‘Colonel Hervey, it is good to see you again. Or is it “General”?’

The enquiry might be innocent enough, but it might also suggest remarkable intelligence (of his coming command of the field force). ‘Colonel, Your Highness.’

‘I observed the chase keenly, Colonel. I hope you enjoyed it. It was close run.’

He wasn’t sure if she meant with the boar or the rissaldar, but he wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. ‘A noble beast, Highness.’

‘Your horse is fatigued, let me find you another.’

‘Thank you, ma’am, but she’ll recover soon enough. She has bottom, as we say.’

The Ranee smiled again. ‘I had thought your daughter might accompany you this morning.’

‘I hope I may have the honour of presenting her later, Your Highness. Meanwhile, may I present my good friend Captain Fairbrother of His Majesty’s Cape Mounted Rifles.’

He beckoned his good friend forward, and they went through the formalities again. Suneyla was all politeness.

She asked how long they intended staying. ‘I understand there will be matters requiring attention with the sad death of Mr Weller.’

‘There will, Your Highness, but not, I think, detaining us much more than a week,’ said Hervey.

‘Then I look forward to the pleasure of your company in that time, and of your daughter, and of course Captain Fairbrother. You will dine with us this evening, I trust.’

‘Thank you, ma’am.’

‘Oh, and while you are in Chintal, I hope you will take opportunity to visit with Colonel Bell – you recall? He came to assist my late father. He is old now, and rather – as you say’ (she smiled as she turned the phrase) ‘infirm, but I believe he would wish a visit by a fellow-countryman.’

Hervey had met Colonel Bell but once. Evidently he’d taken residence, though this was the first he’d heard of it. Yet what interest could Suneyla have in such a man, who was plainly no longer of use to her – not, at least, the use for which he’d first come to Chintalpore, command of troops?

Curious, too, that she singled him out for mention now, rather than later.

He would speak with Fairbrother.

XVIII

The Tamasha

Later

Hundreds upon hundreds of candles: they filled the marbled dining hall with the warmest light and most pleasing of perfume. The guests, a good many in addition to Hervey’s party, sat on cushions at a table laid with a gold cloth and jewelled dishes of pomegranates and jujubes. Hervey sat on the Ranee’s right, the place of honour, just as on the first occasion he’d sat in the place of honour next to her father the rajah. To his right was the sirdar, all affability; on the Ranee’s left, the brooding presence of the dewan, Ashok Acharya, first minister and keeper of the treasury. Musicians in the gallery played lively ragas, and a steady procession of khitmagars brought yet more delights for the table: oranges, peeled and dusted with ginger, finger-lengths of sugar cane, figs and mangoes. This was the Indian way, he’d told Georgiana beforehand. Whereas in England a feast could not begin with sweet things, sweetness being earned by progression through much sourness – as in life itself – in India it was different, for those at the banquet table had earned their title to indulgence in this incarnation through preparation in earlier ones. Or so Suneyla’s father had explained. (Only later did he learn that it was a doctrine in which the rajah did not believe.)