positioning the stool near the stirrup for me. I looked from dead pig to complacent horse to clean spear and back again, then pushed my spectacles up onto my nose and climbed into the saddle.
My first-timer’s luck did not give me a second pig that morning, although by morning’s end I had to admit that it was indeed a sport rather than a means of disposing of pests, with its own demands, skill, and even artistry. Rather like a high-speed variety of bull-fighting, with the horse and rider themselves taking the place of the cape.
With the sun directly overhead, the riders began to gather, handing the servants their spears and talking with varying degrees of excitement. Captain Greaves, his polo-playing cousin, and our host were old hands with the spear, and had taken five pigs between them, but only one of the others, the partner of Thomas Goodheart, had landed a blow. In his case the pig had run off with the spear trailing behind him; the beaters were tracking the wounded animal through the scrub.
The morning’s exercise had put paid to the evening’s excesses—I was famished, and hoped that our gathering together marked an impending meal. And so it proved. We rode a mile back to the lakeside that we had passed earlier, to find that in the hours since we had last seen the grassy field that stretched down to the water, a transformation had occurred. Half a hundred guests, attended by an equal number of servants, lounged about on cushions and brocaded divans that had been arranged around a silken tent the size of a minor dormitory, from whose open sides came tantalising odours and a glimpse of linen-draped tables. The two cheetahs, still wearing their ruby collars, crouched with their attendants; golden cages filled with songbirds had been hung from the trees. More usefully, a cart carrying a tank of warm water and scented soap had been set up at the back of the tent, along with mirror, face flannels, and all the comforts of a bath short of the actual tub. I scrubbed my hands, wound my hair back into place, and was claimed instantly by a servant as I stepped out of the enclosure.
Inside the tent, I accepted a glass of champagne and my attendant conjured up a silver tray with flatware and an empty plate, and moved along the tables at my elbow, arranging my choices on the luminous bone china. To my relief, the meal was considerably less oppressive than that of the night before, a buffet composed of English sandwiches, soups hot and cold, and several kinds of curry. My plate and tray filled to excess, I shook my head at the offer of more and walked over to where the Goodhearts sat, their padded stools and divans shaded by the wide branches of a tree and protected from the ground by layers of priceless Oriental carpets. My attendant arranged cushions and fiddled with the silver tray, unfolding a pair of supports that raised it a few inches from the ground. He draped my table napkin over my lap, positioned the table-tray in front of me, and retreated, lingering nearby to fill my glass and fetch additional temptations.
The tank—what I would call a lake—covered several acres, and had been in existence long enough that large trees lined its borders. Reeds stretched out into the water, sheltering a wide variety of birds, from tiny green things no larger than a butterfly to slow-moving storks. A princely barge shaped like a swan lay moored to one side, simply begging to be taken seriously, although it looked like a rich man’s jest.
To be a prince in British India must, I reflected, be an uneasy thing. The knowledge that, but for this foreign power, one would be fully a king had to cause some degree of frustration, some sense that despite the riches and the honours, despite being (as Nesbit had put it) “above British law,” one’s life was essentially composed of empty ritual. A proud man like the maharaja of Khanpur surely had to chafe at his enforced impotence, and a certain resentment against the Crown could be understood. I could also begin to see the importance of a thing like pig sticking: Where war is forbidden, sport becomes the substitute, wherein a man’s conduct determines his worth, and a silver trophy represents a battle won.
It was, I decided as I speared the last delicate asparagus, a small miracle that more of India’s princes did not assuage their boredom and frustration by descending into feudal ruthlessness.
I permitted the servant to clear my plate and take the tray, turning down his offer of more wine, a third ice, a sliver of chocolate . . . , and stretched out my legs into the sun, deliberately putting dark thoughts from my mind. From where I sat I could see elephants on the other side of the water, languidly reaching for leaves. Closer to, half a dozen peahens pecked their way along the base of some shrubs, oblivious to the full display of their ever-hopeful male. After a couple of minutes, they were startled by the cry of a parrot, and the colourful feathers folded away as the flock slipped into the bushes.
The noisy parrot was not a wild creature, but harbinger of our luncheon amusement. I personally would have been happy to sit and watch Nature’s entertainments, but the great enemy, Boredom, was to be given no chance of a toehold in this place. Three young men trotted up with brilliant green parrots on their shoulders, and proceeded to put on a show. The birds rode miniature bicycles across diminutive tight-ropes, loaded and shot Lilliputian cannon, counted out the answers to elementary mathematical problems by dipping their heads, and in conclusion lay flat on their feathered bellies in salute to the maharaja. The parrot-trainers were followed by a troupe of gymnasts and contortionists, children who tied themselves into knots and threw one another into the air. The third act, a voluptuous young woman who played tunes on a sea of water-filled crystal goblets, lacked the ability to sustain interest, and the warm afternoon combined with the wine made us an inattentive audience. She left after a third tune, and a gramophone was brought out and wound. Sunny gave a little sigh of happiness, and her brother stirred and sat up.
“So, Jimmy,” Goodheart called. “Who took the morning’s first blood?”
“Miss Russell did, although she permitted me to finish the beast off.”
A startled silence fell, before Sunny squealed and clapped her hands. “Oh, Mary, how super! Have you ever done this before?”
“We don’t have all that many wild boar in southern England,” I pointed out. “I shouldn’t think the domesticated variety make for quite the same challenge.”
“You ought to introduce them,” Goodheart suggested. “Get into training for a world cup of pig sticking.”
The man had been making a joke, but the maharaja’s voice cut in, an edge to his words that overrode all conversation. “The British do not need to train for sticking pig. They simply arrange the rules to their satisfaction.”
The green field and its tent and rugs froze into an awkward silence, until our host shrugged to indicate that he had only been making a joke, and then rose to consult with the
“Don’t worry about it, Mother,” he reassured her. “Jimmy’s just a little touchy about having lost the Kadir Cup last year, some kind of technicality. Don’t much understand it myself; I s’pose I shouldn’t have said anything.”
After a while, Sunny went down to dabble in the water, and I stretched out on the silken carpet with my legs in the sun and my topee over my face, half listening to the conversations around me. The gramophone played, a few guests danced laughingly on the manicured grass, and I was nearly asleep when I heard my name, said loudly as if not for the first time. I pulled the topee from my face and sat up, looking into the dark unreadable eyes of the maharaja.
“I’m terribly sorry, Your Highness,” I said. “What was that?”
“The beaters have located the wounded pig,” he said. “I don’t like to leave it. Would you care to come?”
I was speechless. Six men at his disposal, two of whom were old hands, and he was asking me, a woman, and dangerously inexperienced at that.
One of the old hands had the same thought. “I’ve finished here, Jimmy,” Captain Greaves interposed. “I’ll go with you.”
“Thank you, Simon, but Miss Russell and I shall have no problem.”
“From what Goodheart said, it’s a big ’un, I’m happy to—”
“No.” It was said in a flat voice, no anger, but it laid another uncomfortable silence over the gathering, which I hastened to break.
“Certainly, I’m glad to be of help. Shall we go now?”
The servants had brought fresh horses with them. The maharaja had another Arab, a white gelding otherwise identical to the stallion, while I was given an ill-tempered little mare whose ears went back when I approached and who tried to shy against the reins the
“Thank you,” I told him, and mounted briskly.
