“My upper room,” said Pidge softly. “My upper room.”
XLV
AMRITSAR, APRIL 13, 1919
TOWARD the end of the afternoon of Sunday, the 13th, Richard Cobden ordered a carriage. He was still bandaged about the head, his left arm in a sling. This was his first descent from the room since his hurts on the 10th, and meanwhile General Fyatt had taken control of the city, bringing in troops from nearby stations. Dicky had met Fyatt in France, and was on his way now to pay his respects to the General at his Headquarters in the Ram Bagh. He was getting it very clearly just now that if it were observed that he had any sort of affiliation with the natives, he would promptly be placed out of reach of all Punjabi events, even as a spectator.
The American was personally and intensely interested in Nagar and Gandhi, but still he did not feel that he had taken sides in the least. He looked upon Gandhi’s work as visionary, and the work of the British in India as substantial, and the more likely to endure. He had seen Nagar but a moment or two each day since the 10th, and had kept in touch with developments through the English sources.
The air was still furiously hot, though it was after four in the afternoon. The streets were crowded, this being the day of the Baisaki fair, and thousands were in from the country. Dicky heard the roar of a ’plane over the city, and craned out of the window of his half-closed carriage for a glance at its flight. The pilot was making circles over a point at a little distance ahead—a low peculiar hovering.
Dicky inquired of his driver the meaning, and was told that the ’plane appeared to be hanging over the great crowd assembled in the Jallianwalla Bagh—that thousands of the visitors attending the fair were there, listening to the speakers, as well as many townsfolk.
“But didn’t the General give orders for no public assemblies?”
The driver had not heard. Dicky reflected that the ’plane didn’t appear to be there for the amusement of a crowd—no circus ’plane, but an effective bit of government property, rather, with an air of business. It rose now and vanished over the city.
The carriage continued on the way to the Ram Bagh, until it was halted for the passage of troops in the street. A half-hundred Gurkhas and Baluchees, two motor cars with English officers and civilians, the whole outfit trailed by a pair of armored cars, and moving in the direction where the government ’plane had hovered.
“Where are they going?” Dicky asked of his driver.