It took Jacqua only a few minutes to learn what was afoot: the troops had raided Mr Innes’s house, in the Creek Factory, and had caught him in flagrante, unloading opium from a ship’s cutter. They had then arrested the men in the boat, amongst whom were two locals, who had served as guides. The rest of the crew were lascars and they too were now to be incarcerated in a chowki inside the walled city!

The two guides were bruised in body and their clothes were torn to bits. The lascars were unmolested but they too made a pitiable sight, in their bare feet and their thin cotton pyjamas and kurtis, with nothing to protect them from the cold but the bandhnas around their heads and the cumblies over their shoulders. They must have been gubbrowed out of their wits but they did not show it: they seemed stoic and resigned, in the usual Achha way. Even though I knew them to be smugglers and richly deserving of their fate I confess I could not help feeling some pity as I watched them shuffling along, with their eyes lowered: what would I have done, I wondered, were I in their place, surrounded by an angry crowd, in a strange city, being led off to a Celestial prison?

With Jacqua’s help I pushed my way to the front of the crowd, which had in the meanwhile been pressing closer and closer to the guardsmen and their captives. The paltan was now entering Old China Street and in passing through this defile I was pushed abreast of one of the lascars. He was lean of build, but sturdy-looking and although he was hanging his head like the others, I had the impression he was quite young. I was close enough to see that the grimy bandhna around his head was a worn and faded gamchha, and this led me to wonder whether he might not be from Bengal, as lascars often are.

The clamour of the crowd seemed to grow louder as we passed through the shaded confines of the street. This distracted the guards and I was able to push still closer to the young lascar: I could see only the side of his face, but something about the cut of his jaw led me to think I had seen him somewhere before. The crowd was so thick I could not get a good look at him – but I swear to you, from where I stood he looked very much like that ‘brother’ of yours: your beloved Jodu.

But you must not worry, Puggly dear. In the first place I cannot be sure of who the boy was; and Jacqua assures me anyway that ‘cuttee head’ is not to be the fate of those lascars (I confess I had begged him to inquire, for this thought had not eluded me …) – but no, you may be assured it will not come to that; they have merely been incarcerated in the citadel.