"Salaam, sahibs," said a fat babu, backing through a door in front of them and showing himself silhouetted against the lesser outer darkness. "Seeing regimental risaldar on the box seat, I took liberty. The risaldar-major is sending this by as yet unrewarded messenger, and word to the effect that back way out of burning house was easier than front way in. He sends salaam. I am unrewarded messenger."
He slipped something into Colonel Kirby's hands, and Kirby struck a match to examine it. It was Ranjoor Singh's ring that had the regimental crest engraved on it.
"Not yet rewarded!" said the babu.
Let the strong take the wall of the weak,(And there's plenty of room in the dust!)Let the bully be brave, but the meekNo more in the way than he must.Be crimson and ermine and gold,Good lying and living and mirth,(Oh, laugh and be fat!) the reward of the bold,But—(sotto voce)—the meek shall inherit the earth!
"That's the man whose face was in the mirror!" said Warrington suddenly, reaching out to seize the babu's collar. "He's the man who wanted to be regimental clerk! He's the man who was offering to eat a German a day!… No—stand still, and I won't hurt you!"
"Bring him out into the fresh air!" ordered Kirby.
The illimitable sky did not seem big enough just then; four walls could not hold him. Kirby, colonel of light cavalry, and considered by many the soundest man in his profession, was in revolt against himself; and his collar was a beastly mess.
"Hurry out of this hole, for heaven's sake!" he exclaimed.
So Warrington applied a little science to the babu, and that gentleman went out through a narrow door backward at a speed and at an angle that were new to him—so new that he could not express his sensations in the form of speech. The door shut behind them with a slam, and when they looked for it they could see no more than a mark in the wall about fifty yards from the bigger door by which they had originally entered.
"There's the carriage waiting, sir!" said Warrington, and with a glance toward it to reassure himself, Kirby opened his mouth wide and filled his lungs three times with the fresh, rain-sweetened air.
There were splashes of rain falling, and he stood with bared head, face upward, as if the rain would wash Yasmini's musk from him. It was nearly pitch-dark, but Warrington could just see that the risaldar on the box seat raised his whip to them in token of recognition.
"Now then! Speak, my friend! What were you doing in there?" demandedWarrington.
"No, not here!" said Kirby. "We might be recognized. Bring him into the shay."
The babu uttered no complaint, but allowed himself to be pushed along at a trot ahead of the adjutant, and bundled head-foremost through the carriage door.
"Drive slowly!" ordered Kirby, clambering in last; and the risaldar sent the horses forward at a steady trot.
"Now!" said Warrington.
"H-r-r-ump!" said Kirby.
"My God, gentlemen!" said the babu. "Sahibs, I am innocent of all complicitee in this or any other eventualitee. I am married man, having family responsibilitee and other handicaps. Therefore—"
"Where did you get this ring?" demanded Kirby.
"That? Oh, that!" said the babu. "That is veree simplee told. That is simple little matter. There is nothing untoward in that connection. Risaldar-Major Ranjoor Singh, who is legal owner of ring, same being his property, gave it into my hand."
"When?"
Both men demanded to know that in one voice.
"Sahibs, having no means of telling time, how can I guess?"
"How long ago? About how long ago?"
"Being elderly person of advancing years and much, adipose tissue, I am not able to observe more than one thing at a time. And yet many things have been forced on my attention. I do not know how long ago."
"Since I saw you outside the barrack gate?" demanded Warrington.
"Oh, yes. Oh, certainly. By all means!"
"Less than two hours ago, then, sir!" said Warrington, looking at his watch.
"Then he isn't burned to death!" said Kirby, with more satisfaction than he had expressed all the evening.
"Oh, no, sir! Positivelee not, sahib! The risaldar-major is all vitalitee!"
"Where did he give you the ring?"
"Into the palm of my hand, sahib."
"Where—in what place—in what street—at whose house?"
"At nobody's house, sahib. It was in the dark, and the dark is very big."
"Did he give it you at Yasmini's?"
"Oh, no, sahib! Positivelee not!"
"Where is he now?"
"Sahib, how should I know, who am but elderly person of no metaphysical attainments, only failed B.A.?"
"What did he say when he gave it to you?"
"Sahib, he threatened me!"
"Confound you, what did he say?"
"He said, 'Babuji, present this ring to Colonel Kirby sahib. You will find him,babuji, where you will find him, but in any case you will lose no time at all in finding him. When you have given the ring to him he will ask you questions, and you will say Ranjoor Singh said, "All will presently be made clear"; and should you forget the message,babuji, or should you fail to find him soon, there are those who will make it their urgent business,babuji, to open that belly of thine and see what is in it!' So, my God, gentlemen! I am veree timid man! I have given the ring and the message, but how will they know that I have given it? I did not think of that! Moreover, I am unrewarded—I have no emolument—as yet!"
"How willwhoknow?" demanded Warrington.
"They, sahib."
"Who are they?" asked Kirby.
"The men who will investigate the inside of my belly, sahib. Oh, a belly is so sensitive! I am afraid!"
"Did he tell you who 'they' were?"
"No, sahib. Had he done so, I would at once have sought police protection. Not knowing names of individuals, what was use of going to police, who would laugh at me? I went to Yasmini, who understands all things. She laughed, too; but she told me where is Colonel Kirby sahib."
Colonel Kirby became possessed of a bright idea, his first sinceYasmini had thrown her spell over him.
"Could you find the way," he asked, "from here to wherever it was thatRisaldar-Major Ranjoor Singh gave you that ring?"
The babu thrust his head out of the carriage window and gazed into the dark for several minutes.
"Conceivablee yes, sahib."
"Then tell the driver where to turn!"
"I could direct with more discernment from box-seat," said the babu, with a hand on the door.
"No, you don't!" commanded Warrington.
"Let go that handle! What I want to know is why were you so afraid atYasmini's?"
"I, sahib?"
"Yes, you! I saw your face in a mirror, and you were scared nearly to death. Of what?"
"Who is not afraid of Yasmini? Were the sahibs not also afraid?"
"Of what besides Yasmini were you afraid? Of what in particular?"
"Of her cobras, sahib!"
"What of them?" demanded Warrington, with a reminiscent shudder.
"Certain of her women showed them to me."
"Why?"
"To further convince me, sahib, had that been necessary. Oh, but I was already quite convinced. Bravery is not myvade mecum!"
"Confound the man! To convince you of what?"
"That if I tell too much one of those snakes will shortlee be my bedmate. Ah! To think of it causes me to perspirate with sweat. Sahibs, that is a—"
"You shall go to jail if you don't tell me what I want to know!" saidKirby.
"Ah, sahib, I was jail clerk once—dismissed for minor offenses but cumulative in effect. Being familiar with inside of jail, am able to make choice."
"Get on the box-seat with him!" commanded Kirby. "Let him show the driver where to turn. But watch him! Keep hold of him!"
So again the babu was propelled on an involuntary course, and Warrington proceeded to pinch certain of his fat parts to encourage him to mount the box with greater speed; but his helplessness became so obvious that Warrington turned friend and shoved him up at last, keeping hold of his loin-cloth when he wedged his own muscular anatomy into the small space left.
"To the right," said the babu, pointing. And the risaldar drove to the right.
"To the left," said the babu, and Warrington made note of the fact that they were not so very far away from the House-of-the-Eight-Half-brothers.
Soon the babu began to scratch his stomach.
"What's the matter?" demanded Warrington.
"They said they would cut my belly open, sahib! A belly is so sensitive!"
Warrington laughed sympathetically; for the fear was genuine and candidly expressed. The babu continued scratching.
"To the right," he said after a while, and the risaldar drove to the right, toward where a Hindu temple cast deep shadows, and a row of trees stood sentry in spasmodic moonlight. In front of the temple, seated on a mat, was a wandering fakir of the none-too-holy type. By his side was a flat covered basket.
"Look, sahib!" said the babu; and Warrington looked.
"My belly crawls!"
"What's the matter, man?"
"He is a fakir. There are snakes in that basket—cobras, sahib!Ow-ow-ow!"
Warrington, swaying precariously over the edge, held tight by the loin-cloth, depending on it as a yacht in a tideway would to three hundred pounds of iron.
"Oh, cobras are so veree dreadful creatures!" wailed the babu, caressing his waist again. "Look, sahib! Look! Oh, look! Between devil and over-sea what should a man do? Ow!"
The carriage lurched at a mud-puddle. The babu's weight lurched with it, and Warrington's center of gravity shifted. The babu seemed to shrug himself away from the snakes, but the effect was to shove Warrington the odd half-inch it needed to put him overside. He clung to the loin-cloth and pulled hard to haul himself back again, and the loin-cloth came away.
"Halt!" yelled Warrington; and the risaldar reined in.
But the horses took fright and plunged forward, though the risaldar swore afterward that the babu did nothing to them; he supposed it must have been the fakir squatting in the shadows that scared them.
And whatever it may have been—snakes or not—that had scared the babu, it had scared all his helplessness away. Naked from shirt to socks, he rolled like a big ball backward over the carriage top, fell to earth behind the carriage, bumped into Warrington, who was struggling to his feet, knocking him down again, and departed for the temple shadows, screaming. The temple door slammed just as Warrington started after him.
By that time the risaldar had got the horses stopped, and Colonel Kirby realized what had happened.
"Come back, Warrington!" he ordered peremptorily.
Warrington obeyed, but without enthusiasm.
"I can run faster than that fat brute, sir!" he said. "And I saw him go into the temple. We won't find Ranjoor Singh now in a month of Sundays!"
He was trying to wipe the mud from himself with the aid of the loin-cloth.
"Anyhow, I've got the most important part of his costume," he said vindictively. "Gad, I'd like to get him on the run now through the public street!"
"Come along in!" commanded Kirby, opening the door. "There has been trouble enough already without a charge of temple breaking. Tell the risaldar to drive back to quarters. I'm going to get this musk out of my hair before dawn!"
Warrington sniffed as he climbed in. The outer night had given him at least a standard by which to judge things.
"I'd give something to listen to the first man who smells the inside of this shay!" he said cheerily. "D 'you suppose we can blame it on the babu, sir?"
"We can try!" said Kirby. "Is that his loin-cloth you've got still?"
"Didn't propose to leave it in the road for him to come and find, sir! His present shame is about the only consolation prize we get out of the evening's sport. I wish it smelt of musk—but it doesn't; it smells of babu—straight babu, undiluted. Hallo—what's this?"
He began to untwist a corner of the cloth, holding it up to get a better view of it in the dim light that entered through the window. He produced a piece of paper that had to be untwisted, too.
"Got a match, sir?"
Kirby struck one.
"It's addressed to 'Colonel Kirby sahib!' Bet you it's from Ranjoor Singh! Now—d'you suppose that heathen meant to hold on to that until he could get his price for it?"
"Dunno," said Kirby with indifference, opening the note as fast as trembling fingers could unfold it. He would not have admitted to himself what his fingers told so plainly—the extent of his regard for Ranjoor Singh.
The note was short, and Kirby read it aloud, since it was not marked private, and there was nothing in it that even the babu might not have read:
"To Colonel Kirby sahib, from his obedient servant, Risaldar-Major Ranjoor Singh—Leave of absence being out of question after declaration of war, will Colonel Kirby sahib please put in Order of the Day that Risaldar-Major Ranjoor Singh is assigned to special duty, or words to same effect?"
"Is that all?" asked Warrington.
"That's all," said Kirby.
"Suppose it's a forgery?"
"The ring rather proves it isn't, and I've another way of knowing."
"Oh!"
"Yes," said Kirby.
They sat in silence in the swaying shay until the smell of musk and the sense of being mystified became too much for Warrington, and he began to hum to himself. Humming brought about a return to his usual wide-awakefulness, and he began to notice things.
"Shay rides like a gun," he said suddenly.
Kirby grunted.
"All the weight's behind and—" He put his head out of the window to investigate, but Kirby ordered him to sit still.
"Want to be recognized?" he demanded. "Keep your head inside, you young ass!"
So Warrington sat back against the cushions until the guard at the barrack gate turned out to present arms to the risaldar's raised whip. As if he understood the requirements of the occasion without being told, the risaldar sent the horses up the drive at a hard gallop. It was rather more than half-way up the drive that Warrington spoke again.
"Feel that, sir?" he asked.
"I ordered that place to be seen to yesterday!" growled Kirby. "Why wasn't it done?"
"It was, sir."
"Why did we bump there, then?"
"Why aren't we running like a gun any longer?" wondered Warrington."Felt to me as if we'd dropped a load."
"Well, here we are, thank God! What do you mean to do?"
"Rounds," said Warrington.
"Very well."
Kirby dived through his door, while Warrington went behind the shay to have a good look for causes. He could find none, although a black leather apron, usually rolled up behind in order to be strapped over baggage when required, was missing.
"Didn't see who took that apron, did you?" he asked the risaldar; but the risaldar had not known that it was gone.
"All right, then, and thank you!" said Warrington, walking off into the darkness bareheaded, to help the smell evaporate from his hair; and the shay rumbled away to its appointed place, with the babu's loin-cloth inside it on the front seat.
It need surprise nobody that Colonel Kirby found time first to go to his bathroom. His regiment was as ready for active service at any minute as a fire-engine should be—in that particular, India's speed is as three to Prussia's one. The moment orders to march should come, he would parade it in full marching order and lead it away. But there were no orders yet; he had merely had warning.
So he sent for dog-soap and a brush, and proceeded to scour his head. After twenty minutes of it, and ten changes of water, when he felt that he dared face his own servant without blushing, he made that wondering Sikh take turns at shampooing him until he could endure the friction no longer.
"What does my head smell of now?" he demanded.
"Musk, sahib!"
"Not of dog-soap?"
"No, sahib!"
"Bring that carbolic disinfectant here!"
The servant obeyed, and Kirby mixed a lotion that would outsmell most things. He laved his head in it generously, and washed it off sparingly.
"Bring me brown paper?" he ordered then; and again the wide-eyed Sikh obeyed.
Kirby rolled the paper into torches, and giving the servant one, proceeded to fumigate the room and his own person until not even a bloodhound could have tracked him back to Yasmini's, and the reek of musk had been temporarily, at least, subdued into quiescence.
"Go and ask Major Brammle to come and see me," said Kirby then.
* * * * *
Brammle came in sniffing, and Kirby cursed him through tight lips with words that were no less fervent for lack of being heard.
"Hallo! Burning love-letters? The whole mess is doin' the same thing. Haven't had time to burn mine yet—was busy sorting things over when you called. Look here!"
He opened the front of his mess-jacket and produced a little lace handkerchief, a glove and a powder-puff.
"Smell 'em!" he said. "Patchouli! Shame to burn 'em, what? S'pose I must, though."
"Any thing happen while I was gone?" asked Kirby.
"Yes. Most extraordinary thing. You know that a few hours ago D Squadron were all sitting about in groups looking miserable? We set it down to their trooper being murdered and another man being missing. Well, just about the time you and Warrington drove off in the mess shay, they all bucked up and began grinning! Wouldn't say a word. Just grinned, and became the perkiest squadron of the lot!
"Now they're all sleeping like two-year-olds. Reason? Not a word of reason! I saw young Warrington just now on his way to their quarters with a lantern, and if he can find any of 'em awake perhaps he can get the truth out of 'em, for they'll talk to him when they won't to anybody else. By the way, Warrington can't have come in with you, did he?"
Kirby ignored the question.
"Did you tell Warrington to go and ask them?" he demanded.
"Yes. Passed him in the dark, but did not recognize him by the smell. No—no! Got as near him as I could, and then leaned up against the scent to have a word with him! Musk! Never smelt anything like it in my life! Talk about girls! He must be in love with half India, and native at that! Brazen-faced young monkey! I asked him where he got the disinfectant, and he told me he fell into a mud-puddle!"
"Perhaps he did," said Kirby. "Was there mud on him?"
"Couldn't see. Didn't dare get so near him! Don't you think he ought to be spoken to? I mean, the eve of war's the eve of war and all that kind of thing, but—"
"I wish you'd let me see the Orders of the Day," Kirby interrupted. "I want to make an addition to them."
"I'll send an orderly."
"Wish you would."
Five minutes later Kirby sat at his private desk, while Brammle puffed at a cigar by the window. Kirby, after a lot of thinking, wrote:
"Risaldar-Major Ranjoor Singh (D Squadron) assigned to special duty."
He handed the orders back to Brammle, and the major eyed the addition with subdued amazement.
"What'll D Squadron say?" he asked.
"Remains to be seen," said Kirby.
Outside in the muggy blackness that shuts down on India in the rains, Warrington walked alone, swinging a lantern and chuckling to himself as he reflected what D Squadron would be likely to invent as a reason for the smell that walked with him. For he meant to wake D Squadron and learn things.
But all at once it occurred to him that he had left the babu's loin-cloth on the inside front seat of the shay; and, because if that were seen it would have given excuse for a thousand tales too many and too imaginative, he hurried in search of it, taking a short cut to where by that time the shay should be. On his way, close to his destination, he stumbled over something soft that tripped him. He stooped, swung the lantern forward, and picked up—the missing leather apron from behind the shay.
The footpath on which he stood was about a yard wide; the shay could not possibly have come along it. And it certainly had been behind the shay when they left barracks. Moreover, close examination proved it to be the identical apron beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Warrington began to hum to himself. And then he ceased from humming. Then he set the lantern down and stepped away from it sidewise until its light no longer shone on him. He listened, as a dog does, with intelligence and skill. Then, suddenly, he sprang and lit on a bulky mass that yielded—gasped—spluttered—did anything but yell.
"So you rode on the luggage-rack behind the carriage, did you,babuji?" he smiled. "And curled under the apron to look like luggage when we passed the guard, eh?"
"But, my God, sahib!" said a plaintive voice. "Should I walk through Delhi naked? You, who wear pants, you laugh at me, but I assure you, sahib—"
"Hush!" ordered Warrington; and the babu seemed very glad to hush.
"There was a note in a corner of that cloth of yours!"
"And the sahib found it? Oh, then I am relieved. I am preserved from pangs of mutual regret!"
"Why didn't you give that note to Colonel Kirby sahib when you had the chance? Eh?" asked Warrington, keeping firm hold of him.
"Sahib! Your honor! Not being yet remunerated on account of ring and verbal message duly delivered, commercial precedent was all on my side that I should retain further article of value pending settlement. Now, I ask you—"
"Where was Ranjoor Singh when he gave you that ring and message?" demanded Warrington sternly, increasing his grip on the babu's fat arm.
"Sahib, when I have received payment for first service rendered, my disposition may be changed. I am as yet in condition offorma pauperis."
Still holding him tight, Warrington produced twenty rupees in paper money.
"Can you see those,babuji? See them? Then earn them!"
"Oh, my God, sahib, I have positivelee earned a lakh of rupees this night already!"
"Where was Risaldar-Major Ranjoor Singh when he—"
Footsteps were approaching—undoubtedly a guard on his way to investigate. The babu seemed to sense Warrington's impatience.
"Sahib," he said, "I am very meek person, having family of wife and children all dependent. Is that rupees twenty? I would graciously accept same, and positivelee hold my tongue!"
The steps came nearer.
"I was on my way to D Squadron quarters, sahib, to narrate story and pass begging bowl. Total price of story rupees twenty. Or else the sahib may deliver me to guard, and guard shall be regaled free gratis with full account of evening's amusement? Yes?"
The steps came nearer yet. Recognizing an officer, the men halted a few paces away.
"Sahib, for sum of rupees twenty I could hold tongue for twenty years, unless in meantime deceased, in which case—"
"Take 'em!" ordered Warrington; and the babu's fingers shut tight on the money.
"Guard!" ordered Warrington. "Put this babu out into the street!"
"Good night, sahib!" said the babu. "Kindlee present my serious respects to the colonel sahib. Salaam, sahib!"
But Warrington had gone into the darkness.
The Four Winds come, the Four Winds go,(Ye wise o' the world, oh, listen ye!),Whispering, whistling what they know,Wise, since wandering made them so(Ye stay-at-homes, oh, listen ye!).Ever they seek and sift and pry—Listening here, and hurrying by—Restless, ceaseless—know ye why?(Then, wise o' the world, oh, listen ye!)The goal of the search of the hurrying windIs the key to the maze of a woman's mind,(And there is no key! Oh, listen ye!)
So in a darkness that grew blacker every minute, Warrington swung his lantern and found his way toward D Squadron's quarters. He felt rather pleased with himself. From his own point of view he would have rather enjoyed to have a story anent himself and Yasmini go the round of barracks—with modifications, of course, and the kneeling part left out—but he realized that it would not do at all to have Colonel Kirby's name involved in anything of the sort, and he rather flattered himself on his tact in bribing the babu or being blackmailed by him.
"Got to admit that babu's quite a huntsman!" he told himself, beginning to hum. "One day, if the war doesn't account for me, I'll come back and take a fall out of that babu. Hallo—what's that? Who in thunder—who's waking up the horses at this unearthly hour? Sick horse, I suppose. Why don't they get him out and let the others sleep?"
He began to hurry. A light in stables close to midnight was not to be accounted for on any other supposition than an accident or serious emergency, and if there were either it was his affair as adjutant to know all the facts at once.
"What's going on in there?" he shouted in a voice of authority while he was yet twenty yards away.
But there was no answer. He could hear a horse plunge, but nothing more.
"Um-m-m! Horse cast himself!" he straightway decided.
But there was no cast horse, as he was aware the moment he had looked down both long lines of sleepy brutes that whickered their protest against interrupted sleep. At the far end he could see that two men labored, and a big horse fiercely resented their unseasonable attentions to himself. He walked down the length of the stable, and presently recognized Bagh, Ranjoor Singh's charger.
"What are you grooming him for at this hour?" he demanded.
"It is an order, sahib."
"Whose order?"
"Ranjoor Singh sahib's order."
"The deuce it is! When did the order come?"
"But now."
"Who brought it?"
"A babu, with a leather apron."
Warrington walked away ten paces in order to get command of himself, and pinch himself, and make quite sure he was awake.
"A fat babu?" he asked, walking back again.
"Very fat," said one of the troopers, continuing to brush the resentful charger.
"So he delivered his message first, and then went to hunt for his loin-cloth!" mused Warrington. "And he had enough intuition, and guts enough, to look for it first in the shay! I'm beginning to admire that man!" Aloud he asked the trooper: "What was the wording of the risaldar-major sahib's message?"
"'Let Bagh be well groomed and held ready against all contingencies!'" said the trooper.
"Then take him outside!" ordered Warrington. "Groom him where you won't disturb the other horses! How often have you got to be told that a horse needs sleep as much as a man? The squadron won't be fit to march a mile if you keep 'em awake all night! Lead him out quietly, now! Whoa, you brute! Now—take him out and keep him out—put him in the end stall in my stable when you've finished him—d'you hear?"
He flattered himself again. With all these mysterious messages and orders coming in from nowhere, he told himself it would be good to know at all times where Ranjoor Singh's charger was, as well as a service to Ranjoor Singh to stable the brute comfortably. He told himself that was a very smart move, and one for which Ranjoor Singh would some day thank him, provided, of course, that—
"Provided what?" he wondered half aloud. "Seems to me as if Ranjoor Singh has got himself into some kind of a scrape, and hopes to get out of it by the back-door route and no questions asked! Well, let's hope he gets out! Let's hope there'll be no court-martial nastiness! Let's hope—oh, damn just hoping! Ranjoor Singh's a better man than I am. Here's believing in him! Here's to him, thick and thin! Forward—walk—march!"
He turned out the guard, and the particular troop sergeant with whom he wished to speak not being on duty, he ordered him sent for. Ten minutes later the sergeant came, still yawning, from his cot.
"Come over here, Arjan Singh," he called, thinking fast and furiously as he led the way.
If he made one false move or aroused one suspicion in the man's mind, he was likely to learn less than nothing; but if he did not appear to know at least something, he would probably learn nothing either.
As he turned, at a distance from the guard-room light, to face the sergeant, though not to meet his eyes too keenly, the fact that would not keep out of his brain was that the fat babu had been out in the road, offering to eat Germans, a little while before he and the colonel had started out that evening. And, according to what Brammle had told him when they met near the colonel's quarters, it was very shortly after that that the squadron came out of its gloom.
"What was the first message that the babu brought this evening?" heasked, still being very careful not to look into the sergeant's eyes.He spoke as comrade to comrade—servant of the "Salt" to servant of the"Salt."
"Which babu, sahib?" asked Arjan Singh, unblinking.
Now, in all probability, this man—since he had been asleep—knew nothing about the message to groom Bagh. To have answered, "The babu who spoke about the charger," might have been a serious mistake.
"Arjan Singh, look me in the eyes!" he ordered, and the Sikh obeyed. He was taller than Warrington, and looked down on him.
"Are you a true friend of the risaldar-major?"
"May I die, sahib, if I am not!"
"And I? What of me? Am I his friend or his enemy?"
The sergeant hesitated.
"Can I read men's hearts?" he asked.
"Yes!" said Warrington. "And so can I. That is why I had you called from your sleep. I sent for you to learn the truth. What was the message given by the fat babu to one of the guard by the outer gate this evening, and delivered by him or by some other man to D Squadron?"
"Sahib, it was not a written message."
"Repeat it to me."
"Sahib, it was verbal. I can not remember it."
"Arjan Singh, you lie! Did I ever lie to you? Did I ever threaten you and not carry out my threats—promise you and not keep my promise? I am a soldier! Are you a cur?"
"God forbid, sahib! I—"
"Arjan Singh! Repeat that message to me word for word, please, not as a favor, nor as obeying an order, but as a friend of Ranjoor Singh to a friend of Ranjoor Singh!"
"The message was to the squadron, not to me, sahib."
"Are you not of the squadron?"
"Make it an order, sahib!"
"Certainly not—nor a favor either!"
"Sahib, I—"
"Nor will I threaten you! I guarantee you absolute immunity if you refuse to repeat it. My word on it! I am Ranjoor Singh's friend, and I ask of his friend!"
"The babu said: 'Says Ranjoor Singh, "Let the squadron be on its best behavior! Let the squadron know that surely before the blood runs he will be there to lead it, wherever it is! Meanwhile, let the squadron be worthy of its salt and of its officers!"'"
"Was that all?" asked Warrington.
"All, sahib. May my tongue rot if I lie!"
"Thank you, Arjan Singh. That's all. You needn't mention our conversation. Good night."
"Fooled," chuckled Warrington. "She's fooled us to the limit of our special bent, and I take it that's stiff-neckedness!"
He hurried away toward Colonel Kirby's quarters, swinging his lantern and humming to himself.
"And this isn't the Arabian Nights!" he told himself. "It's Delhi—Twentieth Century A.D.! Gad! Wouldn't the whole confounded army rock with laughter!"
Then he stopped chuckling, to hurry faster, for a giant horn had rooted chunks out of the blackness by the barrack gate, and now what sounded like a racing car was tearing up the drive. The head-lights dazzled him, but he ran and reached the colonel's porch breathless. He was admitted at once, and found the colonel and Brammle together, facing an aide-de-camp. In the colonel's hand was a medium-sized, sealed envelope.
"Shall I repeat it, sir?" asked the aide-de-camp.
"Yes, if you think it necessary" answered Kirby.
"The sealed orders are not to be opened until out at sea. You are expected to parade at dawn the day after to-morrow, and there will be somebody from headquarters to act as guide for the occasion. In fact, you will be guided at each point until it is time to open your orders. No explanations will be given about anything until later on. That's all. Good night, sir—and good luck!"
The aide-de-camp held out his hand, and Colonel Kirby shook it a trifle perfunctorily; he was not much given to display of sentiment. The aide-de-camp saluted, and a minute later the giant car spurned the gravel out from under its rear wheels as it started off to warn another regiment.
"So we've got our route!" said Kirby.
"And, thank God, we take our own horses!" said Brammle fervently.
"Bet you a thousand the other end's Marseilles!" said Warrington. "We're in luck. They'd have mounted us on bus-horses if we hadn't brought our own; we'd have had to ring a bell to start and stop a squadron. Who wouldn't be light cavalry?"
Kirby put the sealed letter in an inside pocket.
"I'm going to sleep," said Brammle, yawning. "Night, sir!"
"Night!" said Kirby; but Warrington stayed on. He went and stood near the window, and when Kirby had seen Brammle to the door, he joined him there.
"What now, Warrington?"
"Caught 'em grooming Ranjoor Singh's charger in the dark!"
"Why?"
"Said it was an order from Ranjoor Singh!"
"I'm getting tired of this. I don't know what to make of it."
"That isn't nearly the worst, sir. Listen to this! Long before Yasmini promised us—before we knelt to save his life and honor—Ranjoor Singh had sent a message to his squadron guaranteein' to be with 'em before the blood runs! Specific guarantee, and no conditions!"
"Then—"
"Exactly, sir!"
"She fooled us, eh?"
"D'you suppose she's for or against the government, sir?"
"I don't know. Thank God we've got our marching orders! Go and wash your head! And, Warrington—hold your tongue!"
Warrington held up his right hand.
"So help me, sir!" he grinned, "But will she hold hers?"
Westward, into the hungry West,(Oh, listen, wise men, listen ye!)Whirls the East Wind on his quest,Whimpering, worrying, hurrying, lestThe light o'ertake him. Listen ye!Mark ye the burden of his sigh:"Westward sinks the sun to die!Westward wing the vultures!"—Aye,(Listen, wise men, listen ye!)The East must lose—the West must gain,For none come back to the East again,Though widows call them! Listen ye!
Now, India is unlike every other country in the world in all particulars, and Delhi is in some respects the very heart through which India's unusualness flows. Delhi has five railway stations with which to cope with latter-day floods of paradoxical necessity; and nobody knew from which railway station troops might be expected to entrain or whither, although Delhi knew that there was war.
There did not seem to be anything very much out of the ordinary at any of the stations. In India one or two sidings are nearly always full of empty trains; there did not seem to be more of them than usual.
At the British barracks there was more or less commotion, because Thomas Atkins likes to voice his joy when the long peace breaks at last and he may justify himself; but in the native lines, where dignity is differently understood, the only men who really seemed unusually busy were the farriers, and the armourers who sharpened swords.
The government offices appeared to be undisturbed, and certainly no more messengers ran about than usual, the only difference was that one or two of them were open at a very early hour. But even in them—and Englishmen were busy in them—there seemed no excitement. Delhi had found time in a night to catch her breath and continue listening; for, unlike most big cities that brag with or without good reason, Delhi is listening nearly all the time.
A man was listening in the dingiest of all the offices on the ground floor of a big building on the side away from the street—a man in a drab silk suit, who twisted a leather watch-guard around his thumb and untwisted it incessantly. There was a telephone beside him, and a fair-sized pile of telegraph forms, but beyond that not much to show what his particular business might be. He did not look aggressive, but he seemed nervous, for he jumped perceptibly when the telephone-bell rang; and being a government telephone, with no commercial aims, it did not ring loud.
"Yes," he said, with the receiver at his ear. "Yes, yes. Who else? Oh, I forgot for the moment. Four, three, two, nine, two. Give yours! Very well, I'm listening."
Whoever was speaking at the other end had a lot to say, and none of it can have been expected, for the man in the drab silk suit twisted his wrinkled face and worked his eyes in a hundred expressions that began with displeasure and passed through different stages of surprise to acquiescence.
"I want you to know," he said, "that I got my information at first hand. I got it from Yasmini herself, from three of the hill-men who were present, and from the Afridi who was kicked and beaten. All except the Afridi, who wasn't there by that time, agreed that Ranjoor Singh had words with the German afterward. Eh? What's that?"
He listened again for about five minutes, and then hung up the receiver with an expression of mixed irritation and amusement.
"Caught me hopping on the wrong leg this time!" he muttered, beginning to twist at his watch-guard again.
Presently he sat up and looked bored, for he heard the fast trot of a big, long-striding horse. A minute later a high dogcart drew up in the street, and he heard a man's long—striding footsteps coming round the corner.
"Like horse, like man, like regiment!" he muttered. "Pick his stride or his horse's out of a hundred, and"—he pulled out his nickel watch—"he's ten minutes earlier than I expected him! Morning, Colonel Kirby!" he said pleasantly, as Kirby strode in, helmet in hand. "Take a seat."
He noticed Kirby's scalp was red and that he smelt more than faintly of carbolic.
"Morning!" said Kirby.
"I'm wondering what's brought you," said the man in drab.
"I've come about Ranjoor Singh," said Kirby; and the man in drab tried to look surprised.
"What about him? Reconsidered yesterday's decision?"
"No," said Kirby. "I've come to ask what news you have of him." And Kirby's eye, that some men seemed to think so like a bird's, transfixed the man in drab, so that he squirmed as if he had been impaled.
"You must understand, Colonel Kirby—in fact, I'm sure you do understand—that my business doesn't admit of confidences. Even if I wanted to divulge information, I'm not allowed to. I stretched a point yesterday when I confided in you my suspicions regarding Ranjoor Singh, but that doesn't imply that I'm going to tell you all I know. I asked you whatyouknew, you may remember."
"I told you!" snapped Kirby. "Is Ranjoor Singh still under suspicion?"
That was a straight question of the true Kirby type that admitted of no evasion, and the man in drab pulled his watch out, knocking it on the desk absent-mindedly, as if it were an egg that he wished to crack. He must either answer or not, it seemed, so he did neither.
"Why do you ask?" he parried.
"I've a right to know! Ranjoor Singh's my wing commander, and a better officer or a more loyal gentleman doesn't exist. I want him! I want to know where he is! And if he's under a cloud, I want to know why! Where is he?"
"I don't know where he is," said the man in drab. "Is he—ah—absent without leave?"
"Certainly not!" said Kirby. "I've seen to that!"
"Then you've communicated with him?"
"No."
"Then if his regiment were to march without him—"
"It won't if I can help it!" said Kirby.
"And if you can't help it, Colonel Kirby?"
"In that case he has got what he asked for, and there can be no charge against him until he shows up."
"I understand you have your marching orders?"
"I have sealed orders!" snapped Kirby.
"To be opened at sea?"
"To be opened when I see fit!"
"Oh!"
"Yes," said Kirby. "I asked you is Ranjoor Singh still under suspicion!"
"My good sir, I am not the arbiter of Ranjoor Singh's destiny! How should I know?"
"I intend to know!" vowed Kirby, rising.
"I'm prepared to state that Ranjoor Singh is not in danger of arrest. I don't see that you have right to ask more than that, Colonel Kirby. Martial law has been declared this morning, and things don't take their ordinary course any longer, you know."
Kirby paced once across the office floor, and once back again. Then he faced the man in drab as a duelist faces his antagonist.
"I don't like to go over men's heads," he said, "as you threatened to do to me, for instance, yesterday. If you will give me satisfactory assurance that Ranjoor Singh is being treated as a loyal officer should be, I will ask no more. If not, I shall go now to the general commanding. As you say, there's martial law now, he's the man to see."
"Colonel Kirby," said the man in drab, twisting at his watch-guard furiously, "if you'll tell me what's in your sealed orders—open them and see—I'll tell you what I know about Ranjoor Singh, and we'll call it a bargain!"
"I wasn't joking," said Kirby, turning red as his scalp from the roots of his hair to his collar.
"I'm in deadly earnest!" said the man in drab.
So, without a word more, Colonel Kirby hurried out again, carrying his saber in his left hand at an angle that was peculiar to him, and that illustrated determination better than words could have done.
His huge horse plunged away almost before he had gained the seat, and, saber and all, he gained the seat at a step-and-a-jump. But the sais was not up behind, and Kirby had scarcely settled down to drive before the man in drab had the telephone mouthpiece to his lips and had given his mysterious number again—4-3-2-9-2.
"He's coming, sir!" he said curtly.
Somebody at the other end apparently asked, "Who is coming?" for the man in drab answered:
"Kirby."
* * * * *
Five minutes later Kirby caught a general at breakfast, and was received with courtesy and feigned surprise.
"D'you happen to know anything about my risaldar-major, Ranjoor Singh?" asked Kirby, after a hasty apology for bursting in.
"Why?"
"He was under suspicion yesterday—I was told so. Next he disappeared. Then I received a message from him asking me to assign him to special duty; that was after I'd more than half believed him burned to death in a place called the 'House-of-the-Eight-Half-brothers.' He has sent some most extraordinary messages to his squadron by the hand of a mysterious babu, but not a word of explanation of any kind. Can you tell me anything about him, sir?"
"Wasn't a trooper of yours murdered yesterday?" the general asked.
"Yes," said Kirby.
"And another missing?"
"Yes, sir."
"Did Ranjoor Singh go off to search for the missing man?"
"I was told so."
"H-rrrr-ump! Well, I'm glad you came; you've saved me trouble! Did you put Ranjoor Singh in Orders as assigned to special duty?"
"Yes."
"What is the missing trooper's name?"
"Jagut Singh."
"Well, please enter him in Orders, too."
"Special service?"
"Special service," said the general. "How about Ranjoor Singh's charger?"
"I understand that he's been kept well groomed by Ranjoor Singh's orders, and my adjutant tells me he has the horse in care in his own stable."
The general made a note.
"Whose stable?" lie asked.
"Warrington's."
"Warrington, of Outram's Own, eh? Captain Warrington?"
The general wrote that down, while Kirby watched him bewildered.
"Well now, Kirby, that'll be all right Have the horse left there, will you? I hope You've been able to dispose of your own horses to advantage. Two chargers don't seem a large allowance for a commanding officer of a cavalry regiment, but that's all you can take with you. You'll have to leave the rest behind."
"Haven't given it a thought, sir! Too busy thinking about RanjoorSingh. Worried about him."
"Shouldn't worry!" said the general. "Ranjoor Singh's all right."
"That's the first assurance I've had of it, except by way of a mysterious note," said Kirby.
"By all right, I mean that he isn't in disgrace. But now about your horses and private effects. You've done nothing about them?"
"I'll have time to attend to that this afternoon, sir."
"Oh, no, you won't. That's why I'm glad you came! These"—he gave him a sealed envelope—"are supplementary orders, to be opened when you get back to barracks. I want you out of the way by noon if possible. We'll send a man down this morning to take charge of whatever any of you want kept, and you'd better tell him to sell the rest and pay the money to your bankers; he'll be a responsible officer. That's all. Good-by, Kirby, and good luck!"
The general held out his hand.
"One more minute, sir," said Kirby. "About Ranjoor Singh!"
"What about him?"
"Well, sir—what about him?"
"What have you heard?"
"That—I've heard a sort of promise that he'll be with his squadron, to lead it, before the blood runs."
"Won't that be time enough?" asked the general, smiling. He was looking at Kirby very closely. "Not sick, are you?" he asked. "No? I thought your scalp looked rather redder than usual."
Kirby flushed to the top of his collar instantly, and the general pretended to arrange a sheaf of papers on the table.
"One reason why you're being sent first, my boy," said the general, holding out his hand again, "is that you and your regiment are fittest to be sent. But I've taken into consideration, too, that I don't want you or your adjutant killed by a cobra in any event. And—snf—snf—the salt sea air gets rid of the smell of musk quicker than anything. Good-by, Kirby, my boy, and God bless you!"
"Good-by, sir!"
Kirby stammered the words, and almost ran down the steps to his waiting dog-cart. As all good men do, when undeserved ridicule or blame falls to their lot, he wondered what in the world he could have done wrong.
He had no blame for anybody, only a fierce resentment of injustice—an almost savage sense of shame that any one should know about the adventure of the night before, and a rising sense of joy in his soldier's heart because he had orders in his pocket to be up and doing. So, and only so, could he forget it all.
He whipped up his horse and went down the general's drive at a pace that made the British sentry at the gate grin from ear to ear with whole-souled approval. He did not see a fat babu approach the general's bungalow from the direction of the bazaar. The babu salaamed profoundly, but Kirby's eyes were fixed on the road ahead, and his thoughts were already deep in the future. He saw nothing except the road, until he took the last corner into barracks on one wheel, and drew up a minute later in front of the bachelor quarters that had sheltered him for the past four years.
* * * * *
"Pack! Campaign kit! One trunk!" he ordered his servant. "Orderly!"
An orderly ran in from outside.
"Tell Major Brammle and Captain Warrington to come to me!"
It took ten minutes to find Warrington, since every job was his, and nearly every responsibility, until his colonel should take charge of a paraded, perfect regiment, and lead it away to its fate. He came at last, however, and on the run, and Brammle with him.
"Orders changed!" said Kirby. "March at noon! Man'll be here this morning to take charge of officers' effects. Better have things ready for him and full instructions. One trunk allowed each officer. Two chargers."
"Destination, sir?" asked Brammle.
"Not disclosed!"
"Where do we entrain?" asked Warrington.
"We march out of Delhi. Entrain later, at a place appointed on the road."
Warrington began to hum to himself and to be utterly, consciously happy.
"Then I'll get a move on!" he said, starting to hurry out."Everything's ready, but—"
"Wait a minute!" commanded Kirby; and Warrington remained in the room after Brammle had left it.
"You haven't said anything to anybody, of course, about that incident last night?"
"No, sir."
"Thenshehas!"
Warrington whistled.
"Are you sure she has?"
"Quite. I've just had proof of it!"
"Makes a fellow reverence the sex!" swore Warrington.
"It'll be forgotten by the time we're back in India," said Kirby solemnly. "Remember to keep absolutely silent about it. The best way to help others forget it is to forget it yourself. Not one word now to anybody, even under provocation!"
"Not a word, sir!"
"All right. Go and attend to business!"
What "attending to business" meant nobody can guess who has not been in at the breaking up of quarters at short notice. Everything was ready, as Warrington had boasted, but even an automobile may "stall" for a time in the hands of the best chauffeur, and a regiment contains as many separate human equations as it has men in its ranks.
The amount of personal possessions that had to be jettisoned, or left to the tender mercies of a perfunctory agent, would have wrung groans from any one but soldiers. The last minute details that seemed to be nobody's job, and that, therefore, all fell to Warrington because somebody had to see to them, were beyond the imagination of any but an adjutant, and not even Warrington's imagination proved quite equal to the task.
"We're ready, sir!" he reported at last to Kirby. "We're paraded and waiting. Brammle's inspected 'em, and I've done ditto. There are only thirteen thousand details left undone that I can't think of, and not one of 'em's important enough to keep us waitin'!"
So Kirby rode out on parade and took the regiment's salute. There was nobody to see them off. There were not even women to wail by the barrack gate, for they marched away at dinner-time and official lies had been distributed where they would do most good.
Englishman and Sikh alike rode untormented by the wails or waving farewells of their kindred; and there was only a civilian on a white pony, somewhere along ahead, who seemed to know that they were more than just parading. He led them toward the Ajmere Gate, and by the time that the regiment's luggage came along in wagons, with the little rear-guard last of all, it was too late to run and warn people. Outram's Own had gone at high noon, and nobody the wiser!
There was no music as they marched and no talking. Only the jingling bits and rattling hoofs proclaimed that India's best were riding on a sudden summons to fight for the "Salt." They marched in the direction least expected of them, three-quarters of a day before their scheduled time, and even "Guppy," the mess bull-terrier, who ran under the wagon with the officers' luggage, behaved as if all ends of the world were one to him. He waved his tail with dignity and trotted in content.
Hard by the Ajmere Gate they halted, for some bullock carts had claimed their centuries-long prerogative of getting in the way. While the bullocks, to much tail-twisting and objurgation, labored in the mud in every direction but the right one, Colonel Kirby sat his charger almost underneath the gate, waiting patiently. Then the advance-guard clattered off and he led along.
He never knew where it came from and he never tried to guess. He caught it instinctively, and kept it for the sake of chivalry, or perhaps because she had made him think for a moment of his mother. At all events, the bunch of jasmine flowers that fell into his lap found a warm berth under his buttoned tunic, and he rode on through the great gate with a kinder thought for Yasmini than probably she would guess.
With that resentment gone, he could ride now as suited him, with all his thoughts ahead, and there lacked then only one thing to complete his pleasure—he missed Ranjoor Singh.
It was not that the squadron would lack good leading. An English officer had taken Ranjoor Singh's place. It was the man he missed—the decent loyal gentleman who had worked untiringly to sweat a squadron into shape to Kirby's liking and never once presumed, nor had taken offense at criticism—the man who had been good enough to understand the ethics of an alien colonel, and to translate them for the benefit of his command. It is not easy for a Sikh to rise to the rank of major and lead a squadron for the Raj.
He counted Ranjoor Singh his friend, and he knew that Ranjoor Singh would have given all the rest of his life to ride away now for only one encounter on a foreign battle-field. Nothing, nothing less than the word of Ranjoor Singh himself, would ever convince him of the man's disloyalty. And he would have felt better if he could have shaken hands with Ranjoor Singh before going, since it seemed to be the order of the day that the Sikh should stay behind.
It did not seem quite the thing to be riding away to war with the best native officer in all India somewhere in Delhi on "special service"—whatever that might be.
He was given, as a rule, to smiling at any man who did his best. On any other day he would have very likely exchanged a joke with the bullock-man who labored so unavailingly to get the road cleared in a hurry. But to-day, since his thoughts were of Ranjoor Singh, he paid the man no attention; he had not even formed a mental picture of him by the time he passed the gate.
It was Warrington, cantering up from behind a minute or so later, who changed the color of the earth and sky.
"Did you recognize him, sir?"
"Whom?"
"Ranjoor Singh!"
"No! Where?"
"Not the bullock-man who blocked the road, but the man who ran out from behind the gate and straightened things out again. That man was Ranjoor Singh in mufti!"
"What makes you think so?"
"I recognized him. So did his squadron—look at them! They're riding like new men!"
Kirby looked, and there was no doubt about D Squadron.
"Is he there still?" he asked.
"I can see a man standing there—see him? Fellow in white between two bullock carts?"
Kirby pulled out to the roadside and let the regiment pass him. Then he cantered back. The man between the bullock carts had his back turned, and was gazing toward Delhi under his hand.
"Ranjoor Singh!" said Kirby, reining suddenly. "Is that you?"
"Uh?" The man faced about. He was no more Ranjoor Singh than he wasColonel Kirby.
"Where is the man who came from behind the gate to clear the road?"
The man pointed toward the gate. Inside, within the gloom of the gate itself, Kirby was certain he saw a Sikh who stood at the salute. He cantered to the gate, for he would have given a year's pay for word with Ranjoor Singh. But when he reached the gate the man was gone.
"And he promised he'd be there to lead his squadron when the blood runs," wondered Kirby.
"Now a trap," said the tiger, "is easy to spot,"(Oh, jungli, be seated and listen!)"Some tempt you with live bait, and others do not;"(Oh, jungli, be leery and listen!)"The easiest sort to detect have a door—A box, with three walls and a roof and a floor—That the veriest, hungriest cub should ignore."(Oh, jungli, stop laughing and listen!)"This isn't a trap, as I'll show you, my friend."But the tiger fell into it. That is the end.(Oh, jungli, be loving and listen!)