(Published by NEL, UK,1987, ST Martins Press, NY, Gummerus, Finland, Lubbe Verlag, Germany, Distrubuidor Record de Sevicos, Brazil
CHAPTER ONE

THE SINISTER whisper 'mar', kill, spoken at midnight when the land is at its darkest and the whine of cold wind blowing down from the mountains awakens sleeping spirits, was to alter for ever the lives of men who heard it. The one who spoke of death on this night was an insignificant man. Harmless. He could not summon evil spirits to do his bidding or command armies to march. He would die unknown, ignorant of the effect his whisper would eventually have. It would bring down an empire and change the destiny of the man who heard him with such interest.
      This 'mar', like an 'om' reverberating through the universe, echoed in the minds of those who listened. There were about twenty of them, squatting in the shelter of a deodar tree. They shifted away, fearing this fellow coolie who spoke of death.
      His whisper was heard by the great mountains, silvery and serene, filling the horizon. They listened to the whispers of every man, they heard too his unspoken thoughts and prayers, for God had his abode in those eternal icy folds. Involuntarily the listeners turned towards those peaks, silently invoking their protection. They were too distant to be seen clearly on this dark night, but the Himalayas had long filled their imagination, filled their myths. They knew the mountains had power to protect, to grant them boons.
     'Where did you hear of this "mar"?' asked the young man. His life, from that moment on, would change. He too had begun to look towards the mountains, but then stopped himself.
     'In the bazaar,' the coolie replied. Only when he sucked on his beedi did the glow outline a gaunt, unshaven face with dark, dull eyes. A turban masked his forehead.
     'And who spoke of killing?'
     'Two men.' He peered through the darkness. Drizzle, fine as mist, settled on their, soaking through threadbare shawls. 'One was your age, the other older. I carried them in my rickshaw from the railway station and dropped them in front of Ramchand the chai-wallah's.'
    'Did they go in?'
    'No. They went off in different directions, as if they no longer knew each other.'
    'And did you find out who they were going to kill?'
    The coolie shrugged. 'The Angrezi.'
    'All of them?'
    The man laughed. 'There are too many. Only a few. Why all this interest?'
    'It is better to know such things. Then I can avoid them.'
    The exchange had been overheard by others. It would ripple out into the bazaar and beyond. Betrayal had already begun. A secret had been released. India was a country where nothing ever remained a secret. One man could whisper into the ear of another hidden deep in the jungle with only the kite and the langur as witnesses, and within the day it would be heard a thousand miles away. No one had ever understood how such things happened; it was the mystery of the country that words - truthful and dishonest ones, rumour and gossip - moved even more swiftly than the telegraph.
   'I am tired,' the coolie said. 'When will this tamasha finish?'
   'Only when the sky turns as pink as a memsahib's cheeks,' another replied. 'Then they will order us: jaldhi karo, jaldhi karo, and we shall kill ourselves to rush them home.'
   Together they stared at Viceregal Lodge. It was a turreted wooden palace, quite unlike any other building in this land. They did not know that it was a dream place, a symbol of collective memory from a distant island, transposed here to the foothills of the great mountains. The ghostly night air gave it a sense of make-believe, as though it were a palace from a fairy tale that could suddenly vanish. It was now ablaze with lights, bursting with music and swirling with shadows, filling the night air with gaiety.
  Two bodyguards in resplendent uniform flanked the gateway. Their lances glittered in the electric light. More guards lined the curving drive, fading into the night. Mist blurred the porch lights and the bearers waiting for the guests, who by now had all arrived. The bearers remained at their posts, as still as the guards. The Lodge, a modest name for such a seat of power, was the summer residence of the Viceroy of India. In winter he ruled from Calcutta, so this visit to Chota Simla in the October of 1905 was a special occasion, a farewell ball for Lord Curzon.
  The dining-room was a dark, sombre chamber with mahogany panelled walls. Though lovingly polished, they reflected little light. In the days of lamps and candles, the room was always filled with shadows, and even the electric chandelier above the dining-table could not dispel the gloom that lurked in the distant corners. Its decorations were solemn and formal, a constant reminder to guests that they were dining in the presence of supreme imperial power. On one wall hung a portrait in oils of the King-Emperor Edward VII. It was almost life-size, and none in the room could escape those regal eyes. On the other walls were the martial symbols of the empire: faded pennants of famous regiments, ornate lances plundered from defeated native princes, muskets, jezails, swords and shields. It was a room crowded with memories.
Twenty-four ladies and gentlemen had been dining for the last time with Lord Curzon. He sat at the head of the table, facing the large windows framing shadowy deodars, a slim, aristocratic man.
  'Gentlemen!' Curzon called. The guests all stood, facing him as if in homage. They raised their wine glasses. Curzon turned to the portrait of the monarch.
  'The King-Emperor.'
  They drank the toast, reassured by the familiar ritual, and sat down again. .
  The Vicereine, Lady Curzon, at the foot of the table, now rose to signal the withdrawal of the ladies. The whole company rose, their chairs pulled back by bearers looking splendid in white uniforms with scarlet sashes, who had stood silently behind them all evening. The Viceroy was the last to stand, and even such a simple movement appeared to cause him discomfort. As she passed her husband, Mary Curzon pause to whisper, 'Thank God all this will be over soon.'
She was as tall as he, and they were handsome, like a prince and princess. Her shining hazel eyes were set in a delicately boned face; auburn hair was piled high on her head. For an American, a Chicago heiress, she had played her role well, but had long grown impatient with the pomp and ceremony of her husband's office. Curzon looked drawn and weary. He kissed his wife chastely.
The Colonel, half-way down the table, noticed the discreet show of affection. It had always been so between them, as if to dispel the rumour that he had married her for her money. It was untrue, for Curzon was a moderately wealthy man, but the Colonel still relished the gossip. As the bearers flung open the door for the Vicereine and the ladies, there was a gale of music and English laughter; dancing figures dressed as pirates, beefeaters, Elizabethan ladies, came into view like spirits from another world. Then the doors closed and they vanished.
  Bearers filled brandy glasses and the men selected cigars from carved humidors. Now they raised their glasses in salute to the Viceroy.
  'To Your Excellency. May God go with you.'
  'Thank you.' He sipped, sitting stiff and imperial. 'No doubt you are all relieved at the news of my resignation.'
  They mumbled their protests, but the sentiments lacked passion or belief. Curzon took note of the tone. In private they were celebrating. He too was relieved; Lord Kitchener, the Commander-in-Chief, had made his life here impossible. That man, Curzon reflected, is a monster. I began this task with hope, and now I taste only ashes. I had always dreamed of being Viceroy of India, and it came true, but too soon. Forty was too young and now forty-seven is too old. I failed all that early promise. I live with pain when I should be bathed in the pleasures of power. Success has eluded me. I feel like a draught-animal weary beyond belief. I am ready to drop. What more did they expect me to give to India?
   The great dining-room depressed him. Looking around at the dark panelling, the portraits, he thought it all a sham, a brooding womb in which they sat enshrined. Normally on his summer visits it was his custom to pitch a grand, many-roomed tent, as magnificent as any Mughal's, rather than sleep within these walls.
  'Oh, God,' he said deliberately. 'How I hate Simla.' His companions flinched as though they had been slapped. He felt a small satisfaction at this repayment for their accumulated ill-will. They too had betrayed him, a dozen Judases. 'We come here every summer, year after year, retreating from India, cutting ourselves off from the people. This town's nothing but a fortress against the Indian. '
  'It's the summer heat, Your Excellency.' St John Brodrick spoke patiently as though lecturing a child. He and Curzon had been at Eton and Balliol together, and were friends. Brodrick, unwinking eyes set in a square, stubborn face, was now his friend's inferior. It had turned him venomous. 'No Englishman can be expected to stand it.'
  'Sheer self-indulgence is a trait I will never accept,' Curzon said. 'You people are lazy and self-satisfied. We are supposed to set a good example to the native, but when he sees us disporting ourselves in this little England, cutting him off, how can he learn?'
  'He is not meant to,' the Colonel responded. 'We are his rulers. We do as we please.'
  Curzon felt the Colonel's displeasure. 'For how long?'
  'Such complacency!' Curzon said. 'We can, if we allow them a certain degree of self-rule. We are here by divine right but that right carries with it some degree of compassion.'
  'Totally unnecessary,' said Brodrick. 'They'll botch it.'
  'I agree there isn't one native with the ability to sit on the legislative council but we must ensure that one day there will be.' Curzon's disparagement of the Indian, the Hindu especially, equalled theirs and he did not wish them to doubt this. 'I am leaving behind a secure empire and I have faith that our rule will continue here for centuries to come. I think we should join the others for my farewell.'
His companions rose. The Colonel remained while the others left the room. Bearers silently poured more brandy.
  Curzon, like all who looked at the Colonel, was drawn by his eyes. They were circled by thick brows and deep pouches, like the markings of a predator who watched and waited with immense patience. The observer experienced the uneasy realisation that those eyes knew one's most secret thoughts, and that if he were disturbed, he would reveal one's weaknesses to the world. They were not meant to frighten, but to warn. The remainder of his features were concealed behind the shadows of those eyes, so that later one would not be able to recall them.
  Curzon distrusted the Colonel's power as head of the political and secret department of the Indian government. It was a wrong judgement. The Colonel's loyalty lay not with a single man, but with his belief in the empire. It was the rock on which he rested. If a man, even a Viceroy, were to betray this idea, he would be ruthless in his opposition.
  'Will the Prince and Princess of Wales be safe during their visit here next month?' Curzon asked at last.
  'Assuredly,' the Colonel said after a pause. 'There are bazaar rumours of an assassination plot, but we'll nip it in the bud.'
  'Maybe we listen too much to these bazaar rumours,' Curzon suggested.
  The Colonel's reply was silence. He did not have to remind this Viceroy of 1857, the Mutiny. The Colonel had been only a baby then, but the memory of his whimpers still echoed in his deepest sleep. And what he could barely remember was reinforced by the telling and re-telling of those terrible days. He had smelt blood, seen it blackening on the bodies of his people, heard the sated buzz of flies. Worse, he remembered fear. It had its own peculiar odour: sweat, urine, smoke. It could not be scrubbed away. It had passed into his very soul. Then he had seen sepoys strapped to zam-zamah, the great cannon that stood opposite the Ajain-Gher in Lahore, and blown to shreds. Seen others hanging from trees like giant flying foxes. It had been pleasurable, this sense of cruel vengeance. 1857 haunted them all; like a monsoon cloud it threw its shadow across their sunlight. Except, of course, for men like Curzon, who only lived in India as viceroys and listened to London's drum. The Colonel was determined that 1857 would never repeat itself.
  'I believe,' he said, watching the Viceroy carefully to assess his reaction, 'that we need more stringent laws to keep control of the situation. '
  'Such as?' Curzon gave no hint of his thoughts. 'Detention without trial for a start. Exile.'
   'And no doubt a few executions? You want more power, Colonel, and my answer is "no". I will not tolerate such draconian methods.' The Viceroy silenced the Colonel before he could protest. 'I know you would like to keep this country under lock and key, but we are English and we cannot rule as tyrants.'
  'I believe it to be only a temporary necessity.' The Colonel decided not to pursue the matter with this man. He would wait for the next Viceroy and then push hard for legislation. Bazaar rumours were now to be believed, pursued, crushed, broken.
  'By the way, who's going to do the bud-nipping?' Curzon changed the subject, knowing what the Colonel thought.
'I have an agent-my best man-making enquiries.' He waved the bearers out of the room with an authority equal to that of the Viceroy. The two men sat alone, listening to the strands of music and laughter. It sounded more of a celebration than a farewell.
  The Colonel thought Curzon was a weak man. He had seen him weep when Kitchener defied his viceregal authority. India had broken him - no, he'd broken himself, unable to grasp the task of ruling this country. 'He'll hunt out the seditionists and then I shall crush them.'
  'You seem to depend a lot on one man. Who is he?'
  The Colonel hesitated, displeased at the question. 'He's called Kimball O'Hara.'
  'For God's sake! An Irishman! He'll stand out like a sore thumb in the bazaars! He'll make a complete mess of it.'
  'You have not met him, sir. He looks like an Indian and behaves like one. He can think like them; he knows the crevices of their devious minds.' '
   'With a name like O'Hara?'
'His father and mother were Irish, but he was orphaned early and grew up in the bazaars of Lahore. Kim is, I can assure you, one of us. And I would trust him as I would my own son.'

CHAPTER TWO

KIM LOOKED north, not in worship, but in memory. It was gradually becoming light and it seemed, at first, a trick of the eyes grown used to the Indian night. The mountain peaks were just visible. Soon they would turn pink as the sun brushed the snow.
    'Somewhere up there is the home of my old companion, the Lama. Long ago we travelled from Lahore to Benares in search of the sacred river. He found what he was looking for. He was fortunate. God blesses the innocent -and he was a child. I have never known such innocence. What chance had I, with the bazaars of Lahore and the Grand Trunk Road as the gardens of childhood? It is true I have survived and thrived, more fortunate than many of my chokra companions, dead, disabled, begging. My friend found strength in his belief that God guided him. I have no such belief yet. But one man, the Colonel, is the father I have never known. My mother is India herself; the sun, the dust, the waters, the odour of the hot earth. One day I too will have belief, I too will search. From up there in the mountains my friend's spirit will be my guide in life.'
    Kim stood up and stretched. He strolled over to a deodar, untied his pi-jama and urinated. The steam and smell imparted an earthiness like the smell of cattle, the sweet smoke of dung fires. It gave him life against this wintry chill. After retying his pi-jama he approached one of the Sikh bodyguards.
   'Sardar, when will they finish?'
    'When they are good and ready, and not when chuthias like you want it. Now return to the other coolies.'
    'Salah,' Kim swore cheerfully. 'You too would be squatting with me on the road if it wasn't for that fine uniform. Where are you from?'
    The bodyguard chuckled. 'Near Ludhiana. And you?'
   'Lahore,' Kim replied, conscious that his past was partly fabricated. He could not claim with such certainty a place in India; he had no village, no ancestors. 'Do they pay you well to stand here like a statue?'
   'Well enough to feed my wife and children and to buy my own farm one day.'
   'Buy? For your bharti the sarkar will give you one free from their Crown lands, reserved specially for loyal sardars like you.'