To take care of another human being – this was something Neel had never before thought of doing, not even with his own son, let alone a man of his own age, a foreigner. All he knew of nurture was the tenderness that had been lavished on him by his own care-givers: that they would come to love him was something he had taken for granted – yet knowing his own feelings for them to be in no way equivalent, he had often wondered how that attachment was born. It occurred to him now to ask himself if this was how it happened: was it possible that the mere fact of using one's hands and investing one's attention in someone other than oneself, created a pride and tenderness that had nothing whatever to do with the response of the object of one's care – just as a craftsman's love for his handiwork is in no way diminished by the fact of it being unreciprocated?

After swaddling his cell-mate in a dhoti, Neel propped him against the neem tree and forced a little rice down his throat. To put him back on his verminous charpoy would be to undo all the cleaning he had done, so he made a nest of blankets for him in a corner. Then he dragged the filthy bedstead to the well, gave it a thorough scrubbing and placed it, top down, in the open, as he had seen the other men do, so that the sunlight would burn away its pale, wriggling cargo of blood-sucking insects. Only after the job was done did it occur to Neel that he had lofted the stout bedstead on his own, without any assistance – he, who by family legend had been sickly since birth, subject to all manner of illness. In the same vein, it had been said of him, too, that he would choke on anything other than the most delicate food – but already many days had passed since he'd eaten anything but the cheapest dal and coarsest rice, small in grain, veined with red and weighted with a great quantity of tooth-shattering conkers and grit – yet his appetite had never been more robust.

Next day, through a complicated series of exchanges, involving the writing of letters to chokras and jemadars in other wards, Neel struck a bargain with a barber for the shaving of his cell-mate's head and face.

In all my years of hair-cutting, said the barber, I've never seen anything like this.

Neel looked over the barber's shoulder at his cell-mate's scalp: even as the razor was shaving it clean, the bared skin was sprouting a new growth – a film that moved and shimmered like mercury. It was a swarming horde of lice, and as the matted hair tumbled off, the insects could be seen falling to the ground in showers. Neel was kept busy, drawing and pouring bucketfuls of water, so as to drown the insects before they found others to infest.

The face that emerged from the vanished matting of hair and beard was little more than a skull, with shrunken eyes, a thin beak of a nose, and a forehead in which the bones had all but broken through the skin. That some part of this man was Chinese was suggested by the shape of his eyes and the colour of his skin – but in his high-bridged nose and his wide, full mouth, there was something that hinted also at some other provenance. Looking into that wasted face, Neel thought he could see the ghost of someone else, lively and questing: although temporarily exorcized by the opium, this other being had not entirely surrendered its claim upon the site of its occupancy. Who could say what capacities and talents that other self had possessed? As a test, Neel said, in English: 'What is your name?'

There was a flicker in the afeemkhor's dulled eyes, as if to indicate that he knew what the words meant, and when his head dropped, Neel chose to interpret the gesture not as a refusal but as a postponement of a reply. From then on, with his cell-mate's condition improving steadily, Neel made a ritual of asking the question once a day and even though his attempts to communicate met with no success, he never doubted that he would soon have a response.

The afternoon that Zachary came on board the Ibis, Mr Crowle was on the quarter-deck, pacing its width with a slow, contemplative tread, almost as if he were rehearsing for his day as Captain. He came to a halt when he caught sight of Zachary, with his ditty-bags slung over his shoulder. 'Why, lookee here!' he said in mock surprise. 'Blow me if it isn't little Lord Mannikin hisself, primed to loose for the vasty deep.'

Zachary had resolved that he would not allow himself to be provoked by the first mate. He grinned cheerfully and dropped his ditty-bags. 'Good afternoon, Mr Crowle,' he said, sticking out a hand. 'Trust you've been well?'

'Oh do you now?' said Mr Crowle, shaking his hand brusquely. 'Truth to tell, I wasn't sure we'd have the pleasure o'yer company after all. Thought ye'd claw off and cut the painter, to be honest. Tofficky young tulip like y'self – reckon'd y'might prefer to find gainful employment onshore.'

'Never entered my mind, Mr Crowle,' said Zachary promptly. 'Nothing'd make me give up my berth on the Ibis.'

'Too soon to tell, Mannikin,' said the first mate with a smile. 'Much too early yet.'

Zachary shrugged this off, and over the next few days, what with stowing provisions and tallying the spare equipment, there was no time for any but the most perfunctory exchanges with the first mate. Then, one afternoon, Steward Pinto came aft to let Zachary know that the schooner's contingent of guards and overseers was in the process of embarking. Curious about the newcomers, Zachary stepped out to the quarter-deck to watch, and within a few minutes he was joined at the fife-rail by Mr Crowle.

The guards were for the most part turbaned silahdars – former sepoys with bandoliers crossed over their chests. The overseers were known as maistries, prosperous-looking men in dark chapkans and white dhotis. What was striking about them, maistries and silahdars alike, was the swagger with which they came aboard: it was as if they were a conquering force, that had been deputed to take possession of a captured vessel. They would not demean themselves by shouldering their own baggage; they deigned only to carry weapons and armaments – lathis, whips, spears and swords. Their firearms, which consisted of an impressive cache of muskets, gunpowder and tamancha handguns, were carried aboard by uniformed porters and deposited in the schooner's armoury. But as for the rest of their luggage, it fell to the lascars to fetch, carry and stow their belongings and provisions, to the accompaniment of many a kick, cuff and gali.

The leader of the paltan, Subedar Bhyro Singh, was the last to step on board, and his entry was the most ceremonious of all: the maistries and silahdars received him as though he were a minor potentate, forming ranks and bowing low to offer their salams. A large, barrel-chested, bull-necked man, the subedar stepped on deck wearing a spotless white dhoti and a long kurta with a shimmering silk cummerbund: his head was wrapped in a majestic turban and he had a stout lathi tucked under his arm. He curled his white moustaches as he surveyed the schooner, looking none too pleased until his eyes fell on Mr Crowle. He greeted the first mate by beaming broadly and joining his hands together and Mr Crowle, too, seemed glad to see him, for Zachary heard him muttering, under his breath, 'Well, if it isn't old Muffin-mug!' Then he called out aloud, in the most cordial tone that Zachary had yet heard him employ: 'A very good day to you, Subby-dar.'

This unusual display of affability prompted Zachary to ask: 'Friend of yours, Mr Crowle?'

'We've shipped together in the past, and it's always the same, inn'it, for us Rough-knots? "Shipmates afore strangers, strangers afore dogs".' The first mate's lip curled as he looked Zachary up and down. 'Not that ye'd know about that, Mannikin, not in the company y'keep.'