evidently more tired than the horses, falling away after the second furlong. Hervey pressed on for a third and then pulled up to a walk. Five minutes later they were still without their tormentors, so he presumed they could walk the remainder of the way in peace. And peaceful the land looked to be at this hour. The hills to the east were still shrouded with the morning’s mist — it was Hemanto, Hervey’s bearer had told him, the misty season — and the country looked even greener than in the days that followed the August deluges. An unruly flight of Brahminy duck passed high overhead, their funny clanging call seeming to protest against the intrusion.

  Johnson was pleased to be able to resume the earlier conversation. ‘And so, this ’ere King Baggydrawers reckons we’d just give ’im t’country an’ go ’ome?’

  ‘That’s about the long and the short of it,’ said Hervey, not imagining there was any point insisting on respectful pronunciation. ‘And Mr Somervile says that Bagyidaw would not stop until he reached Calcutta.’

  ‘ ’Ow’s ’e think ’e’d get across all them rivers?’

  ‘I think he’d go by sea. They have a lot of war barges, apparently.’

  ‘ ’E wants tipping a settler, that’s what ’e wants!’

  ‘Just so, Johnson. But how? There’s the rub.’

  ‘ ’Fore ’e’s art o’ ’is pit.’

  Mutual comprehension was by now a matter of context rather than knowledge of vocabulary, especially since Johnson, when aroused to indignation, reverted to a particularly impenetrable strain of Sheffield.

  ‘Yes, but how shall you find the pit? You’re right, though. Mr Somervile says that the Governor-General, a few years ago, wanted to do just that — march into Burma and teach them a lesson. Not that Bagyidaw was king at that time.’

  ‘Daft name. Mebbe if ’is men knew what it meant they’d pack it all in.’

  Hervey smiled. ‘I think they would be parted from their heads first. He’s a very brutal man, it seems.’

  ‘Sounds as if they’d be pleased if we did knock ’im abaht a bit.’

  ‘Perhaps. Anyway, we might get to know a bit more from these Arakanese in an hour or so.’ He checked his watch. ‘Come on; we’d better not dawdle.’

  All about Eyre Somervile’s study were papers and ledgers, boxes and maps. ‘Did you have an agreeable ride?’ he asked, without looking up.

  Hervey felt rather guilty. ‘Yes. I watched the native horse at drill. They go very well.’

  ‘Mm,’ was the reply.

  ‘What has engaged you?’

  ‘The Bengal Secret and Political Consultations. And they would have engaged far less of my time had they a proper index. I found what I was looking for by a most circular exercise — in volume ninety-one, no less.’

  Hervey had learned to tread gently when Somervile was in his ‘scholarly’ frame of mind, as he thought of it. ‘May I ask what were you searching for?’

  ‘After you had gone this morning, I remembered that Lord Wellesley had sent an officer to Ava to treaty with the then king, Bodawpaya, Bagyidaw’s grandfather. A Colonel Symes it was, and it occurred to me that his reports must include some military assessments, and so I have been searching them out.’

  ‘And do they contain that information?’

  ‘In admirable detail. You must read him. The papers are on yonder table.’ He gestured without looking up again.

  Hervey turned, but at that moment Somervile looked up and took off his spectacles. ‘You know, the real danger is these war boats. There are five hundred of them: every town or village near the rivers has to supply a certain number of oarsmen and soldiers — a hundred or so for each boat — and they mount a gun in the bows. These could swarm on Chittagong — and Calcutta for that matter — and there’d be the very devil of a fight.’

  Hervey made rapid calculations. The results were indeed ominous. ‘Then the answer would be to destroy the boats before they discharged their cargo. But that too might be easier said than done, though I dare say Commodore Peto would know how.’

  Somervile raised an eyebrow. ‘I have a sense that we shall feel his want very keenly before too long.’ He took out his watch. ‘Let us go and see who of the Arakanese is come.’

  There were a dozen of them, men who hitherto had been regarded as at best troublesome and at worst practitioners of dacoity. Now they all sat in the lieutenant-governor’s audience room as if they were waiting for a wedding. ‘I have called you here today,’ began Somervile, in confident Bengali, ‘to ask you for information on the activities of the Burmans.’

  There was at once a hubbub, with keen looks of anticipation on the faces of the Arakanese.

  Somervile halted it magisterially. ‘I must warn you, however, that this does not mean we are contemplating any hostilities. It is simply that the Company in Calcutta wishes to know what movements in general are there.’

  None of the Arakanese looked convinced, but that suited Somervile. He wanted their help, and it would be the more vigorous for believing that the fight might be taken to their old enemy. He pointed to the map severa
l times as he elaborated on his requirements, unsure as to its usefulness in that company, but the place names he mentioned, especially the rivers, brought eager nods. At length he promised them the Company would meet all reasonable expenses. ‘But I must warn you that the Company cannot extend any protection. And I will not condone any offensive action whatever. Indeed, I shall deal with it with infinitely greater severity than hitherto.’

  This latter was unwelcome news, but the manifest disappointment was soon replaced by enthusiasm for the covert action to come, and the meeting was ended with Somervile shaking each of the Arakanese by the hand and bidding them khuda hafiz, and expressing his hope that he would see them again soon — abar dekahobe. When they were gone he asked Hervey for his opinion.

  Hervey smiled. He had understood barely a word. ‘I’d wager those men will bring you your intelligence, and severed heads too to prove their word.’

  Somervile nodded, and frowned. ‘That is my fear. I wanted them keen, but I warned them there was to be no dacoity.’

  Hervey nodded as well. ‘What shall you do now?’

  ‘There is nothing more to do. I’ve sent word to the town major telling him to put the border patrols on alert — such as there are. He ought just about to manage that. Any more and I should have little confidence.’

  Hervey sighed. ‘He is certainly past his prime.’

  ‘He’s close to his military dotage!’

  They both smiled.

  ‘I’ve heard tell there are seven ages of the military man,’ said Hervey.