Two weeks after the first clinic day, the Canal Bungalow had acquired a new form of clutter: crates.
Wooden boxes, stencilled with half-erased markings from another war and another continent, were stacked in one of the side rooms. Evelyn had insisted they stay well away from the medical stores.
"These," Bilal said happily inside Jinnah's head, "are the real toys."
D'Souza, sleeves rolled up, prised open the nearest crate . Straw and oil-paper spilled onto the floor, carrying a faint smell of old mud and machine grease.
Inside lay the relics of the Great War:
A compact receiver the size of a small tiffin carrier — a crystal set with a regenerative stage, its little tuning coil wound like an eccentric silver bracelet. A five-watt CW transmitter, three dull glass valves seated in a battered chassis that had clearly known French rain and trench mud. A hand-cranked generator with a folding handle. A spool of thin antenna wire and a lead-weighted throwing line. A Morse key, its contacts polished smooth by a thousand gloved fingers. A small canvas bag for spares and a notebook with waxed pages, meant for messages that did not forgive smudges.
"It looks," Jinnah said dryly, "like someone has broken a piano into smaller tragedies."
D'Souza laughed. "No, Sir. This is music. We put the receiver and transmitter in one box, the generator in another, wire and key in a bag. Two men can carry it, three if one is lazy. Light enough to move, strong enough to reach Lahore if the air behaves. This is good gear. Better than I hoped, honestly."
"You are certain," Jinnah asked, "that it is still… functional? These things have not been asked to work since the Kaiser abdicated."
"We'll string the antenna tomorrow," D'Souza said. "Wire over that tree, ground rod in the yard. We'll crank the handle till my arm falls off. If Lahore replies, we'll know it still has a voice."
You do realise, Bilal murmured, that in my world this is like watching someone assemble the first dial-up modem in the Stone Age.
It is, Jinnah replied, more dignified than your metaphors suggest. But I take the point.
The procurement had required careful choreography: discreet conversations at the Ripon Club with Ardeshir and Fram; a quiet word with two Muslim industrialists in Lahore who supplied Railway and Telegraph and therefore knew which scrap dealers bought crates with history stamped on them.
Each contact had been given the same explanation, adjusted to his vanity but identical in substance.
"I do not wish," Jinnah had told them, "to run this estate as some feudal jagirdar who shouts from a verandah and waits for peasants to appear with rent and complaints. The land is large. I intend to manage it as a modern concern. That requires information to move as swiftly as water. When there is flood, theft, or trouble, I do not want to send a boy on a bicycle in the dark. I want a message in the air. Wireless gives me that."
"A modern agriculture reformist," Ardeshir had said, amused. "You are half mill-owner already, Jinnah-saheb."
"A barrister with a farm telegraph," one of the Lahore men had chuckled. "Very well. We shall see which old army wallah has left-over gadgets in his godown."
And now the gadgets were here, smelling of old canvas and possibility.
Harrington's Concerns
That evening, the Deputy Commissioner's House in Montgomery was brighter than usual. Lamps had been polished; the good tablecloth — the one without ink stains from hurried notes — was in use. Margaret Harrington had insisted on flowers.
"After all, Robert," she said, arranging the vase with the precision of a woman used to making worlds livable with small touches, "how often do you have a celebrity lawyer and a lady doctor at your table? If you spend the whole evening talking only of land revenue, I shall defect to the Congress."
"I doubt Mr. Jinnah wishes to discuss ladies' sewing circles," Harrington replied. "He has just hired fifty men with military bearings and acquired wireless sets. I should like to know why before Lahore imagines I am nursing a princeling's regiment."
Margaret gave him a look. "You will at least be polite while you interrogate him. I am a great admirer of his speeches."
"I know," Harrington sighed. "You told him so in your last note. I believe you wrote the invitation and I merely signed it."
"Of course," she said serenely. "You would have forgotten to add that we should be delighted to have him, which would have been unforgivably rude."
When Jinnah and Evelyn arrived, the reception was warm. Margaret greeted them both with genuine pleasure.
"Mr. Jinnah," she said, "you are most welcome. I cannot tell you how refreshing it is to have someone here who speaks in complete sentences. And Dr. Cartwright — you must tell me everything about your Montgomery experiment after dinner. I promise not to faint at any of the gruesome bits."
"You may regret that promise," Evelyn said. "I have a professional interest in details."
At table, the first course was accompanied by harmless talk: Lahore's dry heat, Bombay theatre, the eccentricities of canal engineers. But Harrington's mind had not come there to rest.
Over the main course, he leant back slightly.
"Mr. Jinnah," he said, "I must confess to a professional curiosity. In the space of a few weeks, you have acquired three hundred and fifty acres, a Canal Bungalow, a doctor, a nurse, and—" he gave a small, wry gesture "—if my reports are accurate, fifty men under something like military discipline. One could almost mistake you for a small State."
Jinnah set down his knife and fork with deliberate neatness.
"You may also note in your reports," he said, "that I have prescribed quinine for fifty villagers and taken my own pills under the supervision of an Anglo-Indian nurse. States seldom begin with malaria treatment."
Margaret hid a smile behind her glass.
"Still," Harrington said, "as Deputy Commissioner, I would be failing in my duty if I did not ask: why fifty men? Most landowners make do with ten watchmen, a few loud dogs, and the threat of the police."
"And bandits," Jinnah said quietly, "make do with numbers. Your own police circular" — he nodded politely towards him — "estimates the largest dacoit group in these parts at forty men."
Harrington raised his eyebrows. "You read that?"
"I make a habit," Jinnah replied, "of learning who has more men than I do within a day's ride. Forty is not a number I care to face with five sleepy chowkidars and good intentions. A barrister of my profile, with known political associations and reasonably public income, is a tempting subject for a kidnapping or a 'robbery with a moral'. There are men who would not arrange it themselves but would chuckle over the reports. I have no intention of giving them that pleasure."
And, Bilal added on the private channel, you're not letting random thugs become DLC content in this run.
"So you hire fifty men," Harrington said, "and you acquire wireless sets."
"Yes," Jinnah answered. "Fifty men, because I do not intend to lose simply because the other side multiplied. Wireless, because a message twenty miles in the air is better than a messenger twenty miles on the ground. But I understand your concern. A force-sized body of armed retainers is precisely what this province does not need more of. So we shall mitigate both appearance and reality."
"How?" Harrington asked. "Because I must tell you frankly, if this looks from Lahore like a private regiment flying the flag of 'rural uplift', I shall have more trouble than malaria on my hands."
Jinnah sipped his water before replying.
"Firstly," he said, "I would welcome the appointment of one of your officers as liaison within my estate management. A man who knows the agriculture department's schemes and is known in your office. He may sit in on my planning meetings, keep his own notes, and report to you directly. I will treat him as part of my staff; you may treat him as your eyes."
"That is… unusually frank," Harrington said.
"I am not building a fortress against you," Jinnah replied. "I am building a machine. It will run better if properly oiled. Your agriculture department has, buried under its bureaucracy, several sensible ideas — improved seed, fertiliser trials, even pilot bee-keeping projects. I would rather adapt existing apparatus than reinvent every wheel myself."
"Honey?" Margaret said, delighted. "You intend to keep bees?"
"Yes," Jinnah said. "Among other things. Bee-keeping, if done properly, improves both honey yield and crop yield. More pollination, more grain, more rupees. It is one of the few reforms that pleases both the farmer's tongue and his pocket. Your pamphlets, Mr. Harrington, are quite lucid on this point. I even enjoyed reading them, which I cannot say of most government documents."
"You flatter our pamphlets," Harrington said. "Few have ever accused them of being read."
"I read laws," Jinnah said. "Pamphlets are a lighter penance."
Margaret laughed.
"And secondly?" Harrington asked. "You mentioned a mitigation."
"Secondly," Jinnah said, "I will not keep my men locked inside my walls. On any given day, two of them will be posted in the each villages — Bhagatpur, Chak 17-M, and the station hamlet — on rotation. Armed, yes, but under strict orders that their first duty is to prevent theft and violence against villagers, their homes, their animals."
Harrington frowned slightly. "You are arming men and scattering them among tenants. That sounds, on paper, like a recipe for complaints."
"It is," Jinnah replied, "a recipe for trust, if cooked properly. A farmer who knows that if a thief comes for his cow there is a man within a hundred yards who can blow a whistle and appear with a rifle, sleeps more deeply. A girl coming back from the canal at dusk walks a little less afraid if she sees one of my men leaning on a wall rather than some drunk with a stick."
"And what," Harrington asked, "prevents your men from becoming the drunk with the stick?"
"The knowledge," Jinnah said, "that if they do, they answer not only to me but to you. Your liaison will hear of it. The villagers will have a clear, written path to complain. Misconduct will be treated as a breach of contract, not a forgivable 'mistake'. I am not collecting small kings. I am hiring watchmen with better training."
He paused.
"There is another aspect," he added. "Productivity. A man whose buffalo is stolen loses not only the animal but the milk, the traction, the interest on the debt he took to buy it. Fear of theft makes people plant less, trade less, sleep badly. Give them a framework of safety — not illusions, but a framework — and their productivity increases. Their surplus grows. When their surplus grows, my rent receipts grow. This is not philanthropy. It is sound business."
Harrington leaned back, considering.
"You are," he said slowly, "the only landowner in my district who has used the phrase 'sound business' in a conversation about village security. Most talk of 'prestige'."
"I leave prestige," Jinnah said, "to men with bigger hats. I am interested in returns, stability, and the prevention of panic."
Margaret looked from one to the other.
"So," she said, summarising, "you are telling my husband: 'Allow me my fifty men and my wireless sets, give me one of your officers, and in return you will have one quieter corner of your district, better harvests, and fewer bandit reports.'"
"Precisely," Jinnah said. "If at any point you find my experiment causes more trouble than it eases, you may say so plainly. I have no wish to fight both the canal and the Commissioner."
Harrington glanced at Evelyn. "And you, Doctor? From your professional standpoint — is this man building a clinic or a small army?"
"A small clinic," Evelyn said, "and a small army to keep fools from burning it down. From a medical standpoint, I approve. From a moral standpoint, I'm content so long as the rifles are used less often than the quinine."
Joint operations, Bilal said, amused. Health department, security department, agriculture department. We're basically writing your first Cabinet in miniature.
Harrington sighed, half-resigned, half-impressed.
"Very well, Mr. Jinnah," he said at last. "You have made your case. I will play my part — cautiously, but in good faith."
The Weapons and the Liaison
Later that evening, in his study, Harrington drafted a memorandum and a telegram.
First, to Lahore:
TO: CHIEF SECRETARY PUNJAB GOVT LAHORE
FROM: COMMISSIONER MONTGOMERY DISTRICT
FURTHER TO EARLIER REPORTS RE MR M A JINNAH ESTATE MONTGOMERY STOP
HAVE MET PERSONALLY STOP HE HAS HIRED APPROX FIFTY EX SERVICEMEN AND OTHER GUARDS FOR SECURITY AND REQUESTS ISSUE OF LEGAL FIREARMS AND AMMUNITION STOP
STATES REASON AS PROTECTION AGAINST LOCAL DACOIT BANDS (EST STRENGTH FORTY MEN) AND PERSONAL VULNERABILITY GIVEN PUBLIC POSITION AND POLITICAL ENEMIES STOP
I AM SATISFIED INTENT IS SECURITY NOT RAISING PRIVATE ARMY STOP HE AGREES TO ACCEPT GOVT LIAISON OFFICER AS PART OF ESTATE MANAGEMENT AND TO PLACE CERTAIN GUARDS IN VILLAGES FOR PROTECTION OF TENANTS AND CATTLE AS PART OF RURAL UPLIFT PROJECT STOP
REQUEST AUTHORITY TO ISSUE LIMITED NUMBER OF RIFLES AND AMMUNITION TO BE LICENSED IN NAME OF ESTATE AND ENTERED UNDER SECURITY AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT SCHEME STOP WILL SUPERVISE AND REPORT ANY MISUSE STOP
Then, a note for his own file:
I have, after discussion, concluded that facilitation is preferable to obstruction in this case.
Jinnah is constitutionally-minded, frank, and possesses a rare quality among influential Indians: he understands both the value of order and the arithmetic of productivity.
His proposal to integrate security with rural uplift (villagers' safety, bee-keeping, agricultural experiments) is unusual but, if successful, may provide a model. Recommend close but sympathetic observation.
The next day, he sent for Ahmed Khan — a capable Muslim extra-assistant in the Collectorate, known both for his grasp of the revenue code and for knowing the difference between wheat and gram when he saw it in a field.
"Ahmed," Harrington said, "how would you like to be seconded to an experiment?"
Ahmed's eyes lit up. "Sir?"
"You will be attached," Harrington said, "to Mr. Jinnah's estate as his assistant in agricultural and administrative matters. Officially, you will help him implement our department's schemes on his land. Unofficially, you will tell me if he starts behaving like a nawab assembling a fortress."
Ahmed smiled. "I have read his speeches, Sir. If he behaves like a nawab, half the province will faint from shock before they complain. I would be very interested to see what he does with three hundred and fifty acres."
"You will sit in his meetings, keep your own notes, and send me a short report each month," Harrington said. "You will also help him secure bee-keeping kits, improved seed, anything else the books permit. Think of it as a chance to see whether our Colonisation schemes work when someone actually reads the pamphlets."
Ahmed nodded. "I accept, Sir."
—
When Jinnah received the formal letter and the informal note Harrington sent with it, he gave a small, satisfied nod.
"So," he said to Bilal, "we have our liaison, our wireless, our pending rifles, and the Commissioner's blessing — with conditions."
That, Bilal said, is as close as you're going to get to a 'Go' button in this build. We've convinced the system to give us APIs instead of just throwing exceptions.
"Your metaphors," Jinnah replied, "remain barbaric. But I understand the sense, Mr. Game Developer."
He folded Harrington's letter and placed it carefully in the estate file marked SANDILBAR – CORE, then reached for his pen.
Outside, in the Canal Bungalow yard, children were still talking about the lady doctor who had given them bitter tablets, and men were still arguing amiably about whether "wireless" meant you could hear voices travelling through the air like ghosts.
Inside, the estate's skeleton — security, communication, administration, health — was slowly taking shape.
The bandits did not know it yet. Nor, for that matter, did the politicians in Delhi or Bombay. But somewhere between the bee-keeping pamphlet and the Morse key, a different kind of independence struggle had already begun.