Bhowani Junction (10 page)

Colonel Savage came in. He said, ‘I think that explains the mystery of the disappearing cleaners and firemen, Mr Jones.’

‘Why, what is it, Colonel?’ Pater asked.

‘A strike,’ Colonel Savage said It began at eight o’clock.
All U.R.W.I. members. I’m afraid I’ll have to go back to the Lines. Miss Victoria had better come along with me.’

Pater banged his glass down on the mantelpiece. He cried, ‘Oh, that is too bad of them to strike just when we were having such a good time.’ The wireless squeaked rhythmically. I went and fetched my handbag. When I came back Colonel Savage gathered up his tunic and tie and said, ‘I’ve got the jeep here; you needn’t worry about your bicycle.’

He thanked Pater and Mater nicely, as though he meant it, and in a couple of minutes we were driving fast up the Pike. It is less than half a mile to the turning where the road to the station leads off on the right, but in that half-mile Patrick overtook us. His headlight bored up behind us, he hooted noisily, and the Norton leaped past us, making a loud shattering noise from its exhaust. As soon as he had passed, he had to swing wildly to take the corner.

Colonel Savage muttered, ‘Bloody fool,’ and drove straight on up the Pike. At the battalion offices he told me to keep in close touch with Patrick and the Railway Traffic Office. He ordered me to find out particularly what trains were likely to be held up in the district, where they would be held, and what they contained.

I picked up the field telephone as soon as I had sat down, called Patrick, and gave him the message. I thought of calling him ‘Mr Taylor’, but it sounded silly. I could be just as cold with ‘Patrick’.

Patrick knew nothing yet. The district staff were all busy trying to find exactly who had walked off their jobs. There would be a conference of non-striking traffic personnel—all the Anglo-Indians and about half the Indians—later in the night. ‘Don’t pester me,’ he shouted at last, and hung up.

The battalion offices had come alive. They throbbed quietly, like an aeroplane waiting to taxi out on to the runway. People came and went in Savage’s office next door. Twice he called me in to hear and note down orders to troops. A platoon had already gone to the yards and was in bivouac there. A night patrol had gone out. The battle radio sets were in operation. I had felt sleepy, but I began to wake up. Colonel Savage’s little
personal orderly, Birkhe, brought me tea—sweet milky tea with pepper in it. He was a boy of about eighteen, slender above the waist, sturdy below, and his skin was no browner than mine. The telephones buzzed and rang all the time in the adjutant’s office. The
peep-peep
whistling of the radio, like birds, sounded in every corner of the offices.

Colonel Savage called me. I went in with my notebook and pencil ready. Major Dickson, the second-in-command, was there, and Macaulay. Major Dickson was a heavy, stolid man. I had known his wife in Delhi, but I did not see any reason to tell him that. Colonel Savage had lit a cheroot. I thought he was less tense than usual.

He said, ‘
Le ballon, il ascend
. This has just been deciphered.’ He took up a message from his desk. ‘This is from Army through Kishanpur Sub-Area. Most immediate and top secret. Some Royal Indian Navy ships at Bombay and Karachi in state of mutiny. Ratings have ordered all officers, both Indian and British, overside. No violence reported yet … Now we know what K. P. Roy has been rehearsing for. And what the people behind the strike were waiting for.’

He put the message down and looked round at the three of us. Dickson’s forehead puckered like a bloodhound’s. He said, ‘H’m. Er. That’s serious, sir.’

‘Yes. We’ve got to make sure the Collector knows,’ Colonel Savage said. ‘I’ll bet he doesn’t. You go and tell him, Henry. Take the message—here—and tell him I’ll be coming round as soon as I’m free. That oughtn’t to be long.’

‘H’m. All right, sir. You don’t want to change any of the orders to the companies?’ Dickson said.

Colonel Savage shook his head. Dickson saluted and went out. For a minute we were silent, thinking our thoughts. For Colonel Savage this would be another Mutiny. He would be thinking how to destroy it before it turned into something as bad as 1857. He would have read all about that in school—I certainly had. A few weeks before, I would have been thinking the same way, from my point of view as a woman and an Anglo-Indian. Now the news, for all its horror and all its implications, was more of a bitter disappointment than anything
else to me. It refastened the chains that had been breaking and falling all round me. If the Indians rose against the English I could not be free, because they would count us Anglo-Indians as we counted ourselves—among the English.

Then the tension and seriousness was broken by a brief incident that was really ridiculously funny, and very typical of the Army. After it, I understood better how soldiers don’t go mad in wars.

Major Dickson came back, almost hurrying, and said, ‘The brigadier’s here, sir. At least, I think that’s who it must be.’

‘Kishanpur Sub-Area?’ Colonel Savage said quickly. ‘Old People-Psmythe?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Colonel Savage said, ‘Okay. You go out that way. I’ll make my obeisances.’ Major Dickson went out.

The orderly-of-the-day marched in, saluted, and said, ‘
Brigadier-sahib
ayo
.’ Over his head I saw the top of an immensely tall thin man. The man came forward, and I saw that he was wearing polo boots, breeches, and a pinkish shirt. We saluted. He wore no medal ribbons and no rank badges. He was swinging a short cane in his hand. His hair was silver-grey, curled, and very long. First he bowed to me, then he shook the others’ hands. He did it like those courtiers in knee-breeches in old pictures.

‘Savage?’ he said. ‘I’m Nigel ffoulkes-Jones. I hate bein’ called “sir”. Been away from Kishanpur, buyin’ carpets. Rodney, isn’t it? Everything all right, Rodney? I don’t believe in worryin’ people. I have a great deal to do, and I’m sure you have. We’re all grown up, aren’t we, even though we do have to keep it a secret from the Army, eh?’

Colonel Savage said, ‘All quiet here, Nigel. Well, there’s a little railway strike and a small naval mutiny, but everything’s in hand. Do you want us to carry on, or do you have an Internal Security scheme you’d prefer us to join?’

The brigadier said, ‘Carry on, Rodney, carry on by all means. I’ve got that big record office to look after, and they take up all my time. Very intelligent young men they are, really. You must come over and spend a week-end with us.
I‘ve started an art class.’

‘Life studies?’ Colonel Savage said.

The brigadier shook his finger and said, ‘Ah, Rodney, I see you have a coarse mind. No, just an introduction to modernism. And we have a Gourmets’ Society, and I’ve lured an Alsatian chef into the club. As a matter of fact I manoeuvred him out of an internees’ camp. Do bring the young lady when you come. What is your name, my dear?’ He bowed to me again.

I tried to find the nerve to answer, Call me Victoria, Nigel; because I was enjoying myself. But if I shared a joke with Colonel Savage I would be going back where I had come from. I said, ‘WAC-seven-four-six, Subaltern Victoria Jones, sir.’

The brigadier put his hands to his thin, fine-boned head. ‘Oh, this Army!’ he cried. ‘Well, you must come too, Victoria. Now, Rodney, I must be going. No, no, I’ve had a meal, thank you so much all the same.’

Colonel Savage said, ‘I’ll keep you informed, Nigel.’

The brigadier said, ‘That would be nice, Rodney. Tell it all to Reggie. He’s my staff captain. Ask Reggie for anything you want. A most charming young man. No, please don’t bother to come out, I can see you’re busy. Good night, good night, Victoria.’

He wandered out. Colonel Savage sat down slowly and began to laugh without making a sound. I was angry with myself for standing there like a dummy. Colonel Savage would think I had as little sense of humour as poor Patrick. It took an effort to remind myself that I didn’t care what Colonel Savage thought.

Colonel Savage said, ‘Brigadier N. F. Q. St D. ffoulkes-Jones, M.B.E.—and that’s the most unkindest cut of all.’

‘What was his regiment, sir?’ Macaulay asked politely.

‘Need you ask?’ Colonel Savage said. ‘Probyn’s. Ah well, it’s a relief really. He hasn’t got any other troops in the sub-area, just that record office and an Army school or two, and Kishanpur’s nearly fifty miles away. I’d much rather have him than one of those keen G.S. type of armchair brigadiers who’d hang round my neck and try to command my battalion for me.
Show some of those people a real soldier, and they think they’re Napoleon. We’ll go over to the Collector’s as soon as Major Dickson comes back, Miss Jones.’

Now the mutiny and the strike were on us again, but the brigadier had done something useful. He had helped me, at any rate, to keep fairly calm from then on. If he could go on worrying about his Alsatian chef and his art classes, surely I need not get into a panic over my own problems.

An orderly came in with a message. Colonel Savage stood up, reaching for his hat. He said, ‘We’re in action on the Karode bridge. An attempt to blow it up, apparently. Kulbahadur reports that he opened fire—too soon, of course, so he didn’t get anybody. He’s an impatient little devil. No damage to the bridge as far as he knows. Karode’s to the south. Miss Jones, ring up Taylor and find out what trains are held up north of here, and what’s in them. Goods trains.’

I saluted, hurried out, and called Patrick on the field telephone. Patrick shouted that at Lidhganj there was a coal train overlapping the short stretch of double track there, and so blocking movement in either direction. A relief driver was going out to it. Lidhganj was two stations south of Karode, where the troops were at the bridge. Then to the north there was a goods train at Malra on the main line. Malra had a long siding, so the train did not block the line.

‘What’s in that one?’ I asked Patrick.

‘How the hell should I know?’ he shouted. ‘It will take me hours to find out what is in every wagon. I am too busy.’

Savage was beside me again. He could hear what Patrick said. He said, ‘Are there any arms, ammunition, or explosives on that train? That’s what I want to know.’

I repeated the question to Patrick. He shouted, ‘I tell you I don’t know.’

Colonel Savage said, ‘Tell him to find out.’

‘I said, ‘It will take time, sir. He will have to telegraph the main offices, and they will have to ask perhaps fifteen stations.’

Colonel Savage said, ‘Tell him to get started. Macaulay!’ Macaulay came running. Colonel Savage said, ‘Get on to the Malra bridge guard and tell them to send a section at once to
guard a goods train which is now in Malra station, until further orders. Report to me when they’ve acknowledged the orders. Tomorrow, send an officer out at first light to see what’s in the train.’

Macaulay said, ‘Yes, sir,’ and hurried out.

Colonel Savage and I went to the signal office. The clerks were deciphering a message, and we waited till it was ready. It said:

MOST IMMEDIATE AND TOP SECRET. NEWS OF THE NAVAL MUTINIES IS ALREADY KNOWN ALL OVER BOMBAY. PRESUMABLY ALSO IN OTHER MAIN CENTRES OF POPULATION. BOMBAY CITY TENSE. ALL LEAVE CANCELLED IN SOUTHERN ARMY. ALL LEAVE TO BOMBAY CANCELLED FOR OTHER ARMIES AND COMMANDS
.

Colonel Savage took the message, and we got into his jeep. Birkhe hopped into the back seat. The Collector’s bungalow was only a couple of hundred yards away across the Pike, but we drove to it, and a second jeep followed us. That one contained a big radio set and two signallers, as well as the driver.

In the Collector’s study I was astonished to see Ranjit Singh Kasel. I wondered whether he was being bullied about his supposed Congress membership. I smiled at him because I did not want him to think I was against him.

The Collector said, ‘Thank you for sending Major Dickson round, Savage. I haven’t heard anything from my own people yet.’

Colonel Savage said, ‘Is the news on the wireless, the ordinary news service?’

The Collector said, ‘No. They must be censoring it for the time being. Your adjutant has just told me about the attempt on the Karode bridge. This is it, I imagine, the big trouble the government have been waiting for.’

Colonel Savage said, ‘Yes. Who do you think’s responsible for the bridge business?’

The Collector said, ‘George Lanson will be on his way to investigate in ten minutes. You remember him—the Deputy Superintendent of Police.’ He turned to Ranjit. ‘You haven’t
heard of any violent revolutionaries or nihilists hiding in these parts, have you, Ranjit?’

Ranjit muttered, ‘No. I have not.’

The Collector said to Colonel Savage, ‘I had asked Ranjit to come and talk to me about the strike situation, but now I think we can deal with both things at once. What do you imagine the Railway Board will do to keep the trains running, Ranjit?’

I could tell from his face that Ranjit inwardly seethed with excitement. His eyes were large, and he had difficulty in standing still in one place. He said, ‘If it was just the strike, I think they would not do anything special, Mr Govindaswami. There are enough non-strikers to keep a skeleton service going. But now, with the R.I.N. mutiny, I do not know. We ought to run pilot engines in front of the trains. There are also armoured wagons with machine guns manned by the Europeans and Anglo-Indians of the Auxiliary Force. But there will hardly be enough non-strikers to do any of that. Will the government be wanting to send many troop trains through?’

‘I don’t think so,’ Colonel Savage said. ‘They can fly troops into Bombay and Karachi if they want to. There’s plenty of armour in Southern Army that can get to Bombay by road. There’s armour near Karachi. There must be a Royal Navy cruiser in Trincomalee that can come up and blow those R.I.N. sloops out of the water if it becomes necessary.’

Ranjit’s eyes grew bigger and sadder while Colonel Savage was speaking.

‘I don’t think the government will ask help from the Royal Navy,’ the Collector said. ‘I think, as far as possible, they will use only Indian troops.’

‘There may be some troop trains, though,’ Colonel Savage said. ‘But I don’t suppose they’ll be anything to do with the mutiny. There are battalions and service units being disbanded every day, and British troops are being sent back to England by the shipload.’