‘And a sahib has been found murdered on the road outside Chintalpore.’
‘A sahib? Which sahib? Who?’ demanded Hervey anxiously, though hardly wishing to hear the name.
‘His face is not known, Captain sahib.’
That much at least was a relief. ‘I’ll come at once. Has Locke-sahib been summoned also?’
The jemadar did not think so.
‘Then please send for him too.’
Fighting proved perhaps too strong a word to describe the incident on the Godavari, and Hervey thought he might have misunderstood the Urdu. The rajah’s dastak officials had been roughly handled by the nizam’s men, and though that hardly bode well it did not constitute an attack. But the officials also reported seeing guns with uncommonly long barrels.
‘Captain Hervey, an official of the Company was found dead this morning on the road from Guntoor.’ The rajah seemed perfectly composed as he handed a letter to him, unlike several minor officials also gathered in the audience chamber. ‘He seems to have been travelling alone, and set upon by thieves, for his pockets were empty and his horse gone. But sewn into the lining of his coat was this letter, addressed to you.’
The seal was unbroken. Hervey was astonished — and then thought meanly of himself for supposing it would be otherwise. He read the letter with mounting despair.
‘Does it reveal who was this man, Captain Hervey?’ said the rajah, still perfectly composed.
‘It does, sir — though a man I never met. He was Colonel Forster, whom the Company — and, indeed, I myself — hoped would take command of the subsidiary force once he had gained your confidence.’ As he spoke the words he could feel the fetters closing fast on him, and his stomach heaved at his abject failure to discharge the duke’s mission. ‘The letter also bears disturbing intelligence, sir,’ he continued, his voice once or twice betraying his turmoil. ‘Word has come from Nagpore that several thousand Pindarees have been swarming along the Nerbudda river, and that the Nagpore subsidiary force is not yet embodied — and that Appa Sahib, the regent, earnestly requests you to lend him all support at once.’
The rajah still seemed remarkably composed at the news. Yet, to Hervey, the situation could hardly have been graver — and he said so. Chintal faced threats on both flanks simultaneously, there was insufficient intelligence of what the nizam’s forces were about, especially in the east, and in the west they appeared to be staring in the face of the most powerful guns in India.
The rajah was not convinced. ‘Captain Hervey, for many years we have lived with the nizam’s fearsome daughters. Like many women, they spit and they make a great deal of noise. But, truly, must they trouble us so?’
Hervey was as close to exasperation as he had been since leaving England. This was not
‘War itself is an option of difficulties,’ replied the rajah simply — complacently, even.
Hervey checked himself. ‘You quote General Wolfe, sir, and that is most apt, for he was only able to take the heights at Quebec after stumbling on an unguarded path. It seems to me that we too must find one.’
‘Captain Hervey,’ smiled the rajah, ‘you do not know how pleased I am to hear you say it is we who shall have to find that path. I had begun to suspect you would desert us!’
Hervey counted himself fortunate, always, that the griping in his vitals — the fear of death or dishonour in equal measure — had never rendered him incapable of thinking. Indeed, in some respects it stimulated it. In an instant he had chosen to say ‘we’, for although he knew his mission for the duke was all but rendered impossible now (and by his own making), he could at least redeem some tiny part of his reputation by facing up to things squarely in Chintal. ‘I am at your service, sir,’ he said resolutely.
‘Do I therefore send my sepoys to Nagpore, Captain Hervey?’
‘No sir,’ he replied at once. ‘That would be to leave Chintal a prey to Haidarabad — and there may already be Pindarees down the Godavari on Nagpore’s borders.’
‘But we do not know what the nizam is to do with these guns,’ protested the rajah. ‘If I am able to recall my history, Quebec was a fortress, its defences fixed. Perhaps that is the nizam’s intent only — a fortress on his border?’
‘Sir, why should the nizam build so strong a fortress when there is no threat whatever? No, the only purpose those guns serve is either to be brought to the palace here, probably on boats down the Godavari, to cannonade you into submission — or else they are a lure.’
The rajah had looked anxious at the suggestion that his palace might be thus despoiled, but positively intrigued at the notion of a lure. ‘Please explain yourself more fully, Captain Hervey.’
At the rajah’s bidding, the assembled company sat down, no longer having need of the map spread on the table. Selden, who had arrived after the conference began, but silent throughout (his influence much diminished by the most recent attack of malaria), started coughing violently. The rajah gave him iced water, which revived him as much by its expression of continuing regard as by any medicinal property. Once the coughing had ceased, and the rajah was again seated, Hervey took a deep breath and began his estimate — a calculation which, if wrong, might soon spell the end of the rajah’s sovereignty over Chintal. ‘The nizam will not invest Chintalpore,’ he opened confidently. ‘His treaty of alliance with the Company forbids any such aggression without the Company’s compliance — and that, we know, is unthinkable.’ The raj kumari cleared her throat. Hervey looked at her and saw the suggestion that he could not be so assured on this point. He decided to press on rather than be drawn into deliberation on the perfidy of the Company, however. ‘Your Highness, as I was saying, it is wholly inconceivable that Haidarabad should undertake overtly offensive action against Chintal.’
‘Unless, that is, those brutish sons of the nizam have a hand in matters,’ responded the rajah. ‘I have heard much of the enfeeblement of the nizam these past months. Nor would I place any faith in that badmash Chundoo Lall, his minister. Their long-held designs on Chintal — or, rather, the wealth of Chintal — are about to be thwarted by our alliance with the Company, about which they will have surely heard, since nothing remains secret in Chintalpore. Is this not now the only remaining opportunity they have to wrest that wealth from me?’
‘I cannot gainsay that hypothesis, sir, but I cannot believe the resident in Haidarabad would not have knowledge of such an enterprise. And, that being so, the Company’s agents would have been alerted, and in turn Chintalpore. We must discount it as the least likely eventuality.’
‘And yet we hear,’ said the rajah, with a hint of reproach, ‘that the resident in Haidarabad is not all that he should be.’
A high official of the Honourable East India Company seduced from his duty by pecuniary advantage: it was a grave charge. Hervey scarcely considered an Englishman was free from the mark of original sin, but he was not inclined to see perfidy in that quarter — though Selden would, no doubt, remark that India sweated the false civilization out of the best of men. He knew he could have complete confidence in one official at least. ‘Your Highness,’ he replied, in careful, measured tones, ‘we know, regrettably, that things in Haidarabad may not be as they should. But I have the utmost faith in the Collector of Guntoor. He would not dissemble.’
The rajah conceded. ‘Then what is it that you suppose the nizam is about? What is this ruse you speak of?’
Hervey considered for a moment how best he might explain his thesis — which was, in essence, simple, however ingenious. ‘If Haidarabad may not attack Chintal, then Chintal must be induced to attack Haidarabad. If, as I suspect, the nizam is at this time building redoubts on Chintal soil — not very distantly across his border, so that he might say that its precise line was in some doubt — it is a gauntlet thrown down in challenge. If you do not take it up then there will be some further encroachment, but all the time falling short of anything to which Calcutta could have substantive objection.’
There followed a long silence during which the rajah appeared to be praying, and the raj kumari calculating. At length the rajah pronounced himself in agreement with the appreciation. ‘But, Captain Hervey, we now come to the most painful part: what is to be done? Do I appeal to Calcutta? Do I journey to Haidarabad to ask for terms? I have read that a good tactician is he who knows what to do when something must be done; whereas strategy must
