"Levavi oculos meos in montes; unde veniet auxilium mihi."
The words were in an unknown tongue, the rhythm strange, but the spirit, the idea, were familiar. It was the song of someone seeking the "Cradle of the Gods," as they were.
"He carries his God, and that means all," said an old man, pushing his way to follow. "The other had none: how could he lead the way?"
"That is true," assented many, following suit.
And some, shrugging their shoulders, said, "He is mad. God has touched his brain. Then he goes the way our fathers went. They lingered not beyond the second dawn. Why should we?"
"Râm! Râm! Sita Râm!"
Thus, swiftly, the footfalls gathered in strength behind the little procession, and no one dared to stop it; not even the Mahomedan sentry at the Fort gate, to whom some of the agitators ran in their disappointment. He only laughed contemptuously; though his gravity returned somewhat at his recognition of old Akbar Khân.
"Lo! that is a new walking for him!" he muttered, in an awed voice. "Truly, folk are right when they say there is magic in these idolaters. Who would have deemed him pilgrim? Well! let him go, he and his mummery. We soldiers can do without priests and Hindoos!"
He twirled his mustache fiercely, and wondered when his comrades would return victorious from the gaol, and give the word for plunder. That was all he cared for.
"Ay!" assented an angry voice, joining the group, "we can do without the fools. There be plenty of wise men left."
"Plenty," put in another; "but their mood is different. See how they wander!"
It was true. The crowd had broken into groups, and from these, pilgrims, singly, or in smaller groups, were drifting after the lessening sound of that chanting voice. Not so much from any belief in Pidar Narâyan, not even because of his lead over, but because it was the old way; the way worn by the feet of their fathers, and their fathers' fathers.
SojogiGorakh-nâth, who, now the coast was clear, had sprung aloft on the old gun, once more attempting to regain his empire, failed egregiously. The crowd passed him by till a big countryman, with a lumbering jest, asked him if he was sure he had picked up the right skull to put on his own shoulders. Then it laughed uproariously.
"Best come on to the Pool of Immortality," suggested a conspirator, consolingly, as he hurried past. "'Tis no use here. The fools have followed after strange gods and men. But at the Pool there are tens of thousands to one here; and they are weary waiting. Besides, 'tis nearer the gaol. Between the two success will lie."
"Yea," added another, "that was the first plan--the soldiers and the Fort spoilt it. But the Pool and the gaol remain."
JogiGorakh-nâth, with a scowl, gathered up his skulls to a bundle and followed hastily. He would at least be out of hearing of that chanting voice.
It had reached the last verse of its Psalm now, and faltered a little over the words:--
"Dominus custodiat introitum tuum et exitum tuum:ex hoc et usque in saeculum."
But the echo of the footsteps behind filled up the blanks.
On the gaol or the Pool of Immortality lay the hopes of those whom Pidar Narâyan had so far discomfited by his arrogant claim to stand between heaven and earth; in other words, to be in personal relations with the Great Awarder of gaols and immortalities, forgivenesses, and punishments.
But the stars in their courses, hidden though they had been by the storm-darkness, had used that very darkness to the due maintenance of law and order as they wheeled serenely to meet the coming dawn.
When Lance, for instance--his heart torn in twain by his desire to follow Erda's fate at all costs and his knowledge that, if he was to do the best for others he must leave her to face it alone--had struck down stream on Am-ma's strange craft, his sole intention had been to rouse the police camp, and secure what help he could for the gaol.
But the darkness set him another task. For, after drifting past the spit, whence he had meant to cut across by land to the bridge of boats, and so, creeping past the city, find the camp beyond it, he had lost himself absolutely in the maze of sand-banks and shallow channels which, when the river was low, as it was now, lay like a network between the deep stream of the Hara, and the deep stream of the Hari. Lost himself so utterly that, realizing his own bewilderment, he had called himself a fool for having lost himself!
A curious discouragement came to him. Yet it made him more dogged and persistent, even while the hopelessness of finding his way grew every second. Surely, thought he, he could not be such a fool as to fail!
Sometimes a sudden belief that he really had had some faint indication of his bearings would make him put all his young strength into the paddle, until once more a soft, yielding, yet irresistible, impact came to tell him that he had failed again, that he was on another sandbank, and another, and another! The dull concussion of them seemed to pass into his brain; he found himself fumbling on almost aimlessly, despite his doggedness, his mind busy with imagining the things which might be happening in the dark around him.
For all he knew close by--
There lay the sting! It was suffocating to be set, as it were, in the solid darkness like--he thought of a fly in amber, the birds he had limed in his boyhood, finally of a death mask. That was more like it--he felt as the corpse must feel--clogged, hampered, helpless!
In such conditions minutes seem hours; and Lance, in reality, had not been drifting about for half of one before the certainty that his mission must inevitably be useless unless he could fulfil it more expeditiously, made him resolve on trying conclusions with the river at first hand. He was a good swimmer. As he told himself this, the first pulse of gratitude he had ever felt for the big bully who had chucked him, a small boy in his first term at Harrow, into "Ducker" to take his chance, came to him; for those few minutes of despairing effort had taught him more than mere swimming; they had taught him to trust himself in water.
More, at any rate, than in a beastly contrivance made of beds and footballs, with no stem, no stern, and a devilish habit of spinning in every eddy like a teetotum!
The mere condemnation of Am-ma's craft, being a prelude to better things, raised his spirits. He flung off his clothes, and, knowing he could not hope to keep his revolver dry, improvised a waistcloth out of the silk sash he wore instead of a waistcoat, in which to stick the hunting-knife that was his only other weapon. As he did so, he thought of the deer the knife had killed; as men think idly, irrelevantly, of such trivialities when their attention is really concentrated on something that is, as yet, outside experience. And Lance, as he slipped into the water, knew himself prepared to swim or wade, but knew nothing else.
So, doggedly as before, and infinitely quicker, he went on through the darkness; sometimes feeling himself in the cool water, sometimes finding his feet on warm sand, sometimes parting a way, he knew not where, through the low tamarisk and high grass marking an island. If he could have guessed which island, or even known which way his face was set, these light swishing touches might have been guides; but he knew nothing.
Until, after a time, a faint far glow, a mere suspicion of something not outer darkness, showed on his left. Even so, he could not guess whether that meant the gaol side, or the city side of the rivers. If the former, could the gaol have been fired by those devils?
The thought made him set his teeth, and, dry sand being beneath his feet, run on recklessly towards the glow.
Only for a yard or two, however; then he pulled up short, amazed to find that it was not far, but near; that it came from the ground, from a leaping fire of tamarisk branches within a stone's throw of him. A step or two more, in fact, showed him a cooking-pot, the remains of some food, a familiar fishing-net, and a chrysalis-looking figure wrapped in a blanket and half-buried in the sand. One of the fisher folk, by all that was lucky! If anyone could tell, they could.
It was only a slender stem of tiger-grass which snapped under his feet, but the noise was sufficient. The sleeper sprang to his like a wild animal, the blanket falling from him, one lithe arm making for the long spear stuck in the sand beside him.
Gu-gu! The missing Gu-gu!
Lance had him back in his sand-bed before hand and spear met. There was no struggle. Gu-gu, knowing himself helpless, lay limp, slack, every muscle proclaiming capitulation; in so far showing himself something less than a wild animal, which struggles till it dies, reckless of odds. But, in truth, Gu-gu, with the certainty of speedy extinction before him, due to that cursed ghost, had given in to fate utterly, all round. Death would come when it came. All that remained, therefore, was to make others suffer if he could. Especially those who were responsible for altering the currents of the river. With one of these on top of you, this was impossible; but time might bring opportunity.
"You devil!" cried Lance, throttling the abject jelly by way of emphasis, "you know all about this business, of course; but now I've found you, you'll have to do mine,--or I'll kill you. Do you understand? Now, which way is the town?"
Gu-gu pointed in the direction whence Lance had come. The latter frowned, realizing that it was impossible to know if the brute spoke truth, but that, unfortunately, he must be trusted.
"Then get up," he said curtly, taking care to keep the jelly within reach of his knife, "and show me the way there. I'll give you a hundred rupees if you do; and if you don't--" He gave the yielding flesh an explanatory prick.
"Does theHuzoormean the Pool of Immortality?" asked Gu-gu, affably; and the words made Lance remember that fruitless waiting for the water.
"Ah! youdidmanage that swindle, did you?" he replied savagely, "and of course you were camping out of the way. I see! No! I don't want to go there yet. To the bridge! So quick, march! or swim; you can tell me about the other as we go along. It may be useful."
Another prick with the knife he held in one hand, while his other clutched firmly on Gu-gu's hemp-strung waist-belt of blue beads, started them. So they went on till the sand grew colder, less resistant, changed to water beneath their feet; then Lance's two hands--and the knife--came down on Gu-gu's bare back. "Strike out," he said briefly; "I'll help."
The two pair of legs and the one pair of hands forged ahead into the darkness none the less rapidly because the second pair of hands were resting,--with something in them--on yielding flesh. The fact indeed, or something else, seemed to make Gu-gu confidential. If theHuzoor, he said, with a shameless comprehension which made Lance inclined to use the knife then and there, wanted to give the alarm at the police camp, he was taking a long road to it. He, Gu-gu, could show him a shorter, if theHuzoorwould trust him.
For a second Lance hesitated. He could not see the man's face; but there was a sort of cunning anxiety in the tone which was doubtful. Then, remembering that, short or long, he was equally at the man's mercy if hechose to brave results--though there seemed to be no reason why he should--he said quietly,--
"I told you to take the shortest."
"TheHuzoorcan dive?" asked Gu-gu. "He should, since he swims so strong."
"Dive!" echoed Lance. "Yes, why?"
Because the short way, Gu-gu explained, was by an underground passage which could be only reached from the river. Undoubtedly theHuzoorwas right, the passage had to do with the miracle; but there must have been more than one miracle in the old days, since there was quite a network of canals and caves, which could be more or less flooded at will. All the river people knew of them, but few ventured in; there was nothing to be gained by doing so,as a rule!And the dive to reach the passage was long and awkward. But if theHuzoorwould trust--
"Go ahead!" broke in Lance, sharply. Hehadto trust; and time meant everything. Besides, even in diving, he could have his revenge on that sleek, yielding back!
For answer, Gu-gu altered his course with almost suspicious alacrity; though, once more, Lance could see no reason for treachery. A hundred rupees was a big bribe to a man who evidently had no personal interest in the matter; else, why should he have been on the island instead of in the row. But then Lance did not know of that call to death.
So, through the dark, the one pair of hands and two pairs of legs forged ahead till a sudden arrest of the former gave Lance a dull shock once more. But this time Gu-gu's voice came quite cheerfully: "The city wall,HuzoorThis slave must feel if he goes up or down."
Apparently it was up, and after a few minutes of crablike edging Gu-gu's voice came again:--
"The tunnel is below, Protector of the Poor. Let the most noble take the longest breath he ever breathed, then strike down till this mean one's legs cease moving. The most noble one's must cease also. The rest will this dust-like one accomplish. Save the breath.Thatis in theHuzoorsown keeping. Therefore let him take time for filling; and when he is ready let him signal this slave with--with a knife-prick if he chooses!"
The cool grasp of the position made Lance smile, though the situation, he knew, was grave enough. That breath to be drawn might be his last; all the more reason why he could have wished it less full of sand!
For the storm was now at its fiercest. Even here out on the river, over the water, the air seemed solid. And it had a vibration that could be felt on the bare skin. As he drew in that long breath before trusting himself to the unseen man whom he held within reach of the grim signal--and something sharper should there be sign of treachery--Lance told himself that the water could scarcely be more suffocating than the air. Then--the sleek skin under his hand shrinking from the knife-prick--the two pairs of legs and the one pair of arms struck down.
It was almost a relief at first to get rid of the stinging dust in one's face; almost a relief not to breathe. But when, after a few seconds, the legs in front of him grew rigid, and nothing was left to be done save to hold on desperately to a waist-belt of blue beads and one's own breath at the same time, the sense of suffocation returned, and the question, "How much longer?" seemed to throb in his brain.
He gripped everything he had to grip tighter. But his own body seemed to grip his mind tighter still. He could feel the clutch of his veins--a whole corded network of them--could see them! A corded, pulsing network edged with prismatic light, sending stars into the darkness, beating time to the singing in his ears, to the fierce duel between the desire to gasp and the determination to hold on,--beating time to the confused rush of thoughts which ended in one--"This is drowning!"
It made his clutch tighter. Gu-gu, at least, should drown too. That was the last conscious thought. It merged into a frantic, insistent clamour for air! air! air! till something cold hit him full on the face and forced him into a quick, gasping cry, that left him senseless.
When he came to himself, as he did a moment or two afterwards, he was still clutching the waist-belt of blue beads, and the touch of it lulled him to an instant's sheer relief. The dive was over; they must be in the cave; the cold that had hit him in the face must have been the air.
But what was he lying upon? Surely rock! And the hand he moved to feel it brought the blue beads with it unresistingly.
Gu-gu! where was Gu-gu?
Gone! And the knife too. It had been used to sever the hempen string of the belt.
Curious. It might have been used for a different and more deadly purpose; but you could never count on what fellows would do--even when they were treacherous.
Lance thought this dreamily, before he realized more than the fact that he was alive; not drowned.
Then he sat up hastily and faced the truth that he was alone once more; alone in that network of underground passages and caves of which Gu-gu had spoken.
Was there any chance of his getting out of it? Not by the dive, certainly. Without help that was impossible. He set himself to remember what his guide had said in reply to the questions with which he had been purposely plied.
First, as to light. If Gu-gu was to be trusted the materials for this must be close at hand. Lance rose cautiously and felt about the ledge on which he lay and the walls of rock about him, and ere long came on what he sought. Flint and steel, a box of tinder, a bottle of oil, and a rag torch hung in an old bit of fishing-net to a peg that was driven into a crevice.
So far, good; and after a minute these enabled him to see that he was in a sort of vaulted well, half hewn out of rock, half built in with brick. It was filled to some three feet or so with water, except in one corner, where the flooring shelved down to an archway. There it was deeper. This must be the opening of the tunnel through which they had dived, and through which, doubtless, Gu-gu had escaped; for he was not likely to have braved the intricate passages without a light. This thought made Lance look to see how much oil the bottle contained.
There was only a mere driblet at the bottom. Plainly, therefore, he could pause no longer; so, instantly, without further thought, he waded across the pool and ran along the only passage which led from it. He had to stoop as he ran, and from the feel to his feet he guessed that the passage led upwards first, then downwards; apparently, too, in a perfectly straight line. The river, therefore, must be behind him, and he tried to make this point a fixed one, so as to give him some notion of his bearings.
After a hundred yards or so he emerged into a second cave or chamber, also nearly waist-deep in water. From this several passages opened, some too small to admit of a man passing through them. These, then, must be the canals of which Gu-gu had spoken; one of them, possibly, that which should have supplied the Pool with Immortality. The memory of that crowd of eager, patient faces, disappointed by such a miserable trick, made Lance feel pitiful; then his pity brought a sudden practical suggestion. Why not open the sluice, or whatever it was, now, and give the miracle? It would at least keepsomeof the crew quiet when it came, at dawn; the dawn which might be so fatal to quiet--the dawn which must, surely, be close at hand.
He raised the torch and saw, close beside him, a foot or two above the present level of the water, a clumsy closed stone conduit with an iron handle. It was a rude primitive tap, no doubt, by which the levels could be raised. Without further thought, he turned it, and smiled to find himself right, as water poured out, filling the vaulted chamber with sound. Then, without further pause, he passed on down the biggest of the passages leading from the chamber; since that seemed the most likely one. After a while, however, the passage narrowed, seemed in danger of ending altogether; so he harked back.
There was no longer any sound in the chamber when he returned to it, and the level of the water had risen almost to the floor of the passage in which he stood, wondering which of the other outlets he had best try. The choice was a case of sheer chance, of course, he told himself; a mere backing of one's luck. But, as he paused to make it, something cold struck on his feet, causing him to look down in sudden surprise.
The water was still rising. That must be stopped, anyhow, unless he was to be drowned out like a sewer rat.
He stuck the torch into a cleft in the rock beside him, hung the net to it, and swam over to the conduit, which was already submerged. But the handle which had turned so easily was stiff now; possibly because of the pressure of the water, possibly because there was some other rude mechanism of which he was unaware. Anyhow, after a few trials he realized that he was helpless until the water had found its own level.
But what was that? Who could tell? Would it rise, and rise, and rise, till it filled the whole place?
Who could tell?
It was not fear which clutched at his heart--only a vague self-pity; almost an amused wonder that this Immortality for others might bring Death to him.
He looked up into the vaulted arch above him, then to the, as yet, dry passages which he could just see, as darker arches of shadow.
Unless one of them rose abruptly to a higher level--and the chance that one did, or that he should find it, was remote--he would be wiser to stay here, and see what happened. The roof was at least higher.
He swam back to the torch and, holding on to the crevices of the wall, waited.
Still rising. He shifted the torch to a higher crevice and waited again, a dull curiosity taking possession of him.
Still rising. He wondered, suddenly, whether it would not have been better for him to have gone back the way he had come. The passage had certainly seemed to ascend, and it was a question of levels. That was all. A mere question of levels.
He shifted the torch again. It was dying down now, the rags showing charred, cindery. But as he fed it with oil and it flared up and smoked, the thought came to him that it was using air needlessly, making suffocation more imminent.
He blew it out deliberately. If a man had to die, he might as well die in the dark. He was glad, a moment later, of the darkness. It shut out reality and left him to dreams; to vague hopes, to kindly forgetfulness, to Erda's face. How plucky she had been! Well! even if hehadto be drowned like a rat in a sewer, he must not be behind her. The pathetic comfort of kindly memory, which with strange unreason--since it enhances the value of the life that is being left--makes the face of death seem less stern to poor humanity, came to him and absorbed him. If he died and she lived, she would not forget him; he knew that.
And still the water rose.
It must be rising now, he thought, in the Pool of Immortality, and the eager, patient faces that had been waiting for it so long must be showing glad in the grey light of the dawn.
For the dawn was coming to the world, though he would not see it. Strange, incomprehensible thought, even though the reality of it was so certain, so close. Incomprehensible? Say rather, impossible; frankly impossible! He could not be going to die!
He shifted the unlit torch to a still higher crevice--almost a ledge in the rock--and waited incredulously for the water to rise.
And as he waited in the dark, someone else in the grey dawn, to whom death was more familiar, to whom, in a way, it was the one great certainty of Life, was feeling the same frank incredulity at the thought of the immediate future.
For Dr. Dillon, when he found himself alone on the roof of the gaol gate with an unconscious woman and a child, knew that the end could not be far off. With Vincent dead, and Eugene cut off by the stern necessity for keeping that door shut, he could not hope for more than a brief, savage resistance--and then? Failure, inevitable failure, unless help came; and that seemed far as ever.
As yet, dazed by that closing of the door, that desperate, triumphant death of the man with his back to it--a death which had gained them nothing--the prisoners were still huddled together, crushed out of further action, at the far end of the alley. So the courtyard was clear, free from assailants. But that could only be for a minute or two. There was an ominous rending and hewing at the gate below; ere long those outside would be inside, and with a leader who would know what to do. So life could only be an affair of moments; yet it seemed incredible, more than incredible, that all his strong will and determination would not avail even to save those helpless creatures in his charge. He stooped hurriedly and lifted the still unconscious woman in his arms, carried her into the turret, closed the door on her and the child--frightened now for the first time at her mother's silence--and returned to wait and watch. It was all he could do for them, unless fate gave him a chance of appealing for them to Roshan Khân. But even then there could be no bargaining, no compromise, no surrender!
A sharp crash, a sudden rise in the babel of voices below, warned him that the gate had given, partially at least. The next instant a soldier or two, ignorant of that dead man with his back against the closed gate, ran lightly down the alley calling on the prisoners to make way. One of them was Roshan Khân; but George Dillon did not waste a cartridge even on him. He was reserving his fire for that storming of the broken stairs which must come when the assailants found themselves still foiled.
In truth Roshan Khân had this same storming in his mind as all he cared for, since it would pit him against his rival, against Vincent Dering, who he knew was on the roof. And so, with that odd acquired sense of honour, fair play, God knows what, he had been planning, as his men battered down the gate, how best to compass those fair odds which were necessary alike to his sense of justice and injustice--for the injustice of his own position cried aloud for proof that he was worth a better one. So he had settled to complete that liberating of the prisoners which, with the help of the keys, ought already to be in hand. This done, the general rabble would be eager for freedom, eager for plunder, eager to get to the town and raise it, eager for all things for which he cared no jot. Then would be his time. Then--he did not even try to formulate how--he could find himself face to face, at fair odds, with Vincent Dering. Wild memories of duels he had read about in western books, duels with others, who had nothing to do with the quarrel, looking on, occurred to him.
Yes! that would satisfy him. To have it out, till death!
He set his teeth as he forced a peremptory way through the crowd at the end of the alley, which hid the closed door until one actually stood beside it.
Then he stood transfixed, for he saw Vincent Dering's dead body still backed by that closed door, still guarding it, unarmed. There was a curious look of content in the dead face, and Roshan, grasping its meaning by intuition, turned from it with a curse, knowing himself forestalled, cheated.
"'Twas not our fault,Khân-jee," protested a voice, quickly; "the swine fought till the other one had locked the door in our faces, and so--"
Roshan struck at the voice fiercely. Not forestalled, not cheated, only; but outdone, conquered! His rival had died a hero's death, and he--he might live to be hanged!
A rage of despair, of despite, seized on him. His one real object gone, the whole hideous folly of the rest made him fling up his hands passionately as he dashed back to the gate, neither knowing nor caring what he was going to do next.
Storm that feeble garrison on the roof? those broken stairs, every crevice, every foothold in which stood out clear, easy, in the light of the search-ray? Was that a man's task?
Confused, dazed, he ran on, followed instinctively by the crowd, wondering what he would be at.
George Dillon, seeing the rush, covered the first foothold of the broken stairs with his rifle, and waited for a man to show on it.
But none came.
Just as the rush reached the courtyard, Eugene Smith's search-ray, having exhausted itself, went out, leaving, not darkness, but the grey mystery of dawn, in which for an instant all sound, all movement, seemed arrested. There was one utterly peaceful second, and then, from behind the splintered gateway, from the shadows of the tunnel, came a breathless voice:--
"Close the outer gate, sergeant; if you can, you have them in a trap! a regular trap!"
A trap!
The word reached those who had followed Roshan in his causeless retreat. Had he foreseen this? Was he escaping from the trap? Their eyes flew to the tunnel, but the light which, till then, had lit up its darkness, the swinging lamp by which the batterers of the gate had worked, was dashed down by someone's hand--a small, white hand--and there was nothing to be seen. Only that voice to be heard repeating, "They're in a trap; keep them there!"
Keep them! Not if they could fight their way into the open! The cry rose in a second:--
"A trap. Yea! a trap! Out of it! Outside, brothers, outside, where we can fight free!"
Roshan, who would have paused at this chance of fair resistance, was caught in the rush from behind, and found himself through the gap in the gate fighting desperately in the crowd, calling on his men to rally. But they had construed his half-frenzied flight from that look on Vincent Dering's face into a lead, and they were mixed up inextricably with the horde of undisciplined conspirators who, having been till now safe under cover of the tunnelled archway, yelled for the open, not so much in which to fight, but in which to run away.
The mere handful of men, whose number was fortunately hidden by the darkness, could never have prevented the rush, but a quick wit amongst them seized on a possibility, and the breathless voice called, "Let them pass--let them pass!"
So, in a second or two, amid confused yells, and mad slashings at friends and foes alike, the positions were reversed. The inside was out, the outside in, like Brian O'Lynn's breeches; and Dr. Dillon's first hint at what the amazing turn of affairs below him meant came with the words:--
"Barricade that gate. Sharp as you know how. They won't give us long."
"Is that you, Carlyon?" he called doubtfully, leaning over the parapet and peering into that grey mystery of dawn.
The figure he saw, a woman in a white dress and a scarlet mess jacket, made him doubt the evidence of his own eyes. But the answer in a woman's voice, with a quick breath in it, sent his back in something between a laugh and a sob.
"Then he isn't here! Oh! what can have become of him?"
There was no doubt that this was a woman!
Once outside, where they could discern friend from foe, the troopers instantly realized their mistake, and rallied round Roshan.
But it was too late for that now. As he stood, centring them, there was a wild contempt, a vague relief, in his face. He knew now where his sympathies lay. Not with these men, treacherous to their salt, but with those who could hold--whohadheld--their own against all odds. Yes! even with that dead figure, still with its back to the door that must not be opened.
The thought stung and seared like hot iron.
No! Not with that! not with that! That was--What?--
He could have killed himself for the unwavering testimony which every scrap of him gave to the heroism, the defiance of such a death. He knew he would give everything to die one like it; and he knew he could not--notnow. He knew he must die a useless death, to save himself from a worse one.
"There is no real harm done,Khân-jee," broke in his lance-duffadarin hurried excuse, seeing the expression on his face. "We can get in easily again. Those holding the horses say there were but a score of them all told--the cursed Sikhs--God knows how they got out of the Fort! I thought we had them safe. And there was a woman with them--a Miss-baba"--he laughed savagely. "Well! if they be brave as men, these infidel women, let them die like men--the hell-cats!"
Roshan Khân looked at the man, whom he had known for years, as if he had never seen him before. And the thought of another woman--with his own blood in her veins--who had been brave also, and who had died--died by his hand--returned to sweep him from every bearing, from every landmark, eastern or western, and leave him rudderless, drifting, in a storm of sheer despair. He laughed suddenly--an insane laugh--at the hideousness, the hopelessness of it all. Laughed like the madman he was for the time, at the horror which drove him mad.
"Kill her, if thou wilt, fool! I have done my share of that," he cried brutally, striking out at the voice as he had struck at the other which had told him of Vincent's victory. Striking as he felt inclined to strike at anything and everything; most of all at the hateful confusion in himself, and in his world. So, without another word, he broke through the circle of troopers, dashed to where his horse awaited him, and was off like a whirlwind; that strange possession of the Oriental races, which, in a way, claims kindred with the Berserk rage of the north, thrilling to his finger-tips; yet held in check, diverted from sheer, mad, uncalculating desire to kill, by that acquired sense of fair play.
"He goes to rouse the city," said some of his men, following him hurriedly.
"And time, too!" assented some of the conspirators. "The dawn is upon us, and if the pilgrims drift away, our hope is gone!"
But most of the crowd, troopers and conspirators alike, felt vaguely that the dawn had indeed come, that the midsummer night's dream of madness was over; that those who were wise would try, while they had the chance, to escape from its consequences.
And that such a chance existed, even now, was patent. The very madness of the night, its lack of reasonable explanation, were in their favour. And its darkness, the outer darkness of the storm, which had sprung up in a minute, must have hidden much. Who, for instance, was to say--except those impenitent ones whose evidence, if given at all, must be doubted as the evidence of condemned men seeking to drag others down to their fate--whether such and such a one had been a rebel at first? Provided, always, that there was no doubt about his staunchness at the last; that is, now that the dawn had come--the dawn which showed doubt, almost a surprise, in so many faces.
What had come to them? Why were they there?
"Kuchch saiya pur gya!" (some shadow fell on me) muttered one man below his breath, as he sheathed his sword.
And another, with an oath, said boldly, "This one is for the winning side," then gave the cry, "To the rescue, brothers, to the rescue! Cut down the mutineers"--so, promptly, began operations on the nearest defenceless prisoner.
Thus, almost before those who had galloped in hot haste after Roshan's lead were out of sight, the prisoners, even the resisting warders, had been driven into the portico, and penned like a flock of sheep between the troopers outside and the pioneers within.
"The Lord is King," said the lance-duffadar, piously, to a neighbour,--he had started back from Roshan's blow with a scowl, and watched his retreat resentfully,--"the Handle-end of His Sword is safest! Lo! Have at them, brothers!"--he added aloud--"have at the evil-born ones who would have killed thememsand thebaba-logueas such scum did in the Great Breathing, making the faces of the soldiery black for all time! Show them our mettle. Forward! 'Gord--save--the--Ka-veen!'"
"Gord--save--the--Ka-veen!"
The cry grew to a shout, and Dr. Dillon, who, with a great incredulity lessening the values of all he saw and heard, had promptly swung himself down into the courtyard, looked through a crevice in the barricade--which was fast taking form under the willing hands of the pioneers--to see what the noise meant.
"It is all over," he said slowly, his face pathetic in its bewilderment; "the troopers are siding with us!"
He stood for a moment as if unable to grasp the reality, and his keen, inquisitive eyes seemed to search almost reproachfully for some cause, some hint of reason, in his surroundings. In the splintered door, in every cranny and foothold of the broken stair, and so, past the parapet, they continued their question to the lightening sky, against which, faint and far, those distant peaks where lay the "Cradle of the Gods" had begun to show dimly.
"All for nothing!" he muttered to himself, almost petulantly. "Poor Dering!" So, swiftly he passed down the alley,--swiftly, but hopelessly; for he knew what those iron shackles meant on a man's bare head.
He drew the body to one side with tender care, then knocked at the closed door and called to the man within. "Smith, open the door! You'd better come out--I think it's all over now; be quick, please."
There was a pause, then a fumbling at the bolts and bars. So, in that grey, cold light, a figure stood at the open door, tall, gaunt, with a hunted look in its eyes, almost a terror, as they looked down--down to the threshold--down for what they knew should be there.
"Dering?" asked Eugene Smith, rather hoarsely; then, seeing what lay to one side, covered his eyes from the sight with a cry like a woman's, and trembled all over. That strain of patient, idle inaction had been awful.
"Oh, God damn them!" burst out the doctor, fiercely. "And all for nothing--for nothing. At least I think so. Come on, Smith, and make sure."
For nothing! For nothing!
The words were echoing in Roshan's brain also, as with loose rein, recklessly, he galloped over the frail bridge of boats, making it quiver and thunder beneath his horse's hoofs, and send curved waves of light and shadow over the clear, steely surface of the water, seen like a polished shield in the dawn. The air was clear also; the distant hills steel grey as the water, the sky steel grey as the hills. And there was the bright keenness as of a glittering sword in the chill breeze that swept from west to east. But Roshan did not feel it; he was absorbed in himself, in the useless battle of his life.
For nothing! For nothing!
He did not even hear the soft yet sonorous roar, beginning like the rush of a big breaker on a beach, ending with a wild, musical note, like the wail of new-weaned lambs and their mothers on a lone hillside, which suddenly echoed out over the water, making those who galloped behind look at each other and whisper joyfully:--
"'Tis all right,Khân-sahib," said one, urging his horse alongside; "the pilgrims are waiting still--hear you not their cry? They grow impatient!"
Roshan looked at him with lack-lustre eyes. What were the pilgrims to him, or their impatience? What was salvation, immortality, to one whose only desire was death--death and forgetfulness? He dug his spurs into his horse, savagely glad to give pain, and rode on.
"Hârâ! Hârî! Harî! Hârâ!"
The roar was articulate now, and those behind looked doubtfully at each other.
"If it should be the miracle?" suggested one conspirator; but another shook his head, "How can that be? None know the trick save those two, Gu-gu and Am-ma, and they are safe."
"Unless itbea miracle," put in a third, almost timidly. "God's club makes no noise, and the night has been full of marvels."
So an uneasy silence fell upon the rest.
"Hârâ! Hârî! Hârî! Hârâ!"
There was no mistaking the cry now. It rose exultant, yet with that wailing note in it still, which lingers always in humanity's claim to have found its lost Paradise, its lost purity.
Yet there was no trace of doubt in the almost frantic joy on every face in the dense multitude which stopped the little cavalcade, as it entered the square around the Pool of Immortality; stopped it hopelessly, as if the moving, breathing, living mass had been a dead wall.
"Hârâ! Hârî! Hârî! Hârâ!"
It was almost a yell. The patience was gone utterly, and far as the eye could reach, in all the wide square, in every street and alley converging to it, there was the restless ineffectual movement of the sea, when, on a summer's day, it beats itself calmly yet persistently--rising and falling--upon a sheer cliff, against the impossible. There was no one to check the crowd now, to prevent it from finding Death and Immortality at the same time. What matter? What were a few hundreds of crushed bodies, when the soul found what it sought?
The riders behind Roshan threw up their hands at the sight. No hope here for the littlenesses of life; for principalities and powers, even for political liberty.
This was the bed-rock; this, in its unalterable aspiration--not for something better, but for the best--neither culture nor conspiracy could touch; this was as much beyond the control of kith and kin as of strangers and aliens.
"Come,Khân-sahib!" they called to the figure with the lack-lustre eyes which sat its horse like a statue, staring at itself, at its world, conscious only of the hideous discords which were, perforce, the music of its sphere. "Come!Nawab-jee!There is still a chance with the 'Teacher of Religion.' Thejogiwill have heldhisfolk, for sure. They will be ready for blood, since Mai Kâli"--the speaker spat his Mahomedan contempt for the idolatry ere he went on--"lets none go. She's a true woman for that!"
So, by back alleys and crooked ways, Roshan--why he did not know, since he meant nothing by it--led the cavalcade past the palace, through the archway into the courtyard with its union-jack of raised paths.
And found it empty.
Empty of all save thejogi, Gorakh-nâth, who was busy, resignedly, in rethreading his chaplet of skulls, ere starting to seek safety over the British border in some far recess of the holy hills, whence, when this affair had blown over, he could swoop down with added sanctity on some other religious fair.
"He and his God stole them from me not the saying of a rosary past," he said cheerfully, after he had explained the position. "They went by yonder door to the old road. So what matter! They are in it. They will come back to Her by and by. It is so always. Men follow other leads, other loves. But they do not find what they seek; so they come back to Her, to the many named Woman.Jai! Kali Ma!"
Those behind Roshan looked at each other.
"It is the end," they said briefly. "Come,risaldar-jee--" the change of title was significant--"we shall have to ride far and fast if we are to live."
Once more, every atom of the man, soul and body, seemed to strike out furiously at the voice, at the truth and the untruth in it; at the assertion of failure, the linking of his need with theirs.
"Ride for your lives if you want them," he cried fiercely; "I seek death."
They left him, after unavailing protests, and rode helter-skelter on to the Fort, warning their comrades that the game was up, so, on towards safety. And thejogi, naked but not ashamed, still swinging his chaplet of skulls, followed them leisurely; for he knew himself safe in the superstition and the devotion of every woman in India. Since he, Her servant, could not fail of shelter in every Hindoo homestead, far or near, in which a woman's hand closed on a man's, holding him tight for herself alone, as the Great Mother holds all men.
Roshan, thus left alone, rode his horse on slowly to the central plinth, dismounted, and, hitching the bridle over the muzzle of the "Teacher of Religion" stood staring out dully at what lay before him; so quiet, so commonplace!
Nothing changed from the day, barely a month ago, when he had stood beside the old gun with Vincent Dering and Lance Carlyon, contemptuous of the ignorance of others, satisfied with himself.
And now?--what had come to him?
The madness, which his wild gallop from the gaol had calmed somewhat, returned in a fierce rush, and with it that one desire for revenge; for something by which to show the contempt, which was not now merely for the ignorant; but for those others, self-righteous, tyrannical, who had dared to touch him--dared to make him what he was--a prey both to ignorance and wisdom, savagery and culture--a laughing-stock even to himself!
And who had begun the fooling? Who had taught him as a boy?
Pidar Narâyan! Who else? Who else had begun the game giving some things, withholding others? And who else was within reach? Who else could be followed up and forced to fair fight? Forced to admit that the pupil was ahead now of the master.
He laughed a laugh of absolute exultation; and a wave of purely childish satisfaction swept through the mind in which there were still so many depths of childish ignorance and misconception; unavoidable depths in the culture of a bare score of years. Leaving his horse tethered to the old gun, he ran hastily across to the palace, so, finding the door open, the whole place quiet, went on down the arched passage. It was still dark there, but a glimmer of light showed the entrance to the chapel, and to the armoury beside it, which was his goal.
He had no other thought except for that armoury, until, with the tall tapers burning at the head and feet, he saw the dead body of the woman who had deceived him lying on the Altar steps. Then the pitifullest clashing of satisfaction and despair, of desire and disgust, came to him that ever rent a man in twain. For a moment he fought for bare reason between them, then with a savage cry, he flung himself beside the dead girl, caught her to him, covered her with frantic, cruel kisses, and, almost flinging her from him again, ran on into the armoury, the red of her dress, her bosom, in his eyes--the red of blood!
The armoury! Where he had had his first lesson in the foils! There they were, harmless in their buttons, crossed on the wall, and above them something more murderous; the dangerous delicate rapiers to which those others were but the prelude. No! one was gone! One Father Ninian had used against thejogi!One he must have with him. So much the better!
He tore down its fellow, and passing the dead girl without a look, dashed out into the courtyard again, his last trace of sanity gone.
The next instant his horse's feet were echoing madly along the pilgrims' road. His enemy must have a quarter of an hour's lead, but that was nothing; he could overtake him, anyhow, at the first station in the pilgrimage,--a temple under a vastbanyantree at the foot of the first rise, where the pious must pause to make offerings.
The road was almost empty at first; for the news that the miracle had only been deferred had spread instantly through the unrestful town, so to a space beyond it, making those who heard the tale turn back to see for themselves. But after a few minutes' wild gallop, he came up with those who had been beyond recall, who had gone on content with that strange lead of a strange God; of a saint, a sinner. Yet, after a time, forgetful of that leadership utterly. For they needed it no more. The danger of novelty had passed with their first step along the beaten track which their fathers had followed. Father Ninian, wise with the wisdom of long years, of secret sympathy, had known this; had counted on it in his forlorn hope of leading them into familiar bondage. He had told himself that he need only go as far as that first station; that then, during the pause for offerings, he might return, as it were, to realities, to something more consistent with the nineteenth century! But to him, also, as he led the way, chanting his offices for the day, had come a strange peace, a strange desire to go on to the end of the pilgrimage; a strange desire to leave those realities behind him in a world from which he was taking nothing, not even his love.
Surely it was time. Surely he was old enough to claim rest. No! not rest. It was something more than that. Surely, now that he had left every atom of earth behind him lying with a dead woman on the Altar steps, he also was free to find the "Cradle of the Gods"!
"My soul fleeth unto the Lord! before the morning watch I say, before the morning watch," he chanted; he had gone on blindly from psalm to psalm intent on the desire to lead those voices behind.
"Have a care,baba-jee!thou and thy God!" said a half-tender, half-jesting one as he stumbled among the stones, and a dark hand stretched itself out to steady the old priest, and a dark face turned to nod approval at other saffron robes; since here was a true pilgrim, a true madman, forgetful of this world, to judge by the face lifted towards those distant hills.
Yet the desire in him to reach them seemed to the wise old heart something that must be set aside. He must return. Yes! he must return. To do what? What could an old man do who had left life, a useless life, behind him? He crushed down that thought also, and stumbled on.
"Man is like a thing of nought, his time passeth away like a shadow!"
His voice spent itself tremulously on that one certainty, and those behind him joined their testimony to his all unwittingly, as they called on Hârâ or Hârî; on the Creator, the Destroyer, as One and Indivisible.
And in the rear again, Roshan in his search for Death, for annihilation, bore witness also, as he came, cursing those who stood in his way, his horse slithering among the stones in its effort to obey whip and spur, and sending a dry clangour of hoof-beats through the little stony valley to startle the sleepy snakes coiled on the distant rocks, and drive them back to their crannies with a hiss.
So, every instant, the distance lessened between the old man and the young one, both weary of life. It was broad daylight now, though the sun was still low on the horizon. The mystery of dawn had left the world, the very pilgrims, between their recurring cries, were chattering, laughing, over the every-day details of life which would make to-day as trivial as yesterday, to-morrow as trivial as to-day.
There had been a "Breathing" in the night, they told each other. Some shadow had fallen. Some God or Devil had had power. But the shackles of custom, of familiarity, were back again, the despotism of detail.
Only in those two strangely different minds in the van, in the rear, the mystery still clouded the reality.
And the distance between them lessened as Roshan drove his way through the saffron robes recklessly.
Yet, fast as he went, when he reached the end of the dry watercourse up which the last part of the rough track had wound, and stood in the hollow, backed by a further rise of the hill, where the quaint, dumpy, black temple hid itself under the huge blotch of thebanyantree--the only green thing visible, far or near--the figure he sought was not to be seen among the crowd.
Akbar Khân, indeed, he saw, utilizing one of the tall tapers as a pipe-light before casting himself on the ground to suck contentedly at the screwedbanyanleaf full of tobacco which he had gathered by claiming a pinch in return for the loan of that same light to others. But with a curious shame Roshan avoided him, and passed on in his search among the jostling crowd, the continuous babel of trivial talk; for this was resting-time, when men and women could be men and women, and forget that they were on a pilgrimage; when they could even dream themselves back in the village under the familiar shelter of some village tree, asking no more than the familiar round of life.
But above the babel came every now and again the insistent clang of a bell, telling that some new petitioner was seeking a favour of the Gods, and making a golden oriole, which sat in the green leafage, flit to another bower with a sudden fluting note, full, joyful, mellow.
"What dost seek,Musulmân?" cavilled a saint, drawing back from Roshan's shadow, as he gabbled invocations, all he knew, on a rosary, ere solacing himself with the pipe which his disciple had prepared. "If 'tis the madman and his God--he hath gone yonder."
He pointed to a side track, which was a short cut to the road above.
Roshan flung himself from his horse without a word, and followed.
The distance lessened at every step now, for the old priest's breath failed him at the steepness of the rise.
Still, it would not delay him long, he told himself, to take that one look at the soft, white cloud which generally hid the goal of pilgrimage, before he turned back over the hill, as best he could, to find what task remained for him in the world.
He might have that one look, surely!
So, reaching the summit of this first bulwark of the unattainable, he sat down, breathlessly, beside an upright black stone which showed strangely distinct amid the redness of the surrounding rock; a plain black stone, not three feet high, chipped rudely to a blunt point. Father Ninian did not need the scattering of dead marigolds and dry basil leaves about its base to tell him that it was a fragment of an older faith than that of the temple below; a faith sterner, purer, founded on a clearer perception of what humanity needed in that search for the lost Paradise; on a closer memory of the cause which lost it.
He laid one hand on the stone almost caressingly, as, holding the pyx in the other, he sat down facing the distant peaks. But there was no cloud upon them. The day had dawned clear and still, and as he sat looking wistfully over the valleys on valleys, the hills on hills, which lay bathed in light between him and the "Cradle of the Gods," a sunbeam--still slanting from the curved edge of the eastern plains--caught the jewelled star of what he held, and stayed there.
It was peaceful beyond words. The hurry, the strain, not only of that long eventful night, but of the whole long eventful life, seemed over. All things seemed behind him. The passion, the pride, the courage, the manhood--all things that had made Ninian Bruce what Ninian Bruce had been--where were they?
Only wisdom, only a tender knowledge, seemed to remain.
The clank of steel upon stone roused him, the clank of Roshan's spurs upon the rocks; and Father Ninian turned to see him, a yard or two on the path below, outlined clearly against the distant view of Eshwara, against the world in which Ninian Bruce had lived and loved--the Ninian Bruce whom he had left behind.
Behind!
No! It was Ninian Bruce and none other who was on his feet in a second, a flush on his face--the face that was like the nether mill-stone in its stern passion, and pride, and power. For, in a second, the old man's soul was back in a world where a dead woman belonging to him lay waiting for revenge. His hand was on his hidden rapier, as he flung his first word of defiance at the man who had killed her.
"Murderer!"
"Your pupil at that, even!" gasped Roshan, "you began it!--your pupil whom you taught--curse you--"
The words failed him--he paused inarticulate--but the keen eyes and ears opposite him took in his meaning with the swift comprehension which had been Pidar Narâyan's always. A sort of contemptuous pity fought with the passion of Ninian Bruce's face.
"My pupil, certainly," he assented. "Have you come to ask me for a final lesson?"
Roshan glared at him. "You understand--you always did--that is the worst. Yes! I have come"--here he laughed wildly--"for what you taught me--fair play and no favour--and I mean to have it." In his fierce excitement he pressed closer, flourishing his rapier.
"Pardon me," came a cold, courteous voice; "I did not teach you that method of assassination, surely? I thought you desired fair play. If so, you might allow me to meet you on equal terms."
Roshan drew back with a flush from the figure which had stood its ground, which looked at him with bitter disdain. He scarcely seemed to recognize it. No wonder! For this was Ninian Bruce himself. Ninian Bruce as he might have spoken to an over-hasty antagonist in the days when he was the most reckless swordsman in Rome, when the world held him body and soul.
The years, his very priesthood, had slipped from him.
"I beg your pardon, sir!" muttered Roshan, standing aside. There was a savage satisfaction in his heart. This man was not old, the odds were equal; there was enough fire and passion here to please any opponent.
So, after a pause to lay aside the pyx--it found a strange resting-place on the blunt summit of that upright black stone--a slim, still elegant figure, divested of its priestly robings, took its stand, its back to the hills, its face to the world.
Still upright, still active, with its blacksoutanecaught up and tucked into the sash to give free play to its limbs.
"Now, sir," came the courteous voice, "I am ready."
Something in the proud grace of bearing, the reckless contempt, made Roshan follow suit.
"The sun will be in your eyes," he said, "let us fight lengthwise to the ridge."
"Wewill--by and by!" came that icy voice, as the speaker, without moving, stood on guard. "We can omit the salute. If you are ready, I am."
For an instant Roshan hesitated, realizing what the life that he meant to take had been, what the man himself whom he meant to kill had been and was. The man whose figure stood out like a black shadow against the distant blue of the hills; and as he realized the fine fibre of his enemy, a sense of powerlessness to touch, to harm him, kept Roshan motionless.
"Shall I count five, and give you a start?" The question came with a shrug of the shoulders.
The taunt told. Roshan pulled himself together, and stood on guard also. But the sense of powerlessness was intolerable; he lowered his rapier for a word more--a word to raise his own self-esteem.
"I warn you," he said haughtily, "that the sun is in your eyes. That I have learnt more than you ever taught me--thatthisis to the death."
"It could scarcely be anything else, could it?" came the instant reply, in a voice that vibrated harshly, like a harpstring struck to its fullest, "with a dead woman between us! Engage, you devil, or I will kill you as you stand!"
Roshan gave a short, sharp cry, like a wild beast. The next instant the curious hiss of two meeting blades sliding along each other was the only sound. It is a strange sound, which, to the listeners, the onlookers, seems to say "hush" to the whole world.
"Hush--hush--sh--sh."
Then, short and sharp as that cry of Roshan's, came another sound; the beaten, baffled clash when steel meets steel instead of flesh.
Roshan, with an inward curse, gripped his rapier closer. He had almost been disarmed,--disarmed in that first encounter. Strange that he should have forgotten his foe,--forgotten the deadly insistence of the master's blade, slack as a snake in curves, firm as a vice in grip. Then that almost invisible turn of the wrist which had so nearly done for him. He had forgotten--these, in years of meaner adversaries. He remembered them now, and would not forget again. And he had such things; ay! and more, in reserve for himself.
So had his master; in reserve for both of them, if needful. And the knowledge that itwouldbe needful came to Ninian Bruce at the first touch of his adversary's sword; for there was that in it which told the old hand that the young one was a master's also.
"My pupil has improved," he said quietly, as, abandoning the attack, he parried Roshan's furious onslaught with scarcely a motion of the hand, held level to his heart.
That he could do. But the other must surely come in the end, since he was old, and Roshan young. If in the end, therefore, why not now? The sooner the better.
A minute after the sun was no longer in Pidar Narâyan's eyes. As he had said, they were fighting lengthwise to the ridge; and he drew back, choosing his ground, until under his feet he felt the dead marigolds, the withered basil leaves that lay about the upright stone,--that strange pedestal on which the star-shaped pyx stood as on an altar, glittering in the sun-rays.
He seemed to see it, to feel it, standing there between the world below and those faint, far peaks. And the eyes which had seen so much felt they need see no more.
"Sta' alerta, Signor!" he cried jibingly, flinging himself savagely forward. "And may the Lord have mercy on your soul," he added in a lower tone; as, in an attack which held in it all the wildness, the fire, the passion of his youth, he drove Roshan back a step,--one step down the faint slope on which he had counted.
A fierce lunge or two, a swift parry, and then,--then an inch beyond safety--given purposely--yielded room for theripostehe sought from that other rapier.
It came with a quick cry of triumph, as Roshan felt that thin, cold steel slide silently on through a dull, faint resistance. A cry that ended in a gasp, as the hand which held the rapier dropped for a second, then flung itself upwards.
For Pidar Narâyan had given thereprise; and 'L'Addio del Marito' had done its work.
So, for an instant--held upright by the lingering force of the old man's hand--the two stood within a sword's length, their faces glaring at each other,--stern, implacable, the one in death, the other still in life.
Then the strength, the life, ebbed; the balance between it and death wavered, and Ninian Bruce, overborne by his enemy's dead weight, sank to his knee, then backwards.
But his hand still gripped the rapier. So Roshan Khân's body, as it fell forward, slithered down the sharp blade, sending a little jet of crimson blood backwards, till it stopped with a dull thud upon the hilt.
So he lay, face downwards, beside the old man, whose face looked skyward; whose head rested among the withered marigolds and the sweet, dead leaves of the basil, which generations and generations of pilgrims had offered to an unknown wisdom on their way to the "Cradle of the Gods."