The officer in the faded coat, who had been looking pretty sour, remarked that expulsion from school was all very well but what concerned him was expulsion from Afghanistan.
"Pardon me," said Cotton, wiping his lips. "Forgot my manners. Mr Flashman, General Nott. General Nott is up from Kandahar, where he commands. We were discussing the state of the army in Afghanistan. No, no, Flashman, sit down. This ain"t Calcutta. On active service the more you know the better. Pray proceed, Nott."
So I sat, a little bewildered and flattered, for generals don"t usually talk before subalterns, while Nott resumed his tirade. It seemed that he had been offended by some communication from McNaghten - Sir William McNaghten, Envoy to Kabul, and head British civilian in the country. Nott was appealing to Cotton to support him in protest, but Cotton didn"t seem to care for the idea.
"It is a simple question of policy," said Nott. "The country, whatever McNaghten may think, is hostile, and we have to treat it as such. We do this in three ways -through the influence which Sujah exerts on his unwilling subjects, which is little enough; through the force of our army here, which with respect is not as all-powerful as McNaghten imagines, since you"re outnumbered fifty to one by one of the fiercest warrior nations in the world; and thirdly, by buying the good will of important chiefs with money. Am I right?"
"Talking like a book," said Cotton. "Fill your gla.s.s, Mr Flashman."
"If one of those three instruments of policy fails - Sujah, our strength, or our money - we"re done for. Oh, I know I"m a "croaker", as McNaghten would say; he thinks we are as secure here as on Horse Guards. He"s wrong, you know. We exist on sufferance, and there won"t be much of that if he takes up this idea of cutting the subsidy to the Gilzai chiefs."
"It would save money," said Cotton. "Anyway, it"s no more than a thought, as I understand."
"It would save money if you didn"t buy a bandage when you were bleeding to death," said Nott, at which Cotton guffawed. "Aye, laugh, Sir Willoughby, but this is a serious matter. Cutting the subsidy is no more than a thought, you say. Very good, it may never happen. But if the Gilzais so much as suspect it might, how long will they continue to keep the pa.s.ses open? They sit above the Khyber - your lifeline, remember - and let our convoys come and go, but if they think their subsidy is in danger they"ll look for another source of revenue. And that will mean convoys ambushed and looted, and a very pretty business on your hands. That is why McNaghten"s a fool even to think of cutting the subsidy, let alone talk about it." "What do you want me to do?" says Cotton, frowning. "Tell him to drop the notion at all costs. He won"t listen to me. And send someone to talk to the Gilzais, take a few gifts to old what"s-his-name at Mogala - Sher Afzul. He has the other Gilzai khans under his thumb, I"m told."
"You know a lot about this country," said Cotton, wagging his head. "Considering this ain"t your territory."
"Someone"s got to," said Nott. "Thirty years in the Company"s service teaches you a thing or two. I wish I thought McNaghten had learned as much. But he goes his way happily, seeing no farther than the end of his nose. Well, well, Cotton, you"re one of the lucky ones. You"ll be getting out in time."
Cotton protested at this that he was a "croaker" after all - I soon discovered that the word was applied to everyone who ventured to criticise McNaghten or express doubts about the safety of the British force in Kabul. They talked for a while, and Cotton was very civil to me and seemed intent on making me feel at home. We dined in his head-quarters, with his staff, and there for the first time I met some of the men, many of them fairly junior officers, whose names were to be household words in England within the next year - "Sekundar" Burnes, with his mincing Scotch voice and pretty little moustache; George Broadfoot, another Scotsman, who sat next to me; Vincent Eyre, "Gentleman Jim" Skinner, Colonel Oliver, and various others. They talked with a freedom that was astonishing, criticising or defending their superiors in the presence of general officers, condemning this policy and praising that, and Cotton and Nott joined in. There was not much good said about McNaghten, and a general gloom about the army"s situation; it seemed to me they scared rather easily, and I told Broadfoot so.
"Wait till ye"ve been here a month or two, and ye"ll be as bad as the rest," he said brusquely. "It"s a bad place, and a bad people, and if we don"t have war on our hands inside a year I"ll be surprised. Have you heard of Akbar Khan? No? He"s the son of the old king, Dost Mohammed, that we deposed for this clown Sujah, and he"s in the hills now, going from this chief to that, gathering support for the day when he"ll raise the country against us. McNaghten won"t believe it, of course, but he"s a gommeril."
"Could we not hold Kabul?" I asked. "Surely with a force of five thousand it should be possible, against undisciplined savages."
"These savages are good men," says he. "Better shots than we are, for one thing. And we"re badly placed here, with no proper fortifications for the cantonment - even the stores are outside the perimeter - and an army that"s going downhill with soft living and bad discipline. Forbye, we have our families with us, and that"s a bad thing when the bullets are flying - who thinks of his duty when he has his wife and weans to care for? And Elphy Bey is to command us when Cotton goes." He shook his head. "You"ll know him better than I, but I"d give my next year"s pay to hear he wasn"t coming and we had Nott instead. I"d sleep at nights, anyway."
This was depressing enough, but in the next few weeks I heard this kind of talk on all hands - there was obviously no confidence in the military or political chiefs, and the Afghans seemed to sense this, for they were an insolent crowd and had no great respect for us. As an aide to Elphy Bey, who was still on his road north, I had time on my hands to look about Kabul, which was a great, filthy sprawling place full of narrow lanes and smelling abominably. But we seldom went there, for the folk hardly made us welcome, and it was pleasant out by the cantonment, where there was little attention to soldiering but a great deal of horseracing and lounging in the orchards and gossiping on the verandahs over cool drinks. There were even cricket matches, and I played myself - I had been a great bowler at Rugby, and my new friends made more of the wickets I took than of the fact that I was beginning to speak Pushtu better than any of them except Burnes and the politicals.
It was at one of these matches that I first saw Shah Sujah, the king, who had come down as the guest of McNaghten.
He was a portly, brown-bearded man who stood gravely contemplating the game, and when McNaghten asked him how he liked it, said:
"Strange and manifold are the ways of G.o.d."
As for McNaghten himself, I despised him on sight. He had a clerk"s face, with a pointed nose and chin, and peered through his spectacles suspiciously, sniffing at you. He was vain as a peac.o.c.k, though, and would strut about in his tall hat and frock-coat, lording it greatly, with his nose turned up. It was evident, as someone said, that he saw only what he wanted to see. Anyone else would have realised that his army was in a mess, for one thing, but not McNaghten. He even seemed to think that Sujah was popular with the people, and that we were honoured guests in the country; if he had heard the men in the bazaar calling us "kaffirs" he might have realised his mistake. But he was too lofty to hear.
However, I pa.s.sed the time pleasantly enough. Burnes, the political agent, when he heard about my Pushtu, took some interest in me, and as he kept a splendid table, and was an influential fellow, I kept in with him. He was a pompous fool, of course, but he knew a good deal about the Afghans, and would go about from time to time in native dress, mixing with the crowds in the bazaar, listening to gossip and keeping his nose to the wind generally. He had another reason for this, of course, which was that he was forever in pursuit of some Afghan woman or other, and had to go to the city to find them. I went with him on these expeditions frequently, and very rewarding they were.
Afghan women are handsome rather than pretty, but they have this great advantage to them, that their own men don"t care for them overmuch. Afghan men would as soon be perverts as not, and have a great taste for young boys; it would sicken you to see them mooning over these painted youths as though they were girls, and our troops thought it a tremendous joke. However, it meant that the Afghan women were always hungry for men, and you could have your pick of them - tall, graceful creatures they were, with long straight noses and proud mouths, running more to muscle than fat, and very active in bed.
Of course, the Afghans didn"t care for this, which was another score against us where they were concerned.
The first weeks pa.s.sed, as I say, pleasantly, and I was beginning to like Kabul, in spite of the pessimists, when I was shaken out of my pleasant rut, thanks to my friend Burnes and the anxieties of General Nott, who had gone back to Kandahar but left his warnings ringing in Sir Willoughby Cotton"s ears. They must have rung an alarm, for when he sent for me to his office in the cantonment he was looking pretty glum, with Burnes at his elbow.
"Flashman," says Cotton. "Sir Alexander here tells me you get along famously with the Afghans."
Thinking of the women, I agreed.
"Hm, well. And you talk their frightful lingo?"
"Pa.s.sably well, sir."
"That means a dam" sight better than most of us. Well, I daresay I shouldn"t do it, but on Sir Alexander"s suggestion" - here Burnes gave me a smile, which I felt somehow boded no good - "and since you"re the son of an old friend, I"m going to give you some work to do - work which"ll help your advancement, let me say, if you do it well, d"you see?" He stared at me a moment, and growled to Burnes: "Dammit, Sandy, he"s devilish young, y"know."
"No younger than I was," says Burnes.
"Umph. Oh, well, I suppose it"s all right. Now, look here, Flashman - you know about the Gilzais, I suppose? They control the pa.s.ses between here and India, and are devilish tricky fellows. You were with me when Nott was talking about their subsidy, and how there were rumours that the politicals would cut it, dam" fools, with all respect, Sandy. Well, it will be cut - in time - but for the present it"s imperative they should be told that all"s well, d"you see? Sir William McNaghten has agreed to this - fact is, he"s written letters to Sher Afzul, at Mogala, and he"s the leader of the pack, so to speak."
This seemed to me a pretty piece of duplicity on McNaghten"s part, but it was typical of our dealings with the Afghans, as I was to discover.
"You"re going to be our postman, like Mr Rowland Hill"s fellows at home. You"ll take the messages of good will to Sher Afzul, hand "em over, say how splendid everything is, be polite to the old devil - he"s half-mad, by the way - set his mind at rest if he"s still worried about the subsidy, and so forth."
"It will all be in the letters," says Burnes. "You must just give any added rea.s.surances that may be needed."
"All right, Flashman?" says Cotton. "Good experience for you. Diplomatic mission, what?"
"It"s very important," says Burnes. "You see, if they thought there was anything wrong, or grew suspicious, it could be bad for us."
It could be a d.a.m.ned sight worse for me, I thought. I didn"t like this idea above half - all I knew of the Gilzais was that they were murderous brutes, like all country Afghans, and the thought of walking into their nests, up in the hills, with not the slightest hope of help if there was trouble - well, Kabul might not be Hyde Park, but at least it was safe for the present. And what the Afghan women did to prisoners was enough to start my stomach turning at the thought - I"d heard the stories.
Some of this must have showed in my face, for Cotton asked fairly sharply what was the matter. Didn"t I want to go?
"Of course, sir," I lied. "But - well, I"m pretty raw, I know. A more experienced officer ..."
"Don"t fret yourself," says Burnes, smiling. "You"re more at home with these folk than some men with twenty years in the service." He winked. "I"ve seen you, Flash-man, remember. Hah-ha! And you"ve got what they call a "fool"s face". No disrespect: it means you look honest. Besides, the fact that you have some Pushtu will win their confidence."
"But as General Elphinstone"s aide, should I not be here ..."
"Elphy ain"t due for a week," snapped Cotton. "Dammit, man, this is an opportunity. Any young feller in your shoes would be bursting to go."
I saw it would be bad to try to make further excuses, so I said I was all eagerness, of course, and had only wanted to be sure I was the right man, and so forth. That settled it: Burnes took me to the great wall map, and showed me where Mogala was - needless to say, it was at the back of nowhere, about fifty miles from Kabul, in h.e.l.lish hill country south of the Jugdulluk Pa.s.s. He pointed out the road we should take, a.s.suring me I should have a good guide, and produced the sealed packet I was to deliver to the half-mad (and doubtless half-human) Sher Afzul.
"Make sure they go into his own hands," he told me. "He"s a good friend to us -just now - but I don"t trust his nephew, Gul Shah. He was too thick with Akbar Khan in the old days. If there"s ever trouble among the Gilzais, it will come from Gul, so watch out for him. And I don"t have to tell you to be careful of old Afzul - he"s sharp when he"s sane, which he is most of the time. He"s lord of life and death in his own parish, and that includes you. Not that he"s likely to offer you harm, but keep on his good side."
I began to wonder if I could manage to fall ill in the next hour or two -jaundice, possibly, or something infectious. Cotton set the final seal on it.
"If there"s trouble," says he, "you must just ride for it." To this fatherly advice he and Burnes added a few words about how I should conduct myself if the matter of subsidy was discussed with me, bidding me be rea.s.suring at all costs - no thought of who should rea.s.sure me, I may say - and dismissed me. Burnes said they had high hopes of me, a sentiment I found it difficult to share.
However, there was nothing for it, and next morning found me on the road east, with Iqbal and an Afghan guide on either side and five troopers of the 16th Lancers for escort. It was a tiny enough guard to be useless against anything but a stray robber - and Afghanistan never lacked for those - but it gave me some heart, and what with the fresh morning air, and the thought that all would probably be well and the mission another small stepping stone in the career of Lieutenant Flashman, I felt rather more cheerful.
The sergeant in charge of the Lancers was called Hudson, and he had already shown himself a steady and capable man. Before setting out he had suggested I leave behind my sabre - they were poor weapons, the Army swords, and turned in your grip(13) - and take instead one of the Persian scimitars that some of the Afghans used. They were light and strong, and d.a.m.ned sharp. He had been very business-like about it, and about such matters as rations for the men and fodder for the horses. He was one of those quiet, middle-sized, square-set men who seem to know exactly what they are doing, and it was good to have him and Iqbal at my back.
Our first day"s march took us as far as Khoord-Kabul, and on the second we left the track at Tezeen and went south-east into the hills. The going had been rough enough on the path, but now it was frightful - the land was all sun-scorched rock and jagged peaks, with stony defiles that were like ovens, where the ponies stumbled over the loose stones. We hardly saw a living creature for twenty miles after we left Tezeen, and when night came we were camped on a high pa.s.s, in the lee of a cliff that might have been the wall of h.e.l.l. It was bitter cold, and the wind howled up the pa.s.s; far away a wolf wailed, and we had barely enough wood to keep our fire going. I lay in my blanket cursing the day I got drunk at Rugby, and wishing I were snug in a warm bed with Elspeth or Fetnab or Josette.
Next day we were picking our way up a long stony slope when Iqbal muttered and pointed, and far ahead on a rocky shoulder I made out a figure which vanished almost as soon as I saw it.
"Gilzai scout," said Iqbal, and in the next hour we saw a dozen more of them; as we rode upwards we were aware of them in the hills on either side, behind boulders or on the ledges, and in the last few miles there were hors.e.m.e.n shadowing us on either side and behind. Then we came out of a defile, and the guide pointed ahead to a height crowned with a great grey fortress, with a round tower behind its outer wall, and a cl.u.s.ter of huts outside its embattled gate. This was Mogala, stronghold of the Gilzai chieftain, Sher Afzul. I seldom saw a place I liked less at first sight.
We went forward at a canter, and the hors.e.m.e.n who had been following us galloped into the open on either side, keeping pace to the fort, but not approaching too close to us. They rode Afghan ponies, carried long jezzails and lances, and were a tough-looking crowd; some wore mail over their robes, and a few had spiked helmets; they looked like warriors from an Eastern fairy tale, with their outlandish clothes and fierce bearded faces - and of course, they were.