From up the road floated the staccato note of a staff beating its surface, and the clanking tinkle of an iron ring against the wooden staff.
"A mail-carrier," Barlow said.
And then to the monotonous pat-pat-pat of trotting feet the mail-carrier emerged from the grey wall of night.
"Here, you, what comes?" the Captain queried, checking the grey.
The postie stopped in terror at the English voice.
"Salaam, Bahadur Sahib; it is war."
"Thou art a tree owl," and Barlow laughed. "A war does not spring up like a drift of driven dust. Is it some raja's elephants and carts with his harem going to adurbar?"
"Sahib, it is, as I have said, war. The big brass cannon that is called'The Humbler of Cities,' goes forth to speak its order, and with it aresepoys to feed it the food of destruction. Beyond that I know not,Sahib, for I am a man of peace, being but a runner of the post."
Then he salaamed and sifted into the night gloom like a thrown handful of white sand, echoing back the clamp-clamp-clamp of his staff's iron ring, which was a signal to all cobras to move from the path of him who ran, slip their chilled folds from the warm dust of the road.
And on in front what had been sounds of mystery was now a turmoil of noises. The hissing screech, the wails, were the expostulations of tortured axles; the rumbling boom was unexplainable; but the jungle of the hillside was possessed of screaming devils. Black-faced, white-whiskered monkeys roused by the din, screamed cries of hate and alarm as they scurried in volplaning leaps from tree to tree. And peacocks, awakened when they should have slept, called with their harsh voices from lofty perches.
A party of villagers hurried by, shifting their cheap turbans to hide faces as they scurried along.
The Gulab was trembling; perhaps the decoits, led by Hunsa, had come by a shorter way; for they were like beasts of the jungle in this art of silent, swift travel.
"Sahib," she pleaded, "go from the road."
"Why, Bootea?"
"The one with the staff spoke of soldiers."
He laughed and patted her shoulder. "Don't fear, little lady," he said, "an army doesn't make war upon one, even if they are soldiers. It will be but a wedding party who now take the wife to the village of her husband."
"Not at night; and a Sahib who carries a woman upon his saddle will hear words of offence."
Though Barlow laughed he was troubled. What if the smouldering fire of sedition had flared up, and that even now men of Sindhia's were slipping on a night march toward some massing of rebels. The resonant, heavy moaning of massive wheels was like the rumble of a gun carriage. And, too, there was the drumming of many hoofs upon the road. Barlow's ear told him it was the rhythmic beat of cavalry horses, not the erratic rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat of native ponies.
With a pressure upon the rein he edged the grey from the white road to a fringe of bamboo and date palms, saying; "If you will wait here, Gulab, I'll see what this is all about."
He slipped from the saddle and lifted her gently to the ground saying, "Don't move; of a certainty it is nothing but the passing of some raja. But, if by any chance I don't return, wait until all is still, until all have gone, and then some well-disposed driver of a bullock cart will take you on your way." Putting his hand in his pocket, and drawing it forth, he added: "Here is the compeller of friendship—silver; for a bribe even an enemy will become a friend."
But the Gulab with her slim fingers closed his hand over the rupees, and pressed the back of it against her lips saying, "If I die it is nothing. But stay here, Sahib, they may be—"
She stopped, and he asked, "May be who, Gulab?"
"Men who will harm thee."
But Barlow lifting to the saddle passed to the road, and Bootea crumpled down in a little desolate heap of misery, her fingers thrust within her bodice, pleading with an amulet for protection for the Sahib. She prayed to her own village god to breathe mercy into the hearts of those who marched in war, and if it were the Bagrees, that Bhowanee would vouchsafe them an omen that to harm the one on a white horse would bring her wrath upon their families and their villages.
Captain Barlow reined in the grey on the roadside, for those that marched were close. Now he could see, two abreast, horses that carried cavalry men. Ten couples of the troop rode by with low-voiced exchanges of words amongst themselves. A petty officer rode at their heels, and behind him, on a bay Arab, whose sweated skin glistened like red wine in the moonlight, came arisiladar, the commander of the troop. A little down the road Barlow could see an undulating, swaying huge ribbon of white-and-pink bullocks, twenty-four yoke of the tall lean-flanked powerfulAmrit Mahal, the breed that Hyder Ali long ago had brought on his conquering way to the land of the Mahrattas. And beyond the ghost-like line of white creatures was some huge thing that they drew.
The commander reined his Arab to a stand beside Barlow and saluted, saying, "Salaam, Major Sahib—you ride alone?"
Barlow said: "My salaams, Risiladar, and I am but a captain. I ride at night because the days are hot. My two men have gone before me because my horse dropped a shoe which had to be replaced. Did the Risiladar see my two servants that were mounted?"
"I met none such," the commander answered. "Perhaps in some village they have rested for a drink of liquor; they of the army are given to such practices when their Captain's eye is not upon them. I go with this"—and he waved a gauntleted hand back toward the thing that loomed beyond the bullocks that had now come to a halt. "It is the brass cannon, the like of which there is no other. We go to the camp of the Amil, who commands the Sindhia troops, taking him the brass cannon that it may compel a Musselman zemindar to pay the tax that is long past due. Why the barbarian should not pay I know not for a tax of one-fourth is not much for a foreigner, a debased follower of Mahomet, to render unto the ruler of this land that is the garden of the world. He has shut himself and men up in his mud fort, but when this brass mother of destruction spits into his stronghold a ball or two that is not opium he will come forth or we will enter by the gate the cannon has made."
"Then there will be bloodshed, Risiladar," Barlow declared.
"True, Captain Sahib; but that is, after a manner, the method of collecting just dues in this land where those who till the soil now, were, but a generation or two since, men of the sword,—they can't forget the traditions. In the land of the British Raj six inches of a paper, with a big seal duly affixed, would do the business. That I know, for I have travelled far, Sahib. As to the bloodshed, worse will be the trampling of crops, for in the district of this worshipper of Mahomet the wheat grows like wild scrub in the jungle, taller than up to the belly of my horse. That is the whyfore of the cannon, in a way of speaking, because from a hill we can send to this man a slaying message, and leave the wheat standing to fill the bellies of those who are in his hands as a tyrant. Sirdar Baptiste was for sending a thousand sepoys to put the fear of destruction in the debtor; but the Dewan with his eye on revenue from crops, hit upon this plan of the loud-voiced one of brass."
Then the commander ordered the advance, and saluting, said: "Salaam, Captain Sahib, and if I meet with your servants I will give them news that you desire their presence."
When the huge cannon had rumbled by, and behind it had passed a company of sepoys on foot, Barlow turned his horse into the jungle for Gulab.
Bootea's eyes glistened like stars when, lowering a hand, Barlow said:"Put a foot upon mine, Gulab, and I'll swing you up."
When they were on the road she said; "I saw them. It is as the runner said, war—is it so, Sahib?"
"The Captain says that he goes to collect revenue, but it may be that he spoke a lie, for it is said that a man of the land of the Five Rivers, which is the Punjaub, has five ways of telling a tale, and but one of them is the truth and comes last."
The girl pondered over this for a little, and then asked; "Does theSahib think perhaps it is war against his people?"
That was just what was in Barlow's mind since he had seen the big gun going forth at night; that perhaps the plot that was just a whisper, fainter than the hum of a humming bird's wing, was moving with swift silent velocity.
"Why do you ask that question? Have you heard from lips—perhaps loosened by wine or desire—aught of this?"
When she remained without answer, Barlow tapped his fingers lightly upon her shoulder, saying, "Tell me, girl."
"I have heard nothing of war," she said. "There was a something though that men whispered in the dark."
"What was it?"
"It was of the Chief of the Pindaris."
She felt the quivering start that ran through Barlow's body; but he said quietly: "With the Pindaris there is always trouble. Something of robbery—of a raid, was it?"
"I will listen again to those that whisper in the dark," she answered, "and perhaps if it concerns you, for your protection, I will tell."
"I hope those men didn't fall in with my two chaps," Barlow said, rather voicing his thoughts than in the way of speaking to the girl.
"The two who rode—they were the Captain Sahib's servants?"
Barlow started. "Yes, they were: I suppose I can trust you."
"And the Sahib is troubled? Perhaps it was a message for the Sahib that they carried."
"I don't know," he answered, evasively. "I was thinking that perhaps they might be messengers, for our sepoys are not stationed here, and come but on such errands."
"And if they were lulled, and the message stolen, it would cause trouble?"
She felt him tremble as he looked down into her eyes.
"I don't know. But the messages of a Raj are not for the ears of men to whom they have not been sent."
Barlow had an intuition that the girl's words were not prompted by idle curiosity. He was possessed of a sudden gloomy impression that she knew something of the two men who rode. And it was strange that they had not been seen upon either of the roads. The officer spoke of them frankly, and not as a man hiding something.
Suddenly he took a firm resolve, perhaps a dangerous one; not dangerous though if his men had really gone through.
"Gulab," he said,—and with his hand he turned her face up by the chin till their eyes were close together,—"if the two bore a message for me, and it was stolen, I would be like that one you loved was lost."
The beautiful face swung from his palm and he could hear her gasping.
"You know something?" he said, and he caressed the smooth black tresses.
"I did not see them, Sahib."
They rode in silence for half a mile and then she said, "Perhaps,Sahib, Bootea can help you—if the message is lost."
"And you will, girl?"
"I will, Sahib; even if I die for doing it, I will."
His arm tightened about her with a shrug of assuring thankfulness, and she knew that this man trusted her and was not sorry of her burden. Little child-dreams floated through her mind that the silver-faced moon would hang there above and light the world forever,—for the moon was the soul of the god Purusha whose sacrificed body had created the world,—and that she would ride forever in the arms of this fair-faced god, and that they were both of one caste, the caste that had as mark the sweet pain in the heart.
And Barlow was sometimes dropping the troubled thought of the missing order and the turmoil that would be in the Council of the Governor General when it became known, to mutter inwardly: "By Jove! if the chaps get wind of this, that I carried the Gulab throughout a moonlit night, there'll be nothing for me but to send in my papers. I'll be drawn;—my leg'll be pulled." And he reflected bitterly that nothing on earth, no protestation, no swearing by the gods, would make it believed as being what it was. He chuckled once, picturing the face of the immaculate Elizabeth while she thrust into him a bodkin of moral autopsy, should she come to know of it.
Bootea thought he had sighed, and laying her slim fingers against his neck said, "The Sahib is troubled."
"I don't care a damn!" he declared in English, his mind still on the personal trail.
Seeing that she, not understanding, had taken the sharp tone as a rebuke, he said, "If I had been alone, Gulab, I'd have been troubled sorely, but perhaps the gods have sent you to help out."
"Ah, yes, God pulled our paths together. And if Bootea is but a sacrifice that will be a favour, she is happy."
If the girl had been of a white race, in her abandon of love she would have laid her lips against his, but the women of Hind do not kiss.
The big plate of burnished silver slid, as if pushed by celestial fingers, across the azure dome toward the loomed walls of the Ghats that it would cross to dip into the sea, the Indian Ocean, and mile upon mile was picked from the front and laid behind by the grey as he strode with untiring swing toward his bed that waited on the high plateau of Poona.
The night-jars, even the bats, had stilled their wings and slept in the limbs of the neem or the pipal, and the air that had borne the soft perfume of blossoms, and the pungent breath of jasmine, had chilled and grown heavy from the pressure of advancing night.
The two on the grey rode sleepily; the Gulab warm and happy, cuddled in the protecting cloak, and Barlow grim, oppressed by fatigue and the mental strain of feared disaster. Now the muscles of the horse rippled in heavier toil, and his hoofs beat the earth in shorted stride; the way was rising from the plain as it approached the plateau that was like an immense shelf let into the wall of the world above the lowland; a shelf that held jewels, topaz and diamonds, that glinted their red and yellow lights, and upon which rested giant pearls, the moonlight silvering the domes and minarets of white palaces and mosques of Poona. The dark hill upon which rested the Temple of Parvati threw its black outline against the sky, and like a burnished helmet glowed the golden dome beneath which sat the alabaster goddess. At their feet, strung out between forbidding banks of clay and sand, ran a molten stream of silver, the sleepy waters of the Muta.
"By Jove!" and Barlow, suddenly cognisant that he had practically arrived at the end of his ride, that the windmill of Don Quixote stood yonder on the hill, realised that in a sense, so far as Bootea was concerned, he had just drifted. Now he asked: "I'm afraid, little girl, your Sahib is somewhat of a fool, for I have not asked where you want me to take you."
"Yonder, Sahib," and her eyes were turned toward the jewelled hill.
As they rose to the hilltop that was a slab of rock and sand carrying a city, he asked: "Where shall I put you down that will be near your place of rest, your friends?"
"Is there a memsahib in the home of the Sahib?" she asked.
"No, Bootea, not so lucky—nobody but servants."
"Then I will go to the bungalow of the Sahib."
"Confusion!" he exclaimed in moral trepidation.
Bootea's hand touched his arm, and she turned her face inward to hide the hot flush that lay upon it. "No, Sahib, not because of Bootea; one does not sleep in the lap of a god."
"All right, girl," he answered—"sorry."
As the grey plodded tiredly down the avenue of trees, a smooth road bordered by a hedge of cactus and lanten, Barlow turned him to the right up a drive of broken stone, and dropping to the ground at the verandah of a white-waited bungalow, lifted the girl down, saying: "Within it can be arranged for a rest place for you."
Achowkidar, lean, like a mummified mendicant, rose up from a squeaking, ropedcharpoyand salaamed.
"Take the horse to the stable, Jungwa, and tell thesyceto undress him. Remember to keep that monkey tongue of yours between your teeth for in my room hangs a bitter whip. It is a lie that I have not ridden home alone," Barlow commanded.
As Barlow led the Gulab within the bungalow she drew, as a veil, a light silk scarf across her face.
Upon the floor of the front room a bearer, head buried in yards of pink cotton cloth, hispuggri, lay fast asleep.
As Barlow raised a foot to touch the sleeper in the ribs the girl drew him back, put the tips of her finger to her lips, and pointed toward the bedroom door.
Barlow shook his head, the flickering flame of the wick in an iron oil-lamp that rested in a niche of the wall exaggerating to ferocity the frown that topped his eyes.
But Bootea pleaded with a mute salaam, and raising her lips to his ear whispered, "Not because of what is not permitted—not because of Bootea—please."
With an arm he swept back the beaded tendrils of a hanging door-curtain, the girl glided to the darkness of the room, and Barlow, lifting from its niche the iron lamp, followed. Within, she pointed to the door that lay open and Barlow, half in rebellion, softly closed it. As he turned he saw that she had dropped from their holding cords the heavy brocaded silk curtains of the window.
His limbs were numb from the long ride with the weight of the girl's body across his thighs; he was tired; he was mentally distressed over the messengers he had failed to locate, and this, the almost forced intrusion of Bootea into his bedroom, the closed door and the curtained windows, her doing, was just another turn of the kaleidoscope with its bits of broken glass of a nightmare. He dropped wearily into a big cane-bottomed Hindu chair, saying; "Little wilted rose, cuddle up on that divan among the cushions and rest, while you tell me why we sit inpurdah."
The girl dragged a cushion from the divan, and placing it on the floor beside his chair, sat on it, curling her feet beneath her knees.
Barlow groaned inwardly. If his mind had not been so lethargic because of the things that weighted it, like the leaden soles upon a diver's boots, he would have roused himself to say, "Look here, a chap can't pull a girl who is as sweet as a flower and as trusting as a babe, out of trouble and then make bazaar love to her; he can't do it if he's any sort of a chap." All this was casually in his mind, but he let his tired eyes droop, and his hand that hung over the teak-wood arm of the chair rested upon the girl's shoulder.
"Bootea will soon go so that the Sahib may sleep, for he is tired," she said; "but first there is something to be said, and I have come close to the Sahib because men not alone whisper in the dark but they listen."
The hand that rested on Bootea's shoulder lifted to her cheek, and strong fingers caressed its oval.
"Would the Sahib sleep, and would his mind rest if he knew where the two who rode are?"
Barlow sat bolt upright in the chair, roused, the lethargy gone, as if he had poured raw whisky down his throat. And he was glad, the closed door and the drawn curtains were not now things of debasement. Curious that he should care what this little Hindu maid was like, but he did. His hand now clasped the girl's wrist, it almost hurt in its tenseness.
"Yes, Gulab,"—and he subdued his voice,—"tell me if you know."
"They are dead upon the road beyond where you saved Bootea."
"Why didn't you tell me this before?"
"It was too late, Sahib; and if you had gone there they would have killed you."
"Who?"
"That, I cannot tell."
"You must, Gulab."
"No, Bootea will not."
Barlow stared angrily into the big eyes that were lifted to his, that though they lingered in soft loving upon his face, told him that she would not tell, that she would die first; even as he would have given his life if he had been captured by tribesmen and asked to betray his fellow men as the price of liberty.
He threw himself back wearily in the chair. "Why tell me this now,—to mock me, to exult?" he said, reproach in his voice.
"But it is the message, Sahib, that is more than the life of asepoy, is it not?"
Again he sat up: "Why do you say this—do you know where it is?"
She drew from beneath her bodice the sandal soles, saying: "These are from the feet of the messenger who is dead. The one the Sahib beat over the head with his pistol dropped them,—and he was carrying them for a purpose. The Sahib knows, perhaps, the secret way of this land."
In the girl's hand was clasped the knife from her girdle, and she tendered it, hilt first: "Bootea knows not if they are of value, the leather soles, but if the Sahib would open them, then if there are eyes that watch the curtains are drawn."
Barlow revivified, stimulated by hope, seized the knife and ran its sharp point around the stitching of the soles. Between the double leather of one lay a thin, strong parchment-like paper.
He gave a cry of exultation as, unfolding it, he saw the seal of his Raj. His cry was a gasp of relief. Almost the shatterment of his career had lain in that worn discoloured sole, and disaster to his Raj if it had fallen into the hands of the conspirators.
In an ecstasy of relief he sprang to his feet, and lifting Bootea, clasped her in his arms, smothering her face in kisses, whispering: "Gulab, you are my preserver; you are the sweetest rose that ever bloomed!"
He felt the pound of her heart against his breast, and her eyes mirrored a happiness that caused him to realise that he was going too far—drifting into troubled waters that threatened destruction. The girl's soul had risen to her eyes and looked out as though he were a god.
As if Bootea sensed the same impending evil she pushed Barlow from her and sank back to the cushion, her face shedding its radiancy.
Cursing himself for the impetuous outburst Barlow slumped into the chair.
"Gulab," he said presently, "my government gives reward for loyalty and service."
"Bootea has had full reward," the girl answered.
He continued: "We had talk on the road about the Pindaris; what did they who whisper in the dark say?"
"That the chief, Amir Khan, has gathered an army, and they fear that because of an English bribe he will attack the Mahrattas; so the Dewan has brought men from Karowlee to go into the camp of the Pindaris in disguise and slay the chief for a reward."
This information coming from Bootea was astounding. Neither ResidentHodson nor Captain Barlow had suspected that there had been a leak.
"And was there talk of this message from the British to—?" Barlow checked.
"To the Sahib?" Bootea asked. "Not of the message; but it was whispered that one would go to the Pindari camp to talk with Amir Khan, and perhaps it was the Sahib they meant. And perhaps they knew he waited for orders from the government."
Then suddenly it flashed upon Barlow that because of this he had been marked. The foul riding in the game of polo that so nearly put him out of commission—it had been deliberately foul, he knew that, but he had attributed it to a personal anger on the part of the Mahratta officer, bred of rivalry in the game and the fanatical hate of an individual Hindu for an Englishman.
"Now that a message has come will the Sahib go to the Pindari camp?"Bootea persisted.
"Why do you ask, Gulab?"
"Not in the way of treachery, but because the Sahib is now like a god; and because I may again be of service, for those who will slay Amir Khan will also slay the Sahib."
"Gulab,—"
Barlow's voice was drowned by yells of terror in the outer room.
"Thieves! Thieves have broken in to rob, and they have stolen my lamp!Chowkidar, chowkidar! wake, son of a pig!"
It was the bearer, who, suddenly wakened by some noise, had in the dark groped for his lamp and found it missing.
"Heavens!" the Captain exclaimed. "Now the cook house will be empty—the servants will come!" He rubbed a hand perplexedly over his forehead. "Quick, Gulab, you must hide!"
He swung open a wooden door between his room and a bedroom next. Within he said: "There's a bed, and you must sleep here till daylight, then I will have thechowkidartake you to where you wish to go. You couldn't go in the dark anyway. Bar the door; you will be quite safe; don't be frightened." He touched her cheek with his fingers: "Salaam, little girl." Then, going out, he opened the door leading to the room of clamour, exclaiming angrily, "You fool, why do you scream in your dreams?"
"God be thanked! it is the Sahib." The bearer flopped to his knees and put his hands in abasement upon his master's feet.
Jungwa had rushed into the room, staff in hand, at the outcry. Now he stood glowering indignantly upon the grovelling bearer.
"It is the opium, Sahib," he declared; "this fool spends all his time in the bazaar smoking with people of ill repute. If the Presence will but admonish him with the whip our slumbers will not again be disturbed."
The bearer, running true to the tenets of native servants, put up the universal alibi—a flat denial.
"Sahib, you who are my father and my mother, be not angry, for I have not slept. I observed the Sahib pass, but as he spoke not, I thought he had matters of import upon his mind and wished not to be disturbed."
"A liar—by Mother Gunga!" Thechowkidarprodded him in the ribs with the end of his staff, and turning in disgust, passed out.
"Come, you fool!" Barlow commanded, returning to his room, and, sitting down wearily upon the bed, held up a leg.
The bearer knelt and in silence stripped theputtiesfrom his master's limbs, unlaced the shoes, and pulled off the breeches.
When Barlow had slipped on the pyjamas handed him, he said: "Tell thechowkidarto come to me at his waking from the first call of the crows."
An omen of dire import all thugs believe is to hear the cry of a kite between midnight and dawn; to hear it before midnight does not matter, for the sleeper in turning over smothers the impending disaster beneath his body. But Captain Barlow had put up no such defence if evil hung over him, for when thechowkidarstood outside the door calling softly, "Captain Sahib! Captain Sahib!" Barlow lay just as he had flopped on the bed, his tiredness having held him as one dead.
Gently the soft voice of thechowkidarpulled him back out of hisNirvana of non-existence, and he called sleepily, "What is it?"
"It is Jungwa," the watchman answered, "and I have received the Sahib's order to come at this hour."
Then Barlow remembered. He swung his feet to the floor, saying, "Come!"
When the watchman had walked out of his sandals to approach in his bare feet, the Captain said, "Is your tongue still to remain in your mouth, Jungwa, or has it been made sacrifice to the knife for the sin of telling in the cookhouse tales of your Sahib and last night?"
"No, Sahib, I have not spoken. I am a Meena of the Ossaryjat. In Jaipur we guard the treasury and the zenanna of the Raja, and it is our chief who puts thetikaupon the forehead of the Maharaja when he ascends to the throne. Think you, then, Sahib, that an Ossary would betray a trust?"
Barlow fixed the lean saffron-hued face with a searching look, and muttered, "Damned if I don't believe the old chap is straight!" "I think it is true," he said. "Shut the door." Then he continued: "The one who came last night is in the next room and you must take her out through the bathroom door, for there is cover of the crotons and oleanders, and then to the road. Acquire agharryand go with her to where she directs you."
"Salaam, Sahib! your servant will obey. And as to thechota hazri,Sahib?"
"By Jove! right you are, Jungwa"; for Barlow had forgotten that—the little breakfast, as it was called.
Then he ran his fingers through his hair. To send the Gulab off without even a cup of tea was one thing; to admit the bearer to know of her presence was another.
The wily old watchman sensed what was passing in his master's mind, and he hazarded, diplomatically, "If the One is of high caste she will not eat what is brought by the bearer who is of the Sudra caste, but from the hands of a Meena none but the Brahminpunditsrefuse food."
Barlow laughed; indeed the grizzled one had perception—he was an accomplice in the plot of secrecy.
"Good! Eggs and toast and tea. Demand plenty—say your Sahib is hungry because of a long ride and nothing to eat. But hurry, I hear the 'seven sisters' (crows) calling to sleepers that the sun is here with its warmth."
Then the bearer entered, but Barlow ordered him away, saying, "Sit without till I call."
As he slipped into breeches and brown riding boots he cursed softly the entanglement that had thrust upon him this thing of ill flavour. Of course the watchman, even if he did keep his mouth shut, which would be a miracle in that land of bazaar gossip, would have but one opinion of why Bootea had spent the night in the bungalow. But if Barlow squared this by speaking of a secret mission, that would be a knowledge that could be exchanged for gold. Perhaps not all servants were spies, but there were always spies among servants.
"Damn the thing!" he muttered; but he was helpless. The old man would give no sign of what, no doubt, was in his mind; he would hold that leathery face in placid acquiescence in prevalent moral vagary.
Then he tapped lightly on the wooden door, calling softly,"Bootea—Bootea!"
When it was opened he said: "Food is coming, Gulab. A man of caste brings it, and it is but eggs from which no life has been taken, so you may eat. Then thechowkidarwill go with you."
Jungwa brought the breakfast and put it down, saying, "I will wait,Sahib, outside the bathroom door."
"Here is money—ten rupees for whatever is needed. Be courteous to the lady, for she is not anautchni."
"The Sahib would entertain none such," thechowkidaranswered with a grave salaam.
"Damn the thing!" Barlow groaned.
An hour later Barlow, mounted on a stalky Cabuli polo-pony, rode to the Residency, happy over the papers in his pocket, but troubling over how he could explain their possession and keep the girl out of it. To even mention the Gulab, unless he fabricated a story, would let escape the night-ride, and, no doubt, in the perversity of things, Resident Hodson would want to know where she was and where he had taken her, and insist on having her produced for an official inquisition. The Resident, a machine, would sacrifice a native woman without a tremor to the official gods.
Barlow could formulate no plausible method; he could not hide the death of the two native messengers, and would simply have to take the stand of, "Here is this message from His Excellency and as to how I came by it is of as little importance as an order from the War Office regulating the colour of thread that attaches buttons to a tunic."
He turned the Cabuli up the wide drive that led to the Residency, the big white walled bungalow in which Hodson lived, and shook his riding crop toward Elizabeth who was reading upon the verandah. He swung from the saddle, and held out his hand to the girl, saying cheerily, "Hello, Beth! Didn't you ride this morning, or are you back early?"
The novel seemed to require support of the girl's hand, or she had not observed that of the caller. Her face, always emotionless, was repellent in its composure as she said; "Father is just inside in his office with a native, and I fancy it's one of the usual dark things of mystery, for he asked me to sit here by the window that he might have both air and privacy; I'm to warn off all who might stand here against the wall with an open ear."
"I'll pull a chair up and chat to you till he's—"
"No, Captain Barlow—" Barlow winced at this formality—"Father, I'm sure, wants you in this matter; in fact, I think achuprassiis on his way now to your bungalow with the Resident's salaams."
Barlow laid his fingers on the girl's shoulder: "I'm ghastly tired,Beth. I'll come back to you."
"Yes, India is enervating," she commented in a flat tone.
Barlow had a curious impression that the girl's grey eyes had turned yellow as she made this observation.
"Ah, Captain, glad you've come," Hodson said, rising and extending a hand across a flat-topped desk. "I'm—I'm—well—pull a chair. This is one Ajeet Singh," and he drooped slightly his thin, lean, bald head toward the Bagree Chief, who stood stiff and erect, one arm in a sling.
At this, Ajeet, knowing it for an informal introduction, put his hand to his forehead, and said, "Salaam, Sahib."
"Tulwarplay, sir, and an appeal for protection to the British, eh?" and Barlow indicated the arm in the sling.
Still speaking in English Hodson said: "As to that,—" he pursed his thin lips,—"something dreadful has happened; this man has been mixed up in a decoity and has come for protection; he wants to turn Approver."
"The usual thing; when these cut-throats are likely to be caught they turn Judas; to save their own necks they offer a sacrifice of their comrades."
"Yes," the Resident affirmed, "but I'm glad he came. Perhaps we had better just sit tight and let him go on—he's only nicely started. I've practically promised him that if what he confesses is of service to His Excellency's government I will give him our conditional pardon, and use what influence I have with the Peshwa. But I fancy that old Baji Rao is mixed up in it himself."
He turned to the decoit: "Commence again, and tell the truth; and if I believe, you may be given protection from the British; but as to Sindhia I have no power to protect his criminals."
The decoit cleared his throat and began: "I, Ajeet Singh, hold allegiance to the Raja of Karowlee, and am Chief of the Bagrees, who are decoits."
The Resident held up his hand: "Have patience." He rose, and took from a little cabinet a small alabaster figure ofKaliwhich he placed upon the table, saying in English to Barlow, "When these decoits confess to be made Approvers, half of the confession is lies, for to swear them on our Bible is as little use as playing a tin whistle. If he's a Bagree this is his goddess."
In Hindi he said: "Ajeet Singh, if you are a Bagree decoit you are in the protection of Bhowanee, and you make oath to her."
"Yes, Sahib."
"This is Bhowanee,—that is your name for Kali,—and with obeisance to her make oath that you will tell the truth."
"Yes, Sahib, it is the proper way."
"Proceed."
The jamadar with the fingers of his two hands clasped to his forehead in obeisance, declared: "If I, Ajeet Singh, tell that which is not true, MotherKali, may thy wrath fall upon me and my family."
Then Hodson shifted the black goddess and let it remain upon a corner of his table, surmising that the sight of it would help.
"Speak, now," the Resident commanded; and the Jamadar proceeded.
"Dewan Sewlal sent to Raja Karowlee for men for a mission, and whether it was in the letter he sent thatthugsshould come I know not, but in our party were thugs, and that led to why I am here."
"What is the difference, Ajeet," Hodson asked sharply. "You are a decoit who robs and kills, and thugs kill and rob; you are both disciples of this murderous creature, Kali."
"We who are decoits, while we make offerings to Kali, are not thugs. They have a chief mission of murder, while we have but desire to gain for our families from the rich. The thugs came in this wise, sahib. Bhowanee created them from the sweat of her arms, and gave to them her tooth for a pick-axe, which is their emblem, a rib for a knife, and the hem of her garment for a noose to strangle. The hem of her sacred garment was yellow-and-white, and theroomalthat they strangle with is yellow-and-white. They are thugs, Sahib, and we are decoits."
"A fine distinction, sir," and Barlow laughed.
"Proceed," Hodson commanded.
"We were told by the Dewan to go to the camp of the Pindaris and bring back the head of Amir Khan."
"Lovely!" Barlow muttered softly; but Hodson started,—a slight rouge crept over his pale face and he said, "By Gad! this grows interesting, my dear Captain."
"Absolutely Oriental," Barlow added.
Then when their voices had stilled Ajeet continued: "But Hunsa had ridden with the Pindari Chief and he knew that he was well guarded, and that it would be impossible to bring his head in a basket, so we refused to go on this mission. The Dewan was angry and would not give us food or pay. Through Hunsa the Dewan sent word that we must obtain our living in the way of our profession, which is decoity."
"I wonder," Barlow queried.
But Hodson, nodding his head said: "Quite possible; and also quite probable that the dear avaricious Dewan would claim a share of the loot if it were of value, jewels especially." He addressed Ajeet, "I have nothing to do with this; I am not Sindhia."
"True, Sahib Bahadur, but a decoity was made upon a merchant on the road and he and his men were killed, but also two Englishsowarswere slain."
"By heavens!" The cool, trained, bloodless machine, that was a British Resident at a court of intrigue, was startled out of his composure; his eyes flashed to those of Barlow.
But the Captain, knowing all this beforehand, had an advantage, and he showed no sign of trepidation.
Then the thin drawn face of the Resident was flattened out by control, and he commanded the decoit to talk on.
"I tried to save the two sepoys, and one was a sergeant, but I was stricken down with a wound and it was in the way of treachery."
Ajeet laid a hand upon his wounded shoulder, saying, "When the twosepoysrode suddenly out of the night into our camp, where there in the moonlight lay the bodies of the merchant and his men, the Bagrees were afraid lest the two should make report. They rushed upon the two riders, and it was then that I was wounded. I would have been killed but for this protection," and Ajeet rubbed affectionately the beautiful strong shirt-of-mail that enwrapped his torso.
"And observe, Sahib, the wound is from behind, which is a wound of treachery. As I rushed to the two and cried to them to be gone, a ball from a short gun in the hands of some Bagree smote me upon the shoulder, and this,—" he again touched the shirt-of-mail,—"and my shoulder-blade turned it from my heart. Even then Hunsa thought I was dead. And he was in league with the Dewan to obtain for Nana Sahib a girl of my household, who is called the Gulab because she is as beautiful as the moon."
At this statement Barlow knew why the man he had beaten with his pistol had tried to seize the Gulab. It was startling. The leg that had rested across a knee clamped noisily to the floor, and a smothered "Damn!" escaped from his lips. What a devilish complicated thing it was.
Ajeet resumed: "Hunsa rushed to where the Gulab was in hiding and helped the men who had been sent by Nana Sahib to steal her. Then he came back to our camp saying that many men had beaten him, and that he had been forced to flee."
At this vagary Barlow chuckled inwardly.
"What of the two soldiers?" Hodson asked; "why were they here in this land and at the camp of the Bagrees?"
"I know not, Sahib."
"Were the bodies robbed by your men—they would be—did they find papers that would indicate the two were messengers?" and the Resident's bloodless fingers that clasped a pen were trembling with the suppression of the awful interest he strove to hide, for he knew, as well as Barlow, what their mission was.
"Yes, Sahib, they were stripped and the bodies thrown in the pit with the others. Eight rupees were taken, but as to papers I know nothing."
"Where is the woman you call the Gulab?"
"She will be in the hands of Nana Sahib," Ajeet answered; "and because of that I have come to confess so your Honour will save my life from him for he will make accusation that I was Chief of those who killed the soldiers of the British; and that the Sahib will cause to have returned to me the Gulab."
The Resident took from a drawer a form, and his pen scratched irritably at blanks here and there. He tossed it over to Barlow saying, "I'm going to give this decoit this provisional pardon; perhaps it will nail him. What he has confessed is of value. You translate this to him while I think; I can't make mistakes—I must not."
Captain Barlow read to Ajeet the pardon, which was the form adopted by the British government to be issued to certain thugs and decoits who became spies, called Approvers, for the British.
"You, Ajeet Singh, are promised exemption from the punishment of death and transportation beyond seas for all past offences, and such reasonable indulgence as your services may seem to merit, and may be compatible with your safe custody on condition:—1st, that you make full confession of all the decoities in which you have been engaged; 2nd, that you mention truly the names of all your associates in these crimes, and assist to the utmost of your power in their arrest and conviction. If you act contrary to these conditions—conceal any of the circumstances of the decoities in which you have been engaged—screen any of your friends—attempt to escape—or accuse any innocent person—you shall be considered to have forfeited thereby all claims to such exemption and indulgence."
When the Captain had finished interpreting this the Resident passed it to the decoit, saying: "This will protect you from the British. You are now bound to the British; and I want you to bring me any papers that may have been found upon the two soldiers. Bring here this woman, the Gulab, if you can find her. Go now."
When Ajeet, with a deep salaam, had gone from the room Hodson threw himself back in his chair wearily and sighed. Then he said: "A woman! the jamadar was lying—all that stuff about Nana Sahib. There's been some deviltry; they've used this woman to trap the messengers; that's India. It's the papers they were after; they must have known they were coming; and they've hidden the woman. We've got to lay hands upon her, Captain—she's the key-note."
Barlow had waited until the decoit would have gone before showing the papers that were in his pocket because it was an advantage that the enemy should think them lost. He was checked now as he put a hand in his pocket to produce them by the entrance of Elizabeth, and he fancied there was a sneer on her thin lips.
"Father," she said, as she leaned against the desk, one hand on its teak-wood top, "I've been listening to the handsome leader of thieves; I couldn't help hearing him. I fancy that Captain Barlow could tell you just where this woman, the Gulab, who is as beautiful as the moon, is. I'm sure he could bring her here—if hewould."
The Captain's fingers unclasped from the papers in his pocket, and now were beating a tattoo on his knee.
"Elizabeth!" the father gasped, "do you know what you are saying?" His cold grey eyes were wide with astonishment. "Did you hear all of Ajeet Singh's story?"
"Yes, all of it."
"It's your friend, Nana Sahib, whom you treat as if he were anEnglishman and to be trusted, that knows where this woman is,Elizabeth."
A cynical laugh issued from the girl's lips that were so like her father's in their unsympathetic contour: "Yes, one may trust men, but a woman's eyes are given her to prevent disaster from this trust which is so natural to the deceivable sex."
"Elizabeth! you do not know what you are saying—what the inference would be."
"Ask Captain Barlow if he doesn't know all about the Gulab's movements."
The Resident pushed irritably some papers on his desk, and turning in his chair, asked, "Can you explain this, Captain—what it is all about?"
There were ripples of low temperature chilling the base of Barlow's skull. "I can't explain it—it's beyond me," he answered doggedly.
The girl turned upon him with ferocity. "Don't lie, Captain Barlow; aBritish officer does not lie to his superior."
"Hush, Beth," the father pleaded.
"Don't you know, Captain Barlow," the girl demanded, "that this woman, the Gulab, is one who uses her beauty to betray men, even Sahibs?"
"No, I don't know that, Miss Hodson. I saw her dance at Nana Sahib's and I've heard Ajeet's statement. I don't know anything evil of the girl, and I don't believe it."
"A man's sense of honour where a woman is concerned—lie to protect her. I have no illusions about the Sahibs in India," she continued, in a tone that was devilish in its cynicism, "but I did think that a British officer would put his duty to his King above the shielding of anautchgirl."
"Elizabeth!" Hodson rose and put a hand upon the girl's arm; "do you realise that you are doing a dreadful thing—that you are impeaching Captain Barlow's honour as a soldier?"
Barlow's face was white, and Hodson was trembling, but the girl stood, a merciless cold triumph in her face: "I do realise that, father. For the girl I care nothing, nor for Captain Barlow's intrigue with such, but I am the daughter of the man who represents the British Raj here."
Barlow, knowing the full deviltry of this high protestation, knowing that Elizabeth, imperious, dominating, cold-blooded, was knifing a supposed rival—a rival not in love, for he fancied Elizabeth was incapable of love—felt a surge of indignation.
"For God's sake, Elizabeth, what impossible thing has led you to believe that Captain Barlow has anything to do with this girl?" the father asked.
"I'll tell you; the matter is too grave for me to remain silent. This morning I rode early—earlier than usual, for I wanted to pick up the Captain before he had started. As I turned my mount in to his compound I saw, coming from the back of the bungalow, this native woman, and she was being taken away by hischowkidar. She had just come out some back door of the bungalow, for from the drive I could see the open space that lay between the bungalow and the servants' quarters."
Hodson dropped a hand to the teak-wood desk; it looked inadequate, thin, bloodless; blue veins mapped its white back. "You are mistaken, Elizabeth, I'm sure. Some other girl—"
"No, father, I was not mistaken. There are not many native girls like the Gulab, I'll admit. As she turned a clump of crotons she saw me sitting my horse and drew a gauze scarf across her face to hide it. I waited, and asked thechowkidarif it were his daughter, and the old fool said it was the wife of his son; and the girl that he claimed was his son's wife had the iron bracelet of a Hindu widow on her arm. And the Gulab wears one—I saw it the night she danced."
A ghastly hush fell upon the three. Barlow was moaning inwardly, "Poor Bootea!"; Hodson, fingers pressed to both temples, was trying to think this was all the mistaken outburst of an angry woman. The strong-faced, honest, fearless soldier sitting in the chair could not be a traitor—could not be.
Suddenly something went awry in the inflamed chambers of Elizabeth's mind—as if an electric current had been abruptly shut off. She hesitated; she had meant to say more; but there was a staggering vacuity.
With an effort she grasped a wavering thing of tangibility, and said:"I'm going now, father—to give the keys to the butler for breakfast.You can question Captain Barlow."
Elizabeth turned and left the room; her feet were like dependents, servants that she had to direct to carry her on her way. She did not call to the butler, but went to her room, closed the door, flung herself on the bed, face downward, and sobbed; tears that scalded splashed her cheeks, and she beat passionately with clenched fist at the pillow, beating, as she knew, at her heart. It was incredible, this thing, her feelings.
"I don't care—I don't care—I never did!" she gasped.
But she did, and only now knew it.
"I was right—I'm glad—I'd say it again!"
But she would not, and she knew it. She knew that Barlow could not be a traitor; she knew it; it was just a battered new love asserting itself.
And below in the room the two men for a little sat not speaking of the ghoulish thing. Barlow had drawn the papers from his pocket; he passed them silently across the table.
Hodson, almost mechanically, had stretched a hand for them, and when they were opened, and he saw the seal, and realised what they were, some curious guttural sound issued from his lips as if he had waked in affright from a nightmare. He pulled a drawer of the desk open, took out a cheroot—and lighted it. Then he commenced to speak, slowly, droppingly, as one speaks who has suddenly been detected in a crime. He put a flat hand on the papers, holding them to the desk. And it was Elizabeth he spoke of at first, as if the thing under his palm, that meant danger to an empire, was subservient.
"Barlow, my boy," he said, "I'm old, I'm tired."
The Captain, looking into the drawn face, had a curious feeling that Hodson was at least a hundred. There was a floaty wonderment in his mind why the fifty-five-years'-service retirement rule had not been enforced in the Colonel's case. Then he heard the other's words.
"I've had but two gods, Barlow, the British Raj and Elizabeth; that's since her mother died. In a little, a few years more, I will retire with just enough to live on plus my pension—perhaps in France, where it's cheap. And then I'll still have two gods, Elizabeth and the one God. And, Captain, somehow I had hoped that you and Elizabeth would hit it off, but I'm afraid she's made a mistake."
Barlow had been following this with half his receptivity, for, though he fought against it, the memory of Bootea—gentle, trusting, radiating love, warmth—cried out against the bitter unfemininity of the girl who had stabbed his honour and his cleanness. The black figure of Kali still rested on the table, and somehow the evil lines in the face of the goddess suggested the vindictiveness that had played about the thin lips of his accuser.
And the very plea the father was making was reacting. It was this, that he, Barlow, was rich, that a chance death or two would make him Lord Barradean, was the attraction, not love. A girl couldn't be in love with a man and strive to break him.
Hodson had taken up the papers, and was again scanning them mistily.
"They were on the murdered messenger—he was killed, wasn't he, Barlow?"
"Yes."
"And has any native seen these papers, Captain?"
"No, I cut them from the soles of the sandals the messenger wore, myself, Sir."
"That is all then, Captain; we have them back—I may say, thank God!" He stood up and holding out his hand added, "Thank you, Captain. I don't want to know anything about the matter—I'm too much machine now to measure rainbows—fancy I should wear a strip of red-tape as a tie."
"If you will listen, Sir—there is another that I want to put right. Your daughter did see the Gulab, but because she had brought me the sandals. And you can take an officer's word for it that the Gulab is not what Elizabeth believes."
"Captain, I have lived a long time in India, too long to be led away by quick impressions, as unfortunately Elizabeth was. I've outlived my prejudices. When themhowatree blooms I can take glorious pleasure from its gorgeous fragrant flowers and not quarrel with its leafless limbs. When the pipal and the neem glisten with star flowers and sweeten the foetid night-air, it matters nothing to me that the natives believe evil gods home in the branches. I know that even a cobra tries to get out of my way if I'll let him, and I know that the natives have beauty in their natures—one gets to almost love them as children. So, my dear Captain, when you tell me that the Gulab rendered you and me and the British Raj this tremendous service, and add, quite unnecessarily, that she's a good girl, I believe it all; we need never bring it up again. Elizabeth has just made a mistake. And, Barlow, men are always forgiving the mistakes of women where their feelings are concerned—they must—that is one of the proofs of their strength. But these"—and he patted the papers lovingly—"well, they're rather like a reprieve brought at the eleventh hour to a man who is to be executed. We're put in a difficult position, though. To pass over in silence the killing of two soldiers would end only in the House of Commons; somebody would rise in his place and want to know why it had been hushed up. But to take action, to create a stir, would give rise to a suspicion of the existence of this."
Hodson rose from his chair and paced the floor, one hand clasped to his forehead, his small grey eyes carrying a dream-look as though he were seeking an occult enlightenment; then he sat down wearily, and spoke as if interpreting something that had been whispered him.
"Yes, Barlow, this decoit has been seized by the Nana Sahib lot. His life was forfeit, and they've offered him his life back to come here and turn Approver—to become a spy, notforus but as a spyonus for them. Ajeet would know that information of his coming to me would be carried to them by spies—the spies are always with me—and his life wouldn't be worth two annas. I gave him that pardon because we have no power to seize him here, but it will make them think that we have fallen into the trap. They might even believe—wily and suspicious as they are—that what he gleans here is the truth.
"There's a curious efficacy, Barlow, in what I might call an affectation of simplicity. You know those stupid heavy-headed crocodiles in that big pool of the Nerbudda below the marble gorge, and how they'll take nearly an hour wallowing and sidling up to a mud-bank before they crawl out to bask in the sun; but just show the tip of your helmet above the rock and they're gone. That's perhaps what I mean. As we might say back in dear old London, this wily Rajput thinks he has pulled my leg."
"I think, Colonel, that you are dead onto his wicket."
"Well, then, the thing to do is to emulate the mugger. But this"—Hodson lifted the paper and he grew crisp, incisive, his grey eyes blued like temper purpling polished steel—"we've got to act: they've got to be delivered, and soon."
"I am ready, Sir."
"It's a dangerous mission—most dangerous."
"Pardon, Sir?"
"Sorry, Captain. I was just thinking aloud—musing; forgive me. Perhaps when one likes a young man he lets the paternal spirit come in where it doesn't belong. I'm sorry. There's a trusty Patan here who could go with you," Hodson continued, "and this side of his own border he is absolutely to be trusted; I have my doubts if any Patan can be relied upon by us across the border."
"I will go alone," Barlow said quietly. Then his strong white teeth showed in a smile. "You know the Moslem saying, Colonel, that ten Dervishes can sleep on one blanket, but a kingdom can only hold one king. I don't mean about the honour of it, but it will be easier for me. I went alone through the Maris tribe when we wanted to know what the trouble was that threatened up above the Bolan, and I had no difficulty. You know, Sir, the playful name the chaps have given me for years?"
"Yes—the 'Patan'—I've heard it."
"I make a good Musselman—scarce need any make-up, I'm so dark; I can rattle off thenamaz(daily prayer), and sing themoonakib, the hymn of the followers of the Prophet."
"Yes," Hodson said, his words coming slowly out of a deep think, "there will be Patans in the Pindari camp; in fact Pindari is an all-embracing name, having little of nationality about it. Rajputs, Bundoolas, Patans, men of Oudh, Sindies—men who have the lust of battle and loot, all flock to the Pindari Chief. Yes, it's a good idea, Captain, the disguise; not only for an unnoticed entrance to the camp, but to escape a waylaying by Nana Sahib's cut-throats."
"Yes, Colonel, from what I have learned—from the Gulab it was, Sir—the Dewan has an inkling that I am going on a mission; and if I rode as myself the King might lose an officer, and officers cost pounds in the making."
The Resident toyed with the papers on his desk, his brow wrinkled from a debate going on behind it; he rose, and grasping the black Kali carried it back to the cabinet, saying: "That devilish thing, so suggestive of what we are always up against here, makes me shiver."
Then he sat down, adding, "Captain, there is another important matter connected with this. The Rana of Udaipur is being stripped of every rupee by Holkar and Sindhia; they take turn about at him. Holkar is up there now, where we have chased him—threatened to sack Udaipur unless he were paid seventy lakhs, seven million rupees—the accursed thief! We have managed to get an envoy to the Rana with a view to having him, and the other smaller rulers of Mewar, join forces with us to crush forever the Mahratta power—drive them out of Mewar for all time. The Rajputs are a brave lot—men of high thought, and it is too bad to have these accursed cut-throats bleeding to death such a race. If the Rana would sign this paper also as an assurance of friendship, to be shown the Pindari Chief, it would help greatly."
"I understand, Colonel. You wish me to get that from the Rana?"
"Yes, Captain; and I may say that if you can get through with all this there will be no question about your Majority; you might even go higher up than Major."
"By Jove! as to that, my dear Colonel, this trip is just good sport—I love it: less danger than playing polo with these rotters. I'll swing over to Udaipur first—it's just west of the Pindari camp,—been there once before on a little pow-wow—then I'll switch back to Amir Khan."
"I wish you luck, Captain; but be careful. If we can feel sure that this horde of Pindaris are not hovering on our army's flank, like the Russians hovered on Napoleon's in the Moscow affair, it will be a great thing—you will have accomplished a wonderful thing."
"Right you are, Sir," Barlow exclaimed blithely. The stupendous task, for it was that, tonicked him; he was like a sportsman that had received news of a tiger within killing distance. He rose, and stretched out his hand for the paper, saying: "I've got a job of cobbling to do—I'll put this between the soles of my sandal, as it was carried before—it's the safest place, really. To-morrow I'll become an apostate, an Afghan; and I'll be busy, for I've got to do it all myself. I can trust no one with a dark skin."
"Not even the Gulab, I fear, Captain; one never knows when a woman will be swayed by some mental transition." He was thinking of Elizabeth.
"You're right, Colonel," Barlow answered. "I fancy I could trust theGulab—but I won't."