The King

Chiswick asked himself for the thousandth time why he had ever thought he wanted to be a soldier, why he had thought life was better in regimental service when he could have bowed to Fate and clerked or farmed back around Guildford. What stupidity had led him to this, he trembled? He was not so much afraid of death as he was afraid of making a total, ineffective ass of himself when battle was joined! There seemed to be no steady center he could seize to calm his trembling. A mosquito whining in his ear set his heart to racing every time. He felt as if his heart wanted to leap free of his chest and escape even if he could not! And when Nandu got mired, and put out a hand on his shoulder for help, he almost jumped out of his skin and yelped with fright.

'Oh God, don't let me fail,' was Chiswick's prayer.

'Come on, oh one pubic hairs!' Col. Sir Hugo St. George Willoughby rasped in a harsh whisper of near-perfect Hindee. 'I've seen Rajput whores carry heavier loads. Subadar-major ji, march our children!'

White teeth and eyes gleamed briefly in the darkness above the white facings, the white dhotis and kurtah shirts of their uniforms. The red-faced coone- sahib seemed angry, but they knew him well by now, and knew it was not true anger. They'd seen enough of that by then, as well, and knew the difference. He'd ask them to do this one last dangerous thing, and then, if they were successful, they'd all go home to Calcutta. They were soldiers, no matter what their humble beginnings, no matter how low their castes, and colonel-sahib Weeby treated them as such, with respect, unlike so many of the gora log feringhee officers. They would do this one last dangerous thing.

For Colonel Weeby-sahib, who threw all his efforts into their training and welfare. For this regiment of theirs that had become a haven from Indian society, and the decreed-by-birth poverty of their castes. They may have started as poor ryots or zamindars, but they were treated like all-conquering kshatriya now, men of the warrior caste. They had not always conquered during the war in the south against Hyder AH and Tippoo Sultan, or against the French, but they had tried.

'God grant us a victory,' Sir Hugo mumbled. 'A victory that lets me keep my colonelcy so another damned fool straight out from England don't fuck this regiment up! Lord knows, it's all I've got and I'll be damned if I'll throw it away for nothing, either. So give us victory. And a Mention-in-Dispatches back to 'John Company' would go down right nice, too. A little loot for my old age, if you've a mind I enjoy one after this day's bloody work. And look after my lad. I really do mean to do right by him. A little time to do right by him would be sweet. Even if I can't, let him show well today. Carry on the family line with honor and glory. You know me well enough by now; I don't make silly promises I don't mean to keep, so I won't make any to You now. And the regiment. Lord, I know they're heathens, but they're good lads. Well, most of 'em, anyways. Let 'em carry all before 'em and not bring any dishonor to the colors.'

Captain Fessenden interrupted what else Sir Hugo would add.

'Sir Hugo, sir,' he whispered. 'The jungle seems to be thinning out on our right flank. And the beach is bending east. I think we're getting close.'

'Chandra-ji,' Sir Hugo muttered, snapping his fingers at his bewhiskered orderly. 'Run tell Chiswick-sa/n'fc to halt, then feel to his right. Major Gaunt, halt the column. Grenadier company to form on the right. Captain Fessenden, your light company to form on the left front across the beach for now, fifty paces forward.'

'At once, sir.'

That taken care of, Sir Hugo found himself a fallen palm log on which to sit and await the results of his scouts. He amused himself by drawing designs, which he could not see, in the sand with a walking stick.

'Sir?' Captain Chiswick whispered, having been led to him by Chandra after a quarter-hour had passed.

'Good morrow, Captain Chiswick,' Sir Hugo grunted. 'What have you to report?'

'Forward of where we stand, sir, the jungle continues for about three hundred yards, thinning out as it goes, and the footing is much firmer. Firm enough I adjudge for artillery. Beyond that, there are flooded rice fields and other crops,' Burgess said with a shaky tone.

'Damme!' Sir Hugo spat.

'But there are some sort of firm dykes surrounding the fields, sir, that are wide enough for gun carriages, and for troops marching three abreast,' Chiswick offered. 'And the flooded fields are more inland, beyond our right flank. If we stay close to the beach with our left flank, we could extend across the dry fields, and use the flooded portion as a shield for our right.'

'How much of a front?'

'I estimate about four hundred yards, sir,' Burgess reported, his body trembling with anticipation and feeling as if he had already spent all of his strength in scouting and pacing off the area.

'Too bloody wide for eight and a half companies,' his colonel muttered. 'Look here, where's the bloody village, then? How much of it do we threaten if we form as planned?'

They paced out into what little moonlight was left to draw a map on the beach sand with Chiswick's sword tip, using dry palm fronds that could be more easily seen.

'Once we incline right, sir,' Chiswick stated on his knees, 'the beach here west of the village is rather wide. I saw what I took to be pirate boats beached, starting here. They'd have artillery in the bows that could enfilade us. Thin undergrowth and trees for cover above the beach, extending south for about one hundred yards. Open fields with knee-high plantings, God knows what, all around it. If we come in from the west instead of striking north, we'd have three hundred yards frontage before our right flank brushed up against these dykes and rice-fields.'

'Chandra-ji. Summon officers here to me,' Sir Hugo commanded, then rose and paced while Chiswick continued to draw out a more elaborate plan of the village and its environs. 'Palisades, captain? Any batteries your scouts could discover facing inland?'

'Bamboo or palm logs for a palisade, sir, quite low,' Chiswick replied, intent on his model that he was now adorning with fronds to represent the jungle, the dykes and the palisade. 'We saw no guns on the inland wall, sir. There is a French battery on the point.'

'Right about here, where the coast trends east?' Sir Hugo asked, using the toe of his boot for a pointer.

'Yes, sir. Dug in as a three-sided redan made of palm logs and sand. It's been planted with bushes on the seaward side to conceal it. Two, perhaps three guns, my scouts told me, sir,' Chiswick went on, intent on his model. It felt so much like playing soldier, childish and silly, to be on his knees once again, re-creating his little fields of battle, moats and entrenchments out of the clay or sand soil of his native North Carolina. He'd stolen clothespins off the lines to be 'troops,' and they could be anything-Romans, Indians or Grenadiers.

'How big is the village?' Sir Hugo asked, kneeling down slowly so his joints didn't creak and pop. 'How far does it extend, sir?'

'About a quarter-mile, sir. On the far side, there is more jungle, much thinner than here, and some dry fields. And another battery of guns, about a mile farther on,' Chiswick said, gathering more material for his construction. 'There's a quarter-mile of open lands beyond the far palisades and the last native houses, pretty much the same as this end. The rice-fields don't extend that far, though, sir. They approach the center of the village's back walls.'

'Which would funnel us down as we fight our way in,' Sir Hugo mused. 'And if we came up from the south?'

'We'd have to split the regiment on either side of them, sir. Or get channeled into the dykes.'

'Damme if I'll play that game,' Sir Hugo snorted with derision as the white officers and their native subadars came to hear their orders.

'Gentlemen, we shall change direction right at the halt and go east, through the thin jungle south of these rice-paddies and fields,' Sir Hugo began. 'Our ships shall be sailing into harbor from the west, so we must attack from the east, to create the greatest confusion. One gun battery here, Captain Fessenden, on the point ahead of us. Have your best jangli-admi emulate Kali's Thuggees and silence them. Now.'

'Yes, Sir Hugo,' Fessenden whispered back.

'We shall form regimental front facing west here, in the jungle east of the village. Captain Chiswick, your light company to seaward on the new right flank. You get two of the light two-pounders. And I want you to silence this battery to your rear that your scouts discovered. Grenadier company in the center, with the bandsmen and the six- pounders spaced between companies. Coehom mortars two hundred paces to the rear of the grenadier company and prepared to support either wing. Major Gaunt, your half-battalion shall form our left, with Captain Fessenden's