The Strangler Vine, page 11
‘We are here in search of Xavier Mountstuart.’
Pursloe blenched. Lieutenant Mauwle laughed, a throaty, scornful sound.
‘You’ve come a long way for nothing then,’ he said. ‘You won’t find him here. And all mention of him is forbidden in Jubbulpore.’
The rest of the day was somewhat befogged in my memory. We were shown to an empty bungalow that smelled of dust. It was surrounded by high compound walls closed by a pair of substantial gates. Our hosts seemed keen to rectify our first impressions, for within a few hours the place had servants, food and bedding and the station’s grumpy old medic arrived. He approved my stitches but tut-tuttingly removed the paste of leaves that Blake had packed around them. I took a bath. In the late afternoon a troop of sepoys escorted us to a small overgrown Mahommedan graveyard where Nungoo was to be buried. I reflected that in Calcutta one would very rarely have attended such a ceremony; and that I was glad that I had come. Blake and I stood slightly apart as Mir Aziz and Sameer and a local Mahommedan holy man said verses and cast earth over the body, which was laid in a shallow grave, wrapped in white shrouds. I found I was too tired to think, too tired to speak. At the bungalow we dined off boiled chicken and rice, and then I crawled under layers of mosquito nets to my bed. The night air was thick with swarming insects, and I was glad of the nets.
The last thing I recall noticing was that the bed legs were sitting in cups of water.
At some point the squeaking of rusty hinges and metal clanging against itself penetrated my dreams. After that I slept for nearly two days.
I dreamt of Devon again. The window of my bedroom open. The view of rough fields and hedgerows stretching on. The wood beyond. In the wood the leaf mould, a hound padding at my heels. A soft, wet, overcast day.
When I woke, my clothes had been laundered and folded on a small chest, my books unpacked and propped up in a glass cabinet, and an unfamiliar servant with a pot of fragrant, steaming coffee stood at the end of the bed. My head throbbed, but I was gladder than I could say to find myself among the fruits of civilization. After I had bathed I ventured on to the verandah. The gates to the compound, rusted but tall and imposing, were locked. Blake was sitting very still, whether thinking or praying I could not have said. I would have returned quietly to my room, but he called my name.
‘The gates,’ I said.
‘Yes, they say they need to lock us in each night for our own safety. Mir Aziz and Sameer are taking a few more days of mourning. I’m calling on Major Sleeman this afternoon.’
‘I should like to accompany you,’ I said, rather cool.
To my surprise he said, ‘All right.’ Truth to tell I did not feel entirely well, but I was determined not to be left behind.
I struggled with my clothes, the bandage making everything difficult, and when I presented myself on the verandah at the appointed time, I had only been able to get on one arm of my best uniform jacket.
Blake was clean-shaven, with a high-collared white muslin shirt, a white necktie, a well-cut blue dress-coat, and pressed white nankeen trousers. I had never seen him so finely dressed, and I did not forebear to stare. He guided my arm into my sleeve and fastened my buttons one by one, then brushed me down.
‘And I had thought myself the beau,’ I said. ‘May I comment on your transformation, Mr Blake? Even your voice is different.’
I thought he might take offence, but he said, ‘Got to look the part.’
We were escorted from our lodgings by a large unit of sepoys. Major Sleeman’s residence was the grandest dwelling in Jubbulpore: a two-storey stone mansion in the classical style, with Greek columns holding up an elegant portico and long windows behind them. It was surrounded by a flourishing walled garden, watered by innumerable little irrigation channels. The Major, however, was not yet at home.
We were shown into a large cool study. Finding myself less robust than I had hoped, I let myself into a chair. We sat in silence. The windows were stretched with fine muslin, and the walls lined with glass cases filled to bursting with books and stuffed animals. There was a large three-quarter-length portrait of a man in a blue regimental jacket, and in the middle of the room a long desk, polished wood with inlaid ivory, on which small rocks and minerals were displayed.
After about five minutes there came the unmistakeable sound of English voices, signalling, I assumed, the arrival of our host. We waited and I felt the beginnings of nausea. Then into the room strode a grey-haired man whose features I recognized from the portrait, though he now had considerably less hair.
‘Aha! Our visitors!’ he said heartily. ‘Might I introduce myself? I am Major William Sleeman.’ He was sturdily built, not tall, with a ruddy farmer’s face, small flinty blue eyes and that yellow, worn-out look that told of decades in India. But all of this was trumped by the general amiability of his countenance and his tremendous air of energy and activity. Behind him came Captain Pursloe and a slight, pale, freckled man with a beaky nose.
Major Sleeman thrust out his hand to Blake, and would have grasped mine in its sling had I not removed it swiftly from his range, waving it slightly instead.
‘Ah, yes, yes. Of course!’ the Major said. ‘The attack!’ He shook his head emphatically. ‘May I present my condolences on the loss of your man. We regard the safety of the roads about Jubbulpore as our responsibility. I am deeply sensible that we have failed you.’ He seemed genuinely upset.
‘Uncle – Major Sleeman,’ said Pursloe, ‘may I present Mr Jeremiah Blake and er …’
‘Lieutenant William Avery,’ I said.
‘Of course, attacks close to Jubbulpore are usually very rare,’ said Pursloe.
‘I imagine they were hungry and took their chances,’ said Blake, more mildly than I expected. ‘We were a small party. I’ve been speaking to the headmen on the road – I hear there have been some bad harvests.’
Major Sleeman shook his head. ‘But an ill deed is a choice, Mr Blake. And this is a reminder that I cannot relax my exertions for a moment. Your assailants were Bhils, a troublesome, nomadic race whom we had hoped we had pacified. You are most fortunate, young man. They are known to poison the tips of their knives.’
‘I’d not heard that,’ said Blake.
‘You know the Bhils?’
‘I have encountered them once or twice.’
‘That is, if I may say, most unusual in a Calcutta civilian,’ said Major Sleeman. ‘Lieutenant Avery, I hear you managed to kill two of them. Well done, sir!’
‘It is a great honour to meet the discoverer of the Thugs and the author of Ramaseeana, sir,’ I said, slightly breathlessly. ‘Everyone speaks of your work in Calcutta.’
The small blue eyes fixed upon me. ‘Avery is a West Country name. Do I detect a trace of Devon?’
I nodded. He grinned. ‘Cornishman myself, born and bred. Hope to see it again, one day. Now, we do not stand on ceremony here, the Company population is too small. You have met our captain, James Pursloe, I think? May I also present Mr Edward Hogwood, my deputy magistrate, who shoulders so much of the burden of running Jubbulpore. I would not know what to do without him.’
Hogwood, who had remained so quiet I had almost forgotten him, smiled, nodded and seemed to stand a little taller in the glow of the Major’s approval. He was a worn, amiable-looking man, about the same height as Sleeman and Pursloe, with dark half-circles under his eyes. I felt perspiration begin to trickle down my forehead.
‘Our little triumvirate does most of the work both of running Jubbulpore and the Thugee bureau, along with Lieutenant Mauwle. Of course, now that I have been appointed Commissioner of Thuggee for all India, I do far less of the day-to-day work. But we are still a small, tight-knit community – Pursloe here is my nephew; the doctor is my cousin. My wife has supervised the growing of new strains of sugar cane in the region. Some might accuse me of nepotism, I suppose’ – he grinned broadly again – ‘but we feel our results speak for themselves.’
He gestured for us to sit, though he remained standing. ‘Let us furnish you with some refreshment. Tea or iced sherbert?’ He clapped his hands. ‘Now, welcome, or as the Moghuls have it …’ and he came out with a stream of something of which I could make no sense at all.
To Sleeman’s evident surprise, Blake answered in the same lingo. I cannot even begin to reproduce the sounds he made.
‘So you know Persian, Mr Blake. I own I am surprised. It is not always done to admit a taste for it in Calcutta these days and certainly not such high-flown prose. For myself, I never got on very well with Calcutta. So much time wasted, so much energy dissipated, so many temptations to peculation.’
‘I would not disgree with you,’ said Blake.
Sleeman produced another wave of Persian, and again Blake answered. Pursloe suppressed a yawn.
‘Most impressive!’ said Sleeman. ‘And do you have any other languages?’
‘A few.’ A silence.
‘And they are?’
‘Hindoostanee, Urdu, Bengalee, Marathee, Pashtun, a little Sanskrit – but that was a long time ago.’
‘May I ask where you acquired such fluency?’
‘I had good teachers.’
Sleeman smiled. There was no disguising Blake’s reluctance to speak about himself.
‘James tells me you made Calcutta to Jubbulpore in three weeks. That is a very considerable feat. How did you manage it?’
‘Small party, little baggage, changed our horses every few days,’ said Blake. ‘I have covered considerable distances the same way up in the north. The worst of the monsoon is done, and the heat was quite bearable.’
I thought ruefully of the nights of soaking tents and cold wet ground.
‘How practical!’ said Major Sleeman. ‘More Company men should travel as efficiently. Too wedded to their comforts. So, Mr Blake, may I ask in what capacity you come to see us?’
Evidently Pursloe had not mentioned Mountstuart.
‘I am the Company’s Special Inquiry Agent.’
‘I was not aware the Company had a “Special Inquiry Agent”,’ said Major Sleeman. ‘It has a rather severe and ominous ring about it. May I be candid? Calcutta is a long way away from here and we have become a little wary of its interventions.’
Pursloe cleared his throat and clasped his hands together. He looked, I thought, extremely discomfited. The other man, Hogwood, raised his eyebrows slightly and smiled.
‘Major Sleeman, I’m not here to interfere with your work. I’ve come to investigate the disappearance of Xavier Mountstuart. He was due back in Calcutta four months ago, and it now appears that Jubbulpore was the last place he was seen. Here are my letters of introduction.’ He stood up and extracted an envelope from the pocket of his black coat.
It was as if all the warmth and liveliness slid from Major Sleeman’s face. The blue eyes narrowed, the lips grew thinner. There was a silence. Pursloe, meanwhile, looked at his feet. He said in a low voice, ‘Major Sleeman does not choose to speak of Mr Mountstuart.’
‘Does not choose to speak of him?’ Blake looked broodingly at the Major.
‘I cannot help you, Mr Blake,’ the Major said with chilly deliberateness. ‘I will not have the man mentioned under any circumstances.
‘Surely there must be some mistake?’ I said – I really was not feeling myself. ‘Major Sleeman, you have to help us.’
‘I beg your pardon, Lieutenant, there is no mistake.’ His tone was icy. ‘I must ask you not to pursue the matter. He was here, he left, he did not deign to tell us where he was going. You have made a wasted journey.’
‘Major Sleeman, I do not wish to provoke you,’ said Blake. ‘I am sorry this inquiry is so unwelcome to you, but I have a task to perform.’
‘Mr Blake, you are most welcome in Jubbulpore as long as you steer away from that subject. We pride ourselves on our hospitality and we will do our best to make you comfortable until you are ready to travel. I must ask, however, that you adhere to our rules.’
‘You mean being locked into our compound each night and required not to go into the town on our own.’
‘There is a Thug hanging next week. It makes the station unsettled. What with concerns that a bad harvest may prompt native unrest, we believe it is safer to ensure that visitors are secure.’
‘I thank you for your hospitality, Major Sleeman,’ said Blake abruptly. ‘We will take our leave.’
I stood up dizzily, but my legs were not ready for me and though I attempted to follow Blake to the door, the next moment I found myself lying on the Turkey carpet, not at all certain how I had got there.
‘Lieutenant, you are soaked with perspiration!’ said Major Sleeman. ‘We will arrange a palanquin. Mr Blake, your assistant is clearly not well at all’ – this said accusingly. ‘I will have the doctor visit you at once.’
I tried to protest, but I was steered back to a deep chair from which I thought I might never rise, and cold towels were brought. With a hint of ill temper Pursloe disappeared to arrange a palanquin. We waited; the sandy-coloured man, Hogwood, hovered. The Major sat at his desk, and Blake examined the bookcases apparently unconcerned by the increasing awkwardness of the silence.
Blake began to talk about some essays the Major had written about orchards and fruit trees. The Major seemed very taken aback that he’d seen them. Then Blake said, ‘But Lieutenant Avery is the keen student of plants and trees.’ And I thought dizzily, Am I?
‘In that case, Mr Avery, perhaps I might show you around my garden before you leave Jubbulpore?’
I nodded obediently, and mopped myself with the towels. Silence returned.
Blake wandered over to the table on which various rocks were arranged. He began to talk about the rocks, identifying each one. ‘And these are ammonites, if I am not mistaken. I have only ever seen them in books. I had no idea that fossils had been found in Hind.’
The Major seemed both surprised and pleased. ‘I believe I am the first man to have identified fossils in India,’ he said. He said he’d found other similar things a few miles outside Jubbulpore, including the bones of an enormous beast, like the skeletons of the giant reptiles they had discovered in England. Dinosauria, he said they were called. I wondered slightly if I was hallucinating.
‘See, Avery,’ said Blake. He opened his palm to reveal a shiny black stone on which was etched what looked like the carved relief of a very large snail. ‘This is the petrified remains of an ancient sea creature, but we’re thousands of miles from the sea.’
I shook my head. But I remembered seeing such things in childhood on the beach in Devon. We’d called them snake stones and devil’s fingers.
‘Mr Blake,’ the Major was saying, ‘may I ask how you come about your own knowledge? I do not know above five men in the country who take an interest in such things.’
‘I came across a copy of Lyell’s Principles of Geology in Calcutta.’
‘Indeed.’ The Major laughed. It was a pleasant sound. ‘Where do you stand on …’ and he said some word like ‘uniformitarianism’. Blake had some answer, but I could not hold my attention upon it. Then the large double doors opened and a small, dark-haired white woman swept into the room, accompanied by a native woman holding a wriggling child, two more servants and, trailing behind, a sulky-looking Pursloe.
‘Amelie!’ said Sleeman. ‘This is my wife, gentleman, and my daughter Louise.’
‘Eh bien, enchantée, Messieurs,’ said Mrs Sleeman. I had the impression of grace and exceptional neatness, and a brisk deliberateness similar to the Major’s.
‘My wife is French,’ the Major said with evident pride. ‘And very clever. She is, among many things, an expert on strains of sugar cane.’
‘William!’ she said, in a tone between exasperation and pleasure. ‘Is this the sick gentleman from Calcutta?’ she said, fixing upon me. ‘The palanquin is prepared. Please let us know if there is anything we may do for you. My dear, I hope you have invited the gentlemen for next week. I am holding a dinner for our regional officers and planters; I do hope William has mentioned it.’
‘Ah, yes, of course, we would very much like you to attend,’ said Major Sleeman, as if the earlier awkwardness was all forgotten.
‘We should be delighted to come,’ said Blake.
Mr Hogwood came forward. ‘Let me help escort the Lieutenant to the litter.’
I said that I could make my own way, but Blake insisted I leant on his arm. I could read nothing in his face.
The doctor unwound my bandages. The wound was swollen, red and seeping. He placed a hand on my forehead.
‘Little to be done,’ he said. ‘Brandy at regular intervals to take down the fever.’ He poured me a small glass. ‘I have a powder somewhere about me. I see you take an interest in native remedies, Mr Blake.’ Blake nodded. ‘I do not,’ the doctor said crisply.
‘Care for a glass yourself?’ said Blake.
‘Oh, no,’ the doctor said. ‘I imbibe only sparingly. We all do in Jubbulpore. Major Sleeman demands the highest standards.’
‘You’re his cousin, I think?’
‘I am,’ he said, mildly suspicious. ‘And Captain Pursloe is his nephew. We are devoted to him, and the cantonment works much the better for it, I should say.’
‘Can you tell me anything about Xavier Mountstuart?’
The doctor looked down. ‘Ah. Yes. Well, as you know Major Sleeman simply will not have the man mentioned.’
‘But you must have met him,’ Blake said, coaxingly. ‘Can you not tell me what you remember? Even in the privacy of the sickroom?’
He shook his head and frowned. ‘I have nothing to say.’
Blake touched his arm lightly. The doctor’s features softened a little.
‘Didn’t like him. Very slighting of my work. I have had a number of well-received articles published in serious journals on the subject of Phrenology and the Thugs.’ The doctor’s mouth tightened into a disapproving moue.
‘Phrenology?’ I said.
‘It is the scientific method by which one may deduce the character of an individual – or potentially a whole race – by means of mapping the lumps on their skull. My conclusions have been received with great interest. We had the skulls of various captured Thugs measured and then sent the dimensions to Edinburgh, where they were analysed by the experts. The results were fascinating. Firstly, they showed that the Thugs’ skulls and therefore brains are smaller than ours, and secondly, the shape of their heads revealed that they are not naturally predisposed to evil, but they are, like children, easily swayed and yield to cruelty. They require guidance.’
