The Lion's Den

by Philip McCutchan

  ‘I’d have expected you to rouse out Miss Gilmour. Frostbite is nurse’s work — not an officer’s.’

  ‘Officers be damned. When a man’s—’

  ‘Keep your voice down, damn you! You bloody fool! We don’t want this to spread—’

  ‘I tell you, James—’

  ‘I know what you told me, yes. What I saw didn’t look to me like frost-bite. Have you no regard for your position at all, none? Don’t you realise the implications, of a British officer and a sepoy being found in such circumstances? If there should be any complaint from the man—’

  ‘There won’t be.’

  ‘How sure are you of that?’

  ‘Very sure. I repeat...oh, for heaven’s sake, James, are you going to go on doubting me? I tell you again, he had frost-bite!’

  ‘Which can be checked on, of course. If he really has been frost-bitten, no doubt the time will come when it’ll be obvious enough even to a layman — and in any case there’s doctors in plenty in Peshawar! How bad is this this frost-bite?’

  After a pause Taggart-Blane said, ‘Not so very bad, I’ll admit. It was the beginnings of it, though — or anyway, that’s what I diagnosed. I acted on that diagnosis, James.’

  ‘So you could be wrong?’

  ‘Doctors themselves are wrong at times, aren’t they?’

  Even the biting cold had sunk into the background of Ogilvie’s awareness now; for possibly the first time in his military career, he was understanding how much more was involved in command than the mere exercise of authority and the successful conduct of an action. He said, Tor your sake, Alan, I hope you’re not wrong this time!’

  Taggart-Blane said surlily, ‘I don’t see why this should go any further.’

  ‘Then you think you might have been wrong?’

  ‘I don’t know! I don’t believe so. But surely that’s not really the point, is it, James? Isn’t the point the fact that I thought he had frost-bite, and that I did something about it?’ There was pleading in the voice now, and a growing fear. ‘Don’t you see? Can’t you understand that?’

  ‘I don’t know what I see. You’ll have to give me time to think about this.’ Ogilvie hesitated. ‘Suppose the man does make a complaint, officially, when we reach Peshawar? I know you said he won’t — but just suppose he does? What then?’

  ‘You mean you’ll be hauled over the coals for not having made a report to the Colonel?’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking of myself, but yes, that would be the case. I’m not asking you to consider that, though. I’m asking you to consider your own position.’

  ‘Even if he did complain...and he won’t, because there was nothing to complain about, unless he has it in for me for some reason...it’d be his word against mine, wouldn’t it? A sepoy’s word against that of a British officer?’

  Ogilvie felt the angry flush spreading over his face. ‘That is unofficer like, ungentlemanly — and unmanly too, which is even worse! You’ll take your medicine if it comes to that. Remember, I’m a pretty material witness myself, and—’

  ‘You seem very certain of what you saw —what you think you saw!’

  ‘I saw an act—’

  ‘In the dark?’ Taggart-Blane was sneering now. ‘It was dark, James, very dark!’

  ‘Not so dark that I couldn’t see what was taking place. If you want me to be precise, then I’ll be precise. I saw an act of what I took to be buggery—’

  ‘What you took to be! What experience have you, dear James, how often have you seen that act take place? Oh, it happens in the Army, of course it does, but I’ll wager you haven’t seen it every day of your damn service, James! You can’t swear to what you saw. You must admit to an element of doubt if you’re as honest as I think you are, basically. For my part, I swear no such act took place at all.’ Taggart-Blane hesitated, his eyes searching Ogilvie’s face through the gloom. ‘But...if you’re so sure...you’d testify?’

  ‘I would have no option, and you know that very well.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ Another sneer came into the subaltern’s voice. ‘And — the regiment, James? The dear old regiment? What would the rest of the Division say about the Queen’s Own Royal Strathspeys? Have you thought about that?’

  Ogilvie flinched. Curtly, angrily, he said, ‘That’s enough. You’ll leave the regiment out of this—’

  ‘Oh, my dear old James!’ Taggart-Blane gave a high, sardonic laugh. ‘You can’t very well do that, can you?’

  For one moment of red-hazed fury, Ogilvie almost struck Taggart-Blane with his fist, but controlled himself just in time. He said, ‘You’ll go to your bivouac and stay there till we move out, and I need hardly say, you’ll talk to no-one at all about this. Is that understood?’

  ‘Oh...yes.’ Taggart-Blane, his moment’s defiance past, now seemed utterly dejected and downcast. ‘What are you doing — relieving me of my duties?’

  ‘No, because you can’t be spared on the march. Also because, as I’ve said, I need to think about this. You’ll carry on as usual, except that you won’t go near the native lines alone until further orders. You’ll make quite sure you stick very rigidly by that order. That’s all. Get out of my sight.’

  ‘You’re prejudging this, aren’t you? You’ve already made your own mind up!’

  ‘No, that’s not true. I’m taking sensible precautions, that’s all. Now do as you’re told, and get out.’

  Taggart-Blane hesitated, then turned slowly away and stumbled off through the lying snow. Ogilvie called him back before he had gone more than a few yards, and asked, ‘The man’s name, the sepoy. Who was it?’

  He could almost have answered the question himself. Taggart-Blane said, ‘Mulata Din.’

  *

  Mulata Din, the old havildar-major had said, was a young boy, fresh from his father’s fields, and Taggart Sahib had been, for an officer, too friendly with him, to the detriment of good order and military discipline — or possibly so. Ogilvie, as he turned away from that interview, felt sickened. Of course, in a sense he had asked for it, in asking for Taggart-Blane to accompany the march in the first place; and now he could not duck his responsibilities, however great the burden. To some extent he now held the honour of the regiment, his own regiment, in his hands. If there was to be a complaint, if as a result of that complaint there was to be a Court Martial, a lot of mud must stick to the good name of the 114th and even he, for the rest of his career, would be known, in the comparatively small, closed world that was the British Army, as the officer who had become involved in one of the most abominable and hateful crimes in the military book of rules.

  Ogilvie was unaware that Gilmour had come up behind him until he felt the friendly hand on his shoulder. Gilmour asked, ‘Well, what’s the result of your talk with him?’

  ‘He says the man was suffering from frost-bite.’

  ‘Frost-bite, hey? That’s a new one! I’m sorry, Ogilvie, I know this is deadly serious, but if it wasn’t, well, there’d be a funny side after all. Frost-bite! Do you know, when I first came out to India in a trooper, the men used to lie with their wives under rugs on the open deck, since their accommodation was separate. Charitable persons used to say it was the wind that was shaking the rugs.’ Gilmour gave a quiet laugh. ‘I repeat my apology, Ogilvie. I know this is different, and I know it’s horrible too, but I’d hate to see you go to pieces over it!

  ‘Oh, I’ll not do that, Major, but I do admit I’m most terribly worried.’

  ‘Which is not a good thing for the safety of us all on the march. You must clear your mind of this, until we reach Peshawar. I think you’d better tell me all the details so far as you know them. It’ll do your soul good!’

  Ogilvie repeated his conversation with Taggart-Blane; when he had finished, Gilmour said, ‘Well, you’ll just have to wait and see — there’s nothing else to be done at this stage. There either will or will not be a complaint from the sepoy. I would rather think he won’t say anything — in fact, I’d be a very astonished man indeed if h
e did. Sepoys don’t complain against their officers, and there’s all sorts of not very flattering reasons for that abstinence, believe me! In addition, if there’s any guilt around at all, half of it could very well lie with the sepoy himself. As another addition, this business isn’t so horrid to the Indians as it is to us.’

  ‘So I’ve been told, but—’

  ‘There was some Indian prince, not long ago, who paid a state visit to London, and the Queen put on a magnificent banquet in his honour. She was intrigued, so I heard, about a young boy in the prince’s retinue...I forget what they told her his function was, but it certainly wasn’t the truth. However, to be serious again, Ogilvie...I feel sure there will be no complaint, and if I’m right, there will be no scandal.’

  ‘But what then, Major? Do I just sit tight and say nothing?’

  ‘Well, that’s rather up to you, isn’t it? I wouldn’t presume to interfere, naturally, but if you want my advice, then I’d say this: if what you think you saw — what I think I saw also — did in fact take place, then a man of that sort should be eradicated from the Army.’ Gilmour’s voice had hardened now. ‘What’s happened once can happen again. And the eradication can take place — so long as there’s no official complaint — without any scandal attaching to anyone. You must know the ways of the Army, Ogilvie. Colonels can require an officer to send in their papers...and it would be most foolish for the officer concerned to refuse his co-operation!’

  ‘That’s equivalent to being found guilty without trial, though.’

  Gilmour said, ‘Yes, I know. It has to depend on how certain one is in one’s own mind. When you are, you act for the good of the regiment and the service, and make a good clean cut. It’s primitive, but it works.’ He paused, with his hand once again on Ogilvie’s shoulder, then added, ‘I think you’d better clear your mind on one point: the frost-bite, true or false?’

  ‘Yes, but how, without a doctor?’

  ‘My daughter’s done a little nursing in the Residency. She’s interested in it, and she’s read a number of books — I don’t know how much she really knows, but I can always ask her to have a look at the man’s feet and pass a lay opinion. She won’t mind.’

  ‘It’s awfully good of you, Major.’

  ‘Thank Katharine, not me, Ogilvie. Would you like me to wake her how, strike while the iron’s hot — or frozen?’

  Ogilvie gave a tight smile. Gilmour’s wit failed, at such a time, to appeal. ‘If you wouldn’t mind,’ he said. While he waited in the lee of a large rock, Gilmour went off to wake his daughter, having first assured Ogilvie that there was no need for her to be given any other explanation than that the man had been observed to be in distress. Gilmour was back with the girl and a storm lantern inside five minutes, and together they went down the line of men, found a naik and told him to take them to Mulata Din. In the flickering light from the lantern, they saw that the young man was awake and was staring at them with fearful eyes, black pools of reflected light. He was little more than a child in spite of his military status and his weapons of war close at hand: young and small and fresh-skinned, virginal...if a man had such proclivities, this youth would be an obvious victim of his desires.

  ‘Mulata Din,’ Ogilvie said, ‘we believe you are in distress about your feet. Is this so?’

  Mulata Dan stared past him at the waiting naik, seeming not to understand. Ogilvie’s command of the sepoy’s dialect was not good, as it happened. The naik translated. Mulata Din’s eyes, still fearful, widened and he answered, ‘This is so, Ogilvie Sahib.’

  ‘Then the mem-sahib will look, and try to help. Show us your feet, Mulata Din.’

  The young native moved the pitifully thin blanket that was over his body, and displayed his naked feet, which, though pale and almost bloodless, didn’t look to Ogilvie’s admittedly inexperienced eye to be showing signs of frost-bite. The toes were wriggling, at any rate, and there was no apparent sign of the waxiness that he believed to be attendant upon frost-bite. Katharine Gilmour bent close, going down on one knee in the snow while her father held the lantern. She felt the feet with what seemed to be expert precision, and a very gentle touch, and asked a few questions in dialect, which Mulata Din answered volubly; he seemed comforted by the touch and presence of a woman. Katharine said a few words to him, smiled kindly and got up. Mulata Din once again pulled the blanket over his slim legs.

  ‘Well, Miss Gilmour?’ Ogilvie asked.

  ‘Oh, I doubt if it’s frost-bite,’ she answered. ‘Indeed, I’m sure it is not, though it could become so. He’s desperately cold, poor fellow, though I dare say no worse than anyone else.’

  ‘You said it could become so. Could you be more explicit, Miss Gilmour?’

  She gave a light laugh, and looked at her father quizzically, then back at Ogilvie. ‘I don’t really think so, Captain Ogilvie, not being a doctor! Why is this man so special, may one ask that?’

  ‘Just answer Captain Ogilvie’s question, my dear,’ Gilmour said. ‘It’s rather important, but we can’t say more than that.’

  ‘Oh, very well, then.’ She shrugged. ‘I think it could become frost-bite if he doesn’t keep on rubbing those feet, or anyway keep them in motion—’

  ‘Has he been rubbing them, Miss Gilmour?’

  ‘Yes, so he says. If he hadn’t, it’s quite likely they’d be in a much worse condition. Rubbing with snow is said to help.’

  ‘He rubbed them himself? He didn’t...get anyone else to do that for him?’

  ‘He said he rubbed them himself, yes. He spoke of no-one else.’ She sounded puzzled, glancing again at her father’s solemn face.

  ‘Then the rubbing has in fact helped him? If it had not taken place, he could have frost-bite already?’

  ‘I think it might be reasonable to say that, Captain Ogilvie.’ She smiled at him, dimpling as she had done earlier. ‘Are you satisfied now? You have my recommendation that it would be beneficial if you were to set all the men to rubbing legs and arms!’

  ‘I’ll keep it in mind,’ he said, smiling back at her. ‘Thank you for your help, Miss Gilmour. It’s much appreciated, I assure you.’ He accompanied the Gilmours back to their bivouac. It would soon be morning, and they would be on the march again; with luck they should reach the Khyber in the next two days unless there was more snow. As he went back to his own bivouac and tried- to find sleep, Ogilvie reflected that Katharine Gilmour’s report had not really helped his peace of mind; nor, in fact, could it lead him to any definite conclusion. Taggart-Blane could have been speaking the truth, he himself could have been misled by the darkness; on the other hand there was no reason to suppose that Mulata Din was in any different state from any of the others — indeed, Gilmour’s daughter had suggested as much. Why, then, had Taggart-Blane picked on Mulata Din? Why? Possibly there was some innocent explanation; at all events, everything that was in Ogilvie urged him to believe so. To believe anything else of a brother officer was to diminish, in a sense, his whole belief in the integrity and honour of the British Army, in the concept of comradeship in arms.

  *

  The snow held off, and shortly after dawn the urgent march for the Khyber was resumed across a deep, crisp blanket of white but under clear skies and a thin, but very welcome, sun that sparkled along the wintry trees and mountain-tops rearing ahead, and turned the lying snow to a sea tinted with gold and pink and green. That sun brought men’s spirits back to life a little, and in the keen snow-free air they marched better, and made good time. Once again, Taggart-Blane and Subedar Gundar Singh brought up the rear of the line, keeping watchful eyes on any stragglers. Ogilvie himself rode frequently to the rear, keeping an eye on Taggart-Blane as much as upon the marching column of sepoys. From time to time he rode with the womenfolk, trying to draw them out, to take Mrs. Gilmour’s mind off the rigours of the journey by talking of happier things, of Peshawar and Simla, of England which neither of the women had seen for many years. But Mrs. Gilmour, clearly sick, was too preoccupied with her fears and her current
discomfort, simply answering his tentative questions as briefly as possible, and offering no conversational openings in return. Ogilvie was relieved when Gilmour came up alongside his wife, and he was able, without offence or rudeness, to give his attention to Katharine.

  ‘When do you think you’ll see England again, Miss Gilmour?’ he asked.

  ‘That depends on my father, Captain Ogilvie. He loves India — he’d never settle at home again. Besides, his work is here.’

  ‘But he’ll get leave?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘He’ll get a home leave next year, but that doesn’t mean to say he’ll go home to England! My grandmother lives in South Africa, in Cape Town, and that’s where we’ll go, I expect.’

  ‘You sound as though you’d like to see England again?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said, and seemed to catch her breath a little. ‘I’d love to, Captain Ogilvie. Just to see an English field again, and a quiet stream. A little Cotswold village...or Yorkshire...Wensleydale in summer, and Aysgarth Falls. The sound of —of happy water. It’s so different out here.’ She gave a sudden violent shiver, one that had no connection with the terrible cold of Afghanistan. ‘So very different! The water sounds are — cruel, I think, is roughly the word. Harsh and discordant. Do you know what I mean?’

  Slowly, frowning, he nodded. ‘Rushing rivers of war and death. Yes, I do know. I’ve seen so many men lost—’ He checked himself; this was not the time to remind a young girl of what could lie ahead in the Khyber Pass. He kept to himself his memories of actions along high tracks with boiling tumults of water far below, of blood running with the water across the fords, of men and horses falling to the impact of the guns, of snipers’ bullets, of bodies whirling away on the river’s flood. He kept it to himself, yet knew that this girl had something similar in her mind. She had started to say something when she broke off, and looked up into the hills to their right. Ogilvie followed her glance and saw, as he had seen from time to time earlier, the wild-looking tribesmen watching distantly, with their rifles slung across their chests, brooding men in an eternal silence. Katharine shivered. ‘They never leave us alone, do they?’