Companions of Paradise (34 page)

Hassan held up his hand. “You have offered us shelter from the bitter cold. You have killed a goat for our entertainment. We are brothers now.”

He smiled without bitterness. “My wealth, Jamaluddin Khan, is your wealth.”

“Ah.” Jamaluddin sighed happily. “In that case, my brother, I accept. Tomorrow morning I will furnish you with the two best mounts this house has to offer, and also its finest food: live chickens and goats; almonds, pistachios, dried figs, and dates from my stores; rice, flour, and beans; sugar, tea, salt, and spices.”

His eyes turned dreamy. “And as for Ghyr Khush, I will never raise my voice to her. I will let her gallop over open spaces as she was born to gallop. I will feed her with my own hands: eggs, mutton fat, barley, and
quatlame
, the food of her homeland. I will cover her in all weathers with layers of fine, felt blanket, and I will love her as I once loved my beautiful Ak Belek.”

A
rguments had raged in the cantonment for days about how much artillery should be taken on the march, and how to get the army across the many rivers on the road to Jalalabad. In the Khurd-Kabul pass alone, it was rumored, the narrow road would cross the stream no less than thirty times.

“The six remaining guns,” General Elphinstone finally declared, “belong to the Crown. On no account must they be left behind. We are abandoning too much valuable property as it is.”

His arm strapped across his chest with a filthy bandage, Harry Fitzgerald shook his head as he received his instructions. “The artillery bullocks and horses are already half starved,” he objected. “They will not be able to pull the guns through those steep defiles. And what if Afghan snipers—”

“Do as you are told,” he was ordered. “Or, at least, begin to do it, since all orders are being countermanded within the hour.”

“Guns, property!” Fitzgerald muttered later that afternoon, as he inspected his bony, shivering artillery horses. “Have they even
thought
of these animals? Have they even considered tents, or food for the men?”

“THE RETREAT is now set for tomorrow,” Lady Sale announced that evening to her daughter, Charles Mott, and Lady Macnaghten, as they sat on her stiff-backed chairs around a fire that did little to warm the room.

Lady Macnaghten nodded. “I have made up my mind what I am taking with me,” she said decisively.

Her voice, a full tone lower than it had been before her husband's death, held no hint of coquettishness. The three shawls she wore together over her head did not flatter her. “I cannot ask the coolies or the servants to carry many of my household belongings, and so I shall bring only my bed, my warm clothes, shawls, and rezais, and all the dried fruit from the Residence pantry. Thank goodness the servants have winter boots.”

Her voice trailed away.

Charles Mott laid a hand on her arm. “I shall remain at your side, Aunt,” he said gravely, “and see to your safety.”

“We shall all stick together,” Lady Sale agreed.

Lady Macnaghten smiled. “Indeed we shall. And we shall reach Jalalabad quite safely. I am sure of it.”

“She is a gallant woman,” Lady Sale observed to her daughter, after Lady Macnaghten had climbed the stairs to her room followed by her nephew, a candle flickering in his hand. “I would never have expected it of her. And that foppish, fool nephew of hers has somehow developed a spine.”

She stood and held her hands to the fire. “I wonder what became of Miss Givens. I cannot believe Mott's claim that an Afghan chief abducted her, and then demanded her entire family, including the servants, as hostages. I think she and her uncle have plotted an escape to India.”

“If they have,” her daughter said bluntly, “then they are cowards.”

“Perhaps they are,” mused Lady Sale, “but they are clever cowards. There is more to that Givens girl than meets the eye. And now,” she added briskly, “we must go to bed, for tomorrow we shall march.”

MORNING ARRIVED in Mariana's tent without sun, or any sign of Hassan Ali Khan.

When Nur Rahman held out a cup of morning tea, Mariana returned his greeting distractedly, her breath white in the tent's freezing air. When he did not leave immediately, but sat down by her doorway, his knife ready at his belt, she understood that he, too, was worried.

“All our drivers have taken their animals, and left,” he volunteered.

“The pack animals are gone? But why?”

He shrugged. “Hassan Ali Khan is supposed to supply all their food. It finished last night. When he had not returned this morning, they went away. Ghulam Ali and I told them to wait, but they said they must seek food and work elsewhere.”

“Are we all alone, then?”

“No.” The boy shook his head. “The servants are in four tents behind us, but they are afraid. They say they have been threatened by people who think they are spying for the British.”

“And what of Ghulam Ali?”

“He is outside your doorway with a musket. He has been there since dawn.”

Her chest tightened. “And
he
is our protection?”

Nur Rahman raised his chin. “Ghulam Ali and
I,”
he said, pointing to his own, wicked-looking knife, “are
your
protection.”

Mariana stood up, tightened her sheepskin across her chest, and pushed the door curtain aside. There was no sign of the courier. The other tents that had dotted the sloping ground in front of her were gone, except for the three menacing-looking ones she had seen the night before.

“Ghulam Ali is not there.” She pushed her hands into her sleeves against the invading wind. “Ask the servants to bring more hot coals.”

Nur Rahman went out, and returned almost immediately. “There is no one in the servants’ tents,” he whispered. “They are gone.”

“Gone?”
She stared. “But where would they go, in this weather?”

“I heard one of them say yesterday that he has a Hindu friend in the city. Perhaps they have gone to find him. I found a tribesman standing near their tents just now,” he added. “He said that he and his friends had been teasing the servants, threatening to come at night and kill them all. He said they were cowards to run away.”

“Perhaps they were not teasing.” A shiver ran down Mariana's back. She had seen only two of Hassan's servants since her arrival, but she knew enough of Indian households to imagine them all—at least three personal servants, a pair of cooks, a sweeper, someone to wash Hassan's clothes, grooms, porters, someone to attend to the fire, a courier….

“And what of Ghulam Ali?” she asked sharply.

The boy shook his head. “He has not returned.”

“Then we are alone.” Panic rose in Mariana's throat.

She put a hand on the tent pole to steady herself. Even the freezing roads would be safer than this vulnerable, unguarded tent. Who knew what horrors they would risk if they stayed.

“We must leave at once,” she said urgently.

“No.” Nur Rahman shook his head. “We must wait. Ghulam Ali cannot have gone far. Hassan Ali Khan is coming back soon. He will—”

“How do you know Hassan will come?” she demanded, her voice rising. “How do you know he has not been killed? How do you know Ghulam Ali is not lying somewhere outside with his throat cut?”

Her shoulders sagged at the sound of her own terrible words. “We have no food left, Nur Rahman, and only that knife of yours for protection. The men in front of us have seen me here. They know we're alone.”

“But where will we go?”

“To Haji Khan's house. He will know what to do. If Hassan returns, he will find me there.”

If.
The Afghans would have seen that Hassan was Indian. She must not picture him shot by a sniper, lying crumpled by the side of the road.

No one knew where she was.

Nur Rahman threw up his hands. “Khanum,” he cried, “we cannot go to the city! It is at war. No women will be allowed on the streets.”

She found her chaderi and threw it on. “Then we must join the British on their march to Jalalabad. If we hurry, we can join the vanguard, where the senior ladies are—”

“No!”

“Please, Nur Rahman,” she begged, her chin wobbling with fright beneath her veil. “We must get away from here before we are killed. Tomorrow morning the British will have marched away, and the city will be safer. We will go to Haji Khan's house then.”

Nur Rahman squeezed his eyes shut.

When she did not reply, he opened his eyes and sighed. “If I am to walk on the road with you,” he said resignedly, “then I must fetch my own chaderi.”

Like a pair of countrywomen, with dirty, worn chaderis over their sheepskins, they walked together under the high gate of the caravanserai, then turned east, along the narrow, trampled path to the city, and the road to Jalalabad.

A faint thudding came from the distance.

“Heavy guns,” Mariana said as they walked. “The British must be fighting a rearguard action, to cover the retreat.”

As they neared the city, the sound of artillery grew louder. Mariana walked heavily, weighed down by her sheepskin, her movements hampered by her sodden chaderi.

Her face burned from the cold.

Nur Rahman pointed. “Look!” he cried, over the thundering of the guns.

To their left, past leafless orchards, heavy gray smoke rose into the air.

“The British fort has fallen,” he said.

She stared despairingly at the column of smoke. She had never thought the enemy would set the cantonment on fire. Where were Lady Macnaghten and Lady Sale? Where were Charles Mott and Harry Fitzgerald?

“Akbar Khan's men have captured the British artillery,” the boy went on. “They are firing after the British as they run away.”

Run away.
It was a terrible admission, but it was correct. The rising smoke certainly did not speak of tactical retreat, a prelude to future victory. It told only of dismal, hopeless flight.

It had taken the Afghans no time at all to use the captured artillery….

Two boys approached, leading a donkey.

Nur Rahman stopped them to ask for news. The elder of the two pointed east, toward the Hindu Kush mountains. His companion gestured excitedly, a wide grin on his dirty face.

When they had gone, Nur Rahman turned to Mariana. “Those boys watched everything, even the shooting,” he said. “They say that Afghan fighters have disrupted the retreating column. They say the British and Indian soldiers are not returning the Afghan artillery fire, and that most of their baggage was plundered before they had even crossed the river.”

Mariana shivered. The smoke now seemed to come from more than one fire. Had Fitzgerald lost all his guns? What would become of the poor, desperate column as it tried to force its way through the first, claustrophobic Khurd-Kabul pass? How would it survive that pass, and the next one, and the next? What of the half-starved sepoys who marched in this bitter cold, or the camp followers, the twelve thousand unarmed men, women, and children? What of the shoeless, runny-nosed babies she had seen in the bazaar?

At its narrowest, the Jagdalak Pass was only six feet wide.

Her legs felt weak. Her feet had lost their feeling. She wanted to sit down, but there was nowhere to rest, only snow, gray skies, leafless trees, and more snow.

“We must avoid the fighting,” Nur Rahman said thoughtfully. “We will turn north to avoid the path of the British army, then travel parallel to them until we reach the head of the column. At dark, after the Ghilzais have stopped shooting, and dispersed to their homes, we will join the British camp.”

She nodded numbly.

“Since it has taken them all morning to cross the river,” he said, “they will not have gone far. Early tomorrow morning, before the fighting begins again, we will get away and return to the city. But we must move quickly.”

Had they made a mistake? she wondered, as she forced herself to follow the boy. Had they abandoned Hassan's camp too soon? Why, in her panic, had she failed to leave a note for Hassan? Was he searching for her even now?

If he was, then
please
make him wait for her at Haji Khan's house.

Nur Rahman pointed toward a narrow path leading north across the snowy landscape. “This is the road,” he said.

It was two more miles before the path they followed was intersected by a second, equally narrow one. Beside that unprepossessing crossroad, a wooden lean-to sat on a patch of packed snow. In its questionable shelter, a red-cheeked man tended a fire beneath a battered samovar.

As she toiled toward it, Mariana looked longingly at the fire and the worn carpets that had been spread on the snow to accommodate the chaikhana's half-dozen customers.

She and Nur Rahman had not a single coin between them.

A second pot stood balanced at the edge of the fire. It was the scent from that pot that drove Mariana to twist off the small gold ring she had worn since she was eighteen, and hold it out to the proprietor.

He pocketed the ring and pointed to a separate place behind the lean-to, out of sight of his male guests. “Wait there,” he said, as Mariana and Nur Rahman sat gratefully down on a shabby Bokhara carpet. “I will bring soup.”