"But why should you imagine I am going to give anybody cause to talk directly your back is turned? I should do nothing while you are away that I wouldn't do while you are here."
"That's just it!" he said, with some excitement. "If you ride and drive all over the place with young Greaves, and let him come and sit here for hours, as you did before he went on leave, there is bound to be gossip."
"Butyouknow that there's nothing in it," she argued plaintively. "You have said so. Isn't that enough?"
Then her heart smote her. She knew she was teasing him, making it more difficult for him to go away with a light heart to enjoy the shoot; and while she considered his attitude absurd, she made up her mind she would humour his scruples and sink her own opinion in favour of the circumstances. Poor dear old George! He was such a prude, so dog-in-the-mangerish, so prone to make a silly fuss about nothing. Yet, if it really worried him to think that she and Guy might lead people to imagine they were lovers, she would give in tohim and promise anything he liked. She wanted him to have some pleasure; she was conscious that her notions of enjoyment were not his, and she felt it would be more than "beastly"--to use her own term--not to help him now to get off on this tiger shoot with a mind at ease.
She came round the table and perched herself on his knee, winding a soft arm about his neck.
"Will it make you happy, old George, if I promise not to go out with Guy while you are away, and not to let him come here when I am alone?"
He pressed her to him in fond compunction, overwhelmed with tender feeling for her, recognising gladly the generous impulse that had prompted her concession.
"Darling, I don't ask you to promise anything. I only want you to remember that you are a married woman, and to guard your name and reputation as something sacred. You have only to think a little, and not expect other people to be as charitable and unsuspicious of evil as you are yourself."
She kissed him lightly on the forehead. "I will think and remember the whole time," she reassured him. "You needn't feel one bit afraid. I shall have heaps to do without bothering about men. I'm going to hem dozens of dusters, and the Padre's wife has promised to teach me no endof cooking, so I shall keep her to her word. You'll be back before I can turn round."
"How can I leave you?" he said, with passionate reluctance.
She laid on the breakfast-table a piece of paper she had brought from the bungalow.
"Here's a telegraph form," she announced cheerily, "and my fountain-pen. I'm going to write out the wire for you. What shall I say?" She shifted her position and began to trace the words: "'Accept with many thanks starting soon as possible.' How's that?"
"Well," he said grudgingly, "I suppose I'd better go."
"Youaregoing," Trixie told him; "and when you are there you will bless your wife for making you go." She referred to Markham's letter and added the address. Then she rose and summoned with a call a lurking orderly, and gave him the form, with some money hitherto secreted in the palm of her hand. "Take that to the post office," she commanded him in halting Hindustani.
In silence they watched the man leave the compound with alert, important progress, and Coventry gave a sigh of resignation.
"You young bully!" he said in mock reproach.
"You old idiot!" she retorted, laughing, and bustled back to grapple with her housekeeping.
THE RIVER
Afterthat there followed a period of unusual activity in the Coventry's bungalow. Guns and rifles were overhauled, ammunition ordered, boxes and cupboards were ransacked for garments suited to the jungle.
Trixie entered keenly into all the preparations. She seldom did anything by halves; and she might almost have been joining in the expedition herself so lively was her interest in every detail. She asked endless questions concerning camps and elephants and tigers, and she listened breathless to all that George could tell her of the fascinations of the jungle. She dragged books on sport from the musty shelves of the club library, and read them with genuine enjoyment during two long, hot afternoons.
Coventry to the last was more or less reluctant to leave her; but she ignored his hesitation, and when the hour of departure came she drove with him gaily to the railway station, and with a cheerful, smiling face saw him off by the night mail.It was when she returned to the empty bungalow that her spirits sank. The rooms were so silent, save for the tiny trumpeting of mosquitoes in the corners; the atmosphere felt so close, and there was a smell of musk rat that was nauseating. Until dawn brought comparative coolness she lay awake, turning restlessly, hearing the desperate cry of the brain-fever bird, and the monotonous thrumming of a stringed instrument in the servants' quarters at the end of the compound. She wondered if natives ever slept save during the spell of rest they claimed in the middle of the day, when a drowsy peace descended everywhere.
With a sense of dismay that hitherto she had held in check, she contemplated the coming fortnight. How boring it would be to have to "think and remember" the whole time that she must be careful to give no cause for gossip! True, she had her household and her livestock, and her linen and store cupboards to occupy her mornings, and she could read and sleep through the succeeding hot hours; but what of the evenings?
For the first week she got on well enough. She snubbed Guy Greaves and other eager slaves who would willingly have placed their time, their dog-carts, their ponies--everything that they possessed--at her disposal. She played in "married" sets of tennis, and dined and consorted with the mostdomesticated couples in the station, so nervous was she of committing any indiscretion. Every day she wrote to George, accounting for her time; this she felt to be a sort of safeguard against the least false step; and so far there had been nothing connected with her doings that she could not chronicle with a perfectly clear conscience.
So the time dragged on until the evening before the day on which George Coventry was expected to come home.
The heat was now terrific; even tennis had become an effort, and Trixie left the bungalow to keep her engagement in the public gardens, feeling listless and oppressed. The hot weather had begun early this year, there had been no cooling storms to give temporary coolness and relief, and on all sides Trixie heard ominous predictions that "the rains" were going to fail. Not that the prospect disturbed her particularly, for as yet she could not realise its gravity. Only those whose lives have been bound up with India can understand the dread of such a visitation, the anxious watching of the sky, the heaviness of heart when meteorological reports look bad. For a failure, or even a weakness, of the monsoon means grim combat with pestilence and famine, and most dire distress, not only at the time, but afterwards, when fever takes its toll from an enfeebled population. It meansstrain and over-work for the long-suffering official; everywhere misery, death, and desolation.
After a languid game she dawdled late at the club with a group of people who, like herself, felt unwilling to return to stuffy bungalows and food that must inevitably prove untempting. To-night especially she shrank from the prospect of a solitary dinner and the weary after hours, even though supported by the knowledge that it was her last evening alone.
They all sat outside the club-house on a round masonry platform, talking fitfully, fanned by a make-shift punkah slung between two poles. Gradually two or three married couples bestirred themselves and drove away; a few unattached men who had dinner engagements deserted also, and presently Mrs. Coventry and Mrs. Roy were the only ladies left, with a small attendance of young men--Guy Greaves, two other subalterns, and a home-sick youth who had joined the Civil Service only last winter, and still preserved pathetically a Bond Street air.
Mrs. Roy was young and pretty and light-hearted, but not entirely without guile. Captain Roy had gone away that afternoon on duty, and she did not intend to dine alone. She invited the company to join her at dinner.
"There's lots of food, such as it is," she toldthem, "and even if we can't eat we can drink champagne with plenty of ice in it."
"I'm afraid I can't come," said Trixie ruefully. She knew that George disapproved of Mrs. Roy.
"Why not?" persisted Mrs. Roy. "Who are you dining with--the missionaries?"
They all laughed.
"I'm not dining with anybody," admitted Trixie, obviously weakening. She longed to join the party and have a little "fling," to laugh and talk nonsense and be amused, as an antidote to all her good behaviour. No letter would have to be written to-morrow to George. She could tell him all about the evening, and make him understand that she had meant and done no harm.
"Then why can't you come? Don't be unsociable," argued Mrs. Roy. "To-morrow we may all be dead of heat apoplexy, or cholera, or snake-bite, or something equally common to this delightful country, and then you'd be sorry you hadn't enjoyed yourself while you had the chance."
"Do say 'Yes,' Mrs. Coventry," sang a chorus of male voices. And after a moment's further hesitation Trixie succumbed.
"I must go back and change, then," she said, and rose. A little later they all met again in Mrs. Roy'spretty bungalow, and despite the heat and the insects, and, according to Mrs. Roy, the uncertainty of existence in India, they were a festive little party. They chaffed and told stories, and drank iced champagne and smoked cigarettes, and Trixie cast from her all thoughts of her husband's displeasure. Until this evening she had conformed to his wishes with the most strict consideration. She felt she deserved this innocent enjoyment, that it would be really unreasonable of George if he grudged it to her.
She had honestly intended to go home soon after dinner was over, but Mrs. Roy refused to "hear of such a thing."
"Behold the moon!" she exclaimed, a good deal later, as they straggled out into the veranda after a short and boisterous game of cards.
And, indeed, the moon was something to behold--huge, orange-coloured, almost terrifying, hanging heavy in the dusty night. Its lurid light filtered through the foliage of the trees and tinged the haze of the atmosphere with an unearthly radiance.
"I ask you, who could go to bed whilst that great lantern blazes in the sky?" cried Mrs. Roy with mock grandiloquence. "Let us all drive down to the river and go for a row. Wouldn't it be simply perfect?"And, with others, Trixie agreed. What did it matter? Who cared? There was a sensuous influence in the hot, scented air that stilled her scruples, rendered her reckless. For the moment all the careless, irresponsible gaiety of her girlhood had returned.
The young civilian and one of the subalterns took charge of Mrs. Roy, the other three climbed into Guy Greaves's dog-cart, and they all drove hatless, wrapless, along the deserted, dusty road hedged with dry mud-banks that were tipped with prickly pear and cactus, until the ground began to slope, the wheels of the vehicles sank deep into the heavy, sandy soil, and they were at the river's edge.
There was a little delay while two boats were got ready by sleepy boatmen roused from their huts, a good deal of talk and laughter and argument as to how the party should divide and how far they should row. Finally it was agreed that in an hour's time they should land at the grove of trees that sheltered the Mohammedan cemetery, and that the syces with the traps, and a man to take back the boats, should meet them there.
Trixie found herself afloat alone with Guy Greaves. She did not know if this was due to an accident or to Guy's deliberate manøuvring. She felt as though she were in a dream as shetook the rudder-lines. The second boat shot past them, and the occupants called out foolish jokes and gibes, sprinkled them with water, and left them far behind.
They slid slowly, silently, over the smooth bosom of the holy river, that was burnished with the moonlight. From the distance came the sound of native singing, a faint sound that rose and fell on the warm night air, only to be drowned, as though in protest, by the yells of jackals hunting, closely packed, across the plain.
Then all again was quiet, with a vast and dreamy peace that held the man and woman speechless, like a spell, as the boat slipped through the water, on and on.
Suddenly Guy Greaves stopped rowing. He leaned towards his companion, his young face set and hard, his eyes dark in the moonlight; his hands, holding the oars, were strained and trembling.
"Trixie!" he said in hoarse appeal.
His voice roused her. She looked at him, surprised.
"Why have you been so cruel to me lately? What have I done?"
She felt irritated, helpless. "Don't, Guy. Don't be so silly. I don't know what you mean."
"Oh! I know it's no use. But I must say it;I must tell you." He spoke with quick, nervous emotion. "It isn't as if I'd ever done or said anything since you came out here married to deserve the way you've sat on me lately--or if I have, I didn't know it. I thought I'd been so jolly careful! It hasn't been easy--and it's no good pretending now that I don't care for you, or for you to pretend that you don't know it. You knew it when I was at home last year, and we had such ripping times together. If only I'd been able to afford to marry, wouldn't you have taken me--Trixie? Wouldn't you? Instead of marrying a man old enough to be your great-grandfather!"
The boy had lost his head; his words came with passionate bitterness.
"Guy, be quiet!" Trixie broke in, distressed and alarmed. "You must be mad to talk like this."
He paid no heed. "No, I'm not mad--unless, perhaps, with wretchedness. I could stand it all as long as you treated me as a pal, and were kind, and let me do things for you. But you suddenly kicked me off like an old shoe, and, as far as I can see, for no reason whatever. I want to know," he went on doggedly, "what I've done."
"You haven't done anything," she hastened to tell him. "It's all your silly imagination. Do, for goodness' sake, go on rowing; we shall never catch up the others before they land."He sat motionless, waiting.
"Guy--youmustrow on. I'll tell you nothing while you behave like this. It's beastly of you. Look--we're floating to the other side of the river! Guy, do be sensible!"
That was what she had said to him last year at home, when he had "talked nonsense" at a dance before he had to sail for India. They both remembered it now. In her agitation she clutched at the rudder-lines confusedly, and the boat almost swung round. He steadied it with the oars, but he did not go on rowing.
"Would you have married me if it had been possible?" he persisted, though now more calmly.
There was a long pause. The boat moved sideways, gravitating towards the farther bank, nearing ridges of sand and islets of brushwood and rubbish, mysterious shapes that stuck up sharp and fantastic in the moonlight. Something swished past, rippling the water with swift cleavage--a long, black water-snake hurrying to its refuge. And a mighty splash broke the stillness--a crocodile disturbed from its stupor on a sandbank.
"No," said Trixie in a low, tense voice, "I would not have married you. I think I could never have married anybody but George."
The truth had come to her, here on the river in the moonlight, with sudden and overpoweringforce. She loved her husband, loved him with all her generous, impulsive heart--and this in spite of his strict views and old-fashioned opinions, his tiresome jealousy, his age! And yet at this very moment she was doing something that, if he could know of it, would hurt and anger him and shake his trust in her, destroy all his pleasure in his holiday, perhaps create a rupture between them that never could be healed! What a fool she had been to dine with Mrs. Roy, to allow herself to be dragged into this idiotic escapade. And here was Guy behaving like a lunatic because she was alone with him on the river in the middle of the night. How could she ever explain it all to George and persuade him to forgive her?
Before her mental vision rose her husband's handsome, careworn face--the keen grey eyes, the dark hair frosted at the temples; and with it came remembrance, realisation of all he must have suffered in the past. How often he had told her that she had restored to him his trust in womanhood, had made him happy when all hope of happiness had seemed denied him.
In a measure she had failed him, too. He would be certain to hear of to-night's folly, even if she told him nothing about it herself. The only thing to do was to get home as quickly as possible.Guy Greaves sat opposite to her, obdurate, motionless, thinking only of himself and his stupid, boyish adoration, which was nothing compared with the love of a man experienced and tried. She felt she hated Guy, and all the superficial view of life that he represented to her penitent soul.
"Oh, go on--go on!" she cried in frightened desperation. "I must get home. I ought never to have come. I can't bear it. If you don't row, I'll never speak to you again."
He took up the oars with reluctance. She pulled the rudder-lines again, first one, then the other. The boat shot crookedly, with a shivering shock, on to a sandbank, and stuck fast. Young Greaves said "Damn!" and Trixie screamed. She stood up.
"For God's sake sit down!" implored Guy, in fear that she might spring from the boat, a hideous thought of lurking crocodiles flashing through his mind.
She sank back to her seat, mute, apprehensive, while he tried vainly to refloat the boat.
"Give me an oar. Let me help," she said. He passed it to her. They used all their strength without avail.
"Shout!" she ordered him. "The others may hear you and come back."
He obeyed her, and the sound echoed wide andfar across the water. But the only answer was the hooting of an owl in some bushes on the bank, and the scrambling of some startled little creature near them in the sand.
"We shall be here all night!" she cried, despairing.
He did not answer. All his attention was concentrated on his efforts to release the boat.
Actually how long it stuck there neither of them knew. The moon sank lower, glowing, molten; myriads of mosquitoes beat about them, bit their faces, hands, and feet; the river seemed as stagnant as a pool.
Trixie felt paralysed, as in a nightmare. What if they were kept prisoners till the dawn--even longer--even till George should have returned to the bungalow and found her absent?
All at once, with a lurch, the boat shot free, and Trixie burst into tears of relief.
Guy Greaves felt almost hysterical himself. "It's all right now, Trixie. Don't cry." He spoke with cheerful reassurance. "I'll row hard, and we shall catch the others up in no time."
"They must have landed long ago," she quavered. "Can't we go back to the starting-place? It must be nearer."
"But the traps were to meet us at the grove," he reminded her. "We should have to walk allthe way home if we went back, and that would take ever so much longer."
"Supposing the others haven't waited," she suggested nervously. "It would be just like them. They can't all get into the same trap, and they'd take yours and leave us to fish for ourselves without caring twopence!" Her agitation rendered her petulant and pessimistic. "You know how thoughtless and inconsiderate Mrs. Roy can be. That is why George can't bear her."
"Oh, nonsense! Mrs. Roy's dog-cart holds four at a pinch, if they let the syce follow. Even if they did take my trap, they'd send it back to meet us. Anyway, don't worry about that till we get there."
He rowed harder than ever, infected in spite of himself by Trixie's forebodings; and he felt hardly surprised to see only the boatman awaiting them on the rough little landing-stage.
"What did I tell you!" said Trixie, a catch of despair in her voice.
"They wouldn't wait down here," he said, as he helped her out of the boat. "Are the sahibs up above in the grove?" he inquired of the man.
The answer was given with drowsy indifference. "I know not. The order was given to wait for this boat, and take it back with the other."They stumbled on up the slope that was steep and uneven, Trixie clinging to Guy, her breath coming fast and audible. "Do coo-ee," she urged him, "I feel I must know if they're there." He obeyed her. His voice rang clear through the trees and over the river, but echo was all the reply it received.
In disconsolate silence they reached the flat ground at the top of the cliff, and plunged into the mysterious gloom of the grove. A weak little breeze had arisen, wandering through the trees, like a sighing soul that could not escape from the burial place; here and there they could see the dim outlines of tombs, dome-shaped, or flat-topped and square, touched by the light of the moon that filtered down through the foliage.
"They are not here. They have gone," said Trixie hopelessly.
"They are outside, waiting on the road," said Guy Greaves.
But they were not. When the pair emerged from the grove they found the road empty and silent, not a sign of a trap or anything living, except a great owl that swooped over the road and across the unfertile plain beyond with an unearthly hoot, as though mocking their plight.
"Come along," said Trixie firmly, "we must walk. If they do send the trap back to meet usso much the better, but we can't wait here on the chance."
The road was unmetalled and the ruts were deep. Without further parley they started, trudging through the dust, engrossed in their own emotions. The boy felt that by his lack of self-control he had jeopardised all future friendship with his idol, and his young heart was heavy with distress, also with resentment; for it seemed to him that Trixie thought he was to blame for their predicament. Barring that asinine outburst of his, which he deeply regretted, he did not see why she should be so perturbed--not only perturbed, but actually frightened. If anyone should be spiteful enough to gossip, the whole thing could be clearly explained in two minutes. Why, in the old days Trixie would have been the first to enjoy such a harmless adventure. A question crept into his mind and filled him with angry concern: Was she afraid of her husband? He recalled certain tales of his colonel's first marriage, chiefly the one that Coventry's jealous restrictions had goaded his wife into bolting with some other fellow. Aunt Marion Greaves had once hinted as much in his hearing, and others had said the same. He stepped along burning with rage at the notion that Trixie was bullied, devising impossible schemes to shield and defendher from trouble with Coventry over to-night's escapade.
Trixie herself was practically oblivious of his presence. She did not observe that he walked a little ahead, his motive being to make sure that she trod on nothing suggestive of reptiles; once he did notice a thin black line that wriggled from the dust in front and disappeared beneath a cactus clump. Luckily she did not see it; she was absorbed in her desire to find herself safe within her home, torn as she was with repentance for her backsliding, dreading as she did the confession she would have to make to George. Guy startled her presently by an abrupt question:
"Why are you in such a funk?" he asked, as though the words had been jerked from his lips against his will.
"What?" said Trixie, with an effort. "What did you say?" She only knew he had spoken, without catching the words.
"I only said, why are you so awfully worried about--about all this? There can't be any scandal when the whole thing was simply an accident."
"It wasn't an accident my going out with all you silly idiots in the middle of the night!" said Trixie crossly. "And if people do talk and say nasty things about our being left behind it will be my own fault, and I shall deserve it. Anyhow,it has taught me a lesson I shan't forget in a hurry."
"Oh, rot! What can they say? And why should you care. Look here, Trixie," he burst out with imprudent impetuosity, "is it that you're in a funk of whatthe colonelwill say or do? For God's sake, tell me if he bullies you. We all know what happened about his first wife."
There was an ominous pause. His pulses beat quickly, the noise of their footsteps crunching the dust sounded loud in his ears. He wished he had let the subject alone.
Then he heard Trixie say in a cold, contemptuous voice: "Perhaps you will tell me what you all know?"
In nervous excitement he stammered his answer. "Why, that he drove her into--into leaving him. Never gave her a chance, wouldn't listen."
And in spite of the anger she felt towards Guy for his outrageous presumption, Trixie's heart sank lower than ever. She knew so little of the history of George's first marriage--had refused to hear when her mother and "Gommie" had wanted to tell her. Never once had she questioned her husband about the divorce, and naturally no one had mentioned it to her in India, until now this blundering boy had raked up the talk he had heard. A horrible doubt assailed her. Could it be truethat George had behaved without mercy, had not been entirely blameless as she had always believed? If so, what might she expect herself when he knew she had not only flown in the face of his wishes, but had been absent nearly all night with Guy Greaves, the one individual, harmless youth though he was, with whom he had begged her not to make herself conspicuous during their separation--Guy, over whom they had almost quarrelled! Hurt and annoyed she was sure her husband would be, but what if, as well, he "would not listen, would not give her a chance?"
Her vexation of mind, her disturbance of conscience, the annoying delay, the scene with Guy on the river, had all combined to harass her nerves and distort her perceptions; and now her companion's perturbing suggestion filled her with dread. Nevertheless her spirit rose up in defence of her husband.
"You know nothing about it," she told Guy severely. "How dare you quote gossip to me! And as to your insinuation about George's behaviour towards me, it only just proves how little you know him."
"They why make such a fuss?" he argued morosely. He did not believe that Trixie was telling the truth.
"Look here, Guy!" She stopped in the middleof the road, and compelled him to turn and face her. "If you weren't such an old friend, and if I didn't know you were a good sort, I should never speak to you again. As it is, you must know we can't be on quite the same terms any more. But I should like you to understand, once and for all, that I love my husband, and because I love him it makes me wretched to think that I should have done anything to vex him. I have broken a promise and behaved like a senseless fool. Of course I shall tell him the whole thing, and I am not in the least afraid that he won't forgive me. But that doesn't make me feel any the less ashamed of myself."
All the same, despite her brave words, Trixie was frightened as well as ashamed, and in her heart she knew that Guy had not only divined her fear, but that he shared it himself acutely.
It was a blessed relief to them both to catch sight at this moment of a dark object moving slowly towards them along the road--Guy Greaves's trap, sent back by the rest of the party to meet them. In silence they got into the trap and jolted along the uneven road till they reached the metalled highway; then they spun swiftly, unhindered, towards the station.
THE JUNGLE
Thesun beat fiercely down on the bed of the river, now dry save for streamlets meandering among the boulders, and encircling patches of sand that were dotted with birds of the long-shanked, long-billed brotherhood. It seemed hard to believe that a few weeks hence this arid, stone-strewn area would be swept by a mighty, tempestuous flood, rushing down from the hills in a volume so vast that nothing could stem its advance. Now the boulders shone round and smooth, and blinding white in the midday heat. They might have been cannon balls hurled by some Titan race in the ages past from the amphitheatre of hills at some foe in the valley beneath. The islets of sand sparkled like gold; indeed, gold dust was known to be mixed with their grains, though as yet whence it came was a secret no man had discovered; at least, if he had, the secret was kept by enchantment. There were stories of venturesome pilgrims, returning from far-away shrines in the mountains, found dead by the road that led back to the world, withnuggets of gold on their persons; no one had lived to return to the spot where he found them.
The straggling line of elephants, lurching in leisurely progress across the bed of the river, showed like black blots among the boulders. The animals felt their footing with careful precision, splashing through narrow streams, avoiding the stretches of sand that might prove to be death-traps for ponderous beasts, tearing up wisps of scrub with their trunks and beating them free of dust before putting them into their mouths, or flinging them far in disdain.
Captain Coventry's elephant brought up the rear of the little procession. He sat idly back in his howdah, his guns and his rifles stacked before him. His thoughts had wandered from river-beds, elephants, "kills," and tigers; for the tents of the camp, gleaming white in a grove of trees on the opposite bank, had attracted his eye, and he was hoping to find a letter from Trixie awaiting him there. His face was burnt by the sun to the hue of a brick, he looked lean and hard and in fine condition. The fortnight in camp had been all to his taste--congenial companions, capital sport, the arrangements as perfect as only a hunter such as his host could have made them.
This morning the camp had moved, therefore sport on the march had been varied. Two padelephants carried the game--spotted deer, jungle fowl, partridge, a wild boar with tushes like ivory sickles, and, chief of all, a magnificent panther, shot by Coventry as it lay stretched along the branch of a tree, watching with wicked green eyes the party of sportsmen filing beneath.
Coventry's leave was nearing its close. In a couple of days he was due to return to the station, and he sometimes surprised himself counting the hours. But he did not intend to desert "the shoot" before the appointed time, especially since the object in moving the camp to-day was to get within reach of a man-eating tiger whose terrible doings had scared all the people for miles around. The inhabitants of the little jungle villages were almost paralysed with fear, their crops were neglected, they dared not take out their cattle to graze; the brute was as active by day as by night, and had even been known to come into a hut and drag out his victim. From all accounts he was not of the usual mangy type that, enfeebled by age, finds man a much easier prey than the deer or the buffalo; he was described by the people as a creature of monstrous proportions, in the prime of life, and possessed with a spirit that was without doubt of the devil, since he slew beasts for caprice or amusement, and human beings for food. Manywere "the sahibs" who had sought to destroy him, on foot, from howdahs, from seats in the trees; in vain had bullocks and goats and buffalo calves been tied up as bait; even the ghastly remains of his meals had been watched. Yet still he went free, the "slayer," the "striped one," the "lord of the jungle." (No villager mentions the tiger by name, for fear of ill-luck.)
As the sportsmen arrived in their camp they were met by a terrified group, a deputation of wretched, half-naked people who had come from a hamlet near by to report yet another disaster. They waited while the sahibs got down from the elephants and stretched their cramped limbs, and then they approached with humble yet eager appeal.
"Highness, protector of the poor, father and mother, we are humble folk," wailed the spokesman, prostrating himself at their feet, a mummified object with rags round his head and his loins. "Thy slaves do entreat thee to slay the 'shaitan' that stalketh by day and by night. No one is safe. Only last night did the evil one fall on the wife of my nephew as she went forth to draw water from the well. In front of our eyes did he spring out and seize her and carry her off in his jaws; and when her husband ran in pursuit, like a fool, with curses and cries, did the evil one pauseand look back. And he threw down the woman and smote the man also, then bore the woman away to the jungle. If it should be the sahibs' pleasure to know that this dust speaks but truth, will we guide the huzoors to the spot where my nephew lies hurt unto death in the village. Maybe he is dead by now."
Again the deputation salaamed, as one man, to the ground, then stood gazing at the sahibs in hopeful anticipation.
"We'd better go and see if there's anything to be done for the wretched beggar," suggested Markham; "and if the tiger should be about and come for us, so much the better; we'll polish him off."
All four "sahibs" were hot and hungry and thirsty. Coventry was hungry for his letters, as well as for his breakfast. But without further delay they followed the squalid, excited little band in single file along a jungle track, their rifles under their arms. They passed through a sea of feathery grass that grew high above their heads, and on among dense bamboo thickets and tangled scrub. They were close to the edge of the forest, and the rustle of the tree-tops in the fierce west wind was unceasing. Their boots sank deep into hot, dry dust; sometimes startled animals darted across the track almost between theirfeet--little hog deer, squirrels, hares, jackals that slunk noiselessly into the grass. The harsh calling of pea-fowl, the chatter of monkeys, the screams of green parrots resounded above them. The heat was like that of a furnace; it was a blessed relief to emerge from the close-bound path on to a clearing in front of the village. It was a pathetic little patch of habitation, the people members of a jungle tribe not far removed from aborigines; just a cluster of mud-built dwellings thatched with grass, a shallow tank covered with green slime, in which pigs and buffaloes wallowed; refuse was scattered about, and on a rudely constructed platform under the usual peepal tree a few aged human beings, wasted with fever and poverty, sat huddled together; naked children with swollen stomachs played at their feet, and mangy pariah dogs met the arrivals with furious barking. It was just such a place as a man-eating tiger could persecute at his pleasure.
Coventry never forgot the sickening scene that followed. He and his friends were conducted with noisy ceremony into a hut that already seemed crowded with people; women were wailing, the smell and the heat and the dimness of the interior were stifling in their effect, and on a low string bedstead lay a twisted form partially covered with rags.The patriarch who had led the deputation to the camp stepped forward full of importance.
"Behold, sahibs, this is the doing of the destroyer!"
To the horror of the Englishmen, before they could check him, he lifted the mask of the unfortunate victim by the nose, and held it poised in the air for a moment before he replaced it. Mercifully the man was dead, only just dead, however; he had lived through the night and into the day with the whole of his face, from the scalp to the chin, torn away by the tiger.
"What extraordinary beggars these jungle people seem to be! I believe that old brute this morning would have lifted off that poor devil's face just the same if we'd got there while he was alive; in fact, I don't think he knew he was dead." The speaker, one of the shooting party, was a young man fresh to India, and this his first experience of the jungle had been full, for him, of excitement and wonder.
"Probably not," said Markham; "the callousness of the Oriental does strike one as pretty brutal sometimes, but it's just an acceptance of misfortune ingrained in them by their religion. In their own way they are charitable and kind-hearted, and they are often brave to rashness.When you come to think what that village has endured, you'd imagine there'd be hardly a sane inhabitant left."
The murmur of voices reached Coventry's brain as from a distance, though the two who were talking were only a few paces from him. He lay half asleep on a long camp chair in the shade, Trixie's letters clasped in his hand--a three days' budget brought out by runners from the nearest point of postal communication. Trixie was well, she had written, but she missed him, the time had seemed long, she was glad it was nearly over. Holding her letters he dreamed, as he dozed, of their meeting, while the murmur of voices went on.... Then as he stirred he caught snatches of talk through his dreams, now distinct, now connected, as drowsiness lifted.
The boy was saying: "You must have seen some curious things in your time, I suppose, sir?" He spoke with the awe and respect of youth for age and experience, as though Markham might be a hundred years old at the least.
Coventry listened, amused, and kept his eyes closed. He knew that if Markham chose, he could tell some odd stories. He lay quiet and listened.
"Well, yes, I suppose I have," Markham said musingly; and Coventry heard him knocking hispipe on his chair before he refilled it. The words and the sound were hopeful. Coventry lay quiet and listened.
"Is there any truth in the tales about children being carried away, and brought up by wolves in the jungle?"
"Undoubtedly. I once saw one myself; in fact, I'm sorry to say I shot the poor creature."
The boy gasped. Markham went on:
"We were out at the foot of the hills after bear, and coming back to camp one evening something jumped out of the long grass and I fired. You see, I don't often miss, and the thing was dead when we picked it up. It wasn't a monkey, as we thought at first; it was a wild man, covered with hair, and evidently it had always gone on its hands and knees."
"And what did you do?" came the breathless question.
"Buried it," said Markham briefly, "and said nothing about it."
"Oh, do go on!" urged the boy, enthralled.
Markham laughed. "Let me think," he said indulgently. "Well, last year I went up towards the head of the Ganges to shoot crocodile with a fellow who thought he was going to make money over the skins--selling them for bags and cases,and so on--and one morning a villager came to the camp and asked us to shoot the 'mugger' that had swallowed his wife the day before. He was a washerman, and he said he and the woman had just taken the clothes down to the edge of the river, and had begun to wash them, when a crocodile the size of a boat, as he described it, suddenly rose from the water and dragged his wife under. He declared the beast swallowed her whole then and there, and he seemed awfully put out because she was wearing the whole of her jewellery into which they had put all their savings--as the peasant people are in the habit of doing out here. He added that we should know her by that, and by her long hair. She had the longest hair, he informed us with pride, of any woman in the village. He didn't seem to understand that we might shoot dozens of crocodiles and never come across the one that had swallowed his wife; he kept saying we couldn't mistake it because it was the biggest crocodile that had ever been seen or heard of, and he went away perfectly confident that he would get the jewellery back. Oddly enough next day we did see a monster, and managed to bag him, and when we cut him open there was the wretched woman in his inside--jewellery, and long hair, and all! The whole village turned out and salaamed to us as if we hadbeen gods, and they became such a nuisance we had to move on."
"Hullo, Markham! Yarning?" Another member of the shoot came out of his tent fresh from a snooze, and flung himself into an empty chair. "What is it? Ghosts, or tigers, or murders, or witchcraft?"
"It's your turn now," said Markham good-temperedly; "tell him the most hair-raising tale you can think of, and give me a rest. As a policeman you ought to know plenty."
"Plenty," replied the policeman, and yawned. "But I can't remember any just now. It's too hot, and I'm too sleepy."
"But you must come across suchinterestingthings in the bazaars!" said the boy, in a pleading voice. His ambition had been to write, to become an author, to follow in the footsteps of Stevenson, Kipling, and other great masters of romance; but his people, being practical, had scolded and pushed him into the Indian Public Works, and he had no time to use his pen for anything but estimates, reports, and office work, which bored his imaginative soul.
"I did come across an odd little echo of the past only the other day," the policeman admitted with an effort. "I had breakfast one morning with some missionaries in an out-of-the-way corner ofmy district, and I noticed an old Englishwoman wandering about the compound with an ayah in attendance. She was dressed in grey, with a poke bonnet and full skirts, like the pictures in oldPunches. They told me she had been found at the time of the Mutiny as a young girl of about fifteen hiding in the jungle wearing native clothes. Nobody knew who she was, and the poor thing couldn't tell them because she was out of her mind, and she had never recovered her reason. She had been handed on to these people by the missionaries they succeeded, and by others before them--and there she had been living for over fifty years, perfectly harmless, costing very little, and only insisting on being dressed in grey and in the fashion of the Mutiny time. If they tried to put her into anything else she only cried and protested pitifully, so they just went on copying the garments, and called her 'Miss Grey.' They can only suppose that her people were killed in the outbreak, and that some faithful servant disguised her and hid her in the jungle, and that then she got lost and went out of her mind with terror."
"And no one will ever know who she was, or what really happened," said the boy, drawing a long breath. "Unless, perhaps, when she is dying it may all come back to her?""It's to be hoped it won't," said the policeman, who was not a romanticist.
"It was lucky for 'Miss Grey' that she was found by friends," put in Markham. "By the way, do you remember that case a few years ago----"
Somnolence stole over Coventry's brain once more; the voices droned on and grew fainter, floating away into space; his head drooped again, and he found himself back in the station, not at all disconcerted because, with the curious inconsequence of dreams, his bungalow and the racquet court had in some marvellous manner been merged into one. He was playing an excellent game, though the furniture got in the way and Trixie kept trying to stop him. She was saying: "George, do come away--think of the woman in the bazaar"; and a crowd of men standing by shouted in chorus: "Yes, remember, old chap, the woman in the bazaar." Then he fell over a chair in the act of making a wonderful stroke, and as, with a jerk, he awoke, he heard Markham repeating--"woman in the bazaar."
"What on earth are you gassing about?" he said crossly. His head ached, and he felt hot and sticky, in spite of his recent tub.
"The case of that woman whose husband did something he shouldn't connected with money, andgot put into prison, and she drifted into one of the big bazaars----"
"What, an Englishwoman?"
"Yes, worse luck. It was some years ago--while you were at home, I suppose; but there was a tremendous fuss made about it at the time, and I believe the Government tried to interfere and to pay her way home, but didn't succeed----"
"That sort of thing isn't so uncommon as you'd think," observed the policeman significantly. "Our service comes up against queer things in that direction."
"Oh, do for Heaven's sake shut up!" exclaimed Coventry, with the captiousness of the newly awakened. "We've had quite enough horrors to last us for one day, at least, what with that business in the village this morning, and now all your infernal reminiscences."
The cause of his dream became clear to him now. While he dozed the conversation around him had recalled to his subconscious mind the unsavoury rumour he had heard in the racquet court one evening--the evening on which, subsequently, he had felt so annoyed with his wife and with young Greaves for staying out late.
"We thought you were asleep," said Markham in a tone of provoking apology."So I was, and you woke me up with your jabber."
"It's time you were awake," Markham said, rising. "We ought to be off pretty soon to the machans."
With the courage and skill of his tribe, the shikari had tracked the tiger, and discovered the spot where the mangled remains of the woman lay hidden beneath the bush. This was not far from the village, and during the day the tracker had fashionedmachans, or rough seats, in the trees for the sahibs, and had tied up a buffalo calf near by as additional bait. In an hour or two the tiger might be on the prowl and return to his hideous meal, though a man-eater's movements are always uncertain--one day, or one night, he may pounce on his prey, and be heard of again next morning five or six miles away; unlike his kindred of more conventional habits, who will kill about every three days, and return as a rule to the carcase two or three times.
It was a long and wearisome wait, sitting cramped and motionless in the trees. Tigers will seldom look up, but the very least noise--a whisper, a movement, a creak of a seat, or the crack of a twig--is sufficient to warn them, and, once suspicious, nothing will tempt them to come within range; they will slink off in silence and slayelsewhere. Coventry and the boy were perched on one platform, their backs against the trunk; lots had been drawn for the seats, and they had been lucky. Their place was just over the bait that was living, and they could see a twisted brown object protruding from under the bush where the tiger had hidden his victim--an arm of the corpse, as the blue glass bangles that still encircled the poor little wrist betokened.
The sun began to go down, flooding the scene with a rose-coloured radiance, and the moon was not due to rise until late. The air was close and the jungle intensely still, save for the humming of countless insects, and sometimes the cry of a peacock, piercing and harsh, in the distance. As the light softened and faded a rustling in the grass told of porcupines that had come out to feed; they seemed, as the boy said afterwards, to be running about like rabbits. Suddenly a shabby little jackal emerged from the undergrowth, noiselessly, with caution; for a moment he stood still and snuffed the air, then he whisked his brush and gave a wild, unearthly yell, repeating it at intervals, and danced and capered in such fantastic fashion that the boy shook with suppressed amusement.
But Coventry stiffened his muscles. He remembered the native belief that some jackals are "pheaows," or providers, by trade, and are supposedto precede the tiger and utter weird cries either to warn him of danger or to announce some find of food. Whether such a belief was based on truth, or whether such conduct was merely the outcome of fear, he knew that the "pheaow's" arrival, with yells and with antics, usually proclaimed the approach of a tiger, and that in all probability it did so now. With a final contortion and a last demoniacal cry the creature fled into covert, and silence again descended, broken only by queer little scuffling noises below and the twittering of owls in the trees. Then a troop of brown monkeys came crashing and chattering through the trees, throwing themselves from branch to branch in a state of the wildest excitement; and the buffalo calf, that had so far lain content on the ground, got up and showed symptoms of fear.
Coventry felt certain that the tiger was about, but except for the angry scoldings of the monkeys, and the nervous lowing of the calf, there was nothing to denote the close vicinity of any beast of prey. Time stole on and darkness fell. If the tiger chose to come between the setting of the sun and the rising of the moon there would be little hope of bagging him. The sportsmen had agreed that if he should delay they would wait until the moonlight gave a better chance, or even till the dawn.Nothing happened, though an intangible vibration in the air kept the human senses tightly strung through the interval of darkness that ensued. Now and then points of light moved over the ground like glow-worms--the eyes of small animals seeking their food.
Then the moon came up, full and serene, the colour of a ripe blood-orange, and threw her molten light upon the scene, till every blade and stick and leaf stood out, sharp and clear, against their own black shadows. The moments seemed interminable, every sound was magnified a hundredfold by the mysterious quiet--the soft fluttering of bats, the breathing of the buffalo calf, the furtive rustles in the grass. Coventry was stiff and tired, he felt half hypnotised; the light was so unnatural, a sort of weird enchantment held the jungle; if a band of sprites and goblins had appeared and danced wildly in a circle he would not have been surprised. He was near the borderland of dreams, and he tried to keep himself awake by thinking of the tiger, of Trixie, of his journey back to the station; but to his annoyance one sentence swung backwards and forwards, like a pendulum, through his brain to the exclusion of everything else: "The woman in the bazaar. The woman in the bazaar." He longed at last to cry it aloud, that he might free his mind from its spell. Why should thesewords have laid hold of his mind with such provoking persistence? He began to wonder if he had fever, if he had been "touched up" by the sun this morning; certainly his bones were aching and his head felt queer, but that might be due to the wearisome wait and the cramped position. He attempted to find his pulse, but he could not determine whether the beats were too fast, or too slow, or only just normal; and still the sentence clanged to and fro in his brain, "The woman in the bazaar. The woman in the bazaar."
Then above it his ears caught a tangible sound, though at first so stealthy, so faint, as to be almost inaudible. Again it came, this time a little more certain, a careful stir in the grass, a movement so soft and so wary, so light, that it might have been made by a snake. Afterwards silence, a silence charged with supreme suspense and excitement for the watchers alert in the trees; they hardly dared breathe. The buffalo calf strained at its tether, but uttered no sound, the poor little creature was dumb with fear.
Five minutes later something came out of the grass--a long, lithe form that looked grey in the moonlight, that wriggled along the ground with head held low and shoulders humped high; truly a very big tiger, though doubtless the rays of the moon enlarged its appearance unduly. Coventrywas reminded of a cat stalking a bird as the beast made a noiseless run towards the buffalo calf and then paused, the muscles rippling under the skin from the large flat head, with ears laid back, to the tip of the tail, that quivered and jerked.
By the laws of sport it was Coventry's shot, for the tiger was nearest to his machan. He caught an agonised whisper of "Shoot, for God's sake!" from the boy, and he raised his rifle.
The weapon felt strangely top-heavy, it swayed in his hands, a mist seemed to rise between him and the sight, and as the report rang out he knew he had missed--missed badly. Almost at once there came other reports from the trees in sharp succession, and a roar of such fury and pain as shook the air, echoing far and near through the forest.
The man-eater's death was terrific. Over and over he rolled, gasping, roaring, biting the earth in his struggles, till with a hoarse, gurgling sigh he lay still, and his crimes were ended.
IN THE BAZAAR
Aswas to be expected the camp took a rest next morning. When Coventry left his tent the hot wind had lulled, and the shadows of the trees had stretched half-way across the tract of bare ground that led to the edge of the jungle. He looked a wreck, for the touch of malaria that had ruffled his temper the previous evening, and ruined his chance of killing the tiger, had since developed into a sharp though short attack with the usual ague, and a temperature that would terrify those unacquainted with the common complaint of the country. It is surprising how quickly malarial fever in India can lay a man low, and yet leave him strength sufficient to rise, once it is over, and pursue his general doings as though nothing unusual had happened. Many even continue to work with fever actually on them. All the way home from the forest Coventry had shivered and grumbled and scolded the rest of the party because he had missed the tiger, and now, though the fever had left him, he felt languid andlimp, and peevish, and was hardly the best of companions. On the outskirts of the camp the man-eater's skin was being pegged out to dry surrounded by a chattering concourse. Half the village had been in the camp since daybreak, squatting around the carcase, helping to rub the raw skin with ashes, lauding the sahibs who had slain the destroyer, rejoicing over the death of the enemy. Now they could travel in safety, at least for the present, could tend their crops, and take out their cattle to graze. Their gratitude did not deter them, however, from furtive attempts to annex the whiskers and claws, and lumps of the fat said to be a miraculous cure for rheumatism. There was to be a "tomasha" to-night in the village to celebrate the event, with music and feasting and fireworks, for which, with the usual fate of the benefactor, the sahibs were expected to pay.
Coventry sat dreamily watching the group. The shikari was directing his assistants, abusing them in the loud arbitrary voice that the native so often assumes towards those whom he considers to be his inferiors, holding forth at the same time on the subject of tigers in general. Most of the servants were idling round, joining in the jokes and altercations; and big, blue-black crows skipped boldly into the midst of the gathering, snatching at morsels of flesh and cawing in hoarseexcitement. Near at hand some vultures, bald and repulsive, had collected, gloating in expectation of a feast; overhead, in the hard blue sky, kites were soaring, and diving and screaming. In the background the elephants, chained to their posts, showed massive and dark, swinging their heads, beating off the flies with branches of trees or wisps of their fodder held in their trunks.
It was a picturesque scene alluring to a sportsman, yet Coventry was conscious of a sudden satiety of sport and all its appurtenances. He had enjoyed the shoot, had been thoroughly keen throughout, but whether the fever was to blame, or his annoyance at missing the tiger, or the nostalgia for wife and home that had been on the increase the last few days, he now felt he wished never to hear of a tiger or find himself in a machan or a howdah again. He looked at his watch--it had struck him that if he could start to-night he might catch the mail train before the one by which he had meant to travel. Trixie would be so surprised and delighted to see him arrive before he was due; she must have had a dull, empty time, poor child, during his absence. He inferred as much from her letters, though she never complained; Trixie was not one to grumble or whine. He reproached himself for having left her alone, and determined to try and make up to her for his selfishness;should he buy her some nice piece of jewellery when he got back? A new ring. Trixie liked rings, and they looked so well on her pretty pink fingers. Later on he would take her away to the hills and let her enjoy herself just as she liked. Then jealousy stirred in his heart, and whispered: "Of course, within reason." He tried to stifle the whisper, but could not succeed; after all, if Trixie kept well she ought to be happy enough in the plains with him, and her pets, and the riding and tennis.
Markham came out of his tent. "Better, old chap?"
"Yes, better, fairly all right again, thanks. I think I'll go off, though, to-night, all the same. I don't feel quite up to another day's beat with a journey to follow. If I hurry a bit I could catch the mail in the morning."
"You might, but it'll be rather a rush, and you'll get no sleep."
"I can sleep in the train to-morrow."
The desire to start had now become almost an obsession, and he held out obstinately against Markham's well-meant persuasions that he should wait, as previously planned, to benefit by the arrangements already concluded for the convenient return of the party to the nearest junction on the railway. Finally it was settled that he shouldjourney on one of the elephants to a point of habitation where some sort of vehicle could be procured to take him to meet the earlier mail.
Therefore it came about that George Coventry, with his bearer and his baggage, rattled up to his bungalow in a dilapidated "ticca-gharry," hired at the railway station, twelve hours sooner than he was expected. From the moment of his catching, as by a miracle, the earlier mail train, he had been thrilled with sweet impatience, anticipating Trixie's welcome, all her glad surprise, their interchange of little news, the pleasant disturbance of his premature home-coming. Her last letter, which was safe in his breast pocket, together with all the others she had written to him during his absence, had told him how she longed for his return, had declared that the final twenty-four hours would seem longer, more tedious than all the rest. To shorten the time of separation he had jolted and bumped over miles of rough country, enduring horrible discomfort, that he might arrive to-night instead of to-morrow, even if he roused her and the establishment at an inconvenient hour.
Needless to say, his much-needed sleep in the train had been broken and restless. Fever still lurked in his system, and whenever he dozed the beat of the wheels had formed itself into a clockwork song with relentless persistence: "Thewoman in the bazaar. The woman in the bazaar." He could not get rid of it, could not divert its maddening rhythm. Even now as he got out of the gharry it followed him up the steps and clamoured inside his brain.
The bungalow was silent, dimly lit. A servant lay rolled up in a cotton sheet, like a corpse, across the threshold of the drawing-room door, which was open. Why was the door open? Why were the venetian outer doors not closed and bolted?
The gharry, with his baggage on the roof, the sleepy driver and the miserable ponies, waited at the foot of the veranda steps while the sahib awoke the slumbering servant both with voice and foot.
The man sprang up with the terrified bewilderment of the suddenly awakened native. "Thieves! Murder! Thieves!" he yelled, until he recognised his master, when he bound his turban hastily about his dishevelled head and salaamed in respectful apology. The gharry man was paid, the luggage was deposited in the veranda, and the ramshackle conveyance rattled out of the compound. It all caused a noisy disturbance, and yet Trixie had not been aroused. No questioning call came from her bedroom to know what it all meant. In puzzled apprehension Coventry passed through the drawing-room, where a couple of wall lamps still burned low. Also the light in her bedroom hadnot been put out. He pushed aside the short curtain and looked into the room. She was not there. The bed was empty, undisturbed.
He returned to the drawing-room and called the bearer. "Where has the memsahib gone to dine?" he asked, realising at the same moment that it was long past the hour for dinner parties to break up.
The man told him blandly that he "believed the memsahib had gone to dine with Captain Roy-memsahib," then added, standing on one foot and rubbing a great toe against the other ankle, that he thought the syce had brought the "tum-tum" back some time ago.
"Call the syce!" said Coventry shortly; and the bearer obeyed, obviously relieved that he was to be questioned no further, since the sahib seemed annoyed.
The syce, a dull but well-intentioned person, could only say that the memsahib had told him to take the cart and the pony home from Roy-mem's bungalow. He did not know why. He also stood on one foot, vaguely apprehensive of the Colonel-sahib's displeasure.
"It was the memsahib's order," he added in hopeful self-exoneration.
"Very well," said Coventry; "go and get the tum-tum ready."
He stood and smoked in the veranda until thetrap came round. His mind was in chaos; he could not think connectedly. What was Trixie doing? Had she been taken ill at Mrs. Roy's bungalow? Or had Mrs. Roy been taken ill, and was Trixie staying with her for the night? Either reason, lots of reasons, would explain her absence. Yet beneath the plausible explaining there lurked a dreadful doubt that clutched malevolently at his heart.
He got into his trap and swung rapidly out of the compound. In the light of the moon the dust-white road had a luminous appearance. Coventry remembered that the shortest route to the Roys' bungalow was by the bazaar; he judged that at this time of the night the streets would be clear. He would save a mile at least if he drove through the city.
He came to the outskirts of the great northern native town, a huddle of thatched huts, their thresholds blocked with sleeping forms. Pariah dogs fought and foraged among the rubbish festering in the gutters; their snarls mingled with raucous native coughing, the wail of fretful infants, long echoing yawns.
Then brick walls rose up, dark and irregular, topped with flat roofs, whence rose faint sounds of music and the murmur of voices. Now he had entered one of the main streets of the citythat yet was hardly wider than a lane; here and there the road space was rendered still narrower by rough string bedsteads set outside the shops and dwellings, figures, scantily clothed, sprawling upon them. Bats flickered from the roofs across the strip of moonlit sky that was like a lid to the street. The air was stifling; indescribable exhalations, odours of kerosene oil, rancid butter, garlic, sandal-wood, spices, sweating Eastern humanity, thickened and soured the atmosphere, nauseating the white man who drove steadily on through the densely packed clusters of buildings. His head ached, his veins felt as though they must burst in his temples; it seemed to him that he had been driving for hours through this fetid wilderness of bricks, as if he should never emerge into air that was pure and untainted.
The beat of his pony's hoofs echoed loud and regular from wall to wall; otherwise there was a heavy silence as he drove through the silversmiths' quarter, and went past the side street where shoes and sandals were made and sold, a fact proclaimed by a horrible stench of badly cured hide. Suddenly he came upon a patch of light and noise. Some important domestic event was in course of celebration, perhaps a wedding, or the birth of a much-desired son. Rows of little lamps illumined one of the houses, just wicks alight floating in pansof coco-nut oil, diffusing smoke and smell; a gaudy group of nautch girls singing, twirling, blocked the doorway, and a crowd of musicians and guests and sightseers pushed and jostled each other for some distance down the street. Somehow he got through the flare, and confusion, and clamour, into the dimness beyond, only to find his way barred by a procession of camels padding towards him in shadowy, leisurely progress, groaning and grumbling, escorted by tall men clad in flowing garments and loose turbans, men with snaky black locks, hooked noses and fierce eyes; a camel caravan arriving from the north, laden with merchandise, weary and dusty with arduous travel.
Coventry was forced to halt. It would be impossible in this narrow thoroughfare to get past the long line of beasts burdened with huge bales that swung broadside from their backs. The syce stood up behind him to proffer advice.
That street, he said--the one to the left--would take them into another main road and thence out of the city just as quickly as if they waited for the camel folk to pass.
"It is the street," added the syce casually, "of the dancing women and such-like."
The leading camel, a towering, loose-lipped shape, lurched and lumbered almost on to the trap. Coventry, to avoid the bubbling beast, turned hispony's head, and next moment he was driving down the side street, down "the street of the dancing women and such-like."