“Not contrary to your orders, sir,” Crawford defended. “You had given me no orders. Furthermore, sir, you had relieved me of my duties and—”
“Damme, sir, that did not mean that you were free to desert the column!” Cockayne flung at him. “And most certainly not for the—devil take it, for the purpose of treating with the enemy, as you appear to have done. You’ve brought four rebels back with you, have you not?”
“Under a flag of truce, yes, sir,” Crawford amended. “If I may be permitted to explain?” He spoke firmly, aware that he had the attention of the other officers. “As your former Chief of Staff, Colonel, I was uneasy about the reports you had received as to the exact state of affairs in Ghorabad. You believed that the garrison was still successfully defending the fort and that they—”
“And are they not, Captain Crawford? Damme, I—”
“Alas, sir, they are not. I made a personal reconnaissance— without your permission, I concede—although I had twice begged you to allow me to lead a party of cavalry to make a reconnaissance of the city, in order to ascertain the situation there …” In careful detail, George Crawford described what he had found. He avoided any mention of the exact date of the surrender, Phillip noticed with warm approval, and made no counter-accusations and, watching Colonel Cockayne’s face, he saw some of the anger fade from it, to be succeeded by a look of stunned disbelief when Crawford spoke of the survivors. But he said nothing, sitting slumped in his chair as the younger man went on, “The Newab is holding them as hostages, sir. He is willing to release them, if you agree to his terms.”
There was a murmur of excitement among the assembled officers and, when Cockayne remained silent, a Captain of the 82nd asked eagerly, “What are the Newab’s terms? Has he told you what they are?”
“They are quite simple,” Crawford answered. “And I have brought his vakeel—Mohammed Aslam, who is known to you, Colonel—to put the proposals to you. We can send for him if you—”
Colonel Cockayne broke his self-imposed silence. “In a moment,” he said thickly. “Outline them, Crawford.”
“Very well, sir.” Point by point, George Crawford went over the Newab’s terms, and Phillip listened, his hopes rising. They were fair; the Newab had, it was evident, seen what Crawford had once described as “the writing on the wall.” He wanted his city left in peace and his own status restored; he was to be pardoned for his part in the rebellion, in return for which he offered to renew his oath of loyalty to the British Raj and to disband his levies, when peace and order were finally restored in Oudh. The hostages would be released unharmed; boats would be provided and a small party permitted to go, under arms, up river to escort them back to the column. As soon as the hostages reached it, the column was to withdraw and return to Cawnpore, and it would be unmolested, provided no further hostile action was taken against villages in the Newab’s territory.
“What guarantee does the fellow offer,” the 82nd officer pursued, “that our boat party will be unmolested when it goes to pick up the survivors of the garrison?”
“He will leave his son with us,” Crawford told him. “And the vakeel will accompany the boats. I think”—he glanced, smiling at Phillip—“that Commander Hazard may be willing to take command of the boats. They are to be armed and—”
“I shall be more than willing,” Phillip responded. “And I can mount a rocket-launcher in one of the boats … with your permission, of course, sir.” Deliberately, he addressed Cockayne and the Colonel, after a momentary hesitation, bowed his head. He seemed to have aged and there was an odd, downward quirk to his mouth but he said nothing, leaving his detachment commanders to question and discuss the Newab’s proposed terms. They did so, at some length but all, Phillip sensed, were immensely relieved—as, indeed, he was himself. The vakeel was summoned; George Crawford and John Arbor went over the terms with him in his own language, translating his replies for the benefit of those officers who did not understand Hindustani.
“I can see no reason why the Newab’s offer should not be accepted, Colonel,” Arbor said and there was a concerted murmur of assent.
“Our orders were to effect the rescue of the garrison, sir,” another officer put in eagerly. “We weren’t aware that they had been compelled to surrender, of course, but we shall assuredly be acting in the spirit of our orders if we bring the survivors safely back with us. This column need risk no further casualties and, above all, sir, we shall be avoiding another Cawnpore. It’s fortunate indeed that these poor people weren’t butchered out of hand.”
They were all looking at the Colonel now, appealing confidently for his assent and Phillip, adding his voice to theirs, saw again the look of incredulity in his face. Perhaps Crawford had supplied the answer, he thought; perhaps, after all, Colonel Cockayne had believed his entire garrison to be dead …
“You realise the risk you will be running, Commander Hazard?” Cockayne demanded suddenly. “The Newab is quite capable of betraying you, if you take those boats into the city.”
“I’m quite prepared to take the risk, sir,” Phillip told him. “If my party are armed and we have the rocket-launcher, I fancy he’ll think twice about attacking us—if he’s even considering such a possibility. We’ve no reason to suppose that he is—and he has offered to leave his son with you as a hostage, has he not, sir?”
“True,” the Colonel conceded but without conviction. He started to interrogate the vakeel in fluent Hindustani; the old grey-bearded Muslim answered his questions with quiet dignity, addressing him courteously by name. Their exchange was too rapid for Phillip to follow, but it was evident that they knew one another well and that there was a certain mutual respect—if, probably, little liking—between them.
“This man admits the killing of all the civilians who took refuge, against my advice, in the Residency,” the Colonel said. “As well as that of a number of officers, who were shot down when endeavouring to reach the fort. But he claims that the mutinied regiments were responsible, not the Newab—and that, I regret to say, I know to be true. However, he cannot— or will not—tell me how many survivors the Newab is holding to ransom.” He paused, fixing Crawford with an icy stare. “Did your personal reconnaissance reveal their number, Captain Crawford, by any fortunate chance?”
Crawford shook his head. “Alas, no, sir. But Mohammed Aslam gave me an assurance that the women and children were spared—as he did to you, when you questioned him just now. And he told me that they had been well treated.”
“Yet he insists he doesn’t know how many of them are still alive!” Cockayne retorted scornfully.
“Surely it doesn’t matter how many, sir,” young Alan Williams suggested. “I mean, sir, if only three or four of the poor souls are left alive, is it not our duty to endeavour to save them when the opportunity is afforded to us? God knows what they must have suffered in the Newab’s prison!” He added diffidently, “And some of them are children, sir.”
Again there was a concerted murmur of agreement and a spasm of pain flicked across the Colonel’s round, red face as George Crawford said forcefully, “If we reject the Newab’s terms for the release of those he is holding hostage, Colonel, he could order their deaths before we could get within sight of the city. And we should be powerless to prevent him. He—”
“Has he threatened to put them to death?” the 82nd Captain demanded, in a shocked tone. “Has he, Crawford?”
“Not in so many words, my dear Grayson. But the threat is implied in his offer of terms—that is the strength from which he is attempting to bargain with us.”
Crawford turned to the vakeel and spoke to him in his own language; the old man nodded vigorously and then held out his hands in mute and moving appeal to the anxious group of officers surrounding him. The Colonel reproved him sharply and the Newab’s envoy drew himself up affronted, to unleash a spate of words, whose meaning—although the actual words were unintelligible to most of the others—was nonetheless clear to them all. He started to move away and Capta
in Grayson, very white of face, laid a restraining hand on his arm, and returned with him to the Colonel’s side.
“Surely, sir,” he urged, “we must accept the Newab’s terms; what choice have we? As Captain Crawford says, he is bargaining from strength. We cannot risk the lives of British women and children, and this fellow here”—he gestured to the old vakeel—“is well aware of it. I beg you to give him your assent, sir.”
Colonel Cockayne eyed him with ill-concealed contempt. “So you would allow a proscribed traitor to go unpunished, in return for some vague promise that he will release an unspecified number of hostages—is that it, Captain Grayson? For heaven’s sake, man, the whole story is probably a tissue of lies! The Newab betrayed us once and he’ll betray us again. I know him, and he’s not to be trusted. He—”
It was the most he could say without revealing his fear that the whole garrison had been slaughtered, Phillip thought. He met George Crawford’s worried gaze and turned to face the Colonel.
“That has yet to be proved, sir,” he countered.
“Proved, Commander Hazard?”
“Yes, sir. We don’t know the Newab’s intentions and we don’t know how many of your garrison he is holding as hostages. I’m willing to put it to the test. Agree to the terms, Colonel, and permit me to take the boats up river. If the Newab does mean to betray us, he will have to show his hand when I reach the city, so you will have ample warning … and the Newab’s son, as your hostage. What have you to lose, sir?”
“Are you offering me advice again, Commander Hazard?” Cockayne demanded unpleasantly. “You are a naval officer, for God’s sake—what do you know of this country and its people? Damme, sir, I’ve had a lifetime’s experience of them and yet you presume to tell me what I should or should not do in this situation! The decision is mine, sir, and mine alone, since I shall be called upon to bear the responsibility for your loss if you put your head into a trap. Your loss and that of the only experienced gunners this force possesses—do I have to remind you of that, Commander? Not to mention the freeing of a despicable traitor, who justly deserves to be hanged!”
Phillip drew himself up, as the vakeel had done a few minutes before. He was suddenly angry with this stiff-necked, arrogant Company’s officer who, it seemed, wanted only to avenge his own real or imagined sufferings. Remembering the heartless butchery Cockayne had instigated at Betarwar and the two other ill-defended native villages, he said, with intentional harshness, “I’m offering a way out of an impasse, sir, and I’ll leave you two guns’ crews and my second-in-command, if you wish; they can be replaced by volunteers from your infantry. I …” He hesitated and then plunged in, his resolution hardening as he saw that the Colonel was about to argue with him, “In the name of humanity, sir, these hostages are British women and children—and your wife may be among them! Your wife and—”
Colonel Cockayne cut him short. “Very well, Commander Hazard, on your head be it. Make what arrangements are necessary with the Newab’s agent; I wash my hands of responsibility for your safety or that of any volunteers who accompany you. It is evident to me, gentlemen,” he added wearily, addressing the other detachment commanders, “that you are all—if I may say so in your ignorance—of a like mind to Commander Hazard in this matter. Am I correct in that assumption?”
There were no dissenting voices and Captain Grayson answered formally, “We are, sir.”
“Then we will continue our advance to the river,” Cockayne ordered. “Return to your detachments, gentlemen, and take post. The advance will be sounded in fifteen minutes. No, not you, Hazard”—as Phillip prepared to accompany the others—“I should like a word with you in private.”
“Very good, sir.” Phillip waited, hiding his impatience. When they were alone together, he realised that the Colonel’s appearance and manner had undergone a startling change; the older man looked defeated and apprehensive and, as they discussed the arrangements for manning the boats, his voice had lost its customery hectoring arrogance. The various details of procedure settled, he appended his signature to the paper setting out the Newab’s terms for the release of the hostages and proffered it, an odd little smile playing about his lips.
“Here you are. Let Mohammed Aslam take this back to his master. I warn you, it’s probably your death warrant, Hazard— but you would have it, wouldn’t you?”
“I’m sorry, sir,” Phillip said stiffly. “But honestly I—”
It was as if he had not spoken. The Colonel went on, a bitter edge to his voice, “In view of which I shall tell you—in confidence—what I have never told another living soul. You are a man of honour, Hazard, however misguided … I can, I hope, trust you to respect my confidence, whatever may be the outcome of this affair?”
“Of course, Colonel,” Phillip assured him. “But it isn’t necessary. I’m not asking—”
“It will ease my conscience to tell you,” Cockayne said. “God knows I have borne the awful burden of it alone for long enough. I’ve come near to breaking under the strain at times. I … you asked about my wife, Hazard.”
“Colonel Cockayne, there’s no need for you to tell me anything,” Phillip began awkwardly, anticipating what was to come. “Believe me, sir, you—”
Again it was as if Cockayne had not heard him. His face had drained of its ruddy colour and the hard, bloodshot blue eyes held the unexpected glint of tears.
“My beloved wife is dead, Hazard. She died in my arms and at my hands.” His voice was barely above a whisper and Phillip, appalled, had to strain his ears to hear it. “At her request, when we knew that we could hold out no longer, I put a bullet into her heart to prevent her falling alive into the hands of these fiends. A number of the others did the same. We … after what happened to the Nana’s poor victims at Cawnpore, we dared not surrender them alive and … Sir Henry Lawrence had advised it, if the Lucknow Residency fell. Besides”—his voice rose—“we had all seen what the Newab did to those who tried to defend the Commissioner’s house. He had them mutilated and beheaded in full view, outside our fort. Do you wonder that I want him to pay the penalty for his treachery, for the atrocities he committed when he believed that the power of the British Raj was waning?”
“I … no, sir, I do not,” Phillip admitted honestly. This was worse, infinitely worse than he had expected, and he shudi dered involuntarily, as a mental vision of the horrors the Ghorabad garrison had endured swam before his eyes. Poor devil, he thought, conscious of the stirrings of pity as he looked at Cockayne’s ravaged face … poor, unhappy devil … what an intolerable burden of guilt and remorse he had been compelled to bear all these months since the surrender! God help him, it was a burden that would have broken most men …
“I escaped, thanks to the loyalty of two of my native officers,” the Colonel continued bleakly. “They hid me in the city for weeks, at the risk of their lives, and when the mutinied regiments went to Lucknow, they procured a horse for me and smuggled me out. I got no further than Betarwar, where I was robbed and tortured, and then driven naked into the jungle to die … by the man I hanged, two days ago. I had no desire to live but …” He sighed. “I survived by a miracle and reached Cawnpore. Since then I have had only one thought, one ambition—to return here, with British troops at my back. I did not care what lengths I had to go to in order to get them; I was ready to perjure myself to Sir Colin Campbell. I … you realise I did perjure myself, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” Phillip said quietly. “I realise that and I can’t blame you. But—”
“But you are still determined to take those boats to the city?” Cockayne accused. “Hazard, I believe I am the only survivor of the garrison. When you go—no, dear God, if you go— I tell you, in all sincerity, that the only hostages you are likely to have released to you will be the wives and children of Eurasian Christians … clerks’ families and the like. Are you willing to risk your neck for them?”
“I cannot go back on my word now, sir,” Phillip said. “And nor can you.” He gestur
ed to the paper in his hand. “We have to honour this, if there is the smallest chance of finding any of your garrison alive. Crawford is convinced that some of them were spared and the vakeel bears out his belief—he swore it, in front of us all, did he not?” Thinking of George Crawford, he added, “Your daughter, sir—can you be certain that she—”
“My daughter?” The Colonel stared at him blankly for a moment and then said, his voice charged with bitterness, “She, poor, sweet child, was with those who took refuge with the Commissioner in his Residency. I can only pray that her sufferings are long since ended.” He paused, his frowning gaze on Phillip’s face, as if hoping, even now, for a reversal of his decision. Receiving none, he took his watch from his pocket. “You’d better take post, Hazard—it’s time we moved off. The boats are to be waiting for us at the river, I understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Very well.” Colonel Cockayne was himself again, brusque and autocratic. “Since you are still set on taking this dangerous gamble, you have my permission to ride ahead of the column with a cavalry escort, so that you may inspect them and arrange for the mounting of the rocket-tube. It will probably be dark before you can start up river and you won’t be able to see much, so I advise you to keep in midstream until you reach the city. At the first sign of treachery, open fire with your rockets on the Newab’s palace. It’s on the east bank—I’ll see you are provided with a plan of its location. Withdraw downstream when you have set it ablaze and I will bring the column in to storm the city from the west bank. Is that quite clear?”
“Quite clear, Colonel,” Phillip acknowledged, his voice devoid of expression. “Will that be all, sir?”
Colonel Cockayne gave him a mirthless smile and held out his hand. “It is, I understand, a tradition of your Service that even its most junior officers are trained to act on their own initiative and accept the responsibilities of command in any situation? That’s so, is it not?”
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