The Serpent's tooth

Chapter 18

Nicholas sat relaxed on his chestnut horse atop a low hill rising from the plain about four miles southwest of Agra. Looking back in the soft early morning light he could still see the familiar outline of the Taj Mahal on the horizon. To him, the dome was a teardrop. The coarser minds among his mercenaries, of whom at his own request he had once more taken command, insisted it was nothing but a woman’s breast and its gold finial a fine pert nipple. In the pre-dawn hours Dara had despatched Nicholas and his five hundred men — disease, wounds and desertions had much reduced their number since the beginning of the northern campaign — to check the early stages of his route before he himself led the main body of his army out towards the Chambal river.

As, flaming torches in their hands, they had made their way down the steep ramp, through the towering gateway and out across the plain they had come upon nothing to concern them militarily. Nicholas had relished what to him was the wonderful and unique scent of Hindustan — the mixture of the smells of earth, night-flowering plants such as the champa, dung cooking fires and spices, as the country dwellers began to awake and prepare for the new day. He had heard nothing beyond the jingling of the harnesses of his men’s horses, the occasional wild screech of a peacock and the nocturnal howl of some wakeful village hound swiftly taken up by its newly roused fellows.

Now, though, the peace was being broken literally and metaphorically. Dara and his main army were beginning their march to face his brothers Aurangzeb and Murad in battle in person. Civil war was under way, with all its bitterness and divisions within families, high and low. He had seen enough of it during his early days in Hindustan as Shah Jahan fought for the throne to know its bloody perils and consequences. Later, letters from his older brother at home on the family estates in the west of England had told him of the civil war raging in his own country — of the execution of the king and the establishment of a people’s parliament. Its puritanical leader insisted on the following of a fundamentalist faith as strict and austere as any prescribed by Aurangzeb and his mullahs, banning even harmless festivities such as dancing around the maypole and the theatre.

Almost instinctively Nicholas put his hand to one of the two pistols in his sash. They had arrived in a tightly bound parcel accompanying his brother’s last letter. Such weapons were rarely seen in Hindustan. They should however prove useful in the fighting to come, even if he was unlikely to have the necessary time in the press of battle to reload them. He must make each of their single shots count, something his initial attempts had shown was difficult to achieve at much more than fifteen yards.

An ear-splitting blast jolted Nicholas from his reverie. It came from a long-stemmed trumpet held by an outrider of the vanguard as it approached.

The vanguard, all mounted on matching black horses and wearing tunics and turbans of Moghul green, were advancing thirty abreast. The front two ranks were made up of trumpeters interspersed with drummers who beat out a steady tattoo on the drums mounted on each side of the saddles of their horses who were so well trained as to appear oblivious of the noise. Behind the musicians the next ranks were of straight-backed cavalrymen. Except for those — one in every six, Nicholas guessed — who gripped the wooden staves of green banners blowing gently in the breeze, they held erect long lances with green pennants. Beyond them came further lines of horsemen, the pennants at their lance tips seeming to roll like the waves of a gentle sea swell or a ripple of wind through an autumn cornfield as their riders bobbed in their saddles.

After some minutes through the golden dust haze Nicholas saw a phalanx of war elephants approaching, each with a great howdah and a coat of overlapping steel plate armour. The individual plates were small to allow the elephants to move freely. Nicholas couldn’t help remembering how he had once tried to count the number in each coat, getting to over three thousand before giving up. As well as their war coats, every elephant had an outsize cutlass securely tied to each tusk. The tusks themselves were painted blood red and some filed to a sharp point to inflict the maximum damage at close quarters. From about a third of the howdahs poked the barrels of gajnals, the small cannon so effective in a war of movement because the elephants could transport them relatively quickly into the thick of the action.

In the middle of the elephant phalanx was a formation of the largest beasts, their tusks painted not red but gold, keeping pace with each other as they walked forward to maintain the shape of a square. From the howdah at each corner of the square flew vast green banners much bigger than those carried by the horsemen, six feet high and perhaps twenty feet long and embroidered in gold with the names of the emperor and Dara Shukoh. At the centre of the square plodded the largest elephant of them all, the jewels in its tower-like howdah glittering and glinting in the rising sun. As the elephant slowly drew closer Nicholas made out ever more clearly the figure of Dara sitting in the centre of the howdah clad in a gold breastplate like his revered great-grandfather the emperor Akbar, two dark-bearded bodyguards with drawn swords squatting behind him. As the column passed Nicholas Dara raised a hand in his direction but Nicholas couldn’t be sure whether he recognised him or was simply doing as a good general should — acknowledging any body of his troops he met along the way.

Half an hour later the army’s cannon were passing Nicholas, who had been ordered to join the rearguard with his men. The air was becoming hot as the morning drew on and the ever-increasing dust was clogging his nose and mouth. However, taking a quick swig from his leather water bottle before drawing his blue face cloth tighter, he couldn’t help being impressed by the magnificence of the artillery as he watched the largest of the cannon rumble past. How long their brass barrels, engraved with serpents and mystical birds, were — some nearly twenty feet. How many oxen were required to pull the great eight-wheeled limbers? He counted thirty straining to pull one of the weapons, urged on by white-loinclothed drivers running barefoot on skinny legs from one animal to another, cracking their long whips and tugging at the rope halters of recalcitrant beasts whose outraged bellowing he could sometimes hear over the general hubbub of the march.

Even more than the war elephants, the cannon — nearly a hundred and fifty years after their introduction into Hindustan by Dara’s ancestor Babur — were at the heart of any modern army, being as well suited to disrupting a charge of horsemen or war elephants as to blasting and battering down the walls and gates of a resisting city. The makers of gunpowder — often Turkish mercenaries — were producing better powder mixtures all the time to give the weapons longer range and greater reliability. If only, thought Nicholas, the forge masters could make these great weapons lighter and thus more manoeuvrable and swifter to deploy.

After the cannon came wooden ox carts, some with tightly roped-down oiled covers — the powder wagons — and some with the cannon balls of stone or iron stacked in them. Behind them, mostly mounted but some on foot, were the musketeers, long weapons and ram rods either tied to their saddles or slung across their backs, together with their powder horns and pouches containing the balls for the muskets. Their weapons were mostly matchlocks, more reliable in Hindustani conditions than the newer flintlocks which were prone to failure to fire through dust or damp. Marching with the musketeers were armourers whose task it was to fashion new musket balls when required by pouring liquid lead into the moulds they carried.

Nicholas was growing ever more hot and tired and anxious to be on the move as the archers marched past. Although fewer in number than on previous campaigns their double bows and quiverfuls of feathered arrows still had the advantage of speed of fire over muskets, even if they were less deadly. Last before the rearguard came the infantry. Hardly any had footwear. Most wore only a loincloth and a simple turban to protect against the sun. A few carried swords. Many had simple spears. But some carried as weapons only the tools such as scythes and hoes which they had used to work the fields from which they had recently and hastily been plucked by their landlords to replace the more experienced men who had gone with Suleiman to confront Shah Shuja.

Nicholas had never found such raw infantry of great use in battle. They were either quick to panic and flee or easy for the enemy to cut down if they did resist. Perhaps their greatest function was by their very number to overawe civilian populations or other inexperienced armies. It took nearly another half-hour for their stumbling, already disorganised mass to pass. Then, with a great sigh of relief, he saw the mounted rearguard appear — a mixture of Rajputs in pale yellow or orange robes mounted on prick-eared Mewari horses and heavily bearded and more bulky-bodied Punjabis on larger beasts, slower but of greater endurance.

With a joyful wave of his hand Nicholas gestured to his men, now all sweating like himself in the hot June sun, perspiration running in rivulets down their faces and coursing down their spines beneath their hot heavy backplates, to join their comrades. As he did so, he gave grateful thanks that he did not have to await the baggage train with its mixture of heavily loaded spitting camels, braying mules and protruding-ribbed donkeys to lumber past, still less the great body of camp followers who as far as he could see through the choking dust were straggling almost back to the gates of Agra. Still, the army needed the entertainment and pleasures the cooks, acrobats, nautch girls and snake charmers provided to while away the empty hours that were such a feature of campaign life, as well as to soothe worries and anxieties as battle approached. May this campaign be a short one and Dara triumphant, he thought, as he kicked his horse forward and the willing chestnut, as glad as Nicholas to be on the move once more, cantered down the small hill to join Dara’s vast army.

Two Sarus cranes rose slowly from the banks of the Chambal and flew along the river searching for fish, their large red heads and grey and white plumage reflected in the Chambal’s glistening pewter waters. As Nicholas watched, seated on the stump of a decayed tree and grateful that the afternoon heat was slowly dying, the long, slim snout of a ghariyal snapped out of the water, also intent on an evening meal. The ghariyal was a crocodile unlike any other Nicholas had seen. Local people had assured him that it was harmless and ate only fish, while warning him that more familiar flesh-hungry crocodiles also lurked in the shallows and that on no account, however hot or tempted, should he swim in the river.

Hearing a noise behind him, Nicholas glanced round. It wasn’t a crocodile — fish-eating or otherwise — but two or three of his fellow officers heading for Dara’s command tent and a meeting to which he had also been summoned. Reminded of the time, Nicholas stood up, brushed down his clothes and also began to walk towards the tent. As he did so he wondered what the council was to be about. The army had arrived at the Chambal that morning after five days’ hot, slow and dusty journey. He presumed the discussion would concern the crossing of the river to confront Aurangzeb and Murad — whether the Chambal was slow and shallow enough to ford safely or whether they needed to consume time in building a bridge of boats.

Five minutes into the meeting, standing in the second row of the sixty commanders clustering around the low divan on which Dara was seated beneath his tent’s awning, Nicholas found out that he was wrong. Gesturing to a travel-grimed figure standing beside the divan, Dara said, ‘Ravi Kumar here has just returned from a two-day scouting mission southwards along the Chambal. Ravi, tell me again what you saw there for the benefit of my officers.’

Ravi Kumar nodded. ‘Last evening I encountered Aurangzeb and Murad’s army fording the river twenty or so miles downstream. Much of the vanguard was already across, but the rest of the army were lighting cooking fires, seemingly prepared to spend the night on the far side.’

As the scout had spoken his first words a gasp of surprise had run round the assembled officers. Now one, a tall, clipped-bearded man Nicholas recognised as Raja Ram Singh Rathor, the ruler of a small state near Gwalior with a high reputation for both bravery and military sagacity, spoke. ‘They’ve moved far faster than we’d thought, Highness. Do they have all their equipment with them?’

Dara motioned to Ravi Kumar to answer.

‘I couldn’t stay too long or get too close but I think they had the leading elements of their baggage train with them. Further wagons seemed to be arriving all the time and a dust cloud on the horizon suggested many more men and much equipment were yet to come. My guess is that it will take all of tomorrow for them to complete the crossing and re-form on the near bank.’

‘Thank you, Ravi Kumar,’ said Dara. He turned to his commanders. ‘Can we break camp and reach them before they have finished crossing?’

After a brief pause Raja Ram Singh Rathor spoke once more, ‘No, Highness. Not if we wish to have our heavy guns and war elephants with us as I think we must. Until now we’ve only made eight or so miles a day. Even if we pushed our animals harder I can’t see the full strength of the army being able to reach the crossing in less than two days. By then Aurangzeb and Murad will be on the march to Agra and we’ll be hard pressed to catch them.’

‘I feared as much,’ said Dara. ‘In the short time since Ravi and the other scouts returned I’ve been looking at maps and talking to some junior officers whose homes are along the Chambal. Even though our enemies have crossed the river, we are considerably to the north of them and much nearer to Agra than they are. However quickly they move, it seems to me if we break camp before dawn and head due west from here we should be able to cut them off and position ourselves across their path on advantageous ground. What do you think?’

‘What sort of country do we have to traverse?’ asked another voice. Nicholas couldn’t see the speaker.

‘I’m told it’s mostly flat with few obstructions, although in places there is some deepish sand which may slow the heavy equipment a little. Still, we should have plenty of time for our march.’

The voice spoke again, ‘Thank you, Highness. In that case there should be no problems. The men and animals are not so exhausted that they will not find sufficient refreshment in a truncated night’s rest.’ His words were convoluted but their meaning clear and they were greeted by general shouts of agreement and nodding of turbaned heads from some other officers.

‘We’re decided then,’ said Dara. ‘I leave it to you, my trusted commanders, to make the necessary preparations. Make sure the men get an extra ration of food. It will hearten them. Tell them that I will reward them well, as I will you, when victory is ours.’ With that, Dara rose and walked slowly back into the interior of his tent.

As he too turned away to make his way in the evening sunlight back to his own quarters, Nicholas couldn’t help wondering whether, generous as were Dara’s words about food and rewards for the troops and welcome as was his confidence in his officers, the prince shouldn’t himself be taking a more central role. Not least, it would give him a chance to get to know some of his commanders better, particularly some of the vassal rulers who had only arrived at Agra at his father’s summons just before the army left the city and had had little chance to meet Dara. To have full loyalty to a leader — particularly a prospective emperor fighting a civil war — a subordinate needed to know him and his virtues in addition to obtaining a general warm feeling about his own future prospects. From his own experience of the two northern campaigns Nicholas knew that neither Aurangzeb nor even Murad would have been so casual, but then they lacked Dara’s obvious charisma and their campaigns had ended in ignominious defeat. God willing they would suffer that fate again.

The Frenchman collapsed slowly from his saddle to hit the sandy ground with a gentle thud. Quickly Nicholas jumped from his own horse and ran over to him. Yet another casualty from the heat, he was sure. Reaching the man’s crumpled form he heaved him over on to his back and with the help of some other of his comrades quickly unbuckled the man’s heavy steel breastplate and lifted it from his chest. It was hot to the touch from the blistering sun. The Frenchman’s hands were twitching. His face was reddish-purple and his pale green eyes were rolling in his head as Nicholas unhooked his own water bottle from his belt, unstoppered it and tried to tip some of the warm liquid into the man’s mouth. A little went between his cracked lips and half-clenched teeth. Most trickled down his stubbly chin and neck.

The man began to cough and Nicholas poured a little more water. ‘Get a dhooli — a litter — to carry him back to the camp, but before you do put some damp cloths on his forehead,’ he ordered. The man might still survive. He hoped he would. The Frenchman was a stern fighter who had come to Hindustan from Bordeaux with a French trading party which he had quit for reasons he had never quite made clear but others said were connected to a missing ruby the size of a duck egg. If he did live, he would be luckier than many others, thought Nicholas, taking a swig himself from his water bottle. Three others of his men had collapsed — two dying on the spot — and he had seen several lifeless bodies carried away from the neighbouring regiment of infantry, arms dangling over the edges of simple stretchers fashioned from dead branches and palm leaves.

Just as they had planned, after three days’ gruelling march Dara’s forces had succeeded in blocking Aurangzeb and Murad’s army’s route to Agra, siting their camp on some low-lying hills — hillocks, really — which straddled the great trunk road to Agra about ten miles from the city at a place Nicholas had been told was called Samugarh. When they had realised that their initial plan to march north had been thwarted Aurangzeb and Murad had turned west amid great clouds of dust, attempting to outflank Dara’s vast army. In response he had countermarched his forces, shadowing his brothers and occasionally sending out small raiding parties to snatch prisoners or probe the strength of pickets. He and his officers had learned little in the process other than that his enemies seemed determined, prone neither to panic nor to surrender.

After two days of such manoeuvring back and forth on the plains around Samugarh, this morning, 7 June, the two armies had deployed in full battle formation, Dara retaining his slight initial advantage of the somewhat higher ground. As the airless morning had drawn on and the heat increased, none of the three brothers had appeared to wish to push for a decisive engagement. Nicholas had even wondered whether there might be a chance for negotiations, though this seemed unlikely. All that had happened for the past five hours was that both sides had stood still or sat on horseback in the broiling sun, which was now at its midday zenith. Both men and horses were falling victim to the heat. Flocks of bald-headed scrawny vultures were already perching on the bodies of some of the dead animals, pecking at eyes and bellies now spilling out skeins of bluish intestines, unwanted portents to the men of their own potential fate in battle when it was finally joined.

Glancing round, Nicholas saw that there was still little movement in the ranks of either army other than young water-bearers running with their gourds and bottles to attempt to slake the thirst of the soldiers although there were not enough of them — nor enough water — to prevent more men collapsing from the heat. In the next two hours Nicholas lost two further men, including one — a ginger-haired Scot named Alex Graham — who had soldiered with him since his first northern campaign with Murad and had begged him to take the five silver coins in the pouch at his waist and get them back to his family in the Scottish highlands. Nicholas had assured him he would, while realising how difficult it would be even if he himself survived, with civil unrest in Britain as well as Hindustan.

As he pondered this question he saw sudden movement in the ranks of the army opposite. Were they going to attack at last? Nicholas shouted to his men to prepare for action, glad that the waiting might be over — nothing could be worse than standing in this awful heat. A few minutes later he realised that there would be no battle that day. The enemy appeared to be retreating back to their camp, which was about a mile behind their current position. Soon the order came from Dara through one of his qorchis to return to their own camp on the hillocks. At least he would live another day, thought Nicholas as he turned his horse and gestured to his men to follow.