Flashman Papers 3-Book Collection 2: Flashman and the Mountain of Light, Flash For Freedom!, Flashman and the Redskins. George Fraser MacDonald
run away – in which case we might just have the gorracharra under the command of someone who knows what the hell he’s doing.”
The more I thought of it, the madder the whole thing sounded – but the maddest part of it was still to be revealed. We’d made our noon halt, and Gardner was turning back to Lahore, but first he rode a little way apart with me to make sure I had it all straight. We were on a little knoll about a furlong from the road, along which a battalion of Sikh infantry was marching, tall stalwarts all in olive green, with their colonel riding ahead, colours flying, drums beating, bugles sounding a rousing air. Gardner may have said something to prompt my question, but I don’t recall; at any rate, I asked him:
“See here … I know the Khalsa’s been spoiling for this – but if they know their own maharani has been conspiring with the enemy, and suspect their own commanders … well, even the rank and file must have a shrewd idea their rulers want to see ’em beat. So … why are they allowing themselves to be sent to war at all?”
He pondered this, and gave one of his rare wintry smiles. “They reckon they can whip John Company. Whoever may be crossing or betraying ’em, don’t matter – they think they can be champions of England. In which case, they’ll be the masters of Hindoostan, with an empire to plunder. Maybe Mai Jeendan has that possibility in mind, too, and figures she’ll win, either way. Oh, she could charm away the suspicions of treason; most of ’em still worship her. Another reason they have for marching is that they believe you British will invade them sooner or later, so they might as well strike first.”
He paused for a moment, frowning, and then said: “But that’s not the half of it. They’re going to war because they’ve taken their oaths to Dalip Singh Maharaja, and he’s sent them out in his name – never mind who put the words in his mouth. So even if they knew they were doomed beyond a doubt … they’d go to the sacrifice.” He turned to look at me. “You don’t know the Sikhs, sir. I do. They’ll fight their way to hell and back … for that little boy. And for their salt.”
He sat gazing across the plain, where the marching battalion was disappearing into the heat haze, the sun twinkling on the bayonets, the sound of the bugles dying away. He shaded his eyes, and it was as though he was talking to himself.
“And when the Khalsa’s beat, and Jeendan and her noble crew are firm in the saddle again, and the Punjab’s quiet under Britannia’s benevolent eye, and little Dalip’s getting his hide tanned at Eton College … why then” – he gestured towards the road – “then, sir, John Company will find he has a hundred thousand of the best recruits on earth, ready to fight for the White Queen. Because that’s their trade. And it’ll all have turned out best for everybody, I guess. Lot of good men will have died first, though. Sikh. Indian. British.” He glanced at me, and nodded. “That’s why Hardinge has held off all this time. He’s probably the only man in India who thinks the price is too high. Now it’s going to be paid.”
He was a strange bird this – all bark and fury most of the time, then quiet and philosophical, which sorted most oddly with his Ghazi figurehead. He chucked the reins and wheeled his pony. “Good luck, soldier. Give my salaams to old Georgie Broadfoot.”
a Must is the madness of the rogue elephant. Doolali=insane, from Deolali Camp, inland from Bombay, where generations of British soldiers (including the editor) were received in India, and supposedly were affected by sunstroke.
b The name given to the tracts between the rivers of the Punjab.
I’ve never cared, much, for service with foreign forces. At best it’s unfamiliar and uncomfortable, and the rations are liable to play havoc with your innards. The American Confederates weren’t bad, I suppose, bar their habit of spitting on carpets, and the worst I can say of the Yankees is that they took soldiering seriously and seemed to be under the impression that they had invented it. But the Malagassy army, of which I was Sergeant-General, was simply disgusting; the Apaches stink and know dam’ all about camp discipline; no one in the Foreign Legion speaks decent French, the boots don’t fit, and the bayonet scabbard is a clanking piece of scrap. All round, the only aliens in whose military employ I could ever be called happy were the Sky-Blue Wolves of Khokand – and that was only because I was full of hashish administered by their general’s mistress after I’d rogered her in his absence. As for the Khalsa, the one good thing about my service in its ranks (or perhaps I should say on its general staff) was that it was short and to the point.
I count it from the moment we set out south, the six of us in column of twos, gorracharra to the life in our oddments of mail and plate and eccentric weapons; Gardner had furnished me with two pistols and a sabre, and while I’d have swapped the lot for my old pepperbox, I consoled myself that with luck I’d never need to use them.
I was in two minds as we cantered down towards Loolianee. On the one hand, I was relieved to elation at leaving the horrors of Lahore behind me; when I thought of that hellish gridiron, and Chaund Cour’s bath, and the ghastly fate of Jawaheer, even the knowledge that I was venturing into the heart of the Khalsa didn’t seem so fearful. A glance at the scowling unshaven thug reflected in Gardner’s pocket mirror had told me that I needn’t fear detection; I might have come straight from Peshawar Valley and no questions asked. And Lal Singh, being up to his arse in treason, would be sure to speed me on my way in quick time; in two days at most I’d be with my own people again – with fresh laurels, too, as the Man Who Brought the News that Saved the Army. If it did save it, that is.
That was t’other side of the coin, and as we rode into the thick of the invading army, all my old fears came flooding back. We kept clear of the road, which was choked with transport trains, but even on the doab we found ourselves riding through regiment after regiment marching in open order across the great sunbaked plain. Twice, as you know, I’d seen the Khalsa mustered, but it seemed that the half hadn’t been shown unto me: now they covered the land to the horizon, men, wagons, horses, camels, and elephants, churning up the red dust into a great haze that hung overhead in the windless air, making noontide like dusk and filling the eyes and nostrils and lungs. When we came to Kussoor late in the afternoon, it was one great park of artillery, line upon line of massive guns, 32 and 48 pounders – and I thought of our pathetic 12 and 16 pounders and horse artillery, and wondered how much use Lal’s betrayal would be. Well, whatever befell, I’d just have to play my game leg for all it was worth, and keep well clear of the action.
There’s great debate, by the way, about how large the Khalsa was, and how long it took to cross the Sutlej, but the fact is that even the Sikhs don’t know. I reckoned about a hundred thousand were on the move from Lahore to the river, and I know now that they’d been crossing in strength for days and already had fifty thousand on the south bank, while Gough and Hardinge were trying to scramble their dispersed thirty thousand together. But muster rolls don’t win wars. Concentration does – not only getting there fustest with the mostest, as the chap said, but bringing ’em to bear in the right place. That’s the secret – and if you run into Lars Porsena he’ll be the first to tell you.29
At the time, I only knew what I could see – camp fires all about us in a vast twinkling sea as we came down by night to the Ferozepore ghat. Even in the small hours they were swarming over the ferry in an endless tide; great burning bales had been set on high poles on either bank, glaring red on the three hundred yards of oily water, and men and guns and beasts and wagons were being poled across on anything that could float – barges and rafts and even rowing boats. There were whole regiments waiting in the dark to take their turn, and the ghat itself was Bedlam, but Ganpat thrust ahead, bawling that we were durbar couriers, and we were given passage in a fisher craft carrying a general and his staff. They ignored us poor gorracharra, and presently we came to the noisy confusion of the southern bank, and made our way by inquiry to the Wazir’s headquarters.
Ferozepore