Flashman and the Cobra

by Robert Brightwell

  People have often asked me how I coped with the heat in India but this was something that you got used to on the journey so that by the time you arrived it was barely noticeable. As we travelled down the coast of Africa it got hotter and hotter, until we were becalmed for a week in the Doldrums. This area of sea is notorious for its sudden lack of wind and merciless heat. We were there for a week and it was like living in a wooden furnace without any cooling breeze. I can well understand how people have gone mad and blown their brains out when forced to stay there longer. One of the frustrations is that you do not know when the wind will come back. A couple of people jumped in the sea to cool off, but no sooner had they done so than two large, evil grey shapes appeared and started to close in. The swimmers came back up the sides of the ship almost as fast as they had flown down them. When the ship had been moving, some of the passengers and crew had tried spearing porpoises and dolphins as they had raced alongside the bow of the ship, but I had not joined in. They seemed such happy creatures it was a shame to try to kill them. But I had no such qualms when it came to shooting at the sharks that calmly circled the ship in the Doldrums, as though they were daring another person to jump. Between us we must have fired a barrel of powder and ball at them with muskets, but either their skin was armoured or the water slowed down the shot. Apart from a nicked dorsal fin, they seemed to take no harm at all.

  The weather got cooler around the Cape of Good Hope and then the heat built slowly again as we approached India. The captain was keen to get to Madras by September to miss the worst of the monsoon season. After nearly four months at sea any land would have been a welcome sight, but the Coramandel coast just south of Madras was particularly beautiful. The early monsoon rains had made the vegetation lush and green. At first it was just a green smudge, but then as we got closer we could see a long, green coast with coconut palms and a range of low mountains behind. Later we saw the buildings of Madras with St Thomas’s Mount in the background and we knew we had finally arrived. Catamarans and massuli boats and other native craft swarmed out around the ship as we dropped anchor out in the bay.

  Chapter 7

  Everyone was keen to get ashore and there was a queue at the captain’s cabin while we retrieved our valuables. With trunks and sea chests to follow, the passengers dressed to make a good first impression on the local populace and swarmed over the side to the waiting native craft. I carried just some spare clothes and my razor with my letters of introduction and money. I was intrigued by the narrow canoe craft with a V-shaped mast arrangement that seemed to move with particular dexterity over the waves. I found one alongside the ship and offered the crew a silver coin to take me ashore. They were delighted, as I subsequently discovered I had massively overpaid for the trip, but to me it was worth every penny. A skilled man makes what he is doing seem easy and the two lads with that canoe made the trip ashore look effortless as they shook out their sail and with their flimsy outrigger poles we sped towards the shore. We moved with exhilarating speed over the surf and within minutes we were beached on the sand. I reached over the side and picked up a handful of Indian sand from the warm sea and had a brief moment of triumph: I had arrived in India. But before I could enjoy the experience further the canoe was surrounded by a crowd of shouting locals.

  Even before I was out of the boat I was the subject of an argument. Around twenty people seemed to be haggling about me rather than with me, although a few broke off to brandish papers in my direction. A wily cove climbed into the boat over the bow and, patting the two oarsmen on the shoulder as he passed them, he sat down next to the rear-most oarsman as though part of the crew.

  “They are arguing over the right to be your dubash, sahib,” he called over the din. “You look a rich man and they will rob you blind before you learn the price of things in India. If you tell them you already have a dubash, I will meet you with a palanquin at the top of the beach.”

  “And you won’t rob me blind, I suppose?” I asked with a grin.

  “No, sahib, I want to serve you for long time, not just the first days. I show you round India, you buy bungalow, I be your housekeeper.” He grinned back. “I make many more rupees from you than them if I serve you long time.”

  Well, you had to laugh at his audacity, and that was how I first met Runjeet, my dubash, factotum, butler, housekeeper and local guide. India would not have been the same without him, and although he claimed he worked for me, there were times when it felt the other way round.

  There was a heck of a row when I got out of the canoe and headed up the beach without hiring the dubash who had won the debate. It served them right for thinking that I would not have a say in whom I hired. But there, where the ground was firmer, was a palanquin with a grinning Runjeet alongside it. A palanquin is a bit like a sedan chair; you could lie in it or sit and bigger ones like this had four bearers, one at each corner. As soon as I was aboard we were off, leaving the crowd behind. I did not really feel comfortable lying down so I sat cross-legged like an Oriental, watching the new sights slide by. The houses on the outskirts of town were mostly of the rundown mud-brick variety, and we soon had a crowd of children and dogs running alongside, shouting for coins. The children were shouting, of course, not the dogs, which reminds me that instead of the variety of dogs we have in England, virtually all the dogs there looked the same, being medium sized and sandy-yellow in colour. We passed various market sellers and a butcher who was hacking with a cleaver at the massive side of an ox. Instead of a sea breeze there were land smells in the wind now; dung featured prominently in the aroma with all the animals about, but I also thought that there was the smell of spice in the air. Certainly Indian settlements had their own distinct smell, which was different to that of a British town. Runjeet ran alongside to assure me that he was having me taken to an excellent hotel that was run by his cousin. As I was to discover, Runjeet had a huge number of cousins, and I should know as I seemed to end up employing most of them.

  The hotel turned out to be a small two-storey affair near the fort. It was also reasonably priced, which brings me to a top travel tip for any reader planning to go to India. Always take two purses. In the first put an amount of money appropriate to a man of modest means and keep the rest hidden away. I had mine stashed in hidden pockets sewn into my leather belt. The prices your dubash will charge are directly related to the amount of gold he thinks you have, with the aim of bleeding you dry during the term of his employment.

  Runjeet and his cousin now showed me up to my room, which was the best in the place. It had a terrace with an awning to keep off the sun and a view of the sea and the fort. There were half a dozen ships out in the bay and I could tell mine by the flurry of boats still pulling back and forth from it. Fort St George looked impregnable with various triangular buttresses so that it must have been star-shaped from above, and there were various outworks, moats and drawbridges to keep out unwanted visitors.

  Having settled in, the hotel served luncheon, or tiffin as they called it, which comprised mulligatawny soup and grilled chicken with rice. As I ate I reflected on what to do next. Now that I was in Madras I could not put off reporting to the governor general and I would have to admit that I had allowed the important despatch I was carrying to be stolen. This seemed a major faux pas for a diplomatic courier and there was the irony that I still had all the less important documents that had been put in the captain’s strongbox. I called for a pen and ink and wrote a brief report of the loss of de Boigne’s letter to add to the papers I had to present. I knew what these diplomatic types are like, you see: they are paper shufflers at heart and like nothing better than more papers to shuffle. The meeting would not go well, but delaying it would not help, and so after tiffin I dressed in the best clothes I had brought with me and headed to the fort with the documents I did have and de Boigne’s ring.

  As I stepped outside and approached the fort I could feel the heat of the afternoon reflecting off the stone surfaces. The pavement of the approach road had been in full sun a
ll day and I could even feel it through my boot soles, which explained why most of the natives wore sandals. But despite the temperature being up in the nineties the soldiers of the garrison were dressed and behaved as though they were in Horse Guards on a chilly day in London. Thick woollen coats were buttoned up to the neck, sentries wore their leather stocks to keep their heads erect and belts were pipe-clayed a gleaming white. The officers were all similarly dressed and were stiff with starch and their own importance. Two other passengers from the boat were already waiting to meet officials but my letter of introduction for no lesser person that the governor general meant that I jumped the queue and I was led by a lieutenant to a grand office on the far side of the fort. I handed all my documents to a clerk and then waited in a stifling anteroom for nearly an hour before I was finally shown into the presence.

  Richard Wellesley, known as Lord Mornington and governor general of India, sat at a large desk. Sitting at another table nearby was a man who bore a striking similarity to Richard whom I learned from the introductions was his brother Henry.

  “Welcome, Mr Flashman,” said Mornington. He gestured at the papers in front of him. “I understand from both Castlereagh and Wickham that you are a capable agent and so it is, er, ‘unfortunate’ that the letter from the de Boigne fellow has gone missing. Unfortunate for us and dangerous for you.”

  “Dangerous for me?” I asked, feeling slightly alarmed.

  “Certainly,” replied Mornington. “The only evidence of Scindia’s betrayal is the letter and your account as a witness to the meeting with de Boigne. If, as you suspect, the letter is now in the Company’s hands then it is either being destroyed or being sent to Scindia himself. When Scindia learns of it from his spies in the Company or from receiving the letter, he will certainly want any other evidence of the meeting destroyed too. That would include you, sir.”

  “You mean he could be sending bands of snake-decapitating killers after me even as we speak?” I asked. I was trying to keep my voice normal and calm but this was absurd. I had taken this trip to avoid being hunted down in London, and here I was less than a day in India and I might be about to be tracked down by an even more lethal band of killers.

  “Oh no,” said Henry Wellesley. “They won’t be sending assassins after you now.” But before I could relax more than a fraction he added, “It will take six, maybe eight weeks to get a message to Scindia and for his response to reach Madras.”

  “You must be used to this in your line of work, I suppose,” added Mornington, giving me a quizzical look, and I remembered that he had just been reading the references on me from Castlereagh and Wickham. I had indeed been pursued by foreign agents in London last year and had escaped their clutches more through panic than cunning. Now it seemed that they expected me to shrug off bands of assassins with the ease of losing a coat.

  But then I saw a glimmer of hope. “Wait a moment,” I said. “I haven’t written an account of the meeting. As far as anyone is concerned I am just a courier; no one else knows I was at the meeting with de Boigne.”

  “That is probably the only reason you were allowed to live on the indiaman,” said Henry Wellesley. “But now we do need you to write a detailed account of the meeting and sign it. I will witness it and my brother will add his seal. We must have an official account of the meeting to give to the raja of Berar. The ring on its own will not serve. Even with your statement he might not believe it, but I suspect that he will start to make enquiries among his people to find out the truth.”

  They were coolly asking me to write what was effectively my own death warrant. I had been expecting a roasting over losing the de Boigne letter but this was far worse. I could not flee straight back to Britain as the heavy monsoon rains were coming and no ships would be leaving for at least a month. I was trapped in India and in the not-too-distant future this Scindia fellow would be sending agents to kill me. Obviously I could not show any alarm to the Wellesleys; I had my reputation as a capable agent to consider. In any event it would have made no difference to the situation if I had run around their office screaming like a virgin in a barracks.

  At least I had some warning this time and an opportunity to make some preparations. Maybe the lack of imminent danger helped, for I was feeling strangely calm in the circumstances. India was a big country with thousands of Europeans in it and hardly any of them knew me. I had wanted to travel a bit in India, and now I realised that the best way forward was to change my name and still travel. Perhaps up the largely British held coast to Calcutta, although that would take me closer to Mahratta territory. Or I could go across the country to the new British protectorate of Mysore; I may be able to catch a ship home on the west coast. So I agreed to give them the statement and offhandedly said that I would just have to make sure that Scindia did not find me.

  “Oh, you should have at least six weeks to enjoy yourself in Madras,” said Henry helpfully. “In the meantime we can arrange for some papers in a new name and some funds to help you lie low for a bit before you sail home.”

  Well, I was ahead of him there. I was not going to wait like a lamb for the slaughter under a false name that Scindia’s spies would doubtless discover. I would take the money, though. My mind was busily considering options as we spoke. If there is one thing that focuses the attention it is preserving one’s skin.

  Chapter 8

  I met Henry Wellesley several times during the next two weeks. He was working on his plans and I was working on mine. We had sat together as I wrote the account of the meeting with Benoit de Boigne and he was most interested to hear about life in Paris. I discovered that he and his sister Anne had been captured by the French on a ship in the Bay of Biscay and they had been prisoners in Paris during the ‘terror’. At one point they were held in the Conciergerie and Henry talked about the prisoners he saw and mentioned that once he saw a whole family carted off to be killed. I wondered if that was the blond girl that the sergeant had talked about, but I did not ask questions as I was still struggling to get that poor girl out of my thoughts.

  Henry arranged for me to receive a letter of introduction from the governor general to the nizam of Hyderabad, a British ally. I had suggested Hyderabad as it was the one place I had no intention of going. The letter introduced my official alias George Thompson as a wool merchant looking for trade opportunities. Henry also gave me fifty guineas in gold, which would enable me to live like a king in India for the time I planned to be here, but annoyingly he also insisted on giving me a draft in George Thompson’s name for another twenty as emergency money and to back up my identity. Cashing that would be a risky business.

  Meanwhile Runjeet and I were making our own preparations. I had hired a boat and gone back to the ship to recover my other luggage. Runjeet had warned me that there was a thriving extortion racket run by the owners of small boats exploiting newcomers to India, or ‘griffins’ as we were called then. Essentially they would wait until you had all your goods in the boat and then, just as they were about to run in through the surf, they would announce that the fare had doubled and demand it in advance.

  “Threaten to put a ghoolie through the side of their boat,��� he advised, obviously offended that someone other than him should take money from me.

  “What is a ghoolie?” I asked. It turned out that ghoolie is an Indian word for pistol or musket ball.

  I chose a boat that was manned by both an Indian and a European, thinking that they might be less likely to try to gull a griffin, but sure enough as we approached the waves the pair of them breached the boat side onto the surf so that it rocked dangerously and demanded a double fare. With Runjeet’s warning I had already taken my pistols from trunk and had loaded them ready in my pockets. Without saying a word I simply pulled one out, cocked it and put the muzzle to the side of the boat on the waterline. Rowing to the shore resumed promptly.

  In many ways, such as climate, India was as I expected, but in others it was totally different, such as the easy way between Europeans and Indians.
Recently I saw my young nephew Harry who has earned fame in India, and from what he says things have changed considerably now. He happily bragged of having to thrash his servants on a daily basis. In my time some beatings did happen but the chief justice at Madras, Sir Henry Gwillam, was doing all he could to ban the practice. When I was in Madras there was a lot of gossip about a Major Cavendish who was known to beat his servants. One had apparently threatened to complain to Sir Henry and the gallant major had arranged to meet him in a small bungalow on the edge of his grounds. Boasting that he had ensured that there would be no witnesses to support a complaint, the major started to set about the servant with a cane. The servant, being bigger and stronger, responded by seizing the cane himself, and as there was no one nearby to come to the major’s aid, gave his master a proper thrashing and then disappeared. I saw the major myself and he was still carrying the bruises then.

  The difference between India in my time and now is down to women. There were few white women in India when I was there; they were only just starting to arrive. So Europeans would mix with Indian women and then they would start having children with them, and sometimes they would marry them, either in native or Christian ceremonies, and often Europeans would adopt some Indian ways. Why, old Sir David Ochterlony who was our 'resident' or ambassador in Delhi, dressed like an Indian and had thirteen wives who would promenade around the walls of the red fort each evening on the back of their own elephants. Because they were living with each other or in business together, Europeans and Indians understood and respected each other much more than they do today. Now they live in separate communities and an English officer would be shunned socially if he married an Indian woman. These days the British treat the Indians with contempt, and mark my words, sooner or later the Indians will bite back.