The Mulberry Empire

by Philip Hensher

  Burnes is unengaged. ‘I recall that they are very fond of fruit, and leave the stones where they lie, after they have been spat out. Perhaps they divine the future from the pattern the stones form on the ground after an orgy of fruit-eating. In truth, sir, I could not tell you. I am certain you know much better than I.’

  Macnaghten is triumphant, and leads his old sparring partner off to watch what strikes them, it seems, as the unendingly interesting spectacle of the mahouts putting up the Governor’s tent. Burnes watches them go.

  3.

  ‘Mr Burnes,’ calls a lady’s voice. He turns, and it is the Governor’s sister Emily. She and her sister, Fanny, have set up a temporary shelter, a sort of preliminary tent consisting of three parasols, stuck firmly in the ground and leaning against each other to provide a degree of shade; they recline gracefully, though pinkly, on a waterproof ground-covering while the proper tents are constructed. By them sits Emily’s lapdog, panting; a pretty little white dog, curled and fluffy, hot as a muff. She scratches the back of his neck, sympathetically. By them, two body-servants lift and lower the heavy feather fans, six feet in length, which do something to provide a mild cool breeze. Burnes walks over, and bows. The sky is heavy and thick and dark, but the sun’s heat somehow penetrates; it is as hot as if under a blanket, and Burnes surreptitiously attempts to get into the wafting of the fan.

  ‘At your service, ma’am,’ Burnes says. ‘I admire your fortitude, but nothing seems to trouble you, no discomfort.’

  ‘You are kind to say so,’ Fanny says smartly, ‘but Emily does nothing but complain; you must have been lucky not to hear any of it.’

  ‘The worst of it,’ Emily says, ‘is not the heat or the dust or the tedium of travel. It is being denied any kind of consolation. You must know, Mr Burnes, that every rajah we visit takes it as his duty to load us with emeralds, and we return the favour with interest.’

  ‘Naturally,’ Fanny chips in. ‘That poor man yesterday – we are, after all, proposing to take away his kingdom.’

  ‘To give him protection, and leave him in authority,’ Emily corrects. ‘And so very little a kingdom after all – I am quite sure, he would be just as happy with a largish sort of garden to rule over.’ The dog wriggles, helplessly; her hands are firmly around its middle. ‘It really is not the same thing at all as invading by force, you know, my dear Fanny. That is the worst torment, for me; to be handed these beautiful jewels, and leave the tent, and immediately have to hand them to John-Company. I am truly desperate to hang on to some of the things we have been given – and, after all, they are giving them to us, and not to some dull old man in a counting house on Cheapside. I am quite certain they would be horrified to discover that our discomforts are not modified by the pretty things they so carefully choose for us.’

  ‘They could hardly be worn, Emily,’ Fanny says. ‘That gigantic peacock head-dress – it would cause quite the wrong sort of sensation if you wore it in London. How people would stare.’

  ‘I should like that, a little,’ Emily says wistfully. ‘And it is, after all, only a variety of tiara. But I only saw the thing for a few moments, and it was whisked out of my hands. One of these days, I shall be driven to drop an earring in my reticule, or hide an entire parure under a thick shawl, and be satisfied that I have gained something, at least, from my years of servitude in this place. Tell me, Mr Burnes, do you have any idea what is in store for us? I have hardly had a chance to talk to George – to Lord Auckland – for days.’

  Burnes is distracted; one of the natives from the Company, busying around the Governor with a serious air, waving sheaves of paper for attention, is familiar to him. He gives up; there are many brilliant young men, studious and attentive, who have crossed his path, and he is not sure when they have met and when they merely resemble other brilliant young natives. ‘Forgive me, Miss Eden. I believe – now, do not take this as gospel – I believe we are to camp here tonight, and the Governor General will receive, either here or at tomorrow night’s camp, the representatives of Runjeet Singh. You will have more jewels to relinquish, I fear. But they may not come tonight; they may not come tomorrow. The Governor General counsels patience.’

  ‘And Shah Shujah, too, I believe,’ Fanny suddenly says. ‘Shah Shujah is coming, too.’

  ‘Shah Shujah?’ Burnes says. He must have misheard. ‘Forgive me, Miss Eden – you said that Shah Shujah is coming here?’

  ‘So I believe,’ Fanny says, shrugging. ‘I think that was the gentleman’s name. I find these names so difficult, and so easy to confuse, but I am all but certain that I have it right now. He is a pensioner of ours, is he not – a nice old Pretender to some distant throne or other? Colonel Wade, at Ludhiana, you know, was telling me about him, some weeks ago – a harmless old man, now, I believe. What a lumber room of discarded emperors we have at Ludhiana, to be sure. Can there be fewer than four of them there? And when they meet in the street, how do they decide who shall bow first, or bow deeper? A great puzzle. As for Shah Shujah, I fear I cannot satisfy what curiosity you may have. What he does here, no one knows. Except George, of course. I expect he knows.’

  Burnes is cautiously astonished. Shah Shujah to come here … That wicked old man, the wicked old King of Afghanistan, has not been thought of for twenty years. Burnes had known, in Kabul, never to mention his name; that, in fact, is the only reason he knows that the wicked old man is still alive. Twenty years ago, Shah Shujah-ul-mulk lost one of those ordinarily ferocious wars, and fled for his life, abandoning his court and half his followers to the vengeance of the victors. And since then, as far as anyone knows, he has been living a life of determined viciousness in a secluded palace somewhere, living the extravagant life of a ruler with nothing but monkeys and wives and – as the Eden sisters so pertly remark – nothing but a ten-acre garden over which to rule. No one has thought of him for years; probably not even the victor of the vicious little war, who now rules in Kabul, and whose name is Dost Mohammed. Burnes never met or heard of him; he was a nothing, surrounded by emeralds. And now he is to come here, and meet not only with Lord Auckland, but quite possibly also with Runjeet Singh, the great prince of the Sikhs. Something strange is happening, all in all, in the Governor’s camp.

  He bows to Fanny, who has no idea what she has just said, and walks towards the Governor’s group. He is tired of the endless civility which these progresses require; civility to the native princes, civility to the servants, civility to the ladies, endless fan-holding. There is something going on here; there is something worrying. Shah Shujah to be unrooted from his lush jewelled pretend court, and come to accept homage. Burnes needs to be there, to talk to the Governor. Things are going wrong, and the Governor, whose mind is too easily made up, is making his mind up in a disastrous direction. Burnes can feel it. And, besides, he is curious about the native follower he glimpsed, and half-recognized.

  4.

  Behind, the tents are being erected with cries and wails and panicking flurries of movements, as the thirty or forty men whose task it is to raise and lower the domicile form themselves into random groups. Fat Ali starts a song – no, a chant, and quickly the others join in. They all come from different places, some country boys, some street beggars, and they barely have a language in common; their faces, too, are an anthology of the variousness of the human expression. This one crafty, this one slow, this one humorous or kind or sour, from all over the world, from one side of India to another, and their skin is every shade you can think of, from the palest lemon of fat sweating Ali, who is always starting on a joke and never quite finishing it aright, to black clever Romesh with his clever white eyes and his thoughts of the green slopes of home. They are all so different from each other, they represent to each other an anthology of the possibilities of India, of the possibilities of the world. They are interested in each other’s unfamiliarities, and listen to the tales of their lives with patient wide-eyed interest. How quiet and dull and indistinguishable the Europeans seem to them, in their hot clothes and
their identical short tempers, their pale square faces with no expression. Ali’s song is one they all know, the sort with a silly line which he sings, and which is then repeated by them all. There is a joke in it about Bustan, who chases after girls; they all chaff him that the plump white memsahibs in their insect-crushing black boots are what he really dreams of. He takes it in good part, having no alternative, and they sing the rude song, knowing that the English will not understand.

  The cup passes around, the blessed cup around the blessed cup

  And what joy, it brims with wine, with wine, the sacred with wine, the sacred

  But what is this? I cannot drink, no I cannot no I cannot

  For there by me is Bustan, who will drink first who will drink first

  And he is no man, for when he lies with women he lies with women

  He lowers his lips to their hairier mouth to their hairier mouth –

  as they sing, their voices crack with their bold merriment, and the ropes of the tent tremble with hilarity.

  – And the man who drinks his fill at that font at that font

  I will not share a cup with him, not any cup not any cup.

  And with delight, they start up again, mocking poor Bustan, the youngest and silliest of the group, who gets drunk quickest, who stares after women, who knows nothing of the world and asks the most questions. Bustan blushes – he blushes most of all when it comes to the word cup, which has an inexpressible double meaning. But he does not hide his own pleasure; it is nice to be noticed and joshed in this way, and treated as a pet by the gang, and everyone knows there is no truth in it, for no one, and not innocent Bustan, would care to do what the song jokes about.

  Macnaghten and Elphinstone have exhausted their topic of argument for the moment, and have no audience but themselves. They are fanning themselves angrily and inadequately with their handkerchiefs, and staring anywhere but at each other – the horizon, a camel, the sky. It hardly matters what has caused this momentary fracture between them; it is something which occurs five times a day, or ten if the group is not travelling. They can argue about anything; whether gunpowder was invented by the Persians or the Chinese, whether there are truly six or seven colours in the rainbow, whether water or tea or curry is more cooling in the frightful climate, whether, indeed, the climate is frightful or, indeed, after some period of residence in India (as Elphinstone said, mopping his purple brow as the punkah-wallah did his best) proves beneficial to the constitution by stretching it. Whatever it is, they have now concluded one argument without persuading each other in the slightest, and are looking around for a new subject.

  ‘Pray, sir,’ Elphinstone says in the end. ‘Do you understand the song the bearers sing? It sounded, almost, like a sea shanty, in pattern only, I mean. You take my meaning, of course.’

  ‘It is a love song,’ Macnaghten says stiffly. ‘The principal singer misses his beloved.’

  ‘How curious,’ Elphinstone says. ‘I was certain that I heard the word cup repeated, which made me think it was a drinking song of some sort.’

  ‘The principal singer misses his beloved,’ Macnaghten says, drawing himself up, ‘and turns to drinking, in solace. A rare but interesting form, the love song which is also a drinking song. I am surprised, sir, that in your many travels, you never heard an example. Perhaps you did, without understanding the full purport of the song. That is always a possibility, when Europeans travel widely without the opportunity to study any one thing at leisure, as you will agree.’

  Elphinstone takes a deep breath; the bearers, almost finished with the tent, embark on their vulgar song for a fifth time through.

  ‘I must go and talk to the Governor General,’ Elphinstone says finally, brutally. And off he goes.

  5.

  The weather over the far hills is thickening and darkening. In a moment, the thunder rolls distantly, a remote roar and patter, like the applause at the theatre. In front of the Governor’s tent, the boys run together, and in seconds have put up a trestle table, silently. There is a pause, and then, from behind them, the kitchen boys with their dishes. In this livid yellow-edged light, the silver gleams as if under water. The exhaustions of the day require some kind of replenishment, and the table being laid for the Governor’s party to stand and pick at is a heavy one; it is some time before a proper dinner may be prepared, and the cold game, claret, dry cakes, cheese, cold roast quail, curried fish and rice is intended to support and sustain the delicate hungry constitution of the party before they dine, no more than that. The boys load up the table swiftly, and stand back in their orders. One of the under-chefs comes from the kitchen tent to inspect the restorative mezzo-meal; he stands there with a critical eye, because his job is to find something wrong. He limits himself to ordering the rearrangement of three or four of the dishes, and then claps his hands. The kitchen boys retreat. As if in response, the weather provides a larger, more distant, rumbling applause. The storm is approaching.

  The Governor General is still deep in conversation, hardly noticing that the table is ready for him. Around him, the party is rising in various degrees of eagerness; those who have no appetite for food make it very plain by their demeanour, and it is odd to know something so very intimate about each member of the party. Nobody steps forward to start on the food; of course, there is no formal precedence here, no taking of the ladies to the table. It is quite the pic-nic. But still, it would be a brave man who reached for the cold roast duck before the Governor or his sisters had exercised their first rights, and the party circles the table at a distance of twenty yards, not seeming to observe it, passing remarks about the weather and the discomfort of the camp and the journey. By the tent, Burnes sees, again, the native in European dress he had remarked earlier. He is separated from the Governor’s little group, and is clearly not a kitchen servant or a domestic; it is not clear why he is standing there, with his undirected gaze and his preoccupied way. Burnes stands and looks at him, puzzled and preparing to go and shout at him to find something to do. Then, all at once, it strikes him; he is standing there, civilly, waiting to be recognized by Burnes. It is Mohan Lal. Paler and plumper than he was when they travelled to Kabul together, and now very elegantly dressed, in the most unshowy of Calcutta fashions, but unmistakably the same fellow. Just as he realizes this, Mohan Lal raises his head, and looks directly at Burnes; he sees, evidently, Burnes’s recognition, and gives back a half-smile and a short bob of the head. That is enough for him, it seems. He turns sharply, and disappears between the narrow channel between the two largest tents, melting away with his hands clasped, disappearing once more into the expanse and confusion of the assembling greater camp.

  ‘Did you see that fellow?’ Burnes says to Fanny, bending down. ‘That native fellow in the black coat?’

  ‘Which one, sir?’ Fanny says. She and Emily had been watching, with some amusement, the gathering of the locusts around their patient, persuadable brother. They hardly ever get near him, these days; but then, neither does anyone else.

  ‘I thought – I was quite convinced for one second – that an old travelling companion of mine, from the old days, was standing just there. I had no idea he was with us. I wonder if you knew anything of him.’

  ‘Forgive me, sir,’ Fanny says. ‘I did not observe him.’

  ‘His name is Mohan Lal,’ Burnes says, letting it drop.

  ‘So difficult,’ Emily says. ‘These native names. Away, Pug, off with you.’

  Emily’s lapdog receives a gentle kick in his side from his mistress’s satin slipper, and off he goes. He has had a long day of wriggling and squirming in her sleeve, and it is good to be put down on earth and run around. Everything here is new and interesting smelling and fresh; and there is rain coming, which will be good. He remembers and knows that much. Up to the table where he can smell food; Lord, how hungry he is, and surely something soon will drop from the sky for him. He tugs at an ankle, but his teeth close on – they bite down on cloth – but there, underneath, is metal, a spur. He lets g
o and runs off, whining a little at the pain in his mouth, and the officers turn and look at him and laugh. No matter. He runs on. Soon he is among strangers, where the legs are bare. Here, he will not bite; he knows that the ones with bare legs are not so good to him, will throw him no cake or meat, and if he bites them in play, they will kick him, and hard. He remembers, dimly, this lesson, and runs on, pausing to piss and mark the places he is running over. In a moment, he comes to a quieter little corner, somewhere where nothing much is happening, a little silken corner, at the edge of a tent. Somewhere he can curl up and not be disturbed, he hopes. Somewhere in his head there is the memory of a silk dress and the soft white hand of his mistress. He lies down anyway. He feels odd, not quite right; there is a pain somewhere in him, a sharp and bad pain. Somewhere deep inside him; not a paw-pain or a nose-pain that can be eased by a rub and a scratch. He lies down, whining quietly, and sniffing, having nothing else to do.

  Elsewhere, the Governor General is deep in conversation with the men from the Company, and the pale and thin connection of Lord Palmerston. They all look distinctly nervous and preoccupied, but they always do. They may be discussing dinner, or some trivial affair. Or they may be contemplating the tremendous event approaching. Some tremendous event is approaching, surely it is; some splendid durbar. To summon Shah Shujah, that empty and forgotten potentate, down from the Imperial lumber rooms of Ludhiana to meet with the Governor General and the great King of the Punjab, Runjeet Singh; what is approaching is some new Field of the Cloth of Gold, and Burnes does not know, and has not been told, what such an event signifies. What such an event (which, in any case, he knows nothing of) could signify. All he knows is what he was instructed by one of Palmerston’s minions, that, on his return to India, he is to travel once more to Kabul. For what purpose, he does not yet know. He received his instructions from a clever young man with mobile hands and a tight smile in one of Palmerston’s gilded anterooms, and nothing else but an injunction to secrecy. He has no idea what he is needed for in Kabul, but it has something to do with this tremendous event.