A Call To Arms (40 page)

‘No, sir.’

Wainwright evidently considered the reply incomplete. ‘He’s got the cramps, though, sir. His joints are aching bad.’

The surgeon had by now come up. He too squatted by Parkin’s side, and laid the back of his hand on the dragoon’s forehead. ‘A fever all right. And a sight worse than at muster. Do you have any head pain?’

Parkin hesitated. ‘A headache, sir, yes.’

‘And his joints are aching, sir,’ added Wainwright.

‘Is that right, Parkin?’

‘I’ll be all right, sir. Just need a bit of a rest.’

The surgeon stood up, then Hervey. ‘What is it?’

‘I don’t know, Hervey. It could be any number of things.’ His tone was not optimistic.

‘What’s the worst it might be?’

‘He has the symptoms of breakbone fever, though I must say I have never witnessed the condition myself.’

Hervey looked blank.

‘Well, it won’t kill him, but the aches will become so bad that he’ll not be able to stay in the saddle.’

‘I don’t want to be fell out, sir,’ insisted Parkin, albeit limply.

‘No, Parkin, I’m sure you don’t. It does you credit. But I can’t risk it.’

‘Let me just go on to the camp tonight, sir. I’ll sweat it out then, and likely be better in the morning.’

Hervey glanced at Wainwright.

‘I can see to him, sir,’ said Wainwright, reluctant but resigned: he knew Parkin would never want to go back to Warminster Common without the same tale of action to tell. And after all, the surgeon
had
said it would not be fatal even if it were the worst.

‘Very well then,’ said Hervey briskly. ‘But I shan’t risk taking you beyond the night’s camp if there’s no amendment.’ It was not a difficult decision; after all, he would still have to send another man back with him whether it were now or then.

Armstrong was not convinced of the logic when Hervey told him, however. ‘You’ve been in these parts a sight more than me, sir, but yon Parkin’s going to get a whole lot worse before he gets better. It’d be kindness to send him home now, with less of a distance to do.’

Hervey knew that Armstrong was right, in one sense at least, but
he was disappointed nevertheless to hear it. How things had changed – Armstrong, the hardest of men, now speaking of
kindness
. How had it come about? Moreover, how far would it go? ‘These are green men, Sar’nt-Major. I’m not going to discourage an instinct for the fight.’

They were sufficiently out of earshot for Armstrong to voice his opinion further. ‘Aw, come on, sir! Parkin’s a babby still. He’s no more idea of a fight than a brawl on a Saturday. We can’t afford to carry anybody as can’t look after themselves. Send him back with one of the syces.’

Hervey was angered. ‘That’s a judgement I’ve got to make. This side of the river there’s hardly a risk.’

Armstrong looked equally black. ‘Of
course
it’s a judgement you’ve got to make, sir! But what good am I supposed to be if I don’t give
my
opinion?’

Hervey did not reply at once. ‘And you’d trust one of the syces?’

‘I would while Parkin’s still able to do for himself. We can’t afford to send one of ours with him.’

Hervey could not make things out; Armstrong, if he were indeed going soft, was as determined as ever. ‘Well, I’ve told him he can stay with us now. If I have to leave him at the river then it will have to be with a syce. I think there’ll be a dak bungalow there anyway.’

Private Johnson led up Hervey’s Marwari. ‘Parkin looks proper poorly to me, Cap’n ’Ervey. Is tha gooin’ to send ’im back?’

Armstrong answered. ‘Johnson, you’ll look a sight poorlier than Parkin if you don’t keep that potato-trap of yours shut. And who said to unbutton that coat?’

Johnson knew he was vulnerable on both counts, and did not even glance at Hervey for support. He braced up instead, and turned away.

Armstrong smiled a little. ‘You know, when I kept that place at Datchet I was of a mind to take him on if ever, as they say, you’d dispensed with his services.’

Hervey relaxed, and smiled too. ‘That might come as a great shock to him.’

‘Oh, I’m not so sure, sir. It’s water off a duck’s back to our Johnson. He knows his worth, that’s one thing.’

Hervey shook his head. ‘And that’s the problem with half the
poor beggars who showed for the shilling. They thought so little of themselves.’

Armstrong took out his pipe. There was no time to light it, but he could prick at the bowl in the familiar way. ‘It’s a queer place this. Most of these ’Indoos as does for us sleeps on the floor, and yet I don’t see ’em cringe for all of that. And as for them Skinner’s men, you’d think they were maharajahs the way they carry themselves.’

‘And what conclusions do you draw from these observations, Sar’nt-Major?’

Armstrong paused. ‘Let’s just say that when this lot is shot over the first time, we’ll have our work cut out.’

Hervey hoped profoundly he was wrong. ‘We can thank God at least that by all accounts the Burmans are not famous fighters.’

Armstrong tapped out his pipe on his boot. ‘Ay, well we’ve heard that afore.’

Hervey knew it, but it was time they began resaddling, and he stood up. ‘A couple of leagues at most, and then we’ll see what their spirit is when I tell them our orders.’

Armstrong rose too. ‘Ay. Crossing yon river’ll leave ’em in no doubt we’ve work to do.’

The Karnaphuli river, at the point where they were to pick up the Bandarban road, was not quite as Hervey had imagined. In one respect it was familiar enough: tall rain trees interlocked their canopies so that the sun could not penetrate in any strength, just as in his memory of the Chintal forest. They were indeed at the edge of the great jungled wilderness that stretched as far as Ava itself, and this much his maps told him; but the Arakanese had described the place as a ford – or that, at least, had been the translation through Bengali. If it was a ford, it was a deep one. Hervey sat contemplating the river for some time. Had he come to the wrong place? The native Arakanese guides seemed sure enough, and after all they had merely had to follow the river upstream to where the only road crossed it. This here was undoubtedly a road of some importance, for there on the far bank was a little ferry – whose ferryman would, in any case, be able to confirm it was the place. Then it tumbled to him: a ford it might be, but for whom? The elephants and their mahouts now wading into the middle from
the far side were his probable answer. Their day’s work done, it was the hour for a cooling soak, and here, it seemed, was the timehonoured place where they came. To a mahout it was indeed a ford.

Some of the troop-horses became unsettled at the sight and smell of the half-dozen elephants, although they were hardly a novelty. Some of the dragoons likewise showed their unease as they saw the river reach half-way up the flanks of the great beasts.

Hervey put on a brave face. ‘Well, the current’s pretty slow. Now’s as good a time as any to try it.’ It was probably true. Swimming was the last drill they had to practise, and although they would first have tried it without saddles, they were not nearly so encumbered as they might have been. And the little rope ferry would take the galloper guns and the farrier’s packhorses.

‘I’ll get them to start waterproofing then, sir,’ said Armstrong. ‘D’you think we can get them elephants to stand sentinel downstream in case we have a few fallers?’

‘I think we may. We’ll take a rope across, too.’

It took a full half-hour to make waterproof the firelocks and cartridges, binding carbines and pistols with oilskin and wrapping cartridges in waxed paper. When they were ready, Hervey had the troop remount and face the river in line, then he rode to the centre and cast his eyes left and right. ‘I have just two things to say, and you will do well to remember them. First, your horse will swim across without any help from you. All you need to do is to let him have his head and sit tall in the saddle. Second, your carbine: you will have no greeting from me if you emerge from the river without it!’

Hervey paused to let the message be understood. Some of the NCOs added their own warnings, though muttered.

‘Those elephants will stand in line in case anyone is unseated,’ Hervey went on, and then, slowing his delivery to emphasize the point, added, ‘which there is no reason to be!’ He nodded to Serjeant Collins.

Collins rode out of the ranks, halted and drew his carbine from its bucket and clipped it to his crossbelt in the approved fashion. Then he took the coil of rope, the end of which the serjeant-major had secured to a tree, looped it in the crook of his right arm, took the carbine in the same hand and rode straight for the river’s edge.

‘See how he holds the carbine up to keep it dry,’ called Hervey, glancing left and right again along the line.

All eyes were on Collins. He rode straight into the river as if it were no more than a field of barley, his horse not hesitating a fraction. For half a minute the water came no higher than Collins’s toes, then his knees, and then there was no longer a footing, and the horse struck out into the peculiar lunging motion that was its swimming method, head pushed forward flat on the water.

‘See how he has let his horse have the rein, and keeps his back straight and carbine hand raised,’ continued Hervey.

For another half a minute Collins’s horse paddled powerfully until its feet touched bottom again.

‘When the horse first gets a footing he’ll lurch a bit until he gets his stride. Don’t let your weight be thrown forward or you’ll unbalance him.’

The water was now back to Collins’s knees, and soon to his toes, and then he was riding up the shallow bank and out of the river.

‘Serjeant Collins will secure the rope, and that shall be to save the unwary. But I say again, I do not expect any one of you to have recourse to it!’ He nodded to Armstrong, who took up post at the entry point.

‘Right, you dryfeet! From the left, begin!’ barked the serjeantmajor.

Armstrong had numbered off the NCOs carefully so that there would be a good spreading of experience. First in went Private French. ‘No harder than driving a pair, lad,’ said Armstrong encouragingly. ‘Probably a lot easier.’

French rode in confidently.

‘Keep that carbine up. He’ll be up to his neck in no time.’

Next went Corporal Mossop. ‘Go on, Eli. Show ’em how it’s done.’

Mossop was by no means the best, but Armstrong knew he would be better for a good word.

Then came Mole, the hireling, and Shepherd Stent. Then Corporal Ashbolt and Harkness, and Corporal McCarthy. ‘Look careful there, Paddy,’ said Armstrong with a smile. ‘It’s not the River Jordan.’

‘No, sor, it isn’t. And I was baptized an infant already.’ McCarthy had crossed rivers before, many a time, and by no means as warm
and sluggish as this, but always on his feet. He looked gingerly ahead, but he had been trained, and he trusted his officers.

A dozen more entered, as regularly as those in front clambered out on the far bank. Johnson took his own mount and Hervey’s second across, knotting his reins and holding his carbine high, and with no more trouble than if he had been crossing the parade ground. Parkin and a clutch of Warminster pals came next. Armstrong eyed him fiercely: ‘Parkin, you keep that carbine hand up, mind!’ That was going to be the least of his worries, Armstrong knew, but this was not the time for second thoughts. He fixed Corporal Tait, following, with a glare. Tait knew what he meant, and nodded. And if there was a better corporal than Tait in the saddle then he wasn’t in the Sixth. Then came Wainwright and Rudd, eager to ride up close to Parkin, but Armstrong held them back awhile (it was no use too many in the stream at once).

Parkin was doing well, sitting upright if a little hunched, struggling manfully to keep his carbine up by his shoulders. Corporal Tait was alongside, Wainwright and Rudd a couple of lengths behind. In less than a minute they would be in the shallows. And then the very worst happened, so quick that none saw it coming. The ferry rope, straining to hold the raft with its two galloper guns, snapped with a crack like a rifle. It startled the horses on the near bank and even unsettled the elephants. The raft swung free as if propelled by a paddle, and bore down at once on the swimmers.

There was nothing they could do. Tait was struck first and knocked clean from the saddle, but he managed to grab the side of the raft. Then it hit the packhorse carrying the goats. The horse lost balance, and the current, though weak, began to take the drowning animal towards the elephants, the goats bleating frantically. Then the raft swung round and caught Parkin, still struggling manfully to keep his carbine dry. He disappeared beneath the big teak logs with a shout of ‘Jobie!’

Jobie Wainwright did not calculate. He threw himself from the saddle towards the raft, but he fell well short. He had swum many a time in the rivers and ponds about Warminster, but the weight of all he bore was too much, and he too sank like a stone. Corporal Tait threw his crossbelt and carbine onto the raft and slid below after them. Armstrong likewise threw off all his equipment
and coat and raced powerfully to the middle of the river, bellowing at Rudd to stay in the saddle. Serjeant Collins plunged in from the far bank astride his gelding, and Shepherd Stent dived headlong after him. Hervey shouted for the remainder to stand fast and then put his own horse into the river. The Skinner’s daffadar struggled to hold the galloper guns on the raft as it swung towards the rope which Collins had paid out.