Nizams Daughters

which by rights should not have gone to the duke. But he had much to explain — to Paris (he scarcely dare think of the duke as he wrote), to his family, and to Henrietta. Sleep, he knew, would not in any case come easily. And then when the moon rose, at a quarter to midnight, he had accompanied a little party of sepoy officers and NCOs to dig and set fougasses with the dafadars in charge of the galloper guns. There had been no shortage of powder in Jhansikote, but after the affair with the nizam’s guns at the river there was now an abundance, for several barrels had floated to the bank, their contents as dry as dust with the tar sealing, and one of the two powder barges had fallen into their hands intact. When first he had explained his intention the dafadars seemed incredulous. Indeed, Hervey himself had never actually seen a fougasse, nor even heard of its making — except that years before he had read some dusty tome in the library at Longleat about the ancient fougasse chambers along the Maltese coast. How strange, he thought as they dug, that a childhood foray among the marquess’s bookshelves should come to such a fruition. Templer had asked him why he made this effort, to which he had replied that since he could not increase his cannonading, explosive pits packed with stones and musket balls must suffice — ‘poor man’s artillery’ he said they were called. And, he declared, their value might be even greater than cannon in the complete surprise of the sudden eruptions.

The work took until after two, and by then a portion of the kadir forward of their right flank, which Hervey already intended to picket, and extending to two furlongs, was peppered with his medieval devices. He had resolved not to make his final appreciation, however, until first light. Then the kadir would be revealed by the sun’s searching power, rather than by the moon’s deceptive glow. And, perhaps even more important, he would have the results of the night’s reconnaissance, for since shortly after dusk his spies had moved freely about the Pindarees’ camp, and even among the nizam’s gunners in their bivouacs beside the cannon. Never could he recall hearing of so free a play of spies. But then the hijdas were no ordinary agents. Before they had left Jhansikote Rani had been joined by a half-dozen others from the Chintalpore hijron, and several more later from that at Polarvaram, and all night they had capered and debauched their way among the enemy’s campfires until the cockerel booty had warned them to leave. An hour before dawn they had slipped back into Hervey’s lines, waking a good number of sepoys by their squeals and laughter, and assembled outside his tent. Torches cast an unflattering light on their gaudy sarees, but, all revulsion at their ambiguity overcome (holding them in some affection, even), he had listened carefully to what they had discovered, only occasionally finding his Urdu insufficient. But their night’s work, though valiant, yielded nothing that provided the key to unlocking the great task before him. True, they had been able to confirm that there were eight guns, whose barrel length was that of the tallest of the hijdas (Hervey had tried not to squirm as that individual related in lewd detail how he had come to be able to judge the length so exactly), also that there were many horses, tethered properly, and arms piled in soldierly fashion in parts of the camp. Behind these disciplined lines, however, lay a host of camp followers, whose fires stretched so far that it was impossible to estimate their number or extent. The only opportunity which the hijdas’ intelligence brought was in this mass of camp followers — no doubt laden with the spoils of their past weeks’ depredations, as tight-packed and immobile as their reputation for intoxicated indolence promised. They might well impede the retreat of the fighting men, for there was the river on one side, and the forest on the other.

But how was Hervey to compel any retreat? The kadir between his lines and the Pindarees’ would be swept by the fire of those eight guns (by the hijdas’ description, the fearsome thirty-six-pounders, with a range of one mile). Equally, the forest and the river limited his chance of manoeuvre. Late in the afternoon of the day before, as they were about to set up camp, he had contemplated doing what he had done the night they had galloped to Jhansikote and found the tree and the picket barring their way on the forest track. But that night they had traversed — what? — half a furlong of jungle? Not more than one and a half, certainly. And their progress had been slow, tiring and unsure. Here, at night, they would have to steal into the forest half a mile at least from the Pindaree lines. They could not reach the lines before dawn, and once the sun was up they would surely be detected if the enemy had taken the slightest precaution of posting sentinels. By day they would have to cover three times that distance, for there was no closer concealed entry to the jungle. They could, perhaps, make the best part of the distance before dark, leaving the last furlong or so to the night, but it would still be risky, and they would lose a whole day in which the Pindarees might even go onto the offensive. It was a doubtful option.

And so, with the sun’s growing heat threatening the most uncomfortable of fighting — but also beginning to put life back into the weariest of the sepoys — and with the cooking fires and spices already sweetening the habitually fetid air of a military camp, Hervey surveyed the kadir through his telescope. He made one resolution at least. He would not make the mistake of fighting when or whom there was no need. The guns were his objective: counter those and the day would be his. But although this helped concentrate his attention on that to which he must direct the principal effort of his force, it did not provide him with an answer to how he might achieve his object. How might he subdue the guns? How might he even reach them without challenging — head-on — the Pindaree cavalry? They greatly outnumbered his and would not be inclined to run, as usually they were expected to, while the guns covered them. What was his little force capable of? He could not consider what the promised augmentation from Guntoor might allow, for there was no knowing when they might arrive. He could dispose six companies of infantry which had been trained, during the past few days, to work as light troops capable of skirmishing and responding to the bugle rather than to fight as dense-packed bearers of volleyed musketry. Without the nizam’s guns to play upon them he was sure they could reach the Pindaree lines. If only there were not the guns! Every time it returned to that question. But just as bewilderment was turning to desperation a thought occurred to him. He reined about and trotted back towards his tent, jumping from the raj kumari’s handy second Kehilan — which she had insisted he take when finally they had parted at the palace — and shaking the sleeping hijda on the ground outside.

‘Yes, Captain sahib?’ he said, blinking.

Hervey did not even have to think of the Urdu. It came at once. ‘Rani, did you visit each of the guns last night?’

‘Yes, sahib, all of them.’

‘How strongly built were the redoubts — the little forts that the guns were in?’

‘Very strong, sahib.’

‘Not easily knocked away?’

‘No, sahib.’

To the hijda’s puzzlement, Hervey looked pleased. ‘And how narrow were the embrasures — the spaces through which the guns fired?’

‘Not more than a woman with voluptuous hips could pass, sahib,’ replied Rani, pouting and describing the shape with his hands.

The Urdu escaped him, but the hijda’s hands said enough. He smiled to himself. Could it be that the nizam’s men had made the mistake of doing what many an embattled gunner had done before, and sacrificed traversing for protection? Yes: this was their Achilles’ heel! This was where he would direct his lance!

He was already back in the saddle when he heard it. First a murmuring, then a buzzing, and then — if not cheering — sounds of distinct approbation. He turned to seek its cause, and there was a sight as glittering as that before Waterloo, when the Duke of Wellington and his staff had made their progress through the ranks. But, he smiled, what a contrast with the duke’s sombre, civilian attire that day was the court dress of the Rajah of Chintalpore!

‘Good morning, Your Highness,’ said Hervey, saluting. He could scarce believe the felicity of the timing. Five minutes before and the rajah would have found him with no plan, and each would have fuelled the other’s despair. Now, though, the rajah was inspired by Hervey’s sanguine air, and he likewise by the rajah’s substance and dignity.

‘Captain Hervey,’ he replied with a smile, ‘you see before you a very indifferent soldier but, I hope, one that may have some utility.’

‘Sir, your coming here now is most welcome to me, and I have no doubt it is everything to your sepoys,’ he replied, bowing.

‘Is there time for you to explain to me what is your design for battle?’

Hervey returned his smile willingly. ‘Indeed there is, sir. It is, in any case, a simple plan. First let me point out to you the ground — the sun is not too bright for you to make out the Pindaree lines in the distance?’

The rajah shaded his eyes and peered across the kadir. ‘Oh yes, Captain Hervey, I see them very well. And the guns like the walls of Jericho. How shall you tumble them?’

Hervey smiled again. ‘If I may first explain the ground, sir. See how on our right the Godavari constrains our