Zemindar Read online

  ‘What a pity there is nothing of native work,’ I said to my companion. ‘I have heard that the Rajput manner is very interesting, and had hoped to see some here.’

  ‘Ah, no, I fear not. The best of that is seen in private houses and the palaces of the great. I do not admire it greatly myself; the want of perspective makes it unlovely to the Western eye. But,’ he added with the justice that I so much liked in him, ‘it is certainly lively, and the colours are most intense and jewel-like. No doubt you will find an opportunity to view some of it in Oudh. Lucknow is reputed to be a treasure house of such things—or at least it was in the days of the Nawabs.’

  Mr Roberts moved on a few steps, but I remained to look at a pleasant water-colour of mountains and a lake, unoriginal but well executed, and was startled by his sudden urgent call to come and look, for he believed he had found something that would interest me.

  This was a portrait, almost life-sized, of a young man.

  The subject posed against a bleak landscape of solid rocks and uncompromising trees, with, in the distance, a building that one guessed was a fort or castle of some sort. He stood erect, his right hand on his hip, and on his left a chained and hooded falcon, and gazed straight down at the viewer. It was obvious at first glance that the portrait was the work of two different artists, the body having been done by a very unaccomplished apprentice. The stance of the figure was stiff, the limbs appearing to be riveted to the trunk like those of a puppet, and the whole covered by clothing that bore no sign of wear—no wrinkles, not a hint of the contours of the limbs beneath, no indication of movement.

  But, by some touch of genius or happy flash of insight, the artist who had painted it had brought to vivid and assertive life the strongly featured face. It was a long face, the forehead high, the chin strong and markedly cleft, the mouth wide and unsmiling but at the same time not wholly stern. A beaked nose stood out beneath dark brows, shadowing eyes that were heavy-lidded, narrow and hazel in colour, and that drew the viewer’s eyes as a magnet draws a pin, so full of life were they, so charged with the expression of their owner’s character. The man might have been any age between twenty-five and thirty, though I inclined towards the older limit.

  We regarded the portrait for some moments in silence, I, at any rate, ignoring the lifeless body and endeavouring from a study of the complex face to form some assessment of the man’s personality, and wondering how it came about that two such differently endowed hands had come to work on the same subject. No doubt it was this point that Mr Roberts considered would interest me, but I knew a little of the system of apprentice painters in portraiture and was not as surprised as he had been.

  ‘A most interesting face, is it not?’ murmured Mr Roberts, keeping his eyes fixed upon it.

  ‘Very,’ I agreed, ‘but I cannot think I would like the man.’

  ‘Is that so?’ Mr Roberts’s voice told me he was smiling. ‘You have come to your conclusion very quickly. What is it that you do not like in him?’

  ‘Perhaps his arrogance. Look at the way the head is set on the shoulders. Stiff-necked and proud.’

  ‘That could be a fault in the painting.’

  ‘Yes, but see, it is in his eyes too, and in the cut of the nostrils.’

  ‘Hm. What else do you see in the eyes?’

  ‘Intelligence—wouldn’t you agree?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘And … and humour, I think. The mouth bears that out—see the faint quirk at the end of the lips? But I feel it must be a most sardonic humour. Look at these long lines coming down by the side of the nose past the lips.’

  ‘Smile lines, perhaps?’

  ‘It would be a cruel smile that left such marking on a face in repose.’

  ‘Or it could be a wide one? What else?’

  I considered for a moment. ‘Imagination. That breadth of forehead, you know. And he has great strength of character. That is a despot’s nose.’

  ‘Yes, there I must agree with you. But do you see no sign of any gentler characteristic? Sensitivity perhaps?’

  ‘Well, there is a hint of delicacy in the moulding of the lips, but I think it has long since been overlaid by assertiveness.’

  ‘Generosity?’

  ‘Certainly nothing of the contrary! There is no hint of meanness or smallness of mind that I can detect.’

  ‘No indeed, no pettiness there. I remember, Miss Hewitt, once telling you that he would be accounted a great man in his own acres, and now, looking at his face, I am inclined to think his greatness lies not wholly in his possessions.’

  Mr Roberts pointed, with a small air of triumph, to lettering, dark against dark foliage, which I had not before noticed. I bent forward, and following his finger read:

  OE … HASSANGANJ … 1848

  ‘This is the gentleman in whom you displayed so much interest on board ship, Miss Hewitt. Mr Oliver Erskine!’

  ‘Mr Erskine? But how can you be so sure? You told me you had never seen him, and the initials may stand for many other names, even the artist’s.’

  ‘True,’ agreed my companion imperturbably, ‘but not in conjunction with “Hassanganj”. That is the name of Erskine’s estate, and that,’ he pointed at the fort-like building in the background, ‘that is the house at Hassanganj. It is quite famous, I assure you.’

  ‘But how extraordinary.’

  I looked with a new and livelier interest at the face, and the more I examined it the more enigmatical it became. All I had read in it before was still there, but the more I studied, the more I found my curiosity aroused. Perhaps the novelty of masculine features entirely clean-shaven added something to my puzzlement. It was rare indeed to meet a gentleman quite unbewhiskered, and I was not sure I liked the effect. At all events, my first feeling of antipathy remained.

  ‘We had better introduce Charles to his brother,’ I said at length, and signalled to attract his attention. He and Emily were together, but Emily had chosen to lean upon the arm of one Lieutenant Charlton, a most devoted admirer, rather than upon her husband’s. They took their time in coming, but as they approached the picture to which Mr Roberts and I had again bent our attention, Emily said, ‘Oh, who is that ugly fellow!’ and shuddered in exaggerated distaste.

  He was certainly singular but he had many other qualities as well, and I could have cheerfully shaken Emily as she chattered on about his great ‘hooked’ nose, and the unfashionable cut of his coat.

  Mr Roberts allowed her to run on, and then said mildly, ‘I am sorry that you have so poor an opinion of the gentleman’s physiognomy. You will probably be much in his company before long as he is your husband’s near relative—Mr Erskine.’

  ‘Mercy!’ My cousin clutched Lieutenant Charlton’s arm and made as if to swoon, and I had to grit my teeth to remain silent. This ridiculous response to trivialities was one of her new affectations that I most disliked.

  Then all had to be explained anew. Charles was properly impressed, wondered how the portrait had come to Calcutta, who had commissioned it, and whether it was a true likeness or not. We all, save Emily, gave our findings as to the gentleman’s character, and at the end Charles and I had something of an altercation, he professing to see in the face much that was powerful, even noble, and I failing to find too much to admire.

  ‘It is a fine manly face,’ he declared.

  ‘Excellently executed,’ I demurred.

  ‘True. But no painter could invent an expression of such strength and marked intelligence.’

  ‘Portraitists are notoriously flattering in their approach,’ I pointed out. ‘Their living depends on it.’

  ‘You can hardly consider that portrait flattering, Laura. As Emily has said, my brother is far from handsome.’

  ‘And I should say he is too conceited to want to be thought otherwise. If my guess is right, he would sooner be considered dominant and self-confident than handsome, and in that case the artist very likely played up the qualities his sitter fancies in himself. Flattery can take many fo
rms.’

  ‘Well,’ and Charles smiled, ‘I can see that you are not to be influenced, and perhaps we shall soon have an opportunity to find out which of us is right.’

  ‘But is it not curious how little similarity there is between the two of you? Neither in colouring nor in feature is there anything to suggest a relationship between you.’

  ‘Perhaps, when we get to know each other, some affinities of character, at least, will become apparent.’

  As we turned away, Emily took a last look and declared, ‘Well, no one will make me think much of his looks, and what is more I am sure I shall be afraid of him.’

  Mr Roberts laughed, and turning to me said that that was the best joke of the day. The others had walked on, so I was left to ask him what he meant.

  ‘It must be a most misleading portrait after all, Miss Hewitt. No wonder Erskine parted with it,’ and he laughed again. ‘You see, in our little party the ladies and gentlemen have reversed the usual pattern of opinion regarding Mr Erskine. Mr Flood and I have found that we can like and admire him, while you and Mrs Flood have both expressed a marked antipathy. But from all I have heard—and it is of course mere hearsay—it is the men who commonly criticize Mr Erskine, while the ladies find him quite irresistible!’

  Well, I thought to myself, there is no accounting for tastes, but I knew that I would have no difficulty at all in resisting Mr Erskine.

  We were now more than halfway through the month of September. Abruptly the daily monsoon downpours ceased and the ‘rains’ (as the locals termed the annual three-month deluge) had ended for the year. The heat and the humidity both abated, and we began to turn our thoughts to plans for our journey upcountry. Captain and Mrs Avery, with whom we were to stay while in Lucknow, would have to be informed of the date of our arrival. Emily had received no less than three letters from Wallace Avery, communicating his pleasure at entertaining his wife’s relatives in his ‘humble’ home.

  But still no word arrived from Mr Oliver Erskine. ‘Well, we shall just have to plan without taking him into account,’ Charles said firmly, though I knew that he would hardly dare to face his mother if he had to return home without visiting his brother. There had been several letters from her, too, but none of them mentioned any communication from her elder son, though each one exhorted Charles to make every effort to meet him.

  Charles reckoned that he would have the ‘hang’ of methods of business in Calcutta by the middle of October. So, tentatively, we planned to leave Calcutta then, spend the intervening weeks until Christmas with the Averys in Lucknow and then, in the cool, clear month of January, make our way to Delhi where further introductions from Hewitt, Flood & Hewitt awaited us—though these were merely social, no business being conducted by the firm in the old Mogul capital. In March we would take the overland route home and be back in England by the end of April, just a year after we left it. However, if Oliver Erskine did extend an invitation, our itinerary would have to change. Everything would be delayed, and as the overland route in the middle of the hot weather was said to be very trying, we might then spend a few months in one of the hill stations, delaying our departure until September. Privately, and though I was almost sure I would dislike having much to do with Mr Erskine (his ill-manners in regard to his brother only buttressed the opinion I had formed on seeing his portrait), I very much hoped that our time in India would be extended. I wished to see as much as possible, and not least the great Himalaya mountains. Fortunately I knew that at the back of Charles’s mind was the intention of making any visit to Hassanganj as long as possible, for he was not unaffected by his mother’s hope of his inheriting the Erskine properties, though he would never admit it.

  Emily took very little part in our discussions and planning. She seemed to have lost interest in everything; where once it had seemed that she found her chiefest joy in contradicting me and thwarting Charles, now she acted as though she had no part in any of our plans. She adopted Mrs Chalmers’s habit of remaining in a muslin wrapper until midday, retired again to her room immediately after tiffin, and only at night, particularly when we were to be in company with some of her young admirers, did she display any sort of animation. And then she displayed too much, flirting with all comers, and pointedly ignoring her husband, who, instead of remonstrating with her on her behaviour, seemed relieved to be free of her presence. I did not like this turn of events, but there was nothing I could do, and neither of the young people ever mentioned their discontent with each other to me.

  At the beginning of October Emily finally attained her dearest objective: an invitation to Government House. She and Charles attended a small but very grand ball, were presented to Lord Canning, the Governor General, hobnobbed with other titled heads and important personages and were for once in agreement in being very well satisfied with their evening of grandeur. The following morning they left the required cards of appreciation in person and, that done, there was nothing else in Calcutta to turn our minds from our forthcoming journey to Lucknow.

  CHAPTER 8

  I like change, I like travel; and nothing lifts my spirits sooner than the prospect of new places to be seen and new people to be met. So it was with great anticipation that I set out on the next stage of our journey.

  India’s first stretch of railway line had recently been opened from Calcutta, and we were accompanied to the railway station by a throng of friends and well-wishers, most of them, I fancy, more taken with the novelty of such a departure than any real concern for us; but in all it was a cheerful, noisy occasion unclouded by those griefs and regrets customary at partings. I would certainly miss Mr Roberts, of course, and was much touched by his presence on the station and by the large packet of books that he put into my hands by way of a farewell gift.

  ‘I hope very much that we will meet again, Miss Hewitt,’ he said, pressing my hand in farewell. ‘You have been like one of my own daughters to me, and I shall miss your company. But who knows? Perhaps I will see you again quite soon. I am usually in Lucknow sometime during the cold months, and now that Oudh is opening up perhaps I shall have more frequent opportunities of seeking out my friends.’

  ‘And don’t forget—you have been summoned to Hassanganj,’ I laughed, trying to withdraw my hand before Emily observed Mr Roberts’s tender clasp and sorrowful face.

  ‘Ah yes, but that entails a separate journey. However, I do hope you will manage to see the place. That’s the real India for you, Miss Hewitt. Now let me know if there is any way in which I can be of service. Please! You have my address?’

  I said I had, and at last managed to withdraw my hand and climb the steps up to the carriage, but as I leant out of the window to wave, I wondered for a second whether Emily could possibly have been right regarding Mr Roberts. Standing there on the crowded platform, in his neat alpaca suit with his hat in his hand and his hand on his breast, he looked quite mournful as the train drew away.

  Dust flooded in on us as we began to move, and by the end of the journey we were as black as coal miners, our eyes red with hot cinders and our hair gritty with ash. However, all our friends had contributed something towards our comfort, and the carriage was so full of fruit, boxes of sweets, bottled chickens and tinned tongues that there was scarcely room for us, and I was ungrateful enough to wonder what was to be done with all this provender when we had to transfer to dak-gharis at the end of the brief stretch of line. A zinc bathtub, packed with ice and sawdust and containing bottled soda water and half a dozen bottles of moselle, was a wonderful help in allaying our discomfort and in passing the time.

  My recollections of the rest of the journey, when we debouched from the train and took to the road, are not pleasant. Over a week we spent jolting over rutted, unpaved roads, in a sort of wooden box on wheels, ill-sprung and fitted with hard seats specifically designed to leave no bone in the body unbruised. We travelled by night, resting, or trying to rest, by day, in a succession of dingy dak-bungalows, eating badly cooked food in dirty rooms crawling with insects and lou
d with the hum of mosquitoes, sleeping on hard beds under tattered netting, and waking, unrested, to another long night of dust, heat and fatigue. Often we were delayed because we could get no change of horses; the Eurasian in charge of the dak would explain volubly that military men and the servants of the Company had priority on the half-starved, broken-winded beasts available. It was not until the third day’s travelling that we discovered that a judicious bribe could be counted on to transfer the priority to ourselves. Thereafter we got along more quickly, if no more comfortably, while Emily bewailed our lack of official status and the fact that we had no travelling carriage of our own, and Charles inveighed against the prevailing corruption of the populace.

  Our Calcutta servants accompanied us in another ghari—the two ayahs, Charles’s bearer and a water-carrier who, as soon as we halted in the compound of a dak-bungalow for the day, set about heating water for our baths, while the bearer made up beds with our own linen and the ayahs washed and pressed our clothes.

  Just a few months before I would have considered so many attendants unnecessary, but then I had not known the impossibility of getting an Indian servant to perform anything but his own explicit and restricted duties, nor had I seen the veritable retinues of factotums that accompanied ‘old India hands’ on even the briefest of peregrinations. And having sampled the dak-bungalow food, we soon regretted turning down Mrs Chalmers’s suggestion that we should bring along our own cook as well.

  But eventually the journey came to an end, and we found ourselves approaching Lucknow very early on a cool, fresh morning. There had been a shower of rain during the night, so the air was clear and the pale sky luminous in the rays of the rising sun as we drove through country that, though not heavily cultivated, bore every mark of fertility. I was impressed especially by the magnificence of the trees: grand groves of ancient mangoes whose dark foliage shone in the soft light, massive peepuls and long avenues of towering jarmins or feathery sheeshums broke up the stretching plain most pleasingly, lending the whole scene a parklike aspect. Early as it was, the villagers were already astir. Bullock carts, their drivers muffled in cotton sheets, lumbered along rough tracks leading off the road; wells, worked by yoked oxen ambling eternally in a small circle, had begun to creak, and men and women padded silently to their work in the fields, accompanied by long, pale, early-morning shadows.