‘That nappy little lass of his threw her head up a bit sharp when he’d taken her bridle off.’
Hervey sighed, handed his reins to Johnson and set off back down the column. He came on Parkin sitting with his head in his hands, with Private Wainwright next to him holding both horses. ‘What is it, Parkin?’
‘It’s nothing, sir,’ replied Parkin, struggling to rise.
‘No, keep where you are,’ said Hervey, squatting on his haunches to take a proper look at Parkin’s face. It was undoubtedly worse than at muster, beads of sweat trickling almost continuously down his cheeks and neck. But they had since been in a brisk trot, and for the best part of an hour. ‘Do you have any pain?’
‘No, sir.’
Wainwright evidently considered the reply incomplete. ‘He’s got the cramps, though, sir. His joints are aching bad.’
The surgeon had by now come up. He too squatted by Parkin’s side, and laid the back of his hand on the dragoon’s forehead. ‘A fever all right. And a sight worse than at muster. Do you have any head pain?’
Parkin hesitated. ‘A headache, sir, yes.’
‘And his joints are aching, sir,’ added Wainwright.
‘Is that right, Parkin?’
‘I’ll be all right, sir. Just need a bit of a rest.’
The surgeon stood up, then Hervey. ‘What is it?’
‘I don’t know, Hervey. It could be any number of things.’ His tone was not optimistic.
‘What’s the worst it might be?’
‘He has the symptoms of breakbone fever, though I must say I have never witnessed the condition myself.’
Hervey looked blank.
‘Well, it won’t kill him, but the aches will become so bad that he’ll not be able to stay in the saddle.’
‘I don’t want to be fell out, sir,’ insisted Parkin, albeit limply.
‘No, Parkin, I’m sure you don’t. It does you credit. But I can’t risk it.’
‘Let me just go on to the camp tonight, sir. I’ll sweat it out then, and likely be better in the morning.’
Hervey glanced at Wainwright.
‘I can see to him, sir,’ said Wainwright, reluctant but resigned: he knew Parkin would never want to go back to Warminster Common without the same tale of action to tell. And after all, the surgeon
‘Very well then,’ said Hervey briskly. ‘But I shan’t risk taking you beyond the night’s camp if there’s no amendment.’ It was not a difficult decision; after all, he would still have to send another man back with him whether it were now or then.
Armstrong was not convinced of the logic when Hervey told him, however. ‘You’ve been in these parts a sight more than me, sir, but yon Parkin’s going to get a whole lot worse before he gets better. It’d be kindness to send him home now, with less of a distance to do.’
Hervey knew that Armstrong was right, in one sense at least, but he was disappointed nevertheless to hear it. How things had changed — Armstrong, the hardest of men, now speaking of
They were sufficiently out of earshot for Armstrong to voice his opinion further. ‘Aw, come on, sir! Parkin’s a babby still. He’s no more idea of a fight than a brawl on a Saturday. We can’t afford to carry anybody as can’t look after themselves. Send him back with one of the syces.’
Hervey was angered. ‘That’s a judgement I’ve got to make. This side of the river there’s hardly a risk.’
Armstrong looked equally black. ‘Of
Hervey did not reply at once. ‘And you’d trust one of the syces?’
‘I would while Parkin’s still able to do for himself. We can’t afford to send one of ours with him.’
Hervey could not make things out; Armstrong, if he were indeed going soft, was as determined as ever. ‘Well, I’ve told him he can stay with us now. If I have to leave him at the river then it will have to be with a syce. I think there’ll be a dak bungalow there anyway.’
Private Johnson led up Hervey’s Marwari. ‘Parkin looks proper poorly to me, Cap’n ’Ervey. Is tha gooin’ to send ’im back?’
Armstrong answered. ‘Johnson, you’ll look a sight poorlier than Parkin if you don’t keep that potato-trap of yours shut. And who said to unbutton that coat?’
Johnson knew he was vulnerable on both counts, and did not even glance at Hervey for support. He braced up instead, and turned away.
Armstrong smiled a little. ‘You know, when I kept that place at Datchet I was of a mind to take him on if ever, as they say, you’d dispensed with his services.’
Hervey relaxed, and smiled too. ‘That might come as a great shock to him.’
‘Oh, I’m not so sure, sir. It’s water off a duck’s back to our Johnson. He knows his worth, that’s one thing.’
Hervey shook his head. ‘And that’s the problem with half the poor beggars who showed for the shilling. They thought so little of themselves.’
Armstrong took out his pipe. There was no time to light it, but he could prick at the bowl in the familiar way. ‘It’s a queer place this. Most of these ’Indoos as does for us sleeps on the floor, and yet I don’t see ’em cringe for all of that. And as for them Skinner’s men, you’d think they were maharajahs the way they carry themselves.’
‘And what conclusions do you draw from these observations, Sar’ntMajor?’
Armstrong paused. ‘Let’s just say that when this lot is shot over the first time, we’ll have our work cut out.’
Hervey hoped profoundly he was wrong. ‘We can thank God at least that by all accounts the Burmans are not famous fighters.’
Armstrong tapped out his pipe on his boot. ‘Ay, well we’ve heard that afore.’
Hervey knew it, but it was time they began resaddling, and he stood up. ‘A couple of leagues at most, and then we’ll see what their spirit is when I tell them our orders.’
Armstrong rose too. ‘Ay. Crossing yon river’ll leave ’em in no doubt we’ve work to do.’
The Karnaphuli river, at the point where they were to pick up the Bandarban road, was not quite as Hervey had imagined. In one respect it was familiar enough: tall rain trees interlocked their canopies so that the sun could not penetrate in any strength, just as in his memory of the Chintal forest. They were indeed at the edge of the great jungled wilderness that stretched as far as Ava itself, and this much his maps told him; but the Arakanese had described the place as a ford — or that, at least, had been the translation through Bengali. If it was a ford, it was a deep one. Hervey sat contemplating the river for some time. Had he come to the wrong place? The native Arakanese guides seemed sure enough, and after all they had merely had to follow the river upstream to where the only road crossed it. This here was undoubtedly a road of some importance, for there on the far bank was a little ferry — whose ferryman would, in any case, be able to confirm it was the place. Then it tumbled to him: a ford it might be, but for whom? The elephants and their mahouts now wading into the middle from the far side were his probable answer. Their day’s work done, it was the hour for a cooling soak, and here, it seemed, was the timehonoured place where they came. To a mahout it was indeed a ford.
Some of the troop-horses became unsettled at the sight and smell of the half-dozen elephants, although they were hardly a novelty. Some of the dragoons likewise showed their unease as they saw the river reach half-way up the flanks of the great beasts.
Hervey put on a brave face. ‘Well, the current’s pretty slow. Now’s as good a time as any to try it.’ It was probably true. Swimming was the last drill they had to practise, and although they would first have tried it without saddles, they were not nearly so encumbered as they might have been. And the little rope ferry would take the galloper guns and the farrier’s packhorses.
‘I’ll get them to start waterproofing then, sir,’ said Armstrong. ‘D’you think we can get them elephants to stand sentinel downstream in case we have a few fallers?’
‘I think we may. We’ll take a rope across, too.’
It took a full half-hour to make waterproof the firelocks and cartridges, binding carbines and pistols with
