SHE HAD TO FIND ALEX, and Thekong, and Lily. She had to warn the people gathering at the bandstand. But who could she tell? Who was likely to listen?
They’ll listen to Jeannie. Jeannie is a memsahib. She has authority. She’ll find an officer . . .
Sophie was breathing too fast and her heart was racing. A sour burning rose in her throat.
But they’ll ask Jeannie how she knew. They’ll suspect she is part of the plot. They could arrest her. Jeannie is a spy and spies, even your own, are not to be trusted.
For a long moment she stood frozen, unable to act, unable to cry out, paralyzed by a terrible uncertainty. It was up to her to raise the alarm, whether or not anyone would listen. She had to make someone, anyone, understand — something terrible is about to happen.
Still she wavered, torn by indecision. Her legs felt rooted to the ground. Was it really to happen here, now, at this moment? Surely it could happen tomorrow, next week — or not at all. And sometimes dreams are only dreams. Who would listen to a girl of seventeen with a story of conspiracies and imminent disaster?
But there on the site of the Victoria Memorial was a message written in latticed iron on a sky the colour of blood. And if she hesitated — on Christmas day, at this celebration of a dead English queen, at a monument to England’s fading glory, people were going to die.
She had failed Alex once before, and Alex could have died. It was that thought that sent her racing heedlessly, recklessly, across the grass, shouting a warning to Jeannie over her shoulder, that she could only hope Jeannie would hear and understand.
The bandstand had been set up on a grassy area just outside the Memorial site. As she drew nearer she could hear the band playing a lively march tune. In a long bank of flowers and low shrubbery that curved close to the bandstand, an Indian gardener was deadheading roses. In her haste she might have passed by without a glance, but every nerve in her body was thrumming like a plucked wire, every sense keenly alert. As she went by the rose garden, her scalp prickled with a feeling of wrongness. Perhaps it was nothing more than the gardener’s watchful look as he paused with his pruning knife in his hand.
The regimental band had struck up “Soldiers of the Queen”, and people were thronging close to the stage. Sophie strained to catch sight of Alex, or Lily, or Thekong. Alex would certainly have maneuvered her way to the front of the crowd for a better view, taking Lily and Thekong with her. But Sophie’s view was blocked by a wall of dark jackets, blue and khaki uniforms, bright Sunday frocks.
“Excuse me, please excuse me, please let me through . . . ” Heads turned to look at her with surprise or annoyance as she pushed her way towards the front.
On the bandstand, the soloist in his scarlet bandsman’s tunic sang out in a robust baritone — the old words, because this was a celebration of Queen Victoria, not King George.
It’s the soldiers of the Queen, my lads
Who’ve been, my lads, who’ve seen, my lads
In the fight for England’s glory lads
When we’ve had to show them what we mean:
And when we say we’ve always won
And when they ask us how it’s done
We’ll proudly point to every one
Of England’s soldiers of the Queen.
At last Sophie caught a glimpse of Lily and Thekong. They were standing off to one side of the bandstand where the crowd was thinner, each holding one of Alex’s hands to keep her close. Sophie waved her hat, trying to catch their attention, but now the crowd had shifted, and there were too many heads in the way. “Let me through,” she cried. “Please. I must get through!” Sensing her urgency, people stepped aside to clear a pathway.
As the song ended to enthusiastic applause, Sophie came up behind Thekong and seized him by the arm. He looked round at her in surprise.
“Miss Memsahib?”
“Thekong, take Alex and Lily. Now, quickly, as far away from here as you can.”
The panic in her voice was all the explanation Thekong needed. “Little Memsahib, Lily, come.”
When Alex opened her mouth to protest, Thekong silenced her with a stern look. Tightening his grasp on her hand, his other hand on Lily’s shoulder, he guided them quickly and calmly through the crowd and across the lawn to what Sophie prayed was safety.
The band was playing another march tune.
“Some talk of Alexander, sang the baritone, “some of Hercules,
Of Hector and Lysander, and such great names as these.
But of all the world’s great heroes, there’s none that can compare.
With a tow, row, row, row, row, row, to the British Grenadiers.”
The sun was low in the west now; dusk was settling across the Maidan.
For Sophie, the air seemed to hum with tension, with a dreadful imminence. But the people in the crowd were relaxed and high-spirited on this holiday evening, some tapping their feet and singing along with the chorus.
She turned to look over their heads, across the broad expanse of lawn that swept away into the gathering dark, and closer at hand, to the shadowy rose garden that curved around the bandstand. The gardener was gone.
And then she saw the small point of flame, the bright flicker in the long grass, moving from the near edge of the rose bed, from the place where the gardener had stood waiting for his signal. A lit fuse was advancing steadily toward the bandstand and the cheerful, unsuspecting crowd.
Something terrible is going to happen.
It was happening now.
The flame was racing through the grass. Sophie fought down an overpowering urge to turn and run. Unbidden and unwelcome the thought came: when the world erupts in flame, what do you feel in that first second — in that instant of time before there is nothing?
Heart thudding, she raced up the steps at the side of the bandstand. The band, without missing a beat of “The British Grenadiers,” regarded her with polite astonishment. The bandmaster turned his head to look down at her, eyebrows raised.
With all the authority she could manage, with the firm and confident voice of a memsahib, she said, “You must ask everyone to leave.” And she drew his attention to the small flame in the dark grass, still some distance off but advancing steadily towards the bandstand.
The bandmaster lowered his baton, gestured to the musicians, and the music dwindled into silence. He turned to face the onlookers. “Ladies and gentleman,” he said, “We have a situation here. I must ask you to clear the area, as quickly as possible.”
Quickly, but with no sign of panic, the bandsmen gathered up their instruments while the audience began to disperse. Such situations, such sudden orders to clear an area, were a part of Calcutta life.
“Has someone got a knife?” The bandmaster’s voice was calm but urgent. No one responded. Sophie, sick with anticipation as she watched the moving flame, thought, if only someone was carrying a sword.
The bassoonist said, “Will this do the trick?” and reaching into his instrument case he drew out what Sophie guessed was his reed-trimming knife.
“In a pinch,” Sophie heard the bandmaster say as he seized the knife. He leaped down from the stand and seconds before the flame could make its way into the dark space beneath the bandstand, he severed the fuse.
Dizzy with relief, Sophie felt her legs give way. One of the drummers caught her arm and she leaned against him for support.
“Well done, Miss,” she heard the drummer say. But she was uncomfortably aware that the bandmaster was giving her a deeply puzzled look.