by M. M. Kaye
And in the same hour, on the other side of the world, a telegram was being handed in to the Foreign Office in London that read: All well with the Kabul Embassy.
At long last Ash sighed and lifted his head, and Anjuli took his ravaged face between her cool palms and bent to kiss him, still without speaking. Only when they were seated side by side on the carpet by the window, her hand in his and her head on his shoulder, did she say quietly: ‘He is dead, then.’ ‘Yes.’
‘And the others?’
‘They too. They are all dead: and I – I had to stand there and watch them die one by one without being able to do anything to help them. My best friend and close on four score of my own Regiment. And others too – so many others…’
Anjuli felt the shudder that racked him and said: ‘Do you wish to tell me of it?’
‘Not now. Some day perhaps. But not now…’
There was a cough outside the door and Gul Baz scratched on the panels requesting permission to enter, and when Anjuli had withdrawn to the inner room he came in bearing lamps and accompanied by two of the household servants. The latter carried trays of cooked food, fruit and glasses of snow-cooled sherbet, and brought a message from their master to say that after the exigencies of the day he thought that his guests would prefer to eat alone that night.
Ash was grateful for the thought, as during Ramadan it was the custom of the house for the men-folk to take the evening meal together, the women doing the same in the Zenana Quarters, and he had not been looking forward to the prospect of being forced to listen to a discussion of the harrowing events of the day; or worse still, having to take part in it. But later on, when the meal was over and Gul Baz came to remove the trays, another servant scratched on the door to ask if Syed Akbar could spare the time to see the Sirdar-Sahib, who greatly desired to speak with him; and though Ash would have excused himself, Gul Baz spoke for him, accepting the invitation and saying that his master would be down shortly.
The servant murmured an acknowledgement and left, and as his footsteps retreated Ash said angrily: ‘Who gave you leave to speak for me? You will now go down yourself to the Sirdar-Sahib and make my apologies to him, because I will see no one tonight: no one, do you hear?’
‘I hear,’ said Gul Baz quietly. ‘But you will have to see him, for what he has to say is of great import, so -’
‘He can say it tomorrow,’ interrupted Ash brusquely. ‘Let there be no more talk. You may go.’
‘We must all go,’ said Gul Baz grimly. ‘You and the Memsahib, and my-elf also. And we must go tonight.’
‘We…? What talk is this? I do not understand. Who says so?’
‘The whole household,’ said Gul Baz, ‘the women-folk more loudly than the rest. And because they will put great pressure upon him, the Sirdar-Bahadur may have no remedy but to warn you of it when he sees you tonight. Of that I was sure even before you returned here, for I spoke with certain servants of the Sirdar's friend, Wali Mohammed Khan, with whom he took refuge today when they brought him back to this house. Since then I have listened to much more talk, and learned many things that you as yet do not know. Will you hear them?’
Ash stared at him for a long moment, and then, motioning him to sit, sat down himself on Anjuli's rush stool to listen, while Gul Baz hunkered down on the floor and began to speak. According to Gul Baz, Wali Mohammed Khan had thought along the same lines as the spy Sohbat, and decided that his friend's best chance of leaving the Bala Hissar and reaching his own house in safety lay in going while the mob were engaged in looting the Residency. He had lost no time in arranging it and had, apparently, been only too anxious to get rid of his guest…
‘Being greatly afraid,’ said Gul Baz, ‘that once the killing and looting is done, many who took part in that will turn to searching for fugitives, since it is already being said that two sepoys who were caught up in the fighting and unable to get back to their fellows were saved from death by friends among the mob, and are now in hiding in the city – or perchance in the Bala Hissar itself. There is also another sepoy who is known to have gone into the Great Bazaar to buy atta before the fight began, and could not return, as well as the three sowars who rode out with the grass-cutters. This the servants of Wali Mohammed Khan told us when they brought our Sirdar back in disguise after the fighting at the Residency Koti was over. And hearing it, the folk in this house also became afraid. They fear that tomorrow the mob will turn to searching for these fugitives and attacking anyone whom they suspect of harbouring them or of being a “Cavagnari-ite”. And that the Sirdar-Bahadur's life may be endangered, because he once served with the Guides. Wherefore they have urged him to leave at once for his house in Aoshar, and remain there until this trouble is past. This he has agreed to do, for he was recognized and sorely mishandled this morning.’
‘I know. I saw him,’ said Ash; ‘and I think he does right to go. But why us?’
‘His household insist that he must send you and your Memsahib away now – tonight. For they say that if men should come here asking questions and demanding to search the house, they will become suspicious when they find strangers who cannot give a good account of themselves – such as a man who is not of Kabul and who may well be a spy, and a woman who claims to be Turkish. Foreigners…’
‘Dear God,’ whispered Ash. ‘Even here!’
Gul Baz shrugged and spread out his hands: ‘Sahib, most men and all women can be hard and cruel when their homes and families are threatened. Also the ignorant everywhere are suspicious of strangers or those who in any way differ from themselves.’
‘That I have already learned to my cost,’ retorted Ash bitterly. ‘But I did not think that the Sirdar-Sahib would do this to me.’
‘He will not,’ said Gul Baz. ‘He has said that the laws of hospitality are sacred, and he will not break them. He has shut his ears and refused to listen to the appeals and arguments of his family and his servants.’
‘Then why -’ began Ash, and stopped. ‘Yes. Yes, I see. You did right to tell me. The Sirdar-Sahib has been too good a friend to me and mine to be repaid in this fashion. And his people are right: our presence in this house could endanger them all. I will see him now and tell him that I think it best for us to leave at once… for our own safety. No need to let him know that you have told me anything.’
‘So I thought,’ nodded Gul Baz; and came to his feet: ‘I will go now and make arrangements.’ He salaamed and withdrew.
Ash heard the door of the inner room open and turned to see Anjuli standing on the threshhold.
‘You heard,’ he said.
It was not a question, but she nodded and came to him, and he rose and took her in his arms, and looking down into her face thought how beautiful she was: more beautiful than ever tonight, for the anxiety and strain that of late he had seen too often in her face had gone, and her candid eyes were serene and unclouded. The lamplight made her skin glow pale gold and the smile on her lovely mouth turned his heart over. He bent his head and kissed it, and after a while he said: ‘You are not afraid, Larla?’
‘To leave Kabul? How could I be? I shall be with you. It has been Kabul and its citadel that I have been afraid of. And after what has taken place today, you are free to go – and must be happy to do so.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Ash slowly, ‘– I had not thought of that… I 'm free… I can go now. But – but what Gul Baz said was true: people everywhere are suspicious of strangers and hostile towards anyone different from themselves, and we two are both strangers, Larla. My people wouldn't accept you because you're both Indian and half-caste, while your people wouldn't accept me because I'm not a Hindu and therefore an outcaste. As for the Mussulmans, to them we are “Unbelievers”… Kafirs -’
‘I know, my love. Yet many of different faiths have shown us great kindness.’
‘Kindness, yes. But they haven't accepted us as one of themselves. Oh dear God, I'm so sick of it all – of intolerance and prejudice and… If only there were somewhere we could go where we could j
ust live quietly and be happy, and not be hedged about by rules and trivial, ancient tribal taboos that mustn't be broken. Somewhere where it wouldn't matter who we were or what gods we worshipped or didn't worship, as long as we harmed no one: and were kind, and didn't try to force everyone else into our own mould. There ought to be somewhere like that – somewhere where we can just be ourselves. Where shall we go, Larla?
‘To the valley, where else?’ said Anjuli.
‘The valley?’
‘Your mother's valley. The one you used to tell me about, where we were going to build a house and plant fruit trees and keep a goat and a donkey. You cannot have forgotten! I have not.’
‘But my Heart, that was only a story. Or… or I think it may have been. I used to believe it was true and that my mother knew where it was; but afterwards I wasn't so sure: and now I think it was only a tale…’
‘What does that matter?’ asked Juli. ‘We can make it come true. There must be hundreds of lost valleys among the mountains: thousands. Valleys with streams running through them that would grind our corn, and where we could plant fruit trees and keep goats and build a house. We have only to look, that is all –’ and for the first time in several weeks she laughed; that rare, enchanting laugh that Ash had not heard since the day the British Mission came to Kabul. But he did not smile in reply. He said slowly: ‘That's true, but… it would be a hard life. Snow and ice in the winter, and –’
‘– and fires of pine-cones and deodar logs, as in all hill villages. Besides, the hill-folk of the Himalayas are a kindly people, soft-spoken, merry, and charitable to all wayfarers. They neither carry arms nor engage in blood-feuds or make war upon each other. Nor would we need to live in too much isolation, for what is ten koss to a hill-man who can walk twice as much in one day? And none would begrudge us a virgin valley that lay too far beyond their home village for their cattle to graze in or their women to collect fodder from. Our hills are not harsh and barren like these of Afghanistan, or in Bhithor, but green with forests and full of streams.’
‘– and wild animals.’ said Ash. ‘Tiger and leopard – and bears. Do not forget that!’
‘At least such animals only kill for food. Not for hate or revenge; or because one bows towards Mecca and another burns incense before the gods. Besides, since when has either of us been safe among men? Your foster-mother fled with you to Gulkote to save you from being slain because you, a child, were an Angrezi; and later you both fled again because Janoo-Rani would have killed you – as you and I fled from Bhithor fearing death at the hands of the Diwan's men. And now, though we thought ourselves safe in this house we must leave it in haste because our presence here endangers everyone in it and if we stay we may all be slain – you and I for being “foreigners” and the others for having harboured us. No, Heart's-dearest, I would rather the wild animals. We shall never lack money, for we have the jewels that were part of my istri-dhan, and these we can always sell little by little; a stone at a time as need arises. So let us look for that valley and build our own world.’
Ash was silent for a space, and then he said softly: ‘Our own Kingdom, where all strangers shall be welcome… Why not? We could go north, towards Chitral – which will be safer at this time than trying to cross the Border and get back into British India. And from there through Kashmir and Jummu towards the Dur Khaima…’
The leaden weight of despair that had fallen on him since he realized that Wally was dead, and that had grown heavier and colder with every word that Gul Baz had spoken, was suddenly lightened, and a measure of the youth and hope that he had lost that day returned to him. Anjuli saw the colour come back to his haggard face and his eyes brighten, and felt his arms tighten about her. He kissed her hard and fiercely, and sweeping her off her feet, carried her into the inner room and sat down on the low bed, holding her close and speaking with his lips buried in her hair…
‘Once, many years ago, your father's Mir Akor, Koda Dad Khan, said something to me that I have never forgotten. I had been complaining that because I was tied to this land by affection and to Belait by blood, I must always be two people in one skin; and he replied that one day I might discover in myself a third person – one who was neither Ashok nor Pelham-Sahib, but someone whole and complete: myself. If he was right, then it is time that I found that third person. For Pelham-Sahib is dead: he died today with his friend and the men of his Regiment whom he could not help. As for Ashok and the spy Syed Akbar, those two died many weeks ago – very early one morning on a raft on the Kabul River, near Michni… Let us forget all three, and find in their stead a man with an undivided heart: your husband, Larla.’
‘What are names to me?’ whispered Anjuli, her arms tight about his neck. ‘I will go where you go and live where you live, and pray that the gods will permit me to die before you die, because without you I cannot live. Yet can you be sure that if you turn your back upon your former life you will have no regrets?’
Ash said slowly: ‘I don't believe that anyone can have no regrets… Perhaps there are times when even God regrets that He created such a thing as man. But one can put them away and not dwell upon them; and I'll have you, Larla… that alone is enough happiness for any man.’
He kissed her long and lovingly, and then with increasing passion; and after that they did not say anything for a long time, and when at last he spoke again it was to say that he must go down and see the Sirdar at once.
The news that his guests had decided that they were no longer safe in Kabul, but must leave immediately, was more than welcome to the harassed master of the house. But Nakshband Khan was far too polite to betray the fact, and though he agreed that if the mob were to embark on a house-to-house hunt for fugitives or suspected ‘Cavagnari-ites' they might all find themselves in grave danger, he had insisted that as far as he was concerned, if they wished to stay they were welcome to do so and he would do all he could to protect them. Finding them set on leaving, he had offered to give them any help they might need, and had, in addition, given Ash much good advice.
‘I too shall leave the city tonight,’ confessed the Sirdar. ‘For until the temper of the mob has cooled, Kabul is no place for one who is known to have served the Sirkar. But I shall not set out until an hour after midnight, by which time all men are asleep – even thieves and cut-throats, who more than any have been too busy today to stay awake this night. I would advise you to do the same, because the moon will not rise until an hour later, and though my road is a short one and easy to follow even on a dark night, yours will not be; and once you are clear of the city you will have need of the moonlight. Where do you go?’
‘We go to find our Kingdom, Sirdar-Sahib. Our own Dur Khaima – our far pavilions.’
‘Your…?’
The Sirdar looked so bewildered that Ash's mouth twitched in the shadow of a smile as he said: ‘Let me say, rather, that we hope to find it. We go in search of some place where we may live and work in peace, and where men do not kill or persecute each other for sport or at the bidding of Governments – or because others do not think or speak or pray as they do, or have skins of a different colour. – do not know if there is such a place, or, if we find it, whether it will prove too hard to live there, building our own house and growing our own food and raising and teaching our children. Yet others without number have done so in the past. Countless others, since the day that out First Parents were expelled from Eden. And what others have done, we can do.’
Nakshband Khan expressed neither surprise nor disapproval. Where a European would have expostulated he merely nodded, and on hearing that Ash's goal was a valley in the Himalayas, agreed that his best plan would be to follow the caravan route to Chitral and from there across the passes into Kashmir. ‘But you cannot take your own horses,’ said the Sirdar. ‘They are not bred for hill work. Also they would attract too much notice. I will give you my four Mongolian ponies in their stead – you will need a spare one. They are small, ill-looking beasts compared with yours, but as strong and hardy as yak
s and as sure-footed as mountain goats. You will also need posh-teens and Gilgit boots, for as you go further north the nights will become cold.’
He had refused to take any payment for his hospitality, saying that the difference in value between Ash's three horses and the sturdy, rough-coated ponies would more than repay him for all. ‘And now you must sleep,’ said the Sirdar, ‘because you have far to ride if you wish to put a safe distance between yourselves and Kabul before the sun rises. I will send a servant to wake you at the half-hour after midnight.’
This advice too seemed good, and Ash returned to Juli and told her to take what rest she could, as they would not be leaving the house until one o'clock. He had also spoken to Gul Baz, explaining what he intended to do and asking him to tell Zarin when he returned to Mardan.
‘Our ways part here,’ said Ash. ‘I have, as you know, made provision for you, and the pension will be paid until you die. That is assured. But no money can repay your care of me and of my wife. For that I can only give you my thanks and my gratitude. I will not forget you.’
‘Nor I you, Sahib,’ said Gul Baz. ‘And were it not that I have a wife and children in Hoti Mardan, and many relatives in the Yusufzai country, I would come with you to look for your kingdom – and maybe live there also. But as it is, I cannot. Nevertheless, we do not part tonight; this is no time for such as the Memsahib to travel through Afghanistan with only one sword to protect her. Two are better and therefore I will go with you as far as Kashmir, and having set you on your way, return from there to Mardan by way of the Murree road to Rawalpindi.’