The Iron Tiger

They threaded their way between the tables, all eyes turning towards Janet and gasps of admiration, even clapping, followed them to their booth.

They sat facing each other across a small brass table, a bead curtain partially obscuring them from the other diners and Drummond ordered.

It was a simple meal, but superbly cooked. Curried chicken so strong that Janet gasped for breath, swallowing great draughts of cold water, thoughtfully provided by the proprietor, to cool her burning mouth. Afterwards, they had green mangoes soaked in syrup, followed by Yemeni mocha, the finest coffee in the world, in tiny, exquisite cups.

‘Satisfied?’ he asked her as he lit a cheroot.

She nodded, her eyes shining. ‘Marvellous, I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.’

‘There’s a floor show of sorts,’ he said. ‘Do you want to see it? Not exactly the Copacabana, I warn you.’

There was an unmistakable challenge in his voice and she responded immediately. ‘I’ve never refused a dare since I was old enough to walk.’

‘Suit yourself.’

There was a sudden roll on the drum, the lights dimmed a little and there was silence. There was an atmosphere of expectancy that she could sense at once and then a gentle, universal sigh echoed through the room.

A woman stepped through a curtain at the rear and poised for a moment, a dark silhouette against the light. ‘Saida! Saida!’ the name echoed faintly through the crowd.

‘One of the few great nautch dancers left,’ Drummond whispered to Janet. ‘She’s fifty if she’s a day, but you’d never guess it.’

The right arm extended slowly and a tiny, tinkling cymbal sounded. Immediately the musicians responded on the tabla and zita and Saida started to sway sensuously, moving into the centre of the room.

Her face was heavily painted, a symbolic mask that never changed expression, but the body beneath the swirling, silken veils was that of a young and vibrant girl.

Gradually, the music increased in tempo and she moved in time, swaying from side to side, discarding her veils one by one until she stood before them, naked except for a small, beaded girdle low across her loins.

She stood quite still as the music stopped and the audience waited. The tabla player’s fingers broke into a fast monotonous tattoo and she started to sway, hands above her head, clapping rhythmically, and the audience swayed with her, clapping in time, crying aloud with delight.

Round and round the perimeter of the floor she moved, faster and faster, sweat glistening on her body, until, with a sudden fierce gesture, she ripped the girdle from her loins and flung herself forward on her knees, sliding to a halt in front of a large, richly dressed merchant who squatted on cushions before a low table with two companions.

There was another abrupt silence and then the drum sounded again, slower this time, the beat becoming more insistent each moment as she writhed sinuously, thrusting her pointed breasts at him, twisting effortlessly from knees to buttocks, sliding away from his grasping hands, sharp cries rising from the crowd.

And then he had her, fingers hooking into her buttocks. As the crowd roared its approval, the drum stopped. She twisted from his grasp, her oiled body slipping between his hands, ran across the floor and melted through the curtain.

The musicians started to play again on a more muted key and the audience returned to their food, discussing the performance with much laughter and joking. When Drummond turned to look at Janet, her face was strangely pale.

‘I warned you,’ he said. ‘You wanted to see the real India and this is a country where sex is as much a part of daily life as eating and drinking, an appetite to be satisfied, that’s all.’

‘Do you believe that?’

‘Depends what a man’s looking for, doesn’t it? Had enough?’

She nodded and he called for the bill and paid it. The room was by this time heavy with smoke and there was the sound of drunken laughter everywhere. As they threaded their way between the tables, eyes turned on Janet, there were winks and leers and sly nudges.

Someone stood up at the edge of the floor and made an obscene gesture. There was a roar of spontaneous laughter and as she turned her head, flushing angrily, she was aware of a hand on her right leg, sliding up beneath the skirt.

She cried out in rage and mortification and swung round. There were four men seated at a low table, three of them typical of a breed to be found the world over in spite of their turbans and loose robes, young, vicious animals, spoiling for trouble. The man who had grabbed at her was older with wild, drunken eyes in a bearded face. He wore a black outer robe threaded with gold and his hands were a blaze of jewels.

As his chin tilted, the mouth wide with laughter, her hand caught him full across the face. His head rocked to one side, there was a general gasp and the room was silent.

His head turned slowly and there was rage and madness in the eyes. As he grabbed at her coat, Drummond spun her to one side. The bearded man was only half-way to his feet when Drummond’s right foot swung into his crutch. The man screamed, doubling over, and Drummond raised a knee into the descending face, smashing the nose, sending him crashing back across the coffee table.

And the thing Janet couldn’t understand was the silence. No one moved to stop them when Drummond turned, straightening his jacket, took her arm, and pushed her through the crowd to the stairs.

Outside in the street, he urged her on, turning and twisting through several alleys until, finally, they emerged on an old stone embankment above the river.

‘Why the rush?’ she said. ‘Did you think they might follow us?’

‘That’s the general idea.’ He lit a cheroot, the match flaring in his cupped hands to reveal the strong, sardonic face. ‘The young squirt-about-town I treated so roughly back there happens to be the son of the town governor.’

‘Will there be trouble?’

‘Not the official kind, if that’s what you mean. He’s got away with too much in the past for anyone to start crying over his ruined looks at this stage. He might put someone on to me privately, but I can handle that.’

‘Did you really need to be so rough?’

‘It never pays to do things by halves, not here. This isn’t tourist India, you know. The only thing I’m sorry about is taking you there in the first place. I should have had more sense.’

‘I’m not,’ she said. ‘You weren’t responsible for what happened. To tell you the truth, I rather enjoyed myself.’

‘Including the nautch dance?’

She laughed. ‘I’ll reserve my opinion on that part of the programme. It was very educational, mind you.’

‘Something of an understatement. You know, you’re quite a girl, and for someone who believes in turning the other cheek, you throw a good punch. You certainly rocked him back there.’

‘A quick temper was always my besetting sin,’ she said. ‘My old grannie used to warn me about that when I was a little girl back home in Maine. Quakers are really quite nice when you get to know them. Flesh and blood, too.’

He grinned and took her arm. ‘All right, I surrender. Let’s walk.’

They went on to the beach below the embankment and strolled through the moonlight without talking for a while. Now and then, sandbanks collapsed into the water with a thunderous roar and cranes threshed through the shallows, disturbed by the noise.

Huge pale flowers swam out of the night, and beyond the trees the sky was violet and purple, more beautiful than anything she had ever seen before. They passed a solitary fisherman cooking a supper of fish over a small fire of dried cowdung and Drummond gave him a greeting in Urdu.

‘What do you do in Balpur beside fly in guns for Mr Cheung?’ she said after a while.

‘Survey work for the Indian government, freight general cargo or passengers. Anything that comes to hand.’

‘I shouldn’t have thought there was much of a living in that.’

‘There isn’t but Cheung pays well for the Tibetan trips. And I’ll be leaving soon, anyway. I’ve had enough of the place.’

‘What’s it like?’

‘Balpur?’ he shrugged. ‘Barren, treacherous mountains. A capital of three thousand people that’s more like an overgrown village. An army, if you can call it that, of seventy-five. When winter comes, it’s absolute hell and that’s in another month. The roads are the worst in the world at the best of times, but during the winter, they’re completely snowed up.’

‘What about the Khan?’