Free The Ravi Lancers by John Masters Page B

Daulat-i-Inglesiya, Faithful Ally of the British Government.
    A crash of thunder shook and rattled the new glass window in its frame, and lightning blazed like white fire over Mr. Fleming, Ranjitsinhji, and the small brass statue of the Lord Krishna embracing his mistress, the graceful Radha, on the mantelpiece.
     

August 1914
     
    ‘Next detail, ready! ‘ the rissaldar barked, and the eight sowars snapped to attention on the firing point. ‘Number!’
    ‘Detail, lying--load!’ The men sprang forward and down into the lying position. The bolts clicked, the rounds crunched home. Warren Bateman, walking up and down behind the raised earth platform of the firing point, heard the buzz of the field telephone. The signaller on duty picked it up and said, ‘ Butts-men tayyar hain, rissaldar-sahib .’
    The rissaldar acknowledged the information with a raised hand and gave the next order. ‘Five rounds grouping--fire! ‘
    Monsoon clouds hung like bloated parti-coloured balloons over the ranges and the muddy fields and green trees that spread all round. Rain was falling on the city a couple of miles to the west and on the cantonments just behind him. Soon it would be raining here, too, and the men would be more depressed than ever. The annual course had to be fired, but Warren thought that in the circumstances it would be better to have postponed it for a time and taken the regiment out on a six-day route march, even though it would have had to be on foot. Anthrax, at this moment above all, when the division was mobilizing with frantic speed, to go first of all Indian troops to the war! And this regiment to be its spearhead, its cavalry arm to search and probe far ahead of the trudging infantry, to protect them against enemy infiltration, to be their eyes and their shield! It was a far more interesting role for the independently minded officer than service in an all-cavalry formation, endlessly practising the charge, endlessly extolling the arme blanche . . .
    And now, a hundred horses already shot and burned, the ashes buried, the others under the strictest quarantine--the 44th Bengal Lancers had simply been wiped out as a cavalry unit, as effectively as though someone had cut the page out of the Indian Army List. The immediate fact was bad enough, seen in the context of the orders for mobilization received six hours before the outbreak was discovered; but the prospect before them was even more bleak. All the remounts available were wanted for the regiments in the Indian Cavalry Corps, and those on the North West Frontier. What on earth could they do with the men until horses were somehow found?
    The banging of musketry continued. The squadron was firing badly, he noted. No good shouting at them--that never helped a man to aim or fire better. They were upset, and it showed.
    A sowar carrying a silver-headed cane marched smartly up and saluted. ‘Colonel-sahib salaam bholta, sahib. Daftar men.’
    Warren returned the salute, calling, ‘Rissaldar-sahib, mujhe daftar-ka jana hai,’ and headed towards the cantonments. It was a mile down a dusty track and the sun was hot and the air damp, for it was nearly ten o’clock. Sweat darkened the back of Warren’s khaki shirt and the top of his breeches under his Sam Browne. He wondered what the colonel wanted him for. He couldn’t think of any crimes of omission or commission, but in the army one never knew. Colonels saw or imagined things their own way, according to their own rules. But it couldn’t be very bad or he’d have been told to appear wearing belt and sabre.
    In the outer office the adjutant rose to salute him as he entered and Warren said, ‘What does the CO want me for, do you know, Rouse?’
    ‘He’ll tell you,’ the adjutant said, with a half smile. ‘Go straight in.’
    Warren opened the colonel’s door and walked in. ‘You sent for me, sir?’
    ‘Yes. Sit down, Bateman ...’ The colonel sat back in his big chair behind the big desk. He was a tall burly