Hervey? You’re not inclined to see any mischief?’
Hervey grimaced to himself. ‘No, I’m not inclined to, not yet. There are any number of reasons why they mightn’t have shown — the haste with which we mounted things, to begin with.’
‘These folk work to a different clock from us, Mr Seton Canning, sir,’ added Armstrong. ‘It were just the same in Spain. There you’d wait days for some bandit to leave off what he was doing.’
‘And in any case, I don’t see any alternative.’
Hervey’s voice had an edge to it again. Seton Canning made no reply.
Just after midday, with close on four hours of marching behind them, the troop halted for the second rest. The going had become harder than the day before, the ground now climbing towards the tribal tracts, but the way was wide enough still to permit two horses to go abreast. This was important for it allowed the NCOs to patrol the column, although, as yesterday, they found remarkably little dereliction or inactivity to reprove.
The troop had taken longer than prescribed at the first halt since they had ridden for longer, the way being too steep to pull up for some miles; and it had been the same with the second halt, for Hervey had wanted to draw closer to the river. By his calculations they were now within three hours of the border. The Chittagong guides seemed sure of it too, although they conceded that their knowledge of these parts was sparse. There was still no sign of the Chakma, however, and Hervey knew that soon the guides would be wholly beyond their reach. Not that they had shown the least hesitation so far. Quite the opposite, indeed: one of them, an Arakani boatman whom Somervile had said knew the rivers well, seemed positively fired with the notion of the coming blow at his people’s oppressor. He told Hervey, in broken Urdu, that he knew the country well enough to take them to the boats, and Hervey could but admire the man’s determination to be at them; and, he reasoned, he was not himself entirely without resource in navigation. The way they had come had been the way of the Karnaphuli, and that was the essential detail, even if for much of the time the river had been out of sight.
Hervey leaned back against a tree, where Johnson had placed a blanket for him to sit, and peered again at his map. That morning he had checked constantly by his travelling compass, and he was as confident as any might be of their position and course. He decided to press on as soon as the rest was up. But he judged it time to make packhorses of the troopers pulling the galloper guns, for if the way deteriorated much more, wheels would be an encumbrance. Also, he did not want to be disassembling guns in a place not of his own choosing. He sent word for the daffadar to make ready as soon as he could.
In a quarter of an hour he got up and walked to the back of the column. There he was surprised to find wheels and trunnions, barrels and trails already stripped down and distributed between the two gun-horses and the four spares. He hoped they would be as quick, if not quicker, reassembling them when the time came: a ball and a bag of grape would be a powerful blow to the enemy, not for its material effect so much as for the shock of cannon fire in so wholly unexpected a place.
The afternoon was the hardest. For the most part the dragoons had to lead, not only to spare the horses but because the way was ever more overgrown. Saj trees crowded the way, their grey bark like crocodile skin and bhorla creepers coiling like snakes about their trunks. Soon the horses were being led single-file. So heavy were the vines and creepers that here and there a branch, and sometimes a whole tree, had collapsed across the way, and the farriers’ axes would be called up. And while the axes swung, the dragoons stood, the respite welcome. They had shed their coats at the second halt, on command, but the sweat ran freely still. Some swore there was less air to breathe, others feared that trees might fall behind them like coffin lids. Some thought secretly of flight; but what chance might they have in this green prison, and with NCOs like Armstrong and Collins — ay, and McCarthy — after them? Only a very few of them could take pleasure in what the jungle offered their eyes: orchids, little dabs of colour in the gloom, or the strange shapes of the dhak trees, dark crooked skeletons which in two or three months’ time would burst into flower, orange and red, the ‘flame of the forest’. Jobie Wainwright could. Jobie saw pleasing things in the most wretched of places. It was why the Common had not made a felon of him as it had many another. For the rest, there were not half a dozen who might share Jobie’s pleasure in the forest. They might be sons of the crowding streets of a great city, but cities weren’t forests: they were not haunted by all manner of beasts that might kill in an instant, whose strike was sudden and unseen. And at night, even in the drearest, foggiest rookery, there were not ghostly creatures that slid or shuffled as here about the forest floor, that darted between the trees, or crept about their branches.
Hervey could see their unease all too well as he walked back along the column when they were halted to clear a third tree. But at the rear was Armstrong, looking for all the world as if he were merely at stables, at Hounslow even. Armstrong was neither fearful of nor partial to the forest. He was entirely unmoved by it: the forest was there, and he was in it; that was that. ‘This is chatty country all right,’ he opined as Hervey pushed past the last dragoon. ‘And getting chattier by the looks of it.’
Hervey took off his shako, wiped his brow with his sleeve, and raised his eyebrows. ‘The guides say it will get no worse — well, not
‘Do they know what they’re about?’
‘Well, they’re putting on a good show if they don’t. They say we should reach the river again before six’ (it was now a little after three), ‘and that’s the border, and then we can ride its length for about a mile and that will place us to advantage above where the boats are.’
‘Where do you want to make camp for the night then?’
‘Just short of the river. We can water and then retire a furlong or so to bivouac.’
‘You’ll be wanting to push out scouts, then.’
‘I think I’d better. Is all well with you?’
‘Ay, sir. Them packers have been struggling a bit of late, but they’re sticking with it.’
‘The gun-horses or the quartermaster’s?’
‘Both. But them Skinner’s men are good.’
Hervey nodded. A cheering report was ever welcome. The struggle past the column was worth it for that alone. He replaced his shako and made to turn. ‘Well, the river will be a fine thing again. The canteens are getting empty.’
It was fortunate that the third saj had lain where it had, for within half an hour the scouts signalled alarm. Corporal Ashbolt, first scout, hurried back to report, finding Hervey now at the front of the column, just behind the pointmen.
‘T’river’s ahead, sir, three hundred yards. But there are voices.’
‘What sort of voices?’ asked Hervey, his unease at once apparent to the guides beside him.
‘Difficult to tell, sir,’ replied Ashbolt. ‘High-pitched, like women, but they might not be. Corporal McCarthy reckons there are three different ones at least.’
Hervey was even more dismayed. Women meant a village. The guides had said they would encounter no settlement. He decided he would tell them nothing for the moment. ‘Mr Seton Canning and the serjeant-major, please,’ he said to his trumpeter. ‘And Serjeant Collins.’
It took a full five minutes to assemble them.
‘The scouts have come on the river and heard voices which might be female,’ said Hervey, as matter-of-fact as he could. ‘I want to take a look for myself, with you, Serjeant Collins.’
Collins nodded.
‘Mr Seton Canning to have the troop stand to, if you please.’
His lieutenant nodded likewise.
‘How are the packhorses, Serjeant-Major?’
‘They’re managing all right, sir.’
‘Good. Well, let’s make a start. Storrs will come as relay. And, Sar’nt-Major, I want a close eye on the guides.’
‘Ay, sir. Mine it’ll be an’ all.’
Hervey took his carbine from the saddle bucket. A sudden thought of the repeater falling from Henrietta’s hands made him hesitate, the first thought of her in days. He recovered himself quickly by shaking his head at Private Johnson. Johnson didn’t need to ask aloud if he could come. He always wanted to, and the answer was always ‘no’. Stent did not even look; his duty it was to go with him.
They had gone not more than a few dozen yards when a noisy flock of lorikeets took off from a tree to their left, a whistling whirl of red and blue and bright green. Hervey swung round, carbine raised, to face whatever would be the manifestation of the enemy. Just as suddenly, all was stillness again. They waited a while, Hervey now more
