Murder As A Fine Art Part 28

Of the British East India Company.

"Two hundred years it's been here," a sergeant had told the artist's unit when they arrived in Calcutta in 1830. "The British East India Company claims its profit comes from shipping tea, silk, and spices back home. And the niter that's the main ingredient in saltpeter. Can't have an empire without saltpeter. You!" The sergeant challenged one of the new arrivals. "What's it used for?"

"My mother used it for pickling, Sergeant."

"You idiot, pickles don't make an empire great. Saltpeter along with sulfur and powdered charcoal gives you what?"

"Gunpowder, Sergeant," the artist of death volunteered, standing at attention under the furnace of the sun.

He was eighteen. He had been in the army from when, as a tall twelve-year-old, he had walked into a London enlistment center and claimed to be fourteen. That had made him eligible for what was called boy service, first as a courier and later as a hospital helper. He preferred the hospital because while he hurried bandages to male nurses or took away slop pails, he had the chance to study the pain of injured soldiers. At the age of seventeen, he had officially become part of the regiment, but the daily routine of marches and maintenance had bored him after the fascination of the agony he saw in the hospital. Because enlistment was for a minimum of twenty-one years, the only way the artist could leave the army was by deserting, but given that the police were already looking for him, he didn't see any point in having the army search for him also. When news spread that the regiment was sailing to India, the artist pretended to share the concern of others about yellow fever and murderous natives, but in truth the prospects made him feel overjoyed.

"Gunpowder. Yes. Very good, laddie." The sergeant looked at the artist of death as if he meant the compliment. His sun-browned and -creased face suggested that the sergeant had been in India forever. The cynical tone with which he delivered the briefing implied that he'd given it more times than he cared to recall.

"Gunpowder," the sergeant emphasized. "The empire can't very well carry on its wars unless it has saltpeter to make gunpowder, right? And India has the greatest reserves of saltpeter ingredients on the planet."

The sun was so fierce that as the artist of death stood at attention with the other arrivals, he stopped sweating. His vision paled. Spots wavered before his eyes.

"But saltpeter, tea, silk, and spices aren't why we're here to help the British East India Company do business, laddies. The reason we're here is this little beauty."

The sergeant held up a pale bulb. "This is the head of a poppy plant."

He used a knife to cut the bulb. "And this white fluid seeping out is called opium. It dries to a brown color. When it's powdered, you can smoke it, eat it, drink it, or inhale it to make you think you're in the clouds. I don't doubt one day somebody'll figure out how to stick it directly into your veins. But if you value your life, do not-I repeat do not-ever-use this stuff. Not because it can kill you if you take too much, and too much is only a little. No, if I catch you using this devil, I'll be the one who kills you. I can't depend on someone whose mind drifts into the clouds. The natives hate us. If they get the chance, they'll turn against us. When the shooting starts, I want to know that the men I'm fighting with are focused on their business and not on swirling dervishes. Do I make myself clear? You! What did I just say?"

The sergeant spoke challengingly to the artist, who fought to clear the spots from in front of his eyes.

"Sergeant, you said don't use opium! Ever!" the artist responded.

"You'll go far, laddie. Not once, everybody! Oh, you'll be tempted to learn what the talk's all about! You'll want to ride the clouds! Resist that temptation, because I swear, before I kill you for using it, I'll break every bone in your body! Everybody, am I clear about that? Do not let this devil tempt you!"

"Yes, Sergeant."

"Louder!"

"Yes, Sergeant!"

"I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

"YES, SERGEANT!"

"Good. To give you an idea of the disgusting depths into which opium can lead, I want each of you to read this piece of filth that I'm holding. This foul book is called Confessions of an English Opium-Eater. Its author is a degenerate named Thomas De Quincey. Those of you who can't read will listen to someone read it out loud. You," the sergeant challenged the artist. "Can you read?"

"Yes, Sergeant!"

"Then make certain these other men know what's in this perverted dung heap of a book!"

"Yes, Sergeant!"

The sergeant dropped the poppy bulb and crushed it with his boot, making a dramatic show of grinding its white fluid into the dirt.

"Now let me tell all of you how the British East India Company works and why you're risking your life for it. The company has plenty of opium from here in India, but it earns more profit from the tea in China. So which makes more sense? Does the company sell the lower-priced opium at home in England and then bring back the money to buy the higher-priced tea in China? Or does it save itself the trouble and keep much of the opium right here, trading it to the Chinese in exchange for tea? Tell me!" the sergeant demanded from the artist as more spots wavered in front of his eyes.

"Trade the opium for the Chinese tea, Sergeant!" the artist of death answered.

"You really show promise, laddie. Exactly. The British East India Company trades the opium for the Chinese tea. There's only one small problem in this scheme. Opium happens to be illegal in China. The Chinese emperor isn't eager for his millions of subjects to become opium degenerates. Imagine the emperor's nerve standing up to the British East India Company and by extension the British Empire. By the way, did I explain that it's very difficult to tell the difference between our government and the British East India Company?"

"You didn't, Sergeant!" the artist replied. "But we wish to know!"

"You'll be a corporal in a couple of weeks, laddie. Everybody, pay attention. All the empire's wars need financing, and we have the British East India Company to thank for making them possible. It lent the British government millions of pounds to finance the Seven Years' War alone. Generous, don't you think? But then, in exchange, the government gave the British East India Company the exclusive right to trade with India and China. It's no coincidence that the chairman of the company's board of directors is the British government's foreign secretary. The result of this cozy arrangement is that when you protect the British East India Company, you protect the British government. Keep that thought foremost in your minds and you'll never wonder why we're here."

A recruit toppled, a victim of the sun.

Two other arrivals stooped to help him.

"Did I say you could move?" the sergeant demanded. "Leave him alone! Both of you remain at attention for an hour after everyone else is dismissed!"

The sergeant walked up and down the line, glaring at all of them. In the background, two elephants used their trunks to carry logs to a construction site. The artist feared that he was going insane.

The sergeant confronted the artist.

"If opium is illegal in China but if the British East India Company wants to trade its opium for Chinese tea, how can that transaction be managed?"

The artist thought carefully, fighting his heat sickness. "By smuggling the opium into China, Sergeant!"

"I hereby officially promote you to corporal. See that you punish the two men who broke ranks just now. Yes, the opium is smuggled into China. That is accomplished via ships to Hong Kong or via caravan through India's northern mountains. When you men aren't making sure the natives don't rebel against us, you'll guard the opium as it's loaded onto ships and caravan wagons. It's a busy life here, laddies, provided you don't weaken the way that man did."

The sergeant pointed toward the man who'd collapsed.

"Is he dead?"

"I think so, Sergeant," a recruit answered.

"Well, what doesn't kill us makes us strong."

COUNTLESS OPIUM BRICKS, the color of coffee, awaited shipment to China or else home to England, there to be blended with alcohol and made into laudanum. All the warehouses had a faint biting odor of the slaked lime that was part of the water solution in which the opium paste was first boiled.

The artist became very familiar with that odor because his first a.s.signment in India was to guard those warehouses. Each night, he and other sentries patrolled the walkways between the buildings. Ignoring the bites of insects, he focused on the shadows ahead, aware that the insects, even if they infected him, would be nothing compared to the anger of the sergeant if someone broke into the warehouses and stole any of the opium.

A slight sc.r.a.ping noise made him pause.

When a shadow scurried from a warehouse, he raised his rifle.

"Stop!"

The shadow ducked behind some crates.

The artist stepped closer, aiming. "Identify yourself!"

"I know that voice. Is it you, Corporal?" a man whispered.

"Step out!"

"Thank G.o.d. We thought you was the sergeant. Keep your voice down."

Figures emerged from behind the crates, three privates with whom the artist had sailed to India.

"We was just grabbin' a brick." One of them grinned. "Figured we'd have a smoke before goin' to sleep. This d.a.m.ned heat. These b.l.o.o.d.y insects. You want some?"

"Put it back in the warehouse."

"You want it all to yourself, eh? Fine. Here it is. We'll walk away. Pretend you never saw us."

"I said, 'Put it back in the warehouse.' "

"And then what?"

The artist didn't answer.

"You're not gonna turn us in, are you?"

The artist kept aiming.

"d.a.m.n it, the b.a.s.t.a.r.d's gonna turn us in!"

When they lunged, the artist shot the first man in the chest. Pivoting with the rifle, he drove his bayonet into the second man.

The third man crashed into him, knocking him against crates. The man thrust a knife at him. Twisting to avoid it, the artist grabbed the man's hand and bent it, forcing him to drop the knife. Ramming his elbow into the man's throat, he heard something crack.

The man sank, clutching his throat, gasping for air.

Voices and footsteps raced toward the artist. Soldiers surrounded him.

"My G.o.d," one of them said, holding a lantern over the bodies.

"Who fired that shot?" The sergeant pushed his way forward. "What happened?"

"That opium brick," the artist explained. "I caught them stealing it from the warehouse."

"So you killed them?" the sergeant asked in surprise.

"Those were your orders."

"Yes, those were indeed my orders."

"Plus, they tried to kill me."

"Three," a soldier said in the background. "He killed all three."

"Not only three, but three of your own." The sergeant studied him. "It's easy to kill natives. But three of your own? Did you ever kill anybody before?"

"No," the artist lied.

"Someone else might have hesitated."

"Sergeant, I didn't have time to think."

"Sometimes not thinking is good. There's someone I want you to talk to."

IGNORE MY RANK. No need to address me as 'sir,' " the major said. "Tell me about your father."

"Didn't know him. My mother wasn't married. When I was four, she met a former soldier and lived with him."

"Where did he serve?"

"With Wellington at Waterloo."

"You lived with a man who helped make history."

"He never talked about it. He had a big scar on his leg, but he never talked about that, either. Nightmares sometimes woke him."

"My father fought at Waterloo, also," the major confided. "Nightmares woke him. The reason I asked is, sometimes it's inherited."

"Inherited?"

"The ability to stare a threat in the face and not flinch. But since you never knew your father, we have no way of telling what you might have inherited from him. The fear of being killed or of killing can paralyze a man. Only twenty percent of our soldiers are able to overcome those fears. The rest provide cover for the actual warriors. It seems that you are one of those warriors."

"All I did was defend myself."

"Against three trained men, but you didn't flinch."

Beyond the major's tent, an instructor showed ten soldiers how to tie a knot in a rope to make an effective garrote. The instructor explained that the weapon, a favorite of the Thug cult, crushed the windpipe in addition to strangling.

The artist listened with interest.

"This is a special unit I'm a.s.sembling. You speak better than your fellows. Where did you learn?" the major asked.

"Every Sunday in London, I went to a church where a teacher gave me a cookie if I learned to read Bible verses."

"The Bible says, 'Thou shalt not kill.' "

"There's a lot of killing in the Old Testament."

The major chuckled. "Why did you become a soldier?"

"When I was an infant, my mother carried me on her back while she gathered chunks of coal along the Thames. Until I was nine, I worked for a dustman, collecting ashes. After that, I shoveled horse droppings from the streets and put them in bins for the fertilizer makers to pick up. When I was eleven, I helped clean privies."

"There seems to be a common denominator."

"After a year of digging out privies, I decided that the army couldn't be much worse, so when I was twelve, I claimed to be fourteen and signed up."