Part 6 (1/2)

”Yes, of course.” She nodded absently. She had studied military strategy since she was twelve. All that time she had likened war to a game of chess General Sale turned to her. ”And now, young lady,” he trumpeted, ”may I ask if you have seen our cantonment?”

”No, Sir Robert, I have not,” she replied flatly.

”Since you have such a keen interest in military matters, if you will present yourself at the gate at three o'clock sharp tomorrow afternoon, one of my subalterns will bring you inside and show you about. And bring your uncle. I like him.”

”Thank you,” was all she could manage.

Now, Mariana,” her uncle told her as they rode under the archway of the cantonment's main gate, ”as we shall not be invited again to see the workings of the cantonment, I encourage you to examine it thoroughly. It is is rather impressive, is it not?” He flushed happily beneath his top hat as he surveyed the huge, enclosed military compound. rather impressive, is it not?” He flushed happily beneath his top hat as he surveyed the huge, enclosed military compound.

Mariana smiled carefully, not wis.h.i.+ng to disturb his expansive mood. Several times recently, she had caught her uncle staring into s.p.a.ce, his face creased with worry. He never told her what information he had gained from his informants about the true state of Afghanistan, or whether Sir William Macnaghten had paid attention to his warnings. But whatever her uncle's concerns were on that score, she could see that he had every confidence in the safety of the cantonment.

This was no time to tell him how puzzling and unwise she found the location of the cantonment and Residence compounds, both overlooked by nearby hills and surrounded on every side by occupied forts.

Why on earth had Sir William Macnaghten so airily dismissed General Elphinstone's plan to buy and destroy those buildings?

Furthermore, the ground on which the cantonment and Residence stood seemed to have been chosen for its beauty rather than its utility, for it was wet orchard land, full of trees and covered like a checkerboard with deep irrigation ditches.

How did they expect to move heavy guns about on this sort of terrain?

She would also not mention that the very length of the cantonment's outer walls, enclosing an area nearly a thousand by six hundred yards, would make it extremely difficult to defend in the event of trouble.

She looked about her. To her left, past a small artillery park with thirteen guns of various sizes, an orchard had inexplicably been left standing, rendering the high rampart between the northern end of the cantonment and the Residence compound nearly invisible through the trees. To her right, neat rows of mud brick barracks and officers' quarters occupied a large area. Behind them she glimpsed the walled compounds of the generals. Straight ahead of her on a large parade ground, groups of red-coated infantrymen wheeled to shouted orders. In the shade of the barracks, other soldiers sat in groups, cleaning weapons and polis.h.i.+ng bra.s.s.

Pack mules filed past, their harnesses jingling, led by grooms in loose, native clothes. A troop of mustachioed cavalrymen trotted toward the parade ground on tall, handsome chargers. Camels strode through a side gate, carrying heavy sacks of foodstuffs.

”I shall ask our guide,” her uncle continued, in a businesslike tone, ”to show you the full view from each corner bastion, and to give the measurements of the surrounding rampart wall and its parapets. You have already pa.s.sed the commissariat fort between here and the city many times, of course, and you know that the fresh water supply comes from the irrigation ca.n.a.l outside our eastern wall.”

He looked about him. ”I am certain we shall be allowed to watch the infantry drilling while we are here, but I doubt we shall see an artillery practice today, since no one seems to be anywhere near the guns. Even so,” he added happily, ”that should be enough to satisfy you and the Would-Be-General.”

Lost in thought, Mariana nodded again.

She did not have to climb the cantonment's corner bastions to know the location of the several small forts that Macnaghten had taken so lightly at dinner. All were within a few hundred yards of the outer walls, one of them almost between the cantonment itself and the commissariat fort where all the food supplies had been stored.

”Here comes our guide.” Her uncle gestured toward the curly-haired youth who hurried toward them. ”It is a pity Fitzgerald has left us for Kandahar. A horse gunner would do a better job of explaining our artillery than this poor little infantryman.”

Mariana sniffed to herself. Thirteen guns scarcely qualified as ”our artillery.”

She returned the young officer's bow. She must stop worrying and pay attention. After all, Papa would like nothing better than a detailed account of the cantonment.

But as the young man began to speak, she did not hear what he was saying, for the vision she had seen all those weeks before at Butkhak returned without warning. It filled her mind's eye with mourning figures, and her heart with dread. She blinked, begging it to leave her, but it remained-the same black-clad funeral procession her muns.h.i.+ had refused to explain, marching somberly past her and across the empty parade ground, to the beat of invisible drums.

Her uncle silenced their guide with an upraised hand. ”Is something wrong, my dear?” he asked her.

”Nothing, Uncle Adrian.” She pressed a damp hand to her forehead. ”Nothing at all.”

He nudged his horse closer, his face full of concern, then signaled to their guide.

”Forgive us, Lieutenant Mathieson,” he said. ”Miss Givens is not at all well. We must return to the Residence compound at once.”

”No, Uncle Adrian,” she objected. ”I-”

”Nonsense,” he interrupted firmly. ”You have gone quite white.”

As he led her slowly home, Mariana noticed her muns.h.i.+ walking in the lane, on the arm of their strange young visitor.

What did Muns.h.i.+ Sahib know? she wondered. And why had he given her that hollow look, his hand tightening on the Afghan boy's shoulder?

”I DO not like the boy,” Dittoo said firmly, as the English lady and her uncle rode toward the bungalow.

He spoke with the conviction of a man experienced with foreigners. ”Bibi,” he declared, ”knows nothing of these people. Without knowing it, she has let a thieving little dancing boy into this house. And I can tell you something else. Now that he is here, he will be difficult to get rid of.”

Having said his piece, he hawked and spat into the dust beneath the tree where he squatted with his two companions. Birds chattered above his head. A goat bleated in a neighbor's garden.

Ghulam Ali grimaced. ”I would have told her not to take him in,” he pointed out, ”but she sent me inside to fetch Muns.h.i.+ Sahib.”

”You should have said something, Yar Mohammad,” Dittoo added accusingly. ”You had the opportunity, but you stood there and said nothing.”

”It was for Muns.h.i.+ Sahib to decide if the boy should stay.” The tall groom got to his feet, and turned far-seeing eyes upon the other two men. ”It was not for us to offer our opinions,” he added, as he started away to take the lady's horse.

Dittoo clucked to himself as he hunched his way to Mariam Bibi's bedroom with a reviving cup of tea. Her muns.h.i.+ was a clever old gentleman, there was no doubt of that. But he was old, and old men made mistakes.

This was certainly a serious error. How would they manage, with a boy of ill repute in the house?

Nothing would upset Dittoo more than to see his unusual English lady hurt.

He had served her through many adventures over the past three years, but the first of these, her miraculous rescue of Saboor, had been the greatest.

He sighed, missing the child.

He would never forget the moment on a winter night in Lah.o.r.e, when he entered her tent and found her sitting on her bed, a badly treated native baby in her arms.

In his twenty-five years of serving the British, Dittoo had never seen a European woman weep over one of his own people.

When it dawned on him that the child was Saboor, Maharajah Ranjit Singh's heavily guarded child hostage, whom the Maharajah believed had magical powers, his embarra.s.sment at the lady's previous, unpredictable behavior had turned to admiration.

From that moment he had been convinced that she was a powerful sorceress, a modest one, to be sure, since she very rarely used her abilities, but a sorceress nonetheless.

He sniffed as he scuffed his shoes off outside her door. As for Yar Mohammad and his calm magnanimity, he would feel the boy's presence more than anyone. For all that he was a groom by trade, Yar Mohammad had loved and served Muns.h.i.+ Sahib faithfully for two years, bringing his tea, was.h.i.+ng his clothes, and seeing to his food.

He, of all people, must have noticed how the boy had clung to Muns.h.i.+ Sahib from the moment he entered the gate.

Dittoo would have been willing to bet that Yar Mohammad had just lost his position.

September 20, 1841 All summer in Kabul had been a delight. The days had been pleasantly hot, the evenings balmy, and the air so clear that one could almost read by the light of the moon. The cantonment had reveled in the city's apricots, its cherries, its great, purple mulberries and milky nuts.

Now that summer was ending, the days were cooler, and the markets were beginning to fill with fresh grapes and melons.