lallison
03-18-2010, 02:48 AM
I came to India by choice. My other choice was to live out the remainder of my life among the cutthroats dumped in Sydney when England emptied her prisons there. No one but a brigand would live in New South Whales. It’s better than prison, no doubt, and spending the day in leg irons, savoring a morsel of crud. No, I would have chosen Sydney, but the offer of paying my debt through service in His Majesty’s Royal Army and marching over India seemed a better fate. The conditions stated that my service would end after ten years, with me a free man. I had also long savored a curiosity about the stories of this place, stories brimming with deities, mythical beasts, desert nomads, and peaks as tall as the sun. Such stories blew in across the ocean with the tea. This I wanted to see myself more than I desired to spend my days tangled like the filthy mustaches of the street brawlers in Sydney.
For most of the year Delhi is not such a horrid place. From the sandstone house of government where I stand guard one can see the streets alive with commerce. Carts dart among the alleys and are crammed into lines in places, waiting for the cursed cows to get out of the dung befouled streets. In the early mornings an eerie chant rolls out from the minarets above Jama Masjid, the great mosque, and blankets the buildings with its call as followers prostrate themselves on their rooftops. After dark the bells of the Hindu temples dotting the hill tops clang relentlessly. Priests carry their flame from idol to idol and ignite the food at the feet of their many handed gods.
No, for much of the year Delhi is not so bad, the soldier’s haunts are not so dismal or unfriendly. But come the month of April, the cobbled streets begin to bake in the sun and the pounding of heat on the brain causes the eye to see strange things, like mirages drifting up from the pavement in the shape of streams, or even the frame of a young woman smiling and dancing around the edge of a corner. If you were to follow her, you would find only a crowded market, and would be greeted only with smiles from those trying to persuade you to purchase their goods.
So when the weather becomes so hostile to a man’s mind that he can not go about his days in peace and begins to toast misery to his fellow, this is the time to seek a different climate, to break camp and to move on to greener places. And every April, when the soldiers make their joke that the governor’s wife has become so uncomfortable from the weather that the complaints from the men at having to carry her into the shady hills of Shimla are more tolerable than the complaints of the governor’s family if they are not carried, we all pack our necessities and head by train, by foot and by horseback toward our second home in the Himalaya.
Once the governor gives his command there is still time to relax, time to spend your last days with the friends you’ve made at your favorite haunts. There is time for the agents in their offices to finish their business, and then there is time for them to pack their papers and those things which they can not do without for the summer. After these preparations, which can take more than a week, then it is time for the soldiers and the porters to obey their orders and to carry the packings onto the cars of the train. The steam trip north to Shahabad is a mere eighteen hours, and if the weather is friendly, in another three days we will have unloaded and prepared the wagons, the horses and the footmen for the trip into the hills.
The road into the mountains is the difficult leg of our journey. Rumor always predicts we shall lose a few men to disease or exhaustion and sometimes we do. After the first hours the jaunting pain to the knees under the weight of the pack begins to spread through the back and the muscles of the thighs, but the pain fades as the days pass. As I have said, there are always rumors of disease, and indeed there are always men who find their way onto the sick beds in the backs of the wagons, but never have I seen disease halt us on our journey, or bring us to a standstill, or even raise the eyebrows of the commanding officers until now.
I’ve visited Shimla thrice before, and although the journey is hell, lugging myself up a mountain, down the back side and up another, once arriving I always enjoy the climate and atmosphere of our summer town. This is why I requested to leave with the first party, to get the traveling through and help make the first preparations for the summer establishment. The opening days passed as expected. There was little to discern other than the dreary trudge up the hill through the evergreens. The slapping of the horses, the groaning of the men and the incessant squealing of the cart wheels seemed to frighten away even the most ravenous beast. Indeed, rarely would the song of a sparrow break the monotony.
And yet rumors spread throughout the company as they did each year. But on this occasion they seemed somehow more hostile to the ear, more serious, and to more distinctly evoke eminent doom. The colonel, it was said, had fallen ill, collapsed and broken into a deadly fever, his arms and neck blanketed by a hungry rash. His doctor had collapsed under similar circumstances and the lieutenant was beginning to succumb. It had been days since we had seen our commanding officers, but this was not unusual. Still, I did not rest easy.
More rumors spread, this time they told of death, that many had begun to collapse and that there was a mutiny in the ranks. That morning a party with a wagon rolled back downwards towards the roads we had come in on. When asked what their business was, there was a reply that they were under special instruction from the colonel, so we let them roll. It was when our entire party stopped mid-afternoon without order and there was no command issued down the line, but only a confusion of voices that slowly rose into the air, that I understood there was truth in the soldiers’ talk.
Far to the front of us the hammer of a gun thundered. A second recoil was followed by yelling men. More fire broke out. Our captain commanded us to form lines and we waited at the ready position with our hearts outpacing the unknown. Then nothing, it was more than an hour before we were permitted to desist and rest. When the command came to pitch camp for the day the sun still hung in the brightness of the afternoon.
These uncanny happenings did little to quash the fears of the soldiers, and I myself, a man not prone to put faith in rumor or even stir a shoulder in sleep, I began to fear skullduggery was afoot, something black and portentous which the officers wished not the men to hear. Late in that sleepless night a whisper rolled like beetles feet through the tents. Three Wagons were turning back toward Shahabad, rolling down the slopes. Indeed, we all looked out and made them in the dim starlight above the pine. They were flanked by a guard of ghoulish looking men in uniforms. I recognized none. They seemed cadaverous on the backs of their horses.
At dawn there was no call from the bugle. I slipped into my trousers and went to see what the orders were. The camp was restless with crowds of men strolling through the companies. I walked to a fellow to find out what was the word, but I stopped out of reach when I saw his stare. Where his eyes should be white they were yellow, like a sick hound, and he spat red foam down his chin. His neck was a rash of red whelps, and he reached for me with trembling hands. I did not try to catch him as he fell forward. His body palsied in a fit as it whipped up the dust.
I recognized the distant calls as yells for help and screams of fear. There were men trying to stand who couldn’t, men trying to crawl from their tents who were hindered by some invisible menace seeming to grip at their heels. Many of those who could still walk had slung on their packs and were headed back on the road. I paused to digest the tragedy. There was no commander. There were no commands, only the rambling of dieing men. I stuffed what I could into my canvas sack, wrapped it over my shoulder and followed the deserters.
Finally free from the troubling sight of my comrades brooding over the slopes of our camp, I recognized a friend sitting at the road side. He was a native of Himydal Pradesh, a porter with whom I had spent many an evening carousing along the streets of Old Delhi. We had seen more than a few tight spots and had squeezed through them together, many on evenings when perhaps we should not have been so carefree. Sitting on his rock, he was sullen with forehead in hand when I approached.
“Are you ill,” I said from a few paces.
“Jeremy? It is good to see you, my friend.” he breathed deeply, “There are Rakshasa nearby. I am tired. I must sit a moment.”
“Its good fate for us to meet, but it would be best if we rested further down the road. Danger is not far from this place.”
He stood uneasily and we walked together. “There have been rumors of plague for days now,” I told him.
“Yes, among the infantry.”
“How could it be true? An English company wiped out by a sickness on the road to Shimla. It is unheard of.”
“No my friend, in India we say Drakalki, the breath of Khali. It is the sickness that ends the journey. This thing is well known among the people of my village. Few have seen it and returned to tell us. It is whispered when we hear of parties disappearing after leaving a village. I believe Rakshasa, the dark spirits, have wondered among us here.”
We walked for some time in silence before he spoke again. “I am ill. I can feel it. My village is not far and I will return there. There is a man who understands the sicknesses. He is the best hope for me.” He paused, “And for you as well, perhaps.”
I pondered the suggestion without speaking, but followed him off the road and onto a footpath winding along a brush covered ridge. We walked through the morning and into the afternoon, stopping once to finish what rations we had between us, and twice to recover after he collapsed. After each fall he lay on the rocky trail and I feared he would not revive, but I shook him, helped him to his feet, and we trudged on. It was near sunset when we walked into the village, his arm around my shoulder, much of his weight laying against me. His eyes had become glazed. As we neared the wooden homes a crowd of children gathered, followed by a group of men who ushered him into a nearby home. Another man took my arm, guided me thought a door and bid me rest on a cushion.
I have learned little of the native tongue spoken in Delhi and nothing of those spoken in the far regions. When the village men came to talk there was no comprehension between us. I was able to gain no news of my friend. They brought water and a mandi and bid I bathe in the local fashion. After my bath I was given food and drink. When at last I came to lie again on the cushion it seemed that every part of my body began to ache. The pain was severe. It burnt even the sockets of my eyes and fogged my sight. I had a vague realization that I was being overtaken by the sickness. At first there was anger. That did not last long for the shivering began to start. Soon it was not the sickness that I cursed, but my body’s stubbornness at clinging to this miserable existence. For that time all I could perceive of life was wretchedness: past, present and future. Death, which I had feared so often, seemed no longer a menace. It was at that point that a detached state overtook me, and what I can remember of the following events seems as if I was watching as a bystander from a smoky corner.
They placed my body onto a wooden shield the size of a table and carried it through the village paths and into another house. Here was my porter friend, lying on a floor pad in the lantern light. His eyes stared up into the dark and there was the sound of sobbing women around me. The men placed my body near his. For some distance in time, I can not say how far, the commotion of the room came and faded like storm noise heard from inside a deep mountain hollow. I drifted there like a boat on a river, rolling with its current towards a void where the sky could not be distinguished from the earth. My shoulders and toes began to succumb to a cold caress. My thoughts were emptied in the darkness. Then a voice came with such solid force that I was able to grasp onto it and pull myself back into the room.
The voice belonged to a native man. It was English, but the accent was heavy and unusual, even to one accustomed to India. I stared at his face. The deep currents of the river I had dreamt seemed etched in his cheeks. His hair was white and as wispy as the foam at the boat’s bow.
“Wake up English soldier. Open your eyes and listen. The dark spirit is among us. You carry it in your chest. Already it has taken the life of Rupesh. He should not have brought death here. Nor should he have brought you. You both mean death for us. You bring disease to all who behold you, to any who breathe the same air. If you die, the spirit will pass among us all. It will infect us. We will appease the Rakshasa that gnaws in your blood. Then you will leave this place and carry your pestilence far from here. You will die alone in a mountain gorge where the spirit will not harm us. There the Rakshasa will sink into the earth, bringing with him your eternal soul. Now lie still. Hold this beneath your tongue.” He opened his hand and showed me a small, ivory charm in the shape of a Sanskrit character. He squeezed my jaw and stuck the charm sharply into position. “I will heal you,” he said, “by taking the life of another. The spirit of Rupesh’s child will imprison the Rakshasa inside you, where it can not do harm to another.”
With these words the man brought his hand to his forehead and revealed that he was now clutching a curved knife. I watched as he placed the blade against my shoulder and drew it across my skin to my chest. I could feel nothing. Through the shadows of the room came two men carrying what I thought at first was a kicking animal, but as they brought it close I could see it was a young girl, perhaps eight years old. Her eyes were lit the darkness around her tawny face. I watched as they forced her head to the floor, pulling it by a clump of tangled hair. There was a low chanting voice joined by another and another. The light seemed to fade from the room and all I heard was the high pitched, convulsive heaving of a child’s chest.
***
I can remember nothing of the events that occurred between when the men brought the child into the room and the time when I awoke. It was morning, but how many days had passed I can not say, for it seemed somehow longer than a single night. I opened my eyes to a dreary half light seeping in through the doorway. A mist, thin like steam, drifted throughout the room. Outside was the sound of animals: an insect’s chirp, the soft low of the cows. The pain that had vibrated through every muscle was now gone. I had no sweat or stiffness from fever and felt well rested as if having awoken from a long and peaceful sleep.
I sat up, gazed about the room and realized with a shudder that it was strewn with the bodies of the native people who had brought me in. They looked contorted, expressions of horror etched into their countenance, their eyes starring out, flat and empty, and a dark rash prickling their flesh wherever it was exposed. I stood quickly, found my shirt and dressed, for I was eager to be gone from this place. I feared the same fate would strike me.
Moving towards the door I heard a sound from behind, a soft moan. I turned and after a moment of scanning the room I realized that it had come from the young girl, Rupesh’s daughter. I examined the body and found she still had breath in her. I cradled her and carried her with me out the door.
The scene outside was better only in that there was life in the greenness from the pines and there was stirring from the livestock that roamed throughout the village. But here and there were gruesome bodies similar to those I had seen in the house. I knew we could not stay here. I saw no sign of life and although the breathing of the girl gave me hope that there would be others, those I examined were beyond rescue. As I searched the grounds I found a rucksack that could be thrown over my shoulder and I stuffed it with warm blankets, wooden matches, lintels, and water. The food and water I feared were contaminated, and I planned to exchange them at first chance, but I had to make due with what was available. I made a cradle for the girl out of one of the blankets and tied the corners around my neck and shoulder to help me support her weight.
There were many paths surrounding the village. I could not remember from which direction we had come. Finally I opted to take the widest path. This path appeared to be the most well-trodden. I hoped it would take us to another settlement where we could get more supplies and directions back to the road to Shimla.
This decision proved to be a poor one, and the logic I used to make it was without merit. The path wound incessantly up into the mountains, growing narrow in places and often following along treacherous ridges. Our best fortune was that we regularly came upon brooks or streams of water trickling down from the higher country. The water was a grey color and carried sediment. I had seen this phenomenon before and guessed it was the product of melted glaciers. The taste was not pleasant, but it kept us alive.
Hours passed into days. The weight of the girl and our supplies was a heavy burden. It took its toll on the muscles of my legs and my back, which began to ache almost intolerably. The girl seemed to be waning in a state of semi-consciousness. When I pressed the water to her lips, she drank. When I spooned the lentils to her mouth, she ate. On occasion she would open her eyes and stare up into my face with a sorrowful look. When she did this it filled my heart with both pity and dread. In her eyes seemed almost the look of accusation. I guessed she was week with illness, and yet she showed no symptoms of fever or rash. I made sure she ate and drank enough to sustain her body, and prayed she would regain strength before long. But often, while trudging up the endless hills, my mind wandered back into that dark room where I had laid helpless with fever, and where I had first seen this girl that was now my companion. What had the old native man said? I remembered, and yet I could never believe.
I tried not to think too hard about the mystery I was leaving behind. What had happened to our troops? It was surely a strange tale, and one I would spend many a night mouthing in a tavern once I reached Shimla. There would be time later to ponder the events of the village, but before I spent too much effort solving the mystery of my own survival, I had to ensure that I was to survive.
Three days passed in this manner. Our supply of food was beginning to dwindle. We had passed no sign of any human settlement. The girl was showing no improvement. I was beginning to entertain the notion that hope of our survival was little. During the hour before the sun was to sink below the now snow capped peaks, as I walked looking for a nice place to build a fire and camp, the path emerged into a bald spot in the trees. From there I was able to survey the surrounding area, and what I saw made my heart leap for we were standing above a magnificent sight that I immediately recognized as a place I had seen before.
In the valley wedged between the surrounding mountains was an immense glacier. It gave the appearance of a frozen plane that stretched far onto the horizon, rolling over entire mountains in its center. It sprawled wider as it went into the distance, covering everything in its path. The white plane had the insidious appearance of being gentle and rolling, like a colorless, sand desert, but I had heard stories that beneath the snow were crevices large enough to swallow a wagon. I recognized this glacier as one I had seen on an excursion from Shimla a year earlier. It was a day’s walk from the town. The difference was that I had seen it only from the perspective viewed above the opposite side of the valley. We would have to attempt a crossing to reach our destination.
The air was chilled that night, but our fire lasted well into the early hours of the morning. The girl seemed to rest peacefully without a stir, as she had every night since we had left her village. I slept little and tried to remember what I could about the glacier. I knew that men had gone onto the ice to get a close look, but as far as I was aware, no one had ever attempted to cross. Crossing a glacier was a dangerous endeavor because of the questionable stability of every step and the deep gaps hidden beneath the snow. The far side was no short distance. It was almost impossible to judge as the sheer vastness of the seen made the scope appear smaller than it really was. Midway to our destination was a lifeless, icy monolith of rock protruding high out of the snow. I estimated I would be able to reach this rock and perhaps find shelter for the night if the crossing proved too much for one day, which was likely.
The next morning as I was packing our meager supplies I found a long, solid staff with which I judged I would be able to use to test the firmness of the ground before each step, so as to avoid tumbling into a hole. The journey down to the ice took a long portion of the morning. As I stood at its edge and gazed out I was struck by the enormity of the scene and just how difficult the task I was setting out on would be.
There was a cold wind cutting across the top of the glacier. It stirred the snow and whipped it across my face. I had no gloves, and my socks were soiled and torn from the days of walking I had already done. The ice was solid, but in some places the snow covering it would give way a few inches and cover my boot. Before I would set a foot forward, I tested the spot with my staff to be sure nothing was hidden beneath the covering. On two occasions I uncovered deep holes. How deep, I can not say, but the path I made around them was at least forty feet on both occasions.
From above, the snow had looked clear and had glittered in the sun. But now, with it resting just below my feet as I crunched through, I realized that it was mixed with sediment. The sun’s glare reflected into my eyes and was at times painful. I could feel the sting of sunburn on my face before mid-day. There was no place to sit and rest. On a few occasions I simply sat on the ice to collect my strength for a moment. I was slowly becoming exhausted, but the towering rock that was my destination grew ever closer.
By late afternoon I was there, and we were both still alive. I could feel the girl’s warm breath just beneath my chin. I made my way along the edge of the rock monolith, looking for some place that might give us shelter for the night. I judged the distance to the far side of the glacier would be a shorter journey from here than the distance I had already covered. Still, I was tired to my last bit of strength, and it would be impossible to complete the crossing before dark. It would be much better to wait out the night and start fresh and well rested the next day.
I found a deep notch that we could fit into on the rock’s far side. Its floor and walls were still wrapped in ice and snow, but it provided a place to rest protected from the wind which was blowing at the monolith’s back side. I unpacked the blankets and fed the girl. We huddled together for warmth and I soon fell asleep.
Rarely have I fallen so deeply and so strongly into the world of dreams. In the vision, I awoke alone in the notch. There was blackness all around and I could feel the ice against my cheek and ear. There was no moon and no cloud, but a gathering of stars broadly spattered above the shadows of the surrounding Himalaya.
There was no wind as I stepped out onto the glacier. In the strange, still darkness the ice felt smooth beneath my feet. So strange it was and so real that I bent to touch it, and I felt the texture of glass frozen beneath my finger tips. As I looked in amazement, the ground seemed to be reflecting the pin pricks of the stars. They glistened and glittered far below the surface. Some of them seemed to draw closer, and as I watched they seemed almost to weave from side to side as they shimmered.
As I stood in stunned revelry, peering at the lights above and below the glass as far as the eye could see. I heard a whisper break in the chilled air. The sound was that of a hiss, made by a tongue pressing the roof of the mouth. I felt no wind. Then a soft voice startled me from behind.
“I also wish to live,” it said.
I turned and saw, standing only a few feet away, the young girl I had carried for four days through the mountains and across the ice. She looked rigid and strangely illuminated. Her brown face that I had gazed upon so often seemed eerily pale. Her hair waved out behind her neck and fell onto her back. I stood and stared in awe, for she appeared more phantom than girl.
She spoke again,“I also wish to live.”
The event was mysterious and at the time it did not even strike me as odd that this native child was speaking to me in perfect English. Beyond that and the shock of the fantastic scene that lay before my eyes, I was taken by her words, for they seemed both pleading and accusatory. My first assumption was that she had recovered somewhat, but was still sick and delusional.
“Are you cold?” I said. “You should be beneath the blankets.”
“Will you give it back?” she asked. I thought she meant the blanket I was huddled in.
“Yes, take this. Come, let’s sit down at the camp.” I took the blanket from my shoulders and made to wrap her in it, but what she said next stopped me with a force as if I had been struck.
“Will you give me back my soul?”
Fear overtook me and I recalled the words of the old man that horrible night at the village: The spirit of Rupesh’s child will imprison the Rakshasa inside you. You will die alone in a mountain gorge.
“Come, wear this blanket. Let’s go and rest until morning.” I made to wrap the blanket around her and as I did, she was gone. She simply wasn’t there. The noise of an animal howl echoed across the ice. When I turned to go back to my resting place she was standing just behind me.
“Will you give it back?” she said.
“You’re going to be just fine. Let’s return to our camp and rest. There’s nothing to worry. You’re going to be just fine.”
“Will you give it back? I can not live with out it. I see it now in your chest, in your arms. Will you give it back?”
I was tempted to say “yes,” for she was so delusional it seemed the only way to satisfy her and bring her back to safety. But the words froze up, and I only reached out again to wrap her in the blanket. Again she was gone in the blink of an eye.
At this point I felt seriously unnerved. I walked quickly back to the notch in the rock where we had rested, hoping to find the girl there, but when I arrived there was no one. I huddled in the blanket myself and turned to look out at the landscape. She was just behind me, looking at me with those sorrow-filled eyes as I crouched with my back to the icy granite.
“I need it,” she said. She extended one arm and began to take a step closer as if she was trying to touch my chest. At this I was so unnerved that, even though it was only a dream, I still question my actions and whether I made a gravely wrong choice. But one can hardly be held accountable for their actions within a dream.
“No,” I shrieked. “I want to live.” Her arm dropped, her eyes welled up with tears, and she was gone.
I awoke from the nightmare as the sun was breaking the horizon. Immediately, I looked to the girl. Her body was rigid. Her skin was strangely white and cool, like the rock we rested in. There was no breath in her cheeks, no pulse in her chest. She had not survived the night. After some time sitting quietly with her, pondering what would be the best course of action, I buried her beneath the snow and moved on.
Without the additional weight it was not difficult to make it across the ice. I did it quickly and was half way up the other side of the valley by evening. I made camp and the next day I arrived in Shimla. Other parties of soldiers and bureaucrats had already arrived and India’s government was already in place and functioning. I reported to the military headquarters and told the story of our company. Few soldiers from my party had survived the strange illness. I explained what had happened to me, but left out the old man in the village and the young girl, for fear that they would think I was delusional. I was quarantined for weeks, but after a time it seemed I was in perfect health. Better health, perhaps, than I have been in since I was a very young man. Eventually I was released from the hospital, after weeks of examination, and I began to go about my duties as a soldier.
For most of the year Delhi is not such a horrid place. From the sandstone house of government where I stand guard one can see the streets alive with commerce. Carts dart among the alleys and are crammed into lines in places, waiting for the cursed cows to get out of the dung befouled streets. In the early mornings an eerie chant rolls out from the minarets above Jama Masjid, the great mosque, and blankets the buildings with its call as followers prostrate themselves on their rooftops. After dark the bells of the Hindu temples dotting the hill tops clang relentlessly. Priests carry their flame from idol to idol and ignite the food at the feet of their many handed gods.
No, for much of the year Delhi is not so bad, the soldier’s haunts are not so dismal or unfriendly. But come the month of April, the cobbled streets begin to bake in the sun and the pounding of heat on the brain causes the eye to see strange things, like mirages drifting up from the pavement in the shape of streams, or even the frame of a young woman smiling and dancing around the edge of a corner. If you were to follow her, you would find only a crowded market, and would be greeted only with smiles from those trying to persuade you to purchase their goods.
So when the weather becomes so hostile to a man’s mind that he can not go about his days in peace and begins to toast misery to his fellow, this is the time to seek a different climate, to break camp and to move on to greener places. And every April, when the soldiers make their joke that the governor’s wife has become so uncomfortable from the weather that the complaints from the men at having to carry her into the shady hills of Shimla are more tolerable than the complaints of the governor’s family if they are not carried, we all pack our necessities and head by train, by foot and by horseback toward our second home in the Himalaya.
Once the governor gives his command there is still time to relax, time to spend your last days with the friends you’ve made at your favorite haunts. There is time for the agents in their offices to finish their business, and then there is time for them to pack their papers and those things which they can not do without for the summer. After these preparations, which can take more than a week, then it is time for the soldiers and the porters to obey their orders and to carry the packings onto the cars of the train. The steam trip north to Shahabad is a mere eighteen hours, and if the weather is friendly, in another three days we will have unloaded and prepared the wagons, the horses and the footmen for the trip into the hills.
The road into the mountains is the difficult leg of our journey. Rumor always predicts we shall lose a few men to disease or exhaustion and sometimes we do. After the first hours the jaunting pain to the knees under the weight of the pack begins to spread through the back and the muscles of the thighs, but the pain fades as the days pass. As I have said, there are always rumors of disease, and indeed there are always men who find their way onto the sick beds in the backs of the wagons, but never have I seen disease halt us on our journey, or bring us to a standstill, or even raise the eyebrows of the commanding officers until now.
I’ve visited Shimla thrice before, and although the journey is hell, lugging myself up a mountain, down the back side and up another, once arriving I always enjoy the climate and atmosphere of our summer town. This is why I requested to leave with the first party, to get the traveling through and help make the first preparations for the summer establishment. The opening days passed as expected. There was little to discern other than the dreary trudge up the hill through the evergreens. The slapping of the horses, the groaning of the men and the incessant squealing of the cart wheels seemed to frighten away even the most ravenous beast. Indeed, rarely would the song of a sparrow break the monotony.
And yet rumors spread throughout the company as they did each year. But on this occasion they seemed somehow more hostile to the ear, more serious, and to more distinctly evoke eminent doom. The colonel, it was said, had fallen ill, collapsed and broken into a deadly fever, his arms and neck blanketed by a hungry rash. His doctor had collapsed under similar circumstances and the lieutenant was beginning to succumb. It had been days since we had seen our commanding officers, but this was not unusual. Still, I did not rest easy.
More rumors spread, this time they told of death, that many had begun to collapse and that there was a mutiny in the ranks. That morning a party with a wagon rolled back downwards towards the roads we had come in on. When asked what their business was, there was a reply that they were under special instruction from the colonel, so we let them roll. It was when our entire party stopped mid-afternoon without order and there was no command issued down the line, but only a confusion of voices that slowly rose into the air, that I understood there was truth in the soldiers’ talk.
Far to the front of us the hammer of a gun thundered. A second recoil was followed by yelling men. More fire broke out. Our captain commanded us to form lines and we waited at the ready position with our hearts outpacing the unknown. Then nothing, it was more than an hour before we were permitted to desist and rest. When the command came to pitch camp for the day the sun still hung in the brightness of the afternoon.
These uncanny happenings did little to quash the fears of the soldiers, and I myself, a man not prone to put faith in rumor or even stir a shoulder in sleep, I began to fear skullduggery was afoot, something black and portentous which the officers wished not the men to hear. Late in that sleepless night a whisper rolled like beetles feet through the tents. Three Wagons were turning back toward Shahabad, rolling down the slopes. Indeed, we all looked out and made them in the dim starlight above the pine. They were flanked by a guard of ghoulish looking men in uniforms. I recognized none. They seemed cadaverous on the backs of their horses.
At dawn there was no call from the bugle. I slipped into my trousers and went to see what the orders were. The camp was restless with crowds of men strolling through the companies. I walked to a fellow to find out what was the word, but I stopped out of reach when I saw his stare. Where his eyes should be white they were yellow, like a sick hound, and he spat red foam down his chin. His neck was a rash of red whelps, and he reached for me with trembling hands. I did not try to catch him as he fell forward. His body palsied in a fit as it whipped up the dust.
I recognized the distant calls as yells for help and screams of fear. There were men trying to stand who couldn’t, men trying to crawl from their tents who were hindered by some invisible menace seeming to grip at their heels. Many of those who could still walk had slung on their packs and were headed back on the road. I paused to digest the tragedy. There was no commander. There were no commands, only the rambling of dieing men. I stuffed what I could into my canvas sack, wrapped it over my shoulder and followed the deserters.
Finally free from the troubling sight of my comrades brooding over the slopes of our camp, I recognized a friend sitting at the road side. He was a native of Himydal Pradesh, a porter with whom I had spent many an evening carousing along the streets of Old Delhi. We had seen more than a few tight spots and had squeezed through them together, many on evenings when perhaps we should not have been so carefree. Sitting on his rock, he was sullen with forehead in hand when I approached.
“Are you ill,” I said from a few paces.
“Jeremy? It is good to see you, my friend.” he breathed deeply, “There are Rakshasa nearby. I am tired. I must sit a moment.”
“Its good fate for us to meet, but it would be best if we rested further down the road. Danger is not far from this place.”
He stood uneasily and we walked together. “There have been rumors of plague for days now,” I told him.
“Yes, among the infantry.”
“How could it be true? An English company wiped out by a sickness on the road to Shimla. It is unheard of.”
“No my friend, in India we say Drakalki, the breath of Khali. It is the sickness that ends the journey. This thing is well known among the people of my village. Few have seen it and returned to tell us. It is whispered when we hear of parties disappearing after leaving a village. I believe Rakshasa, the dark spirits, have wondered among us here.”
We walked for some time in silence before he spoke again. “I am ill. I can feel it. My village is not far and I will return there. There is a man who understands the sicknesses. He is the best hope for me.” He paused, “And for you as well, perhaps.”
I pondered the suggestion without speaking, but followed him off the road and onto a footpath winding along a brush covered ridge. We walked through the morning and into the afternoon, stopping once to finish what rations we had between us, and twice to recover after he collapsed. After each fall he lay on the rocky trail and I feared he would not revive, but I shook him, helped him to his feet, and we trudged on. It was near sunset when we walked into the village, his arm around my shoulder, much of his weight laying against me. His eyes had become glazed. As we neared the wooden homes a crowd of children gathered, followed by a group of men who ushered him into a nearby home. Another man took my arm, guided me thought a door and bid me rest on a cushion.
I have learned little of the native tongue spoken in Delhi and nothing of those spoken in the far regions. When the village men came to talk there was no comprehension between us. I was able to gain no news of my friend. They brought water and a mandi and bid I bathe in the local fashion. After my bath I was given food and drink. When at last I came to lie again on the cushion it seemed that every part of my body began to ache. The pain was severe. It burnt even the sockets of my eyes and fogged my sight. I had a vague realization that I was being overtaken by the sickness. At first there was anger. That did not last long for the shivering began to start. Soon it was not the sickness that I cursed, but my body’s stubbornness at clinging to this miserable existence. For that time all I could perceive of life was wretchedness: past, present and future. Death, which I had feared so often, seemed no longer a menace. It was at that point that a detached state overtook me, and what I can remember of the following events seems as if I was watching as a bystander from a smoky corner.
They placed my body onto a wooden shield the size of a table and carried it through the village paths and into another house. Here was my porter friend, lying on a floor pad in the lantern light. His eyes stared up into the dark and there was the sound of sobbing women around me. The men placed my body near his. For some distance in time, I can not say how far, the commotion of the room came and faded like storm noise heard from inside a deep mountain hollow. I drifted there like a boat on a river, rolling with its current towards a void where the sky could not be distinguished from the earth. My shoulders and toes began to succumb to a cold caress. My thoughts were emptied in the darkness. Then a voice came with such solid force that I was able to grasp onto it and pull myself back into the room.
The voice belonged to a native man. It was English, but the accent was heavy and unusual, even to one accustomed to India. I stared at his face. The deep currents of the river I had dreamt seemed etched in his cheeks. His hair was white and as wispy as the foam at the boat’s bow.
“Wake up English soldier. Open your eyes and listen. The dark spirit is among us. You carry it in your chest. Already it has taken the life of Rupesh. He should not have brought death here. Nor should he have brought you. You both mean death for us. You bring disease to all who behold you, to any who breathe the same air. If you die, the spirit will pass among us all. It will infect us. We will appease the Rakshasa that gnaws in your blood. Then you will leave this place and carry your pestilence far from here. You will die alone in a mountain gorge where the spirit will not harm us. There the Rakshasa will sink into the earth, bringing with him your eternal soul. Now lie still. Hold this beneath your tongue.” He opened his hand and showed me a small, ivory charm in the shape of a Sanskrit character. He squeezed my jaw and stuck the charm sharply into position. “I will heal you,” he said, “by taking the life of another. The spirit of Rupesh’s child will imprison the Rakshasa inside you, where it can not do harm to another.”
With these words the man brought his hand to his forehead and revealed that he was now clutching a curved knife. I watched as he placed the blade against my shoulder and drew it across my skin to my chest. I could feel nothing. Through the shadows of the room came two men carrying what I thought at first was a kicking animal, but as they brought it close I could see it was a young girl, perhaps eight years old. Her eyes were lit the darkness around her tawny face. I watched as they forced her head to the floor, pulling it by a clump of tangled hair. There was a low chanting voice joined by another and another. The light seemed to fade from the room and all I heard was the high pitched, convulsive heaving of a child’s chest.
***
I can remember nothing of the events that occurred between when the men brought the child into the room and the time when I awoke. It was morning, but how many days had passed I can not say, for it seemed somehow longer than a single night. I opened my eyes to a dreary half light seeping in through the doorway. A mist, thin like steam, drifted throughout the room. Outside was the sound of animals: an insect’s chirp, the soft low of the cows. The pain that had vibrated through every muscle was now gone. I had no sweat or stiffness from fever and felt well rested as if having awoken from a long and peaceful sleep.
I sat up, gazed about the room and realized with a shudder that it was strewn with the bodies of the native people who had brought me in. They looked contorted, expressions of horror etched into their countenance, their eyes starring out, flat and empty, and a dark rash prickling their flesh wherever it was exposed. I stood quickly, found my shirt and dressed, for I was eager to be gone from this place. I feared the same fate would strike me.
Moving towards the door I heard a sound from behind, a soft moan. I turned and after a moment of scanning the room I realized that it had come from the young girl, Rupesh’s daughter. I examined the body and found she still had breath in her. I cradled her and carried her with me out the door.
The scene outside was better only in that there was life in the greenness from the pines and there was stirring from the livestock that roamed throughout the village. But here and there were gruesome bodies similar to those I had seen in the house. I knew we could not stay here. I saw no sign of life and although the breathing of the girl gave me hope that there would be others, those I examined were beyond rescue. As I searched the grounds I found a rucksack that could be thrown over my shoulder and I stuffed it with warm blankets, wooden matches, lintels, and water. The food and water I feared were contaminated, and I planned to exchange them at first chance, but I had to make due with what was available. I made a cradle for the girl out of one of the blankets and tied the corners around my neck and shoulder to help me support her weight.
There were many paths surrounding the village. I could not remember from which direction we had come. Finally I opted to take the widest path. This path appeared to be the most well-trodden. I hoped it would take us to another settlement where we could get more supplies and directions back to the road to Shimla.
This decision proved to be a poor one, and the logic I used to make it was without merit. The path wound incessantly up into the mountains, growing narrow in places and often following along treacherous ridges. Our best fortune was that we regularly came upon brooks or streams of water trickling down from the higher country. The water was a grey color and carried sediment. I had seen this phenomenon before and guessed it was the product of melted glaciers. The taste was not pleasant, but it kept us alive.
Hours passed into days. The weight of the girl and our supplies was a heavy burden. It took its toll on the muscles of my legs and my back, which began to ache almost intolerably. The girl seemed to be waning in a state of semi-consciousness. When I pressed the water to her lips, she drank. When I spooned the lentils to her mouth, she ate. On occasion she would open her eyes and stare up into my face with a sorrowful look. When she did this it filled my heart with both pity and dread. In her eyes seemed almost the look of accusation. I guessed she was week with illness, and yet she showed no symptoms of fever or rash. I made sure she ate and drank enough to sustain her body, and prayed she would regain strength before long. But often, while trudging up the endless hills, my mind wandered back into that dark room where I had laid helpless with fever, and where I had first seen this girl that was now my companion. What had the old native man said? I remembered, and yet I could never believe.
I tried not to think too hard about the mystery I was leaving behind. What had happened to our troops? It was surely a strange tale, and one I would spend many a night mouthing in a tavern once I reached Shimla. There would be time later to ponder the events of the village, but before I spent too much effort solving the mystery of my own survival, I had to ensure that I was to survive.
Three days passed in this manner. Our supply of food was beginning to dwindle. We had passed no sign of any human settlement. The girl was showing no improvement. I was beginning to entertain the notion that hope of our survival was little. During the hour before the sun was to sink below the now snow capped peaks, as I walked looking for a nice place to build a fire and camp, the path emerged into a bald spot in the trees. From there I was able to survey the surrounding area, and what I saw made my heart leap for we were standing above a magnificent sight that I immediately recognized as a place I had seen before.
In the valley wedged between the surrounding mountains was an immense glacier. It gave the appearance of a frozen plane that stretched far onto the horizon, rolling over entire mountains in its center. It sprawled wider as it went into the distance, covering everything in its path. The white plane had the insidious appearance of being gentle and rolling, like a colorless, sand desert, but I had heard stories that beneath the snow were crevices large enough to swallow a wagon. I recognized this glacier as one I had seen on an excursion from Shimla a year earlier. It was a day’s walk from the town. The difference was that I had seen it only from the perspective viewed above the opposite side of the valley. We would have to attempt a crossing to reach our destination.
The air was chilled that night, but our fire lasted well into the early hours of the morning. The girl seemed to rest peacefully without a stir, as she had every night since we had left her village. I slept little and tried to remember what I could about the glacier. I knew that men had gone onto the ice to get a close look, but as far as I was aware, no one had ever attempted to cross. Crossing a glacier was a dangerous endeavor because of the questionable stability of every step and the deep gaps hidden beneath the snow. The far side was no short distance. It was almost impossible to judge as the sheer vastness of the seen made the scope appear smaller than it really was. Midway to our destination was a lifeless, icy monolith of rock protruding high out of the snow. I estimated I would be able to reach this rock and perhaps find shelter for the night if the crossing proved too much for one day, which was likely.
The next morning as I was packing our meager supplies I found a long, solid staff with which I judged I would be able to use to test the firmness of the ground before each step, so as to avoid tumbling into a hole. The journey down to the ice took a long portion of the morning. As I stood at its edge and gazed out I was struck by the enormity of the scene and just how difficult the task I was setting out on would be.
There was a cold wind cutting across the top of the glacier. It stirred the snow and whipped it across my face. I had no gloves, and my socks were soiled and torn from the days of walking I had already done. The ice was solid, but in some places the snow covering it would give way a few inches and cover my boot. Before I would set a foot forward, I tested the spot with my staff to be sure nothing was hidden beneath the covering. On two occasions I uncovered deep holes. How deep, I can not say, but the path I made around them was at least forty feet on both occasions.
From above, the snow had looked clear and had glittered in the sun. But now, with it resting just below my feet as I crunched through, I realized that it was mixed with sediment. The sun’s glare reflected into my eyes and was at times painful. I could feel the sting of sunburn on my face before mid-day. There was no place to sit and rest. On a few occasions I simply sat on the ice to collect my strength for a moment. I was slowly becoming exhausted, but the towering rock that was my destination grew ever closer.
By late afternoon I was there, and we were both still alive. I could feel the girl’s warm breath just beneath my chin. I made my way along the edge of the rock monolith, looking for some place that might give us shelter for the night. I judged the distance to the far side of the glacier would be a shorter journey from here than the distance I had already covered. Still, I was tired to my last bit of strength, and it would be impossible to complete the crossing before dark. It would be much better to wait out the night and start fresh and well rested the next day.
I found a deep notch that we could fit into on the rock’s far side. Its floor and walls were still wrapped in ice and snow, but it provided a place to rest protected from the wind which was blowing at the monolith’s back side. I unpacked the blankets and fed the girl. We huddled together for warmth and I soon fell asleep.
Rarely have I fallen so deeply and so strongly into the world of dreams. In the vision, I awoke alone in the notch. There was blackness all around and I could feel the ice against my cheek and ear. There was no moon and no cloud, but a gathering of stars broadly spattered above the shadows of the surrounding Himalaya.
There was no wind as I stepped out onto the glacier. In the strange, still darkness the ice felt smooth beneath my feet. So strange it was and so real that I bent to touch it, and I felt the texture of glass frozen beneath my finger tips. As I looked in amazement, the ground seemed to be reflecting the pin pricks of the stars. They glistened and glittered far below the surface. Some of them seemed to draw closer, and as I watched they seemed almost to weave from side to side as they shimmered.
As I stood in stunned revelry, peering at the lights above and below the glass as far as the eye could see. I heard a whisper break in the chilled air. The sound was that of a hiss, made by a tongue pressing the roof of the mouth. I felt no wind. Then a soft voice startled me from behind.
“I also wish to live,” it said.
I turned and saw, standing only a few feet away, the young girl I had carried for four days through the mountains and across the ice. She looked rigid and strangely illuminated. Her brown face that I had gazed upon so often seemed eerily pale. Her hair waved out behind her neck and fell onto her back. I stood and stared in awe, for she appeared more phantom than girl.
She spoke again,“I also wish to live.”
The event was mysterious and at the time it did not even strike me as odd that this native child was speaking to me in perfect English. Beyond that and the shock of the fantastic scene that lay before my eyes, I was taken by her words, for they seemed both pleading and accusatory. My first assumption was that she had recovered somewhat, but was still sick and delusional.
“Are you cold?” I said. “You should be beneath the blankets.”
“Will you give it back?” she asked. I thought she meant the blanket I was huddled in.
“Yes, take this. Come, let’s sit down at the camp.” I took the blanket from my shoulders and made to wrap her in it, but what she said next stopped me with a force as if I had been struck.
“Will you give me back my soul?”
Fear overtook me and I recalled the words of the old man that horrible night at the village: The spirit of Rupesh’s child will imprison the Rakshasa inside you. You will die alone in a mountain gorge.
“Come, wear this blanket. Let’s go and rest until morning.” I made to wrap the blanket around her and as I did, she was gone. She simply wasn’t there. The noise of an animal howl echoed across the ice. When I turned to go back to my resting place she was standing just behind me.
“Will you give it back?” she said.
“You’re going to be just fine. Let’s return to our camp and rest. There’s nothing to worry. You’re going to be just fine.”
“Will you give it back? I can not live with out it. I see it now in your chest, in your arms. Will you give it back?”
I was tempted to say “yes,” for she was so delusional it seemed the only way to satisfy her and bring her back to safety. But the words froze up, and I only reached out again to wrap her in the blanket. Again she was gone in the blink of an eye.
At this point I felt seriously unnerved. I walked quickly back to the notch in the rock where we had rested, hoping to find the girl there, but when I arrived there was no one. I huddled in the blanket myself and turned to look out at the landscape. She was just behind me, looking at me with those sorrow-filled eyes as I crouched with my back to the icy granite.
“I need it,” she said. She extended one arm and began to take a step closer as if she was trying to touch my chest. At this I was so unnerved that, even though it was only a dream, I still question my actions and whether I made a gravely wrong choice. But one can hardly be held accountable for their actions within a dream.
“No,” I shrieked. “I want to live.” Her arm dropped, her eyes welled up with tears, and she was gone.
I awoke from the nightmare as the sun was breaking the horizon. Immediately, I looked to the girl. Her body was rigid. Her skin was strangely white and cool, like the rock we rested in. There was no breath in her cheeks, no pulse in her chest. She had not survived the night. After some time sitting quietly with her, pondering what would be the best course of action, I buried her beneath the snow and moved on.
Without the additional weight it was not difficult to make it across the ice. I did it quickly and was half way up the other side of the valley by evening. I made camp and the next day I arrived in Shimla. Other parties of soldiers and bureaucrats had already arrived and India’s government was already in place and functioning. I reported to the military headquarters and told the story of our company. Few soldiers from my party had survived the strange illness. I explained what had happened to me, but left out the old man in the village and the young girl, for fear that they would think I was delusional. I was quarantined for weeks, but after a time it seemed I was in perfect health. Better health, perhaps, than I have been in since I was a very young man. Eventually I was released from the hospital, after weeks of examination, and I began to go about my duties as a soldier.