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He grunted, so she turned Rajat, Pavan wheeling with him as though understanding the need to keep Nick within her reach. But he managed to stay upright in the saddle, one hand on the reins, the other pressed to his shoulder. He was doing it by sheer will-power, as far as she could see—his face was white under the tan, his eyes unfocused.
Anusha smelled the town before they reached it. The thick, cloyingly sweet smell of boiling sugar filled the air and they began to pass small sugar-mills along the side of the road with pairs of oxen yoked to a beam that turned the crushing wheels while men pushed in the canes.
‘These look honest people. We must stop.’
‘No.’ She leaned from the saddle to catch the muttered words. ‘The town...there’ll be a Company agent.’
That was true. Anusha fought the instinct to get help, any help, as quickly as possible and rode on. A qualified doctor and someone of influence, that was what they needed. She began to call to people as they passed and the road became busier, lined with market stalls, an encampment of gypsy tinsmiths, more sugar-mills. They all pointed onwards.
Assuredly there was an angrezi, at least six of them, came the replies. Where? At the big house or at the sugar-boiling place or perhaps at the riverside. Who could tell what the angrezi would do?
There was no one, no one in this bustling, stinking chaos, she thought in despair and then, suddenly in front of her, there was figure wearing a broad straw hat, head and shoulders above the crowd.
Anusha urged Rajat forward, shouting in English, abandoning Nick to catch the man before he vanished into some side street. ‘Sahib! Sir! Help, please, for an officer of the Company who is hurt!’
The man started, frowned at her and pushed forwards, the bearers at his back hurrying with him. ‘An officer? Where, boy?’
‘There!’ She pointed and the men ran and caught Nick as he slid, completely unconscious, into their arms.
* * *
‘The bullet will have to come out, of course. As soon as possible.’ The cadaverously thin doctor stood looking down at Nick, hands on hips as though sizing up a choice cut of meat on the butcher’s block. His patient was laid out, stripped to the waist, on the agent’s best spare bed on to which he was bleeding sluggishly.
‘Not yet.’ Nick opened his eyes and Anusha sat down with a thump on the nearest chair, ignored by the entire household. She had thought he was dying, dead, if it had not been for that steady soak of blood, yet he could speak. She scrubbed the back of her hand across her eyes and tried not to sniff.
‘And why not, might I ask?’ Doctor Smythe was already reaching for his instrument case.
‘Because it is going to take some digging. I don’t think I am going to be at my best when you’ve finished and there are things I need to organise first.’
‘There is nothing you need to organise!’ Anusha exploded from the corner and pushed to the bedside to glare down at Nick. ‘Nothing except getting better, you stupid, stubborn man,’ she added.
The doctor and the agent both turned on her. ‘Now look here, boy, your master may give you licence to speak your mind,’ Mr Rowley, the agent, snapped, ‘but insolence I will not have—’
‘Gentlemen, allow me to present you to Miss Anusha
Laurens, daughter of Sir George Laurens of Calcutta and niece to his Highness the Raja of Kalatwah.’ Nick’s voice was slurred, but he sounded amused. ‘One does not have to give Miss Laurens licence to speak her mind,
she does it anyway.’
‘Ma’am.’ They both bowed, both looked utterly scandalised.
‘Major Herriard is taking me to my father,’ Anusha said quickly, scrabbling for her English. Better to explain and hope Nick would stay quiet and rest. ‘It was necessary to not be found...to evade...the Maharaja of Altaphur who wishes to marry me, which is why I am as a boy, disguised. We were ambushed by dacoits outside the town.’
‘Outrageous!’ It was not clear whether that was directed at the dacoits, the maharaja or her travelling, dressed as a boy, with a man. Probably all three. ‘Well, you are quite safe here, Miss Laurens. You will doubtless wish to change into your proper clothes and make yourself comfortable while the doctor deals with Major Herriard. My wife will organise that.’
‘I have no proper clothes and I do not leave Major Herriard.’ She did wish Englishmen were not all so large. Anusha set her feet apart and squared her shoulders—he was going to have to carry her out of there.
‘Rowley, I need a pinnace, something that will get us downriver safely to Calcutta.’ Nick cut through the argument raging over his body. Anusha shut her mouth and listened. ‘And I need it crewing, equipping and provisioning. And I need our horses taken down by reliable grooms. If you can give me a round reckoning for that, I can pay for it now and remit any shortfall when I arrive.’
