Nizams Daughters

best I can manage in order to do justice to—’

Locke slapped him on the shoulder again. ‘I’m sure you’ll do the right thing. You’re a King’s officer after all: you can’t just go fortune-hunting.’

‘And shall you remain here for the rest of your furlough?’ tried Hervey, not wanting any more discussion of where duty lay.

Locke glanced around him, and up to where the nautch girls stood, and simply smiled.

‘Yes,’ smiled Hervey by return. ‘Why indeed should you not?’

Alter Fritz looked worried. ‘Never have I seen so many horses with fever. Yesterday we had to burn seven more.’ His German had the sound of one whose everyday tongue was no longer his own, its cadences distinctly native.

The first thing that puzzled Hervey was why no attempt had been made to isolate those with symptoms of the sickness. Although the stables were airier than many he had known — made more so by the enormous punkahs which swung night and day — there was still a vapour which assaulted the nose and eyes on entering, and on which he supposed the contagion was borne. Alter Fritz explained that, by the time the fever had taken hold, there was nothing they could do to reorder the lines, save making space in one building for the worst cases. And besides, he feared the contagion had now taken hold in the bedding and fabric of the stables. He had considered turning all the horses loose, but he had no means of corralling.

‘You had better show me the worst cases, then,’ said Hervey.

Alter Fritz took him to where two dozen mares and geldings stood motionless in their stalls, heads held unusually still, and silent but for an occasional muted cough. Hervey looked carefully at each of them. All were sweating, and there was discharge from the nose (in some cases as thick as syrup). There were fearful abscesses of the glands beneath and behind the lower jaw, too. Some had erupted, and a thick, creamy pus oozed from them. Alter Fritz said that those horses which had discharged in this way had not then died, but he did not know why some developed the abscesses and some did not. He had observed that if the contagion were retained in the body then the animal grew worse — certainly, the fever continued — whereas it seemed to remit if the abscesses came to a head.

‘Have you lanced any of them?’ asked Hervey.

They had not, replied Alter Fritz, but they had bled every horse.

Hervey had never liked the notion of bleeding; not since, as a boy, he saw a young horse sever an artery, and watched helplessly as blood poured from it, the colt becoming too weak to stand in but a minute. He could never comprehend, therefore, the principle by which the bleeding of an already enfeebled animal should restore its health.

Alter Fritz agreed they did not bleed as a rule. ‘But when all else seems of no avail…’ he shrugged.

‘Very well,’ said Hervey, ‘but let us take the knife to these abscesses instead, since it’s they which appear to be the point of contagion. Those that have died — what was the manner of their dying?’

Alter Fritz said their breathing became laboured, that they no longer had the strength to draw in breath.

‘When did the last one succumb?’

‘A little before you arrived — a mare.’

They went to find her. She was not yet consigned to the pyre since Alter Fritz expected there would be two more by the end of the day. She lay covered in marigolds (the sowars’ customary mark of respect), and by a mound of brushwood that would later be torched. Hervey could not help but think it curious that, in a land where life seemed to be held so cheap, one troop-horse should be accorded such honour. In England it would be the limepit — or hound trenchers — and no ceremony.

The angle of the mare’s jaw was sorely swollen but rigor mortis had not yet set in. He asked for a knife, and one of the farriers gave him his razor.

‘What will you do?’ asked Alter Fritz.

‘I want to see if the abscesses have taken hold within,’ he replied. But first he asked that the horse’s mouth be opened as far as possible so that he could probe inside. Sowars crowded round to help or watch. He slipped his hand into her mouth, probing with a finger. ‘The soft palate’s compressed; she simply couldn’t breathe.’

‘Why is it swollen, think you, Hervey?’ asked Alter Fritz, holding a handkerchief to his nose.

‘Not swollen, compressed. I’m pretty sure it’s the abscesses about the jaw and neck which cause the compression.’ He pointed to the swellings, none of which showed signs of having discharged. And then, with the razor, he incised two of them and squeezed until pus spurted.

‘Ach, das ist schlimm!’ spat Alter Fritz.

‘Yes,’ agreed Hervey, his German unconsciously assuming the emphatic inflections of Alter Fritz’s, ‘very nasty indeed. I think it’s a case of — I don’t know how you say it in German — strangles.’

Alter Fritz looked puzzled.

Hervey put his hands to his neck: ‘Strangle — erdrosseln?’

He understood. But he had not seen a case either, nor did he know anything about it.

‘If it is strangles,’ continued Hervey, shaking his head, ‘we must try to bring the abscesses to a head and then lance them to take the pressure off the pharynx. Never have I seen sores so big. Everything in this country seems to grow to twice the size of what it would be in England.’ He wiped his hands on some cotton waste and stepped back from the carcass. ‘Tell your sowars to make poultices for their horses, and to keep cleaning the nostrils. Make up soft feeds which can be swallowed easily. Add syrup to make it appealing. And everything which comes into contact with any discharge must be burned, and the sowars must wash their hands before they attend to any horse that doesn’t already show the symptoms. I’m sure the contagion is in the body fluids.’

Alter Fritz acknowledged the instructions. ‘And you believe, Hervey, that we might save a few?’

‘I see no reason why we should not. Except that — as I understand it — there’s a complication to the disease known as bastard strangles, where the abscesses spread to the thorax and abdomen — and when they burst there’s such corruption that the horse dies no matter what is done. I was inclined to cut her open to search for such signs, but the pharynx is so compressed that there’s little purpose.’

Alter Fritz had begun to look more confident, but he now lowered his voice and screwed up his face. ‘Hervey, there’s one horse in particular you should see.’

‘How so?’

‘The raj kumari’s mare shows these symptoms too. It has been here with the rissalahs this month past.’

‘Oh,’ he groaned. Why were there always complications? ‘I’d better take a look at her at once.’

The little flea-bitten grey stood downcast in her stall on the other side of the maidan, separate from the main lines. Her head stayed still as they came in, her flanks were wet and her breathing shallow.

‘How long has she been this way?’ asked Hervey.

‘About a week.’

He felt about her lower jaw and neck. There were the tell-tale swellings. ‘Inform her syce that he must poultice at least three times a day to draw the poison to the surface. There’s little more we can do. She’ll be at her worst in another three days or so.’

He stayed with her until he was satisfied the syce could do the job properly, and then spent the remainder of the afternoon supervising the others to see they kept the discipline of burning the used wadding. Alter Fritz asked if strangles could pass from horse to man, to which Hervey replied that he did not know, but that he supposed it less likely if the men did as he bid in respect of vigorous hand-washing. And so all afternoon Hervey and the old German worked side by side — encouraging, demonstrating, upbraiding, labouring, consoling. Then, as the sun was beginning its descent over the forest towards Chintalpore, they retired to the officers’ quarters for restorative measures of whiskey and seltzer, and the prospect of a good supper. Bearers brought bowls of hot water, clean shirts and hose, fresh decanters and bottles. In a quarter of an hour they were sunk into deep leather chairs, exhausted but still hopeful. Alter Fritz closed his eyes briefly, allowing Hervey to search his face for what signs of perfidy might be etched in those sunweathered features. He saw none. Indeed, he saw nothing but the bluff openness of an old quartermaster — wily, perhaps, but never a deceiver.

But then the prospect of their good supper was rudely dispelled by the arrival of the last person they would have wished to see in the circumstances. The raj kumari came in without ceremony, though, her anxiety quite evident. Hervey sat her down and called for the khitmagar. Dust fell from her shoulders still, and the same long