Soldiers three, The story of the Gadsbys, In black and white

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SOLDIERS THREE

THE STORY OF THE GADSBYS

IN BLACK Aro WHITE

BT

RUDYARD KIPLING

anthok of " plain taieb from the hills,"
"life's handicap," etc., etc.

JSTEW EDITION, REVISED
WITE ADDITIONS

TStia gorft
MACMILLAN AND CO.

AND LONDON
1895

e

All rights reserved

COPTBIOHT, 1895,

Bt MACaOLLAN AND CO.

N'acinooti jPcetss :

J. S. Gushing & Co. — Berwick & Smith

Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

CONTENTS

PAGZ

The God fbom the Machine 1

Of Those Called , .13

Private Leabotd's Stoet 17

The Big Dktjnk Deaf' 28

The Wbeck of the Visigoth .40

The Solid Muldoon 45

With the Main Guabd 57

In the Mattee of a Pbivaxe 76

Black Jack 88

I' I

, Poor Deak Mamma Ill

The World without 124

, The Tents of Kjedak 136

With Ant Amazement 149

/ The Garden of Eden 161

Fatima 173

The Valley of the Shadow 188

The Swelling of Jordan 200

Drat Wara Yow Dee . 213.

-The Jddgment of Dungaba 226

At Howli Thana . 238

Gemini 245

At Twentt-Two 257

In Flood Time 271

The Sending op Dana Da 283

On the Citt Wall 296

V

THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE

Hit a man an' help a woman, an' ye can't be far wrong anyways.
— Maxims of Private Mulvaney.

The Inexpressibles gave a ball. They borrowed a
seven-pounder from the Gunners, and wreathed it with
laurels, and made the dancing-floor plate-glass, and
provided a supper, the like of which had never been
eaten before, and set two sentries at the door of the
room to hold the trays of programme-cards. My friend.
Private Mulvaney, was one of the sentries, because he
was the tallest man in the regiment. When the dance
was fairly started the sentries were released, and Pri-
vate Mulvanej'- went to curry favour with the Mess
Sergeant in charge of the supper. Whether the Mess
Sergeant gave or Mulvaney took, I cannot say. All
that I am certain of is that, at supper-time, I found
Mulvaney with Private Ortheris, two-thirds of a ham,
a loafr of ^bread, half a pdte-de-foie-gras, and two mag-
nums of champagne, sitting on the roof of my carriage.
As I came up I heard him saying —

'Praise be a danst doesn't come as often as Ord'ly-
room, or, by this an' that, Orth'ris, me son, I wud be
the dishgrace av the rig'mint »instid av the brightest
jool in uts crown. '

"Hand the Colonel's pet noosance,' said Ortheris.
'But wot makes you curse your rations? This 'ere
fizzy stuff's good enough. '

2 THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE

'Stuff, ye oncivilised pagin! 'Tis champagne we're
dhrinkin' now. 'Tisn't that I am set ag'in. 'Tis this
quare stuff wid the little bits av black leather in it. I
misdoubt I will be distressin'ly sick wid it in the
mornin'. Fwhatisut?'

'Goose liver,' I said, climbing on the top of the car-
riage, for I knew that it was better to sit out with
Mulvaney than to dance many dances.

'Goose liver is ut?' said Mulvaney. 'Faith, I'm
thinkin' thim that makes it wud do betther to cut up
the Colonel. He carries a power av liver undher his
right arrum whin the days are warm an' the nights chill.
He wud give thim tons an' tons av liver. 'Tis he sez
so. "I'm all liver to-day," sez he; an' wid that he
ordhers me ten days C.B. for as moild a dhrink as iver
a good sodger tuk betune his teeth. '

'That was when 'e wanted for to wash 'isself in the
Fort Ditch,' Ortheris explained. 'Said there was too
much beer in the Barrack water-butts for a God-fearing
man. You was lucky in gettin' orfwith wot you did,
Mulvaney. '

'Say you so? Now I'm pershuaded I was cruel hard
trated, seein' fwhat I've done for the likes av him in
the days whin my eyes were wider opin than they are
now. Man alive, for the Colonel to whip me on the peg
in that way! Me that have saved the repitation av a
ten times better man than him! 'Twas ne-farious —
an' that manes a power av evil! '

'Never mind the nefariousness, ' I said. 'Whose
reputation did you save ? '

'More's the pity, 'twasn't my own, but I tuk more
trouble wid ut than av ut was. 'Twas just my way,
messin' wid fwhat was no business av mine. Hear

THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE 3

now!' He settled himself at ease on the top of the
carriage. 'I'll tell you all about ut. Avcoorse I will
name no names, for there's wan that's an orf'cer's lady
now, that was in ut, and no more will I name places,
for a man is thracked by a place.'

'Eyah! ' said Ortheris lazily, 'but this is a mixed
story wot's comin'.'

'Wanst upon a time, as the childer-books say, I was
a recruity. '

'Was you though? ' said Ortheris; 'now that's extry-
ordinary ! '

'Orth'ris,' said Mulvaney, 'av you opin thim lips av
yours again, I will, savin' your presince, Sorr, take you
by the slack av your trousers an' heave you.'

'I'm mum,' said Ortheris. 'Wot 'appened when you
was a recruity?'

'I was a betther recruity than you iver was or will be,
but that's neither here nor there. Thin I became a man,
an' the divil of a man I was fifteen years ago. Thej'
called me Buck Mulvaney in thim days, an', begad,
I tuk a woman's eye. I did that! Ortheris, ye scrub,
fwhat are ye sniggerin' at? Do you misdoubt me? '

'Devil a doubt! ' said Ortheris; 'but I've 'eard sum-
mat like that before ! '

Mulvaney dismissed the impertinence with a lofty
wave of his hand and continued —

'An' the orf'cers av the rig'mint I was in in thim
days was orf'cers — gran' men, wid a manner on 'em,
an' a way wid 'em such as is not made these days — all
but wan — wan. o' the capt'ns. A bad dhrill, a wake
voice, an' a limp leg — thim three things are the signs
av a bad man. You bear that in your mind, Orth'ris,
me son.

4 THE GOD FROM THE MACHmE

'An' the Colonel av the rig'mint had a daughter —
wan av thim lamblike, bleatin', pick-me-up-an'-carry-
me-or-I'U-die gurls such as was made for the natural
prey av men like the Capt'n, who was iverlastin' payin'
coort to her, though the Colonel he said time an'' over,
" Kape out av the brute's way, my dear." But he niver
had the heart for to send her away from the throuble,
bein' as he was a widower, an' she their wan child.'

'Stop a minute, Mulvaney,' said I; 'how in the world
did you come to know these things ? '

'How did I come ? ' said Mulvaney, with a scornful
grunt; 'bekase I'm turned durin' the Quane's pleasure
to a lump av wood, lookin' out straight fominst me,
wid a — a — candelabbrum in my hand, for you to pick
your cards out av, must I not see nor feel? Av coorse
I du! Up my back, an' in my boots, an' in the short
hair av the neck — that's where I kape my eyes whin .
I'm on duty an' the reg'lar wans are fixed. Know!
Take my word for it, Sorr, ivrything an' a great dale
more is known in a rig'mint j or fwhat wud be the use
av a Mess Sargint, or a Sargint's wife doin' wet-nurse
to the Major's baby? To reshume. He was a bad
dhrill was this Capt'n — a rotten bad dhrill — an' whin
first I jan me eye over him, I sez to myself: " My Militia
bantam ! " I sez, " My cock av a Gosport dunghill " —
'twas from Portsmouth he came to us — "there's combs
to be cut," sez I, "an' by the grace av God, 'tis Terence
Mulvaney will cut thim."

'So he wint menowderin', and minanderin', an' blan-
dandhering roun' an' about the Colonel's daughter, an'
she, poor innocint, lookin' at him like a Comm'ssariat
bullock looks at the Comp'ny cook. He'd a dhirty little
scrub av a black moustache, an' he twisted an' turned

THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE 6

ivry wurrd he used as av he found ut too sweet for to
spit out. Eyah! He was a tricky man an' a liar by
natur'. Some are bom so. He was wan. I knew he
was over his belt in money borrowed from natives;
besides a lot av other matthers which, in regard for your
presince, Sorr, I will oblitherate. A little av fwhat I
knew, the Colonel knew, for he wud have none av him,
an' that, I'm thinkin', by fwhat happened aftherwards,
the Capt'in knew.

'Wan day, bein' mortial idle, or they wud never ha'
thried ut, the rig'mint gave amsure theatricals — orf 'cers
an' orf'cers' ladies. You've seen the likes time an'
agin, Sorr, an' poor fun 'tis for them that sit in the back
row an' stamp wid their boots for the honour av the
rig'mint. I was told off for to shif ' the scenes, haulin'
up this an' draggin' down that. Light work ut was,
wid lashins av beer and the gurl that dhressed the
orf'cers' ladies — but she died in Aggra twelve years
gone, an' my tongue's gettin' the betther avme. They
was actin' a play thing called Sweethearts, which you
may ha' heard av, an' the Colonel's daughter she was a
lady's maid. The Capt'n was a boy called Broom —
Spread Broom was his name in the play. Thin I saw
— ut come out in the actin' — fwhat I niver saw before,
an' that was that he was no gentleman. They was too
much together, thim two, a-whishperin'behind the scenes
I shifted, an' some av what they said I heard; for I was
death — l^\\e death an' ivy — on the comb-cuttin'. He
was iverlastin'ly oppressing her to fall in wid some
sneakin' schame av his, an' she was thryin' to stand out
against him, but not as though she was set in her will.
I wonder now in thim days that my ears did not grow a
yard on me head wid list'nin'. But I looked straight

6 THE GOD PROM THE MACHINE

forninst me an' hauled up this an' dragged down that,
such as was my duty, an' the orf'cers' ladies sez one to
another, thinkin' I was out ay listen-reach: "Fwhatan
obligin' young man is this Corp'ril Mulvaney ! " I was
a Corp'ril then. I was rejuced aftherwards, but, no
matther, I was a Corp'ril wanst.

'Well, this Sweethearts^ business wint on like most
amshure theatricals, an' barrin' fwhat I suspicioned,
'twasn't till the dhxess-rehearsal that I saw for
certain that thim two — he the blackguard, an' she
no wiser than she should ha' been — had put up an
evasion. '

'A what?' said I.

'E-vasion! Fwhat you call an elopemint. E-vasion
I calls it, bekaze, exceptin' whin 'tis right an' natural
an' proper, 'tis wrong an' dhirty to steal a man's wan
child she not knowin' her own mind. There was a
Sargint in the Comm'ssariat who set my face upon
e-vasions. I'll tell you about that '

'Stick to the bloomin' Captains, Mulvaney,' said
Ortheris; 'Comm'ssariat Sargints is low.'

Mulvaney accepted the amendment and went on : —

'Now I knew that the Colonel was no fool, any more
than me, for I was hild the smartest man in the rig'mint,
an' the Colonel was the best orf'cer commaridin'' in
Asia; so fwhat he said an' /said was a mortial truth.
"We knew that the Capt'n was bad, but, for reasons which
I have already oblitherated, I knew more than me Colo-
nel. I wud ha' rolled out his face wid the butt av my
gun before permittin' av him to steal the gurl. Saints
knew av he wud ha' married her, and av he didn't she
wud be in great tormint, an' the divil av a "scandal."
But I niver sthruck, niver raised me hand on my shu-

THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE 7

perior orf' cer; an' that was a merricle now I come to
considher it. '

'Mulvaney, the dawn's risin',' said Ortlieris, 'an'
we're no nearer 'ome than we was at the beginnin'.
Lend me your pouch. Mine's all dust.'

Mulvaney pitched his pouch over, and filled his pipe
afresh.

'So the dhress-rehearsal came to an end, an', bekaze
I was curious, I stayed behind whin the scene-shiftin'
was ended, an' I shud ha' been in barricks, lyin' as flat
as a toad under a painted cottage thing. They was
talkin' in whispers, an' she was shiverin' an' gaspin'
like a fresh-hukked fish. " Are you sure you've got the
hang av the manewvers ?" sez he, or wurrds to that effec',
as the coort-martial sez. " Sure as death," sez she, " but
I misdoubt 'tis cruel hard on my father. " " Damn your
father," sez he, or anyt^frays 'twas fwhat he thought,
" the arrangement is as clear as mud. Jungi will drive
the carri'ge afther all's over, an' you come to the station,
cool an' aisy, in time for the two o'clock thrain, where
I'll be wid your kit." "Faith," thinks I to myself,
" thin there's a ayah in the business tu ! "

'A powerful bad thing is a ayah. Don't you niver
have any thruck wid wan. Thin he began sootherin'
her, an' all the orf'cers an' orf'cers' ladies left, an' they
put out the lights. To explain the theory av the flight,
as they say at . Muskthry, you must understand that
afther this Sweethearts^ nonsinse was ended, there was
another little bit av a play called Couples — some kind
av couple or anpther. The gurl was actin' in this, but
not the man. I suspicioned he'd go to the station wid
the gurl's kit at the end av the first piece. 'Twas the
kit that flusthered me, for I knew for a Capt'n to go

8 THE GOD FROM THE MACHINB

trapesing about the impire wid the Lord knew what av
a truso on his arrum was nefarious, an' wud be worse
than easin' the flag, so far as the talk aftherwards wint.'

"Old on, Mulvaney. Wot's truso? ' said Ortheris.

'You're an oncivilised man, me son. Whin a gurl's
married, all her kit an' 'coutrements are truso, which
manes weddin'-portion. An' 'tis the same whin she's
runnin' away, even wid the biggest blackguard on the
Arrmy List.

'So I made my plan av campaign. The Colonel's
house was a good two miles away. "Dennis," sez I to
my colour-sargint, " av you love me lend me your kyart,
for me heart is bruk an' me feet is sore wid trampin' to
and from this foolishness at the Gaff." An' Dennis
lent ut, wid a rampin', stampin' red stallion in the
shafts. Whin they was all settled down to their
Sweethearts for the first scerte, which was a long wan,
I slips outside and into the kyart. Mother av Hivin!
but I made that horse walk, an' we came into the
Colonel's compound as the divil wint through Atblone
— in standin' leps. There was no one there excipt the
servints, an' I wint round to the back an' found the
girl's ayah.

' " Ye black brazen Jezebel, " sez I, " sellin' your mas-
ther's honour for five rupees — pack up all the Miss
Sahib's kit an' look slippy! Oapfn Sahib's order," sez
I. " Going to the station we are," I sez, an' wid that I
laid my finger to my nose an' looked the schamin' sin-
ner I was.

^"Bote acohy" says she; so I knew she was in the
business, an' I piled up all the sweet talk I'd iver
learnt in the bazars on to this she-bullock, an' pra5'ed
av her to put all the quick she knew into the thing.

THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE 9

While she packed, I stud outside an' sweated, for I was
wanted for to shif the second scene. I tell you, a
young gurl's e-vasion manes as much baggage as a rig'-
mint on the line av march! "Saints help Dennis's
springs," thinks I, as I bundled the stuff into the thrap^
"for I'll have no mercy! "

'"I'm comin' too," says the ayah.

'"No, you don't," sez I, "later — pechy ! You laito
where you are. I'll pechy come an' bring you sart,
along with me, you maraudin' " — niver mind fwhat I
called her.

'Thin I wint for the Gaff, an' by the special ordher
av Providence, for I was doin' a good work you will
ondersthand, Dennis's springs hild toight. "Now,
whin the Capt'n goes for that kit," thinks I, "he'll be
throubled." At the end av Sweethearts off the Capt'n
runs in his kyart to the Colonel's house, an' I sits down
on the steps and laughs. Wanst an' again I slipped in
to see how the little piece was goin', an' whin ut was
near endin' I stepped out all among the carriages an'
sings out very softly, " Jungi ! " Wid that a carr'ge
began to move, an' I waved to the dhriver. " Ritherao ! "
sez I, an' he hitheraoed till I judged he was at proper
distance, an' thin I tuk him, fair an' square betune the
eyes, all I knew for good or bad, an' he dhropped wid a
guggle like the canteen beer-engine whin ut's runnin'
low. Thin I ran to the kyart an' tuk out all the kit an'
piled it into the carr'ge, the sweat runnin' down my
face in dhrops. " Go home," sez I, to the sais ; "you'll
find a man close here. Very sick he is. Take him
away, an' av you iver say wan wurrd about fwhat you've
dekkoed, I'll marrow you till your own wife won't sumjao
who you are! " Thin I heard the stampin' av feet at

10 THE GOD TEOM THE MACHINE

the ind av the play, an' I ran in to let down the cur-
tain. Whin they all came out the gurl thried to hide
herself behind wan av the pillars, an' sez " Jungi " in a
voice that wouldn't ha' scared a hare. I run over to
Jungi's earr'ge an' tuk up the lousy old horse-blanket
on the box, wrapped my head an' the rest av me in ut,
an' dhrove up to where she was.

'"Miss Sahib," sez I; "going to the. station? Cap-
tain Sahib's order! " an| widout a sign she jumped in
all among her own kit.

'I laid to an' dhruv like steam to the Colonel's house
before the Colonel was there, an' she screamed an' I
thought she was goin' off. Out comes the ayah, saying .
all sorts av things about the Capt'n havin' come for the
kit an' gone to the station. '

' " Take out the luggage, you divil," sez I, " or I'll
murther you ! "

'The lights av the thraps people comin' from the
Gaff was showin' across the parade ground, an', by this
an' that, the way thim two women worked at the bundles
an' thrunks was a caution ! I was dyin' to help, but,
seein' I didn't want to be known, I sat wid the blanket
roun' me an' coughed an' thanked the Saints there was
no moon that night.

' Whin all was in the house again, I niver asked for
bukshish but dhruv tremenjus in the opp'site way from
the other earr'ge an' put out my lights. Presintly, I
saw a naygur man wallowin' in the road. I slipped down
before I got to him, for I suspicioned Providence was
wid me all through that night. 'Twas Jungi, his nose
smashed in flat, all dumb sick as you please. Dennis's
man must have tilted him out av the thrap. Whin he
came to, " Hutt ! " sez I, but he began to howl.

THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE H

' " You black lump av dirt," I sez, " is this the way you
dhrive your gharri? That tikka has been owirC an'
fere-owifC all over the bloomin' country this whole
bloomin' night, an' you as mut^alla as Davey's sow.
Get up, you hog ! " sez I, louder, for I heard the wheels
av a thrap in the dark ; " get up an' light your lamps,
or you'll be run into ! " This was on the road to the
Railway Station.

' " Fwhat the divil's this ? " sez the Capt'n's voice in
the dhark, an' I could judge he was in a lather av rage.

'■ '■^ Q-harri dhriver here, dhrunk, Sorr," sez I; "I've
found his gharri sthrayin' about cantonmints, an' now
I've found him."

'" Oh ! " sez the Capt'n ; " fwhat's his name ? " I
stooped down an' pretended to listen.

' " He sez his name's Jungi, Sorr," sez I.

' " Hould my harse," sez the Capt'n to his man, an'
wid that he gets down wid the whip an' lays into Jungi,
just mad wid rage an' swearin' like the scutt he was.

' I thought, afther a while, he wud kill the man, so I
sez : — " Stop, Sorr, or you'll murdher him ! " That
dhrew all his fire on me, an' he cursed me into Blazes,
an' out again. I stud to attenshin an' saluted: —
"Sorr," sez I, "av ivry man in this wurruld had his
rights, I'm thinkin' that more than wan wud be beaten
to a jelly for tliis night's work — that niver came off at
all, Sorr, as you see?'" "Now," thinks I to myself,
"Terence Mulvaney, you've cut your own throat, for
he'll sthrike, an' you'll knock him down for the good av
his sowl an' your own iverlastin' dishgrace ! "

'"But the Capt'n never said a single wurrd. He
choked "where he stud, an' thin he went into his thrap
widout sayin' good-night, an' I wint back to barricks,'

12 THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE

' And then ? ' said Ortheris and I together.

' That was all,' said Mulvaney ; ' niver another word
did I hear av the whole thing. All I know was that
;there was no e-vasion, an' that was fwhat I wanted.
Now, I put ut to you, Sorr, is ten days' C.B. a fit an'
a proper tratement for a man who has behaved as me ? '

' Well, any'ow,' said Ortheris, ' tweren't this 'ere
Colonel's daughter, an' you was blazin' copped when
you tried to wash in the Fort Ditch.'

' That,' said Mulvaney, finishing the champagne, ' is a
shuparfluous an' impert'nint observation.'

OF THOSE CALLED!

We were wallowing through the China Seas in a
dense fog, the horn blowing every two minutes for the
benefit of the fishery craft that crowded the waterways.
From the bridge tlie fo'c'sle was invisible; from the
hand-wheel at the stern the captain's cabin. The fog
held possession of everything — the pearly white fog.
Once or twice when it tried to lift, we saw a glimpse of
the oily sea, the flitting vision of a junk's sail spread in
the vain "hope of catching the breeze, or the buoys of a
line of nets. Somewhere close to us lay the land, but
it might have been the Kurile Islands for aught we
knew. Very early in the morning there passed us, not
a cable's-length away, but as unseen as the spirits of
the dead, a steamer of the same line as ours. She
howled melodiously in answer to our bellowing, and
passed on.

' Suppose she had hit us,' said a man from Saigon.
' Then we should have gone down,' answered the chief
officer sweetly. ' 'Beastly thing to go down in a fog,'
said a young gentleman who was travelling for pleas-
ure. ' Chokes a man both ways, y' know.' We were
comfortably gathered in the smoking-room, the weather
being too cold to venture on the deck. Conversation
naturally turned upon accidents of fog, "the horn toot-
ing significantly in the pauses between the tales. I

» Copyright, 1895, by Maomillan & Co.
13

14 OF THOSE CALLED

heard of the wreck of the Eric, the cutting down of
the Strathnairn within half a mile of harbour, and the
carrying away of the bow plates of the Sigismund out-
side Sandy Hook.

' It is astonishing,' said the man from Saigon, 'how
many true stories are put down as sea yarns. It makes
a man almost shrink from telling an anecdote.'

' Oh, please don't shrink on our account,' said the
smoking-room with one voice.

' It's not my own story,' said the nian from Saigon.
' A fellow on a Massageries boat told it me. He had
been third ofl&cer of a sort on a Geordie tramp — one of
those lumbering, dish-bottomed coal-barges where the
machinery is tied up with a string and the plates are
rivetted with putty. The way he told his tale was
this. The tramp had been creeping along some sea or
other with a chart ten years old and the haziest sort of
chronometers when she got into a fog — just such a fog
as we have now.'

Here the smoking-room turned round as one man,
and looked through the windows.

'In the man's own words, "just when the fog was
thickest, the engines broke down. They had been doing
this for some weeks, and we were too weary to care. I
went forward of the bridge, and leaned over the side,
wondering where I should ever get something that I
could call a ship, and whether the old hulk would fall
to pieces as she lay. The fog was as thick as any
London one, but as white as steam. While they were
tinkering at the engines below, I heard a voice in the
fog about twenty yards from the ship's side, calling
out, ' Can you climb on board if we throw you a rope ? '
That startled me, because I fancied we were going to

OF THOSE CALLED 15

be run down the next minute by a ship engaged in res-
cuing a man overboard. I shouted for the engine-room
whistle; and it whistled about five minutes, but never
the sound of a ship could we hear. The ship's boy-
came forward with some biscuit for me. As he put it
into my hand, I heard the voice in the fog, crying out
about throwing us a rope. This time it was the boy
that yelled, ' Ship on us ! ' and off went the whistle
again, while the men in the engine-room — it generally
took the ship's crew to repair the Hespa^s engines —
tumbled upon deck to know what we were doing. I
told them about the hail, and we listened in the smother
of the fog for the sound of a screw. We listened for
ten minutes, then we blew the whistle for another ten.
Then the crew began to call the ship's boy a fool, mean-
ing that the third mate was no better. When thejr
were going down below, I heard the hail the third time,
so did the ship's boy. 'There you are,' I said, 'it is
not twenty yards from us.' The engineer sings out,
' I heard it too ! Are you all asleep ? ' Then the
crew began to swear at the engineer; and what with
discussion, argument, and a little swearing, — for there
is not much discipline on board a tramp, — we raised
such a row that our skipper came aft to enquire. I,
the engineer, and the ship's boy stuck to our tale.
'Voices or no voices,' said the captain, 'you'd better
patch the old engines up, and see if you've got enough
steam to whistle with. I've a notion that we've got
into rather too crowded ways.'

' " The engineer stayed on deck whUe the men went
down below. The skipper hadn't got back to the
chart-room before I saw thirty feet of bowsprit hang-
ing over the break of the fo'c'sle. Thirty feet of

16 OF THOSE CAI/LED

bowsprit, sir, doesn't belong to anything tbat sails the
seas except a sailing-ship or a man-of-war. I specu-
lated quite a long time, with my hands on the bul-
warks, as to whether our friend was soft wood or steel
plated. It would not have made much difference to us,
anyway; but I felt there was more honour in being
rammed, you know. Then I knew all about it. It
was a ram. We opened out. I am not exaggerating
— we opened out, sir, like a cardboard box. The other
ship cut us two-thirds through, a little behind the break
of the fo'c'sle. Our decks split up lengthways. The
mizzen-mast bounded out of its place, and we heeled
over. Then the other ship blew a fog-horn. I remem-
ber thinking, as I took water from the port bulwark,
that this was rather ostentatious after she had done all
the mischief. After that, I was a mile and a half under
sea, trying to go to sleep as hard as I could. Some
one caught hold of my hair, and waked me up. I was
hanging to vrhat was left of one of our boats under the
lee of a large English ironclad. There were two men
with me; the three of us began to yell. A man on the
ship sings out, ' Can you climb on board if we throw
you a rope ? ' They weren't going to let down a fine
new man-of-war's boat to pick up three half -drowned
rats. We accepted the invitation. We climbed — I,
the engineer, and the ship's boy. About half an horn-
later the fog cleared entirely; except for the half of
the boat away in the of&ng, there was neither stick nor
string on the sea to show that the Hespa had been cut
down."

'And what do you think of that now?' said the
man from Saigon.

PRIVATE LEAROYD'S STORY

And he told a tale. — Chronicles of Gautama Buddha.

Far from the liaunts of Company Officers who insist
upon kit-inspections, far from keen-nosed Sergeants who
sniff the pipe stuffed into the bedding-roll, two miles
from the tumult of the barracks, lies the Trap. It is
an old dry well, shadowed by a twisted pipal tree and
fenced with high grass. Here, in the years gone by,
did Private Ortheris establish his depot and menagerie
for such possessions, dead and living, as could not safely
be introduced to the barrack-room. Here were gathered
Houdin pullets, and fox-terriers of undoubted pedigree
and more than doubtful ownership, for Ortheris was an
inveterate poacher and pre-eminent among a regiment
of neat-handed dog-stealers.

If ever again will the long lazy evenings return wherein
Ortheris, whistling softly, moved surgeon-wise among
the captives of his craft at the bottom of the well ;
when Learoyd sat in the niche, giving sage counsel
on the management of ' tykes,' and Mulvaney, from the
crook of the overhanging pipal, waved his enormous
boots in benediction above our heads, delighting us
with tales of Love and War, and strange experiences
of cities and men.

Ortheris — landed at last in the ' little stuff bird-shop '
for which your soul longed; Learoyd — back again in
the smoky, stone-ribbed North, amid the clang of the
c 17

18 PRIVATE LEAEOYD'S STOBY

Bradford looms ; Mulvaney — grizzled, tender, and very-
wise Ulysses, sweltering on the earthwork of a Central
India line — judge if I have forgotten old days in the
Trap!

Orth'ris, as alius thinks he knaws more than other
foaks, said she wasn't a real laady, but nobbut a Hew-
rasian. I don't gainsay as her culler was a bit doosky
like. But she was a laady. Why, she rode iv a carriage,
an' good 'osses, too, an' her 'air was that oiled as you
could see your faice in it, an' she wore dimond rings an'
a goold chain, an' silk an' satin dresses as mun 'a' cost
a deal, for it isn't a cheap shop as keeps enough o' one
pattern to fit a figure like hers. Her name was Mrs.
DeSussa, an' t' waay I coom to be acquainted wi' her
was along of our Colonel's Laady's dog Rip.

I've seen a vast o' dogs, but Rip was t' prettiest picter
of a cliver fox-tarrier 'at iver I set eyes on. He could
do owt you like but speeak, an' t' Colonel's Laady set
more store by him than if he hed been a Christian.
She hed bairns of her awn, but they was i' England,
and Rip seemed to get all t' coodlin' and pettin' as be-
longed to a bairn by good right.

But Rip wej'e a bit on a rover, an' hed a habit o'
breakin' out o' barricks like, and trottin' round t' plaice
as if he were t' Cantonment Magistrate coom round
inspectin'. The Colonel leathers him once or twice,
but Rip didn't care an' kept on gooin' his rounds, wi'
his taail a-waggin' as if he were flag-signallin' to t'
world at large 'at he was ' gettin' on nicely, thank yo',
and how's yo'sen ? ' An' then t' Colonel, as was noa
sort of a hand wi' a dog, tees him oop. A real clipper
of a dog, an' it's noa wonder yon laady, Mrs. DeSussa,

PRIVATE LEAROYD'S STORY 19

should tek a fancy tiv him. Theer's one o' t' Ten Com-
mandments says yo maun't cuvvet your neebor's ox nor
his jackass, but it doesn't say nowt about his tarrier
dogs, an' happen thot's t' reason why Mrs. DeSussa
cuvYeted Rip, tho' she went to church reg'lar along wi'
her husband who was so mich darker 'at if he hedn't
such a good coaat tiv his back yo' might ha' called him
a black man and nut tell a lee nawther. They said he
addled his brass i' jute, an' he'd a rare lot on it.

Well, you seen, when they teed Rip up, t' poor awd
lad didn't enjoy very good 'elth. So t' Colonel's Laady
sends for me as 'ad a naame for bein' knowledgeable
about a dog, an' axes what's ailin' wi' him.

'Why,' says I, 'he's getten t' mopes, an' what he
wants is his libbaty an' coompany like t' rest on us;
wal happen a rat or two 'ud liven him oop. It's low,
mum,' says I, 'is rats, but it's t' nature of a dog; an'
soa's cuttin' round an' meetin' another dog or two an'
passin' t' time o' day, an' hevvin' a bit of a turn-up wi'
him like a Christian.'

So she says her dog maunt niver fight an' noa Chris-
tians iver fought.

' Then what's a soldier for?' says I; an' I explains
to her t' contrairy qualities of a dog, 'at, when yo' coom
to think on't, is one o' t' curusest things as is. For
they larn to behave theirsens Uke gentlemen born, fit
for t' fost o' coompany — they tell me t' Widdy herself
is fond of a good dog and knaws one when she sees it
as well as onny body: then on t' other hand a-tewin'
round after cats an' gettin' mixed oop i' all manners o'
blackguardly street-rows, an' killin' rats, an' fightin' like
divils.

T' Colonel's Laady says : — ' Well, Learoyd, I doan't

20 PEIVATE LEAROYD'S STORY

agree wi' you, but you're right in a way o' speeakin', an'
I should like yo' to tek Rip out a-walkin' wi' you some-
times ; but yo' maun't let him fight, nor chase oats, nor
do nowt 'orrid ' : an' them was her very wods.

Soa Rip an' me gooes out a-walkin' o' evenin's, he bein'
a dog as did credit tiv a man, an' I catches a lot o' rats
an' we hed a bit, of a match on in an awd dry swimmin'-
bath at back o' t' cantonments, an' it was none so long
afore he was as bright as a button again. He hed a
way o' flyin' at them big yaller pariah dogs as if he was
a harrow offan a bow, an' though his weight were nowt,
he tuk 'em so suddint-like they rolled over like skittles
in a halley, an' when they coot he stretched after 'em as
if he were rabbi t-runnin'. Saame with cats when he
cud get t' cat agaate o' runnin'.

One evenin', him an' me was trespassin' ovver a
compound wall after one of them mongooses 'at he'd
started, an' we was busy grubbin' round a prickle-bush,
an' when we looks up there was Mrs. DeSussa wi' a
parasel ovver her shoulder, a-watchin' us. ' Oh my ! '
she sings out ; ' there's that lovelee dog ! Would he
let me stroke him. Mister Soldier ? '

' Ay, he would, mum,' sez I, ' for he's fond o' laady's
coompany. Coom here, Rip, an' speeak to this kind
laady.' An' Rip, seein' 'at t' mongoose hed getten
clean awaay, cooms up like t' gentleman he was, nivver
a hauporth shy or okkord.

' Oh, you beautiful — you prettee dog ! ' she says,
clippin' an' chantin' her speech in a way them sooart
has o' their awn ; ' I would like a dog like you. You
are so verree lovelee — so awf uUee prettee,' an' all thot
sort o' talk, 'at a dog o' sense mebbe thinks nowt on,
tho' he bides it by reason o' his breedin'.

PRIVATE LEAROYD'S STORY 21

An' then I meks him joomp ovver my swagger-cane,
an' shek hands, an' beg, an' lie dead, an' a lot o' them
tricks as laadies teeaches dogs, though I doan't haud
with it mysen, for it's makin' a fool o' a good dog to do
such like.

An' at lung length it cooms out 'at she'd been
thrawin' sheep's eyes, as t' sayin' is, at Rip for many
a day. Yo' see, her childer was grown up, an' she'd
nowt mich to do, an' were alius fond of a dog. Soa
she axes me if I'd tek somethin' to dhrink. An' we
goes into t' drawn-room wheer her 'usband was a-settin'.
They meks a gurt fuss ovver t' dog an' I has a bottle o'
aale, an' he gave me a handful o' cigars.

Soa r coomed away, but t' awd lass sings out — ' Oh,
Mister Soldier, please coom again and bring that prettee
dog.'

I didn't let on to t' Colonel's Laady about Mrs.
DeSussa, and Rip, he says nowt nawther; an' I gooes
again, an' ivry time there was a good dhrink an' a
handful o' good smooaks. An' I telled t' awd lass a
heeap more about Rip than I'd ever heeared ; how he
tuk t' fost prize at Lunnon dog-show and cost thotty-
three pounds fower shillin' from t' man as bred him ; 'at
his own brother was t' propputty o' t' Prince o' Wailes,
an' 'at he had a pedigree as long as a Dock's. An' she
lapped it all oop an' were niver tired o' admirin' him.
But when t' awd lass took to givin' me money an' I
seed 'at she were gettin' fair fond about t' dog, I began
to suspicion summat. Onny body may give a soldier t'
price of a pint in a friendly way an' theer's no 'arm"
done, but when it cooms to five rupees slipt into your /
hand, sly like, why, it's what t' 'lectioneerin' fellows [
calls bribery an' corruption. Specially when Mrs. De4

22 PRIVATE LEAROTD'S STORY

Sussa threwed hints how t' cold weather would soon be
ovver an' she was goin' to Munsooree Pahar an' we was
goin' to Rawalpindi, an' she would niver see Rip any-
more onless somebody she knowed on would be kind tiv
her.

Soa I tells Mulvaney an' Ortheris all t' taale thro',
beginnin' to end.

' 'Tis larceny that wicked ould laady manes,' says 't
Irishman, ' 'tis felony she is sejuicin' ye into, my frind
Learoyd, but I'll purtect your innocince. I'll save ye
from the wicked wiles av that wealthy ould woman, an'
I'll go wid ye this evenin' and spake to her the wurrds
ay truth an' honesty. But Jock,' says he, waggin' his
heead, ' 'twas not like ye to kape all that good dhrink
an' thim fine cigars to yerself, while Orth'ris here an'
me have been prowlin' round wid throats as dry as
lime-kilns, and nothin' to smoke but Canteen plug.
' 'Twas a dhirty thrick to play on a comrade, for why
should you, Learoyd, be balancin' yourself on the butt
av a satin chair, as if Terence Mulvaney was not the
aquil av anybody who thrades in jute ! '

'Let alone me,' sticks in Orth'ris, 'but that's like
life. Them wot's really fitted to decorate society get no
show while a blunderin' Yorkshireman like you '

'Nay,' says I, 'it's none o' t' blunderin' Yorkshire-
man she wants; it's Rip. He's t' gentleman this
journey.'

Soa t' next day, Mulvaney an' Rip an' me goes to
Mrs. DeSussa's, an' t' Irishman bein' a strainger she
wor a bit shy at fost. But yo've heeard Mulvaney
talk, an yo' may believe as he fairly bewitched t' awd
lass wal she let out 'at she wanted to tek Rip away wi'
her to Munsooree Pahar. Then Mulvaney changes his

PRIVATE LEAEOYD'S STORY 23

tune an' axes her solemn-like if she'd thought o' t' con-
sequences o' gettin' two poor but honest soldiers sent t'
Andamning Islands. Mrs. DeSussa began to cry, so
Mulvaney turns round oppen t' other tack and smooths
her down, aUowin' 'at Rip ud be a vast better off in t'
Hills than down i' Bengal, and 'twas a pity he shouldn't
go wheer he was so well beliked. And soa he went on,
backin' an' fiUin' an' workin' up t' awd lass wal she felt
as if her life warn't worth nowt if she didn't hev fc'
dog.

Then all of a suddint he says : — ' But ye shall have
him, marm, for I've a feelin' heart, not like this could-
blooded Yorkshireman ; but 'twill cost ye not a penny
less than three hundher rupees.'

'Don't yo' believe him, mum,' says I; 't' Colonel's
Laady wouldn't tek five hundred for him.'

' Who said she would ? ' says Mulvaney ; ' it's not
buyin' him I mane, but for the sake o' this kind, good
laady, I'll do what I never dreamt to do in my life.
I'll stale him ! '

' Don't say steal,' says Mrs. DeSussa ; ' he shall have
the happiest home. Dogs often get lost, you know,
and then they stray, an' he likes me and I like him
as I niver liked a dog yet, an' I must hev him. If
I goii him at t' last minute I could carry him off to
Munsooree Pahar and nobody would niver knaw.'

Now an' again Mulvaney looTced acrost at me, an'
though I could mak nowt o' what he was after, I con-
cluded to take his leead.

' Well, mum,' I says, ' I never thowt to coom down
to dog-steealin', but if my comrade sees how it could be
done to oblige a laady like yo'sen, I'm nut t' man to
hod back, tho' it's a bad business I'm thin kin', an' three

24 PBIVATE LEAROYD'S STORY

hundred rupees is a poor set-off again t' chance of them
Damning Islands as Mulvaney talks on.'

' I'll mek it three fifty,' says Mrs. DeSussa ; ' only let
me hev t' dog ! '

So we let her persuade us, an' she teks Rip's measure
theer an' then, an' sent to Hamilton's to order a silver
collar again t' time when he was to be her awn, which
was to be t' day she set off for Munsooree Pahar.

'Sitha, Mulvaney,' says I, when we was outside,
' you're niver goin' to let her hev Rip ! '

'An' would ye disappoint a poor old woman? ' says
he ; ' she shall have a Rip.'

' An' wheer's he to come through?' says I.

' Learoyd, my man,' he sings out, ' you're a pretty
man av your inches an' a good comrade, but your head
is made av duff. Isn't our friend Orth'ris a Taxider-
mist, an' a rale artist wid his nimble white fingers?
An' what's a Taxidermist but a man who can thrate
shkins ? Do ye mind the white dog that belongs to the
Canteen Sargint, bad cess to him — he that's lost half
his time an' snarlin' the rest? He shall be lost for
good now; an' do ye mind that he's the very spit in
shape an' size av the Colonel's, bafrin' that his tail is
an inch too long, an' he has none av the colour that
divarsifies the rale Rip, an' his timper is that av his
masther an' worse. But fwhat is an inch on a dog's
tail ? An' fwhat to a professional like Orth'ris is a few
ringstraked shpots av black, brown, an' white? Nothin'
at all, at all.'

Then we meets Orth'ris, an' that little man, bein'
sharp as a needle, seed his way through t' business in a
minute. An' he went to work a-practisin' 'air-dyes the
very next day, beginnin' on some white rabbits he had.

PRIVATE LEAROYD'S STORY 25

an' then he drored all Rip's markin's on t' back of a
white Commissariat bullock, so as to get his 'and in an'
be sure of his colours ; shadin' off brown into black as
nateral as life. If Rip hed a fault it was too mich
markin', but it was straingely reg'lar an' Orth'ris set-
tled himself to make a fost-rate job on it when he got
baud o' t' Canteen Sargint's dog. Theer niver was sich
a dog as thot for bad temper, an' it did nut get no
better when his tail hed to be fettled an inch an' a half
shorter. But they may talk o' theer Royal Academies
as they like. I niver seed a bit o' animal paintin' to
beat t' copy as Orth'ris made of Rip's marks, wal t'
picter itself was snarlin' all t' time an' tryin' to get at
Rip standin' theer to be copied as good as goold.

Orth'ris alius hed as mich conceit on himsen as
would lift a balloon, an' he wor so pleeased wi' his
sham Rip he wor for tekking him to Mrs. DeSussa
before she went away. But Mulvaney an' me stopped
thot, knowin' Orth^ris's work, though niver so cliver,
was nobbut skin-deep.

An' at last Mrs. DeSussa fixed t' day for startin' to
Munsooree Pahar. We was to tek Rip to t' stayshun i'
a basket an' hand him ovver just when they was ready
to start, an' then she'd give us t' brass — as was agreed
upon.

An' my wod! It were high time she were off, for
them 'air-dyes upon t' cur's back took a vast of paintin'
to keep t' reet culler, tho' Orth'ris spent a matter o'
seven rupees six annas i' t' best drooggist shops i'
Calcutta.

An' t' Canteen Sargint was lookin' for 'is dog every-
wheer; an', wi' bein' tied up, t' beast's timper got
waur nor ever.

26 PRIVATE LEAROYD'S STORY

It wor i' t' evenin' when t' train started thro' Howrah,
an' we 'elped Mrs. DeSussa wi' about sixty boxes, an'
then we gave her t' basket. Orth'ris, for pride av his
work, axed us to let him coom along wi' us, an' he
couldn't help liftin' t' lid an' showin' t' cur as he lay-
coiled oop.

' Oh ! ' says t' awd lass ; ' the beautee ! How sweet
he looks ! ' An' just then t' beauty snarled an' showed
his teeth, so Mulvaney shuts down t' lid and says :
'Ye'U be careful, marm, whin ye tek him out. He's
disaccustomed to travelling by t' railway, an' he'll be
sure to want his rale mistress an' his friend Learoyd, so
ye'U make allowance for his feelings at fost.'

She would do all thot an' more for the dear, good
Rip, an' she would nut oppen t' basket till they were
miles away, for fear anybody should recognise him, an'
we were real good and kind soldier-men, we were, an'
she bonds me a bundle o' notes, an' then cooms up a
few of her relations an' friends to say good-by — not
more than seventy-five there wasn't — an' we cuts
away.

What coom to t' three hundred and fifty rupees?
Thot's what I can scarcelins tell yo', but we melted it
— we melted it. It was share an' share alike, for Mul-
vaney said : ' If Learoyd got hold of Mrs. DeSussa first,
sure 'twas I that remimbered the Sargint's dog just in
the nick av time, an' Orth'ris was the artist av janius
that made a work av art out av that ugly piece av ill-
nature. Yet, by way av a thank-ofEerin' that I was not
led into felony by that wicked ould woman, I'll send a
thrifle to Father Victor for the poor people he's always
beggin' for.'

But me an' Orth'ris, he bein' Cockney an' I bein'

PRIVATE LEAEOYD'S STORY 27

pretty far north, did nut see it i' t' saame way. We'd
getten t' brass, an' we meaned to keep it. An' soa we
did — for a short time.

Noa, noa, we niver heeard a wod more o' t' awd lass.
Our rig'mint went to Pindi, an' t' Canteen Sargint he
got himself another tyke insteead o' t' one 'at got lost so
reg'lar, an' was lost for good at last.

THE BIG DRUNK DRAF'

We're goin' 'ome, we're goin' 'ome —

Our ship is at the shore,
An' you mus' pack your 'aversaok,

For we won't come back no more.
Ho, don't you grieve for me,

My lovely Mary Ann,
For I'll marry you yet on a fourp'ny bit,

As a time-expired ma-a^an !

Barrack'room Ballad.

An awful thing has happened ! My friend, Private
Mulvaney, who went home in the Serapis, time-expired,
not very long ago, has come back to India as a civilian !
It was all Dinah Shadd's fault. She could not stand
the poky little lodgings, and she missed her servant
Abdullah more than words could tell. The fact was
that the Mulvaneys had been out here too long, and
had lost touch of England.

Mulvaney knew a contractor on one of the new
Central India lines, and wrote to him for some sort of
jvork. The contractor said that if Mulvaney could pay
the passage he would give him command of a gang of
coolies for old sake's sake. The pay was eighty-five
rupees a month, and Dinah Shadd said that if Terence
did not accept she would make his life a ' basted purga-
thory.' Therefore the Mulvaneys came out as 'civil-
ians,' which was a great and terrible fall; though
Mulvaney tried to disguise it, by saying that he was
' Ker'nel on the railway Une, an' a consequinshal man.'

28

THE BIG DRUNK DEAF' ^ 29

He wrote me an invitation, on a tool-indent form, to
visit him ; and I came down to the funny little ' con-
struction' bungalow at the side of the line. Dinah
Shadd had planted peas about and about, and nature
had spread all manner of green stuff round the place.
There was no change in Mulvaney except the change of
clothing, which was deplorable, but could not be helped.
He was standing upon his trolly, haranguing a gang-
man, and his shoulders were as well drilled, and his big,
thick chin was as clean-shaven as ever.

' I'm a civilian now,' said Mulvaney. ' Cud you tell
that I was iver a martial man ? Don't answer, Sorr, av
you're strainin' betune a complimint an' a lie. There's
no houldin' Dinah Shadd now she's got a house av her
own. Go inside, an' dhrink tay out av chiny in the
drrrrawin'-room, an' thin we'll dhrink like Christians
undher the tree here. Scutt, ye naygur-folk ! There's
a Sahib come to. call on me, an' that's more than he'll
iver do for you onless you run! Get out, an' go on
pilin' up the earth, quick, till sundown.'

When we three were comfortably settled under the
big sisham in front of the bungalow, and the first rush
.of questions and answers about Privates Ortheris and
Learoyd and old times and places had died away, Mul-
vaney said, reflectively — ' Glory be there's no p'rade
to-morrow, an' no bun-headed Corp'ril-bhoy to give you
his lip. An' yit I don't know. 'Tis harrd to be some-
thing ye niver were an' niver meant to be, an' all the
ould days shut up along wid your papers. Eyah ! I'm
growin' rusty, an' 'tis the will av God that a man
mustn't serve his Quane for time an' all.'

He helped himself to a fresh peg, and sighed furiously.

' Let your beard- grow, Mulvaney,' said I, 'and then

30 THE BIG DRUNK DEAF'

you won't be troubled with those notions. You'll be a
real civilian. '

Dinah Shadd had told me in the drawing-room of her
desire to coax Mulvaney into letting his beard grow.
"Twas so civilian-like,' said poor Dinah, who hated
her husband's hankering for his old life.

'Dinah Shadd, you're a dishgraceto an honust, clane-
scraped man ! ' said Mulvaney, without replying to me.
'Grow a beard on your own chin, darlint, and lave my
razors alone. They're all that stand betune me and
dis-ris-pect-ability. Av I didn't shave, I wud be tor-
minted wid an outrajis thurrst; for there's nothin' so
dhryin' to the throat as a big billy-goat beard waggin'
undher the chin. Ye wudn't have me dhrink always,
Dinah Shadd? By the same token, you're kapin' me
crool dhry now. Let me look at that whiskey. '

The whiskey was lent and returned, but Dinah Shadd,
who had been just as eager as her husband in asking
after old friends, rent me with —

'I take shame for you, Sorr, coming down here —
though the Saints know you're as welkim as the day-
light whin you do come — an' upsettin' Terence's head
wid your nonsense about — about fwhat's much better
forgotten. He bein' a civilian now, an' you niver was
aught else. Can you not let the Arrmy rest? 'Tis not
good for Terence. '

I took refuge by Mulvaney, for Dinah Shadd has a
temper of her own.

'Let be — let be,' said Mulvaney. "Tis only wanst
in a way I can talk about the ould days.' Then to me :
— 'Ye say Dhrumshticks is well, an' his lady tu? I
niver knew how I liked the gray garron till I was shut
av him an' Asia.' — 'Dhrumshticks ' was the nickname

THE BIG DRUNK DRAf' 31

of the Colonel commanding Mulvaney's old regiment.
— 'Will you be seein' him again? You will. Thin
tell him ' — Mulvaney's eyes began to twinkle — 'tell
him wid Privit ' '

^Mister, Terence,' interrupted Dinah Shadd.

'Now the Divil an' all his angils an' the Firmament
av Hiven fly away wid the "Mister," an' the sin av
making me swear be on your confession, Dinah Shadd!
Privit, I tell ye. Wid Privit Mulvaney's best obedi-
ence, that but for me the last time-expired wud be still
pullin' hair on their way to the sea.'

He threw himself back in the chair, chuckled, and
was silent.

'Mrs. Mulvaney, ' I said, 'please take up the whiskey,
and don't let him have it until he has told the story. '

Dinah Shadd dexterously whipped the bottle away,
saying at the same time, "Tis nothing to be proud
av,' and thus captured by the enemy, Mulvaney
spake : —

"Twas on Chuseday week. I was behaderin' round
wid the gangs on the 'bankmint — I've taught the hop-
pers how to kape step an' stop screechin' — whin a
head-gangman comes up to me, wid about two inches av
shirt-tail hanging round his neck an' a disthressful light
in his oi. " Sahib, " sez he, " there's a reg'mint an' a half
av soldiers up at the junction, knockin' red cindete
but av ivrything an' ivrybody ! They thried to hang
me in my cloth," he sez, "an' there will be murder an'
ruin an' rape in the place before nightfall! They say
they're comin' down here to wake us up. What will
we do wid our women-folk ? "

'-"Fetch my throUy! " sez I; "my heart's sick in my
ribs for a wink at anything wid the Quane's uniform on

32 THE BIG DBUNK DEAF'

ut. Fetch my throlly, an' six av the jildiest men, and
run me up in shtyle." '

'He tuk his best coat,' said Dinah Shadd reproach-
fully.

"Twas to do honour to the Widdy. I cud ha' done
no less, Dinah Shadd. You and your digresshins inter-
fere wid the coorse av the narrative. Have you iver
considhered fwhat I wud look like wid me head shaved
as well as my chin ? You bear that in your mind, Dinah
darlin'.

'I was throllied up six miles, all to get a shquint at
that draf '. I knew 'twas a spring draf goin' home, for
there's no rig'mint hereabouts, more's the pity.'

'Praise the Virgin! ' murmured Dinah Shadd. But
Mulvaney did- not hear. *'

'Whin I was about three-quarters av a mile off the
rest-camp, powtherin' along fit to burrst, 1 heard the
noise av the men an', on my sowl, Sorr, I cud catch
the voice av Peg Barney bellowin' like a bison wid the
belly-ache. You remimber Peg Barney that was in D
Comp'ny — a red, hairy scraun, wid a scar on his jaw?
Peg Barney that cleared out the Blue Lights' Jubilee
meeting wid the cook-rcSom mop last year?

'Thin I knew ut was a draf of the ould rig'mint, an'
I was conshumed wid sorrow for the bhoy that was in
charge. We was harrd scrapin's at any time. Did I
iver tell you how Horker Kelley went into clink nakid
as Phoebus ApoUonius, wid the shirts av the Corp'ril
an' file undher his arrum? An' he was a moild man!
But I'm digreshin'. 'Tis a shame both to the rig'-
mints and theArrmy sendin' down little orf'cer bhoys
wid a draf av strong men mad wid liquor an' the chanst
av gettin' shut av India, an' niver a punishment that^s

THE BIG DEUNK DEAF' 33

fit to he given right down an* away from cantonmints to the
dock! 'Tis this nonsince. Whin I am servin' my
time, I'm undher the Articles av War, an' can be
whipped on the peg for thim. But whin I've served
my time, I'm a Reserve man, an' the Articles av War
haven't any hould on me. An orf cer can't do anyihin'
to a time-expired savin' confinin' him to barricks. 'Tis
a wise rig'lation bekaze a time-expired does not have
any barricks; bein' on the move all the time. 'Tis a
Solomon av a rig'lation, is that. I wud like to be
inthxoduced to the man that made ut. 'Tis easier to
get colts from a Kibbereen horse-fair into Galway than
to take a bad draf over ten miles av country. Consi-
quintly that rig'lation — for fear that the men wud be
hurt by the little orf cer bhoy. No matther. The
nearer my throUy came to the rest-camp, the woilder
was the shine, an' the louder was the voice av Peg
Barney. "'Tis good I am here," thinks I to myself,
"for Peg alone is employmint for two or three." He
bein', I well knew, as copped as a dhrover.

' Faith, that rest-camp was a sight ! The tent-ropes
was all skew-nosed, an' the pegs looked as dhrunk as
the men — fifty av thim — the scourin's, an' rinsin's, an'
Divil's lavin's av the Ould Rig'mint. I tell you, Sorr,
they were dhrunker than any men you've ever seen in
your mortial life. How does a draf get dhrunk ? How
does a frog get fat ? They suk ut in through.their shkins.

'There was Peg Barney sittin' on the groun' in his
shirt — wan shoe off an' wan shoe on — whackin' a
tent-peg over the head wid his boot, an' singin' fit to
wake the dead. 'Twas no clane song that he sung,
though. 'Twas the Divil's Mass.'

'What's that?' I asked.

34. THE BIG DRUNK DEAF'

'Whin a bad egg is shut av the Army, he sings the
Diyil's Mass for a good riddance ; an' that manes swear-
in' at ivrything from the Commandher-in-Chief down
to the Room-Corp'ril, such as you niver in your days
heard. Some men can swear so as to make green turf
crack! Have you iver heard the Curse in an Orange
Lodge? The Divil's Mass is ten times worse, an' Peg
Barney was singin' ut, whackin' the tent-peg on the
head wid his boot for each man that he cursed. A
powerful big voice had Peg Barney, an' a hard swearer
he was whin sober. I stood forninst him, an' 'twas
not me oi alone that cud tell Peg was dhrunk as a coot.

'"Good mornin' Peg," I sez, whin he dhrew breath
afther cursin' the Adj'tint Gen'ral; "I've put on my
best coat to see you, Peg Barney," sez I.

'"Thin take ut off again," sez Peg Barney, latherin'
away wid the boot; "take ut off an' dance, ye lousy
civilian! "

'Wid that he begins cursin' ould Dhrumshticks, being
so full he clean disremimbers the Brigade-Major an'
the Judge Advokit Gen'ral.

'"Do you not know me, Ppg?" sez I, though me
blood was hot in me wid being ckUed a civilian. '

'An' him a decent married man!' wailed Dinah
Shadd.

'"I do not," sez Peg, "but dhrunk or sober I'll tear
the hide off your back wid a shovel whin I've stopped
singin'."

'"Say you so. Peg Barney?" sez I. "'Tis clear as
mud you've forgotten me. I'll assist your autobiog-
raphy." Wid that I stretched Peg Barney, boot an'
all, an' wint into the camp. An awful sight ut was !

'"Where's the orf'cer in charge avthe detachment?"

THE BIG DEXJNK DEAF' 35

sez I to Scrub Greene — the manest little worm that
ever walked.

'"There's no orf'cer, ye ould cook," sez Scrub;
"we're a bloomin' Republic."

'"Are you that?" sez I; "thin I'm O'Connell the
Dictator, an' by this you will lam to kape a civil
tongue in your rag-box."

'" Wid that I stretched Scrub Greene an' wint to the
orf'cer's tent. 'Twas a new little bhoy — not wan I'd
iver seen before. He was sittin' in his tent, purtendin'
not to 'ave ear av the racket.

'I saluted — but for the life av me I mint to shake
hands whin I went in. 'Twas the sword hangin' on
the tent-pole changed my will.

'"Can't I help, Sorr?" sez I; "'tis a strong man's
job they've given you, an' you'll be wantin' help by
sundown." He was a bhoy wid bowils, that child, an'
a rale gintleman.

'"Sit down,." sez he.

'"Not before my orf'cer," sez I; an' I tould him
fwhat my service was.

'"I've heard av you," sez he. "You tuk the town
av Lungtungpen nakid. "

'"Faith," thinks I, "that's Honour an' Glory"; for
'twas Lift'nint Brazenose did that job. "I'm wid ye,
Sorr," sez I, " if I'm av use. They shud niver ha' sent
you down wid the draf. Savin' your presince, Sorr,"
I sez, " 'tis only Lift'nint Hackerston in the Ould
Rig'mint can manage a Home draf."

'"I've niver had charge of men like this before," sez
he, playin' wid the pens on the table; "an' I see by
the Rig'lations "

'"Shut your oi to the Rig'lations, Sorr," I sez, "till

36 THE BIG DKTINK DRAF'

the throoper's into blue wather. By the Rig'lations
you've got to tuck thim up for the night, or they'll be
runnin' foul av my coolies an' makin' a shiyerarium
half through the country. Can you trust your non-
coms, Son?"

"'Yes,"sezhe.
- '"Good," sez I; "there'll be throuble before the
night. Are you marchin', Sorr?"

'"To the next station," sez he.

'"Better still," sez I; "there'll be big throuble."

'"Can't be too hard on a Home draf," sez he; "the
great thing is to get thim in-ship. "

'"Faith you've larnt the half av your lesson, Sorr,"
sez I, "but av you shtick to the Rig'lations you'll niver
get thim in-ship at all, at all. Or there won't be a rag
av kit betune thim whin you do."

"Twas a dear little orf'cer bhoy, an' by way av kapin'
his heart up, I tould him fwhat I saw wanst in a draf
in Egypt. ' «**>.

'What was that, Mulvaney? ' said I.

'Sivin an' fifty men sittin' on the bank av a canal,
laughin' at a poor little squidgereen av an orf'cer that
they'd made wade into the slush an' pitch the things
out av the boats for their Lord High Mightinesses.
That made me orf'cer bhoy woild wid indignation.

'"Soft an' aisy, Sorr," sez I; "you've niver had your
draf in hand since you left cantonmints. Wait till
the night, an' your work will be ready to you. Wid
your permission, Sorr, I will investigate the camp, an'
talk to my ould frinds. 'Tis no manner av use thryin'
to shtop the divilmint now."

'Wid that I wint out into the camp an' inthrojuced
mysilf to ivry man sober enough to remimber me. I

THE BIG DRUNK DRAP' 37

was some wan in the ould days, an' the bhoys was glad
to see me — all excipt. Peg Barney wid a eye like a
tomata five days in the bazar, an' a nose to match.
They come round me an' shuk me, an' I tould thim I
was in privit employ wid an income av me own, an' a
drrrawin'-room iit to bate the Quane's ; an' wid me lies
an' me shtories an' nonsinse gin'rally, I kept 'em quiet
in wan way an' another, knockin' roun' the camp.
'Twas bad even thin whin I was the Angil av Peace.

'I talked to me ould non-coms — they was sober —
an' betune me an' thim we wore the draf over into
their tents at the proper time. The little orf 'cer bhoy
he comes round, decint an' civil-spoken as might be.

'"Rough quarters, men," sez he, "but you can't look
to be as comfortable as in barricks. We must make
the best av things. I've shut my eyes to a dale av dog's
tricks to-day, an' now there must be no more av ut."

'"No more we will. Come an' have a dhrink, me
son," sez Peg's Barney, staggerin' where he stud. Me
little orf'cer bhoy kep' his timper.

'"You're a sulky swine, you are," sez Peg Barney,
an' at that the men in the tent began to laugh.

'I tould you me orf'cer bhoy had bowils. He cut Peg
Barney as near as might be on the oi that I'd squshed
whin we first met. Peg wint spinnin' acrost the tent.

'"Peg him out, Sorr," sez I, in a whishper.

'"Peg him out! " sez me orf'cer bhoy, up loud, just
as if 'twas battalion-p'rade an' he pickin' his wurrds
from the Sargint.

'The non-coms tuk Peg Barney — a howlin' handful
he was — an' in three minuts he was pegged out — chin
down, tight-dhrawn — on his stummick, a tent-peg to
each' arm an' leg, swearin' fit to turn a naygur white.

38 THE BIG DRUNK DEAF'

'I tuk a peg an' jammed ut into his ugly jaw. —
"Bite on that, Peg Barney," I sez; "the night is set-
tin' frosty, an' you'll be wantin' divarsion before the
mornin'. But for the Rig'lations you'd be bitin' on a
bullet now at the thriangles. Peg Barney, " sez I.

' All the draf ' was out av their tents watohin' Barney
bein' pegged.

'"'Tis agin the Rig'lations! He strook him!"
screeches out Scrub Greene, whp was always a lawyer;
an' some of the men tuk up the shoutin'.

'"Peg out that man!" sez my orf'cer bhoy, niver
losin' his timper; an' the non-coms wint in and pegged
out Scrub Greene by the side av Peg Barney.

'I cud see that the draf was comin' roun'. The men
stud not knowin' fwhat to do.

' " Get to your tents ! " sez me orf'cer bhoy. " Sar-
gint, put a sintry over these two men."

'The men wint back into the tents like jackals, an'
the rest av the night there was no noise at all excipt
the stip av the sintry over the two, an' Scrub Greene
blubberin' like a child. 'Twas a chilly night, an'
faith, ut sobered Peg Barney.

'Just before Revelly, my orf'cer bhoy comes out an'
sez : " Loose those men an' send thim to their tents ! "
Scrub Greene wint away widout a word, but Peg Bar-
ney, stiff wid the cowld, stud like a sheep, thryin:^ to
make his orf'cer understhand he was sorry for playin'
the goat.

'There was no tucker in the draf whin ut fell in for
the march, an' divil a wurrd about " illegality " cud I
hear. '

'I wint to the ould Colour Sargint and I sez: — "Let
me die in glory," sez I. "I've seen a man this day! "

THE BIG DRUNK DRAF 39

'"A man he is," sez ould Hother; "the draf's as sick
as a herrin'. They'll all go down to the sea like
lambs. That bhoy has the bowils av a cantonmint av
Gin'rals."

'"Amin," sez I, "an' good luck go wid him, wher-
iver he be, by land or by sea. Let me know how the
draf gets clear."

'An' do you know how they did? That bhoy, so
I ~wa,s tould by letter from Bombay, bullydamned ' em
down to the dock, till they cudn't call their sowls their
own. From the time they left me oi till they was
'twem decks, not wan av thim was more than dacintly
dhrunk. An', by the Holy Articles av War, whin
they wint aboard they cheered him till they cudn't
spake, an' that, mark you, has not come about wid a
draf in the mim'ry av livin' man ! You look to that
little orf'cer bhoy. He has bowils. 'Tis not ivry
child that wud chuck the Rig'lations to Flanders an'
stretch Peg Barney on a wink from a brokin an'
dilapidated ould carkiss like mesilf. I'd be proud to
serve '

' Terence, you're a civilian,' said Dinah Shadd warn-
ingly.

' So I am — so I am. Is ut likely I wud forget ut ?
But he was a gran' bhoy all the same, an' I'm only a
mudtipper w;id a hod on my shoulthers. The whiskey's
in the heel av your hand, Sorr. Wid your good lave
we'll dhrink to the Ould Rig'miht — three fingers —
standin' up!'

And we drank.

THE WRECK OF THE VISIGOTH i

'Eternal Father, strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave,
Who bidst the mighty ocean keep
Its own appointed limits deep.'

The lady passengers were trying the wheezy old
harmonium in front of the cuddy, because it was Sunday
night. In the patch of darkness near the wheel-grat-
ing sat the Captain, and the end of his cheroot burned
like a head-lamp. There was neither breath nor motion
upon the waters through which the screw was thudding.
They spread, dull silver, under the haze of the moon-
light till they joined the low coast of Malacca away to
the eastward. The voices of the singers at the harmo-
nium were held down by the awnings, and came to us

with force.

' Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,
For those in peril on the sea.'

It was as though the little congregation were afraid
of the vastness of the sea. But a laugh followed, and
some one said, ' Shall we take it through again a little
quicker? ' Then the Captain told the story of just such
a night, lowering his voice for fear of disturbing the
music and the minds of the passengers.

' She was the Visigoth, — live hundred tons, or it may
have been six, — in the cop,sting trade ; one of the best
steamers and best found on the Kutch-Kasauli line.

' Copyright, 1895, by Macmiluj) & Co.
40

THE WRECK OF THE VISIGOTH 41

She wasn't six years old when the thing happened : on
just such a night as this, with an oily smooth sea, under
brilliant starlight, about a hundred miles from land.
To this day no one knows really what the matter was.
She was so small that she could not have struck even a
log in the water without every soul on board feeling
the jar ; and even if she had struck something, it
wouldn't have made her go down as she did. I was
fourth officer then; we had about seven saloon passen-
gers, including the Captairi's wife and another woman,
and perhaps five hundred deck-passengers going up the
coast to a shrine, on just such a night as this, when she
was ripping through the level sea at a level nine knots
an hour. The man on the bridge, whoever it was, saw
that she was sinking at the head. Sinking by the head
as she went along. That was the only warning we got.
She began to sink as she went along. Of course the
Captain was told, and he sent me to wake up the saloon
passengers and tell them to come on deck. 'Sounds a
curious sort of message that to deliver on a dead stUI
night. The people tumbled up in their dressing-
gowns and pyjamas, and wouldn't believe me. We
were just sinking as fast as we could, and I had to tell
'em that. Then the deck-passengers got wind of it,
and all Hell woke up along the decks.

' The rule in these little affairs is to get your saloon
passengers off first, then to fill the boats with the
balance, and afterwards — God help the extras, that's
all. I was getting the starboard stern boat — the mail-
boat — away. It hung as it might be over yonder, and
as I came along from the cuddy, the deck-passengers
hung round me, shoving their money-belts into my
hand, taking off their nose-rings and earrings, and

42 THE WRECK OF THE YISIGOTH

thrusting 'em upon me to buy just one chance for life. If
I hadn't been so desperately busy, I should have thought
it horrible. I put biscuits and water into the boat, and
got the two ladies in. One of 'em was the Captain's
wife. She had to be put in by main force. You've no
notion how women can struggle. The other woman
was the wife of an officer going to meet her husband ;
and there were a couple of passengers beside the las-
cars. The Captain said he was going to stay with the
ship. You see the rule in these affairs, I believe, is
that the Captain has to bow gracefully from the bridge
and go down. I haven't had a ship under my charge
wrecked yet. When that comes, I'll have to do like
the others. After the boats were away, and I saw that
there was nothing to be got by waiting, I jumped over-
board exactly as I might have vaulted over into a flat
green field, and struck out for the mail-boat. Another
officer did the same thing, but he went for a boat full
of natives, and they whacked him on the chest with
oars, so he had some difficulty in climbing in.

' It was as well that I reached the mail-boat. There
was a compass in it, but the idiots had managed to fiU
the boat half full of water somehow or another, and
none of the crew seemed to know what was required of
them. Then the Visigoth went down and took every
one with her — ships generally do that; the corpses
don't cumber the sea for some time.

'What did I do? I kept all the boats together, and
headed into the track of the coasting steamers. The
aggravating thing was the thought that we were close
to land as far as a big steamer was concerned, and in
the middle of eternity as far as regarded a little boat.
The sea looks hugeous big from a boat at night.'

THE WKECK OF THE VISIGOTH 43

' Oh, Christ, whose voice the waters heard
And hushed their ravings at Thy word,
Who waliedst on the foaming deep
And calm amidst its rage did keep, —
Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,
For those in peril on the sea 1 '

sang the passengers cheerily.

' That harmonium is disgracefully out of tune,' said
the Captain. ' The sea air affects their insides. Well,
as I was saying, we settled down in the boat. The
Captain's wife was unconscious ; she lay in the bottom
of the boat and moaned. I was glad she wasn't thresh-
ing about the boat: but what I did think was wrong,
was the way the two men passengers behaved. They
were useless with funk — out and out fear. They lay
in the boat and did nothing. Fetched a groan now
and again to show they were alive ; but that was all.
But the other woman was a jewel. Damn it, it was
worth being shipwrecked to have that woman in the
boat ; she was awfully handsome, and as brave as she
was lovely. She helped me bail out the boat, and she
worked like a man.

'So we kicked about the sea from midnight till
seven the next evening, and then we saw a steamer.
"I'll — I'll give you anything I'm wearing to hoist as
a signal of distress," said the woman; but I had no
need to ask her, for the steamer picked us up and took
us back to Bombay. I forgot to tell you that, when
the day broke, I couldn't recognise the Captain's wife
— widow, I mean. She had changed in the night as if
fire had gone over her. I met her a long time after-
wards, and even then she hadn't forgiven me for put-
ting her into the boat and obeying the Captain's orders.

44 THE WRECK OF THE VISIGOTH

But the husband of the other woman — he's in the Army
— wrote me no end of a letter of thanks. I don't sup-
pose he considered that the way his wife behaved was
enough to make any decent man do all he could. The
other fellows, who lay in the bottom of the boat and
groaned, I've never met. Don't want to. Shouldn't
be civil to 'em if I did. And that's how the Visigoth
went down, for no assignable reason, with eighty bags
of mail, five hundred souls, and not a single packet
insured, on just such a night as this.'

' Oh, Trinity of love and power,
Our brethren shield in that dread hour,
From rock and tempest, fire and foe,
Protect them wheresoe'er they go.
Thus evermore shall rise to Thee
Glad hymns of praise by land and sea.'

'Strikes me they'll go on singing that hymn aU
night. Imperfect sort of doctrine in the last lines,
don't you think? They might have run in an extra
verse specifying sudden collapse — like the Visigoth' s^
I'm going on to the bridge, now. Good-night,' said
the Captain.

And I was left alone with the steady thud, thud, of
the screw and the gentle creaking of the boats at the
davits.

That made me shudder.

THE SOLID MULDOON

Did ye see John Malone, wid his shinin', brand-new hat?

Did ye see how he walked like a grand aristocrat ?

There was flags an' banners wavin' high, an' dhress and shtyle were

shown,
But the best av all the company was Misther John Malone.

John Malone.

Thbeb had been a royal dog-fight in the ravine at
the back of the rifle-butts, between Learoyd's Joch and
Ortheris's Blue Rot — both mongrel Rampur hounds,
chiefly ribs and' teeth. It lasted for twenty happy,
howling minutes, and then Blue Hot collapsed and
Ortheris paid Learoyd three rupees, and we were all
very thirsty. A dog-fight is a most heating entertain-
ment, quite apart from the shouting, because Rampurs
fight over a couple of acres of ground. Later, when
the sound of belt-badges clicking against the necks of
beer-bottles had died away, conversation drifted from
dog to man-fights of all kinds. Humans resemble red-
deer in some respects. Any talk of fighting seems to
wake up a sort of imp in their breasts, and they beU
one to the other, exactly like challenging bucks. This
is noticeable even in men who consider themselves supe-
rior to Privates of the Line : it shows the Refining
Influence of Civilisation and the March of Progress.

Tale provoked tale, and each tale more beer. Even
dreamy Learoyd's eyes began to. brighten, and he un-
burdened himself of a long history in which a trip to

45

46 THE SOLID MULDOON

Malham Cove, a girl at Pateley Brigg, a ganger, himself
and a pair of clogs were mixed in drawling tangle.

' An'' so Ah coot's yead oppen from t' chin to t' hair,
an' he was abed for t' matter o' a month,' concluded
Learoyd pensively.

Mulvaney came out of a reverie — he was lying down
— and flourished his heels in the air. ' You're a man,
Learoyd,' said he critically, ' but you've only fought wid
men, an' that's an ivry-day expayrience ; but I've stud
up to a ghost, an' that was not an ivry-day expayrience.'

'No?' said Ortheris, throwing a cork at him. 'You
git up an' address the 'ouse — you an' yer expayriences.
Is it a bigger one nor usual ? '

' 'Twas the livin' trut' ! ' answered Mulvaney, stretch-
ing out a huge arm and catching Ortheris by the collar.
' Now where are ye, me son? Will ye take the wurrud
av the Lorrd out av my mouth another time ? ' He
shook him to emphasise the question.

' No, somethin' else, though,' said Ortheris, making a
dash at Mulvaney's pipe, capturing it and holding it at
arm's length; ' I'll chuck it acrost the ditch if you don't
let me go ! '

' You maraudin' hathen ! 'Tis the only cutty I iver
loved. Handle her tinder or I'll chuck you acrost the
nullah. If that poipe was bruk — Ah ! Give her back
to me, Sorr ! '

Ortheris had passed the treasure to my hand. It was
an absolutely perfect clay, as shiny as the black ball at
Pool. I took it reverently, but I was firm.

' Will you tell us about the ghost-fight if I do ?' I
said.

' Is ut the shtory that's troublin' you ? Av course I
will. I mint to all along. I was only gettin' at ut my

THE SOLID MULDOON 47

own way, as Popp Doggie said whin they found him
thrying to ram a cartridge down the muzzle. Orth'ris,
fall away ! '

He released the little Londoner, took back his pipe,
filled it, and his eyes twinkled. He has the most elo-
quent eyes of any one that I know.

' Did I iyer tell you,' he began, ' that I was wanst the
divil av a man ? '

' You did,' said Learoyd with a childish gravity that
made Ortheris yell with laughter, for Mulvaney was
always impressing upon us his great merits in the old
days.

' Did I iver tell you,' Mulvaney continued calmly,
' that I was wanst more av a divil than I am now ? '

' Mer — ^ria ! You don't mean it ? ' said Ortheris.

' Whin I was Corp'ril — I was rejuced af therwards —
but, as I say, whin I was Corp'ril, I was a divil of a man.'

He was silent for nearly a minute, while his mind
rummaged among old memories and his eye glowed.
He bit upon the pipe-stem and charged into his tale.

' Eyah ! They was great times. I'm ould now ; me
hide's wore off in patches ; sinthrygo has disconceited
me, an' I'm a married man tu. But I've had my day —
I've had my day, an' nothin' can take away the taste av
that ! Oh my time past, whin I put me fut through ivry .
livin' wan av the Tin Commandmints between Revelly;
and Lights Out, blew the froth off a pewter, wiped me
moustache wid the back av me hand, an' slept on ut all
as quiet as a little child ! But ut's over — ut's over,
an' 'twUl niver come back to me ; not though I prayed
for a week av Sundays. Was there any wan in the
Ould Rig'mint to touch Corp'ril Terence Mulvaney
whin that same was turned out for sedukshin ? I niver

48 THE SOLID MULDOON

met him. Ivry woman that was not a witch was worth
the runnin' afther in those days, an' ivry man was my
dearest frind or — I had stripped to him an' we knew
which was the betther av the tu.

' Whin I was Corp'ril I wud not ha' changed wid the
Colonel — no, nor yet the Commandher-in-Chief. I
wud be a Sargint. There was nothin' I wud not be !
Mother av Hivin, look at me ! Fwhat am I now f

' We was quartered in a big cantonmint — 'tis no
manner av use namin' names, for ut might give the
barricks disrepitation — an' I was the Imperor av the
Earth to my own mind, an' wan or tu women thought
the same. Small blame to thim. Afther we had lain
there a year, Bragin, the Colour Sargint av E C«)mp'ny,
wint an' took a wife that was lady's maid to some big
lady in the Station. She's dead now is Annie Bragin

— died in child-bed at Kiipa Tal, or ut may ha' been
Almorah — seven — nine years gone, an' Bragin he
married agin. But she was a pretty woman whin Bragin
inthrojuced her to cantonmint society. She had eyes
like the brown av a buttherfly's wing whin the sun
catches ut, an' a waist no thicker than my arm, an' a
little sof button av a mouth I would ha' gone through
all Asia bristlin' wid bay'nits to get the kiss av. An'
her hair was as long as the tail av the Colonel's charger

— forgive me mentionin' that blunderin' baste in the
same mouthful with Annie Bragin — but 'twas all shpun
gold, an' time was when a lock av ut was more than
di'monds to me. There was niver pretty woman yet, an'
I've had thruck wid a few, cud open the door to Annie
Bragin.

' ' Twas in the Cath'lic Chapel I saw her first, me oi
rolling round as usual to see fwhat was to be seen.

THE SOLID MULDOON 49

" You're too good for Bragin, my love," thinks I to
mesilf , " but that's a mistake I can put straight, or my
name is not Terence Mulvaney."

' Now take my wurrd for ut, you Orth'ris there an'
Learoyd, an' kape out av the Married Quarters — as I
did not. No good iver comes av ut, an' there's always
the chance av your bein' found wid your face in the
dirt, a long picket in the back av your head, an' your
hands playing the fifes on the tread av another man's
doorstep. 'Twas so we found O'Hara, he that Rafferty
killed six years gone, when he wint to his death wid his
hair oiled, whistlin' Larry 0''Rourhe betune his teeth.
Kape out av the Married Quarters, I say, as I did not.
'Tis onwholesim, 'tis dangerous, an' 'tis ivrything else
that's bad, but — O my sowl, 'tis swate while ut
lasts !

' I was always hangin' about there whin I was off
duty an' Bragin wasn't, but niver a sweet word beyon'
ordinar' did I get from Annie Bragin. " 'Tis the per-
varsity av the sect," sez I to mesilf, an' gave my cap
another cock on my head an' straightened my back
— 'twas the back av a Dhrum Major in those days — an'
wint off as tho' I did not care, wid all the women in the
Married Quarters laughin'. I was pershuaded — most
bhoys are I'm thinkin' — that no woman born av woman
cud stand against me av I hild up my little finger. I
had reason fer thinkin' that way — till I met Annie
Bragin.

'Time an' agin whin I was blandandherin' in the
dusk a man wud go past me as quiet as a cat. " That's
quare," thinks I, "for I am, or I should be, the only
man in these parts. Now what divilment can Annie be
up to ? " Thin I called myself a blayguard for thinkin'

60 THE SOLID MULDOON

such things; but I thought thim all the same. An'
that, mark you, is the way av a man.

' Wan evenin' I said : — " Mrs. Bragin, manin' no
disrespect to you, who is that Corp'ril man " — I had
seen the stripes though I cud niver get sight av his
face — " who is that Corp'ril man that comes in always
whin I'm goin' away ? "

' " Mother av God ! " sez she, turnin' as white as my
belt ; " have you seen him too ? "

' " Seen him ! " sez I ; " av coorse I have. Did ye want
me not to see him, for" — we were standin' talkin' in
the dhark, outside the veranda av Bragin's quarters —
"you^d betther tell me to shut me eyes. Onless I'm
mistaken, he's come now."

. ' An', sure enough, the Corp'ril man was walkin' to us,
hangin' his head down as though he was ashamed av
himsilf.

' " Good-night, Mn. Bragin," sez I, very cool ; " 'tis
not for me to interfere wid your a-moors ; but you might
manage some things wid more dacincy. I'm off to can-
teen," I sez.

' I turned on my heel an' wint away, swearin' I wud
give that man a dhressin' that wud shtop him messin'
about the Married Quarters for a month an' a week. I
had not tuk ten paces before Annie Bragin was hangin'
on to my arm, an' I cud feel that she was shakin' all over.

' " Stay wid me, Mister Mulvaney," sez she ; " you're
flesh an' blood, at the least — are ye not?"

'"I'm all that," sez I, an' my anger wint away«in a
flash. " Will I want to be asked twice, Annie ? "

' Wid that I slipped my arm round her waist, for»
begad, I fancied she had surrindered at discretion, an'
the honours av war were mine.

THE SOLID MULDOON 51

' " Fwhat nonsinse is this ? " sez she, dhrawin' hersilf
up on the tips av her dear little toes. " Wid the
mother's milk not dhry on your impident mouth ? Let
go ! " she sez.

'"Did ye not say just now that I was flesh and
blood? " sez I. " I have not changed since," I sez ; an'
I kep' my arm where ut was.

'"Your arms to yoursilf!'' sez she, an' her eyes
sparkild.

'"Sure, 'tis only human nature," sez I, an' I kep'
my arm where ut was.

'"Nature or no nature," sez she, "you take your
arm away or I'll tell Bragin, an' he'll alter the nature
av your head. Fwhat d'you take me for ? " she sez.

' " A woman," sez I ; " the prettiest in barricks."

'"A wife" sez she; "the straightest in canton-
mints ! "

' Wid that I dropped my arm, fejl back tu paces, an'
saluted, for I saw that she mint fwhat she said.'

' Then you know something that some men would
give a good deal to be certain of. How could you tell?'
I demanded in' the interests of Science.

' " Watch the hand," said Mulvaney ; " av she shuts
her hand tight, thumb down over the knuckle, take up
your hat an' go. You'll only make a fool av yoursilf av
you shtay. But av the hand lies opin on the lap, or av
you see her thryin' to shut ut, an' she can't, — go on !
She's not past reasonin' wid."

' Well, as I was sayin', I fell back, saluted, an' was
goin' away.

' " Shtay wid me," she sez. " Look ! He's comin'
again."

' She pointed to the veranda, an' by the Height av

52 THE SOLID MULDOON

Impart'nince, the Corp'ril man was comin' out av Bra-
gin's quarters.

' " He's done that these fire evenin's past," sez Annie
Br'agin. " Oh, fwhat will I do ! "

'"He'll not do ut again," sez I," for I was fightin'
mad.

- ' Kape away from a man that has heen a thrifle
crossed in love till the fever's died down. He rages
like a brute beast.

'I wint up to the man in the veranda, manin', as
sure as I sit, to knock the life out av him. He slipped
into the open. "Fwhat are you doin' philanderin'
about here, ye scum av the gutter?" sez I polite, to
give him his warnin', for I wanted him ready.

' He niver lifted his head, but sez, all mournful an'
melancolius, as if he thought I wud be sorry for him :
" I can't find her," sez he.

'"My troth," sez I, "you've lived too long — you
an' your seekin's an' findin's in a dacint married
woman's quarters ! Hould up your head, ye frozen
thief av Genesis," sez I, " an' you'll find all you want
an' more ! "

' But he niver hild up, an' I let go from the shoulder
to where the hair is short over the eyebrows.

' " That'll do your business," sez I, but it nearly did
mine instid. I put my body weight behind the blow,
but I hit nothing at all, an' near put my shoulther out.
The Corp'ril man was not there, an' Annie Bragin, who
had been watchin' from the veranda, throws up her
heels, an' carries on like a cock whin his neck's wrung
by the dhrummer-bhoy. I wint back to her, for a livin'
woman, an' a woman like Annie Bragin, is more than a
p'rade-groun' full av ghosts. I'd never seen a woman

THE SOLID MULDOON 53

faint before, an' I stud like a shtuck calf, askin' her
whether she was dead, an' prayin' her for the love av
me, an' the love av her husband, an' the love av the
Virgin, to opin her blessed eyes again, an' callin' mesilf
all the names undher the canopy av Hivin for plaguin'
her wid my miserable Ormoors whin I ought to ha' stud
betune her an' this Corp'ril man that had lost the num-
ber av his mess.

' I misremimber fwhat nonsinse I said, but I was not
so far gone that I cud not hear a fut on the dirt outside.
'Twas Bragin comin' in, an' by the same token Annie
was comin' to. I jumped to the far end av the veranda
an' looked as if butter wudn't melt in my mouth. But
Mrs. Quinn, the Quarter-Master's wife that was, had
tould Bragin about my hangin' round Annie.

' " I'm not pleased wid you, Mulvaney," sez Bragin,
unbucklin' his sword, for he had been on duty.

' " That's bad hearin', " I sez, an' I knew that the
pickets were dhriven in. "What for, Sargint?" sez I.

' " Come outside," sez he, " an' I'll show you why."

' " I'm willin'," I sez ; " but my stripes are none so
ould that I can afford to lose thim. Tell me now, who
do I go out wid ? " sez I.

' He was a quick man an' a just, an' saw fwhat I wud
be afther. " Wid Mrs. Bragin's husband," sez he. He
might ha' known by me askin' that favour that I had
done him no wrong.

'We wint to the back av the arsenal an' I stripped
to him, an' for ten minutes 'twas all I cud do to pre-
vent him killin' himself against my fistes. He was mad
as a dumb dog — just frothing wid rage; but he had
no chanst wid me in reach, or learnin', or anything
else.

54 THE SOLID MULDOON

" ' Will ye hear reason ? " sez I, whin his first wind
was run out.

' " Not whoile I can see," sez he. Wid that I gave
him both, one after the other, smash through the low
gyard that he'd been taught whin he was a boy, an' the
eyebrow shut down on the cheek-bone like the wing av
a sick crow.

' " Will you hear reason now, ye brave man? " sez I.

' " Not whoile I can speak," sez he, staggerin' up
blind as a stump. I was loath to do ut, but I wint
round an' swung into the jaw side-on an' shifted ut a
half pace to the lef.

'"Will ye hear reason now?" sez I; "I can't keep
my timper much longer, an' 'tis like I wiU hurt you."

' " Not whoile I can stand," he mumbles out av one
corner av his mouth. So I closed an' threw him —
blind, dumb, an' sick, an' jammed the jaw straight.

' " You're an ould fool, Mister Bragin," sez I.

' " You're a young thief," sez he, " an' you've bruk
my heart, you an' Annie betune you ! "

' Thin he began cryin' like a child as he lay. I was
sorry as I had niver been before. 'Tis an awful thing
to see a strong man cry.

' " I'll swear on the Cross ! " sez I.

' " I care for none av your oaths," sez he.

' " Come back to your quarters," sez I, " an' if you
don't believe the livin', begad, you shall listen to the
dead," I sez.

'I hoisted him an' tuk him back to his quarters.
" Mrs. Bragin," sez I, " here's a man that you can cure
quicker than me."

' " You've shamed me before my wife," he whimpers.

'"Have I so?" sez I. "By the look on Mrs. Bragia's

THE SOLID MULDOON 55

face I think I'm for a dhressin'-down worse than I gave
you."

' An' I was ! Annie Bragin was woild wid indigna-
tion. There was not a name that a dacint woman cud
use that was not given my way. I've had my Colonel
walk roun' me like a cooper roun' a cask for fifteen
minuts in Ord'ly Room, bekaze I wint into the Corner
Shop an unstrapped lewnatic ; but all that I iver tuk
from his rasp av a tongue was ginger-pop to fwhat
Annie tould me. An' that, mark you, is the way av a
woman.

' Whin ut was done for want av breath, an' Annie
was bendin' over her husband, I sez : " 'Tis all thrue,
an' I'm a blayguard an' you're an honest woman ; but
will you tell him of wan service that I did you ? "

' As I finished speakin' the Corp'ril man came up to
the veranda, an' Annie Bragin shquealed. The moon
was up, an' we cud see his face.

' " I can't find her," sez the Corp'ril man," an' wint
out like the puff av a candle.

' " Saints stand betune us an' evil ! " sez Bragin,
crossin' himself ; " that's Flahy av the Tyrone."

' "Who was he?" I sez, " for he has given me a dale
av fightin' this day."

' Bragin tould us that Flahy was a Corp'ril who lost
his wife av cholera in those quarters three years gone,
an' wint mad, an' walked afther they buried him,
huntin' for her.

' " Well," sez I to Bragin, " he's been hookin' out av
Purgathory to kape company wid Mrs. Bragin ivry
evenin' for the last fortnight. You may tell Mrs.
Quinn, wid my love, for I know that she's been talkin'
to you, an' you've been listenin', that she ought to

66 THE SOLID MULDOON

ondherstand the differ 'twixt a man an' a ghost. She's
had three husbands," sez I, " an' you\Q got a wife too
good for you. Instid av which you lave her to be
boddered by ghosts an' — an' all manner av evil
spirruts. I'll niver go talkin' in the way av politeness
to a man's wife again. Good-night to you both," sez I ,
an' wid that I wint away, havin' fought wid woman,
man and Divil all in the heart av an hour. By the
same token I gave Father Victor wan rupee to say a
mass for Flahy's soul, me bavin' discommoded him by
shticking my fist into his systim.'

' Your ideas of politeness seem rather large, Mul-
vaney,' I said.

' That's as you look at ut,' said Mulvaney calmly ;
' Annie Bragin niver cared for me. For all that, I did
not want to leave anythinfe,behin' me that Bragin could
take hould av to be angcy wid her about — whin an
honust wurrd cud ha' cleared all up. There's nothing
like opiu-speakin'. Orth'ris, ye scutt, let me put me oi
to that bottle, for my throat's as dhry as whin I thought
I wud get a kiss from Annie Bragin. An' that's four-
teen years gone ! Eyah ! Cork's own city an' the blue
sky above ut — an' the times that was — the times that

was

)'

WITH THE MAIN GUARD

Der jungere Uhlanen
Sit roiond mit open mouth
While Breitmanu tell dem stdories
Of fightin' in the South ;
Und gif dem moral lessons,
How before der battle pops,
Take a little prayer to Himmel
Und a goot long drink of Schnapps.

Hans Breitmann' s Ballads.

■ Mauy, Mother av Mercy, fwhat the divil possist us
to take an' kape this melancolious counthry ? Answer
me that, Sorr.'

It was Mulvaney who was speaking. The time was
one o'clock of a stifling June night, and the place was
the main gate of Fort Amara, most desolate and least de-
sirable of all fortresses in India. What I was doing there
at that hour is a question which only concerns M'Grath
the Sergeant of the Guard, and the men on the gate.

' Slape,' said Mulvaney, ' is a shuparfluous necessity.
This gyard'U shtay lively till relieved.' He himself
was stripped to the waist ; Learoyd on the next bed-
stead was dripping from the skinful of water which
Ortheris, clad oiily in white trousers, had just sluiced
over his shoulders ; and a fourth private was mutter-
ing uneasily as he dozed open-mouthed in the glare of
the great guard-lantern. The heat under the bricked
archway was terrifying.

57

58 WITH THE MAIN GUARD

' The worrst night that iver I remimber. Eyali ! Is
all Hell loose this tide ? ' said Mulvaney. A puff of
burning wind lashed through the wicket-gate like a
wave of the sea, and Ortheris swore.

'Are ye more heasy, Jock?' he said to Learoyd.
'Put yer 'ead between your legs. It'U go orf in a
minute.'

' Ah don't care. Ah would not care, but ma heart
is plaayin' tiwy-tivvy on ma ribs. Let me die !
Oh, leave me die ! ' groaned the huge Yorkshireman,
who was feeling the heat acutely, being of fleshly
build.

The sleeper under the lantern roused for a moment
and raised himself on his elbow. — ' Die and be damned
then ! " he said. ' Tra damned and I can't die ! '

' Who's that ? ' I whispered, for the voice was new
to me.

' Gentleman born,' said Mulvaney; ' Corp'ril wan
year, Sargint nex'. Red-hot on his C'mission, but
dhrinks like a fish. He'll be gone before the cowld
weather's here. So ! '

He slipped his boot, and with the naked toe just
touched the trigger of his Martini. Ortheris mis-
understood the movement, and the next instant the
Irishman's rifle was dashed aside, while Ortheris stood
before him, his eyes blazing with reproof.

' You ! ' said Ortheris. ' My Gawd, you ! If it was
you, wot would we do ? '

' Kape quiet, little man,' said Mulvaney, putting him
aside, but very gently; ' 'tis not me, nor wiU ut be
me whoile Dinah Shadd's here. I was but showin'
something.'

Learoyd, bowed on his bedstead, groaned, and the

WITH THE MAIN GUARD 59

gentleman-ranker sighed in his sleep. Ortheris took
Mulvaney's tendered pouch, and we three smoked
gravely for a space while the dust-devils danced on the
glacis and scoured the red-hot plain.

' Pop ? ' said Ortheris, wiping his forehead.

'■ Don't tantalise wid talkin' av dhrink, or I'll shtuff
you into your own breech-block an' — fire you o£f!'
grunted Mulvaney.

Ortheris chuckled, and from a niche in the veranda
produced six bottles of gingerade.

' Where did ye get ut, ye Machiavel ? ' said Mul-
vaney. ' 'Tis no bazar pop. '

' 'Ow do Si know wot the Orf'cers drink? ' answered
Ortheris. 'Arst the mess-man.'

' Ye'U have a Disthrict Coort-martial settin' on ye
yet, me son,' said Mulvaney, ' but ' — he opened a bot-
tle — 'I will not report ye this time. Fwhat's in the
mess-kid is mint for the belly, as they say, 'specially
whin that mate is dhrink. Here's luck ! A bloody
war or a — no, we've got the sickly season. War,
thin ! " — he waved the innocent ' pop ' to the four
quarters of Heaven. ' Bloody war ! North, East,
South, an' West ! Jock, ye quakin' hayrick, come
an' dhrink.'

But Learoyd, half mad with the fear of death pre-
saged in the swelling veins of his neck, was pegging
his Maker to strike him dead, and fighting for more air
between his prayers. A second time Ortheris drenched
the quivering body with water, and the giant revived.

' An' Ah divn't see th,ot a mon is i' fettle for. gooin'
on to live ; an' Ah divn't see thot there is owt for
t' livin' for. Hear now, lads ' Ah'm tired — tired.
There's nobbut watter i' ma bones. Let me die ! '

60 "WITH THE MAIN GUAED

The hollow of the arch gave back Learoyd's broken
whisper in a bass boom. Mnlvaney looked at me hope-
lessly, but I remembered how the madness of despair
had once fallen upon Ortheris, that weary, weary after-
noon in the banks of the Khemi River, and how it had
been exorcised by the skilful magician Mulvaney.

' Talk, Terence ! ' I said, ' or we shall have Learoyd
slinging loose, and he'll be worse than Ortheris was.
Talk ! He'll answer to your voice.'

Almost before Ortheris had deftly thrown all the
rifles of the Guard on Mulvaney's bedstead, the Irish-
man's voicp was uplifted as that of one in the middle
of a story, and, turning to me, he said —

' In barricks or out of it, as you say, Sorr, an Oirish
rig'mint is the divil an' more. 'Tis only fit for a
young man wid eddicated fisteses. Oh the crame av
disruption is an Oirish rig'mint, an' rippin'. tearin',
ragin' scattherers in the field av war ! My first rig'-
mint was Oirish — Faynians an' rebils to the heart av
their marrow was they, an' so they fought for the Widdy
betther than most, bein' contrairy — Oirish. They was
the Black Tyrone. You've heard av thim, Sorr ? '

Heard of them ! I knew the Black Tyrone for the
choicest collection of unmitigated blackguards, dog-
stealers, robbers of hen-roosts, assaulters of innocent
citizens, and recklessly daring heroes in the Army
List. Half Europe and half Asia has had cause to
know the Black Tyrone — good luck be with their tat-
tered Colours as Glory has ever been !

' They was hot pickils an' ginger ! I cut a man's
head tu deep wid my belt in the days av my youth,
an', afther some circumstances which I wDl oblither-
ate, I came to the Ould Rig'mint, bearin' the char-

WITH THE MAIN GUARD 61

acter av a man wid hands an' feet. But, as I was
goin' to tell you, I fell acrost the Black Tyrone
agin wan day whin we wanted thim powerful bad.
Orth'ris, me son, fwhat was the name av that place
where they sint wan comp'ny av us an' wan av the
Tyrone roun' a hill an' down again, all for to tache
the Paythans something they'd niver learned before?
Afther Ghuzni 'twas.'

' Don't know what the bloomin' Paythans called it.
We called it Silver's Theayter. You know that, sure I '

'Silver's Theatre — so 'twas. A gut betune two
hills, as black as a bucket, an' as thin as a girl's waist.
There was over-many Paythans for our convaynience
in the gut, an' begad they called thimselves a Reserve
— bein' impident by natur ! Our Scotchies an' lashins
av Gurkys was poundin' into some Paythan rig'mints,
I think 'twas. Scotchies an' Gurkys are twins bekaze
they're so onlike, an' they get dhrunk together whin
God plazes. As I was sayin', they sint wan comp'ny
av the Ould an' wan av the Tyrone to double up the
hill an' clane out the Paythan Reserve. Orf'cers was
scarce in thim days, fwhat with dysintry an' not takin'
care av thimselves, an' we was sint out wid only wan
orf 'cer for the comp'ny ; but he was a Man that had
his feet beneath him, an' all his teeth in their sockuts.'

' Who was he ? ' I asked.

' Captain O'Neil — Old Crook — Cruikna-buUeen —
him that I tould ye that tale av whin he was in Burma. ^
Hah ! He wa§ a Man. The Tyrone tuk a little orf cer
bhoy, but divil a bit was he in command, as I'll dimon-
strate presintly. We an' they came over the brow av

1 Now first of the foemen of Boh Da Thone
Was Captain O'Neil of the Black Tyrone.

The Ballad of Boh Da Thone.

62 WITH THE MAIN GUARD

the liill, wan on eacli side av the gut, an' there was
that ondacint Reserve waitin' down below like rats in
a pit.

' " Howld on, men," sez Crook, who tuk a mother's
care av us always. " Rowl some rocks on thim by way
av visitin'-kyards." We hadn't rowled more than
twinty bowlders, an' the Paythans was begiimin' to
swear tremenjus, whin the little orf'cer bhoy av the
Tyrone shqueaks out acrost the valley : — " Fwhat the
devil an' all are you doin', shpoilin' the fun for my
men? Do ye not see they'll stand?"

' " Faith, that's a rare pluckt wan ! " sez Crook.
"Niver mind the rocks, men. Come along down an'
take tay wid thim ! "

' " There's damned little sugar in ut ! " sez my rear-
rank man ; but Crook heard.

' " Have ye not all got spoons ? " he sez, laughin', an'
down we wint as fast as we cud Learoyd bein' sick
at the Base, he, av coorse, was not there."

' Thot's a lie ! ■ said Learoyd, dragging his bedstead
nearer. ' Ah gotten thot theer, an' you knaw it, Mul-
vaney.' He threw up his arms, and from the right
arm-pit ran, diagonally through the fell of his chest, a
thin white line terminating near the fourth left rib

'My mind's goin',' said Mulvaney, the unabashed.
' Ye were there. Fwhat I was thinkin' of ! 'Twas
another man, av coorse. Well, you'll remimber thin,
Jock, how we an' the Tyrone met wid a bang at the
bottom an' got jammed past all movin' among the
Paythans.'

'Ow! It was a tight 'ole. I was squeezed till I
thought I'd bloomin' well bust,' said Ortheris, rubbing
his stomach meditatively.

WITH THE MAIN GUABD 63

' 'Twas no place for a little man, but wan little man '
— Mulvaney put his hand on Ortheris's shoulder —
'saved the life av me. There we shtuek, for di\dl a
bit did the Paythans flinch, an' divil a bit dare we :
our business bein' to clear 'em out. An' the most
exthryordinar' thing av all was that we an' they just
rushed into each other's arrums, an' there was no firing
for a long time. Nothin' but knife an' bay'nit when we
cud get our hands free : an' that was not often. We
was breast-on to thim, an' the Tyrone was yelpin
behind av us in a way I didn't see the lean av at first.
But I knew later, an' so did the Paythans.

' " Knee to knee ! " sings out Crook, wid a laugh
whin the rush av our comin' into the gut shtopped,
an' he was huggin' a hairy great Paythan, neither bein'
able to do anything to the other, tho' both was wishful.

' " Breast to breast ! " he sez, as the Tyrone was
pushin' us forward closer an' closer.

' " An' hand over back ! " sez a Sargint that was
behin'. I saw a sword lick out past Crook's ear, an'
the Paythan was tuk in the apple av his throat like a
pig at Dromeen fair.

' " Thank ye. Brother Inner Guard," sez Crook, cool
as a cucumber widout salt. " I wanted that room."
An' he wint forward by the thickness av a man's body,
havin' turned the Paythan undher him. The man bit
the heel off Crook's boot in his death-bite.

' " Push, men ! " sez Crook. " Push, ye paper-backed
beggars ! " he sez. "Am I to pull ye through?" So
we pushed, an' we kicked, an' we swung, an' we swore,
an' the grass bein' slippery, our heels wouldn't bite,
an' God help the front-rank man that wint do-wm that
day!'

64 WITH THE MAIN GUARD

' 'Ave you ever bin in the Pit lientrance o' the Vic.
on a thick night ? ' interrupted Ortheris. ' It was
worse nor that, for they was goin' one way an' we
wouldn't 'ave it. Leastaways, I 'adn't much to say.'

' Faith, me son, ye said ut, thin, I kep' the little
man betune my knees as long as I cud, but he was
pokin' roun' wid his bay'nit, blindin' an' stiffin' fero-
shus. The devil of a man is Orth'ris in a ruction —
aren't ye ? ' said Mulvaney.

' Don't make game ! ' said the Cockney. ' I knowed
I wasn't no good then, but I guv 'em compot from the
lef ' flank when we opened out. No ! ' he said, bring-
ing down his hand with a thump on the bedstead, ' a
bay'nit ain't no good to a little man — might as well
'ave a bloomin' fishin'-rod ! I 'ate a clawin', maulin'
mess, but gimme a breech that's wore out a bit, an'
hamminition one year in store, to let the powder kiss
the bullet, an' put me somewheres where I ain't trod
on by 'ulkin swine like you, an' s'elp me Gawd, I could
bowl you over five times outer seven at height 'undred.
Would yer try, you lumberin' Hirishman.'

' No, ye wasp. I've seen ye do ut. I say there's
nothin' better than the bay'nit, wid a long reach, a
double twist av ye can, an' a slow recover.'

' Dom the bay'nit,' said Learoyd, who had been
listening intently. ' Look a-here ! ' He picked up a
rifle an inch below the foresight with an underhand
action, and used it exactly as a man would, use a
dagger.

' Sitha,' said he softly, ' thot's better than owt, for a
mon can bash t' faace wi' thot, an', if he divn't, he can
breeak t' forearm o' t' gaard. 'Tis not i' t' books,
though. Gie me t' butt.'

WITH THE MAIN GUARD 65

' Each does ut his own way, like makin' love,' said
Mulvaney quietly; ' the butt or the bay'nit or the
bullet accordin' to the natur' av the man. Well, as I
was sayin', we shtuck there breathin' in each other's
faces and swearin' powerful; Orth'ris cursin' the
mother that bore him bekaze he was not three inches
taller.

' Prisintly he sez : — " Duck, ye lump, an' I can get
at a man over your shouldher ! "

' " You'll blow me head off," I sez, throwin' my arm
clear; "go through under my arm-pit, ye bloodthirsty
little scutt," sez I, "but don't shtick me or I'll wring
your ears round."

'Fwhat was ut ye gave the Paythan man forninst
me, him that cut at me whin I cudn't move hand or
foot ? Hot or cowld was ut ? '

' Cold,' said Ortheris, ' up an' under the rib-jint. 'E
come down flat. Best for you 'e did.'

' Thrue, my son ! This jam thing that I'm talkin'
about lasted for five minutes good, an' thin we got
our arms clear an' wint in. I misremimber exactly
fwhat I did, but I didn't want Dinah to be a widdy
at the Depot. Thin, after some promishkuous hackin'
we shtuck again, an' the TjTone behin' was callin' us
dogs an' cowards an' all manner av names; we barrin'
their way.

' "Fwhat ails the Tyrone ? " thinks I; "they've the
makin's av a most convanient fight here."

' A man behind me sez beseechful an' in a whisper :
— " Let me get at thim ! For the Love av Mary give
me room beside ye, ye tall man ! "

' " An' who are you that's so anxious to be kilt ? "
sez I, widout turnin' my head, for the long knives was

66 WITH THE MAIN GUARD

dancin' in front like the sun on Donegal Bay whin ut's
rough.

'"We've seen .our dead," he sez, squeezin' into me;
" our dead that was men two days gone ! An' me that
was his cousin by blood could not bring Tim Coulan
off ! Let me get on," he sez, " let me get to thim or
I'll run ye through the back ! "

' " My troth," thinks I, " if the Tyrone have seen
their dead, God help the Paythans this day ! " An'
thin I knew why the Oirish was ragin' behind us as
they was.

' I gave room to the man, an' he ran forward wid the
Haymakers' Lift on his bay'nit an' swung a Paythan
clear off his feet by the belly-band av the brute, an' the
iron bruk at the lockin'-ring.

' " Tim Coulan '11 slape easy to-night,' sez he wid
a grin; an' the next minut his head was in two halves
and he wint down grinnin' by sections.

' The Tyrone was pushin' an' pushin' in, an' our men
was swearin' at thim, an' Crook was workin' away in
front av us all, his sword-arm swingin' like a pump-
handle an' his revolver spittin' like a cat. But the
strange thing av ut was the quiet that lay upon.
'Twas like a fight in a drame — except for thim that
was dead.

' Whin I gave room to the Oirishman I was expinded
an' forlorn in my inside. 'Tis a way I have, savin' your
presince, Sorr, in action. " Let me out, bhoys," sez I,
backin' in among thim. "I'm goin' to be onwell! "
Faith they gave me room at the wurrud, though they
would not ha' given room for all HeU wid the chill off.
When I got clear, I was, savin' your presince, Sorr,
outragis sick bekaze I had dlirunk heavy that day.

WITH THE MAIN GUABD 67

'Well an' far out av harm was a Sargint av the
Tyrone sittin' on the little orf cer bhoy who had stopped
Crook from rowlin' the rocks. Oh, he was a beautiful
bhoy, an' the long black curses was slidin' out av his
innocint motith like mornin'-jew from a rose !

' " Fwhat have you got there ? " sez I to the
Sargint.

' " Wan av Her Majesty's bantams wid his spurs up,"
sez he. "He's goin' to Coort-martial me."

' " Let me go ! " sez the little orf 'cer bhoy. " Let
me go and command my men ! " manin' thereby the
Black Tyrone which was beyond any command — ay,
even av they had made the Divil a Field-orf'cer.

' " His father howlds my mother's cow-feed in Clon-
mel," sez the man that was sittin' on him. " WiU I go
back to Mb mother an' tell her that I've let him throw
himself away? Lie stUl, ye little pinch av dynamite,
an' Coort-martial me aftherwards."

'"Good," sez I; "'tis the likes av him makes the
likes av the Commandher-in-Chief, but we must pre-
sarve thim. Fwhat d' you want to do, Sorr ? " sez I,
very politeful.

' " Kill the beggars — kill the beggars ! " he shqueaks ;
his big blue eyes brimmin' wid tears.

' " An' how'U ye do that ? " sez I. " You've shquibbed
off your revolver like a child wid a cracker ; you can
make no play wid that fine large sword av yours ; an'
your hand's shakin' like an asp on a leaf. Lie still
an' grow," sez I.

'"Get back to your comp'ny," sez he; "you're
insolint ! "

' " All in good time," sez I, " but I'll have a dhrink
first."

68 WITH THE MAIN GUARD

' Just thin Crook comes up, blue an' white all over
where he wasn't red.

' " Wather ! " sez he ; " I'm dead wid drouth ! Oh,
but it's a gran' day ! "

' He dhrank half a skinful, and the rest he tUts into
his chest, an' it fair hissed on the hairy hide av him.
He sees the little orf 'cer bhoy undher the Sargint.

'"Fwhat's yonder?" sez he.

'"Mutiny, Sorr," sez the Sargint, an' the orf 'cer
bhoy begins pleadin' pitiful to Crook to be let go : but
divil a bit wud Crook budge.

' " Kape him there," he sez, " 'tis no child's work
this day. By the same token," sez he, " I'll confish-
cate that iligant nickel-plated scent-sprinkler av yours,
for my own has been vomitin' dishgraceful ! "

' The fork av his hand was black wid the backspit
av the machine. So he tuk the orf'cer bhoy's revolver.
Ye may look, Sorr, but, by my faith, there's a dale more
done in the field than iver gets into Field Ordhers !

'"Come on, Mulvaney," sez Crook; "is this a
Coort-martial ? " The two av us wint back together
into the mess an' the Paythans were stUl standin'
up. They was not too impart'nint though, for the
Tyrone was callin' wan to another to remimber Tim
Coulan.

' Crook stopped outside av the strife an' looked anx-
ious, his eyes rowlin' roun'.

' " Fwhat is ut, Sorr ? " sez I ; " can I get ye
anything ? "

' " Where's a bugler ? " sez he.

' I wint into the crowd — our men was dhrawin'
breath behin' the Tyrone who was fightin' like sowls
in tormint — an' prisintly I came acrost little Frehan,

WITH THE MAIN GUARD 69

our bugler bhoy, pokin' rouu' among the best wid a
rifle an' bay'nit.

'"Is amusin' yoursilf fwhat you're paid for, ye
limb ? " sez I, catcliin' him by the scruff. " Come out
av that an' attind to your duty," I sez ; but the bhoy
was not pleased.

' " I've got wan," sez he, grinnin', " big as you, Mul-
vaney, an' fair half as ugly. Let me go get another."

'I was dishpleased at the personability av that re-,
mark, so I tucks him under my arm an' carries him to
Crook who was watchin' how the fight wint. Crook
cuffs him till the bhoy cries, an' thin sez nothin' for a
whoile,

'The Paythans began to flicker onaisy, an' our
men roared. " Opin ordher ! Double ! " sez Crook.
"Blow, child, blow for the honour av the British
Arrrdy ! "

' That bhoy blew like a typhoon, an' the Tyrone an'
we opined out as the Paythans broke, an' I saw that
fwhat had gone before wud be kissin' an' huggin'
to fwhat was to come. We'd dhruv thim into a
broad part av the gut whin they gave, an' thin we
opined out an' fair danced down the valley, dhrivin'
thim before us. Oh, 'twas lovely, an' stiddy, too !
There was the Sargints on the flanks av what was
left av us, kapin' touch, an' the fire was runnin' from
flank to flank, an' the Paythans was dhroppin'. We
opined out wid the widenin' av the valley, an' whin
the valley narrowed we closed again like the shticks
on a lady's fan, an' at the far ind av the gut where
they thried to stand, we fair blew them off their feet,
for we had expinded very little ammunition by reason
av the knife work.'

70 WITH THE, MAIN GUAKD

' Hi used thirty rounds goin' down that valley,' said
Ortheris, ' an' it was gentleman's work. Might 'a' done
it in a white 'andkerchief an' pint silk stockin's, that
part. Hi was on in that piece.'

' You could ha' heard the Tyrone yellin' a mile away,'
said Mulvaney, ' an' 'twas all their Sargints cud do to
get thim off. They was mad — mad — mad! Crook
sits down in the quiet that fell whin we had gone
down the valley, an' covers his face wid his hands.
Prisintly we all came back again accordin' to our
natures and disposishins, for they, mark you, show
through the hide av a man in that hour.

' "JBhoys ! bhoys ! " sez Croo^k to himself. " I mis-
doubt we could ha' engaged at long range an' saved
betther men than me." He looked at our dead an'
said no more.

' " Captain dear," sez a man av the Tyrone, comin'
up wid his mouth bigger than iver his mother kissed
ut, spittin' blood like a whale ; " Captain dear," sez
he, "if wan or two in the shtalls have been discom-
moded, the gallery have enjoyed the performinces av a
Roshus."

' Thill I knew that man for the Dublin dock-rat he
was — wan av the bhoys that made the lessee av Sil-
ver's Theatre gray before his time wid tearin' out the
bowils av the benches an' t'rowin' thim into the pit.
So I passed the wurrud that I knew when I was in the
Tyrone an' we lay in Dublin. " I don't know who
'twas," I whispers, " an' I don't care, but anyways I'll
knock the face av you, Tim Kelly."

' " Eyah ! " sez the man, " was you there too ? We'll
call ut Silver's Theatre." Half the Tyrone, knowin' the
ould place, tuk ut up : so we called ut Silver's Theatre.

WITH THE MAIN GUARD 71

'The little orf'cer bhoy av the Tyrone was threm-
blin' an' cryin'. He had no heart for the Coort-Mar-
tials that he talked so big upon. " Ye'U do well later,"
sez Crook, very quiet, "for not bein' allowed to kill
yourself for amusemint."

' " I'm a dishgraced man ! " sez the little orf'cer
bhoy.

' " Put me undher arrest, Sorr, if you wiU, but, by
my sowl, I'd do ut again sooner than face your
mother wid you dead," sez the Sargint that had sat
on his head, standin' to attention an' salutin'. But
the young wan only cried as tho' his little heart was
breakin'.

' Thin another man av the Tyrone came up, wid the
fog av fightin' on him.'

' The what, Mulvaney? '

' Fog av fightin'. You know, Sorr, that, like makin'
love, ut takes each man diff'rint. Now I can't help
bein' powerful sick whin I'm in action. Orth'ris, here,
niver stops swearin' from ind to ind, an' the only time
that Learoyd opins his mouth to sing is whin he is
messin' wid other people's heads ; for he's a dhirty
fighter is Jock. Recruities sometime cry, an' sometime
they don't know fwhat they do, an' sometime they are
all for cuttin' throats an' such like dirtiness ; but some
men get heavy-dead-dhrunk on the fightin'. This man
was. He was staggerin', an' his eyes were half shut,
an' we cud hear him dhraw breath twinty yards
away. He sees the little orf'cer bhoy, an' comes up,
talkin' thick an' drowsy to himsilf. " Blood the young
whelp!" he sez; "blood the young whelp"; an' wid
that he threw up his arms, shpun roun', an' dropped at
our feet, dead as a Paythan, an' there was niver sign

72 WITH THE MAIN GUARD

or scratch on him. They said 'twas his heart was rot-
ten, but oh, 'twas a quare thing to see !

' Thin we wint to bury our dead, for we wud not
lave thim to the Paythans, an' in movin' among the
haythen we nearly lost that little orf'cer bhoy. He
was for givin' wan divil wather and layin' him aisy
against a rock. " Be careful, Sorr," sez I ; "a wounded
Paythan's worse than a live wan." My troth, before
the words was out of my mouth, the man on the ground
fires at the orf'cer bhoy lanin' over him, an' I saw the
helmit fly. I dropped the butt on the face av the man
an' tuk his pistol. The little orf'cer bhoy turned very
white, for the hair av half his head was singed away.

' " I tould you so, Sorr ! " sez I ; an', afther that, whin
he wanted to help ' a Paythan I stud wid the muzzle
contagious to the ear. They dare not do anythin' but
curse. The Tyrone was growlin' like dogs over a bone
that had been taken away too soon, for they had seen
their dead an' they wanted to kill ivry sowl on the
ground. Crook tould thim that he'd blow the hide off
any man that misconducted himself ; but, seeing that
ut was the first time the Tyrone had iver seen their
dead, I do not wondher they were on the sharp. 'Tis
a shameful sight ! Whin I first saw ut I wud niver
ha' given quarter to any man north of the Khaibar —
no, nor woman either, for the women used to come
out afther dhark — Auggrh!

' Well, evenshually we buried our dead an' tuk away
our wounded, an' come over the brow av the hills to
see the Scotchies an' the Gurkys taking tay with the
Paythans in bucketsfuls. We were a gang av dissolute
ruffians, for the blood had caked the dust, an' the sweat
had cut the cake, an' our bay'nits was hangin' like

WITH THE MAIN GUAED 73

butchers' steels betune ur legs, an' most av us were
marked one way or another.

' A Staff Orf'cer man, clean as a new rifle, rides up
an' sez : " What damned scarecrows are you ? "

'"A comp'ny av Her Majesty's Black Tyrone an'
wan av the Ould Rig'mint," sez Crook very quiet,
givin' our visitors the flure as 'twas.

'"Oh!" sez the Staff Orf'cer; "did you dislodge
that Reserve ? "

' " No ! " sez Crook, an' the Tyrone laughed.

' " Thin fwhat the divLl have ye done ? "

' " Disthroyed ut," sez Crook, an' he took us on, but
not before Toomey that was in the Tyrone sez aloud,
his voice somewhere in his stummick : " Fwhat in the
name av misfortune does this parrit widout a tail mane
by shtoppin' the road av his betthers ? "

' The Staff Orf'cer wint blue, an' Toomey makes him
pink by changin' to the voice av a minowderin' woman
an' sayin' : " Come an' kiss me. Major dear, for me hus-
band's at the wars an' I'm all alone at the Depot."

' The Staff Orf'cer wint away, an' I cud see Crook's
shoulthers shakin'.

'His Corp'ril checks Toomey. "Lave me alone,"
sez Toomey, widout a wink. " I was his batman be-
fore he was married an' he knows fwhat I mane, av
you don't. There's nothin' like livin' in the height av
society." D'you remimber that, Orth'ris ! '

'Hi do. Toomey, 'e died in 'orspital, next week it
was, 'cause I bought 'arf his kit ; an' I remember after
that '

' GrrAEBD, TTJEN OUT ! '

The Relief had come ; it was four o'clock. ' I'll
catch a kyart for you, Sorr,' said Mulvaney, diving

74 WITH THE MAIN GUARD

hastily into his accoutrements. ' Come up to the top
av the Fort an' we'll pershue our invistigations into
M'Grath's shtable.' The relieyed Guard strolled round
the main bastion on its way to the swimming-bath, and
Learoyd grew almost talkative. Ortheris looked into
the Fort ditch and across the plain. ' Ho ! it's weary
waitin' for Ma-ary ! ' he hummed ; ' but I'd like to kill
some more bloomin' Paythans before my time's up.
War! Bloody war! North, East, South, and West.'

' Amen,' said Learoyd slowly.

' Fwhat's here ? ' said Mulvaney, checking at a blur of
white by the foot of the old sentry-box. He stooped
and touched it. ' It's Norah — Norah M'Taggart !
Why, Nonie darlin', fwhat are ye doin' out av your
mother's bed at this time ? '

The two-year-old child of Sergeant M'Taggart must
have wandered for a breath of cool air to the very verge
of the parapet of the Fort ditch. Her tiny night-shift
was gathered into a wisp round her neck and she moaned
in her sleep. ' See there ! ' said Mulvaney ; 'poor lamb!
Look at the heat-rash on the innocint skin av her. ' Tis
hard— ^crool hard even for us. Fwhat must it be for
these ? Wake up, Nonie, your mother will be woild about
you. Begad, the child might ha' fallen into the ditch ! '

He picked her up in the growing light, and set her on
his shoulder, and her fair curls touched the grizzled
stubble of his temples. Ortheris and Learoyd followed
snapping their fingers, while Norah smiled at them a
sleepy smile. Then carolled Mulvaney, clear as a lark,
dancing the baby on his arm —

' If any young man should marry you,
Say nothin' about the joke ;
That iver ye slep' in a sinthry-box,
Wrapped up in a soldier's cloak.'

WITH THE MAIN GUARD 75

' Though, on my sowl, Nonie,' he said gravely, ' there
was not much cloak about you. Nirer mind, you won't
dhress like this ten years to come. Kiss your friends
an' run along to your mother.'

Nonie, set down close to the Married Quarters, nodded
with the quiet obedience of the soldier's child, but, ere
she pattered off over the flagged path, held up her lips
to be kissed by the Three Musketeers. Ortheris wiped
his mouth with the back of his hand and swore senti-
mentally ; Learoyd turned pink ; and the two walked
away together. The Yorkshireman lifted up his voice
and gave in thunder the chorus of The Sentry-Box, while
Ortheris piped at his side.

' 'Bin to a bloomin' sing-song, you two ? ' said the
Artilleryman, who was taking his cartridge down to
the Morning Gun. ' You're over merry for these dashed

days.'

' I bid ye take care o' the brat, said he,
For it comes of a noble race,'

Learoyd bellowed. The voices died out in the swim-
ming-bath.

'Oh, Terence!' I said, dropping into Mulvaney's
speech, when we were alone, ' it's you that have the
Tongue ! '

He looked at me wearily ; his eyes were sunk in his

head, and his face was drawn and white. ' Eyah !' said

he ; ' I've blandandhered thim through the night some-

. how, but can thim that helps others help thimselves?

Answer me that, Sorr ! '

And over the bastions of Fort-Amara broke the piti-
less day.

IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE

Hurrah ! hurrah ! a soldier's life for me ! .

Shout, hoys, shout ! for it makes you jolly and free.

The Mamrod Corps.

People who have seen, say that one of the quaintest
spectacles of human frailty is an outbreak of hysterics
in a girls' school. It starts without warning, generally
on a hot afternoon, among the elder pupils. A girl
giggles till the giggle gets beyond control. Then she
throws up her head, and cries, "Monk, honk, honk,^ hke
a wild goose, and tears mix with the laughter. If the
mistress be wise, she will rap out something severe at
this point to check matters. If she be tender-hearted,
and send for a drink of water, the chances are largely
in favour of another girl laughing at the afflicted one
and herself collapsing. Thus the trouble spreads, and
may end in half of what answers to the Lower Sixth of
a boys' school rocking and whooping together. Given
a week of warm weather, two stately promenades per
diem, a heavy mutton and rice meal in the middle of
the day, a certain amount of nagging from the teachers,
and a few other things, some amazing effects develop.
At least, this is what folk say who have had experience.

Now, the Mother Superior of a Convent and the
Colonel of a British Infantry Regiment would be justly
shocked at any comparison being made between their
respective charges. But it is a fact that, under certain

76

IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE 77

circumstances, Thomas in bulk can be worked up into
ditthering, rippling hysteria. He does not weep, but he
shows his trouble unmistakably, and the consequences
get into the newspapers, and all the good people wlio
hardly know a Martini from a Snider say: ' Take away
the brute's ammunition ! '

Thomas isn't a brute, and his business, which is to
look after the virtuous people, demands that he shall
have his ammunition to his hand. He doesn't wear silk
stockings, and he really ought to be supplied with a new
Adjective to help him to express his opinions : but, for
all that, he is a great man. If you call him ' the heroic
defender of the national honour ' one day, and ' a brutal
and licentious soldiery ' the next, you naturally bewilder
him, and he looks upon you with suspicion. There is
nobody to speak for Thomas except people who have
theories to work off on him ; and nobody understands
Thomas except Thomas, and he does not always know
what is the matter with himself.

That is the prologue. This is the story : —
Corporal Slane was engaged to be married to Miss
Jhansi M'Kenna, whose history is well known in the
regiment and elsewhere. He had his Colonel's permis-
sion, and, being popular with the men, every arrange-
ment had been made to give the wedding what Private
Ortheris called ' eeklar.' It fell in the heart of the hot
weather, and, after the wedding, Slane was going up to
the Hills with the bride. None the less, Slane's griev-
ance was that the affair would be only a hired-carriage
wedding, and he felt that the 'eeklar' of that was
meagre. Miss M'Kenna did not care so much. The
Sergeant's wife was helping her to make her wedding-
dress, and she was very busy. Slane was, just then,

78 IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE

the only moderately contented man in barracks. All
the rest were more or less miserable.

And they had so much to make them happy, too.
All their work was over at eight in the morning, and
for the rest of the day they could lie on their backs and
smoke Canteen-plug and swear at the punkah-coolies.
They enjoyed a fine, full flesh meal in the middle of
the day, and then threw themselves down on their cots
and sweated and slept till it was cool enough to go out
with their ' towny,' whose vocabulary contained less
than six hundred words, and the Adjective, and whose
views on every conceivable question they had heard
many times before.

There was the Canteen, of course, and there was the
Temperance Eoom with the second-hand papers in it;
but a man of any profession dannot read for eight hours
a day in a temperature of 96° or 98° in the shade, run-
ning up sometimes to 103° at midnight. Very few men,
even though they get a pannikin of flat, stale, muddy
beer and hide it under their cots, can continue drinking
for six hours a day. One man tried, but he died, and
nearly the whole regiment went to his funeral because
it gave them something to do. It was too early for the
excitement of fever or cholera. The men could only
wait and wait and wait, and watch the shadow of the
barrack creeping across the blinding white dust. That
was a gay life.

They lounged about cantonments — it was too hot
for any sort of game, and almost too hot for vice — and
fuddled themselves in the evening, and filled themselves
to distension with the healthy nitrogenous food provided
for them, and the more they stoked the less exercise
they took and more explosive they grew. Then tempers

IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE 79

began to wear away, and men fell a-brooding over insults
real or imaginary, for they had nothing else to think of.
The tone of the repartees changed, and instead of say-
ing light-heartedly : ' I'll knock your silly face in,' men
grew laboriously polite and hinted that the canton-
ments were not big enough for themselves and their
enemy, and that there would be more space for one of
the two in another Place.

It may have been the Devil who arranged the thing,
but the fact of the case is that Losson had for a long
time been worrying Simmons in an aimless way. It
gave him occupation. The two had their cots side by
side, and would sometimes spend a long afternoon
swearing at each other; but Simmons was afraid of
Losson and dared not challenge him to a fight. He
thought over the words in the hot still nights, and half
the hate he felt towards Losson he vented on the
wretched punkah-coolie.

Losson bought a parrot in the bazar, and put it into a
little cage, and lowered the cage into the cool darkness
of a well, and sat on the well-curb, shouting bad lan-
guage down to the parrot. He taught it to say : ' Sim-
mons, ye so-oor,' which means swine, and several other
things entirely unfit for publication. He was a big
gross man, and he shook like a jelly when the parrot
had the sentence correctly. Simmons, however, shook
with rage, for all the room were laughing at him — the
parrot was such a disreputable puff of green feathers
and it looked so human when it chattered. Losson
used to sit, swinging his fat legs, on the side of the cot,
and ask the parrot what it thought of Simmons. The
parrot would answer : ' Simmons, ye so-oor.' ' Good
boy,' Losson used to say, scratching the parrot's head ;

80 IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE

'ye 'ear that, Sim?' And Simmons used to turn over
on his stomach and make answer : ' I 'ear. Take 'eed
you don't 'ear something one of these days.'

In the restless nights, after he had been asleep all day,
fits of blind rage came upon Simmons and held him till
he trembled all over, while he thought in how many
different ways he would slay Losson. Sometimes he
would picture himself trampling the life out of the man,
with heavy ammunition-boots, and at others smashing
in his face with the butt, and at others jumping on his
shoulders and dragging the head back till the neckbone
cracked. Then his mouth would feel hot and fevered,
and he would reach out for another sup of the beer in
the pannikin.

But the fancy that came to him most frequently and
stayed with him longest was one connected with the
great roll of fat under Lesson's right ear. He noticed
it first on a moonlight night, and thereafter it was always
before his eyes. It was a fascinating roll of fat. A
man could get his hand upon it and tear away one side
of the neck ; or he could place the muzzle of a rifle on it
and blow away all the head in a flash. Losson had no
right to be sleek and contented and well-to-do, when
he, ■ Simmons, was the butt of the room. Some day,
perhaps, he would show those who laughed at the
' Simmons, ye so-oor ' joke, that he was as good as the rest,
and held a man's life in the crook of his forefinger.
When Losson snored, Simmons hated him more bitterly
than ever. Why should Losson be able to sleep when
Simmons had to stay awake hour after hour, tossing and
turning on the tapes, with the dull liver pain gnawing
into his right side and his head throbbing and aching
after Canteen? He thought over this for many many

IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE 81

nights, and the world became unprofitable to him. He
even blunted his naturally fine appetite with beer and
tobacco ; and all the while the parrot talked at and
made a mock of him.

The heat continued and the tempers wore away more
quickly than before. A Sergeant's wife died of heat-
apoplexy in the night, and the rumour ran abroad that
it was cholera. Men rejoiced openly, hoping that it
would spread and send them into camp. But that was
a false alarm.

It was late on a Tuesday evening, and the men were
waiting in the deep double verandas for ' Last Posts,'
when Simmons went to the box at the foot of his bed,
took out his pipe, and slammed the lid down with a
bang that echoed through the deserted barrack like the
crack of a rifle. Ordinarily speaking, the men would
have taken no notice ; but their nerves were fretted to
fiddle-strings. They jumped up, and three or four
clattered into the barrack-room only to find Simmons
kneeling by his box.

' Ow ! It's you, is it ? ' they said and laughed fool-
ishly. ' We thought 'twas '

Simmons rose slowly. If the accident had so shaken
his fellows, what would not the reality do ?

' You thought it was — did you ? And what makes
you think ? ' he said, lashing himself into madness as he
went on ; 'to Hell with your thinking, ye dirty spies.'

' Simmons, ye so-oor,' chuckled the parrot in the ve-
randa sleepily, recognising a well-known voice. Now
that was absolutely all.

The tension snapped. Simmons fell back on the arm-
rack deliberately, — the men were at the far end of the
room, — and took out his rifle and packet of ammuni-

82 IN THE MATTER OF A PBIVATE

tion. ' Don't go playing the goat, Sim ! ' said Losson.
' Put it down,' but there was a quaver in his voice.
Another man stooped, slipped his boot and hurled it at
Simmons's head. The prompt answer was a shot which,
fired at random, found its billet in Losson's throat.
Losson fell forward without a word, and the others
scattered.

' You thought it was ! ' yelled Simmons. ' You're
drivin' me to it ! I tell you you're drivin' me to it !
Get up, Losson, an' don't lie shammin' there — you an'
your blasted parrit that druv me to it ! '

But there was an unaffected reality about Losson's
pose that showed Simmons what he had done. The
men were still clamouring in the veranda. Simmons
appropriated two more packets of ammunition and ran
into the moonlight, muttering : ' I'll make a night of
it. Thirty roun's, an' the last for myself. Take you
that, you dogs ! '

He dropped on one knee and fired in|;o the brown of
the men on the veranda, but the bullet flew high, and
landed in the brickwork with a vicious phwit that made
some of the younger ones turn pale. It is, as musketry
theorists observe, one thing to fire and another to be
fired at.

Then the instinct of the chase flared up. The news
spread from barrack to barrack, and the men doubled
out intent on the capture of Simmons, the wild beast,
who was heading for the Cavalry parade-ground, stop-
ping now and again to send back a shot and a curse in
the direction of his pursuers.

' I'll learn you to spy on me ! ' he shouted ; ' I'll learn
you to give me dorg's names ! Come on the 'ole lot
o' you ! Colonel John Anthony Deever, C.B. ! ' — he

IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE 83

turned towards the Infantry Mess and shook his rifle —
' you think yourself the devil of a man — but I tell you
that if you put your ugly old carcass outside o' that
door, I'll make you the poorest-lookin' man in the army.
Come out, Colonel John Anthony Deever, C.B. ! Come
out and see me practiss on the rainge. I'm the crack
shot of the 'ole bloomin' battalion.' In proof of which
statement Simmons fired at the lighted windows of the
mess-house.

' Private Simmons, E~ Comp'ny, on the Cavalry p'rade-
ground, Sir, with thirty rounds,' said a Sergeant breath-
lessly to the Colonel. ' Shootin' right and lef, Sir.
Shot Private Losson. What's to be done. Sir ? '

Colonel John Anthony Deever, C.B., sallied out, only
to be saluted by a spurt of dust at his feet.

' Pull up ! ' said the Second in Command ; ' I don't
want my step in that way. Colonel. He's as danger-
ous as a mad dog.'

' Shoot him like one, then,' said the Colonel bitterly,
' if he won't take his chance. My regiment, too ! If
it had been the Towheads I could have understood.'

Private Simmons had occupied a strong position near
a well on the edge of the parade-ground, and was defy-
ing the regiment to come on. The regiment was not
anxious to comply, for there is small honour in being
shot by a fellow-private. Only Corporal Slane, rifle in
hand, threw himself down on the ground, and wormed
his way towards the well.

'Don't shoot,' said he to the men round him; 'like
as not you'll 'it me. I'll catch the beggar, livin'.'

Simmons peased shouting for a while, and the noise
of trap-wheels could be heard across the plain. Major
Oldyne, Commanding the Horse Battery, was coming

84 IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE

back from a dinner in the Civil Lines ; was driving
after his usual custom — that is to say, as fast as the
horse could go.

' A orf'cer ! A blooming spangled orf' cer ! ' shrieked
Simmons ; ' I'll make a scarecrow of that orf'cer ! '
The trap stopped.

'What's this?' demanded the Major of Gunners.
' You there, drop your rifle.'

' Why, it's Jerry Blazes ! I ain't got no quarrel with
you, Jerry Blazes. Pass frien', an' all's well ! '

But Jerry Blazes had not the faintest intention of
passing a dangerous murderer. He was, as his adoring
Battery swore long and fervently, without knowledge
of fear, and they were surely the best judges, for Jerry
Blazes, it was notorious, had done his possible to kill a
man each time the Battery went out.

He walked towards Simmons, with the intention of
rushing him, and knocking him down.

' Don't make me do it. Sir,' said Simmons ; ' I ain't
got nothing agin you. Ah ! you would ? ' — the Major
broke into a run — ' Take that then ! '

The Major dropped with a bullet through his shoul-
der, and Simmons stood over him. He had lost the
satisfaction of killing Losson in the desired way : but
here was a helpless body to his hand. Should he slip
in another cartridge, and blow off the head, or with the
butt smash in the white face ? He stopped to consider,
and a cry went up from the far side of the parade-
ground : ' He's killed Jerry Blazes ! ' But in the
shelter of the well-pillars Simmons was safe, except
when he stepped out to fire. ' I'll blow yer 'andsome
'ead off, Jerry Blazes,' said Simmons reflectively. ' Six
an' three is nine an' one is ten, an' that leaves me

IN THE MATTER Or A PRIVATE 85

another nineteen, an' one for myself.' He tugged at
the string of the second packet of ammunition. Cor-
poral Slane crawled out of the shadow of a bank into
the moonlight.

' I see you ! ' said Simmons. ' Come a bit furder on
an' I'll do for you.'

'I'm comin',' said Corporal Slane briefly; 'you're
done a bad day's work, Sim. Come out 'ere an' come
back with me.'

'Come to ,' laughed Simmons, sending a car-
tridge home with his thumb. ' Not before I've settled
you an' Jerry Blazes.'

The Corporal was lying at full length in the dust of
the parade-ground, a rifle under him. Some of the less-
cautious men in the distance shouted : ' Shoot 'im !
Shoot 'im, Slane ! '

' You move 'and or fcjot, Slane,' said Simmons, ' an'
I'll kick Jerry Blazes' 'ead in, and shoot you after.'

' I ain't movin',' said the Corporal, raising his head ;
' you daren't 'it a man on 'is legs. Let go o' Jerry
Blazes an' come out o' that with your fistes. Come an'
'it me. You daren't, you bloomin' dog-shooter ! '

'I dare.'

'You lie, you man-sticker. You sneakin', Sheeny
butcher, you lie. See there ! ' Slane kicked the rifle
away, and stood up in the peril of his life. ' Come on.

now

I'

The temptation was more than Simmons could resist,
for the Corporal in his white clothes offered a perfect
mark.

'Don't misname me,' shouted Simmons, firing as he
spoke. The shot missed, and the shooter, blind with
rage, threw his rifle down and rushed at Slane from the

86 IN THE MATTER OF A, PRIVATE

protection of the well. Within striking distance, he
kicked savagely at Slane's stomach, but the weedy Cor-
poral knew something of Simmons's weakness, and
knew, too, the deadly guard for that kick. Bowing
forward and drawing up his right leg till the heel of
the right foot was set some three inches above the in-
side of the left knee-cap, he met the blow standing
on one leg — exactly as Gonds stand when they medi-
tate — and ready for the fall that would foUow. There
was an oath, the Corporal fell over to his own left as
shinbone met shinbone, and the Private collapsed, his
right leg broken an inch above the ankle.

' 'Pity you don't know that guard, Sim,' said Slane,
spitting out the dust as he rose. Then raising his voice
— ' Come an' take him orf . I've bruk 'is leg.' This
was not strictly true, for the Private had accomplished
his own downfall, since it is 'the special merit of that
leg-guard that the harder the kick the greater the
kicker's discomfiture.

Slane walked to Jerry Blazes and hung over him with
ostentatious anxiety, while Simmons, weeping with pain,
was carried away. ' 'Ope you ain't 'urt badly, Sir,' said
Slane. The Major had fainted, and there was an ugly,
ragged hole through the top of his arm. Slane knelt
down and murmured : ' S'elp me, I believe 'e's dead.
Well, if that ain't my blooming luck all over ! '

But the Major was destined to lead his Battery afield
for many a long day with unshaken nerve. He was re-
moved, and nursed and petted into convalescence, while
the Battery discussed the wisdom of capturing Simmons,
and blowing him from a gun. They idolised their Major,
and his reappearance on parade brought about a scene
nowhere provided for in the Army Regulations.

ISr THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE 87

Great, too, was the glory that fell to Slane's share.
The Gunners would have made him drunk thrice a day
for at least a fortnight. Even the Colonel of his own
regiment complimented him upon his coolness, and the
local paper called him a hero. These things did not
puff him up. When the Major offered him money and
thanks, the virtuous Corporal took the one and put
aside the other. But he had a request to make and
prefaced it with many a ' Beg y' pardon. Sir.' Could the
Major see his way to letting the Slane-M'Kenna wedding
be adorned by the presence of four Battery horses to
pull a hired barouche ? The Major could, and so could
the Battery. Excessively so. It was a gorgeous wedding.

'Wot did I do it for?' said Corporal Slane. 'For
the 'orses o' course. Jhansi ain't a beauty to look at,
but I wasn't goin' to 'ave a hired turn-out. Jerry
Blazes ? If I 'adn't 'a' wanted something, Sim might
ha' blowed Jerry Blazes' blooming 'ead into Hirish
stew for aught I'd 'a' cared.'

And they hanged Private Simmons — hanged him as
high as Haman in hollow square of the regiment; and
the Colonel said it was Drink; and the Chaplain was
sure it was the Devil; and Simmons fancied it was
both, but he didn't know, and only hoped his fate
would be a warning to his companions; and half a
dozen 'intelligent publicists ' wrote six beautiful lead-
ing articles on 'The Prevalence of Crime in the Army.'

But not a soul thought of comparing the 'bloody-
minded Simmons' to the squawking, gaping schoolgirl
with which this story opens.

BLACK JACK

To the wake av Tim O'Hara

Came company,
All St. Patrick's Alley

Was there to see.

Bobert Buchanan.

As the Three Musketeers share their silver, tobacco,
and liquor together, as they protect each other in bar-
racks or camp, and as they rejoice together over the joy
of one, so do they divide their sorrows. When Or-
theris's irrepressible tongue has brought him into cells
for a season, or Learoyd has run amok through his kit
and accoutrements, or Mulvaney has indulged in strong
waters, and under their influence reproved his Com-
manding Officer, you can see the trouble in the faces
of the untouched two. And the rest of the regiment
know that comment or jest is unsafe. Generally
the three avoid Orderly Room and the Corner Shop
that follows, leaving both to the young bloods who
have not sown their wild oats; but there are occa-
sions

For instance, Ortheris was sitting on the drawbridge
of the main gate of Fort Amara, with his hands in his
pockets and his pipe, bowl down, in his mouth. Lea-
royd was lying at full length on the turf of the glacis,
kicking his heels in the air, and I came round the
corner and asked for Mulvaney.

Ortheris spat into the ditch and shook his head.

88

BLACK JACK 89

'No good seein' 'im now,' said Ortheris; "e's a bloom-
in' camel. Listen.'

I heard on the flags of the veranda opposite to the
cells, which are close to the Guard-Room, a measured
step that I could have identified in the tramp of an
army. There were twenty paces crescendo, a pause,
and then twenty diminuendo.

'That's 'im,' said Ortheris; 'my Gawd, that's 'im!
All for a bloomin' button you could see your face in an'
a bit o' lip that a bloomin' Harkangel would 'a' guv
back. '

Mulvaney was doing pack-drill — was compelled,
that is to say, to walk up and down for certain hours
in full marching order, with rifle, bayonet, ammuni-
tion, knapsack, and overcoat. And his offence was
being dirty on parade! I nearly fell into the Fort
Ditch with astonishment and wrath, for Mulvaney is
the smartest man that ever mounted guard, and would
as soon think of turning out uncleanly as of dispensing
with his trousers.

'Who was the Sergeant that checked him? ' I asked.

'MuUins, o' course,' said Ortheris. 'There ain't
no other man would whip 'im on the peg so. But
MuUins ain't a man. 'E's a dirty little pigscraper,
that's wot 'e is.'

'What did Mulvaney say? He's not the make of
man to take that quietly. '

'Said! Bin better for 'im if 'e'd shut 'is mouth.
Lord, 'ow we laughed ! " Sargint, " 'e sez, " ye say
I'm dirty. Well," sez 'e, "when your wife lets you
blow your own nose for yourself, perhaps you'll know
wot dirt is. You're himperfectly eddicated, Sargint,"
sez 'e, an' then we fell in. But after p'rade, 'e was up

90 BLACK JACK

an' Mullins was swearin' 'imself black in the face at
Ord'ly Room that Mulvaney 'ad called 'im a swine an'
lord knows wot all. You know Mullins. 'E'll 'ave
'is 'ead broke in one o' these days. 'E's too big a
bloomin' liar for ord'nary consumption. " Three hours'
can an' kit," sez the Colonel; "not for bein' dirty on
p'rade, but for 'avin' said somethin' to Mullins, tho' I
do not believe, "sez 'e, "you said wot 'e said you said."
An' Mulvaney fell away sayin' nothin'. You know 'e
never speaks to the Colonel for fear o' gettin' 'imself
fresh copped.'

Mullins, a very young and very much married Ser-
geant, whose manners were partly the result of innate
depravity and partly of imperfectly digested Board
School, came over the bridge, and most rudely asked
Ortheris what he was doing.

'Me?' said Ortheris. 'Ow! I'm waiting for my
emission. 'Seed it comin' along yit? '

Mullins turned purple and passed on. There was
the sound of a gentle chuckle from the glacis where
Learoyd lay.

' 'E expects to get 'is C 'mission some day,' explained
Orth'ris; 'Gawd 'elp the Mess that 'ave to put their
'ands into the same kiddy as 'im! Wot time d'you
make it, Sir? Fower! Mulvaney '11 be out in 'arf an
hour. You don't want to buy a dorg^ Sir, do you? A
pup you can trust — 'arf Rampore by the Colonel's grey-
'ound. '

'Ortheris,' I answered sternly, for I knew what was
in his mind, ' do you mean to say that '

'I didn't mean to arx money o' you, any'ow,' said
Ortheris; 'I'd 'a' sold you the dorg good an' cheap,
but — but — I know Mulvaney'U want somethin' after

BLACK JACK 91

we've walked 'im orf, an' I ain't got nothin', nor 'e
'asn't neither. I'd sooner sell you the dorg, Sir. 'S
trewth I would! '

A shadow fell on the drawbridge, and Ortheris began
to rise into the air, lifted by a huge hand upon his
collar.

'Onything but t' braass,' said Learoyd quietly, as
he held the Londoner over the ditch. ' Onything but
t' braass,' Orth'ris, ma son! Ah've got one rupee
eight annas of ma own.' He showed two coins, and
replaced Ortheris on the drawbridge rail.

'Very good,' I said; 'where are you going to?'

'Goin' to walk 'im orf wen 'e comes out — two
miles or three or fower, ' said Ortheris.

The footsteps within ceased. I heard the dull thud
of a knapsack falling on a bedstead, followed by the
rattle of arms. Ten minutes later, Mulvaney, fault-
lessly dressed, his lips tight and his face as black as a
thunderstorm, stalked into the sunshine on the draw-
bridge. Learoyd and Ortheris sprang from my side
and closed in upon him, both leaning towards as horses
lean upon the pole. In an instant they had disappeared
down the sunken road to the cantonments, and I was
left alone. Mulvaney had not seen fit to recognise me ;
so I knew that his trouble must be heavy upon him.

I climbed one of the bastions and watched the figures
of the Three Musketeers grow smaller and smaller
across the plain. They were walking as fast as they
could put foot to the ground, and their heads were
bowed. They fetched a great compass round the
parade-ground, skirted the Cavalry lines, and vanished
in the belt of trees that fringes the low land by the
river.

92 BLACK JACK

I followed slowly, and sighted them — dusty, sweat-
ing, but still keeping up their long, swinging tramp —
on the river bank. They crashed through the Forest
Reserve, headed towards the Bridge of Boats, and pres-
ently established themselves on the bow of one of the
pontoons. I rode cautiously till I saw three puffs of
white smoke rise and die out in the clear evening air,
and knew that peace had come again. At the bridge-
head they waved me forward with gestures of welcome.

'Tie up your 'orse,' shouted Ortheris, ' an' come on,
Sir. We're all goin' 'ome in this 'ere bloomin' boat.'

From the bridge-head to the Forest Officer's bunga-
low is but a step. The mess-man was there, and would
see that a man held my horse. Did the Sahib require
aught else — a peg, or beer? Ritchie Sahib had left
half a dozen bottles of the latter, but since the Sahib
was a friend of Ritchie Sahib, and he, the mess-man,
was a poor man •

I gave my order quietly, and returned to the bridge.
Mulvaney had taken off his boots, and was dabbling
his toes in the water; Learoyd was lying on his back
on the pontoon; and Ortheris was pretending to row
with a big bamboo.

'I'm an ould fool,' said Mulvaney, reflectively,
'dhraggin' you two out here bekaze I was undher the
Black Dog — sulkin' like a child. Me that was sol-
dierin' when Mullins, an' be damned to him, was
shquealin' on a counterpin for five shillin' a week —
an' that not paid! Bhoys, I've took you five miles out
av natural pevarsity. Phew ! '

'Wot's the odds so long as you're 'appy?' said Or-
theris, applying himself afresh to the bamboo. 'As
well 'ere as anywhere else.'

BLACK JACK 93

Learoyd held up a rupee and an eight-anna bit, and
shook his head sorrowfully. 'Five mile from t' Can-
teen, all along o' Mulvaney's blaasted pride. '

'I know ut,' said Mulvaney penitently. 'Why will
ye come wid me? An' yet I wud be mortial sorry if
ye did not — any time — though I am ould enough to
know betther. But I will do penance. I will take a
dhrink av wather. '

Ortheris squeaked shrilly. The butler of the Forest
bungalow was standing near the railings with a basket,
uncertain how to clamber down to the pontoon. 'Might
'a' know'd you'd 'a' got liquor out o' bloomin' desert.
Sir,' said Ortheris, gracefully, to me. Then to the
mess-man: 'Easy with them there bottles. They're
worth their weight in gold. Jock, ye long-armed beg-
gar, get out o' that an' hike 'em down.'

Learoyd had the basket on the pontoon in an instant,
and the Three Musketeers gathered round it with dry
lips. They drank my health in due and ancient form,
and thereafter tobacco tasted sweeter than ever. They
absorbed all the beer, and disposed themselves in pict-
uresque attitudes to admire the setting sun — no man
speaking for a while.

Mulvaney's head dropped upon his chest, and we
thought that he was asleep.

'What on earth did you come so far for ? ' I whispered
to Ortheris.

'To walk 'im orf, o' course. When 'e's been checked
we alius walks 'im orf. 'E ain't iit to be spoke to those
times — nor 'e ain't fit to leave alone neither. So we
takes 'im till 'e is.'

Mulvaney raised his head, and stared straight into
the sunset. 'I had my rifle,' said he dreamily, 'an' I

94 BLACK JACK

had my bay'nit, an' MuUins came round the corner, an'
he looked in my face an' grinned dishpiteful. " You
can't blow your own nose," sez he. Now, I cannot tell
fwhat Mullins's expayrience may ha' been, but. Mother
av God, he was nearer to his death that minut' than I
have iver been to mine — and that's less than the thick-
nuss av a hair ! '

'Yes,' said Qrtheris calmly, ' you'd look fine with all
your buttons took orf, an' the Band in front o' you,
walkin' roun' slow time. We're both front-rank men,
me an' Jock, when the rig'meht's in 'ollow square.
Bloomin' fine you'd look. "The Lord giveth an' the
Lord taketh awai, — Heasy with that there drop! —
Blessed be the naime o' the Lord,"' he gulped in a
quaint and suggestive fashion.

' MuUins ! Wot's MuUins ? ' said Learoyd slowly.
'Ah'd take a coomp'ny o' MuUinses — ma hand behind
me. Sitha, Mulvaney, don't be a fool.'

' You were not checked for fwhat you did not do, an'
made a mock av afther. 'Twas for less than that the
Tyrone wud ha' sent O'Hara to hell, instid av lettin'
him go by his own choosin', whin Rafferty shot him, '
retorted Mulvaney.

'And who stopped the Tyrone from doing it?' I
asked.

' That ould fool who's sorry he didn't stick the pig
MuUins.' His head dropped again. When he raised
it he shivered and put his hands on the shoulders of
his two companions.

' Ye've walked the Divil out av me, bhoys,' said he.

Ortheris shot out the red-hot dottel of his pipe on the
back of the hairy fist. ' They say 'Ell's 'otter than
that,' said he, as Mulvaney swore aloud. 'You be

BLACK JACK 96

warned so. Look yonder ! ' — he points^ across the
river to a ruined temple — ' Me an' you an' 'm ' — he
indicated me by a jerk of his head — 'was there one day
when Hi made a bloomin' show o' myself. You an'
'im stopped me doin' such — an' Hi was on'y wishful
for to desert. You are makin' a bigger bloomin' show
o' yourself now. '

' Don't mind him, Mulvaney, ' I said ; ' Dinah Shadd
won't let you hang yourself yet awhile, and you don't
intend to try it either. Let's hear about the Tyrone
and O'Hara. Rafferty shot him for fooling with his
wife. What happened before that ? '

' There's no fool like an ould fool. You know you
can do anythin' wid me whin I'm talkin'. Did I say
I wud like to cut MuUins's liver out? I deny the
imputashin, for fear that Orth'ris here wud report me
— Ah ! You wud tip me into the river, wud you ? Sit
quiet, little man. Anyways, JVLullins is not worth the
trouble av an extry p'rade, an' I will trate him wid
outrajis contimpt. The Tyrone an' O'Hara! O'Hara
an' the Tyrone, begad! Ould days are hard to bring
back into the mouth, but they're always inside the
head. '

Followed a long pause.

' O'Hara was a Divil. Though I saved him, for the
honour av the rig'miut, from his death that time, I say
it now. He was a Divil — a long, bould, black-haired
Divil.'

' Which way ? ' asked Ortheris.

' Women.'

' Then I know another.'

' Not more than in reason, if you mane me, ye warped
walkin'-shtick. I have been young, an' for why should

96 BLACK JACK

I not have tuk what I cud? Did I ivef, whin I was
Corp'ril, use the rise av my rank — wan step an' that
taken away, more's the sorrow an' the fault av me ! —
to prosecute a nefarious inthrigue, as O'Hara did?
Did I, whin I was Corp'ril, lay my spite upon a man an'
make his life a dog's life from day to day ? Did I lie,
as O'Hara lied, till the young wans in the Tyrone
turned white wid the fear av the Judgment av God
killin' thim all in a lump, as ut killed the woman at
Devizes ? I did not ! I have sinned my sins an' I have
made my confesshin, an' Father Victor knows the worst
av me. O'Hara was tuk, before he cud spake, on
Rafferty's doorstep, an' no man knows the worst av
him. But this much I know!

'The Tyrone was recruited any fashion in the ould
days. A draf from Connemara — a draf from Ports-
mouth — a draf from Kerry, an' that was a blazin' bad
draf — here, there and ivery where — but the large av
thim was Oirish — Black Oirish. Now there are Oirish
an' Oirish. The good are good as the best, but the
bad are wurrst than the wurrst. 'Tis this way. They
clog together in pieces as fast as thieves, an' no wan
knows fwhat they will do till wan turns informer an'
the gang is bruk. But ut begins again, a day later,
meetin' in holes an' corners an' swearin' bloody oaths
an' shtickin' a man in the back an' runnin' away, an'
thin waitin' for the blood-money on the reward papers —
to see if ut's worth enough. Those are the Black
Oirish, an' 'tis they that bring dishgrace upon the name
av Oireland, an' thim I wud kill — as I nearly killed
wan wanst.

'But to reshume. My room — 'twas before I was
married — was wid twelve av the scum av the earth —

BLACK JACK 97

the pickin's av the gutter — mane men that wud
neither laugh nor talk nor yet get dhrunk as a man
shud. They thried some av their dog's thricks on me,
but I dhrew a line round my cot, an' the man that
thransgressed ut wint into hospital for three days good.

' O'Hara had put his spite on the room — he was my
Colour Sargint — an' nothin' cud we do to plaze him.
I was younger than I am now, an' I tuk what I got in
the way av dressing down and punishmint-dhrill wid
my tongue in my cheek. But it was diff'rint wid the
others, an' why I cannot say, excipt that some men are
borrun mane an' go to dhirty murdher where a fist
is more than enough. Afther a whoile, they changed
their chune to me an' was desp'rit frien'ly — all twelve
av thim cursin' O'Hara in chorus.

' " Eyah," sez I, " O'Hara's a divil an' I'm not for
denyin' ut, but is he the only man in the wurruld?
Let him go. He'll get tired av findin' our kit foul an'
our 'coutrements onproperly kep'."

' " We will not let him go," sez they.

' " Thin take him," sez I, " an' a dashed poor yield
you will get for your throuble."

'"Is he not misconductin' himself wid Slimmy's
wife ? " sez another.

' " She's common to the rig'mint," sez I. " Fwhat
has made ye this partic'lar on a suddint ? "

' " Has he not put his spite on the roomful av us ?
Can we do anythin' that he will not check us for ? " sez
another.

' " That's thrue," sez I.

' " Will ye not help us to do aught," sez another —
" a big bould man like you ? "

' " I will break his head upon his shoulthers av he

98 BLACK JACK

puts hand on me," sez I. " I will give him the lie av
he says that I'm dhirty, an' I wud not mind duckin'
him in the Artillery troughs if ut was n6t that I'm
thryin' for my shtripes."

' " Is that all ye will do ? " sez another. " Have ye
no more spunk than that, ye blood-dhrawn calf ? "

' " Blood-dhrawn I may be," sez I, gettin' back to
my cot an' makin' my line round ut ; " but ye know
that the man who comes aerost this mark will be more
blood-dhrawn than me. No man gives me the name in
my mouth," I sez. " Ondersthand, I will have no part
wid you in anythin' ye do, nor will I raise my fist to
my shuperior. Is any wan comin' on ? " sez I.

' They made no move, tho' I gave them full time,
but stud growlin' an' snarlin' together at wan ind av
the room. I tuk up my cap and wint out to Canteen,
thinkin' no little av mesilf, and there I grew most
ondacintly dhrunk in my legs. My hea& was all
reasonable.

' " HouUgan," I sez to a man in E Comp'ny that was
by way av bein' a frind av mine ; " I'm overtuk from
the belt down. Do you give me the touch av your
shoulther to presarve my formation an' march me aerost
the ground into the high grass. I'll sleep ut off there,"
sez I ; an' Houligan — he's dead now, but good he was
while he lasted — walked wid me, givin' me the touch
whin I wint wide, ontil we came to the high grass, an',
my faith, the sky an' the earth was fair rowlin' undher
me. I made for where the grass was thickust, an' there
I slep' off my liquor wid an easy conscience. I did not
desire to come on books too frequent ; my characther
havin' been shpotless for the good half av a year.

' Whin I roused, the dhrink was dyin' out in me, an'

BLACK JACK 99

I felt as though, a she-cat had littered in my mouth. I
had not learned to hould my liquor wid comfort in
thim days. 'Tis little betther I am now. " I will get
Houligan to pour a bucket over my head," thinks I, an'
I wud ha' risen, but I heard some wan say: " Mulvaney
can take the blame av ut for the backslidin' hound he
is."

' " Oho ! " sez I, an' my head rang like a guard-room
gong : " fwhat is the blame that this young man must
take to oblige Tim Vulmea ? " For 'twas Tim Vulmea
that shpoke.

' I turned on my belly an' crawled through the grass,
a bit at a time, to where the spache came from. There
was the twelve av my room sittin' down in a little
patch, the dhry grass wavin' above their heads an' the
sin av black murdher in their hearts. I put the stuff
aside to get a clear view.

' " Fwhat's that ? " sez wan man, jumpin' up.

' " A dog," says Vulmea. " You're a nice hand to
this job ! As I said, Mulvaney will take the blame —
av ut comes to a pinch."

'"'Tis harrd to swear a man's life away," sez a
young wan.

'"Thank ye for that," thinks I. "Now, fwhat the
divil are you paragins conthrivin' against me '? "

' " 'Tis as easy as dhrinkin' your quart," sez Vulmea.
" At seven or thereon, O'Hara will come acrost to the
Married Quarters, goin' to call on Slimmy's wife, the
swine ! Wan av us'U pass the wurrd to the room an'
we shtart the divil an' all av a shine — laughin' an'
crackin' on an' t'rowin' our boots about. Thin O'Hara
will come to give us the ordher to be quiet, the more
by token bekaze the room-lamp will be knocked over in

100 BLACK JACK

the larkin'. He will take the straight road to the ind
door where there's the lamp in the veranda, an' that'll
bring him clear against the light as he shtands. He
will not be able to look into the dhark. Wan av us
will loose off, an' a close shot ut will be, an' shame to
the man that misses. 'Twill be Mulvaney's rifle, she
that is at the head av the rack — there's no mistakin'
that long-shtocked, cross-eyed bitch even in the dhark."

' The thief misnamed my ould firin'-piece out av
jealousy — I was pershuaded av that — an' ut made me
more angry than all.

' But Vulmea goes on : " O'Hara will dhrop, an' by
the time the light's lit again, there'll be some six av us
on the chest av Mulvaney, cryin' murdher an' rape.
Mulvaney's cot is near the ind door, an' the shmokin'
rifle will be lyin' undher him whin we've knocked him
over. We know, an' all the rig'mint knows, that
Mulvaney has given O'Hara more lip than any man av
us. Will there be any doubt at the Coort-Martial ?
Wud twelve honust sodger-bhoys swear away the life
av a dear, quiet, swate-timpered man such as is Mul-
vaney — wid his line av pipe-clay roun' his cot, threat-
enin'^us wid murdher av we overshtepped ut, as we can
truthful testify?"

' " Mary, Mother av Mercy ! " thinks I to mesilf ; "it
is this to have an unruly mimber an' fistes fit to use !
Oh the sneakin' hounds ! "

' The big dhrops ran down my face, for I was wake
wid the liquor an' had not the full av my wits about
me. I laid shtill an' heard thim workin' themselves up
to swear my life by tellin' tales av ivry time I had put
my mark on wan or another ; an' my faith, tliey was
few that was not so dishtinguished. 'Twas all in the

BLACK JACK 101

way av fair fight, though, for niver did I raise my hand
excipt whin they had provoked me to ut.

' " 'Tis all well," sez wan av thim, " but who's to do
this shootin' ? "

' " Fwhat matther ? " sez Vulmea. " 'Tis Mulvaney
will do that — at the Coort-Martial."

' " He will so," sez the man, " but whose hand is put
to the trigger — in the room ? "

' " Who'll do ut ? " sez Vulmea, lookin' round, but
divil a man answeared. They began to dishpute till
Kiss, that was always playin' Shpoil Five, sez : " Thry
the kyards ! " Wid that he opined his tunic an' tuk
out the greasy palammers, an' they all fell in wid
the notion.

' " Deal on ! " sez Vulmea, wid a big rattlin' oath,
"an' the Black Curse av Shielygh come to the man
that will not do his duty as the kyards say. Amin ! "

'"Black Jack is the masther," sez Kiss, dealin'.
Black Jack, Sorr, I shud expaytiate to you, is the Ace
av Shpades which from time immimorial has been inti-
mately connect wid battle, murdher an' suddin death.

'■Wanst Kiss dealt an' there was no sign, but the
men was whoite wid the workin's av their sowls.
Twice Kiss dealt, an' there was a gray shine on their
cheeks like the mess av an egg. Three times Kiss dealt
an' they was blue. "Have ye not lost him?" sez Vul-
mea, wipin' the sweat on him; " Let's ha' done quick I "
" Quick ut is," sez Kiss t'rowin' him the kyard ; an' ut
fell face up on his knee — Black Jack !

'Thin they all cackled wid laughin'. "Duty thrip-
pence," sez. wan av thim, "an' damned cheap at that
price ! " But I cud see they all dhrew a little away
from Vulmea an' lef him sittin' playin' wid the kyard.

102 BLACK JACK

Vulmea sez no word for a whoile but licked his lips —
cat-ways. Thin he threw up his head an' made the
men swear by ivry oath known to stand by him not
alone in the room but at the Coort-Martial that was to
set on me ! He tould off five av the biggest to stretch
me on my cot whin the shot was fired, an' another man
he tould off to put out the light, an' yet another to load
my rifle. He wud not do that himself ; an' that was
quare, for 'twas but a little thing considerin'.

' Thin they swore over again that they wud not be-
thray wan another, an' crep' out av the grass in diff'rint
ways, two by two. A mercy ut was that they did not
come on me. I was sick wid fear in the pit av my
stummick — sick, sick, sick ! Afther they was all gone,
I wint back to Canteen an' called for a quart to put a
thought in me. Vulmea was there, dhrinkin' heavy, an'
politeful to me beyond reason. "Fwhat will I do —
f what will I do ? " thinks I to mesilf whin Vulmea wint
away.

' Presintly the Arm'rer Sargint comes in stiffin' an'
crackin' on, not pleased wid any wan, bekaze the Martini
Henri bein' new to the rig'mint in those days we used
to play the mischief wid her arrange mints. 'Twas a
long time before I cud get out av the way av thryin' to
pull back the back-sight an' turnin' her over afther firin'
— as if she was a Snider.

' " Fwhat taUor-men do they give me to work wid ? "
sez the Arm'rer Sargint. " Here's Hogan, his nose flat
as a table, laid by for a week, an' ivry Comp'ny sendin'
their arrums in knocked to small shivreens."

'"Fwhat's wrong wid Hogan, Sargint?" sez I.

' " Wrong ! " sez the Arm'rer Sargint ; " I showed
.him, as though I had been his mother, the way av

BLACK JACK 103

shtrippin' a 'Tini, an' he shtrup her clane an' easy. ' I
tould him to put her to again an' fire a blank into the
blow-pit to show how the dirt hung on the groovin'.
He did that, but he did not put in the pin av the fallin'-
block, an' av coorse whin he fired he was strook by the
block jumpin' clear. Well for him 'twas but a blank —
a full charge wud ha' cut his oi out."

' I looked a thrifle wiser than a boiled sheep's head.
" Hows that, Sargint ? " sez I.

'"This way, ye blundherin' man, an' don't you be
doin' ut," sez he. Wid that he shows me a Waster
action — the breech av her all cut away to show the in-
side — an' so plazed he was to grumble that he dimon-
strated fwhat Hogan had done twice over. " An' that
comes av not knowin' the wepping you're purvided
wid," sez he.

' " Thank ye, Sargint," sez I ; " I will come to you
again for further information."

' " Ye will not," sez he. " Kape your clanin'-rod
away from the breech-pin or you will get into throuble."

'I wint outside an' I could ha' danced wid delight
for the grandeur av ut. " They will load my rifle, good
luck to thim, whoile I'm away," thinks I, and back I
wint to the Canteen to give them their clear chanst.

' The Canteen was fiUin' wid men at the ind av the
day. I made feign to be far gone in dhrink, an', wan by
wan, aU my roomful came in wid Vulmea. I wint
away, walkin' thick an' heavy, but not so thick an'
heavy that any wan cud ha' tuk me. Sure and thrue,
there was a kyartridge gone from my pouch an' lyin'
snug in my rifle. I was hot wid rage against thim all,
an' I worried the bullet out wid my teeth as fast as I
cud, the room bein' empty. Then I tuk my boot an'

104 BLACK JACK

the clanin'-rod and knocked out the pin av the fallin'-
block. Oh, 'twas music when that pin rowled on the
flure ! I put ut into my pouch an' stuck a dab av dirt
on the holes in the plate, puttin' the fallin'-block back.
" That'll do your business, Vulmea," sez I, lyin' easy on
the cot. " Come an' sit on my chest the whole room av
you, an' I will take you to my bosom for the biggest
divils that iver cheated halter." I wud have no mercy
on Vulmea. His oi or his life — little I cared !

'At dusk they came back, the twelve av thim, an'
they had all been dhrinkin'. I was shammin' sleep on
the cot. Wan man wint outside in the veranda. Whin
he whishtled they began to rage roun' the room an'
carry on tremenjus. But 1 niver want to hear men
laugh as they did — skylarkin' too ! 'Twas like mad
jackals.

' " Shtop that blasted noise ! " sez O'Hara in the dark,
an' pop goes the room lamp. I cud hear O'Hara runnin'
up an' the rattffii' av my rifle in the rack an' the men
breathin'' heavy as they stud roun' my cot. I cud see
O'Hara in the light av the veranda lamp, an' thin I
heard the crack av my rifle. She cried loud, poor darl-
int, bein' mishandled. Next minut' five men were hould-
in' me down. " Go easy," I sez ; " fwhat's ut all about ? "

' Thin Vulmea, on the flure, raised a howl you cud
hear from wan ind av cantonmints to the other. " I'm
dead, I'm butchered, I'm blind ! " sez he. " Saints have
mercy on my sinful sowl ! Sind for Father Constant !
Oh sind for Father Constant an' let me go clean ! " By
that I knew he was not so dead as I cud ha' wished.

' O'Hara picks up the lamp in the veranda wid a hand
as stiddy as a rest. "Fwhat damned dog's thrick is
this av yours?" sez he, and turns the light on Tim

BLACK JACK 105

Vulmea that was shwimmin' in blood from top to toe.
The fallin'-block had sprung free behin' a full charge av
powther — good care I tuk to bite down the brass af ther
takin' out the bullet that there might be somethin' to
give ut full worth — an' had cut Tim from the lip to
the corner av the right eye, lavin' the eyelid in tatthers,
an' so up an' along by the forehead to the hair. 'Twas
more av a rakin' plough, if you will ondherstand, than
a clean cut ; an' niver did I see a man bleed as Vulmea
did. The dhrink an' the stew that he was in pumped
the blood strong. The minut' the men sittin' on my
chest heard O'Hara spakin' they scatthered each wan to
his cot, an' cried out very politeful : " Fwhat is ut, Sar-
gint?"

' " Fwhat is ut ! " sez O'Hara, shakin' Tim. " Well
an' good do you know fwhat ut is, ye skulkin' ditch-
lurkin' dogs! Get a doolie, an' take this whimperin'
scutt away. There will be more heard av ut than any
av you will care for."

'Vulmea sat up rockin' his head in his hand an'
moanin' for Father Constant.

' " Be done ! " sez O'Hara, dhraggin' him up by the
hair. " You're none so dead that you cannot go fifteen
years for thryin' to shoot me."

' " I did not," sez Vulmea ; " I was shootin' mesilf."

' " That's quare," sez O'Hara, " for the front av my
jackut is black wid your powther." He tuk up the
rifle that was still warm an' began to laugh. "I'll
make your life Hell to you," sez he, "for attempted
murdher an' kapin' your rifle onproperly. You'll be
hanged first an' thin put undher stoppages for four
fifteen. The rifle's done for," sez he.

' " Why, 'tis my rifle ! " sez I, comin' up to look ;

106 BLACK JACK

"Vulmea, ye divil, fwhat were you doin' wid her —
answer me that ? "

' " Lave me alone," sez Vulmea ; " I'm dyin' ! "

* " I'll wait till you're betther," sez I, " an' thin we
two will talk ut out umbrageous."

' O'Hara pitched Tim into the doolie, none too tinder,
but all the bhoys kep' by their cots, which was not the
sign av innocint men. I was huntin' ivrywhere for my
fallin'-block, but not findin' ut at all. I niver found ut.

' " Now fwhat will I do ? " sez O'Hara, swinging the
veranda light in his hand an' lookin' down the room.
I had hate and contimpt av O'Hara an' I have now,
dead tho' he is, but, for all that, will I say he was a
brave man. He is baskin' in Purgathory this tide, but
I wish he cud hear that, whin he stud lookin' down
the room an' the bhoys shivered before the oi av him, I
knew him for a brave man an' I liked him so.

' " Fwhat will I do ? " sez O'Hara agin, an' we heard
the voice av a woman low an' sof ' in the veranda. 'Twas
Slimmy's wife, come over at the shot, sittin' on wan av
the benches an' scarce able to walk.

' " O Denny ! — Denny, dear," sez she, " have they kilt
you?"

' O'Hara looked down the room again an' showed his
teeth to the gum. Then he spat on the flure.

' " You're not worth ut," sez he. " Light that lamp,
ye dogs," an' wid that he turned away, an' I saw him
walkin' off wid Slimmy's wife ; she thryin' to wipe off
the powther-black on the front av his jackut wid her
handkerchief. " A brave man you are," thinks I — "a
brave man an' a bad woman."

'No wan said a word for a time. They was all
ashamed, past spache.

BLACK JACK 107

' " Fwhat d'you think he will do ?" sez wan av thim
at last. " He knows we're all in ut."

' " Are we so ? " sez I from my cot. " The man that
sez that to me will be hurt. I do not know," sez I,
" fwhat onderhand divilmint you have conthrived, but
by what I've seen I know that you cannot commit
murdher wid another man's rifle — such shakin' cowards
you are. I'm goin' to slape," I sez, " an' j'^ou can blow
my head off whoile I lay." I did not slape, though, for
a long time. Can ye wonder ?

'Next morn the news was through all the rig'mint,
an' there was nothin' that the men did not tell. O'Hara
reports, fair an' easy, that Vulmea was come to grief
through tamperin' wid his rifle in barricks, all for to
show the mechanism. An' by my sowl, he had the im-
part'nince to say that he was on the shpot at the time
an' cud certify that ut was an accidint ! You might ha'
knocked my roomful down wid a straw whin they heard .
that. 'Twas lucky for thim that the bhoys were always
thryin' to find out how the new rifle was made, an' a lot
av thim had come up for easin' the pull by shtickin' bits
av grass an' such in the part av the lock that showed
near the thrigger. The first issues of the 'Tinis was not
covered in, an' I mesilf have eased the pull av mine time
an' agin. A light pull is ten points on the range to me.

' " I will not have this foolishness ! " sez the Colonel.
" I will twist the tail off Vulmea ! " sez he ; but whin he
saw him, all tied up an' groanin' in hospital, he changed
his will. " Make him an early convalescint," sez he to
the Doctor, an' Vulmea was made so for a warnin'. His
big bloody bandages an' face puckered up to wan side
did more to kape the bhoys from messin' wid the insides
av their rifles than any punishmint.

108 BLACK JACK

' O'Hara gave no reason for fwhat he'd said, an' all
my roomful were too glad to inquire, tho' he put his
spite upon thim more wearin' than before. Wan day,
howiver, he tuk me apart very polite, for he cud be that
at the choosin'.

' " You're a good sodger, tho' you're a damned inso-
lint man," sez he.

' " Fair words, Sargint," sez I, " or I may be insolint
again."

' " 'Tis not like you," sez he, " to lave your rifle in
the rack widout the breech-pin, for widout the breec"h-
pin she was whin Vulmea fired. I should ha' found
the break av ut in the eyes av the holes, else," he sez.

'"Sargint," sez I, "fwhat wud your life ha' been
worth av the breech-pin had been in place, for, on my
sowl, my life wud be worth just as much to me av I
tould you whether ut was or was not. "Be thankful
the bullet was not there," I sez.

' " That's thrue," sez he, pulling his moustache ; " but
I do not believe that you, for all your lip, was in that
business."

' " Sargint," sez I, " I cud hammer the life out av a
man in ten minuts wid my fistes if that man dishpleased
me ; for I am a good sodger, an' I will be threated as
such, an' whoile my fistes are my own they're strong
enough for all work I have to do. They do not fly
back towards me ! " sez I, lookin' him betune the eyes.

' " You're a good man," sez he, lookin' me betune the
eyes — an' oh he was a gran' -built man to see ! —
" you're a good man," he sez, " an' I cud wish, for the
pure frolic av ut, that I was not a Sargint, or that you
were not a Privit; an' you will think me no coward
whin I say this thing."

BLACK JACK 109

'" I do not," sez I. " I saw you whin Vulmea mis-
handled the rifle. But, Sargint," I sez, "take the
wurrd from me now, spakin' as man to man wid the
shtripes off, tho' 'tis little right I have to talk, me being
fwhat I am by natur'. This time ye tuk no harm, an'
next time ye may not, but, in the ind, so sure as Slim-
my's wife came into the veranda, so sure will ye take
harm — an' bad harm. Have thought, Sargint," sez I.
" Is ut worth ut?"

' " Ye're a bould man," sez he, breathin' harrd. " A
very bould man. But I am a bould man tu. Do you
go your way, Privit Mulvaney, an' I will go mine."

' We had no further spache thin or af ther, but, wan
by another, he drafted the twelve av my room out into
other rooms an' got thim spread among the Comp'nies,
for they was not a good breed to live together, an' the
Comp'ny orf'cers saw ut. They wud ha' shot me in the
night av they had known fwhat I knew; but that they
did not.

'An', in the ind, as I said, O'Hara met his death
from Rafferty for foolin' wid his wife. He wint his
own way too Tvell — Eyah, too well ! Shtraight to
that affair, widout turnin' to the right or to the lef,
he wint, an' may the Lord have mercy on his sowl.
Amin ! '

' 'Ear ! 'Ear ! ' said Ortheris, pointing the moral with
a wave of his pipe. 'An' this is 'im 'oo would be a
bloomin' Vulmea all for the sake of MuUins an' a
bloomin' button ! Mullins never went after a woman
in his life. Mrs. Mullins, she saw 'im one day '

' Ortheris,' I said, hastily, for the romances of Private
Ortheris are all too daring for publication, ' look at the
sun. It's a quarter past six ! '

110 BLACK JACK

' Lord ! Three quarters of an hour for five an' a
'arf miles ! We'll 'ave to run like Jimmy O.'

The Three Musketeers clambered on to the bridge,
and departed hastily in the direction of the cantonment
road. When I overtook' them I offered them two stir-
rups and a tail, which they accepted enthusiastically.
Ortheris held the tail, and in this manner we trotted
steadily through the shadows by an unfrequented road.

At the turn into the cantonments we heard carriage
wheels. It was the Colonel's barouche, and in it sat
the Colonel's wife and daughter. I caught a suppressed
chuckle, and my beast sprang forward with a lighter
step.

The Three Musketeers had vanished into the night.

POOR DEAR MAMMA

The wild hawk to the wind-swept sky,

The deer to the wholesome wold,
And the heart of a man to the heart of a maid,

As it was in the days of old.

Gypsy Song.

Scene. — Interior of Miss Minnie Thrbegan's bed-
room at Simla. Miss Threegan, in window-seat,
turning over a drawerful of things. Miss Emma Debk-
COURT, bosomfriend, who has come to spend the day, sit-
ting on the bed, manipulating the bodice of a ballroom
frock and a bunch of artificial lilies of the valley. Time,
6.30 P.M. on a hot May afternoon.
Miss Deercoxjrt. And he said : ' I shall never for-
get this dance,' and, of course, I said : ' Oh ! how can
you be so silly!' Do you think he meant anything,
dear?

Miss Threegan. (^Extracting long lavender silk
stocking from the rubbish.") You know him better than
J do.

Miss D. Oh, do be sympathetic, Minnie ! I'm sure
he does. At least I would be sure if he wasn't always
riding with that odious Mrs. Hagan.

Miss T. I suppose so. How does one manage to
dance through one's heels first ? Look at this — isn't it
shameful? (Spreads stocking-heel on open hand for
inspection.")

Miss D. Never mind that !• You can't mend it.
Ill

112 POOR DEAR MAMMA

Help me with, this hateful bodice, I've run the string
so, and I've run the string so, and I can't make the ful-
ness come right. Where would you put this ? ( Waves
lilies of the valley.')

Miss T. As high up on the shoulder as possible.

Miss D. Am I quite tall enough ? I know it makes
May Olger look lop-sided.

Miss T. Yes, but May hasn't your shoulders.
Hers are like a hock-bottle.

Beaeek. (^Rapping at door.) Captain Sahib aya.

Miss D. (Jumping up wildly, and hunting for body,
which she has discarded owing to the heat of the day.)
Captain Sahib! What Captain Sahib? Oh, good gra-
cious, and I'm only half dressed ! Well, I sha'n't bother.

Miss T. (Calmly.) You needn't. It isn't for us.
That's Captain Gadsby. He is going for a ride with
Mamma. He generally comes five days out of the
seven.

Agonised Voice. (From an inner apartment.)
Minnie, run out and give Captain Gadsby some tea,
and tell him I shall be ready in ten minutes; and, O
Minnie, come to me an instant, there's a dear girl !

Miss T. Oh, bother! (Aloud.) Very well.
Mamma.

Uadt, and reappears, after five minutes, flushed, and
rrlbbing her fingers.

Miss D. You look pink. What has happened?

Miss T. (In a stage whisper.) A twenty-four-iuch
waist, and she won't let it out. Where are my bangles ?
(Hummages on the toilet-table, and dabs at her hair with
a brush in the interval.)

Miss D, Who is this Captain Gadsby? I don't
think I've met him.

POOR DEAR MAMMA 113

Miss T. You must have. He belongs to the Harrar
set. I've danced with him, but I've never talked to
him. He's a big yellow man, just like a newly-hatched
chicken, with an e-normous moustache. He walks like
this (imitates Cavalry swagger), and he goes 'Ha —
Hmmm ! ' deep down in his throat when he can't think
of anything to say. Mamma likes him. I don't.

Miss D. (Abstractedly.') Does he wax that mous-
tache?

Miss T. (Busy with powder-puff.) Yes, I think so.
Why?

Miss D. (Bendirig over the bodice and sewing furi-
ously. ) Oh, nothing — only

Miss T. (Sternly.) Only what? Out with it,
Emma,

Miss D. Well, May Olger — she's engaged to Mr.
Charteris, you know — said — Promise you won't
repeat this?

Miss T, Yes, I promise. What did she say?

Miss D. That — that being kissed (with a rush) by
a man who didn't wax his moustache was — like eating
an egg without salt.

Miss T. (Af her full height, with crushing scorn.)
May Olger is a horrid, nasty Thing, and you can tell
her I said so. I'm.glad she doesn't belong to my set —
I must go and feed this man ! Do I look presentable ?

Miss D. Yes, perfectly. Be quick and hand him
over to your Mother, and then we can talk. I shall
listen at the door to hear what you say to him.

Miss T. 'Sure I don't care. Im not afraid of Cap-
tain Gadsby.

In proof of this swings into drawing-room with a mannish
stride followed by two short steps, which produces

114 POOR DEAR MAMMA

the effect of a restive horse entering. Misses Cap-
tain Gadsby, who is sitting in the shadow of the
window-curtain, and gazes round helplessly.

Captain Gadsby. (^Aside.') The filly, by Jove!
'Must ha' picked up that action from the sire. QAloud,
rising.") Good evening, Miss Threegan.

Miss T. {Conscious that she is flushing) Good
evening, Captain Gadsby. Mamma told me to say that
she will be ready in a few minutes. Won't you have
some tea? {Aside.) I hope Mamma will be quick.
What am I to say to the creature? {Aloud and
abruptly.) Milk and sugar?

Capt. G. No sugar, tha-anks, and very little milk.
Ha-Hmmm.

Miss T. {Aside.) If he's going to do that, I'm
lost. I shall laugh. I know I shall !

Capt. G. {Pulling at his moustache and watching it
sideways down his nose.) Ha-Hmmm. {Aside.) 'Won-
der what the little beast can talk about. 'Must make a
shot at it.

Miss T. {Aside.) Oh, this is agonising. I must
say something.

Both Together. Have you been

Capt. G. I beg your pardon. You were going to

say

, Miss T. ( Who has been watching the moustache with
awed fascination.) Won't you have some eggs?

Capt. G. {Looking bewilderedly at the tea-table.)
Eggs ! {Aside.) O Hades ! She must have a nursery-
tea at this hour. S'pose they've wiped her mouth and
sent her to me while the Mother is getting on her
duds. {Aloud.) No, thanks.

Miss T. ( Crimson with confusion.) Oh ! I didn't

POOR DEAK MAMMA 115

mean that. I wasn't thinking of mou — eggs for an
instant. I mean »alt. Won't you have some sa —
sweets ? (^Adde.') He'll think me a raving lunatic.
I wish Mamma would come.

Capt. G. (^Aside.') It was a nursery-tea and she's
ashamed of it. By Jove ! She doesn't look half bad
wiien she colours up like that. (^Aloud, helping himself
from the dish.') Have you seen those new chocolates at
Pehti's?

Miss T. No, I made these myself. What are they
like?

Capt. G. These ! i)e-licious. (^Aaide.') And that's
a fact.

MissT. {Aside.) Oh, bother! he'll think I'm fish-
ing for compliments. (Aloud.) No, Peliti's of course.

Capt. G. (Enthusiastically.) Not to compare with
these. How d'you make them? I can't get my khansa-
mah to understand the simplest thing beyond mutton
and fowl.

Miss T. Yes ? I'm not a khansamah, you know.
Perhaps you frighten him. You should never frighten
a servant. He loses his head. It's very bad policy.

Capt. G. He's so awf'ly stupid.

Miss T. (Folding her hands in her lap.) You
should call him quietly and say : ' O khansamah jee ! '

Capt. G. (G-etting interested.) Yes? (Aside.)
Fancy that little featherweight saying, 'O khansamah
jee ' to my bloodthirsty Mir Khan !

Miss T. Then you should explain the dinner, dish
by dish.

Capt. G. But I can't Speak the vernacular.

Miss T. (Patronisingly.) You should pass the
Higher Standard and try.

116 POOR DEAR MAMMA

Capt. G. I have, but I don't seem to be any the
wiser. Are you?

Miss T. I never passed the Higher Standard. But
the hhansamah is very patient with me. He doesn't
get angry when I talk about sheep's topees, or order
maunds of grain when I mean seers.

Capt. G. (^Aside, with intense indignation.') I'd like
to see Mir Khan being rude to that girl! Hullo!
Steady the Buffs ! (^Aloud.) And do you understand
about horses, too ?

Miss T. A little — not very much. I can't doctor
them, but I know what they ought to eat, and I am in
charge of our stable.

Capt. G. Indeed! You might help me then.
What ought a man to give his sais in the Hills? My
ruffian says eight rupees, because everything is so dear.

Miss T. Six rupees a month, and one rupee Simla
allowance — neither more nor less. And a grass-cut
gets six rupees. That's better than buying grass in the
bazar.

Capt. G. (^Admiringly.') How do you know?

Miss T. I have tried both ways.

Capt. G. Do you ride much, then? I've never seen
you on the Mall.

Miss T. (^Aside.) I haven't passed him more than
fifty times. (Aloud.) Nearly every day.

Capt. G. By Jove! I didn't know that. Ha-
Hmmm! (Pulls at his moustache and is silent for forty
seconds.)

Miss T. (^Desperately, and wondering what will hap-
pen next.) It looks beautiful. I shouldn't touch it if
I were you. (^Aside.) It's all Mamma's fault for not
coming before. I will be rude !

POOR DEAE MAMMA 117

Capt. G. (^Bronzing under the tan and bringing down
his hand very quickly.') Eh! Wha-at! Oh, yes! Ha!
Ha! (^Laughs uneasily.) (^Aside.) Well, of all the
dashed cheek! I never had a woman say that to me
yet. She must he a cool hand or else — Ah! that
nursery -tea !

Voice pkom the Unknown. Tchk ! Tchk ! Tchk !

Capt. G. Good gracious ! What's that ?

Miss T. The dog, I think. (^Aside.) Emma has
been listening, and I'll never forgive her !

Capt. G. (^Aside.) They don't keep dogs here.
(^Aloud.) 'Didn't sound like a dog, did it ?

Miss T. Then it must have been the cat. Let's go
into the veranda. What a lovely evening it is !

Steps into veranda and looks out across the hills
into sunset. The Captain follows.

Capt. G. QAside.) Superb eyes ! I wonder that I
never noticed them before ! (^Aloud.) There's going
to be% dance at Viceregal Lodge on Wednesday. Can
you spare me one ?

Miss T. {Shortly.) No ! I don't want any of your
charity-dances. You only ask me because Mamma
told you to. I hop and I bump. You know I do !

Capt. G. (^Aside.) That's true, but little girls
shouldn't understand these things. (^Aloud.) No, on
my word, I don't. You dance beautifully.

Miss T. Then why do you always stand out after
half a dozen turns? I thought officers in the Army
didn't tell fibs.

Capt. G. It wasn't a fib, believe me. I really do
want the pleasure of a dance with you.

MissT. (^Wickedly.) Why? Won't Mamma dance
with you any more ?

118 POOR DEAR MAMMA

Capt. G. (^More earnestly than the necessity de-
mands.') I wasn't thinking of your Mother. (Aside.)
You little vixen !

Miss T. (Still looTdng out of the window.) Eh?
Oh, I beg your pardon. I was thinking of something
else.

Capt. G. (^Aside.) Well ! I wonder what she'll say
next. I've never known a woman treat me like this be-
fore. I might be — Dash it, I might be an Infantry
subaltern ! (Aloud.) Oh, please don't trouble. I'm
not worth thinking about. Isn't your Mother ready
yet?

Miss T. I should think so ; but promise me. Captain
Gadsby, you won't take poor dear Mamma twice round
Jakko any more. It tires her so.

Capt. G. She says that no exercise tires her.

Miss T. Yes, but she suffers afterwards. You don't
know what rheumatism is, and you oughtn't to keep
her out so late, when it gets chill in the evenings.

Capt. G. (Aside.) Rheumatism ! I thought she
came off her horse rather in a bunch. Whew ! One
lives and learns. (Aloud.) I'm sorry to hear that.
She hasn't mentioned it to me.

Miss T. (Flurried.) Of course not! Poor dear
Mamma never would. And you mustn't say that I told
you either. Promise me that you won't. Oh, Captain
Gadsby, promise me you won't !

Capt. G. I am dumb, or — I shall be as soon as
you've given me that dance, and another — if you can
trouble yourself to think about me for a minute.

Miss T. But you won't like it one little bit. You'll
be awfully sorry afterwards.

Capt. G. I shall like it above all things, and I shall

POOR DEAR MAMMA 119

only be sorry that I didn't get more. (^Aside.) Now
what in the world am I saying ?

Miss T. Very well. You will have only yourself
to thank if your toes are trodden on. Shall we say
Seven ?

Capt. G. And Eleven. (^Aside.^ She can't be more
than eight stone, but, even then, it's an absurdly small
foot. (JJoohs at his own riding boots.')

Miss T. They're beautifully shiny. I can almost
see my face in them.

Capt. G. I was thinking whether I should have to
go on crutches for the rest of my life if you trod on
my toes.

Miss T. Very likely. Why not change Eleven for
a square ?

Capt. G. No, please! I want them both waltzes.
Won't you write them down ?

Miss T. / don't get so many dances that I shall
confuse them. You will be the offender.

Capt. G. Wait and see ! QAside.') She doesn't
dance perfectly, perhaps, but

Miss T. Your tea nili^v-have got cold by this time.
Won't you have another cup ?

Capt. G. No, thanks. Don't you think it's pleas-
anter out in the veranda ? (^Aside.) I never saw hair
take that colour in the sunshine before. (^Aloud.) It's
like one of Dicksee's pictures.

Miss T. Yes! It's a wonderful sunset, isn't it?
(^Bluntly.') But what do you know about Dicksee's
pictures ?

Capt. G. I go Home occasionally. And I used to
know the Galleries. (^Nervously.) You mustn't think
me only a Philistine with — a moustache.

120 POOK DEAR MAMMA

Miss T. Don't ! Flease don't ! I'm so sorry for
what I said then. I was horribly rude. It slipped out
before I thought. Don't you know the temptation to
say frightful and shocking things just for the mere
sake of saying them? I'm afraid I gave way to it.

Capt. G. (^Watching the girl as she flushes.) I
think I know the feeling. It would be terrible if we
all yielded to it, wouldn't it? For instance, I might
say

Poor Deae Mamma. (^Entering, habited, hatted, and
booted.') Ah, Captain Gadsby ! 'Sorry to keep you
waiting. 'Hope you haven't been bored. 'My little
girl been talking to you ?

Miss T. (^Aside.) I'm not sorry I spoke about the
rheumatism. I'm not! I'm not! I only wish I'd
mentioned the corns too.

Capt. G. (Aside.) What a shame ! I wonder how
old she is. It never occurred to me before. (Aloud.)
We've been discussing ' Shakespeare and the musical
glasses ' in the veranda.

Miss T. (Aside.) Nice man! He knows that quo-
tation. He isnH a Philistine with a moustache. (Alovd.)
Good-bye, Captain Gadsby. (Aside.) What a huge
hand and what a squeeze ! I don't suppose he meant it,
but he has driven the rings into my fingers.

Poor Deab Mamma. Has Vermillion come round
yet ? Oh, yes ! Captain Gadsby, don't you think that
the saddle is too far forward? (They pass into the
front veranda.)

Capt. G. (Aside.) How the dickens should I
know what she prefers? She told me that she doted on
horses. (Aloud.) I think it is.

Miss T. (Coming out into front veranda.) Oh!

POOR DEAR MAMMA 121

Bad Buldoo ! I must speak to him for this. He has
taken up the curb two links, and Vermillion hates that.
(^Passes out and to horse's head.')
Capt. G. Let me do it !

Miss T. No, Vermillion understands me. Don't
you, old man? (^Looses curb-chain skilfully, and pats
horse on nose and throttle.) Poor Vermillion ! Did
they want to cut his chin off ? There !

Captain Gadsby watches the interlude with un-
disguised admiration.
Poor Dear Mamma. (^Tartly to Miss T.) You've
forgotten your guest, I think, dear.

Miss T. Good gracious ! So I have ! Good-bye.
(^Retreats indoors hastily.)

Poor Dear Mamma. (^Bunching reins in fingers
hampered iy too tight gauntlets.) Captain Gadsby !

Captain Gadsby stoops and makes the foot-rest.
Poor Dear Mamma blunders, halts too long,
and breaks through it.
Capt. G. QAside.) Can't hold up eleven stone for
ever. It's all your rheumatism. (^Aloud.) Can't im-
agine why I was so clumsy. (^Aside.) Now Little
Featherweight would have gone up like a bird.

They ride out of the garden. The Captain falls
back.
Capt. G. (^Aside.) How that habit catches her
under the arms ! Ugh !

Poor Dear Mamma. ( With the worn smile of sixteen
seasons, the worse for exchange.) You're dull this after-
noon, Captain Gadsby.

Capt. G. (^Spurring up wearily.) Why did you
keep me waiting so long ?
^t ccBtera, et ccetera, et ccetera.

122 POOR DEAE MAMMA

(an interval op THEBE "WEEKS.)

Gilded Youth. (^Sitting on railings opposite Town
Hall.') Hullo, Gaddy ! 'Been trotting out the Gorgon-
zola ! We all thought it was the Gorgon you're mash-
ing.

Capt. G. (^With withering emphasis.') You young

cub ! What the does it matter to you ?

Proceeds to read Gilded Youth a lecture on dis-
cretion and deportment, which crwmbles latter
like a Chinese Lantern. Departs fuming.

(fuethee inteeval of five weeks.)

Scene. — Exterior of New Simla Library on a foggy

evening. Miss Theeegan and Miss Deeecouet

meet among the Wickshaws. Miss T. is carrying a

bundle of hooks under her left arm.

Miss D. (^Level intonation.) Well ?

Miss T. (Ascending intonation.) Well ?

Miss D. ( Capturing her friend's left arm, taking
away all the books, placing books in 'rickshaw, returning
to arm, securing hand by the third finger and investi-
gating.) Well ! You bad girl ! And you never told
me.

Miss T. (Demurely.) He — he — he only spoke yes-
terday afternoon.

Miss D. Bless you, dear! And I'm to be bridesmaid,
aren't I ? You know you promised ever so long ago.

Miss T. Of course. I'll tell you all about it to-
morrow. ( Gets into 'rickshaw.) O Emma !

Miss D. ( With intense interest.) Yes, dear ?

POOR DEAR MAMMA 123

Miss T. (Piano.^ It's quite true — about — the —

egg-
Miss D. What egg ?

Miss T. (^Pianissimo prestissimo.') The egg with-
out the salt. ( Forte.') Ohalo ghar ko jaldi, jhampani !
(Go home, jhampani.)

THE WORLD WITHOUT

Certain people of importance.

Scene. — Smoking^oom of the DegeM Ql'uh. Time,
10.30 P.M. of a stuffy night in the Rains. Four
men dispersed in picturesque attitudes and easy-
chairs. To these enter Blayne of the Irregular
Moguls, in evening dress.

Blayne. Phew ! The Judge ought to be hanged
in his own store-godown. Hi, hhitmatgar! Poqra
whiskey-peg, to take the taste out of my mouth.

Ctiktiss. (Royal Artillery. ) That's it, is it ? What
the deuce made you dine at the Judge's ? You know
his bandobust.

Blayne. 'Thought it couldn't be worse than the
Clubi but I'll swear he buys ullaged liquor and
doctors it with gin and ink {looking round the roonC).
Is this all of you to-night ?

DOONE. {P.W.B.) Anthony was called out at
dinner. Mingle had a pain in his tummy.

CcjRTiss. Miggy dies of cholera once a week in
the Rains, and gets drunk on chlorodyne in between.
'Good little chap, though. Any one at the Judge's,
Blayne?

Blaynb. Cockley and his memsahib looking awfully
white and fagged. 'Female girl — couldn't catch the
name — on her way to the Hills, under the Cockleys'

124

THE WORLD WITHOUT 125

charge — the Judge, and Markyn fresh from Simla —
disgustingly fit.

Ctjrtiss. Good Lord, how truly magnificent ! Was
there enough ice ? When I mangled garbage there I
got one whole lump — nearly as big as a walnut. What
had Markyn to say for himself ?

Blayke. 'Seems that every one is having a fairly
good time up there in spite of the rain. By Jove, that
reminds me ! I know I hadn't come across just for
the pleasure of your society. News ! Great news !
Markyn told me.

DooNE. Who's dead now ?

BLAY]srE. No one that I know of ; but Gaddy's
hooked at last!

Dropping Chorus. How much ? The Devil !
Markyn was pulling your leg. Not Gaddy !

Blayne. (JEumming.) ' Yea, verily, verily, verily!
Verily, verily, I say unto thee.' Theodore, the gift
o' God ! Our Phillup ! It's been given out up
above.

Mackesy. (^Barri8ter-ai>Law.^ Huh! Women will
give out anything. What does accused say ?

Blayne. Markyn told me that he congratulated
him warily — one hand held out, t'other ready to guard.
Gaddy turned pink and said it was so.

GuRTiss. Poor old Gaddy ! They all do it. Who's
she ? Let's hear the details.

Blayne. She's a girl — daughter of a Colonel
Somebody.

DooNE. Simla's stiff with Colonels' daughters. Be
more explicit.

Blayne. Wait a shake. What was her name?
Three — something. Three

126 THE WORLD WITHOUT

CuETiss. Stars, perhaps. Gaddy knows that brand.

Blaytstb. Threegan — Minnie Threegan.

Mackesy. Threegan ! Isn't she a little bit of a
girl with red hair ?

Blaynb. 'Bout that — from what Markyn said.

Mackesy. Then I've met her. She was at Lucknow
last season. 'Owned a permanently juvenile Mamma,
and danced damnably. I say, Jervoise, you knew the
Threegans, didn't you ?

Jbbvoisb. (Civilian of twenty-five years' service, wak-
ing up from Ms doze.) Eh ? What's that ? Knew who ?
How ? I thought I was at Home, confound you !

Mackesy. The Threegan girl's engaged, so Blayne
says.

Jbkvoisb. (Slowly.) Engaged — engaged ! Bless
my soul ! I'm getting an old man ! Little Minnia
Threegan engaged. It was only the other day I went
home with them in the Sural — no, the Massilia — and
she was crawling about on her hands and knees among
the ayahs. 'Used to call me the '■Tick Taek Sahib ^
because I showed her my watch. And that was in
Sixty-Seven — no. Seventy. Good God, how time flies !
I'm an old man. I remember when Threegan married
Miss Derwent — daughter of old Hooky Derwent — but
that was before your time.. And so the little baby's
engaged to have a little baby of her own ! Who's the
other fool ?

Mackesy. Gadsby of the Pink Hussars.

Jervoise. 'Never met him. Tlireegan lived in debt,
married in debt, and'U die in debt. 'Must be glad to
get the girl off his hands.

Blayne. Gaddy has money — lucky devil. Place
at Home, too.

THE WORLD WITHOUT 127

DooNE. He comes of first-class stock. 'Can't quite
understand his being caught by a Colonel's daughter,
and (looking cautiously round room) Black Infantry at
that ! No offence to you, Blayne.

Blayne. (Stiffly.) Not much, tha-anks.

CuETiss. ( Quoting motto of Irregular Moguls.) ' We
are what we are,' eh, old man ? But Gaddy was such a
superior animal as a rule. Why didn't he go Home
and pick his wife there?

Mackesy, They are all alike when they come to the
turn into the straight. About thirty a man begins to
get sick of living alone

CuRTiss. And of the eternal muttony-chap in the
morning.

DoONE. It's dead goat as a rule, but go on, Mackesy.

Mackesy, If a man's once taken that way nothing
will hold him. Do you remember Benoit of your ser-
vice, Doone ? They transferred him to Tharanda when
his time came, and he married a platelayer's daughter, or
something bf that kind. She was the only female about
the place.

Doone. Yes, poor brute. That smashed Benoit's
chances of promotion altogether. Mrs. Benoit used to
ask : ' Was you goin' to the dance this evenin' ? '

CuETiss. Hang it all ! Gaddy hasn't married beneath
him. There's no tar-brush in the family, I suppose.

Jeevoise. Tar-brush ! Not an anna. You young
fellows talk as though the man was doing the girl an
honour in marrying her. You're all too conceited —
nothing's good enough for you.

Blayne. Not even an empty Club, a dam' bad din-
ner at the Judge's, and a Station as sickly as a hospital.
You're quite right. We're a set of Sybarites.

128 THE WORLD WITHOUT

DooNE. Luxurious dogs, wallowing in

CuETiss. Prickly heat between the shoulders. I'm
covered with it. Let's hope Beora will be cooler.

Blayne. Whew ! Are you ordered into camp,
too ? I thought the Gunners had a clean sheet.

Ctjetiss. No, worse luck. Two cases yesterday —
one died — and if we have a third, out we go. Is
there any shooting at Beora, Doone ?

DooNB. The country's under water, except the patch
by the Grand Trunk Road. I was there yesterday,
looking at a hund, and came across four poor devils in
their last stage. It's rather bad from here to Kuchara.

CtTRTiss. Then we're pretty certain to have a heavy
go of it. Heigho ! I shouldn't mind changing places
with Gaddy for a while. 'Sport with Amaryllis in the
shade of the Town Hall, and all that. Oh, why doesn't
somebody come and marry me, instead of letting me
go into cholera-camp ?

Mackesy. Ask the Committee.

CuETiss. You ruffian ! You'll stand me another
peg for that. Blayne, what will you take ? Mackesy
is line on moral grounds. Doone, have you any
preference ?

Doone. Small glass Kiimmel, please. Excellent
carminative, these days. Anthony told me so.

Mackesy. (^Signing voucher for four drinks.') Most
unfair punishment. I only thought of Curtiss as
Actseon being chivied round the billiard tables by the
nymf)hs of Diana.

Blayne. Curtiss would have to import his nymphs
by train. Mrs. Cockley's the only woman in the
Station. She won't leave Cockley, and he's doing his
best to get her to go.

THE WORLD WITHOUT 129

CuETiss. Good, indeed ! ' Here's Mrs. Cockley's
health. To the only wife in the Station and a damned
brave woman !

Omnes. (^Drinking. ^ A damned brave woman !

Blaynb. I suppose Gaddy will bring his wife here
at the end of the cold weather. They are going to be
married almost immediately, I believe.

CuKTiss. Gaddy may thank his luck that the Pink
Hussars are all detachment and no headquarters this
hot weather, or he'd be torn from the arms of his love
as sure as death. Have you ever noticed the thorough-
minded way British Cavalry take to cholera? It's
because they are so expensive. If the Pinks had stood
fast here, they would have been out in camp a month
ago. Yes, I should decidedly like to be Gaddy.

Mackesy. He'll go Home after he's married, and
send in his papers — see if he doesn't.

Blaynb. Why shouldn't he ? Hasn't he money ?
Would any one of us be here if we weren't paupers ?

DooNE. Poor old pauper ! What has become of
the six hundred you rooked from our table last month ?

Blayke. It took unto itself wings. I think an
enterprising tradesman got some of it, and a sTiroff
gobbled the rest — or else I spent it.

CxiETiss. Gaddy never had dealings with a shroff in
his life.

DooNE. Virtuous Gaddy ! If I had three thou-
sand a month, paid from England, I don't think I'd
deal with a shroff either.

Mackesy. (^Yawning.') Oh, it's a sweet life ! I
wonder whether matrimony would make it sweeter.

Ctjetiss. Ask Cockley — with his wife dying by
inches !

130 THE WORLD WITHOUT

Blaynb. Go home and get a fool of a girl to come
out to — what is it Thackeray says? — 'the splendid
palace of an Indian pro-consul.'

DooNE. "Which reminds me. My quarters leak
like a sieve. I had fever last night from sleeping in a
swamp. And the worst of it is, one can't do anything
to a roof till the Rains are over.

CuRTiss. What's wrong with you? You haven't
eighty rotting Tommies to take into a running
stream.

DoONE. No : but I'm mixed boils and bad lan-
guage. I'm a regular Job all over my body. It's
sheer poverty of blood, and I don't see any chance of
getting richer — either way.

Blayne. Can't you take leave ?

DooNB. That's the pull you Army men have over
us. Ten days are nothing in your sight. Fm so
important that Government can't find a substitute if
I go away. Ye-es, I'd like to be Gaddy, whoever his
wife may be

CuRTiss. You've passed the turn of life that Mack-
esy was speaking of.

DooNE. Indeed I have, but I never yet had the
brutality to ask a woman to share my life out here.

Blayne. On my soul I believe you're right. I'm
thinking of Mrs. Cockley. The woman's an absolute
wreck.

DooNE. Exactly. Because she stays down here.
The only way to keep her fit would be to send her to
the Hills for eight months — and the same with any
woman. I fancy I see myself taking a wife on those
terms.

Mackesy. With the rupee at one and sixpence.

THE WORLD WITHOUT ^131 ^

The little Doones would be little Dehra Doones, with a

fine Mussoorie chi-chi anent to bring home for the

holidays.

- CxTBTiss. And a pair of be-ewtiful sawiJAwr-horns

for Doone to wear, free of expense, presented by

DooNE. Yes, it's an enchanting prospect. By the
way, the rupee hasn't done faUing yet. The time will
come when we shall think ourselves lucky if we only
lose half our pay.

CuBTiss. Surely a third's loss enough. Who gains
by the arrangement ? That's what I want to know.

Blaynb. The Silver Question ! I'm going to bed
if you begin squabbling. Thank Goodness, here's
Anthony — looking like a ghost.

Enter Anthony, Indian Medical Staff, very
white and tired.

Anthony. 'Evening, Blayne. It's raining in sheets.
Whiskey peg lao, hhitmatgar. The roads are something
ghastly.

CtrnTiss. How's Mingle ?

Anthony. Very bad, and more frightened. I
handed him over to Fewton. Mingle might just as
well have called him in the first place, instead of
bothering me.

Blayne. He's a nervous little chap. What has
he got, this time ?

Anthony. 'Can't quite say. A very bad tummy
and a blue funk so far. He asked me at once if it was
cholera, and I told him not to be a fool. That soothed
him,

Ctjetiss. Poor devil ! The funk does half the
business iiife man of that build.

Anthony. (^Lighting a cheroot.^ I firmly believe

132 THE WORLD WITHOUT

the funk will kill him if he stays down. You know
the amount of trouble he's been giving Fewton for the
last three weeks. He's doing his very best to frighten
himself into the grave.

Gbnbkal Choetjs. Poor little devil! Why doesn't
he get away ?

Anthont. 'Can't. He has his leave all right, but
he's so dipped he can't take it, and I don't think his
name on paper would raise four annas. That's in con-
fidence, though.

Mackesy! All the Station knows it.

Anthony. 'I suppose I shall have to die here,' he
said, squirming all across the bed. He's quite made
up his mind to Kingdom Come. And I hnow he has
nothing more than a wet-weather tummy if he could
only keep a hand on himself.

Blayne. That's bad. That's very bad. Poor little
Miggy. Good little chap, too. I say

Anthony. What do you say ?

Blayne. Well, look here — anyhow. If it's like
that — as you say — I say fifty.

CuKTiss. I say fifty.

Mackesy. I go twenty better.

DooNB. Bloated Croesus of the Bar ! I say fifty.
Jervoise, what do you say ? Hi ! Wake up !

Jeevoise. Eh? What's that? What's that?

CuETlss. We want a hundred rupees from you.
You're a bachelor drawing a gigantic income, and
there's a man in a hole.

Jeevoise. What man ? Any one dead ?

Blayne. No, but he'll die if you don't give the
hundred. Here ! Here's a peg-voucher. You can
see what we've signed for, and Anthony's man will

THE WORLD WITHOUT 133

come round to-morrow to collect it. So there will be
no trouble.

Jekvoise. (^Signing.} One hundred, E. M. J.
There you are {feebly). It isn't one of your jokes, is
it?

Blayne. No, it really is wanted. Anthony, you
were the biggest poker -winner last week, and you've
defrauded the tax-collector too long. Sign!

Anthony. Let's see. Three fifties and a seventy
— two twenty — three twenty — say four hundred and
twenty. That'll give him a month clear at the Hills.
Many»thanks, you men. I'll send round the ehaprassi
to-morrow.

Ctjetiss. You must engineer his taking the stuff,
and of course you mustn't

Anthony. Of course. It would never do. He'd
weep with gratitude over his evening drink.

Blaynb. That's just what he would do, damn him.
Oh ! I say, Anthony, you pretend to know everything.
Have you heard about Gaddy ?

Anthony. No. Divorce Court at last ?

Blayne. Worse. He's engaged !

Anthony. How much ? He can't be !

Blayne. He is. He's going to be married in a few
weeks. Markyn told me at the Judge's this evening.
It's pukka.

Anthony. You don't say so? Holy Moses!
There'll be a shine in the tents of Kedar.

CuRTiss. 'Regiment cut up rough, think you ?

Anthony. 'Don't know anythiug about the Regi-
ment.

Mackesy. It is bigamy, then?

Anthony. Maybe. Do you mean to say that you

134 THE WORLD WITHOUT

men have forgotten, or is there more charity in the
world than I thought ?

DooNE. You don't look pretty when you are trying
to keep a secret. You bloat. Explain.

Anthony. Mrs. Herriott!

Blayne. {After a long pause, to the room generally.^
It's my notion that we are a set of fools.

Maokesy. Nonsense. That business was knocked
on the head last season. Why, young Mallard

Anthony. Mallard was a candlestick, paraded as
such. Think awhile. Recollect last season and the
talk then. Mallard or no Mallard, did Gaddy* ever
talk to any other woman?

CuETiss. There's something in that. It was
slightly noticeable now you come to mention it. But
she's at Naini Tal and he's at Simla.

Anthony. He had to go to Simla to look after a
globe-trotter relative of his — a person with a title.
Uncle or aunt.

Blaynb. And there he got engaged. No law pre-
vents a man growing tired of a woman.

Anthony. Except that he mustn't do it till the
woman is tired of him. And the Herriott woman was
not that.

Ctjetiss. She may be now. Two months of Naini
Tal work wonders.

DooNB. Curious thing how some women carry a
Fate with them. There was a Mrs. Deegie in the
Central Provinces whose men invariably fell away and
got married. It became a regular proverb with us
when I was down there. I remember three men des-
perately devoted to her, and they all, one after another,
took wives.

THE WORLD WITHOUT 135

CuRTiss. That's odd. Now I should have thought
that Mrs. Deegie's influence would have led them to
take other men's wives. It ought to have made them
afraid of the judgment of Providence.

Anthony. Mrs. Herriott will make Gaddy afraid
of something more than the judgment of Providence,
I fancy.

Blaynb. Supposing things are as you say, he'll be
a fool to face her. He'll sit tight at Simla.

Anthony. 'Shouldn't be a bit surprised if he went
off to Naini to explain. He's an unaccountable sort of
man, and she's likely to be a more than unaccountable
woman.

DoONE. What makes you take her character away
so confidently?

Anthony. Primum tempus. Gaddy was her first,
and a woman doesn't allow her first man to drop away
without expostulation. She justifies the first transfer
of affection to herself by swearing that it is for ever
and ever. Consequently

Blayne Consequently, we are sitting here till
past one o'clock, talking scandal like a set of Station
cats. Anthony, it's all your fault. We were perfectly
respectable till you came in. Go to bed. I'm off.
Good-night all.

Ctjetiss. Past one! It's past two, by Jove, and
here's the khit coming for the late charge. Just
Heavens ! One, two, three, four, five rupees to pay
for the pleasure of saying that a poor little beast of a •
woman is no better than she should be. I'm ashamed
of myself. Go to bed, you slanderous villains, and if
I'm sent to Beora to-morrow, be prepared to hear I'm
dead before paying- my card account !

THE TENTS OF KEDAR

Only why should it he with pain at all,
Why must I 'twixt the leaves of coronal

Put any kiss of pardon on thy hrow?
Why should the other women know so much,
And talk together : — Such the look and such
The smile he used to love with, then as now.

Any Wife to any Husband.

Scene. — A Naini Tal dinner for thirty-four. Plate,
wines, crockery, and hhitmatgars carefully calculated
to scale of Rs. 6000 per mensem, less Exchange. Table
split lengthways by bank of flowers.

Mrs. Hbeeiott. (After conversation has risen to
proper pitch.") Ah! 'Didn't see you in the crush in
the drawing-room. (Sotto voce.') Where have you
been all this while, Pip ?

Captain Gadsby. (Turning from regularly ordained
dinner partner and settling hock glasses.) Good even-
ing. (Sotto voce.) Not quite so loud another time.
You've no notion how your voice carries. (Aside.) So
much for shirking the written explanation. It'lf have
to be a verbal one now. Sweet j)rospect ! How on earth
am I to tell her that I am a respectable, engaged
member of society and it's all over between us ?

Mks. H. I've a heavy score against you. Where
were you at the Monday Pop ? Where were you on
Tuesday ? Where were you at the Lamonts' tennis ?
I was looking everywhere.

136

THE TENTS OF KEDAR 137

Capt. G. For me ! Oh, I was alive somewhere, I
suppose. QAside.^ It's for Minnie's sake, but it's
going to be dashed unpleasant.

Mks. H. Have I done anything to offend you? I
never meant it if I have. I couldn't help going for a
ride with the Vaynor man. It was promised a week
before you came up.

Capt. G. I didn't know

Mks, H. It really was.

Capt. G. Anything about it, I mean.

Mes. H. What has upset you to-day? All these
days ? You haven't been near me for four whole days
— nearly one hundred hours. Was it kind of you,
Pip ? And I've been looking forward so much to your
coming.

Capt. G. Have you?

Mes. H. You know I have ! I've been as foolish as
a schoolgirl about it. I made a little calendar and put
it in my card-case, and every time the twelve o'clock
gun went off I scratched out a square and said : ' That
brings me nearer to Pip. My Pip ! '

Capt. G. (With an uneasy laugh.') What will
Mackler think if you neglect him so ?

Mes. H. And it hasn't brought you nearer. You
seem farther away than ever. Are you sulking about
something ? I know your temper.

Capt. G. No.

Mes. H. Have I grown old in the last few months,
then? (^Reaches forward to bank of flowers for menu-
card.)

Paetnee on Left. Allow me. (^Hands menu-card.
Mes. H. keeps her arm at full stretch for three seconds.)

Mes. H. {To partner.) Oh, thanks. I didn't see.

138 THE TENTS OF KEDAR

{Turns right' again.') Is anything in me changed at
ali?

Capt. Gr- For Goodness' sake go on with your
dinner ! You must eat something. Try one of those
cutlet arrangements. (Aside.') And I fancied she had
good shoulders, once upon a time ! What an ass a
man can make of himself !

Mes. H. (Helping herself to a paper frill, seven peas,
some stamped carrots and a spoonful of gravy. ) That
isn't an answer. TeU me whether I have done any-
thing.

Capt. G. (^Aside.) If it isn't ended here there will
be a ghastly scene somewhere else. If only I'd written
to her and stood the racket — at long range! (^To
Khitmatgar.) Han! Simphin do. (Aloud.) I'll tell
you later on.

Mes. H. Tell me now. It must be some foolish
misunderstanding, and you know that there was to be
nothing of that sort between us. We, of all people in
the world, can't afford it. Is it the Vaynor man. and
don't you like to say so ? On my honour ■

Capt. G. I haven't given the Vaynor man a thought.

Mes. H. But how d'you know that J haven't ?

Capt. G. (Aside.) Here's my chance and may the
Devil help me through with it. (Aloud and meas-
uredly.) Believe me, I do not care how often or how
tenderly you think of the Vaynor man.

Mbs. H. I wonder if you mean that. — Oh, what is
the good of squabbling and pretending to misunder-
stand when you are only up for so short a time ? Pip,
don't be a stupid !

Follows a pause, during which he crosses his left
leg over his right and continues his dinner.

THE TENTS OF KEDAR 139

Capt. G. (iw answer to the thunderstorm in her
eyes.) Corns — my worst.

Mrs. H. Upon my word, you are the very rudest
man in the world ! I'll never do it again.

Capt. G. QAside.) No, I don't think you will;
but I wonder what you wiU do before it's all over.
(^To Khitmatgar.) Thorah ur Simphin do.

Mrs. H. Well ! Haven't you the grace to apolo-
gise, bad man ?

Capt. G. (^Aside.) I mustn't let it drift back now.
Trust a woman for being as blind as a bat when she
won't see.

Mrs. H. I'm waiting : or would you like me to
dictate a form of apology?

Capt. G. (^Desperately.) By all means dictate.

Mrs. H. (^Lightly.) Very well. Rehearse your
several Christian names after me and go on : ' Profess
my sincere repentance.'

Capt. G. 'Sincere repentance.'

Mrs. H. ' For having behaved '

Capt. G. (Aside.) At last ! I wish to Goodness
she'd look away. 'For having behaved' — as I have
behaved, and declare that I am thoroughly and heartily
sick of the whole business, and take this opportunity
of making clear my intention of ending it, now, hence-
forward, and for ever. (Aside.) If any one had told
me I should be such a blackguard !

Mrs. H. (Shaking a spoonful of potato chips into
her plate.) That's, not a pretty joke.

Capt. G, No. It's a reality. (Aside.) I wonder
if smashes of this kind are always so raw.

Mrs. H. Really, Pip, you're getting more absurd
every day.

140 THE TENTS OF KEDAE

Capt. G. I don't think you quite understand me.
Shall I repeat it ?

Mes. H. No ! For pity's sake don't do that. It's
too terrible, even in fun.

Capt. G. I'll let her think it over for a while.
But I ought to be horse-whipped.

Mes. H. I want to know what you meant by what
you said just now.

Capt. G. Exactly what I said. No less,

Mes. H. But what have I done to deserve it?
What have I done ?

Capt. G. {Aside.) If she only wouldn't look at
me. (^Aloud and very slowly, his eyes on Ms plate.)
D'you remember that evening in July, before the Rains
broke, when you said that the end would have to come
sooner or later — and you wondered for which of us it
would come first ?

Mes. H. Yes ! I was only joking. And you
swore that, as long as there was breath in your body, it
should never come. And I believed you.

Capt. G. (^Fingering menu-card.) Well, it has.
That's all.

A long pause, during which Mes. H. hows her
head and rolls the bread-twist into little pellets :
G. stares at the oleanders.

Mes. H. (^Throwing back her head and laughing
naturally.) They traip us women well, don't they, Pip?

Capt. G. (^Brutally, touching shirt-stud.) So far
as the expression goes. (^Aside.) It isn't in her
nature to take things quietly. There'll be an explosion
yet.

Mes. H. (With a shudder.) Thank you. B-but
even Red Indians allow people to wriggle when they're

THE TENTS OF KEDAR ^ 141

being tortured, I believe. (^Slips fan from girdle and
fans slowly: rim of fan level with cMn.^

Partner on Left. Very close to-night, isn't it?
'You find it too mucb for you?

Mrs. H. Oh, no, not in the least. But they really
ought to have punkahs, even in your cool Naini Tal,
oughtn't they? (^Turns, dropping fan and raising eye-
hrows.')

Capt. G. It's all right. (Aside. ) Here comes the
storm !

Mrs. H. (Her eyes on the tablecloth : fan ready in
right hand.') It was very cleverly managed, Pip, and
I congratulate you. You swore — you never contented
yourself with merely saying a thing — you swore that,
as far as lay in your power, you'd make my wretched
life pleasant for me. And you've denied me the con-
solation of breaking down. I should have done it —
indeed I should. A woman would hardly have thought
of this refinement, my kind, considerate friend. (Fan-
guard as before.) You have explained things so ten-
derly and truthfully, too ! You haven't spoken or
written a word of warning, and you have let me believe
in you till the last minute. You haven't condescended
to give me your reason yet. No ! A woman could
not have managed it half so well. Are there many
men like you in the world ?

Capt. Gc I'm sure I don't know. (To Khitmatgar.)
Ohe ! Simphin do.

Mrs. H. You call yourself a man of the world,
don't you? Do men of the world behave like Devils
when they do a woman the honour to get tired of her ?

Capt. G. I'm sure I don't know. Don't speak so
loud !

142 THE TENTS OP KEDAE

Mbs. H. Keep us respectable, O Lord, whatever
happens ! Don't be afraid of my compromising you.
You've chosen your ground far too well, and I've
been properly brought up. (Lowering fan.') Haven't
you any pity, Pip, except for yourself?

Capt. G. Wouldn't it be rather impertinent of me
to say that I'm sorry for you ?

Mes. H. I think you have said it once or twice be-
fore. You're growing very careful of my feelings. My
God, Pip, I was a good woman once ! You %aid I was.
You've made me what I am. What are you going to
do with me ? What are you going to do with me ?
Won't you say that you are sorry ? (Helps hersdf to
iced asparagus.')

Capt. G. I am sorry for you, if you want the pity
of such a brute as I am. I'm awfly sorry for you.

Mes. H. Rather tame for a man of the world. Do
you think that that admission clears you ?

Capt. G. What can I do ? I can only tell you
what I think of myself. You can't think worse than
that?

Mes. H. Oh, yes, I can ! And now, Avill you tell
me the reason of all this ? Remorse ? Has Bayard
been suddenly conscience-stricken?

Capt. G. (Angrily, Ms eyes stilllowered.) No I The
thing has come to an end on my side. That's alL
Mafisch!

Mes. H. 'That's all. Mafisch T As though I were
a Cairene Dragoman. You used to make prettier
speeches. D'you remember when you said ?

Capt. G. For Heaven's sake don't bring that back !
Call me anything you like and I'll admit it

Mes. H. But you don't care to be reminded of old

THK TENTS OE KEDAE 143

lies ? If I could hope to hurt you one-tenth as much
as you have hurt me to-night — No, I wouldn't — I
couldn't do it — liar though you are.

Capt. G. I've spoken the truth.

Mrs. H. My dear Sir, you flatter yourself. You
have lied over the reason. Pip, remember that I know
you as you don't know yourself. You have been every-
thing to me, though you are — (Fan-guard.') Oh, what
a contemptible Thing it is ! And so you are merely
tired of me ?

Capt. G. Since you insist upon my repeating it
— Yes.

Mrs. H. Lie the first. I wish I knew a coarser
word. Lie seems so ineffectual in your case. The fire
has just died out and there is no fresh one ? Think
for a minute, Pip, if you care whether I despise you
more than I do. Simply Mafisch, is it ?

Capt. G. Yes. (Aside.') I think I deserve this.

Mes. H. Lie number two. Before the next glass
chokes you, tell me her name.

Capt. G. (Aside.) I'll make her pay for dragging
Minnie into the business ! (Aloud.) Is it likely ?

Mes. H. Very likely if you thought that it would
flatter your vanity. You'd cry my name on the house-
tops to make people turn round.

Capt. G. I wish I had. There would have been an
end of this business.

Mes. H. Oh, no, there would not — And so you
were going to be virtuous and blasS, were you? To
come to me and say : ' I've done with you. The inci-
dent is clo-osed.' I ought to be proud of having kept
such a man so long.

Capt. G. (Aside.) It only remains to pray for the

144 THE TENTS OF KEDAR

end of the dinner. (^Aloud.') You know what I think
of myself.

Mks. H. As it's the only person in the world you
ever do think of, and as I know your mind thoroughly,
I do. You want to get it all over and^ — Oh, I
can't keep you back ! And you're going — think of it,
Pip — to throw me over for another woman. And you

swore that all other women were Pip, my Pip 1

She canH care for you as I do. Believe me, she can't !
Is it any one that I know ?

Capt. G. Thank Goodness it isn't. (^Aside.') I
expected a cyclone, but not an earthquake.

Mes. H. She can't! Is there anything that I
wouldn't do for you — or haven't done ? And to think
that I should take this trouble over you, knowing what
you are ! Do you despise me for it?

Capt. G. {Wiping his mouth to hide a smile.^
Again? It's entirely a work of charity on your
part.

Mrs. H. Ahhh ! But I have no right to resent it.
— Is she better-looking than I ? Who was it said ?

Capt. G. No — not that !

Mrs. H. I'll be more merciful than you were.
Don't you know that all women are alike ?

Capt. G. (^Aside.') Then this is the exception
that proves the rule.

Mks. H. All of them ! I'll tell you anything you
like. I wiU, upon my word ! They only want the
admiration — from anybody — no matter who — any-
body ! But there is always one man that they care for
more than any one else in the world, and would sacri-
fice all the others to. Oh, do listen! I've kept the
Vaynor man trotting after me like a poodle, and he

THE TENTS OF KEDAR 145

believes tliat lie is the only man I am interested in.
I'll tell you what he said to me.

Capt. G. Spare him. (J.sic?e.) I wonder what
his version is.

Mes. H. He's been waiting for me to look at him
all through dinner. Shall I do it, and you can see
what an idiot he looks ?

Capt. G. ' But what imports the nomination of
this gentleman ? '

Mes. H. Watch ! (^Sends a glance to the Vaynor
man, who tries vainly to combine a mouthful of ice pud-
ding, a smirk of self -satisfaction,-q, glare of intense devo-
tion, and the stolidity of a British dining countenance.')

Capt. G. (^Critically.) He doesn't look pretty.
Why didn't you wait till the spoon was out of his
mouth ?

Mes. H. To amuse you. She'll make an exhibi-
tion of you as I've made of him ; and people wUl
laugh at you. Oh, Pip, can't you see that ? It's as
plain as the noonday sun. You'll be trotted about
and told lies, and made a fool of like the others. /
never made a fool of you, did I ?

Capt. G. (^Aside.) What a clever little woman it
is!

Mes. H. Well, what have you to say ?

Capt. G. I feel better.

Mes. H. Yes, I suppose so, after I have come down
to your level. I couldn't have done it if I hadn't
cared for you so much. I have spoken the truth.

Capt. G. It doesn't alter the situation.

Mes. H. {Passionately.) Then she has said that
she cares for you ! Don't believe her, Pip! It's a lie
— as bad as yours to me !

146 THE TENTS OF KEDAR

Capt. G. Ssssteady ! I've a notion that . a friend
of yours is looking at you.

Mrs. H. He ! I haU him. He introduced you to
me.

Capt. G. (^Aside.) And some people would like
women to assist in making the laws. Introduction to
imply condonement. (^Aloud.) Well, you see, if you
can remember so far back as that, I couldn't, in com-
mon politeness, refuse the offer.

Mrs. H. In common politeness ! We have got
beyond that!

Capt. G. (^Aside.) Old ground means fresh trouble.
(^Aloud.^ On my honour

Mrs. H. Your what? Ha, ha!

Capt. G. Dishonour, then. She's not what you
imagine. I meant to

Mrs. H. Don't tell me anything about her ! She
won't care for you, and when you come back, after hav-
ing made an exhibition of yourself, you'll find me occu-
pied with

Capt. G. (^Insolently.') You couldn't while I am
alive. (Aside.') If that doesn't bring her pride to
her rescue, nothing will.

Mrs. H. (^Drawing herself up.) Couldn't do it?
I? (^Softening.) You're right. I don't believe I could
— though you are what you are — a coward and a liar
in grain.

Capt. G. It doesn't hurt so much after your little
lecture — with demonstrations.

Mrs. H. One mass of vanity! WiU. nothing ever
touch you in this life ? There must be a Hereafter if

it's only for the benefit of But you wiU have it

all to yourself.

THE TENTS OF KEDAR 147

Capt. G. (^Under his eyebrows.') Are you so certain
of that ?

Mks. H. I shall have had mine in this life ; and it
will serve me right.

Capt. G. But the admiration that you insisted on
so strongly a moment ago? (^Aside.) Oh, I am a
brute !

Mes. H. (^Fiercely.') Will that console me for
knowing that you will go to her with the same words,
the same arguments, and the — the same pet names you
used to me? And if she cares for you, you two will-
laugh over my story. Won't that be punishment heavy
enough even for me — even for me ? — And it's all use-
less. That's another punishment.

Capt. G. (Feehly.) Oh, come! I'm not so low as
you think.

Mbs. H. Not now, perhaps, but you will be. Oh,
Pip, if a woman flatters your vanity, there's nothing
on earth that you would not tell her ; and no meanness
that you would not do. Have I known you so long
without knowing that ?

Capt. G. If you can trust me in nothing else —
and I don't see why I should be trusted — you can
count upon my holding my tongue.

Mes. H, If you denied everything you've said this
evening and declared it was all in fun (a long pause),
I'd trust you. Not otherwise. All I ask is, don't tell
her my name. Please don't. A man might forget : a
woman never would. {Looks up table and sees hostess
beginning to collect eyes.) So it's all ended, through
no fault of mine — Haven't I behaved beautifully?
I've accepted your dismissal, and you managed it as
cruelly as you could, and I have made you respect my

148 THE TENTS OF KEDAE

sex, haven't I ? {Arranging gloves and fan.') I only
pray that she'll know you some day as I know you
now. I wouldn't be you then, for I think even your
conceit will be hurt. I hope she'll pay you back the
humiliation you've brought on me. I hope — No. I
don't. • I carSt give you up ! I must have something
to look forward to or I shall go crazy. When it's all
over, come back to me, come back to me, and you'll
find that you're my Pip still !

Capt. G. (Very clearly.') 'False move, and you
pay for it. It's a girl I

Mbs. H. (Rising.) Then it was true! They said

but I wouldn't insult you by asking. A girl! I

was a girl not very long ago. Be good to her, Pip. I
daresay she believes in you,

Q-oes out with an uncertain smile He watches
her through the door, and settles into a chair
as the men redistribute themselves.

Capt. G. Now, if there is any Power who looks
after this world, will He kindly tell me what I have
done ? (Reaching out for the claret, and half aloud.)
What have I done ?

WITH ANY AMAZEMENT
And are not afraid with any amazement. — Marriage Service.

Scene. — A bachelor's bedroom — toilet-table arranged
with unnatural neatness. Captain Gadsby asleep
and snoring heavily. Time, 10.30 A.M. — a glori-
ous autumn day at Simla. Enter delicately Captain
Mafflim of Gadsbt's regiment. Looks at sleeper,
and shakes his head murmuring ' Poor GraddyJ Per-
forms violent fantasia with hair-brushes on chair-bach.

Capt. M. Wake up, my sleeping beauty ! (^Boars.^

' Uprouse ye, then, my merry merry men 1
It is our opening day !
It is our opening da-ay I '

Gaddy, the little dicky-birds have been billing and
cooing for ever so long ; and Fm here !

Capt. G. (^Sitting up and yawning.^ 'Mornin'.
This is awf'ly good of you, old fellow. Most awf'ly
good of you. 'Don't know what I should do without
you. 'Pon my soul, I don't. 'Haven't slept a wink all
night.

Capt. M. I didn't get in till half-past eleven.
'Had a look at you then, and you seemed to be sleeping
as soundly as a condemned criminal.

Capt. G. Jack, if you want to make those disgust-
ingly worn-out jokes, you'd better go away. ( With por-
tentous gravity.^ It's the happiest day in my life.

149

150 WITH ANY AMAZEMENT

Capt. M. (^Chuckling grimly.) Not by a very long
chalk, my son. You're going through some of the
most refined torture you've ever known. But be calm,
/am with you. 'Shun! Dress!

Capt. G. Eh!,Wha-at?

Capt. M. Bo you suppose that you are your own
master for the next twelve hours? If you do, of
course (Makes for the door.)

Capt. G. No ! For Goodness' sake, old man, don't
do that! You'll see me through, won't you? I've
be,en mugging up that beastly drill, and can't remember
a line of it.

Capt. M. (Overhauling Gr,^& uniform.) Go and tub.
Don't bother me. I'll give you ten minutes to dress in.
Interval, filled by the noise as of one splashing in
the bathrToom.

Capt. G. (^Emerging from dressing-^oom.) What
time is it?

Capt. M. Nearly eleven.

Capt. G. Five hours more. O Lord !

Capt. M. (^Aside.) 'First sign of funk, that. 'Won-
der if it's going to spread. (^Aloud.) Come along to
breakfast.

Capt. G. I can't eat anything. I don't want any
breakfast.

Capt. M. (Aside.) So early ! (Aloud.) Captain
Gadsby, I order you to eat breakfast, and a dashed good
breakfast, too. None of your bridal airs and graces
with me !

Leads G. downstairs, and stands over him while
he eats two chops.

Capt. G. (Who has looked at his watch thrice in the
last five minutes.) What time is it?

WITH ANY AMAZEMENT 151

Capt. M. Time to come for a walk. Light up.

Capt. G. I haven't smoked for ten days, and I won't
now. (^Takes cheroot which M. has cut for him, and blows
smoke through his nose luxuriously.^ We aren't going
down the Mall, are we ? »^-

Capt. M. (Aside.") They're all alike in these stages.
(Aloud.') No, my Vestal. We're going along the
quietest road we can find.

Capt. G. Any chance of seeing Her ?

Capt. M. Innocent ! No ! Come along, and, if you
want me for the final obsequies, don't cut my eye out
with your stick.

Capt. G. (Spinning round.) I say, isn't She the
dearest creature that ever walked ? What's the time ?
What comes after ' wilt thou take this woman ' ?

Capt. M. You go for the ring. R'clect it'll be on
the top of my right-hand little finger, and just be care-
ful - how you draw it ofE, because I shall have the
Verger's fees somewhere in my glove.

Capt. G. (Walking forward hastily.) D the

Verger ! Come along ! It's past twelve and I haven't
seen Her since yesterday evening. (Spinning round
again.) She's an absolute angel, Jack, and She's a
dashed deal too good for me. Look here, does She
come up the aisle on my arm, or how ?

Capt. M. If I thought that there was the least
chance of your remembering anything for two consecu-
tive minutes, I'd tell you. Stop passaging about like
that!

Capt. G. (Halting in the middle of the road.) I
say, Jack.

Capt. M. Keep quiet for another ten minutes if you
can, you lunatic ; and walk !

152 WITH ANY AMAZEMENT

The two trcm/p at five miles an hour for fifteen
mirmtes.

Capt. G. What's the time? How about that cursed
wedding-cake and the slippers ? They don't throw 'em
about in church, do they ?

Capt. M. In-variably. The Padre leads o£E with
his boots.

Capt. G. Confound your silly soul! Don't make
fun of me. I can't stand it, and I won't !

Capt. M. ( Untroubled.') So-ooo, old horse ! You'll
have to sleep for a couple of hours this afternoon.

Capt. G. (^Spinning round.') I'm not going to be
treated like a dashed child. Understand that !

Capt. M. (^Aside.) Nerves gone to fiddle-strings.
What a day we're having! (^Tenderly putting his hand
on G.'s shoulder.) My David, how long have you known
this Jonathan ? Would I come up here to make a fool
of you — after all these years ?

Capt. G. (Penitently.) I know, I know, Jack —
but I'm as upset as I can be. Don't mind what I say.
Just hear me run through the drill and see if I've got
it all right : —

' To have and to hold for better or worse, as it was in
the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without
end, so help me God. Amen.'

Capt. M. (Suffocating with suppressed laughter.)
Yes. That's about the gist of it. I'll prompt if you
get into a hat.

Capt. G. (^Earnestly.) Yes, you'll stick by me, Jack,
won't you ? I'm awf 'ly happy, but I don't mind telling
you that I'm in a blue funk !

Capt. M. (Q-ravely.) Are you? 1 should never
have noticed it. You don't look like it.

WITH ANY AMAZEMENT 153

Capt. G. Don't I? That's all right. (^Spinning
round.") On my soul and honour, Jack, She's the sweetest
little angel that ever came down from the sky. There
isn't a woman on earth fit to speak to Her.

Capt. M. (^Aside.') And this is old Gaddy ! (Aloud.')
Go on if it relieves you.

Capt. G. You can laugh ! That's aU you wild asses
of bachelors are fit for.

Capt. M. (^Brawling.) You never would wait for
the troop to come up. You aren't quite married yet,
y'know.

Capt. G. Ugh ! That reminds me. I don't believe
I shall be able to get into my boots. Let's go' home
and try 'em on ! (Burries forward.)

Capt. M. 'Wouldn't be in your shoes for anything
that Asia has to offer.

Capt. G. (^Spinning round.) That just shows your
hideous blackness of soul — your dense stupidity —
your brutal narrow-mindedness. There's only one fault
about you. You're the best of good fellows, and I
don't know what I should have done without you, but
— you aren't married. ( Wags Ms head gravely.) Take
a wife. Jack.

Capt. M. ( With a face like a wall.) Ya-as. Whose
for choice ?

Capt. G. If you're going to be a blackguard, I'm
going on — What's the time ?

Capt. M. (Hums.) —

' An' since 'twas very clear we drank only ginger-beer,
,^ Faith, there must ha' been some stingo in the ginger.'

Come back, you maniac. I'm going to take you
home, and you're going to lie down.

154 WITH ANY AMAZEMENT

Capt. G. What on earth do I want to lie down
for?

Capt. M. Give me a light from your cheroot and
see.

Capt. G. ( Watching eheroot-hutt quiver like a tuning-
fork) Sweet state I'm in !

Capt. M. You are. I'll get you a peg and you'll go
to sleep.

Thei/ return and M. compounds a four-finder peg.

Capt. G. O bus ! bus ! It'll make me as drunk as
an owl.

Capt. M. 'Curious thing, 'twon't have the slightest
effect on you. Drink it off, chuck yourself down there,
and go to bye-bye.

Capt. G. It's absurd. I shan't sleep. I know I
shan't !

Falls into heavy doze at end of seven, minutes.
Capt. M. watches him tenderly.

Capt. M. Poor old Gaddy ! I've seen a few turned
off before, but never one who went to the gallows in
this condition. 'Can't tell how it affects 'em, though.
It's the thoroughbreds that sweat when they're backed
into double-harness. — And that's the man who went
through the guns at Amdheran like a devil possessed
of devils. (^Leans over G.) But this is worse than the
guns, old pal — worse than the guns, isn't it ? (G. turns
in his sleep, and M. touches him clumsily on the fore-
head.') Poor, dear old Gaddy ! Going like the rest of
'em — going like the rest of 'em — Friend that sticketh
closer than a brother — eight years. Dashed bit of a
slip of a girl — eight weeks ! And — where's your
friend ? (^Smokes disconsolately till church clock strikes
three.)

WITH ANY AMAZEMENT 155

Capt. M. Up with you ! Get into your kit.

Capt. G. Already? Isn't it too soon? Hadn't I
better have a shave?

Capt. M. No! You're all right. (J.«ic?e.) He'd
chip his chin to pieces.

Capt. G. What's the hurry ?

Capt. M. You've got to be there first.

Capt. G. To be stared at?

Capt. M. Exactly. You're part of the show.
Where's the burnisher ? Your spurs are in a shameful
state.

Capt. G. (Jxruffly^ Jack, I be damned if you
shall do that for me.

Capt. M. (More gruffly.') Dry up and get dressed !
If I choose to clean your spurs, you're under my orders.
Capt. G. dresses. M. follows suit.

Capt. M. (Critically., walking round.') M'yes, you'll
do. Only don't look so like a criminal. Ring, gloves,
fees — that's all right for me. Let your moustache
alone. Now, if the ponies are ready, we'll go.

Capt. G. (Nervously.) It's much too soon. Let's
light up ! Let's have a peg ! Let's

Capt. M. Let's make bally asses of ourselves !

Bells. ( 'Without.) —

' Good — peo — pie — all
To prayers — we call.'

Capt. M. There go the bells! Come on — unless
you'd rather not. (They ride off.)
Bells. —

' We honour the King
And Brides joy do bring —
Good tidings we tell,
And ring the Dead's knell.'

166 WITH ANY AMAZEMENT

Capt. G. (^Dismounting at the door of the Church.')
I say, aren't we much too soon ? There are no end of
people inside. I say, aren't we much too late? Stick
by me, Jack ! What the devil do I do ?

Capt. M. Strike an attitude at the head of the aisle
and wait for Her. (G. groans as M. wheels him into
position before three hundred eyes.)

Capt. M, (Imploringly.) Gaddy, if you love me,
for pity's sake, for the Honour of the Regiment, stand
up ! Chuck yourself into your uniform ! Look like a
man ! I've got to speak to the Padre a minute. (G.
breaks into a gentle perspiration.) If you wipe your
"face I'll never be your best man again. Stand up!
(G. trembles visibly.)

Capt. M. (^Returning.) She's coming now. Look
out when the music starts. There's the organ begin-
ning to clack.

Bride steps out of 'rickshaw at Church door. G.
catches a glimpse of her and takes heart.

Okgan. —

' The Voice that breathed o'er Eden,
That earliest marriage day,
The primal marriage-blessing,
It hath not passed away.'

Capt. M. (Watching G.) By Jove ! He is looking
well. 'Didn't think he had it in him.

Capt. G. How long does this hymn go on for ?

Capt. M. It will be over directly. (Anxiously.)
Beginning to bleach and gulp? Hold on, Gaddy, and
think o' the Regiment.

Capt. G. (Measuredly.) I say, there's a big brown
lizard crawling up that wall.

WITH ANY AMAZEMENT 157

Capt. M. My Sainted Mother! The last stage of
collapse !

Bride, comes up to left of altar, lifts her eyes once
to G., who is suddenly smitten mad.
Capt. G. (Jb himself again and again.') Little
Featherweight's a woman — a woman ! And I thought
she was a little girl.

Capt. M. (In a whisper.) Form the halt — inward
wheel.

Capt. G. obeys mechanically and the ceremony
proceeds.
Padee. . . . only unto her as long as ye hoth shall
live?

Capt. G. (Mis throat useless.) Ha — hmmm!
Capt. M. Say you will or you won't. There's no
second deal here.

Bride gives response with perfect coolness, and is
given away by the father.
Capt. G. (Thinking to show his learning.) Jack,
give me away now, quick!

Capt. M. You're given yourself away quite enough.
Her right hand, man ! Repeat ! Repeat ! ' Theodore
Philip.' Have you forgotten your own name ?

Capt. G. stumbles through Affirmation, which
Bride repeats without a tremor.
Capt. M. Now the ring! Follow the Padre ! Don't
pull off my glove ! Here it is ! Great Cupid, he's
found his voice !

G. repeats Troth in a voice to be heard to the end
of the Church and turns on his heel.
Capt. M. (Desperately.) Rein back ! Back to
your troop ! 'Tisn't half legal yet.

Padee. . . . joined together let no man put asunder.

168 WITH ANY AMAZEMENT

Capt. G. paralysed with fear- Jibs after Blessing.
Capt. M. QQuickly.') On your own front — one
length. Take her with you. I don't come. You've
nothing to say. (Capt. G. jingles up to altar.)

Capt. M. (In a piercing rattle meant to be a whis-
per.') Kneel, you stiff-necked ruffian ! Kneel !

Padbb. . . . whose daughters are ye so long as ye
do well and are not afraid with any amazement.
Capt. M. Dismiss ! Break off ! Left wheel !

All troop to vestry. They sign.
Capt. M. Kiss Her, Gaddy.

Capt. G. (Rubbing the ink into his glove.) Eh!
Wha— at ?

Capt. M. (^Taking one pace to Bride.) If you don't,
I shall.

Capt. G. (Interposing an arm.) Not this journey !
G-eneral kissing, in which Capt. G. is pursued by
unkno wn female.
Capt. G. (Faintly to M.) This is Hades ! Can I
wipe my face now?

Capt. M. My responsibility has ended. Better ask
Missis Gadsby.

Capt. G. winces as though shot and procession is
Mendelssohned out of Church to house, where
usual tortures take place over the wedding-
cake.
Capt. M. (At table.) Up with you, Gaddy. They
expect a speech.

Capt. G. (After three minutes' agony.) Ha —
hmmm. (Thunders of applause.)

Capt. M. Doocid good, for a first attempt. Now go
and change your kit while Mamma is weeping over —
' the Missus.' (Capt. G. disappears. Capt. M. starts

WITH ANY AMAZEMENT 159

up tearing Ms hair.) It's not half legal. Where are
the shoes ? Get an ayah.

Ayah. Missie Captain Sahib done gone band karo
all the jutis.

Capt. M. (^Brandishing scabbarded sword.) Woman,
produce those shoes ! Some one lend me a bread-knife.
We mustn't crack Gaddy's head more than it is. (Slices
heel off white satin slipper and puts slipper up his
sleeve.') Where is the Bride ? (To the company at
large.) Be tender with that rice. It's a heathen cus-
tom. Give me the big bag.

Bride slips out quietly into ^rickshaw and departs

towards the sunset.

Capt. M. (In the open.) Stole away, by Jove I

So much the worse for Gaddy! Here he is. Now

Gaddy, this'll be livelier than Amdheran! Where's

your horse ?

Capt. G. (Furiously, seeing that the women are out

of earshot.) Where the is my Wife?

Capt. M. Half-way to Mahasu by this time. You'll
have to ride like Young Lochinvar.

Horse comes round on his hind legs ; refuses to let
G. handle him.
Capt. G. Oh you will, will you ? Get round, you
brute — you hog — you beast ! Get round !

Wrenches horses head over, nearly breaking lower

jaw ; swings himself into saddle, and sends

home both spurs in the midst of a spattering gale

of Best Patna.

Capt. M. For your life and your love — ride,

Gaddy ! — And God bless you !

Throws half a pound of rice at G., who disappears.

160 WITH ANY AMAZEMENT

bowed forward on the saddle, in a cloud of
sunlit dust.
Capt. M. I've lost old Gaddy. (lAghts cigarette
and strolls off, singing absently') : —

'You may carve it on his tombstone, you may cut it on his card,
That a young man married is a young man marred ! '

Miss Debrcouet. (From her horse.") ReaUy,
Captain MafQin! You are more plain spoken than
polite !

Capt. M. (Aside.) They say marriage is like
cholera. 'Wonder who'll be the next victim.

White satin slipper slides from his sleeve and falls
at his feet. Left wondering.

THE GARDEN OF EDEN

And ye shall be as — Gods !

Scene. — Thymy grass-plot at hack of the Mahasu ddk-
bungaloiv, overlooking little wooded valley. On the left,
glimpse of the Bead Forest of Fagoo ; on the right,
Simla Hills. In haehground, line of the Snows.
Captain Gadsby, now three weeks a husband, is smok-
ing the pipe of peace on a rug in the sunshine. Banjo
and tobacco-pouch on rug. Overhead the Fagoo eagles.
Mes. G. comes out of bungalow.

Mes. G. My husband !

Capt. G. (^Lazily, with intense enjoyment.') Eh,
wha-at ? Say that again.

Mes. G. I've written to Mamma and told her that
we shall be back on the 17th.

Capt. G. Did you give her my love ?

Mes. G. No, 1 kept all that for myself. (^Sitting down
by his side.) I thought you wouldn't mind.

Capt. G. ( With mock sternness.) I object awf 'l3^
How did you know that it was yours to keep ?

Mes. G. I guessed, Phil.

Capt. G. (^Rapturously.) Lit-tle Featherweight !

Mrs. G. I won't be called those sporting pet names,
bad boy.

Capt. G. You'll be called anything I choose. Has
it ever occurred to you. Madam, that you are ray Wife ?

M 161

162 THE GARDEN OF EDEN

Mrs. Gr. It has. I haven't ceased wondering at it
yet.

Capt. G. Nor I. It seems so strange ; and yet,
somehow, it doesn't. (^Confidently.') You see, it could
have been no one else.

Mrs. G. (Softly.) No. No one else — for me or
for you. It must have been all arranged from the begin-
ning. Phil, tell me again what made you care for me.

Capt. G. How could I help it? You were you, you
know.

Mrs. G. Did you ever want to help it ? Speak the
truth !

Capt. G. (A twinkle in his eye.) I did, darling, just
at the first. But only at the very first. (^Chuckles.)
I called you — stoop low and I'll whisper — ' a little
beast.' Ho! Ho! Ho!

Mrs. G. (Taking him by the moustache and making
him sit up.) ' A — little — beast ! ' Stop laughing over
your crime ! And yet you had the — the — awful cheek
to propose to me !

Capt. G. I'd changed my mind then. And you
weren't a little beast any more.

Mrs. G. Thank you, Sir! And when was I ever?

Capt. G. Never! But that first day, when you gave
me tea in that peach-coloured muslin gown thing, you
looked — you did indeed, dear — such an absurd little
mite. And I didn't know what to say to you.

Mrs. G. (Twisting moustache.) So you said 'little
beast.' Upon my word. Sir ! I called you a ' Crrrreat-
ure,' but I wish now I had called you something worse.

Capt. G. (Very meekly.) I apologise, but you're
hurting me awf'ly. (Interlude.) You're welcome to
torture me again on those terms.

THE GARDEN OF EDEN 163

Mes. G. Oh, why did you let me do it ?

Capt. G. (Looking across valley.^ No reason in par-
ticular, but — if it amused you or did you any good —
you might — wipe those dear little boots of yours on me.

Mrs. G. (^Stretching out her hands.') Don't! Oh,
don't! Philip, my King, please don't talk like that.
It's how I feel. You're so much too good for me. So
much too good !

Capt. G. Me ! I'm not fit to put my arm round
you. (Puts it round.')

Mrs. G. Yes, you are. But I ^ what have I ever
done?

Capt. G. Given me a wee bit of your heart, haven't
you, my Queen ?

Mrs. G. Thais nothing. Any one would do that.
They cou — couldn't help it.

Capt. G. Pussy, you'll make me horribly conceited.
Just when I was beginning to feel so humble, too.

Mrs. G. Humble ! I don't believe it's in your
character.

Capt. G. What do you know of my character,
Impertinence ?

Mrs. G. Ah, but I shall, shan't I, Phil ? I shaU
have time in all the years and years to come, to know
everything about you; and there will be no secrets
between us.

Capt. G. Little witch I I believe you know me
thoroughly already.

Mrs. G. I think I can guess. You're selfish ?

Capt. G. Yes.

Mrs. G. Foolish?

Capt. G. Very.

Mrs. G. And a dear ?

164 THE GARDEN OF EDEN

Capt. G. That is as my lady pleases.

Mrs. G. Then your lady is pleased. (J. pause.)
D'you know that we're two solemn, serious, grown-up
people

Capt. G. (^Tilting her straw hat over her ei/es.) You
grown-up ! Pooh ! You're a baby.

Mrs. G. And we're talking nonsense.

Capt. G. Then let's go on talking nonsense. I
rather like it. Pussy, I'll tell you a secret. Promise
not to repeat ?

Mrs. G. Ye — es. Only to you.

Capt. G. I love you.

Mes. G. Re-ally ! For how long?

Capt. G. For ever and ever.

Mrs. G. That's a long time.

Capt. G. 'Think so? It's the shortest / can do
with.

Mrs. G. You're getting quite clever.

Capt. G. I'm talking to you.

Mrs. G. Prettily turned. Hold up your stupid old
head and I'll pay you for it !

Capt. G. (^Affecting supreme contempt.') Take it
yourself if you want it.

Mes. G. I've a great mind to — and I will ! (^Takes
it and is repaid with interest.)

Capt. G. Little Featherweight, it's my opinion that
we are a couple of idiots.

Mes. G. We're the only two sensible people in the
world ! Ask the eagle. He's coming by.

Capt. G. Ah ! I daresay he's seen a good many
sensible people at Mahasu. They say that those birds
live for ever so long.

Mes. G. How long?

THE GARDEN OF EDEN 165

Capt. G. a hundred and twenty years.

Mrs. G. a hundred and twenty years ! O-oh !
And in a hundred and twenty years where will these
two sensible people be ?

Capt. G. What does it matter so long as we are
together now?

Mrs. G. (^Looking round the horizon.) Yes. Only
you and I — I and you — in the whole wide, wide world
until the end. (^Sees the line of the Snows.) How big
and quiet the hills look ! D'you think they care for us ?

Capt. G. 'Can't say I've consulted 'em particularly.
I care, and that's enough for me.

Mrs. G. (^Drawing nearer to him.) Yes, now — but
afterwards. What's that little black blur on the Snows?

Capt. G. A snowstorm, forty miles away. You'll
see it move, as the wind carries it across the face of that
spur, and then it will be all gone.

Mrs. G. And then it will be all gone. (^Shivers.)

Capt. G. (^Anxiously.) 'Not chilled, pet, are you?
'Better let me get your cloak.

Mrs.'G. No. Don't leave me, Phil. Stay here. I
believe I am afraid. Oh, why are thp hills so horrid!
Phil, promise me, promise me that you'll always love
me.

Capt. G. What's the trouble, darling? I can't
promise any more than I have; but I'll promise that
again and again if you like.

Mrs. G. (Her head on his shoulder.) Say it, then
— say it! N-no — -don't! The — the — eagles would
laugh. (^Recovering.) My husband, you've married a
little goose.

Capt. G. ( Very tenderly.) Have I ? I am content
whatever she is, so long as she is mine.

166 THE GAEDEN OF EDEN

Mrs. G. (^Quicklr/.) Because she is yours or because
she is me mineself ?

Capt. G. Because she is both. {Piteously.') I'm
not clever, dear, and I don't think I can make myself
understood properly.

Mrs. G. I understand. Pip, will you tell me
something ?

Capt. G. Anything you like. (J.«iie.) I wonder
what's coming now.

Mrs. G. (^Haltingly, her eyes lowered.') You told
me once in the old days — centuries and centuries ago
— that you had been engaged before. I didn't say
anything — then.

Capt. G. (^Innocently.') Why not?

Mrs. G. {Raising her eyes to his.) Because —
because I was afraid of losing you, my heart. But
now — tell about it — please.

Capt. G. There's nothing to tell. I was awf 'ly old
then — nearly two and twenty — and she was quite
that.

Mrs. G. That means she was older than "you. I
shouldn't like her to have been younger. Well ?

Capt. G. Well, I fancied myself in love and raved
about a bit, and — oh, yes, by Jove ! I made up poetry.
Ha! Ha!

Mrs. G. You never wrote any for me! What
happened ?

Capt. G. I came out here, and the whole thing
went phut. She wrote to say that there had been a
mistake, and then she married.

Mrs. G. Did she care for you much?

Capt. G. No. At least she didn't show it as far as
I remember.

THE GARDEN OF EDEN 167

Mrs. G. As far as you remember ! Do you remem-
ber her name ? {Hears it and hows her head.') Thank
you, my husband.

Capt. G. Who but you had the right? Now, Little
Featherweight, have you ever been mixed up in any
dark and dismal tragedy ?

Mks. G. If you call me Mrs. Gadsby, p'raps I'll tell.

Capt. G. {Throwing Parade rasp into his voice.')
Mrs. Gadsby, confess !

Mrs. G. Good Heavens, Phil ! I never knew that
you could speak in that terrible voice.

Capt. G. You don't know half my accomplishments
yet. Wait till we are settled in the Plains, and I'll
show you how I bark at my troop. You were going to
say, darling?

Mrs. G. I — I don't like to, after that voice.
{Tremulously.) Phil, never you dare to speak to me
in that tone, whatever I may do !

Capt. G. My poor little love ! Why, you're shak-
ing all over. I am so sorry. Of course I never meant
to upset you. Don't tell me anything. I'm a brute.

Mrs. G. No, you aren't, and I will tell — There was
a man.

Capt. G. {Lightly.) Was there ? Lucky man !

Mrs. G. {In a whisper.) And I thought I cared
for him.

Capt. G. Still luckier man ! Well ?

Mrs. G. And I thought I cared for him — and I
didn't — and then you came — and I cared for you very,
very much indeed. That's all. {Face hidden.) You
aren't angry, are you ?

Capt. G. Angry? Not in the least. {Aside.)
Good Lord, what have I done to deserve this angel ?

168 THE GARDEN OF EDEN

Mrs. G. (Aside.) And he never asked for the
name ! How funny men are ! But perhaps it's as
well.

Capt. G. That man will go to heaven because you
once thought you cared for him. 'Wonder if you'll
ever drag me up there ?

Mrs. G. {Firmly.') 'Sha'n't go if you don't.

Capt. G. Thanks. I say, Pussy, I don't know much
about your religious beliefs. You were brought; up to
believe in a heaven and all that, weren't you ?

Mrs. G. Yes. But it was a pincushion heaven,
with hymn-books in all the pews.

Capt. G. (Wagging his head with intense convic-
tion.) Never mind. There is a pukka heaven.

Mrs. G. Where do you bring that message from,
my prophet?

Capt. G. Here ! Because we care for each other.
So it's all right.

Mrs. G. (J.S a troop of langurs crash through the
branches.) So it's all right. But Darwin says that we
came from those !

Capt. G. (Placidly.) Ah ! Darwin was never in
love with an angel. That settles it. Sstt, you brutes!
Monkeys, indeed ! You shouldn't read those books.

Mrs. G. (Folding her hands.) If it pleases my
Lord the King to issue proclamation.

Capt. G. Don't, dear one. There are no orders
between us. Only I'd rather you didn't. They lead
to nothing, and bother people's heads.

Mrs. G. Like your first engagement.

Capt. G. (With an immense calm.) That was a
necessary evil and led to you. Are you nothing?

Mrs. G. Not so very much, am I ?

THE GARDEN OF EDEN 169

Capt. G. All this world and the next to me.

Mes. G. ( Very softly.) My boy of boys ! Shall I
tell you something ?

Capt. G. Yes, if it's not dreadful — about other
men.

Mes. G. It's about my own bad little self.

Capt. G. Then it must be good. Go on, dear.

Mes. G. (^Slowly.) I don't know why I'm telling

you, Pip ; but if ever you marry again (^Interlude.')

Take your hand from my mouth or I'll hits ! In the
future, then remember — I don't know quite how to
put it!

Capt. G. (^Snorting indignantly.) Don't try. 'Marry
again,' indeed!

Mes. G. I must. Listen, my husband. Never,
never, never tell your wife anything that you do not
wish her to remember and think over all her life. Be-
cause a woman — yes, I am a, woman — can't forget.

Capt. G. By Jove, how do you know that ?

Mrs. G. (^Confusedly.) I don't. I'm only guessing.
I am — I was — a silly little girl ; but I feel that I know
so much, oh, so very much more than you, dearest. To
begin with, I'm your wife.

Capt. G. So I have been led to believe.

Mes. G. And I shall want to know every one of
your secrets — to share everything you know with you.
(^Stares round desperately.)

Capt. G. So you shall, dear, so you shall ^- but
don't look like that.

Mes. G. For your own sake don't stop me, Phil. I
shall never talk to you in this way again. You must
not tell me ! At least, not now. Later on, when I'm
an old matron it won't matter, but if you love me, be

170 THE GAKDEN OF EDEN

very good to me now ; for this part of my life I shall
never forget ! Have I made you understand ?

Capt. G. I think so, child. Have I said anything
yet that you disapprove of ?

Mrs. G. Will you he very angry? That — that
voice, and what you said about the engagement

Capt. G. But you asked to be told that, darling.

Mks. G. And that's why you shouldn't have told
me ! You must be the judge, and, oh, Pip, dearly as I
love you, I sha'n't be able to help you ! I shall hinder
you, and you must judge in spite of me !

Capt. G. (^Meditatively.') We have a great many
things to find out together, God help us both — say so,
Pussy — but we shall understand each other better
every day; and I think I'm beginning to see now.
How in the world did you come to know just the impor-
tance of giving me just that lead?

Mrs. G. I've told you that I don't know. Only
somehow it seemed that, in all this new life, I was being
guided for your sake as well as my own.

Capt. G. (Aside.) Then Mafflin was right ! They
know, and we — we're blind — all of us. (Lightly.)
'Getting a little beyond our depth, dear, aren't we ? I'll
remember, and, if I fail, let me be punished as I deserve.

Mrs. G. There shall be no punishment. We'll start
into life together from here — you and I — and no one
else,

Capt. G. And no one else. (A pause.) Your eye-
lashes are all wet. Sweet ? Was there ever such a quaint
little Absurdity?

Mrs. G. Was there ever such nonsense talked
before ?

Capt. G. (Knocking the ashes out of his pipe.)

THE GARDEN OF EDEN 171

'Tisn't what we say, it's what we don't say, that helps.
And it's all the profoundest philosophy. But no one
would understand — even if it were put into a book.

Mes. G. The idea! No — only we ourselves, or
people like ourselves — if there are any people like us.

Capt. G. (^Magisterially.') All people, not like our-
selves, are blind idiots.

Mes. G. (Wiping her eyes.) Do you think, then,
that there are any people as happy as we are ?

Capt. G. 'Must be — unless we've appropriated all
the happiness in the world.

Mks. G. (^Looking towards Simla.) Poor dears !
Just fancy if we have !

Capt. G. Then we'll hang on to the whole show,
for it's a great deal too jolly to lose — eh, wife o'
mine?

Mrs. G. O Pip ! Pip ! How much of you is a
solemn, married man and how much a horrid, slangy
schoolboy ?

Capt. G. When you tell me how much of you was
eighteen last birthday and how much is as old as the
Sphinx and twice as mysterious, perhaps I'll attend to
you. Lend me that banjo. The spirit moveth me to
yowl at the sunset.

Mrs.'G. Mind! It's not tuned. Ah! How that
jars.

Capt. G. (^Turning pegs.) It's amazingly difficult
to keep a banjo to proper pitch.

Mrs. G. It's the same with all musical instruments.
What shall it be ?

Capt. G. 'Vanity,' and let the hills hear. (^Sings
through the first and half of the second verse. Turning to
Mrs. G.) Now, chorus ! Sing, Pussy !

172 THE GARDEN OF EDEN

Both Together. (Cow brio, to the horror of the
monkeys who are settling for the night.') —

' Vanity, all is Vanity,' said Wisdom, scorning me —
I clasped my true Love's tender hand and answered

frank and free — ee : —
' If this be Vanity who'd be wise ?
If this be Vanity who'd be wise ?
If this be Vanity who'd be wi — ise'.
(Crescendo.) Vanity let it be I '

Mrs. G. (^Defiantly to the gray of the evening shy.)

/^anity let it be ! '

Echo. (From the Fagoo spur.) Let it be !

FATIMA

And you may go into every room of the house and see everything
that is there, but into the Blue Room you must not go. — The Story
of Blue Beard.

Scene. — The Gadsbys' bungalow in the Plains. Time,
11 A.M. on a Sunday Tnorning. Captain Gadsby,
in his shirt-sleeves, is bending over a complete set of
Hussar's equipment, from saddle to picketing-rope,
which is neatly spread over the floor of his study. He
is smoking an unclean briar, and his forehead is puck-
ered with thought.

Capt. G. (^To himself , fingering a headstall.') Jack's
an ass. There's enough hrass on this to load a mule —
and, if the Americans know anything about anything,
it can be cut down to a bit only. 'Don't want the
watering-bridle, either. Humbug ! — Half a dozen sets
of chains and pulleys for one horse! Rot! (^Scratching
his head.) Now, let's consider it all over from the
beginning. By Jove, I've forgotten the scale of
weights ! Ne'er mind. 'Keep the bit only, and elim-
inate every boss from the crupper to breastplate. No
breastplate at all. Simple leather strap across the
breast — like the Russians. Hi I Jack never thought
of that!

Mrs. G. (Entering hastily, her hand bound in a
cloth.) Oh, Pip, I've scalded my hand over that horrid,
horrid Tiparee jam !

173

174 FATIMA

Capt. G. (Absently.) Eh! Wha-at?

Mes. G. ( With TounA-eyed reproach.) I've scalded
it aw-fuUy ! Aren't you sorry ? And I did so want
that jam to jam properly.

Capt. G. Poor little woman! Let me kiss the
place and make it well. (Unrolling handage.) You
small sinner ! Where's that scald ? I can't see it.

Mrs. G. On the top of the little finger. There ! —
It's a most 'normous big burn !

,^Capt. G. (Kissing little finger.) Baby! LetHyder
look after the jam. You know I don't care for sweets.

Mes. G. In-deed ? — Pip !

Capt. G. Not of that kind, anyhow. And now run
along, Minnie, and leave me to my own base devices.
I'm busy.

Mes. G. (Calmly settling herself in long chair.) So
I see. What a mess you're making ! Why have you
brought all that smelly leather stuff into the house ?

Capt. G. To play with. Do you mind, dear?

Mks. G. Let me play too. I'd like it.

Capt. G. I'm afraid you wouldn't. Pussy — Don't
you think that jam will burn, or whatever it is that jam
does when it's not looked after by a clever little house-
keeper ?

Mrs. G. I thought you said Hyder could attend to
it. I left him in the veranda, stirring — when I hurt
myself so.

Capt. G. (His eye returning to the equipment.)
Po-oor little woman ! — Three pounds four and seven is
three eleven, and that can be cut down to two eight,
with just a Zee-tie cafe, without weakening anything.
Farriery is all rot in incompetent hands. What's the
use of a shoe-case when a man's scouting? He can't

FATIMA 175

stick it on with a lick — like a stamp — the shoe !
Skittles !

Mrs. G. What's skittles? Pah! What is this
leather cleaned with ?

Capt. Gr. Cream and champagne and — Look here,
dear, do you really want to talk to me about anything
important ?

Mrs. G. No. I've done my accounts, and I thought
I'd like to see what you're doing.

Capt. G. Well, lore, now you've seen and

Would you mind ? — That is to say — Minnie, I reaUy
am busy.

Mrs. G. You want me to go ?

Capt. G. Yes, dear, for a little while. This tobacco
will hang in your dress, and saddlery doesn't interest
you.

Mrs. G. Everything you do interests me, Pip.

Capt. G. Yes, I know, I know, dear. I'll , tell you
all about it some day when I've put a head-on this
thing. In the meantime

Mrs. G. I'm to be turned out of the room like a
troublesome child?

Capt. G. No-o. I don't mean that exactly. But,
you see, I shall be tramping up and down, shifting
these things to and fro, and I shall be in your way.
Don't you think so ?

Mrs. G. Can't I lift them about? Let me try.
(^Reaches forward to trooper's saddle.^

Capt. G. Good gracious, child, don't touch it.
You'll hurt yourself. (^Picking up saddle.^ Little
girls aren't expected to handle numdahs. Now, where
would you like it put ? (^Rolds saddle above his head.')

Mrs. G. (J. break in her voice.') Nowhere. Pip,

176 FATIMA

how good you are — and how strong ! Oh, what's that
ugly red streak inside your arm ?

Capt. G. ^Lowering saddle quickly.^ Nothing.
It's a mark of sorts. (^Aside.') And Jack's coming to
tifi&n with M^ notions all cut and dried !

Mes. G. I know it's a mark, but I've never seen it
before. It runs all up the arm. What is it ?

Capt. G. A cut — if you want to know.

Mes. G. Want to know ! Of course I do ! I can't
have my husband cut to pieces in this way- How did
it come ? Was it an accident? Tell me, Pip.

Capt. G. ( G-rimly.') No. 'Twasn't an accident.
I got it — from a man — in Afghanistan.

Mes. G. In action ? Oh, Pip, and you never told me !

Capt. G. I'd forgotten all about it.

Mes. G. Hold up your arm ! What a horrid, ugly
scar ! Are you sure it doesn't hurt now ! How did
the man give it you !

Capt. G. (Desperately looking at his watch.') With
a knife. I came down — old Van Loo did, that's to
say — and fell on my leg, so I couldn't run. And then
this man came up and began chopping at me as I
sprawled. '

Mes. G. Oh, don't, don't! That's enough I —
Well, what happened?

Capt. G. I couldn't get to my holster, and Mafflin
came round the corner and stopped the performance.

Mes. G. How ? He s such a lazy man, I don't
believe he did.

Capt. G. Don't you? I don't think the man had
much doubt about it. Jack cut his 'head off.

Mes. G. Cut —his— head — off ! ' With one blow,'
as they say in the books ?

FATIMA 177

Capt. G. I'm not sure. I was too interested in my-
self to know much about it. Anyhow, the head was
off, and Jack was punching old Van Loo in the ribs to
make him get up. Now you know all about it, dear,
and now *

Mrs. Gr. You want me to go, of course. You never
told me about this, though I've been married to you
for ever so long ; and you never would have told me if
I hadn't found out ; and you never do tell me anything
about yourself, or what you do, or what you take an
interest in.

Capt. G. Darling, I'm always with you, aren't I ?

Mes. G. Always in my pocket, you were going to
say. I know you are ; but you are always thinking
away from me.

Capt. G. QTrying to hide a smile.') Am I ? I
wasn't aware of it. I'm awf'ly sorry.

Mks. G. (^Piteously.') Oh, don't make fun of me !
Pip, you know what I mean. When you are reading
one of those things about Cavalry, by that idiotic
Prince — why doesn't he he a Prince instead of a
stable-boy ?

Capt. G. Prince Kraft a stable-boy — Oh, my Aunt !
Never mind, dear. You were going to say ?

Mrs. G. It doesn't matter ; you don't care for what
I say. Only — only you get up and walk about the
room, staring in front of you, and then Mafflin comes in
to dinner, and after I'm in the drawing-room I can hear
you and him talking, and talking, and talking, about
things I can't understand, and — oh, I get so tired and
feel so lonely ! — I don't want to complain and be a
trouble, Pip ; but I do — indeed I do !

Capt. G. My poor darling ! I never thought of

178 PATIMA

that. Why don't you ask some nice people in to
dinner ?

Mrs. G. Nice people ! Where am I to find them ?
Horrid frumps ! And if I did, I shouldn't be amused.
You know I only want you.

Capt. G. And you have me surely, Sweetheart?

Mrs. G. I have not ! Pip, why don't you take me
into your life ?

Capt. G. More than I do ? That would be difficult,
dear.

Mrs. G. Yes, I suppose it would — to you. I'm no
help to you — no companion to you ; and you like to
have it so.

Capt. G. Aren't you a little unreasonable, Pussy?

Mrs. G. (^Stamping her foot.') I'm the most reason-
able woman in the world — when I'm treated properly.

Capt. G. And since when have I been treating you
improperly ?

Mrs. G. Always — and since the beginning. You
know you have.

Capt. G. I don't ; but I'm willing to be convinced.

Mrs. G. (^Pointing to saddlery.) There !

Capt. G. How do you mean?

Mrs. G. What does all that mean ? Why am I not
to be told ? Is it so precious ?

Capt. G. I forget its exact Government value just
at present. It means that it is a great deal too heavy.

Mrs. G. Then why do you toUch it ?

Capt. G. To make it lighter. See here, little love,
I've one notion and Jack has another, but we are both
agreed that all this equipment is about thirty pounds
too heavy. The thing is how to cut it down without
weakening any part of it, and, at the same time, allow-

FATIMA 179

ing the trooper to carry everything he wants for his own
comfort — socks and shirts and things of that kind.

Mes. G. Why doesn't he pack them in a little
trunk ?

Capt. G. (^Kissing her.) Oh, you darling! Pack
them in a little trunk, indeed! Hussars don't carry
trunks, and it's a most important thing to make the
horse do all the carrying.

Mrs. G. But why need you bother about it ? You're
not a trooper.

Capt. G. No ;. but I command a few score of him ;
and equipment is nearly everything in these days.

Mfis. G. More than me ?

Capt. G. Stupid ! Of course not ; but it's a matter
that I'm tremendously interested in, because if I or
Jack, or I and Jack, work out some sort of lighter sad-
dlery and all that, it's possible that we may get it
adopted.

Mrs. G. How ?

Capt. G. Sanctioned at Home, where they will
make a sealed pattern — a pattern that all the saddlers
must copy — and so it will be used by all the regiments.
■ Mrs. G. And that interests you?
' Capt. G. It's part of my profession, y'know, and
my profession is a good deal to me. Everything in a
soldier's equipment is important, and if we can improve
that equipment, so much the better for the soldiers and
for us.

Mrs. G. Who's ' us ' ?

Capt. G. Jack and I ; only Jack's notions are too
radical. What's that big sigh for, Minnie ?

Mrs. G. Oh, nothing — and you've kept all this
a secret from me I Why?'

180 FATIMA

Capt. G. Not a secret, exactly, dear. I didn't say
anything about it to you because I didn't think it would
amuse you.

Mrs. G. ■ And am I only made to be amused ?

Capt. G. No, of course. I merely mean that it
couldn't interest you.

Mrs. G. It's your work and — and if you'd let me,
I'd count all these things up. If they are too heavy,
you know by how much they are too heavy, and you
must have a list of things made out to your scale of
lightness, and

Capt. G. I have got both scales somewhere in my
head ; but it's hard to tell how light you can make a
headstall, for instance, until you've actually had a
model made.

Mrs. G. But if you read out the list, I could copy
it down, and pin it up there just above your table.
Wouldn't that do?

Capt. G. It would be awf'ly nice, dear, but it
would be giving you trouble for nothing. I can't work
that way. I go by rule of thumb. I know the present
scale of weights, and the other one — the one that I'm
trying to work to — will shift and vary so much that
I couldn't be certain, even if I wrote it down.

Mrs. G. I'm so sorry. I thought I might help. Is
there anything else that I could be of use in?

Capt. G. (^Looking round the room.') I can't think
of anything. You're always helping me, you know.

Mrs. G. Ami? How?

Capt. G. You are you of course, and as long as
you're near me — I can't explain exactly, but it's in
the air.

M RS. G. And that's why you wanted to send me away ?

FATIMA 181

Capt. G. That's only when I'm trying to do work
— grubby work like this.

Mes. G. Mafflin's better, then, isn't he ?

Capt. G. (^Rashly.') Of course he is. Jack and T
have been thinking along the same groove for two or
three years about this equipment. It's our hobby, and
it may really be useful some day.

Mes. G. (After a pause.') And that's all that you
have away from me ?

Capt. G. It isn't very far away from you now.
Take care the oil on that bit doesn't come off on your
dress.

Mes. G. I wish — I wish so much that I could really
help you. I believe I could — if I left the room. But
that's not what I mean.

Capt. G. (^Aside.) Give me patience ! I wish she
would go. (^Aloud.') I assure you you can't do any-
thing for me, Minnie, and I must really settle down to
this. Where's my pouch?

Mes. G. (^Crossing to writing-table.') Here you are.
Bear. What a mess you keep your table in !

Capt. G. Don't touch it. There's a method in my
madness, though you mightn't think of it.

Mes. G. (J.« table.) I want to look Do you

keep accounts, Pip?

Capt. G. (^Bending over saddlery.) Of a sort. Are
you rummaging among the Troop papers? Be
careful.

Mes. G. Why? I shan't disturb anything. Good
gracious ! I had no idea that you had anything to do
with so many sick horses.

Capt. G. 'Wish I hadn't, but they insist on falling
sick. Minnie, if I were you I really should not investi-

182 FATIMA

gate those papers. You may come across something
that you won't like.

Mes. G. Why will you always treat me like a child ?
I know I'm not displacing the horrid things.

Capt. G. (^Resignedly.) Very well, then. Don't
blame me if anything happens. Play with the table
and let me go on with the saddlery. (Slipping hand
into trousers-pocket.') Oh, the deuce !

Mes. G. (Rer back to G.) What's that for ?

Capt. G. Nothing. (Aside.) There's not much
in it, but I wish I'd torn it up.

Mes. G. (Turning over contents of table.) I know
you'll hate me for this ; but I do want to see what your
work is like. (A pause.) Pip, what are ' farcy-buds ' ?

Capt. G. Hah ! Would you really like to know ?
They aren't pretty things.

Mes. G. This Journal of Veterinary Science says
they are of ' absorbing interest.' Tell me.

Capt. G. (Aside.) It may turn her attention.

Gives a long and designedly loathsome account of
glanders and farcy.

Mes. G. Oh, that's enough. Don't go on !

Capt. G. But you wanted to know — Then these
things suppurate and matterate and spread

Mes. G. Pip, you're making me sick! You're a
horrid, disgusting schoolboy.

Capt. G. ( On his knees among the bridles.) You
asked to be told. It's not my fault if you worry me into
talking about horrors.

Mes. G. Why didn't you say — No ?

Capt. G. Good Heavens, child! Have you come
in here simply to bully me ?

Mes. G. I bully youf How could I! You're so

FATIMA 183

Strong. (^Hysterically.) Strong enough to pick me up
and put me outside the door and leave me there to cry.
Aren't you?

Capt. G. It seems to me that you're an irrational
little baby. Are you quite well ?

Mrs. G. Do I look ill ? (Returning to table.) Who
is your lady friend with the big gray envelope and the
fat monogram outside ?

Capt. G. (^Aside.) Then it wasn't locked up, con-
found it. (^Aloud.) ' God made her, therefore let her
pass for a woman.' You remember what farcy-buds are
like?

Mrs. G. (^Showing envelope.') This has nothing to
do with them. I'm going to open it. May I ?

Capt. G. Certainly, if you want to. I'd sooner you
didn't, though. I don't ask to look at your letters to
the Deercourt girl.

Mrs. G. You'd Setter not. Sir! (Takes letter from
envelope.) Now, may I look ? If you say no, I shall cry.

Capt. G. You've never cried in my knowledge of
you, and I don't believe you could.

Mrs. G. I feel very like it to-day, Pip. Don't be
hard on me. (Reads letter.) It begins in the middle,
without any 'Dear Captain Gadsby,' or anything. How
funny !

Capt. G. (Aside.) No, it's not Dear Captain
Gadsby, or anything, now. How funny !

Mrs. G. ' What a strange letter ! (Reads.) ' And
so the moth has come too near the candle at last, and
has been singed into — shall I say Respectability? I
congratulate him, and hope he will be as happy as he
deserves to be.' What does that mean ? Is she con-
gratulating you about our marriage ?

184 y FATIMA

Capt. G. Yes, I suppose so.

Mrs. G. {Still reading letter.) She seems to be a
particular friend of yours.

Capt. G. Yes. She was an excellent matron of
sorts — a Mrs. Herriott — wife of a Colonel Herriott.
I used to know some of her people at Home long ago
^-before I came out.

Mes. G. Some Colonels' wives are young — as
young as me. I knew one who was younger.

Capt. G. Then it couldn't have been Mrs. Herriott.
She was old enough to have been your mother, dear.

Mrs. G. I remember now. Mrs. Scargill was talk-
ing about her at the Duffins' tennis, before you came
for me, on Tuesday. Captain Mafflin said she was a
' dear old woman.' Do you know, I think Mafflin is a
very clumsy man with his feet.

Capt. G. (^Aside.) Good old Jack! (^Aloud.)
Why, dear ?

Mrs. G. He had put his cup down on the ground
then, and he literally stepped into it. Some of the tea
spirted over my dress — the gray one. I meant to tell
you about it before.

Capt. G. (^Aside.') There are the makings of a
strategist about Jack, though his methods are coarse.
(^Aloud.') You'd better get a new dress, then. (^Aside.)
Let us pray that that will turn her.

Mrs. G. Oh, it isn't stained in the least. I only
thought that I'd tell you. (^Returning to letter.") What
an extraordinary person! (^Reads.) 'But need I
remind you that you have taken upon yourself a
charge of wardship' — what in the world is a charge
of ^vardship ? — ' which, as you yourself know, may end
in Consequences '

FATIMA 185

Capt. G. (^Aside.') It's safest to let 'em see every-
thing as they come across it ; but 'seems to me that
there are exceptions to the rule. (^Aloud.^ I told you
that there was nothing to be gained from rearranging
my table.

Mrs. G. (^Absently.') What does the woman mean ?
She goes on talking about Consequences — 'almost inevi-
table Consequences ' with a capital C — for half a page.
(^Flushing scarlet.^ Oh, good gracious ! How abominable !

Capt. G. (^Promptly.) Do you think so ? Doesn't
it show a sort of motherly interest in us? (^Aside.)
Thank Heaven, Harry always wrapped her meaning
up safely ! (^Aloud.^ Is it absolutely necessary to go
on with the letter, darling ?

Mrs. G. It's impertinent — it's simply horrid. What
right has this woman to write in this way to you ? She
oughtn't to.

Capt. G. When you write to the Deercourt girl, I
notice that you generally fill three or four sheets. Can't
you let an old woman babble on paper once in a way ?
She means well.

Mrs. G. I don't care. She shouldn't write, and if
she did, jou ought to have shown me her letter.

Capt. G. Can't you understand why I kept it to
myself, or must I explain at length — as I explained the
farcy-buds ?

Mrs. G. (Furiously.) Pip, I hate you ! This is as
bad as those idiotic saddle-bags on the floor. Never
mind whether it would please me or not, you ought to
have given it to me to read.

Capt. G. It comes to the same thing. You took it
yourself.

Mrs. G. Yes, but if I hadn't taken it, you wouldn't

186 FATIMA

have said a word. I think this Harriet Herriott — it's
like a name in a book — is an interfering old Thing.

Capt. G. {Asidei) So long as you thoroughly
understand that she is old, I don't much care what you
think. (^Aloud.') Very good, dear. Would you like to
write and tell her so ? She's seven thousand miles away.

Mes. G. I don't want to have anything to do with
her, but you ought to have told me. (^Turning to last
page of letter.) And she patronises me, too. -Z"'ve never
seen her ! (^Reads.) ' I do not know how the world
stands with you ; in all human probability I shall never
know ; but whatever I may have said before, I pray for
her sake more than for yours that all may be well. I
have learnt what misery means, and I dare not wish
that any one dear to you should share my knowledge.'

Capt. G. Good God ! Can't you leave that letter
alone, or, at least, can't you refrain from reading it
aloud? I've been through it once. Put it back on the
desk. Do you hear me ?

Mrs. G. (^Irresolutely.) I sh — shan't ! (Looks at
G.'s eyes.) Oh, Pip, please! I didn't mean to make
you angry — 'Deed, I didn't. Pip, I'm so sorry. I
know I've wasted your time

Capt. G. (G-rimlg.) You have. Now, will you be
good enough to go — if there is nothing more in my
room that you are anxious to pry into ?

Mrs. G. (Putting out her hands.) Oh, Pip, don't
look at me like that! I've never seen you look like
that before and it hu-urts me ! I'm sorry. I oughtn't
to have been here at all, and — and — and — (sobbing).
Oh, be good to me ! Be good to me ! There's only
you — anywhere !

Breaks down in long chair, hiding face in cushions.

FATIMA 187

Capt. G. (^Aside.') She doesn't know how she
flicked me on the raw. (^Aloud, bending over chair.')
I didn't mean to beTiarsh, dear — I didn't really. You
can stay here as long as you please, and do what you
please. Don't cry like that. You'll make yourself
sick. (Aside.) What on earth has come over her?
(Aloud.) Darling, what's the matter with you ?

Mks. G. (Her face still hidden.) Let me go — let
me go to my own room. Only — only say you aren't
angry with me.

Capt. G. Angry with you, love ! Of course not. I
was angry with myself. I'd lost my temper over the sad-
dlery — Don't hide your face. Pussy. I want to kiss it.
Bends lower, Mrs. G. slides right arm round his
neck. Several interludes and much sobbing.

Mks. G. (In a whisper,) I didn't mean about the
jam when I came in to tell you

Capt. G. Bother the jam and the equipment!
(Interlude.)

Mks. G. (Still more faintly.) My finger wasn't
scalded at all. I — I wanted to speak to you about
— about — something else, and — I didn't know how.

Capt. G. Speak away, then. (Looking into her
eyes.) Eh! Wha — at? Minnie! Here, don't go
away ! You don't mean?

Mrs. G. (Hysterically, backing to portiire and hid-
ing her face in its folds.) The — the Almost Inevitable
Consequences ! (Flits though portiire as G. attempts
to catch her, and bolts herself in her own room.)

Capt. G. (Eis arms full of portiire.) Oh ! (Sit-
ing down heavily in chair.) I'm a brute — a pig — a
bully, and a blackguard. My poor, poor little darling !
' Made to be amused only ? '

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW

Knowing Good and Evil.

Scene. — The Gadsbys' bungalow in the Plains, in June.
Punkahrcoolies asleep in veranda where Captain
Gadsby is walking up and down. Doctok's trap
in porch. JuNiOK Chaplain drifting generally and
uneasily through the house. Time, 3.40 a.m. Seat
94° in veranda.

DocTOB. (^Coming into veranda and touching G.
on the shoulder.) You had better go in and see her
now.

Capt. .G. (^77ie colour of good cigar-ash.") Eh,
wha-at? Oh, yes, of course. What did you say?

Doctor. (^Syllable hy syllable.) Go — in — to —
the — room — and — see — her. She wants to speak
to you. (^Aside, testily.) I shall have him on my
hands next.

Junior Chaplain, (iw half-lighted dining-room.)
Isn't there any ?

Doctor. (^Savagely.) Hsh, you little fool !

Junior Chaplain. Let me do my work. Gadsby,
stop a minute ! (^Edges after G.)

Doctor. Wait till she sends for you at least — at
least. Man alive, he'll kill you if you go in there !
What are you bothering him for?

Junior Chaplain. (^Coming ivio veranda.) I've

188

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 189

given him a stiff brandy-peg. He wants it. You've
forgotten him for the last ten hours and — forgotten
yourself too.

G. enters bedroom, which is lit hy one night-lamp.
Ayah on the floor pretending to be asleep.

Voice. (^From the bed.} All down the street —
such bonfires ! Ayah, go and put them out ! (^Appeal-
ingly.} How can I sleep with an installation of the
CLE. in my room? No — not CLE. Something
else. What was it?

Capt. G. {Trying to control his voice.') Minnie, I'm
here. (^Bending over bed.) Don't you know me, Min-
nie ? It's me — it's Phil — it's your husband.

Voice. {Mechanically.) It's me — it's Phil — it's
your husband.

Capt. G. She doesn't know me ! — It's your own
husband, darling.

Voice. Your own husband, darling.

Ayah. {With an inspiration.) Memsahib under-
standing all I saying.

Capt. G. Make her understand me then — quick !

Ayah. {Hand on Mrs. G.'s forehead.) Memsahib!
Captain Sahib here.

Voice. Salam do. {Fretfully.) I know I'm not
fit to be seen.

Ayah. {Aside to G.) Say ^marneen^ same as
breakfash.

Capt. G. Good-morning, little woman. How are
we to-day?

Voice. That's Phil. Poor old Phil. {Viciously.)
Phil, you fool, I can't see you. Come nearer.

Capt. G. Minnie ! Minnie ! It's me — you know
me?

190 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW

Voice. (^Mockingly.') Of course I do. Who does
not know the man who was so cruel to his wife —
almost the only one he ever had ?

Capt. G. Yes, dear. Yes — of course, of course.
But won't you speak to him ? He wants to speak to
you so much.

Voice. They'd never let him in. The Doctor would
give darwaza bund even if he were in the house. He'll
never come. (^Despairingly.^ O Judas! Judas! Judas!

Capt. G. (Putting out his arms.') They have let
him in, and he always was in the house. Oh,, my
love — don't you know me ?

Voice. (In a half chant.) ' And it came to pass at
the eleventh hour that this poor soul repented.' It
knocked at the gates, but they were shut — tight as a
plaster — a great, burning plaster. They had pasted
our marriage certiiicate all across the door, and it was
made of red-hot iron — people really ought to be more
careful, you know.

Capt. G. What am I to do? (Takes her in his
arms.) Minnie ! speak to me — to Phil.

Voice. What shall I say ? Oh, tell me what to say
before it's too late I They are all going away and I
can't say anything.

Capt. G. Say you know me ! Only say you know
me !

Doctor. (Who has entered quietly.) For pity's
sake don't take it too much to heart, Gadsby. It's
this way sometimes. They won't recognise. They
say all sorts of queer things — don't you see f

Capt. G. All right! All right ! Go away now;
she'll recognise me ; you're bothering her. She must
— mustn't she ?

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 191

Doctor. She will before Have I your leave

to try ?

Capt. G. Anything you please, so long as she'll
know me. It's only a question of — hours, isn't it?

DoCTOK. (^Professionally.) While there's life there's
hope, y'know. But don't build on it.

Capt. G. I don't. Pull her together if it's possible.
(Aside.) What have I done to deserve this ?

DocTOE. (Bending over bed.) Now, Mrs. Gadsby!
We shall be all right to-morrow. You must take it, or
I shan't let Phil see you. It isn't nasty, is it ?

Voice. Medicines ! Always more medicines ! Can't
you leave me alone ?

Capt. G. Oh, leave her in peace. Doc !

Doctor. (Stepping back, — aside.) May 1 be for-
given if I've done wrong. (Aloud.) In a few minutes
she ought to be sensible ; but I daren't tell you to
look for anything. It's only

Capt. G. What ? Go on, man.

Doctor. (In a whisper.) Forcing the last rally.

Capt. G. Then leave us alone.

Doctor. Don't mind what she says at first, if you
can. They — they — they turn against those they love
most sometimes in this. — It's hard, but

Capt. G. Am I her husband or are you ? Leave
us alone for what time we have together.

Voice. (Oonfidentially.) And we were engaged
quite suddenly, Emma. I assure you that I never
thought of it for a moment ; but, oh, my little Me !
— I don't know what I should have done if he
hadn't proposed.

Capt. G. She thinks of that Deercourt girl before
she thinks of me. (Aloud.) Minnie !

192 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW

Voice. Not from the shops, Mummy dear. You
can get the real leaves from Kaintu, and (laughing
weakly') never mind about the blossoms — Dead white
silk is only fit for widows, and I won't wear it. It's as
bad as a winding sheet. (^A long pause.)

Capt. G: I never asked a favour yet. If there is
anybody to listen to me, let her kndw me — even if I
die too ! /

Voice. (Very faintly.) Pip, Pip dear.

Capt. G. I'm here, darling.

Voice. What has happened? They've been bother-
ing me so with medicines and things, and they wouldn't
let you come and see me. I was never Ul before. Am
I ill now ?

Capt. G. You — you aren't quite well.

Voice. How funny! Have I been iH long ?

Capt. G. Some days ; but you'll be all right in a
little time.

Voice. Do you think so, Pip ? I don't feel • well
and — Oh ! what have they done to my hair ?

Capt. G. I d-d-don't know.

Voice. They've cut it off. What a shame !

Capt. G. It must have been to make your head
cooler.

Voice. ' Just like a boy's wig. Don't I look horrid?

Capt. G. Never looked prettier in your life, dear.
(Aside.) How am I to ask her to say good-bye?

Voice. I don't feel pretty. I feel very ill. My
heart won't work. It's nearly dead inside me, and
there's a funny feeling in my eyes. Everything seems
the same distance — you and the almirah and the table
— inside my eyes or miles away. What does it mean,
Pip?

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 193

Capt. G. You're a little feverish, Sweetheart —
very feverish. (^Breaking down.') My love ! my love !
How can I let you gp ?

Voice. I thought so. Why didn't you tell me
that at first?

Capt. G. What?

Voice. That I am going to — die.

Capt. G. But you aren't ! You shan't.

Ayah to punkah-coolie. (^Stepping into veranda after
a glance at the bed.) Punkah chor do ! ( Stop pulling
the punkah.)

Voice. It's hard, Pip. So very, very hard after
one year — just one year. (^Wailing.) And I'm only
twenty. Most girls aren't even married at twenty.
Can't they do anything to help me ? I don't want to
die.

Capt. G. Hush, dear. You won't.

Voice. What's the use of talking ? Help me !
You've never failed me yet. Oh, Phil, help me to
keep alive. (Feverishly.) I don't believe you wish
me to live. You weren't a bit sorry when that horrid
Baby thing died. I wish I'd killed it !

Capt. G. (Drawing his hand across his forehead.)
It's more than a man's meant to bear — it's not right.
(Aloud.) Minnie, love, I'd die for you if it would help.

Voice. No more death. There's enough already.
Pip, don't you die too.

Capt, G. I wish I dared.

Voice. It says: 'Till Death do us part.' Nothing
after that — and so it would be no use. It stops at
the dying. Why does it stop there? Only such a
very short life, too. Pip, I'm sorry we married.

Capt. G. No ! Anything but that, Min !

194 ' THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW

Voice. Because you'll forget and I'll forget. Oh,
Pip, don't forget ! I always loved you, though I was
cross sometimes. If I ever did anything that you
didn't like, say you forgive me now.

Capt. G. You never did, darling. On my soul
and honour you never did. I haven't a thing to
forgive you.

Voice. I sulked for a whole week about those
petunias. (^With a laugh.') What a little wretch I
was, and how grieved you were ! Forgive me that,
Pip.

Capt. G. There's nothing to forgive. It was my
fault. They were too near the drive. For God's sake
don't talk so, Minnie ! There's such a lot to say and
so little time to say it in.

Voice. Say that you'll always love me — imtil the
end.

Capt. G. Until the end. (^Carried away.') It's a
lie. It must be, because we've loved each other. This
isn't the end.

Voice. (^Relapsing into semi-delirium.) My Church-
service has an ivory-cross on the back, and it says so,
so it must be true. 'Till Death do us part.' — But
that's a lie. (^With a parody of G.'s manner.) A
damned lie ! {Recklessly.) Yes, I can swear as well
as Trooper Pip. I can't make my head think, though.
That's because they cut off my hair. How can one
think with one's head all fuzzy ? (Pleadingly.) Hold
me, Pip! Keep me with you always and always.
(Relapsing.) But if you marry the Thorniss girl
when I'm dead, I'll come back and howl under our
bedroom window all night. Oh, bother ! You'll think
I'm a jackal. Pip, what time is it ?

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 195

Capt. G. a little before tlie dawn, dear.

Voice. I wonder where I shall be this time to-
morrow ?

Capt. G. Would you like to see the Padre ?

Voice. Why should I? He'd tell me that I am
going to heaven; and that wouldn't be true, because
you are here. Do you recollect when he upset the
cream-ice all over his trousers at the Gassers'
tennis ?

Capt. G. Yes, dear.

Voice. I often wondered whether he got another
pair of trousers ; but then his are so shiny all over
that you really couldn't tell unless you were told.
Let's call him in and ask.

Capt. G. (^Crravely .') No. I don't think he'd like
that. 'Your head comfy. Sweetheart ?

Voice, (Faintly with a sigh of contentment.^ Yeth!
Gracious, Pip, when did you shave last? Your chin's
worse than the barrel of a musical box. — No, don't
lift it up. I like it. (A pause.^ You said you've
never cried at all. You're crying all over my cheek.

Capt. G. I — I — I can't help it, dear.

Voice. How funny! I couldn't cry now to save
my life. (G. shivers.) /want to sing.

Capt. G. Won't it tire you ? 'Better not, perhaps.

Voice. Why? I wow'< be bothered about. (Begins
in a hoarse quaver) : —

' Minnie bakes oaten cake, Minnie brews ale,
AU because her Johnnie's coming home from the sea.
(That's parade, Pip.)

And she grows red as rose, who was so pale ;
And " Are you sure the church-clock goes ? " says she.'

(^Pettishly.') I knew I couldn't take the last note.

196 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW

How do the bass chords run ? (^Puts out her hands and
begins playing piano on the sheet. )

Capt. G. (^Catching up hands.') Ahh! Don't do
that, Pussy, if you love me.

Voice. Love you? Of course I do. Who else
should it be? (^A pause.)

Voice. ( Very clearly.) Pip, I'm going now. Some-
thing's choking me cruelly. (^Indistinctly.) Into the
dark — without you, my heart. — But it's a lie, dear —
we mustn't believe it. — For ever and ever, living or
dead. Don't let me go, my husband — hold me tight.
-^They can't — whatever happens. (A cough.) Pip
— my Vipl Not for always — and — so — soon! (Voice
ceases.)

Pause of, ten minutes. Gr. buries his face in the
side of the bed while Ayah bends over led from
opposite side and feels Mrs. G.'s breast and
forehead.

Capt. G. (Rising.) Doctor Sahib ko salaam do.

Ayah. (Still by bedside., with a shriek.) Ai ! Ai !
Tuta — phuta ! My Memsahib ! Not getting — not have
got! — Pusseena agya ! (The sweat has come.) (Fiercely
to G.) TuM Jao Doctor Sahib ko j'aldi ! ( You go to
the doctor.) Oh, my Memsahib !

Doctor. (Entering hastily.) Come away, Gadsby.
(Bends over bed.) Eh! The Dev — What inspired
you to stop the punkah ? Get out, man — go away —
wait outside ! Cro ! Here, Ayah ! ( Over his shoulder
to G.) Mind, I promise nothing.

The dawn breaks as G. stumbles into the garden.

Capt. M. (Reining up at the gate on his way to
parade and very soberly.) Old man, how goes?

Capt. G. (Dazed.) I don't quite know. Stay a

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 197

bit. Have a drink or something. Don't run away.
You're just getting amusing. Ha ! Ha !

Capt. M. (^Aside.') What am I let in for ? Gaddy
has aged ten years in the night.

Capt. G. (^Slowly, fingering charger's headstall.^
Your curb's too loose.

Capt. M. So it is. Put it straight, will you?
(^Aside.) I shall be late for parade. Poor Gaddy.

Capt. G. links and unlinJcs curb-chain aimlessly,
and finally stands staring towards the veranda.
The day brightens.

DoCTOE. (^Knocked out ofprofessional gravity, tramp-
ing across flower-beds and shaking G.'s hands.') It's —
it's — it's ! — Gadsby, there's a fair chance — a dashed
fair chance ! The flicker, y'know. The sweat, y'know !
I saw how it would be. The punkah, y'know. Deuced
clever woman that Ayah of yours. Stopped the punkah
just at the right time. A dashed good chance ! No —
you don't go in. We'll pull her through yet I promise
on my reputation — under Providence. Send a man
with this note to Bingle. Two heads better than one.
'Specially the Ayah ! We'll pull her round. (^Retreats
hastily to house.')

Capt. G. (jHj's head on neck of M.'s charger.) Jack !
I bub — bub — believe, I'm going to make a bub — bub
— bloody exhibitiod of byself .

Capt. M. (^Sniffing openly and feeling in his left
cuff.) I b-b — believe, I'b doing it already. Old bad,
what cad I say ? I'b as pleased as — Cod dab you,
Gaddy ! You're one big idiot and I'b adother. (^Pull-
ing himself together) Sit tight.' Here comes the
Devil-dodger.

Junior Chaplain. (^Who is not in the Doctor's

198 THE VALLEY OP THE SHADOW

confidence.) We — we are only men in these things,
Gadsby. I know that I can say nothing now to
help

Capt. M. (Jealously.) Then don't say it ! Leave
him alone. It's not bad enough to croak over. Here,
Gaddy, take the ehit to Bingle and ride hell-for-leather.
It'll do you good. I can't go.

Junior Chaplain. Do him good ! (Smiling.) Give
me the chit and I'll drive. Let him lie down. Your
horse is blocking my cart — please I

Capt. M. (Slowly without reining back.) I beg
your pardon — I'll apologise. On paper if you like.

Jtjniok Chaplain. (Flicking M.'s charger.) That'll
do, thanks. Turn in, Gadsby, and I'll bring Bingle
back — ahem — ' hell-for-leather.'

Capt. M. (Solus.) It would have served me right
if he'd cut me across the face. He can drive too. I
shouldn't care to go that pace in a bamboo cart. What
a faith he must have in his Maker — of harness ! Come
hup, you brute ! ( Grallops off to parade, blowing his
nose, as the sun rises.)

(interval op pivb weeks.)

Mrs. G. ( Very white and pinched, in morning wrap-
per at breakfast table.) How big and strange the room
looks, and oh how glad I am to see it again ! What
dust, though ! I must talk to the servants. Sugar,
Pip? I've almost forgotten. (Seriously.) Wasn't I
very ill ?

Capt. G. lUer than I liked. (Tenderly.) Oh, you
bad little Pussy, what a start you gave me !

Mrs. G. I'll never do it again.

Capt. G. You'd better not. And now get those

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 199

poor pale cheeks pink again, or I shall be angry. Don't
try to lift the urn. You'll upset it. Wait. (^Comes
round to head of table and lifts urn.^

Mrs. G. (^Quickly.') Khitmatgar, bowarehi-khana
see kettly lao. Butler, get a kettle from the cook-house.
(^Drawing down G.'s face to her own.') Pip dear, I
remember.

Capt. G. What?

Mrs. G. That last terrible night.

Capt. G. Then just you forget all about it.

Mrs. G. (^Softly, her eyes filling.) Never. It has
brought us very close together, my husband. There !
(^Interlude.) I'm going to give Junda a saree.

Capt. G. I gave her fifty dibs.

Mrs. G. So she told me. It was a 'normous reward.
Was I worth it? (^Several interludes.) Don't! Here's
the khitmatgar. — Two lumps or one, Sir ?

THE SWELLING OF JORDAN

If thou hast run with the footmen and they have wearied thee,
then how canst thou contend with horses? And if in the land of
peace wherein thou trustedst they wearied thee, then how wilt thou
do in the swelling of Jordan ?

Scene. — The Gadsbys' bungalow in the Plains, on a
January morning. Mrs. G. arguing with hearer in
hack veranda.

Capt. M. rides up.
Capt. M. 'Mornin', Mrs. Gadsby. How's the Infant
Phenomenon and the Proud Proprietor ?

Mes. G. You'll find them in the front veranda ; go
through the house. I'm Martha just now.

Capt. M. 'Cumbered about with cares of khitmat-
gars ? I fly.

Passes into front veranda, where Gadsby is watch-
ing Gadsby Junior, aged ten months, crawling
about the matting.
Capt. M. What's the trouble, Gaddy — spoiling an
honest man's Europe morning this way? (^Seeing G.
Junior.) By Jove, that yearling's comin' on amazingly !
Any amount of bone below the knee there.

Capt. G. Yes, he's a healthy little scoundrel. Don't
you think his hair's growing ?

M. Let's have a look. Hi! Hst! Come here,
General Luck, and we'll report on you.

Mrs. G. (^Within.') What absurd name will you
give him next? Why do you call him that?

200

THE SWELLING OF JORDAN 201

M. Isn't he our Inspector-General of Cavalry?
Doesn't he come down in his seventeen-two peram-
bulator every morning the Pink Hussars parade ? Don't
wriggle, Brigadier. Give us your private opinion on
the way the third squadron went past. 'Trifle ragged,
weren't they?

G. A bigger set of tailors than the new draft I don't
wish to see. They've given me more than my fair
share — knocking the squadron out of shape. It's
sickening !

M. When you'xe in command, you'll do better,
young 'un. Can't you walk yet ? Grip my finger and
try. (JIo G.) 'Twon't hurt his hocks, will it?

G. Oh, no. Don't let him flop, though, or he'll lick
all the blacking off your boots.

Mrs. G. (Within^ Who's destroying my son's
character?

M. And my Godson's. I'm ashamed of you, Gaddy.
Punch your father in the eye, Jack ! Don't you stand
it ! Hit him again !

G. (Sotto voce.^ Put The Butcha down and come
to the end of the veranda. I'd rather the Wife didn't
hear — just now.

M. You look awf 'ly serious. Anything wrong ?

G. 'Depends on your view entirely. I say, Jack,
you won't think more hardly of me than you can help,
will you? Come further this way. — The fact of the
matter is, that I've made up my mind — at least I'm
thinking seriously of — cutting the Service.

M. Hwhatt?

G. Don't shout. I'm going to send in my papers.

M. You ! Are you mad ?

G. No — only married.

202 THE SWELLING OF JORDAN

M. Look here ! What's the meaning of it all ? You
never intend to leave us. You canH. Isn't the best
squadron of the best regiment of the best cavalry in all
the world good enough for you ?

G. (Jerking his head over his shoulder.') She doesn't
seem to thrive in this God-forsaken country, and there's
The Bwtcha to be considered and all that, you know.

M. Does she say that she doesn't like India ?

G. That's the worst of it. She won't for fear of
leaving me.

M. What are the Hills made for ?

G. Not for my wife, at any rate.

M. You know too much, Gaddy, and — I don't like
you any the better for it !

G. Never mind that. She wants England, and The
Butcha would be all the better for it. I'm going to
chuck. You don't understand.

M. (Hotly.) I understand this. One hundred and
thirty-seven new horses to be licked into shape somehow
before Luck comes round again ; a hairy-heeled draft
who'll give more trouble than the horses ; a camp next
cold weather for a certainty ; ourselves the first on the
roster ; the Russian shindy ready to come to a head at
five minutes' notice, and you, the best of us all, back-
ing out of it all ! Think a little, Gaddy. You won't
do it.

G. Hang it, a man has some duties towards his
family, I suppose.

M. I remember a man, though, who told me, the
night after Amdheran, when we were picketed under
Jagai, and he'd left his sword — by the way, did you
ever pay Ranken for that sword ? — in an Utmanzai's
head — that man told me that he'd stick by me and the

THE SWELLING OF JORDAN 203

Pinks as long as he lived. I don't blame him for not
sticking by me — I'm not much of a man — but I do
blame him for not sticking by the Pink Hussars.

G. (^Uneasily.') We were little more than boys
then. Can't you see, Jack, how things stand? 'Tisn't
as if we were serving for our bread. We've all of tis,
more or less, got the filthy lucre. I'm luckier than
some, perhaps. There's no call for me to serve on.

M. None in the world for you or for us, except the
Regimental. If you don't choose to answer to that, of
course

G. Don't be too hard on a man. You know that a
lot of us only take up the thing for a few years and
then go back to Town and catch on with the rest.

M. Not lots, and they aren't some of Us.

G. And then there are one's affairs at Home to be
considered — my place and the rents, and all that. I
don't suppose my father can last much longer, and that
means the title, and so on.

M. 'Fraid you wont be entered in the Stud Book
correctly unless you go Home ? Take six months, then,
and come out in October. If I could slay off a brother
or two, I s'pose I should be a Marquis of sorts. Any
fool can be that ; but it needs men, Gaddy — men like
you — to lead flanking squadrons properly. Don't you
delude yourself into the belief that you're going Home
to take your place and prance about among pink-nosed
Kabuli dowagers. You aren't built that way. I know
better.

G. A man has a right to live his life as happily as
he can. You aren't married.

M. No^ — praise be to Providence and the one or
two women who have had the good sense to jawab me,

204 THE SWELLING OF JORDAN

G. Then you don't know what it is to go into your
own room and see your wife's head on the pillow, and
when everything else is safe and the house shut up for
the night, to wonder whether the roof-beams won't give
and kill her.

M. (^Aside.') Revelations first and second ! (^Aloud.^
So-o ! I knew a man who got squifEy at our Mess once
and confided to me that he never helped his wife on to
her horse without praying that she'd break her neck
before she came back. All husbands aren't alike, you
see.

G. What on earth has that to do with my case?
The man must ha' been mad, or his wife as bad as they
make 'em.

M. (^Aside.') 'No fault of yours if either weren't all
you say. You've forgotten the time when you were
insane about the Herriott woman. You always were a
good hand at forgetting. (^Aloud.') Not more mad
than men who go to the other extreme. Be reasonable,
Gaddy. Your roof-beams are sound enough.

G. That was only a way of speaking. I've been
uneasy and worried about the Wife ever since that
awful business three years ago — when — I nearly lost
her. Can you wonder?

M. Oh, a shell never falls twice in the same
place. You've paid your toll to misfortune — why
should your Wife be picked out more than anybody
else's ?

G. I can talk just as reasonably as you can, but you
don't understand — you don't understand. And then
there's The Butcha. Deuce knows where the Ayah
takes him to sit in the evening! He has a bit of a
cough. Haven't you noticed it?

THE SWELLING OF JORDAN 206

M. Bosli ! The Brigadier's jumping out of his skin
with pure condition. He's got a muzzle like a rose-leaf
and the chest of a two-year-old. What's demoralised
you?

G. Funk. That's the long and the short of it.
Funk!

M. But what is there to funk ?

G. Everything. It's ghastly.

M. Ah ! I see.

You don't want to fight,

And by Jingo when we do,
You've got the kid, you've got the Wife,

You've got the money, too.

That's about the case, eh?

G. I suppose that's it. But it's not for myself. It's
because of them. At least I think it is.

M. Are you sure? Looking at the matter in a cold-
blooded light, the Wife is provided for even if you were
wiped out to-night. She has an ancestral home to go
to, money, and the Brigadier to carry on the illustrious
name.

G. Then it is for myself or because they are part of
me. You don't see it. My life's so good, so pleasant,
as it is, that I want to make it quite safe. Can't you
understand?

M. Perfectly. 'Shelter-pit for the Orf'cer's charger,'
as they say in the Line.

G. And I have everything to my hand to make it
so. I'm sick of the strain and the worry for their sakes
out here ; and there isn't a single real difficulty to pre-
vent my dropping it altogether. It'll only cost me —
Jack, I hope you'll never know the shame that I've
been going through for the past six months.

206 THE SWELLING OF JORDAN

M. Hold on there,! I don't wish to be told. Every-
man has his moods and tenses sometimes.

Gr. (Laughing Utterly.) Has he ? What do you
call craning over to see where your near-fore lands?

M. In my case it means that I have been on the
Considerable Bend, and have come to parade with a
Head and a Hand. It passes in three strides.

G. (Lowering voice.) It never passes with me, Jack.
I'm always thinking about it. Phil Gadsby funking a
fall on parade ! Sweet picture, isn't it ! Draw it for
me.

M. ( Gravely.) Heaven forbid ! A man like you
can't be as bad as that. A fall is no nice thing, biit one
never gives it a thought.

G. Doesn't one ? Wait till you've got a wife and
a youngster of your own, and then you'll know how the
roar of the squadron behind you turns you cold all up
the back.

M. (Aside.) And this man led at Amdheran after
Bagal-Deasin went under, and we were all mixed up
together, and he came out of the show dripping like a
butcher. (Aloud.) Skittles ! The men can always open
out, and you can always pick your way more or less.
We haven't the dust to bother us, as the men have, and
whoever heard of a horse stepping on a man ?

G. Never — as long as he can see. But did they
open out for poor Errington?

M. Oh, this is childish !

G. I know it is, worse than that. I don't care.
You've ridden Van Loo. Is he the sort of brute to
pick his way — 'specially when we're coming up in
column of troop with any pace on?

M. Once in a Blue Moon do we gallop in column of

THE SWELLING OF JORDAN 207

troop, and tlien only to save time. Aren't three lengths
enough for you ?

G. Yes — quite enough. They just allow for the
full development of the smash. I'm talking like a cur,
I know : but I tell you that, for the past three months,
I've felt every hoof of the squadron in the small of my
back every time that I've led.

M. But, Gaddy, this is awful !

G. Isn't it lovely? Isn't it royal? A Captain of
the Pink Hussars watering up his charger before parade
like the blasted boozing Colonel of a Black Regiment !

M. You never did !

G. Once only. He squelched like a mussuck, and
the Troop-Sergeant-Major cocked his eye at me. You
know old Haffy's eye. I was afraid to do it
again.

M. I should think so. That was the best way to
rupture old Van Loo's tummy, and make him crumple
you up. You knew that.

G. I didn't care. It took the edge off him.

M. 'Took the edge off him'? Gaddy, you — you
— you mustn't, you know ! Think of the men.

G. That's another thing I am afraid of. D'you
s'pose they know ?

M. Let's hope not ; but they're deadly quick to spot
skrim — little things of that kind. See here, old man,
send the Wife Home for the hot weather and come to
Kashmir with me. We'll start a boat on the Dal or
cross the Rhotang — shoot ibex or loaf — which you
please. Only come! You're a bit off your oats and
you're talking nonsense. Look at the Colonel — swag-
bellied rascal that he is. He has a wife and no end of a
bow-window of his own. Can any one of us ride round

208 THE SWELLING OF JORDAN

him — chalkstones and all? I can't, and I think I can
shove a crock along a bit.

G. Some men are different. I haven't the nerve.
Lord help me, I haven't the nerve! I've taken up a
hole and a half to get my knees well under the wallets.
I can't help it. I'm so afraid of anything happening to
me. On my soul, I ought to be broke in front of the
squadron, for cowardice.

M. Ugly word, that. I should never have the cour-
age to own up.

G. I meant to lie about my reasons when I began,
but — I've got out of the habit of lying to you, old man.
Jack, you wont ? — But I know you won't.

M. Of course not. (^Half aloud.') The Pinks are
paying dearly for their Pride.

G. Eh!- Wha-at?.

M. Don't you know? The men have called Mrs.
Gadsby the Pride of the Pink Hussars ever since she
came to us.

G. 'Tisn't her fault. Don't think that. It's all
mine.

M. What does she say?

G. ' I haven't exactly put it before her. She's the
best little woman in the world. Jack, and all that — but
she wouldn't counsel a man to stick to his calling if it
came between him and her.. At least, I tbinls; •

M. Never mind. Don't tell her what you told me.
Go on the Peerage and Landed-Gentry tack.

G. She'd see through it. She's five times cleverer
thah I am.'

M. (^Aside.') Then she'll accept the sacrifice and
think a little bit worse of him for the rest of her daysi

G. (^Absently.) I say, do you despise me ? -

THE SWELLING OF JORDAN 209

M. 'Queer way of putting it. Have you ever been
asked that question? Think a minute. What answer
used you to give ?

G. So bad as that ? I'm not entitled to expect any-
thing more ; but it's a bit hard when one's best friend
turns round and

M. So I have found. But you will have consola-
tions — Bailiffs and Drains and Liquid Manure and
the Primrose League, and, perhaps, if you're lucky,
the Colonelcy of a Yeomanry Cav-al-ry Regiment —
all uniform and no riding, I believe. How old are
you?

G. Thirty-three. I know it's

M. At forty you'll be a fool of a J.P. landlord. At
fifty you'll own a bath-chair, and The Brigadier, if he
takes after you, will be fluttering the dovecotes of —
what's the particular dunghill you're going to ? Also,
Mrs. Gadsby will be fat.

G. (Limply.') This is rather more than a joke.

M. D'you think so? Isn't cutting the Service a
joke ? It generally takes a man fifty years to arrive at
it. You're quite right, though. It is more than a joke.
You've managed it in thirty-three.

G. Don't make me feel worse than I do. Will it
satisfy you if I own that I am a shirker, a skrim-
shanker, and a coward?

M. It will not, because I'm the only man in the
world who can talk to you like this without being
knocked down. You mustn't take all that I've said to
heart in this way. I only spoke — a lot of it at least —
out of pure selfishness, because, because — Oh, damn it
all, old man, — I don't know what I shall do without
you. Of course, you've got the money and the place

210 THE SWELLING OF JORDAN

and all that — and there are two very good reasons why
you should take care of yourself.

G. 'Doesn't make it any the sweeter. I'm backing
out — I know I am. I always had a soft drop in me
somewhere — and I daren't risk any danger to them.

M. Why in the world should you ? You're bound to
think of your family — bound to think. Er-hmm. If I
wasn't a younger son I'd go too — be shot if I wouldn't I

G. Thank you, Jack. It's a kind lie, but it's the
blackest you've told for some time. I know what I'm
doing, and I'm going into it with my eyes open. Old
man, I earCt help it. What would you do if you were
in my place?

M. (^Aside.") 'Couldn't conceive any woman getting
permanently between me and the Regiment. (Aloud.')
'Can't say. 'Very likely I should do no better. I'm
sorry for you — awf'ly sorry — but 'if them's your senti-
ments,' I believe, I really do, that you are acting wisely.

G. Do you? I hope you do. (In a whisper.') Jack,
be very sure of yourself before you marry. I'm an
ungrateful ruffian to say this, but marriage — even as
good a marriage as mine has been — hampers a man's
work, it cripples his sword-arm, and oh, it plays Hell
with his notions of duty ! Sometimes — good and sweet
as she is — sometimes I could wish that I had kept my
freedom — No, I don't mean that exactly.

Mrs. G. (Cominff down veranda.) What are you
wagging your head over, Pip ?

M. (^Turning quickly.) Me, as usual. The old ser-
mon. Your husband is recommending me to get mar-
ried. 'Never saw such a one-ideaed man !

Mrs. G. Well, why don't you? I daresay you
would make some woman very happy.

THE SWELLING OF JORDAN 211

G. There's the Law and the Prophets, Jack. Never
mind the Regiment. Make a woman happy. (^Aside.y
O Lord !

M. We'll see. I must be off to make a Troop Cook
desperately unhappy. I won't have the wily Hussar fed
on Government Bullock Train shinbones — (jffa«ii7y.)
Surely black ants can't be good for The Brigadier. He's
picking 'em off the matting and eating 'em. Here, Senor
Comandante Don Grubbynose, come and .talk to me.
(^Lifts G. Junior in his arms.} 'Want my watch ? You
won't be able to put it into your mouth, but you can try.
(G. Junior drops watch, breaking dial and hands.")

Mrs. G. Oh, Captain Mafflin, I am so sorry ! Jack,
you bad, bad little villain. Ahhh !

M. It's not the least consequence, I assure you.
He'd treat the world in the same way if he could get it
into his hands-. Everything's made to be played with
and broken, isn't it, young 'un ? '

Mrs. G. Mafflin didn't at all like his watch being
broken, though he -was too polite to say so. It was
entirely his fault for giving it to the child. Dem little
puds are werry, werry feeble, aren't dey, my Jack-in-de-
box? (2^0 G.) What did he want to see you for?

G. Regimental shop as usual.

Mrs. G. The Regiment! Alwai/s the Regiment. On
my word, I sometimes feel jealous of Mafflin.

G. (^Wearily.) Poor old Jack? I don't think you
need. Isn't it time for The Butcha to have his nap?
Bring a chair out here, dear. I've got something to
talk over with you.

And this is the End op the Story op the
Gadsbys.

L'ENVOI

What is the moral ? Who rides may read.

When the night is thick and the tracks are blind,
A friend at a pinch is a friend indeed ;

But a fool to wait for the laggard behind :
Down to Gehenna or up to the Throne
He travels the fastest who travels alone.

White hands .cling to the tightened rein,
, Slipping the spur from the booted heel,

Tenderest voices cry, ' Turn again,'
Red lips tarnish the scabbarded steel,

High hopes faint on a warm hearth-stone —

He travels the fastest who travels alone.

One may fall but he falls by himself —
Falls by himself with himself to blame ;

One may attain and to him is the pelf,
Loot of the city in Gold or Fame :

Plunder of earth shall be all his own

Who travels the fastest and travels alone.

Wherefore the more ye be holpen and stayed —
Stayed by a friend in the hour of toil.

Sing the heretical song I have made —
His be the labour and yours be the spoil.

Win by his aid and the aid disown — ;-

He travels the fastest who travels alone.
212

DRAY WARA YOW DEE

For jealousy is the rage of a man : therefore he will not spare In
the day of vengeance. — Prov. vi. 34.

Almonds and raisins, Sahib? Grapes from Kabul?
Or a pony of the rarest if the Sahib will only come with
me. He is thirteen three, Sahib, plays polo, goes in a
cart, carries a lady and — Holy Kurshed and the Blessed
Imams, it is the Sahib himself! My heart is made fat
and my eye glad. May you never be tired! As is cold
water in the Tirah, so is the sight of a friend in a far
place. And what do you in this accursed land? South
of Delhi, Sahib, you know the saying — 'Rats are the
men and trulls the women. ' It was an order ? Ahoo !
An order is an order till one is strong enough to dis-
obey. O my brother, O my friend, we have met in an
auspicious hour! Is all well in the heart and the body
and the house ? In a lucky day have we two come to-
gether again.

I am to go with you? Your favour is great. Will
there be picket-room in the compound? I have three
horses and the bundles and the horse-boy. Moreover,
remember that the police here hold me a horse-thief.
What do these Lowland bastards know of horse-thieves ?
Do you remember that time in Peshawur when Kamal
hammered on the gates of Jumrud — mountebank that
he, was — and lifted the Colonel's horses all in one
night ? Kamal is dead now, but his nephew has taken

213

214 DRAY WARA YOW DEE

up the matter, and there will be more horses amissing
if the Khaiber Levies do not look to it.

The Peace of God and the favour of His Prophet be
upon this house and all that is in it ! ShafizuUah, rope
the mottled mare under the tree and draw water. The
horses can stand in the sun, but double the felts over
.the loins. Nay, my friend, do not trouble to look them
oyer. They are to sell to the Officer fools who know
so many things of the horse. The mare is heavy in
foal ; the gray is a devil unlicked ; and the dun — but
you know the trick of the peg. When they are sold I
go back to Pubbi, or, ii may be, the Valley of Pe-
shawur.

O friend of my heart, it is good to see you again. I
have been bowing and lying all day to the Officer-
Sahibs in respect to those horses ; and my mouth is dry
for straight talk. Auggrh! Before a meal tobacco is
good. Do not join me, for we are not in our own coun-
try. Sit in the veranda and I will spread my cloth
here. But first I will drink. In the name of Grod
returning thanks, thrice ! This is sweet water, indeed
— sweet as the water of Sheoran when it comes from
the snows.

They are all well and pleased in the North — Khoda
Baksh and the others. Yar Khan has come down with
the horses from Kurdistan — six and thirty head only,
and a full half pack-ponies — and has said openly in
the Kashmir Serai that you English should send guns
and blow the Amir into Hell. There are fifteen tolls
now on the Kabul road ; and at Dakka, when he thought
he was clear, Yar Khan was stripped of all his Balkh
stallions by the Governor! This is a great injustice,
and Yar Khan is hot with rage. And of the others :

DEAY WARA YOW DEB 215

Mahbub Ali is still at Pubbi, writing God knows what.
Tugluq Khan is in jail for the business of the Kohat
Police Post. Faiz Beg came down from Ismail-ki-
Dhera with a Bokhariot belt for thee, my brother, at the
closing of the year, but none knew whither thou hadst
gone: there was no news left behind. The Cousins
have taken a new run near Pakpattan to breed mules
for the Government carts, and there is a story in Bazar
of a priest. Oho ! Such a salt tale ! Listen

Sahib, why do you ask that? My clothes are fouled
because of the dust on the road. My eyes are sad be-
cause of the glare of the sun. My feet are swollen
because I have washed them in bitter water, and my
cheeks are hollow because the food here is bad. Fire
burn your money! What do I want with it? I am
rich and I thought you were my friend ; but you are
like the others — a Sahib. Is a man sad ? Give him
money, say the Sahibs. Is he dishonoured ? Give him
money, say the Sahibs. Hath he a wrong upon his
head? Give him money, say the Sahibs. Such are
the Sahibs, and such art thou — even thou.

Nay, do not look at the feet of the dun. Pity it is
that I ever taught you to know the legs of a horse.
Footsore ? Be it so. What of that ? The roads are
hard. And the mare footsore? She bears a double
burden. Sahib.

And now I pray you, give me permission to depart.
Great favour and honour has the Sahib done me, and
graciously has he shown his belief that the horses are
stolen. Will it please him to send me to the Thana ?
To call a sweeper and have me led away by one of these
lizard-men ? I am the Sahib's friend. I have drunk
water in the shadow of his house, and he has blackened

216 DEAY WARA YOW DEE

my face. Remains there anything more to do ? Will
the Sahib give me eight annas to make smooth the in-
jury and — complete the insult ?

Forgive me, my brother. 1 knew not — I know not
now — what I say. Yes, I lied to you! I will put
dust on my head — and I am an Afridi ! The horses
have been marched footsore from the Valley to this
place, and my eyes are dim, and my body aches for the
want of sleep, and my heart is dried up with sorrow
and shame. But as it was my shame, so by God the
Dispenser of Justice — by AUah-al-Mumit — it shall
be my own revenge !

We have spoken together with naked hearts before
this, and our hands have dipped into the same dish and
thou hast been to me as a brother. Therefore I pay
thee back with lies and ingratitude — as a Pathan.
Listen now ! When the grief of the soul is too heavy
for endurance it may be a little eased by speech, and,
moreover, the mind of a true man is as a well, and the
pebble of confession dropped therein sinks and is no
more seen. From the Valley have I come on foot,
league by league, with a iire in my chest like the fire
of the Pit. And why? Hast thou, then, so quickly
forgotten our customs, among this folk who sell their
wives and their daughters for silver? Come back with
me to the North and be among men once more. Come
back, when this matter is accomplished and I call for
thee ! The bloom of the peach-orchards is upon all the
Valley, and here is only dust and a great stink. There
is a pleasant wind among the mulberry trees, and the
streams are bright with snow-water,' and the caravans
go up and the caravans go down, and a hundred fires
sparkle in the gut of the Pass, and tent-peg answers

DRAY WAKA YOW DEE 217

hammer-nose, and pack-horse squeals to pack-horse
across the drift smoke of the evening. It is good in
the North now. Come back with me. Let us return
to our own people! Come!

* *'* * * * * * *

Whence is my sorrow? Does a man tear out his
heart and make fritters thereof over a slow fire for aught
other than a woman ? Do not laugh, friend of -mine,
for your time will also be. A woman of the iipazai
was she, and I took her to wife to staunch the feud
between our village and the men of Ghor. I am no
longer young ? The lime has touched my beard ? True.
I had no need of the wedding ? Nay, but I loved her.
What saith Rahman: 'Into whose heart Love enters,
there is Folly and naught else. By a glance of the eye
she hath blinded thee ,- and by the eyelids and the fringe
of the eyelids taken thee into the captivity without
ransom, and naught else.'' Dost thou remember that
song at the sheep-roasting in the Pindi camp among
the Uzbegs of the Amir ?

The Abazai are dogs and their women the servants
of sin. There was a lover of her own people, but of
that her father told me naught. My friend, curse for
me in your prayers, as I curse at each praying from the
Fakr to the Isha, the name of Daoud Shah, Abazai,
whose head is still upon his neck, whose hands are
still upon his wrists, who has done me dishonour, who
has made my name a laughing-stock among the women
of Little Malikand.

I went into Hindustan at the end of two months —
to Cherat. I was gone twelve days only; but I had
said that I would be fifteen days absent. This I did to
try her, for it is written: 'Trust not the incapable.'

218 DRAY WARA YOW DEB

Coming up the gorge alone in the falling of the light,
I heard the voice of a man singing at the door of my
house; and it was the voice of Daoud Shah, and the
song that he sang was ''Dray war a yow dee^ — 'AH
three are one.' It was as though a heel-rope had been
slipped round my heart and all the Devils were draw-
ing it tight past endurance. '' I crept silently up the
hill-road, but the fuse of my matchlock was wetted with
the rain, and I could not slay Daoud Shah from afar.
Moreover, it was in my mind to kill the woman also.
Thus he sang, sitting outside my house, and, anon, the
woman opened the door, and I came nearer, crawling
on my belly among the rocks. ^I had only my knife to
my hand. But a stone slipped under my foot, and the
two looked down the hillside, and he, leaving his match-
lock, fled from my anger, because he was afraid for the
life that was in him. ^ But the woman moved not till I
stood in front of her, crying : ' O woman, what is this
that thou hast done?' >And she, void of fear, though
she knew my thought, laughed, saying: 'It is a little
thing. I loved him, and thou art a dog and cattle-thief
coming by night. Strike ! ' And I, being still blinded
by her beauty, for, O my friend, the women of the
Abazai are very fair, said: 'Hast thou no fear? ' And
she answered: 'None — but only the fear that I do not
die. ' Then said I : ' Have no fear. ' < And she bowed
her head, and I smote it off at the neck-bone so that it
leaped between my feet. Thereafter the rage of our
people came upon me, and I hacked off the breasts, that
the men of Little Malikand might know the crime, and
cast the body into the water-course that flows to the
Kabul river. ^Dray wara yow dee ! Dray ivara yow dee !
The. body without the head, the soul without light, and

DRAY WAEA YOW DEE 219

my own darkling heart — all three are one — all three
are one! ^

That night, making no halt, I went to Ghor and de-
manded news of Daoud Shah. Men said: 'He is gone
to Pubbi for horses. What wouldst thou of him ? There
is peace between the villages.' I made answer: 'Aye!
The peace of treachery and the love that the Devil Atala
bore to Gurel.' So I fired thrice into the gate and
laughed and went' my way.

In those hours, brother and friend of my heart's heart,
the moon and the stars were as blood above me, and in
my mouth was the taste of dry earth. Also, I broke
no bread, and my drink was the rain of the Valley of
Ghor upon my face.

At Pubbi I found Mahbub Ali, the writer, sitting
upon his charpoy and gave up my arms according to
your Law. But I was not grieved, for it was in my
heart that I should kill Daoud Shah with my bare hands
thus — as a man strips a bunch of raisins. Mahbub
Ali said: 'Daoud Shah has even now gone hot-foot to
Peshawur, and he will pick up his horses upon the road
to Delhi, for it is said that the Bombay Tramway Com-
pany are buying horses there by the truck-load; eight
horses to the truck. ' And that was a true saying.

Then I saw that the hunting would be no little thing,
for the man was gone into your borders to save himself
against my wrath. >And shall he save himself so?
Am I not alive? Though he run northward to the
Dora and the snow, or southerly to the Black Water, I
will follow him, as a lover follows the footsteps of his
mistress, and coming upon him I will take him ten-
derly — Aho ! so tenderly ! — in my arms, saying : 'Well
hast thou done and well shalt thou be repaid. ' < And

220 DRAY WARA YOW DEE

out of that embrace Daoud Shah shall not go forth with
the breath in his nostrils. Auggrh! Where is the
pitcher? I am as thirsty as a mother-mare in the first
month.

Your Law! What is your Law to me? When the
horses fight on the runs do they regard the boundary
pillars ; or do the kites of Ali Musjid forbear because
the carrion lies under the shadow of the Ghor Kuttri ?
The matter began across the Border. It shall finish
where God pleases. Here, in my own country, or in
Hell. All three are one.

^ Listen now, sharer of the sorrow of my heart, and
I will tell of the hunting. I followed to. Peshawur
from Pubbi, and I went to and fro about the streets of
Peshawur like a houseless dog, seeking for my enemy.
Once I thought that I saw him washing his mouth
in the conduit in the big square, but when I came up
he was gone. It may be that it was he, and, seeing
my face, he had fled.

A girl of the bazar said that he would go to Now-
shera. I said: 'O heart's heart, does Dacwtd Shah visit
thee?' And she said: 'Even so.' I said: 'I would
fain see him, for we be friends parted for two years.
Hide me, I pray, here in the shadow of the window
shutter, and I will wait for his coming.' And the
girl said : ' O Pathan, look into my eyes ! ' And I
turned, leaning upon her breast, and looked into her
eyes, swearing that I spoke the very Truth of God.
But she answered: 'Never friend waited friend with
such eyes. Lie to God and the Prophet, but to a woman
ye cannot lie. Get hence ! There shall no harm befall
Daoud Shah by cause of me. '

I would have strangled that girl but for the fear of

DRAY WAKA YOW DEE 221

your Police; and thus the hunting would have come to
naught. Therefore I only laughed and departed, and
she leaned over the window-bar in the night and mocked
me down the street. Her name is Jamun. When I
have made my account with the man I will return to
Peshawur and — her lovers shall desire her no more for
her beauty's sake. She shall not he Jamun but Ah,
the cripple among trees. Ho! Ho! Ah shall she be!'=

At Peshawur I bought the horses and grapes, and
the almonds and dried fruits, that the reason of my
wanderings might be open to the Government, and
that there might be no hindrance upon the road. But
when T came to Nowshera he was gone, and I knew not
where to go. I stayed one day at Nowshera, and in
the night a Voice spoke in my ears as I slept among
the horses. All night it flew round my head and would
not cease from whispering. I was upon my belly,
sleeping as the Devils sleep, and it may have been that
the Voice was the voice of a Devil. It said: 'Go
south, and thou shalt come upon Daoud Shah. ' Listen,
my brother 'fl.nd chiefest among friends — listen! Is
the tale a lorig one ? Think how it was long to me. I
have trodden every league of the road from Pubbi to
this place ; and from Nowshera my guide was only the
Voice and the lust of vengeance.

To the Uttock I went, but that was no hindrance to
me. Ho! Ho! A man may turn the word twice,
even in his trouble. The Uttock was no uttoch (obsta-
cle) to me ; and I. heard the Voice above the noise of
the waters beating on the big rock, saying: 'Go to the
right. ' -*■ So I went to Pindigheb, and in those days my
sleep was taken from me utterly, and the head of the
woman of the Abazai was before me night and day, even

222 DRAY WABA YOW DEE

as it had fallen between my feet. Dray wara yow dee !
Dray wara yow dee! Fire, ashes, and my couch, all
three are one — all three are one ! <

Now I was far from the winter path of the dealers
who had gone to Sialkot and so south by the rail and
the Big Road to the line of cantonments ; but there was
a Sahib in camp at Pindigheb who bought from me a
white mare at a good price, and told me that one Daoud
Shah had passed to Shahpur with horses. Then I saw
that the warning of the Voice was true, and made swift
to come to the Salt Hills. The Jhelum was in flood,
but I could not wait, and, in the crossing, a bay stallion
was washed down and drowned. Herein was God hard
to me — not in respect of the beast, of that I had no
care — but in this snatching. While I was upon the
right bank urging the horses into the water, Daoud
Shah was upon the left ; for — Alghias ! Alghias ! — the
hoofs of my mare scattered the hot ashes of his fires
when we came up the hither bank in the light of
morning. But he had fled. His feet were made swift
by the terror of Death. And I went south from Shah-
pur as the kite flies. I dared not turn aside, lest I
should miss my vengeance — which is my right. From
Shahpur I skirted by the Jhelum, for I thought that he
would avoid the Desert of the Rechna. But, presently,
at Sahiwal, I turned away upon the road to Jhang,
Samundri, and Gugera, till, upon a night, the mottled
mare breasted the fence of the rail that runs to Mont-
gomery. And that place was Okara, and the head of
the woman of the Abazai lay upon the sand between my
feet.

Thence I went to Fazilka, and they said that I was
mad to bring starved horses there. The Voice was

DBAY WABA YOW DEE 223

with me, and I was not mad, but only wearied, because
I could not find Daoud Shah. It was written that I
should not find him at Rania nor Bahadurgarh, and
I came into Delhi from the west, and there also I found
him not. >My friend, I have seen many strange things
in my wanderings. I have seen Devils rioting across
the Rechna as the stallions riot in spring. I have
heard the Djinns calling to each other from holes in
the sand, and I have seen them pass before my face. /
There are no Devils, say the Sahibs? They are very
wise, but they do not know all things about devils or
— horses. Ho ! Ho ! I say to you who are laughing
at my misery, that;I have seen the Devils at high noon
whooping and leaping on the shoals of the Chenab.
And was I afraid ? My brother, when the desire of a
man is set upon one thing alone, he fears neither God
nor Man nor Devil. If my vengeance failed, I would
splinter the Gates of Paradise with the butt of my gun,
or I would cut my way into Hell with my knife, and I
would call upon Those who Govern there for the body
of Daoud Shah. What love so deep as hate ? L

Do not speak. I know the thought in your heart.
Is the white of this eye clouded ? How does the blood
beat at the wrist ? There is no madness in my flesh,
but only the vehemence of the desire that has eaten me
up. Listen !

' South of Delhi I knew not the country at all. There-
fore I cannot say where I went, but I passed through
many cities.- I knew only that it was laid upon me to
go south. When the horses could march no more, I
threw myself upon the earth, and waited till the day.
There' was no sleep with me in that journeying; and
that was a heavy burden. Dost thou know, brother of

224 DBAY WARA YOW DEE

mine, the evil of wakefulness that cannot break — when
the bones are sore for lack of sleep, and the skin of the
temples twitches with weariness, and yet — there is no
sleep — there is no sleep ? Dray wara yow dee ! Dray
wara yow dee! The eye of the Sun, the eye of the
Moon, and my own unrestful eyes — all three are one
— all three are one!

There was a city the name whereof I have forgotten,
and there the Voice called all night. That was ten
days ago. It has cheated me afresh.

I have come hither from a place called Hamirpur,
and, behold, it is my Fate that I should meet with
thee to my comfort, and the increase of friendship.
This is a good omen. By the joy of looking upon
thy face the weariness has gone from my feet, and
the sorrow of my so long travel is forgotten. Also
my heart is peaceful ; for I know that the end is
near.

> It may be that I shall find Daoud Shah in this city
going northward, since a Hillman will ever head back
to his Hills when the spring warns. And shall he see
those hills of our country? Surely I shall overtake
him ! Surely my vengeance is safe ! Surely God hath
him in the hollow of His hand against my claiming.
There shall no harm befall Daoud Shah till I come;
for I would fain kill him quick and whole with the life
sticking firm in his body. A pomegranate is sweetest
when the cloves break away unwilling from the rind.
Let it be in the daytime, that I may see his face, and
my delight may be crowned.

And when I have accomplished the matter and my
Honour is made clean, < I shall return thanks unto
God, the Holder of the Scale of the Law, and?I shall

DBAY WARA YOW DEE 225

sleep. From the night, through the day, and into
the night again I shall sleep ; and no dream shall
trouble me.

And now, O my brother, the tale is all told. AM !
AM! Alghias! AM! <

THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGARA

See the pale martyr with his shirt on fire. — Printer^ s Error.

They tell the tale even now among the groves of
the Berbulda Hill, and for corroboration point to the
roofless and windowless Mission-house. The great
God Dungara, the God of Things as They Are, Most
Terrible, One-eyed, Bearing the Red Elephant Tusk,
did it all; and he who refuses to believe in Dungara
will assuredly be smitten by the Madness of Yat — the
madness that fell upon the sons and the daughters of
the Buria Kol when they turned aside from Dungara
and put on clothes. So says Athon Daz^, who is
High Priest of the shrine and Warden of the Red
Elephant Tusk. But if you ask the Assistant Collec-
tor and Agent in Charge of the Buria Kol, he will
laugh — not because he bears any malice against mis-
sions, but because he himself saw the vengeance of
Dungara executed upon the spiritual children of the
Reverend Justus Krenk, Pastor of the Tubingen Mis-
sion, and upon Lotta, his virtuous wife.

Yet if ever a man merited good treatment of the Gods
it was the Reverend Justus, one time of Heidelberg,
who, on the faith of a call, went into the wilderness
and took the blonde, blue-eyed Lotta with him. ' We
will these Heathen now by idolatrous practices so dark-
ened better make, ' said Justus in the early days of his
career. 'Yes,' he added with conviction, 'they shall

226

THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGAKA 227-

be good and shall witli their hands to work learn. For
all good Christians must work. ' And upon a stipend
more modest even than that of an English lay-reader,
Justus Krenk kept house beyond Kamala and the gorge
of Malair, beyond the Berbulda River close to the foot
of the blue hill of Panth on whose summit stands the
Temple of Dungara — in the heart of the country of
the Buria Kol — the naked, good-tempered, timid,
shameless, lazy Buria Kol.

Do you know what life at a Mission outpost means?
Try to imagine a loneliness exceeding that of the small-
est station to which Government has ever sent you —
isolation that weighs upon the waking eyelids and
drives you by force headlong into the labours of the
day. There is no post, there is no one of your own
colour to speak to, there are no roads : there is, indeed,
food to keep jou alive, but it is not pleasant to eat;
and whatever of good or beauty or interest there is in
your life, must come from yourself and the grace that
may be planted in you.

In the morning, with a patter of soft feet, the con-
verts, the doubtful, and the open scoffers, troop up to
the veranda. You must be infinitely kind and patient,
and, above all, clear-sighted, for you deal with the
simplicity of childhood, the experience of man, and
the subtlety of the savage. Your congregation have a
hundred material wants to be considered ; and it is for
you, as you believe in your personal responsibility to
your Maker, to pick out of the clamouring crowd any
grain of spirituality that may lie therein. If to the
cure of souls you add that of bodies, your task will be
all the more difficult, for the sick and the maimed will
profess any and every creed for the sake of healing, and

228 THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGAEA

will laugh at you because you are simple enough to
believe them.

As the day wears and the impetus of the morning
dies away, there will come upon you an overwhelming
sense of the uselessness of your toil. This must be
striven against, and the only spur in your side will be
the belief that you are playing against the Devil for the
living soul. It is a great, a joyous belief; but he who
can hold it unwavering for four and twenty consecu-
tive hours, must be blessed with an abundantly strong
physique and equable nerve.

Ask the gray heads of the Bannockburn Medical
Crusade what manner of life their preachers lead; speak
to the Racine Gospel Agency, those lean Americans
whose boast is that they go where no Englishman dare
follow; get a Pastor of the Tubingen Mission to talk
of his experiences — if you can. You will be referred
to the printed reports, but these contain no mention of
the men who have lost youth and health, all that a man
may lose except faith, in the wilds ; of English maidens
who have gone forth and died in the fever-stricken
jungle of the Panth Hills, knowing from the first that
death was almost a certainty. Few Pastors will tell
you of these things any more than they will speak
of that young David of Sfc. Bees, who, set apart for
the Lord's work, broke down in the utter desolation,
and returned half distraught to the Head Mission,
crying: 'There is no God, but I have walked with the
Devil! '

The reports are silent here, because heroism, failure,
doubt, despair, and self-abnegation on the part of a
mere cultured white man are things of no weight as
compared to the saving of one half-human soul from a

THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGARA 229

fantastic faith in wood-spirits, goblins of the rock, and
river-fiends.

And Gallic, the Assistant Collector of the country
side, 'cared for none of these things.' He had been
long in the district, and the Buria Kol loved him and
brought him offerings of speared fish, orchids from the
dim moist heart of the forests, and as much game as he
could eat. In return, he gave them quinine, and with
Athon Daz^, the High Priest, controlled their simple
policies.

'When you have been some years in the country,'
said Gallio at the Krenks' table, ' you grow to find one
creed as good as another. I'll give you all the assists
ance in my power, of course, but don't hurt my Buria
Kol. They are a good people and they trust me.'

' I will them the Word of the Lord teach,' said
Justus, his round face beaming with enthusiasm, ' and
I will assuredly to their prejudices no wrong hastily
without thinking make. But, O my friend, this in the
mind impartiality-of-creed-judgment-be-looking is very
bad.'

' Heigh-ho ! ' said Gallio, ' I have their bodies and the
district to see to, but you can try what you can do for
their souls. Only don't behave as your predecessor
did, or I'm afraid that I can't guarantee your life.'

'And that?' said Lotta sturdily, handing him a cup
of tea.

' He went up to the Temple of Dungara — to be sure
he was new to the country — and began hammering old
Dungara over the head with an umbrella ; so the Buria
Kol turned out and hammered him rather savagely. I
was in the district, and he sent a runner to me with a
note saying: "Persecuted for the Lord's sake. Send

230 THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGARA

wing of regiment." The nearest troops were about
two hundred miles off, but I guessed what he had been
doing. I rode to Panth and talked to old Athon Daz^
like a father, telling him that a man of his wisdom
ought to have known that the Sahib had sunstroke and
was mad. You never saw a people more sorry in your
life. Athon Daz6 apologised, sent wood and milk and
fowls and all sorts of things; and I gave five rupees to
the shrine and told Macnamara that he had been inju-
dicious. He said that I had bowed down in the House
of Rimmon ; but if he had only just gone over the brow
of the hill and insulted Palin Deo, the idol of the Suria
Kol, he would have been impaled on a charred bamboo
long before I could have done anything, and then I should
have had to have hanged some of the poor brutes. Be gen-
tle with them, Padri — but I don't think you'll do much.'

' Not I,' said Justus, ' but my Master. We will with
the little children begin. Many of them will be sick —
that is so. After the children the mothers ; and then
the men. But I would greatly that you were in inter-
nal sympathies with us prefer.'

Gallio departed to risk his life in mending the rotten
bamboo bridges of his people, in killing a too persistent
tiger here or there, in sleeping out in the reeking jungle,
or in tracking the Suria Kol raiders who had taken a
few heads from their brethren of the Buria clan. He
was a knock-kneed, shambling young man, naturally
devoid of creed or reverence, with a longing for abso-
lute power which his undesirable district gratified.

' No one wants my post,' he used ,to say grimly, ' and
my Collector only pokes his nose in when he's quite
certain that there is no fever. I'm monarch of all I
survey, and Athon Daz6 is my viceroy.'

THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGARA 231

Because Gallio prided himself on his supreme disre-
gard of human life — though he never extended the
theory beyond his own — he naturally rode forty miles
to the Mission with a tiny brown girl-baby on his
saddle-bow.

'Here is something for you, Padri,' said he. 'The
Kols leave their surplus children to die. 'Don't see
why they shouldn't, but you may rear this one. I
picked it up beyond the Berbulda fork. I've a notion
that the mother has been following me through the
woods ever since.'

'It is the first of the fold,' said Justus, and Lotta
caught up the screaming morsel to her bosom and
hushed it craftily ; while, as a wolf hangs in the field,
Matui, who had borne it and in accordance with the
law of her tribe had exposed it to die, panted weary
and footsore in the bamboo-brake, watching the house
with hungry mother-eyes. What would the omnipotent
Assistant Collector do? Would the little man in the
black coat eat her daughter alive as Athon Daz^ said
was the custom of all men in black coats ?

Matui waited among the bamboos through the long
night; and, in the morning, there came forth a fair
white woman, the like of whom Matui had never seen,
and in her arms was Matui's daughter clad in spotless
raiment. Lotta knew little of the tongue of the Buria
Kol, but when mother calls to mother, speech is easy to
follow. By the hands stretched timidly to the hem* of
her gown, by the passionate gutturals and the longing
eyes, Lotta understood with whom she had to deal. So
Matui took her child again — would be a servant, even
a slave, to this wonderful white woman, for her own
tribe would recognise her no more. And Lotta wept

232 THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGARA

witli her exhaustively, after the German fashion, which
includes much blowing of the nose.

' First the child, then the mother, and last the man,
and to the Glory of God all,' said Justus the Hopeful.
And the man came, with a bow and arrows, very angry
indeed, for there was no one to cook for him.

But the tale of the Mission is a long one, and I have
no space to show how Justus, forgetful of his injudi-
cious predecessor, grievously smote Moto, the husband
of Matui, for his brutality ; how Moto was startled, but
being released from the fear of instant death, took
heart and became the faithful ally and first convert of
Justus ; how the little gathering grew, to the huge dis-
gust of Athon Daz6 ; how the Priest of the God of
Things as They Are argued ^btilely with the Priest
of the God of Things as They Should Be, and was
worsted; how the dues of the Temple of Dungara fell
away in fowls and fish and honeycomb, how Lotta
lightened the Curse of Eve among the women, and how
Justus did his best to introduce the Curse of Adam;
how the Buria Kol rebelled at this, saying that their
God was an idle God, and how Justus partially over-
came their scruples against work, and taught them that
the black earth was rich in other produce than pig-nuts

only-
All these things belong to the history of many
months, and throughout those months the white-haired
Athon Daz6 meditated revenge for the tribal neglect of
Dungara. With savage cunning he feigned friendship
towards Justus, even hinting at his own conversion;
but to the congregation of Dungara he said darkly:
'They of the Padri's flock have put on clothes and
worship a busy God. Therefore Dungara will afflict

THE JUDGMENT OE DUNGARA 233

them grievously till they throw themselves, howling,
into the waters of the Berbulda.' At night the Red
Elephant Tusk boomed and groaned among the hills,
and the faithful waked and said : ' The God of Things
as They Are matures revenge against the backsliders.
Be merciful, Dungara, to us Thy children, arid give us
all their crops ! '

Late in the cold weather, the Collector and his wife
came into the Buria Kol country. ' Go and look at
Krenk's Mission,' said Gallic. ' He is doing good work
in his own way, and I think he'd be pleased if you
opened the bamboo chapel that he has managed to run
up. At any rate you'll see a civilised Buria Kol.'

Great was the stir in the Mission. ' Now he and the
gracious lady will that we have done good work with
their own eyes see, and — yes — we will him our con-
verts in all their new clothes by their own hands con-
structed exhibit. It will a great day be — for the Lord
always,' said Justus , and Lotta said ' Amen.'

Justus had, in his quiet way, felt jealous of the Basel
Weaving Mission, his own converts being unhandy ;
but Athon Daz^ had latterly induced some of them to
hackle the glossy silky fibres of a plant that grew plen-
teously on the Panth Hills. It yielded a cloth white
and smooth almost as the tappa of the South Seas, and
that day the converts were to wear for the first time
clothes made therefrom. Justus was proud of his work.

' They shall in white clothes clothed to meet the Col-
lector and his well-born lady come down, singing " Now
thank we all our Grod." Then he will the Chapel open,
and — yes — even Gallic to believe will begin. Stand
so, my children, two by two, and — Lotta, why do they
thus themselves bescratch ? It is not seemly to wriggle.

234 THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGARA

Nala, my child. The Collector will be here and be
pained.'

The Collector, his wife, and Gallic climbed the hill
to the Mission^tation. The converts were drawn up in
two lines, a shining band nearly forty strong. ' Hah ! '
said the Collector, whose acquisitive bent of mind led
him to believe that he had fostered the institution from
the first. ' Advancing, I see, by leaps and bounds.'

Never was truer word spoken! The Mission was
advancing exactly as he had said — at first by little
hops and shuffles of shamefaced uneasiness, but soon by
the leaps of fly-stung horses and the bounds of mad-
dened kangaroos. From the hill of Panth the Red
Elephant Tusk delivered a dry and anguished blare.
The ranks of the converts wavered, broke and scattered
with yells and shrieks of pain, while Justus and Lotta
stood horror-stricken.

'It is the Judgment of Dungara!' shouted a voice.
' I burn ! I burn ! To the river or we die ! '

The mob wheeled and headed for the rocks that over-
hung the Berbulda, writhing, stamping, twisting and
shedding its garments as it ran, pursued by the thunder
of the trumpet of Dungara. Justus and Lotta fled to
the Collector almost in tears.

'I cannot understand! Yesterday,' panted Justus,
'they had the Ten Commandments. — What is this?
Praise the Lord all good spirits by laud and by sea.
Nala ! Oh, shame ! '

With a bound and a scream there alighted on the
rocks above their heads, Nala, once the pride of the
Mission, a maiden of fourteen summers, good, docile,
and virtuous — now naked as the dawn and spitting like
a wild-cat.

THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGAKA 236

' Was it for this ! ' she raved, hurling her petticoat at
Justus , ' was it for this I left my people and Dungara

— for the fires of your Bad Place? Blind ape, little
earthworm, dried fish that you are, you said that I
should never burn ! O Dungara, I burn now ! I
burn now! Have mercy, God of Things as They
Are!'

She turned and flung herself into, the Berbulda, and
the trumpet of Dungara bellowed jubilantly. The last
of the converts of the Tubingen Mission had put a
quarter of a mile of rapid river between herself and her
teachers.

' Yesterday,' gulped Justus, ' she taught in the school
A, B, C, D. — Oh ! It is the work of Satan ! '

But Gallic was curiously regarding the maiden's
petticoat where it had fallen at his feet. He felt its
texture, drew back his shirt-sleeve beyond the deep
tan of his wrist and pressed a fold of the cloth against
the flesh. A blotch of angry red rose on the white
skin.

' Ah! ' said Gallio calmly, ' I thought so.'

' What is it ? ' said Justus.

' I should call it the Shirt of Nessus, but — Where
did you get the fibre of this cloth from ? '

' Athon Daz^,' said Justus. ' He showed the boys
how it should manufactured be.'

' The old fox ! Do you know that he has given you
the Nilgiri Nettle — scorpion — G-irardenia heterojphylla

— to work up ? No wonder they squirmed ! Why, it
stings even when they make bridge-ropes of it, unless
it's soaked for six weeks. The cunning brute ! It
would take about half an hour to burn through their
thick hides, and then ! '

236 THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGAEA

Gallio burst into laughter, but Lotta was weeping in
the arms of the Collector's wife, and Justus had cov-
ered his face with his hands.

' Grirardenia heteropJiylla ! ' repeated Gallio. ' Krenk,
why didn't you tell me ? I could have saved you this.
Woven fire ! Anybody but a naked Kol would have
known it, and, if I'm a judge of their ways, you'll never
get them back.'

He looked across the river to where the converts
were still wallowing and wailing in the shallows, and
the laughter died out of his eyes, for he saw that the
Tubingen Mission to the Buria Kol was dead.

Never again, though they hung mournfully round the
deserted school for three months, could Lotta or Justus
coax back even the most promising of their flock. No !
The end of conversion was the fire of the Bad Place —
fire that ran through the limbs and gnawed into the
bones. Who dare a second time tempt the anger of
Dungara? Let the little man and his wife go else-
where. The Buria Kol would have none of them. An
unofficial message to Athon Daz^ that if a hair of
their heads were touched, Athon Daz6 and the priests
of Dungara would be hanged by Gallio at the tem-
ple shrine, protected Justus and Lotta from the stumpy
poisoned arrows of the Buria Kol, but neither fish nor
fowl, honeycomb, salt nor young pig were brought to
their doors any more. And, alas ! man cannot live by
grace alone if meat be wanting.

' Let us go, mine wife,' said Justus ; ' there is no
good here, and the Lord has willed that some other
man shall the work take — in good time — in His own
good time. We will go away, and I will — yes — some
botany bestudy.'

THE JUDGMENT OF DUNGAEA 237

If any one is anxious to convert the Buria Kol afresh,
there lies at least the core of a mission-house under the
hill of Panth. But the chapel and school have long
since fallen back into jungle.

AT HOWLI THANA

His own shoe, his own head. — Native Proverb.

As a messenger, if the heart of the Presence be
moved to so great favour. And on six rupees.
Yes, Sahib, for I have three little little children whose
stomachs are always empty, and corn is now but forty
pounds to the rupee. I will make so clever a messen-
ger that you shall all day long be pleased with me, and,
at the end of the year, bestow a turban. I know all
the roads of the Station and many other things. Aha,
Sahib ! I am clever. Give me service. I was afore-
time in the Police. A bad character? Now without
doubt an enemy has told this tale. Never was I a
scamp. I am a man of clean heart, and all my words
are true. They knew this when I was in the Pohce.
They said : ' Afzal Khan is a true speaker in whose
words men may trust.' I am a Delhi Pathan, Sahib —
all Delhi Pathans are good men. You have seen Delhi ?
Yes, it is true that there be many scamps among the
Delhi Pathans. How wise is the Sahib ! Nothing is
hid from his eyes, and he will make me his messenger,
and I will take all his notes secretly and without osten-
tation. Nay, Sahib, God is my witness that I meant
no evil. I have long desired to serve under a true
Sahib — a virtuous Sahib. Many young Sahibs are as
devils unchained. With these Sahibs I would take no

238

AT HOWLI THANA 239

service — not though all the stomachs of my little chil-
dren were crying for bread.

Why am I not still in the Police ? I wiU speak true
talk. An evil came to the Thana — to Ram Baksh, the
Havildar, and Mania Baksh, and Juggut Ram and
Bhim Singh and Suruj Bui. Ram Baksh is in the jail
for a space, and so also is Maula Baksh.

It was at the Thana of Howli, on the road that leads
to Gokral-Seetarun wherein are many dacoits. We were
all brave men — Rustums. Wherefore we were sent to
that Thana which was eight miles from the next Thana.
All day and all night we watched for dacoits. Why
does the Sahib laugh? Nay, I will make a confession.
The dacoits were too clever, and, seeing this, we made
no further trouble. It was in the hot weather. What
can a man do in the hot days ? Is the Sahib who is so
strong — is he, even, vigorous in that hour? We made
an arrangement with the dacoits for the sake of peace.
That was the work of the Havildar who was fat. Ho !
Ho ! Sahib, he is now getting thin in the jail among the
carpets. The Havildar said : ' Give us no trouble, and
we will give you no trouble. At the end of the reap-
ing send us a man to lead before the judge, a man of
infirm mind against whom the trumped-up case will
break down. Thus we shall save our honour.' To this
talk the dacoits agreed, and we had no trouble at the
Thana, and could eat melons in peace, sitting upon our
charpoys all day long. Sweet as sugar-cane are the
melons of Howli.

Now there was an assistant commissioner — a Stunt
Sahib, in that district, called Yunkum Sahib. Aha!
He was hard — hard even as is the Sahib who, without
doubt, will give me the shadow of his protection.

240 AT HOWLI THANA

Many eyes had Yunkum Sahib, and moved quickly
through, his district. Men called him The Tiger of
Gokral-Seetarun, because he would arrive unannounced
and make his kill, and, before sunset, would be giving
trouble to the Tehsildars thirty miles away. No one
knew the comings or the goings of Yunkum Sahib.
He had no camp, and when his horse was weary he
rode upon a devil-carriage. I do not know its name,
but the Sahib sat in the midst of 'khree silver wheels
that made no creaking, and drave them with his legs,
prancing like a bean-fed horse — thus. A shadow of a
hawk upon the fields was not more without noise than
the devil-carriage of Yunkum Sahib. It was here : it
was there: it was gone: and the rapport was made,
and there was trouble. Ask the Tehsildar of Rohestri
how the hen-stealing came to be known, Sahib.

It fell upon a night that we of the Thana slept
according to custom upon our charpoys, having eaten
the evening meal and drunk tobacco. When we awoke
in the morning, behold, of our six rifles not one re-
mained! Also, the big Police-book that was jn the
Havildar's charge was gone. Seeing these things, we
were very much afraid, thinking on our parts that the
dacoits, regardless of honour, had come by night, and
put us to shame. Then said Ram Baksh, the Havildar:
' Be silent ! The business is an evil business, but it
may yet go well. Let us make the case complete.
Bring a kid and my tulwar. See you not now, O fools?
A kick for a horse, but a word is enough for a man.'

We of the Thana, perceiving quickly what was in
the mind of the Havildar, and greatly fearing that the
service would be lost, made haste to take the kid into
the inner room, and attended to the words of the Hav-

AT HOWLI THANA 241

ildar. ' Twenty dacoits came,' said the Havildar, and
we, taking his words, repeated. after him according to
custom. ' There was a great fight,' said the Havildar,
'and of us no man escaped imhurt. The bars of the
window were broken. Suruj Bui, see thou to that ;
and, O men, put speed into your work, for a runner
must go with the news to The Tiger of Gokral-Seetarun.'
Thereon, Suruj Bui, leaning with his shoulder, brake
in the bars of the window, and I, beating her with a
whip, made the Havildar's mare skip among the melon-
beds till they were much trodden with hoof-prints.

These things being made, I returned to the Thana,
and the goat was slain, and certain portions of the
walls were blackened with fire, and each man dipped
his clothes a little into the blood of the goat. Know,

Sahib, that a wound made by man upon his own
body can, by those skilled, be easily discerned from a
wound wrought by another man. Therefore, the Hav-
ildar, taking his tulwar, smote one of us lightly on the
forearm in the fat, and another on the leg, and a third
on the back of the hand. Thus dealt he with all of us
till the blood came ; and Suruj Bui, more eager than
the others, took out much hair. O Sahib, never was
so perfect an arrangement^.^ Yea, even I would have
sworn that the Than^had been treated as we said.
There was smoke and breaking and blood and trampled
earth.

' Ride now, Mmtla. Baksh,' said the Havildar, ' to the
house of the munt Sahib, and carry the news of the
dacoity. tjuDo you also, O Afzal Khan, run there, and
take heed that you are mired with sweat and dust on
your in-coming. The blood will be dry on the clothes.

1 will stay and send a straight report to the Dipty

242 AT HOWLI THANA

Sahib, and we will catch certain that ye know of, villa-
gers, so that all may be ready against the Dipty Sahib's
arrival.'

Thus Maula Baksh rode and I ran hanging on the
stirrup, and together we came in an evil plight before
The Tiger of Gokral-Seetarun in the Rohestri tehsil.
Our tale was long and correct, Sahib, for we gave even
the names of the dacoits and the issue of the fight and
besought him to come. But The Tiger made no sign,
and only smiled after the manner of Sahibs when they
have a wickedness in their hearts. ' Swear ye to the
rapport ? ' said he, and we said : ' Thy servants swear.
The blood of the fight is but newly dry upon us.
Judge thou if it be the blood of the servants of the
Presence, or not.' And he said : ' I see. Ye have
done well.' But he did not call for his horse or his
devil-carriage, and scour the land as was his custom.
He said : ' Rest now and eat bread, for ye be wearied
men. I will wait the coming of the Dipty Sahib.'

Now it is the order that the Havildar of the Thana
should send a straight report of all dacoities to the
Dipty Sahib. At noon came he, a fat man and an old,
and overbearing withal, but we of the Thana had no
fear of his anger ; dreading more the silences of The
Tiger of Gokral-Seetarun. .With him came Ram
Baksh, the Havildar, and the others, guarding ten men
of the village of Howli — all men evil affected towards
the Police of the Sirkar. As prisoners they came, the
irons upon their hands, crying for mercy — Imam
Baksh, the farmer, who had denied his wife to the
Havildar, and others, ill-conditioned rascals against
whom we of the Thana bore spite. It was well done,
and the Havildar was proud. But the Dipty Sahib

AT HOWLI THANA 243

was angry with the Stunt for lack of zeal, and said
'Dam-Dam' after the custom of the English people,
and extolled the Havildar. Yunkum Sahib lay still in
his long chair. ' Have the men sworn ? ' said Yunkum
Sahib. 'Aye, and captured ten evildoers,' said the
Dipty Sahib. ' There be more abroad in your charge.
Take horse — ride, and go in the name of the Sirkar!
' Truly there be more evildoers abroad,' said Yunkum
Sahib, ' but there is no need of a horse. Come aU men
with me.'

I saw the mark of a string on the temples of Imam
Baksh. Does the Presence know the torture of the
Cold Draw? I saw also the face of The Tiger of
Gokral-Seetarun, the evil smile was upon it, and I
stood back ready for what might befall. "Well it was.
Sahib, that I did this thing. Yunkum Sahib unlocked
the door of his bath-room, and smiled anew. Within
lay the six rifles and the big Police-book of the Thana
of Howli ! He had come by night in the devil-carriage
that is noiseless as a ghoul, and moving among us
asleep, had taken away both the guns and the book !
Twice had he come to the Thana, taking each time
three rifles. The liver of the Havildar was turned to
water, and he fell scrabbling in the dirt about the boots
of Yunkum Sahib, crying — ' Have mercy! '

And I? Sahib, I am a Delhi Pathan, and a young
man with little children. The Havildar's mare was in
the compound. I ran to her and rode : the black wrath
of the Sirkar was behind me, and I knew not whither
to go. Till she dropped and died I rode the red mare ;
and by the blessing of God, who is without doubt on
the side of all just men, I escaped. But the Havildar
and the rest are now in jail.

244 AT HOWLI THANA

I am a scamp ? It is as the Presence pleases. God
will make the Presence a .Lord, and give him a rich
Memsahih as fair as a Peri to wife, and many strong
sons, if he makes me his orderly. The Mercy of Heaven
be upon the Sahib ! Yes, I will only go to the bazar
and bring my children to these so-palace-like quar-
ters, and then — the Presence is my Father and my
Mother, and I, Afzal Khan, am his slave,

Ohe, Sirdar-ji ! I also am of the household of the
Sahib.

GEMINI

Great is the justice of the White Man — greater the power of a
lie. — Native Proverb.

This is your English Justice, Protector of the Poor.
Look at my back and loins which are beaten with
sticks — heavy sticks ! I am a poor man, and there is
no justice in Courts.

There were two of us, and we were born of one
birth, but I swear to you that I was born the first, and
Ram Dass is the younger by three full breaths. The
astrologer said so, and it is written in my horoscope —
the horoscope of Durga Dass.

But we were alike — I and my brother who is a
beast without honour — so alike that none knew, to-
gether or apart, which was Durga Dass. I am a Maha-
jun of Pali in Marwar, and an honest man. This is true
talk. When we were men, we left our father's house in
Pali, and went to the Punjab, where all the people are
mud-heads and sons of asses. We took shop together in
Isser Jang — I and my brother — near the big well
where the Governor's camp draws water. But Ram
Dass, who is without truth, made quarrel with me, and
we were divided. He took his books, and his pots, and
his Mark, and became a bunnia — a money-lender — in
the long street of Isser Jang, near the gateway of the
road that goes to Montgomery. It was not my fault that
we pulled each other's turbans. I am a Mahajun of Pali,

245

246 GEMINI

and I always speak true talk. Ram Dass was the thief
and the liar.

Now no man, not even the little children, could at
one glance see which was Ram Dass and which was
Durga Dass. But all the people of Isser Jang — may
they die without sons ! — said that we were thieves.
They used much bad talk, but I took money on their
bedsteads and their cooking-pots and the standing crop
and the calf unborn, from the well in the big square to
the gate of the Montgomery road. They were fools,
these people — unfit to cut the toe-nails of a Marwari
from Pali. I lent money to them all. A little, very
little only — here a pice and there a pice. God is my
witness that I am a poor man ! The money is all
with Ram Dass — may his sons turn Christian, and his
daughter be a burning fire and a shame in the house
from generation to generation ! May she die unwed,
and be the mother of a multitude of bastards ! Let the
light go out in the house of Ram Dass, my brother.
This I pray daily twice — with offerings and charms.

Thus the trouble began. We divided the town of
Isser Jang between us — I and my brother. There was
a landholder beyond the gates, living but one short
mile out, on the road that leads to Montgomery, and
his name was Muhammad Shah, son of a Nawab. He
was a great devil and drank wine. So long as there
were women in his house, and wine and money for the
marriage-feasts, he was merry and wiped his mouth.
Ram Dass lent him the money, a lakh or half a lakh —
how do I know ' — and so long as the money was lent,
the landholder cared not what he signed.

The people of Isser Jang were my portion, and the
landholder and the out-town was the portion of Ram

GEMINI 247

Dass; for so we had arranged. I was the poor man,
for the people of Isser Jang were without wealth. T
did what I could, but Ram Dass had only to wait with-
out the door of the landholder's garden-court, and to
lend him the money ; taking the bonds from the hand
of the steward.

In the autumn of the year after the lending, Ram
Dass said to the landholder : ' Pay me my money,' but
the landholder gave him abuse. But Ram Dass went
into the Courts with the papers and the bonds — all
correct — and took out decrees against the liandholder ;
and the name of the Government was across the stamps
of the decrees. Ram Dass took field by field, and
mango-tree by mango-tree, and well by well; putting
in his own men — debtors of the out-town of Isser Jang
— to cultivate the crops. So he crept up across the
land, for he had the papers, and the name of the Gov-
ernment was across the stamps, till his men held the
crops for him on all sides of the big white house of the
landholder. It was well done ; but when the land-
holder saw these things he was very angry and cursed
Ram Dass after the manner of the Muhammadans.

And thus the landholder was angry, but Ram Dass
laughed and claimed more fields, as was written upon
the bonds. This was in the month of Phagun. I took
my horse and went out to speak to the man who makes
lac-bangles upon the road that leads to Montgomery,
because he owed me a debt. There was in front of me,
upon his horse, my brother Ram Dass. And when he
saw me, he turned aside into the high crops, because
there was hatred between us. And I went forward till
I came to the orange-bushes by the landholder's house.
The bats were flying, and the evening smoke was low

248 GEMINI

down upon the land. Here met me four men — swash-
bucklers and Muhammadans — with their faces bound
up, laying hold of my horse's bridle and crying out :
' This is Ram Dass ! Beat ! ' Me they beat with their
staves — heavy staves bound about with wire at the
end, such weapons as those swine of Punjabis use —
till, having cried for mercy, I fell down senseless. But
these shameless ones still beat me, saying: 'O Ram
Dass, this is your interest — well weighed and counted
into your hand, Ram Dass,' I cried aloud that I was
not Ram Dass but Durga Dass, his brother, yet they
only beat me the more, and when I could make no
more outcry they left me. But I saw their faces.
There was Elahi Baksh who runs by the side> of the
landholder's white horse, and Nur Ali the keeper of the
door, and Wajib Ali the very strong cook, and Abdul
Latif the messenger — all of the household of the land-
holder. These things I can swear on the Cow's Tail
if need be, but — AM! AM! — it has been already
sworn, and I am a poor man whose honour is lost.

When these four had gone away laughing, my brother
Ram Dass came out of the crops and mourned over me
as one dead. But I opened my eyes, and prayed him
to get me water. When I had drunk, he carried me on
his back, and by byways brought me into the town of
Isser Jang. My heart was turned to Ram Dass, my
brother, in that hour, because of his kindness, and I
lost my enmity-

But a snake is a snake till it is dead ; and a liar is a
liar till the Judgment of the Gods takes hold of his
heel. I was wrong in that I trusted my brother — the
son of my mother.

When we had come to his house and I was a little

GEMINI 249

restored, I told him my tale, and he said: 'Without
doubt it is me whom they would have beaten. But the
Law Courts are open, and there is the Justice of the
Sirkar above all; and to the Law Courts do thou go
when this sickness is overpast.'

Now when we two had left Pali in the old years,
there fell a famine that ran from Jeysulmir to Gurgaon
and touched Gogunda in the south. At that time the
sister of my father came away and lived with us in Isser
Jang 5 for a man must above all see that his folk do not
die of want. When the quarrel between us twain came
about, the sister of my -father — a lean she-dog without
teeth — said that Ram Dass had the right, and went with
him. Into her hands — because she knew medicines
and many cures — Ram Dass, my brother, put me faint
with the beating, and much bruised even to the pouring
of blood from the mouth. When I had two days' sick-
ness the fever came upon me ; and I set aside the fever
to, the account written in my mind against the land-
holder.

The Punjabis of Isser Jang are all the sons of Belial
and a she-ass, but they are very good witnesses, bearing
testimony unshakingly whatever the pleaders may say.
I would purchase witnesses by the score, and each man
should give evidence, not only against Nur Ali, Wajib
Ali, Abdul Latif and Elahi Baksh, but against the land-
holder, saying that he upon his white horse had called
his men to beat me ; and, further, that they had robbed
me of two hundred rupees. For the latter testimony,
I would remit a little of the debt of the man who sold
the lac-bangles, and he should say that he had put the
money into my hands, and had seen the robbery from
afar, but, being afraid, had run away. This plan I told

250 GEMINI

to my brother Ram Dass ; and he said that the arrange-
ment was good, and bade me take comfort and make
swift work to be abroad again. My heart was opened
to my brother in my sickness, and I told him the names
of those whom I would call as witnesses — all men in
my debt, but of that the Magistrate Sahib could have
no knowledge, nor the landholder. The fever stayed
with me, and after the fever, I was taken with colic,
and gripings very terrible. In that day I thought that
my end was at hand, but I know now that she who
gave me the medicines, the sister of my father — a
widow with a widow's heart — had brought about my
second sickness. Ram Dass, my brother, said that my
house was shut and locked, and brought me the big
door-key and my books, together with all the moneys
that were in my house — even the money that was
buried under the floor; for I was in great fear lest
thieves should break in and dig. I speak true talk;
there was but very little money in my house. Perhaps
ten rupees — perhaps twenty. How can I tell? God
is my witness that I am a poor man.

One night, when I had told Ram Dass all that was in
my heart of the lawsuit that I would bring against the
landholder, and Ram Dass had said that he had made
the arrangements with the witnesses, giving me their
names written, I was taken with a new great sickness,
and they put me on the bed. When I was a little re-
covered — I cannot tell how many days afterwards — I
made enquiry for Ram Dass, and the sister of my father
said that he had gone to Montgomery upon a lawsuit.
I took medicine and slept very heavily without waking.
When my eyes were opened, there was a great stillness
in the house of Ram Dass, and none answered when I

GEMINI 251

called — not even tlie sister of my father. This filled
me with fear, for I knew not what had happened.

Taking a stick in my hand, I went out slowly, till I
came to the great square by the well, and my heart was
hot in me against the landholder because of the pain of
every step I took.

I called for Jowar Singh, the carpenter, whose
name was first upon the list of those who should
bear evidence against the landholder, saying: 'Are
all things ready, and do you know what should be
said?'

Jowar Singh answered : ' What is this, and whence
do you come, Durga Dass ? '

I said: 'From my bed, where I have so long lain
sick because of the landholder. Where is Ram Dass,
my brother, who was to have made the arrangement
for the witnesses ? Surely you and yours know these
things ! '

Then Jowar Singh said : ' What has this to do with
us, O Liar? I have borne witness and I have been
paid, and the landholder has, by the order of the Court,
paid both the five hundred rupees that he robbed from
Ram Dass and yet other five hundred because of the
great injury he did to your brother.'

The well and the jujube-tree above it and the square
of Isser Jang became dark in my eyes, but I leaned on
my stick and said: 'Nay! This is child's talk and
senseless. It was I who suffered at the hands of the
landholder, and I am come to make ready the case.
Where is my brother Ram Dass?'

But Jowar Singh shook his head, and a woman cried :
' What lie is here ? What quarrel had the landholder
with you, hunnia ? It is only a shameless one and one

252 GEMINI

without faith who profits by his brother's smarts. Have
these iwnnias no bowels ? '

I cried again, saying : ' By the Cow — by the Oath
of the Cow, by the Temple of the Blue-throated Maha-
deo, I and I only was beaten — beaten to the death !
Let your talk be straight, O people of Isser Jang, and
I will pay for the witnesses.' And I tottered where I
stood, for the sickness and the pain of the beating were
heavy upon me.

Then Ram Narain, who has his carpet spread under
the jujube-tree by the well, and writes all letters for the
men of the town, came up and said : ' To-day is the
one and fortieth day since the beating, and since these
six days the case has been judged in the Court, and the
Assistant Commissioner Sahib has given it for your
brother Ram Dass, allowing the robbery, to which, too,
I bore witness, and all things else as the witnesses said.
There were many witnesses, and twice Ram Dass became
senseless in the Court because of his wounds, and the
Stunt Sahib — the haba Stunt Sahib — gave him a chair
before all the pleaders. Why do you howl, Durga
Dass ? These things fell as I have said. Was it not
so?'

And Jowar Singh said: 'That is truth. I was
there, and there was a red cushion in the chair.'

And Ram Narain said : ' Great shame has come upon
the landholder because of this judgment, and fear
ing his anger. Ram Dass and all his house have gone
back to Pali. Ram Dass told us that you also had gone
first, the enmity being healed between you, to open a
shop in Pali. Indeed, it were well for you that you go
even now, for the landholder has sworn that if he catch
any one of your house, he will hang him by the heels

GEMDfl 253

from the well-beam, and, swinging him to and fro, will
beat him with staves till the blood runs from his ears.
What I have said in respect to the case is true, as these
men here can testify — even to the five hundred rupees.'

I said : ' Was it five hundred? ' And Kirpa Ram, the
jat, said : ' Five hundred ; for I bore witness also.'

And I groaned, for it had been in my heart to have
said two hundred only.

Then a new fear came upon me and my bowels
turned to water, and, running swiftly to the house of
Ram Dass, I sought for my books and my money in
the great wooden chest under my bedstead. There
remained nothing : not even a cowrie's value. All had
been taken by the devil who said he was my brother.
I went to my own house also and opened the boards of
the shutters; but there also was nothing save the rats
among the grain-baskets. In that hour my senses left
me, and, tearing my clothes, I ran to the well-place, cry-
ing out for the Justice of the English on my brother
Ram Dass, and, in my madness, telling all that the
books were lost. When men saw that I would have
jumped down the well, they believed the truth of my
talk ; more especially because upon my back and bosom
were still the marks of the staves of the landholder.

Jowar Singh the carpenter withstood me, and turn-
ing me in his hands — for he is a very strong man —
showed the scars upon my body, and bowed down with
laughter upon the well-curb. He cried aloud so that
all heard him, from the well-square to the Caravanserai
of the Pilgrims : ' Oho ! The jackals have quarrelled,
and the gray one has been caught in the trap. In
truth, this man has been grievously beaten, and his
brother has taken the money which the Court decreed !

264 GEMINI

Oh, hunnia, this shall be told for years against you !
The jackals have quarrelled, and, moreover, the books
are burned. O people indebted to Durga Dass — and I
know that ye be many — the books are burned ! '

Then all Isser Jang took up the cry that the books
were burned — AM! AM! that in my folly I had let
that escape my mouth — and they laughed throughout
the city. They gave me the abuse of the Punjabi,
which is a terrible abuse and very hot ; pelting me also
with sticks and cow-dung till I fell down and cried for
mercy.

Ram Narain, the letter-writer, bade the people cease,
for fear that the news should get into Montgomery, and
the Policemen might come down to enquire. He said,
using many bad words : ' This much mercy will I do to
you, Durga Dass, though there was no mercy in your
dealings with my sister's son over the matter of the
dun heifer. Has any man a pony on which he sets no
store, that this fellow may escape ? If the landholder
hears that one of the twain (and God knows whether
he beat one or both, but this man is certainly beaten)
be in the city, there will be a murder done, and then
will come the Police, making inquisition into each
man's house and eating the sweet-seller's stuff all day
long.'

Kirpa Ram, the Jat, said : ' I have a pony very sick.
But with beating he can be made to walk for two miles.
If he dies, the hide-sellers will have the body.'

Then Chumbo, the hide-seller, said : ' I will pay three
annas for the body, and will walk by this man's side till
such time as the pony dies. If it be more than two
miles, I will pay two annas only.'

Kirpa Ram, said : ' Be it so.' Men brought out the

GEMINI 255

pony, and I asked leave to draw a little water from the
well, because I was dried up with fear.

Then Ram Narain said : ' Here be four anims. God
has brought you very low, Durga Dass, and I would not
send you away empty, even though the matter of my
sister's son's dun heifer be an open sore between us.
It is a long way to your own country. Go, and if it be
so willed, live ; but, above all, do not take the pony's
bridle, for that is mine.'

And I went out of Isser Jang, amid the laughing of
the huge-thighed Jats, and the hide-seller walked by
my side waiting for the pony to fall dead. In one mile
it died, and being full of fear of the landholder, I ran
till I could run no more and came to this place.

But I swear by the Cow, I swear by all things
whereon Hindus and Musalmans, and even the Sahibs
swear, that I, and not my brother, was beaten by the
landholder. But the case is shut and the doors of the
Law Courts are shut, and God knows where the laba
Stunt Sahib — the mother's milk is not yet dry upon
his hairless lip — is gone. AM! AM! I have no
witnesses, and the scars will heal, and I am a poor man.
But, on my Father's Soul, on the oath of a Mahajun
from Pali, I, and not my brother, I was beaten by the
landholder !

What can I do ? The Justice of the English is as a
great river. Having gone forward, it does not return.
Howbeit, do you. Sahib, take a pen and write clearly
what I have said, that the Dipty Sahib may see, and
reprove the Stunt Sahib, who is a colt yet unlicked by
the mare, so young is he. I, and not my brother, was
beaten, and he is gone to the west — I do not know
where.

256 GEMINI

»'i -
But, above all things, write — so that Sahihe m&j

read, and his disgrace be accomplished — that !feam
Dass, my brother, son of Purun Dass, Mahajun of Pali,
is a swine and a night-thief, a taker of life, an eater of
flesh, a jackal-spawn without beauty, or faith, or clean-
liness, or honour !

AT TWENTY-TWO

Narrow as the womb, deep as the Pit, and dark as the heart of
a man. — Sonthal Miner's Proverb.

'A "WEAVER went out to reap but stayed to unravel
the corn-stalks. Ha! Ha! Ha! Is there any sense
in a weaver ? '

Janki Meah glared at Kundoo, but, as Janki Meah
was blind, Kundoo was not impressed. He had come
to argue with Janki Meah, and, if chance favoured, to
make love to the old man's pretty young wife.

This was Kundoo's grievance, and he spoke in the
name of all the five men who, with Janki Meah, com-
posed the gang in Number Seven gallery of Twenty-
Two. Janki Meah had been blind for the thirty years
during which he had served the Jimahari Collieries
with pick and crowbar. All through those thirty years
he had regularly, every morning before going down,
drawn from the overseer his allowance of lamp-oil —
just as if he had been an eyed miner. What Kundoo's
gang resented, as hundreds of gangs had resented
before, was Janki Meah's selfishness. He would not
add. the oil to the common stock of his gang, but would
save and sell it.

' I knew these workings before you were born,' Janki
Meah used to reply : ' I don't want the light to get my
coal out by, and I am not going to help you. The oil
is mine, and I intend to keep it.'
s 257

258 AT TWENTY-TWO

A strange man in many ways was Janki Meah, the
white-haired, hot-tempered, sightless weaver who had
turned pitman. All day long — except on Sundays
and Mondays when he was usually drunk — he worked
in the Twenty Two shaft of the Jimahari Colliery as
cleverly as a man with all the senses. At evening he
went up in the great steam-hauled cage to the pit-bank,
and there called for his pony — a rusty, coal-dusty
beast, nearly as old as Janki Meah. The pony would
come to his side, and Janki Meah would clamber on to
its back and be taken at once to the plot of land which
he, like the other miners, received from the Jimahari
Company, The pony knew that place, and when, after
six years, the Company changed all the allotments to
prevent the miners from acquiring proprietary rights,
Janki Meah represented, with tears in his eyes, that
were his holding shifted, he would never be able to find
his way to the new one. ' My horse only knows that
place,' pleaded Janki Meah, and so he was allowed to
keep his land.

On the strength of this concession and his accumu-
lated oil-savings, Janki Meah took a second wife — a
girl of the Jolaha main stock of the Meahs, and singu-
larly beautiful. Janki Meah could not see her beauty ;
wherefore he took her on trust, and forbade her to go
down the pit. He had not worked for thirty years
in the dark without knowing that the pit was no place
for pretty women. He loaded her with ornaments —
not brass or pewter, but real silver ones — and she
rewarded him by flirting outrageously with Kundoo of
Number Seven gallery gang. Kundoo was really the
gang-head, but Janki Meah insisted upon all the work
being entered in his own name, and chose the men that

AT TWENTY-TWO 259

he worked with. Custom — stronger even than the
Jimahari Company — dictated that Janki, by right of
his years, should manage these things, and should, also,
work despite his blindness. In Indian mines where
they cut into the solid coal with the pick and clear it
out from floor to ceiling, he could come to no great
harm. At Home, where they undercut the coal and
bring it down in crashing avalanches from the roof, he
would never have been allowed to set foot in a pit.
He was not a popular man, because of his oil-savings ;
but all the gangs admitted that Janki knew all the
khads, or workings, that had ever been sunk or worked
since the Jimahari Company first started operations on
the Tarachunda fields.

Pretty little Unda only knew that her old husband
was a fool who could be managed. She took no inter-
est in-the collieries except in so far as they swallowed
up Kundoo five days out of the seven, and covered him
with coal-dust. Kundoo was a great workman, and did
his best not to get drunk, because, when he had saved
forty rupees, Unda was to steal everything that she
could find in Janki's house and run with Kundoo to a
land where there were no. mines, and every one kept
three fat bullocks and a milch-buffalo. While this
scheme ripened it was his custom to drop in upon Janki
and worry him about the oil savings. Unda sat in a
cq^er and nodded approval. On the night when
Kundoo had quoted that objectionable proverb about
weavers, Janki grew angry.

* Listen, you pig,' said he, ' blind I am, and old I am,
but, before ever you were born, I was gray among the
coal. Even in the days when the Twenty-Two khad
was unsunk and there were not two thousand men here,

260 AT TWENTY-TWO

I was known to have all knowledge of the pits. What
khad is there that I do not know, from the bottom of
the shaft to the end of the last driye? Is it the Ba-
romba khad, the oldest, or the Twenty-Two where
Tibu's gallery runs up to Number Five ? '

' Hear the old fool talk ! ' said Kundoo, nodding to
Unda. ' No gallery of Twenty-Two will cut into Five
before the end of the Rains. We have a month's solid
coal before us. The Babuji says so.'

' Babuji ! Pigji ! Dogji ! What do these fat slugs
from Calcutta know ? He draws and draws and
draws, and talks and talks and talks, and his maps
are all wrong. I, Janki, know that this is so. When
a man has been shut up in the dark for thirty years-,
God gives him knowledge. The old gallery that
Tibu's gang made is not six feet from Number Five.'

'Without doubt God gives the blind knowledge,'
said Kundoo, with a look at Unda. ' Let it be as you
say. I, for my part, do not know where lies the gallery
of Tibu's gang, but I am not a withered monkey who
needs oil to grease his joints with.'

Kundoo swung out of the hut laughing, and Unda
giggled. Janki turned his sightless eyes toward his
wife and swore. ' I have land, and I have sold a
great deal of lamp-oil,' mused Janki ; ' but I was a
fool to marry this child.'

A week later the Rains set in with a vengeance, and
the gangs paddled about in coal-slush at the pit-banks.
Then the big mine-pumps were made ready, and the
Manager of the Colliery ploughed through the wet
towards the Tarachunda River swelling between its
soppy banks. ' Lord send that this beastly beck
doesn't misbehave,' said the Manager piously, and he

AT TWENTY-TWO 261

went to take counsel with his Assistant about the
pumps.

But the Tarachunda misbehaved very much indeed.
After a fall of three inches of rain in an hour it was
obliged to do something. It topped its bank and
joined the flood water that was hemmed between two
low hills just where the embankment of the Colliery
main line crossed. When a large part of a rain-fed
river, and a few acres of flood- water, make a dead set
for a nine-foot culvert, the culvert may spout its finest,
but the water cannot all get out. The Manager
pranced upon one leg with excitement, and his lan-
guage was improper.

He had reason to swear, because he knew that one
inch of water on land meant a pressure of one hundred
tons to the acre ; and here were about five feet of water
forming, behind the railway embankment, over the
shallower workings of Twenty-Two. You must un-
derstand that, in a coal-mine, the coal nearest the
surface is -v^orked first from the central shaft. That
is to say, the miners may clear out the stuff to within
ten, twenty, or thirty feet of the surface, and, when
all is worked out, leave only a skin of earth upheld
by some few pillars of coal. In a deep mine where they
k]jow that they have any amount of material at hand,
men prefer to get all their mineral out at one shaft,
rather than make a number of little holes to tap the
comparatively unimportant surface-coal.

And the Manager watched the flood.

The culvert spouted a nine-foot gush ; but the water
still formed, and word was sent to clear the men out
of Twenty-Two. The cages came up crammed and
crammed again with the men nearest the pit-eye, as

262 AT TWENTY-TWO

they call the place where you can see daylight from the
hottom of the main shaft. All away and away up the
long black galleries the flare-lamps were winking and
dancing like so many fireflies, and the men and the
women waited for the clanking, rattling, thundering
cages to come down and fly up again. But the out-
workings were very far off, and word could not be
passed quickly, though the heads of the gangs and
the Assistant shouted and swore and tramped and
stumbled. The Manager kept one eye on the great
troubled pool behind the embankment, and prayed that
the culvert would give way and let the water through
in time. With the other eye he watched the cages
come up and saw the headmen counting the roll of
the gangs. With .all his heart and soul he swore at
the winder who controlled the iron drum that wound
up the wire rope on which hung the cages.

In a little time there was a down-draw in the water
behind the embankment — a sucking whirlpool, aU
yellow and yeasty. The water had smashed thi-ough
the skin of the earth and was pouring into the old shal-
low workings of Twenty-Two.

Deep down below, a rush of black water caught the
last gang waiting for the cage, and as they clambered
in, the whirl was about their waists. The cage reacl^d
the pit-bank, and the Manager called the roll. The
gangs were all safe except Gang Janki, Gang Mogul, and
Gang Rahim, eighteen men, with perhaps ten basket-
women who loaded the coal into the little iron carriages
that ran on the tramways of the main galleries. These
gangs were in the out-workings, three-quarters of a
mile away, on the extreme fringe of the mine. Once
more the cage went down, but with only two English-

AT TWENTY-TWO 263

men in it, and dropped into a swirling, roaring current
that had almost touched the roof of some of the lower
side-galleries. One of the wooden balks with which
they had propped the old workings shot past on the
current, just missing the cage.

' If we don't want our ribs knocked out, we'd better
go,' said the Manager. ' We can't even save the
Company's props.'

The cage drew out of the water with a splash, and
a few minutes later, it was officially reported that
there were at least ten feet of water in the pit's eye.
Now ten feet of water there meant that all other
places in the mine were flooded except such galleries
as were more than ten feet above the level of the
bottom of the shaft. The deep workings would be
full, the main galleries would be full, but in the high
workings reached by inclines from the main roads,
there would be a certaia amount of air cut off, so to
speak, by the water and squeezed up by it. The little
science-primers explain how water behaves when you
pour it down test-tubes. The flooding of Twenty-
Two was an illustration on a large scale.

' By the Holy Grove, what has happened to the air ! '
It was a Sonthal gangman of Gang Mogul in Number
Nine gallery, and he was driving a six-foot way
through the coal. Then there was a rush from the
other galleries, and Gang Janki and Gang Rahim
stumbled up with their basket-women.

' Water has come in the mine,' they said, ' and there
is no way of getting out.'

' I went down,' said Janki — ' down the slope of my
gallery, and I felt the water.'

264 AT TWENTY-TWO

' There has been no water in the cutting in our time,'
clamoured the women. ' Why cannot we go away ? '

' Be silent ! ' said Janki. ' Long ago, when my father
was here, water came to T.en — no. Eleven — cutting,
and there was great trouble. Let us get away to
where the air is better.'

The three gangs and the basket-women left Number
Nine gallery and went further up Number Sixteen.
At one turn of the road they could see the pitchy black
water lapping on the coal. It had touched the roof of
a gallery that they knew well — a gallery where they
used to smoke their Jmqas and manage their flirtations.
Seeing this, they called aloud upon their Gods, and the
Mehas, who are thrice bastered Muhammadans, strove
to recollect the name of the Prophet. They came to
a great open square whence nearly all the coal had
been extracted. It was the end of the out-workings,
and the end of the mine.

Far away down the gallery a small pumping-engine,
used for keeping dry a deep working and fed with
steam from above, was throbbing faithfully. They
heard it cease.

' They have cut off the steam,' said Kundoo hope-
fully. ' They have given the order to use all the steam
for the pit-bank pumps. They will clear out the
water.'

' If the water has reached the smoking-gallery,' said
Janki, 'aU the Company's pumps can do nothing for
three days.'

'It is very hot,' moaned Jasoda, the Meah basket-
women. ' There is a very bad air here because of the
lamps.'

' Put them out,' said Janki ; ' why do you want lamps ? '

AT TWENTY-TWO 265

The lamps were put out and the company sat still in the
utter dark. Somebody rose quietly and began walk-
ing over the coals. It was Janki, who was touching
the walls with his hands. 'Where is the ledge?' he
murmured to himself.

' Sit, sit ! ' said Kundoo. ' If we die, we die. The
air is very bad.'

But Janki stiU stumbled and crept and tapped with
his pick upon the walls. The women rose to their
feet.

' Stay all where you are. Without the lamps you
cannot see, and I — I am always seeing,' said Janki.
Then he paused, and called out : ' Oh, you who have
been in the cutting more than ten years, what is the
name of this open place ? I am an old man and I have
forgotten.'

' Btillia's Room,' answered the Sonthal who had com-
plained of the vileness of the air.

' Again,' said Janki.

'BuUia's Room.'

' Then I have found it,' said Janki. ' The name
only had slipped my memory. Tibu's gang's gallery
is here.'

' A lie,' said Kundoo. ' There have been no galleries
in this place since my day.'

' Three paces was the depth of the ledge,' muttered
Janki without heeding — ' and — oh, my poor bones ! —
I have found it ! It is here, up this ledge. Come all
you, one by one, to the place of my voice, and I will
count you.'

There was a rush in the dark, and Janki felt the first
man's face hit his knees as the Sonthal scrambled up
the ledge.

266 AT TWENTY-TWO

■ ' Who ? ' cried Janki.

' I, Sunua Mauji.'

' Sit you down,' said Janki. ' Who next ? '

One by one the women and the men crawled up the
ledge which ran along one side of ' BuUia's Room.'
Degraded Muhammadan, pig-eating Musahr and wild
Sonthal, Janki ran his hand over them all.

' Now follow after,' said he, ' catching hold of my
heel, and the women catching the men's clothes'' He
did not ask whether the men had brought their picks
with them. A miner, black or white, does not drop
his pick. One by one, Janki leading, they crept into
the old gallery — a six-foot way with a scant four feet
from thill to roof.

' The air is better here,' said Jasoda. They could hear
her heart beating in thick, sick bumps.

' Slowly, slowly,' said Janki. ' I am an old man, and
I forget many things. This is Tibu's gallery, but where
are the four bricks where they used to put their huqa
fire on when the Sahibs never saw? Slowly, slowly,
you people behind.'

They heard his hands disturbing the small coal on
the floor of the gallery and then a dull sound. ' This is
one unbaked brick, and this is another and another.
Kundoo is a young man — let him come forward. Put a
knee upon this brick and strike here. When Tibu's
gang were at dinner on the last day before the good
coal ended, they heard the men of Five on the other
side, and Five worked their gallery two Sundays later —
or it may have been one. Strike there, Kundoo, but
give me room to go back.'

Kundoo, doubting, drove the pick, but the first soft
crush of the coal was a call to him. He was fighting

AT TWENTY-TWO 267

for his life and for Unda — pretty little Unda with rings
on all her toes — for Unda and the forty rupees. The
women sang the Song of the Pick — the terrible, slow,
swinging melody with the muttered chorus that repeats
the sliding of the loosened coal, and, to each cadence,
Kundoo smote in the black dark. When he could do
no more, Sunua Manji took the pick, and struck for his
life and his wife, and his village beyond the blue hills
over the Tarachunda River. An hour the men worked,
and then the women cleared away the coal.

'It is farther than I thought,' said Janki. 'The air
is very bad; but strike, Kundoo, strike hard.'

For the fifth time Kundoo took up the pick as
the Sonthal crawled back. The song had scarcely
recommenced when it was broken by a yell from Kun-
doo that echoed down the gallery : ' Par hua ! Par
hua ! We are through, we are through ! ' The impris-
oned air in the mine shot through the opening, and
the women at the far end of the gallery heard the water
rush thi'ough the pillars of ' BuUia's Room ' and roar
against the ledge. Having fulfilled the law under
which it worked, it rose no farther. The women
screamed and pressed forward. ' The water has come —
we shall be killed ! Let us go.'

Kundoo crawled through the gap and found himself
in a propped gallery by the simple process of hitting
his head against a beam.

' Do I know the pits or do I not ? ' chuckled Janki.
' This is the Number Five ; go you out slowly, giv-
ing me your names. Ho ! Rahim, count your gang !
Now let us go forward, each catching hold of the other
as before.'

They formed a line in the darkness and Janki led

268 AT TWENTY-TWO

them — for a pit-man in a strange pit is only one
degree less liable to err than an ordinary mortal
underground for the first time. At last they saw a
flare-lamp, and Gangs Janki, Mogul, and Rahim of
Twenty-Two stumbled dazed into the glare of the
draught-furnace at the bottom of Five : Janki feeling
his way and the rest behind.

'Water has come into Twenty-Two. God knows
where are the others. I have brought these men from
Tibu's gallery in our cutting ; making connection
through the north side of the gallery. Take us to
the cage,' said Janki Meah.

At the pit-bank of Twenty-Two, some thousand
people clamoured and wept and shouted. One hun-
dred men — one thousand men — had been drowned in
the cutting. They would all go to their homes to-
morrow. Where were their men? Little Unda, her
cloth drenched with the rain, stood at the pit-mouth
calling down the shaft for Kundoo. They had swung
the cages clear of the mouth, and her only answer was
the murmur of the flood in the pit's eye two hundred
and sixty feet below.

- Look after that woman ! She'll chuck herself down
the shaft in a minute,' shouted the Manager.

But he need not have troubled ; Unda was afraid
of Death. She wanted Kundoo. The Assistant was
watching the flood and seeing how far he could wade
into it. There was a lull in the water, and the
whirlpool had slackened. The mine was full, and the
people at the pit-bank howled.

' My faith, we shall be lucky if we have five hundred
hands on the place to-morrow ! ' said the Manager.

AT TWENTY-TWO 269

' There's some chance yet of running a temporary dam
across that water. Shove in anything — tubs and bul-
lock-carts if you haven't enough bricks. Make them
work now if they never worked before. Hi ! you
gangers, make them work.'

Little by little the crowd was broken into detach-
ments, and pushed towards the water with promises of
overtime. The dam-making began, and when it was
fairly under way, the Manager thought that the hour
had come for the pumps. There was no fresh inrush
into the mine. The tall, red, iron-clamped pump-beam
rose and fell, and the pumps snored and guttered and
shrieked as the first water poured out of the pipe.

'We must run her all to-night,' said the Manager
wearily, ' but there's no hope for the poor devils down
below. Look here, Gur Sahai, if you are proud of your
engines, show me what they can do now.'

Gur Sahai grinned and nodded, with his right hand
upon the lever and an oil-can in his left. He could do
no more than he was doing, but he could keep that up
till the dawn. Were the Company's pumps to be beaten
by the vagaries of that troublesome Tarachunda River ?
Never, never ! And the pumps sobbed and panted :
' Never, never ! ' The Manager sat in the shelter of
the pit-bank roofing, trying to dry himself by the
pump-boiler fire, and, in the dreary dusk, he saw the
crowds on the dam scatter and fly

'That's the end,' he groaned. ''Twill take us six
weeks to persuade 'em that we haven't tried to drown
their mates on purpose. Oh, for a decent, rational
Geordie ! '

But the flight had no panic in it. Men had run over
from Five with astounding news, and the foremen could

270 AT TWENTY-TWO

not hold their gangs together. Presently, surrounded
by a clamorous crew, Gangs Rahim, Mogul, and Janki,
and ten basket-women, walked up to report themselves,
and pretty little Unda stole away to Janki's hut to pre-
pare his evening meal.

' Alone I found the way,' explained Janki Meah, ' and
now wUl the Company give me pension ? '

The simple pit-folk shouted and leaped and went
back to the dam, reassured in their old belief that,
whatever happened, so great was the power of the
Company whose salt they ate, none of them could be
killed. But Gur Sahai only bared his white teeth and
kept his hand upon the lever and proved his pumps to
the uttermost.

'I say,' said the Assistant to the Manager, a week
later, ' do you recollect G-erminal ? '

' Yes. 'Queer thing. I thought of it in the cage
when that balk went by. Why ? '

' Oh, this business seems to be Crerminal upside down.
Janki was in my veranda all this morning, telling me
that Kundoo had eloped with his wife — Unda or Anda,
I think her name was.'

' Hillo ! And those were the cattle that you risked
your life to clear out of Twenty-Two -' '

' No — I was thinking of the Company's props, not
the Company's men.'

'Sounds better to say so now; but I don't believe
you, old fellow.'

IN FLOOD TIME

Tweed said tae Till :

' What gars ye rin sae still ? '

Till said tae Tweed :

• Though ye rin wi' speed

An' I rin slaw —

Yet where ye droon ae man

I droon twa. '

There is no getting over the river to-night, Sahib.
They say that a buUock-eart has been washed down
alreadj^ and the ekka that went over a half hour before
you came, has not yet reached the far side. Is the
Sahib in haste? I will drive the ford-elephant in to
show him. Ohe, mahout there in the shed ! Bring out
Ram Pershad, and if he will face the current, good.
An elephant never lies, Sahib, and Ram Pershad is sepa-
rated from his friend Kala Nag. He, too, wishes to
cross to the far side. Well done ! Well done ! my
King ! Go half way across, mahoutji, and see what the
river says. Well done, Ram Pershad ! Pearl among
elephants, go into the river ! Hit him on the head,
fool ! Was the goad made only to scratch thy own fat
back -with, bastard? Strike! Strike! What are the
boulders to thee. Ram Pershad, my Rustum, my moun-
tain of strength ? Go in ! Go in !

No, Sahib ! It is useless. You can hear him trumpet.
He is telling Kala Nag that he cannot come over. See !
He has swung round and is shaking his head. He is

271

272 IN FLOOD TIME

no fool. He knows what the Barhwi means when it is
angry. Aha! Indeed, thou art no fool, my child!
Salaam, "Rsiva. Pershad, Bahadur! Take him under the
trees, mahout, and see that he gets his spices. Well
done, thou chiefest among tuskers. Salaam to the
Sirkar and go to sleep.

What is to be done ? The Sahib must wait till thje
river goes down. It will shrink to-morrow morning, if
God pleases, or the day after at the latest. Now why
does the Sahib get so angry? I am his servant. Before
God, / did not create this stream ! What can I do ?
My hut and all that is therein is at the service of the
Sahib, and it is beginning to rain. Come away, my
Lord. How will the river go down for your throwing
abuse at it? In the old days the English people were
not thus. The fire-carriage has made them soft. In
the old days, when they drave behind horses by day or
by night, they said naught if a river barred the way, or
a carriage sat down in the mud. It was the will of
God — not like a fire-carriage which goes and goes and
goes, and would go though all the devils in the land
hung on to its tail. The fire-carriage hath spoiled the
English people. After all, what is a day lost, or, for
that matter, what are two days ? Is the Sahib going to
his own wedding, that he is so mad with haste ? Ho !
Ho ! Ho ! I am an old man and see few Sahibs. For-
give me if I have forgotten the respect that is due to
them. The Sahib is not angry?

His own wedding ! Ho ! Ho ! Ho ! The mind of
an old man is like the numah-tree. Fruit, bud, blossom,
and the dead leaves of all the years of the past flourish
together. Old and new and that which is gone out of
remembrance, all three are there ! Sit on the bedstead,

m FLOOD TIME 273

Sahib, and drink milk. Or — would the Sahib in truth
care to drink my tobacco ? It is good. It is the tobacco
of Nuklao. My son, who is in service there, sent it to
me. Drink, then, Sahib, if you know how to handle
the tube. The Sahib takes it like a Musalman. Wah !
Wah ! Where did he learn that ? His own wedding !
Ho ! Ho ! Ho ! The Sahibs says that there is no wed-
ding in the matter at all? Now is it likely that the
Sahib would speak true talk to me who am only a black
man ? Small wonder, then, that he is in haste. Thirty
years have I beaten the gong at this ford, but never
have I seen a Sahib in such haste. Thirty years. Sahib !
That is a very long time. Thirty years ago this ford
was on the track of the Iwnjaras, and I have seen two
thousand pack-bullocks cross in one night. Now the
rail has come, and the fire-carriage says bus-buz-huz, and
a hundred lakhs of maunds slide across that big bridge.
It is very wonderful ; but the ford is lonely now that
there are no bunjaras to camp under the trees.

Nay, do not trouble to look at the sky without. It
will rain till the dawn. Listen ! The boulders are
talking to-night in the bed of the river. Hear them !
They would be husking your bones, Sahib, had you tried
to cross. See, I will shut the door and no rain can
enter. Wahi ! AM ! Ugh ! Thirty years on the banks
of the ford ! An old man am I and — where is the oil
for the lamp?

Tp ?f& 7|t 7^ Tf^ * ^ ^ t(&

Your pardon, but, because of my years, I Sleep no
sounder than a dog; and you moved to the door. Look
then. Sahib. Look and listen. A full half kos from
bank to bank is the stream now — you can see it under
the stars — and there are ten feet of water therein. It

274 IN FLOOD TIME

will not shrink because of the anger in your eyes, and
it will not be quiet on account of your curses. Which
is louder, Sahib — your voice or the voice of the river ?
Call to it — perhaps it will be ashamed. Lie down and
sleep afresh, Sahib. I know the anger of the Barhwi
when there has fallen rain in the foot-hills. I swam
the flood, once, on a night tenfold worse than this, and
by the Favour of God I was released from Death when
I had come to the very gates thereof.

May I tell the tale ? Very good talk. I will fill the
pipe anew.

Thirty years ago it was, when I was a young man and
had but newly come to the ford. I was strong then,
and the hunjaras had no doubt when I said ' this ford is
clear.' I have toiled all night up to my shoulder-blades
in running water amid a hundred bullocks mad with
fear, and have brought them across losing not a hoof.
A^lhen all was done I fetched the shivering men, and
they gave me for reward the pick of their cattle — the
bell-bullock of the drove. So great was the honour in
which I was held ! But, to-day when the rain falls and
the river rises, I creep into my hut and whimper like a
dog. My strength is gone from me. I am an old man
and the fire-carriage has made the ford desolate. They
were wont to call me the Strong One of the Barhwi.

Behold my face. Sahib — it is the face of a monkey.
And my arm — it is the arm of an old woman. I swear
to you. Sahib, that a woman has loved this face and has
rested in the hollow of this arm. Twenty years ago.
Sahib. Believe me, this was true talk — twenty years
ago.

Come to the door and look across. Can you see a
thin fire very far away down the stream ? That is the

m FLOOD TIME 275

temple-fire, in the shrine of Hanuman, of the village of
Pateera. North, under the big star, is the village itself,
but it is hidden by a bend of the river. Is that far
to swim. Sahib? Would you take off your clothes
and adventui'e? Yet I swam to Pateera — not once
but many times ; and there are muggers in the river
too.

Love knows no caste; else why should I, a Musal-
man and the son of a Musalman, have sought a Hindu
woman — a widow of the Hindus — the sister of the
headman of Pateera? But it was even so. They of
the headman's household came on a pilgrimage to Mut-
tra when She was but newly a bride. Silver tires were
upon the wheels of the bullock-cart, and silken curtains
hid the woman. Sahib, I made no haste in their con-
veyance, for the wind parted the curtains and I saw
Her. When they returned from pilgrimage the boy
that was Her husband had died, and I saw Her again
in the bullock-cart. By God, these Hindus are fools !
What was it to me whether She was Hindu or Jain —
scavenger, leper, or whole ? I would have married Her
and made Her a home by the ford. The Seventh of the
Nine Bars says that a man may not marry one of the
idolaters? Is that truth? Both Shiahs and Sunnis
say that a Musalman may not marry one of the idola-
ters? Is the Sahib a priest, then, that he knows so
much? I will tell him something that he does not
know. There is neither Shiah nor Sunni, forbidden
nor idolater, in Love ; and the Nine Bars are but nine
little fagots that the flame of Love utterly burns away.
In truth, I would have taken Her ; but what could I
do ? The headman would have sent his men to break
my head with staves. I am not — I was not — afraid

276 IN FLOOD TIME

of any five men ; but against half a village who can
prevail ?

Therefore it was my custom, these things having
been arranged between us twain, to go by night to the
village of Pateera, and there we met among the crops ;
no man knowing aught of the matter. Behold, now!
I was wont to cross here, skirting the jungle to the
river bend where the railway bridge is, and . thence
across the elbow of land to Pateera. The light of the
shrine was my guide when the nights were dark. That
jungle near the river is very full of snakes — little
haraits that sleep on the sand — and moreover. Her
brothers would have slain me had they found me in the
crops. But none knew — none knew save She and I;
and the blown sand of the river-bed covered the track
of my feet. In the hot months it was an easy thing to
pass from the ford, to Pateera, and in the first Rains,
when the river rose slowly, it was an easy thing also.
I set the strength of my body against the strength of
the stream, and nightly I ate in my hut here and drank
at Pateera yonder. She had said that one Hirnam
Singh, a thief, had sought Her, and he was of a village
up the river but on the same bank. All Sikhs are dogs,
and they have refused in their folly that %ood gift of
God — tobacco. I was ready to destroy Hirnam Singh
that ever he had come nigh Her ; and the more because
he had sworn to Her that She had a lover, and that he
would lie in wait and give the name to the headman
unless She went away with him. What curs are these
Sikhs !

After that news, I swam always with a little sharp
knife in my belt, and evil would it have been for a man
had he stayed me. I knew not ^q face of Hirnam

IN FLOOD TIME 277

Singh, but I would have killed any who came between
me and Her.

Upon a night in the beginning of the Rains, I was
minded to go across to Pateera, albeit the river was
angry. Now the nature of the Barhwi is this. Sahib.
In twenty breaths it comes down from the Hills, a wall
three feet high, and I have seen it, between the lighting
of a fire and the cooking of a ehupatty, grow from a
runnel to a sister of the Jumna.

When I left this bank there was a shoal a half mile
down, and I made shift to fetch it and draw breath
there ere going forward; for I felt the hands of the
river heavy upon my heels. Yet what will a young
man not do for Love's sake ? There was but little light
from the stars, and midway to the shoal a branch of the
stinking deodar tree brushed my mouth as I swam.
That was a sign of heavy rain in the foot-hills and
beyond, for the deodar is a strong tree, not easily shaken
from the hillsides. I made haste, the river aiding me,
but ere I had touched the shoal, the pulse of the stream
beat, as it were, within me and around, and, behold, the
shoal was gone and I rode high on the crest of a wave
that ran from bank to bank. Has the Sahib ever been
cast into much water that fights and will not let a man
use his limbs? To me, my head upon the water, it
seemed as though there were naught but water to the
world's end, and the river drave me with its driftwood.
A man is a very little thing in the belly of a flood.
And this flood, though I knew it not, was the Great
Flood about which men talk still. My liver was dis-
solved and I lay like a log upon my back in the fear
of Death. There were living things in the water, cry-
ing and howling grievously — beasts of the forest and

278 IN FLOOD TIME

cattle, and once the voice of a man asking for help.
But the rain came and lashed the water white, and I
heard no more save the roar of the boulders below and
the roar of the rain above. Thus I was whirled down-
stream, wrestling for the breath in me. It is very hard
to die when one is young. Can the Sahib, standing
here, see the railway bridge ? Look, there are the lights
of the mail-train going to Peshawur! The bridge is
now twenty feet above the river, but upon that night
the water was roaring against the lattice-work and
against the lattice came I feet first. But much drift-
wood was piled there and upon the piers, and I took no
great hurt. Only the river pressed me as a strong man
presses a weaker. Scarcely could I take hold of the
lattice-work and crawl to the upper boom. Sahib, the
water was foaming across the rails a foot deep ! Judge
therefore what manner of flood it must have been. I
could not hear. I could not see. I could but lie on the
boom and pant for breath.

After a while the rain ceased and there came out in
the sky certain new washed stars, and by their light I
saw that there was no end to the black water as far as
the eye could travel, and the water had risen upon the
rails. There were dead beasts in the driftwood on the
piers, and others caught by the neck in the lattice-work,
and others not yet drowned who strove to find a foot-
hold on the lattice-work — buffaloes and kine, and wild
pig, and deer one or two, and snakes and jackals past
all counting. Their bodies were black upon the left
side of the bridge, but the smaller of them were forced
through the lattice-work and whirled down-stream.

Thereafter the stars died and the rain came down
afresh and the river rose yet more, and I felt the bridge

IN FLOOD TIME 279

begin to stir under me as a man stirs in his sleep ere he
wakes. But I was not afraid, Sahib. I swear to you
that I was not afraid, though I had no power in my
limbs. I knew that I should not die till I had seen Her
once more. But I was very cold, and I felt that the
bridge must go.

There was a trembling in the water, such a trembling
as goes before the coming of a great wave, and the
bridge lifted its flank to the rush of that coming so that
the right lattice dipped under water and the left rose
clear. On my beard. Sahib, I am speaking God's truth !
As a Mirzapore stone-boat careens to the wind, so the
Barhwi Bridge turned. Thus and in no other manner.

I slid from the boom into deep water, and behind me
came the wave of the wrath of the river. I heard its
voice and the scream of the middle part of the bridge as
it moved from the piers and sank, and I knew no more
till I rose in the middle of the great flood. I put forth
my hand to swim, and lo ! it fell upon the knotted hair
of the head of a man. He was dead, for no one but I,
the Strong One of Barhwi, could have lived in that race.
He had been dead full two days, for he rode high,
wallowing, and was an aid to me. I laughed then,
knowing for a surety that I should yet see Her and
take no harm ; and I twisted my fingers in the hair of
the man, for I was far spent, and together we went
down the stream — he the dead and I the living. Lack-
ing that help I should have sunk : the cold was in my
marrow, and my flesh was ribbed and sodden on my
bones. But he had no fear who had known the utter-
most of the power of the river ; and I let him go where
he chose. At last we came into the power of a side-
current that set to the right bank, and I strove with my

280 IN FLOOD TIME

feet to draw with it. But the dead man swung heavily
in the whirl, and I feared that some branch had struck
him and that he would sink. The tops of the tamarisk
brushed my knees, so I knew we were come into flood-
water above the crops, and, after, I let down my legs
and felt bottom — the ridge of a field — and, after, the
dead man stayed upon a knoll under a fig-tree, and I
drew my body from the water rejoicing.

Does the Sahib know whither the backwash of the
flood had borne me ? To the knoll which is the eastern
boundary-mark of the village of Pateera ! No other
place. I drew the dead man up on the grass for the
service that he had done me, and also because I knew
not whether I should need him again. Then I went,
crying thrice like a jackal, to the appointed place which
was near the byre of the headman's house. But my
Love was already there, weeping. She feared that the
flood had swept my hut at the Barhwi Ford. When I
came softly through the ankle-deep water, She thought
it was a ghost and would have fled, but I put my arms
round Her, and — I was no' ghost in those days, though
I am an old man now. Ho ! Ho ! Dried corn, in
truth. Maize without juice. Ho ! Ho ! ^

I told Her the story of the breaking of the Barhwi
Bridge, and She said that I was greater than mortal
man, for none may cross the Barhwi in full flood, and
I had seen what never man had seen before. Hand in
hand we went to the knoll where the dead lay, and I
showed Her by what help I had made the ford. She
looked also upon the body under the stars, for the latter
end of the night was clear, and hid Her face in Her

' I grieve to say that the Warden of Barhwi Ford is responsible here
for two very had puns in the vernacular. — S. K.

IN FLOOD TIME 281

hands, crying : ' It is the body of Himam Singh ! ' I
said : ' The swine is of more use dead than living, my
Beloved,' and She said : ' Surely, for he has saved the
dearest life in the world to my love. None the less, he
cannot stay here, for that would bring shame upon me.'
The body was not a gunshot from Her door.

Then said I, rolling the body with my hands : ' God
hath judged between us, Hirnam Singh, that thy blood
might not be upon my head. Now, whether I have
done thee a wrong in keeping thee from the burning-
ghat, do thou and the crows settle together.' So I cast
him adrift into the flood-water, and he was drawn out
to the open, ever wagging his thick black beard like a
priest under the pulpit-board. And I saw no more of
Hirnam Singh.

Before the breaking of the day we two parted, and
I moved towards such of the jungle as was not flooded.
With the full light I saw what I had done in the dark-
ness, and the bones of my body were loosened in my
flesh, for there ran two koB of raging water between
the village of Pateera and the trees of the far bank,
and, in the middle, the piers of the Barhwi Bridge
showed like broken teeth in the jaw of an old man.
Nor was there any life upon the waters — neither birds
nor boats, but only an army of drowned things — bul-
locks and horses and men — and the river was redder
than blood from the clay of the foot-hills. Never had I
seen such a flood — never since that year have I seen
the like — and, O Sahib, no man living had done what
I had done. There was no return for me that day.
Not for all the lands of the headman would I venture a
second time without the shield of darkness that cloaks
danger. I went a kos up the river to the house of a

282 IN FLOOD TIME

blacksmith, saying that the flood had swept me from my
hut, and they gave me food. Seven days I stayed with
the blacksmith, till a boat came and I returned to my
house. There was no trace of wall, or roof, or floor —
naught but a patch of slimy mud. Judge, therefore,
Sahib, how far the river must have risen.

It was written that I should not die either in my
house, or in the heart of the Barhwi, or under the
wreck of the Barhwi Bridge, for God sent down Hirnam
Singh two days dead, though I know not how the man
died, to be my buoy and support. Hirnam Singh has
been in Hell these twenty years, and the thought of
that night must be the flower of his torment.

Listen, Sahib ! The river has changed its voice. It
is going to sleep before the dawn, to which there is yet
one hour. With the light it will come down afresh.
How do I know ? Have I been here thirty years with-
out knowing the voice of the river as a father knows
the voice of his son ? Every moment it is talking less
angrily. I swear that there will be no danger for one
hour or, perhaps, two. I cannot answer for the morn-
ing. Be quick, Sahib ! I will call Ram Pershad, and
he will not turn back this time. Is the paulin tightly
corded upon all the baggage ? Ohe, mahout with a mud
head, the elephant for the Sahib, and tell them on the
far side that there will be no crossing after daylight.

Money ? Nay, Sahib. I am not of that kind. No,
not even to give sweetmeats to the baby-folk. ' My
house, look you, is empty, and I am an old man.

Dutt, Ram Pershad! Butt! Dutt! Dutt! Good
luck go with you. Sahib.

THE SENDING OF DANA DA

When the Devil rides on yovir chest remember the chamar. —
Native Proverb.

Once upon a time, some people in India made a new
Heaven and a new Earth out of broken tea-cups, a miss-
ing brooch or two, and a hair-brush. These were hidden
under bushes, or stuffed into holes in the hillside, and
an entire Civil Service of subordinate Gods used to find
or mend them again ; and every one said : ' There are
more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in
our philosophy.' Several other things happened also,
but the Religion never seemed to get much beyond its
first manifestations ; though it added an air-line postal
service, and orchestral effects in order to keep abreast
of the times, and choke off competition.

This Religion was too elastic for ordinary use. It
stretched itself and embraced pieces of everything that
the medicine-men of all ages have manufactured. It
approved of and stole from Freemasonry; looted the
Latter-day Rosicrucians of half their pet words ; took
any fragments of Egyptian philosophy that it found in
the Encycloposdia Britannica ; annexed as many of the
Vedas as had been translated into French or English,
and talked of all the rest; built in the German versions
of what is left of the Zend Avesta ; encouraged White,
Gray and Black Magic, including spiritualism, pal-
mistry, fortune-telling by cards, hot chestnuts, double-

283

284 THE SENDING OF DANA DA

kernelled nuts and tallow droppings; would have
adopted Voodoo and Oboe had it known anything
about them, and showed itself, in every way, one of the
most accommodating arrangements that had ever been
invented since the birth of the Sea.

When it was in thorough working order, with all the
machinery, down to the subscriptions, complete, Dana
Da came from nowhere, with nothing in his hands, and
wrote a chapter in its history which has hitherto been
unpublished. He said that his first name was Dana,
and his second was Da. Now, setting aside Dana of
the New York Sun, Dana is a Bhil name, and Da fits no
native of India unless you except the Bengali D6 as the
original spelling. Da is Lap or Finnish ; and Dana Da
was neither Finn, Chin, Bhil, Bengali, Lap, Nair, Gond,
Romaney, Magh, Bokhariot, Kurd, Armenian, Levantine,
Jew, Persian, Punjabi, Madrasi, Parsee, nor anything
else known to ethnologists. He was simply Dana Da,
and declined to give further information. For the sake
of brevity and as roughly indicating his origin, he was
called ' The Native.' He might have been the original
Old Man of the Mountains, who is said to be the only
authorised head of the Tea-cup Creed. Some people
said that he was ; but Dana Da used to smile and deny
any connection with the cult; explaining that he was
an 'Independent Experimenter.'

As I have said, he came from nowhere, with his hands
behind his back, and studied the Creed for three weeks ;
sitting at the feet of those best competent to explain its
mysteries. Then he laughed aloud and went away, but
the laugh might have been either of devotion or
derision.

When he returned he was without money, but his

THE SENDING OF DANA DA 285

pride was unabated. He declared that he knew more
about the Things in Heaven and Earth than those who
taught him, and for this contumacy was abandoned
altogether.

His next appearance in public life was at a big canton-
ment in Upper India, and he was then telling fortunes
with the help of three leaden dice, a very dirty old
cloth, and a little tin box of opium piUs. He told
better fortunes when he was allowed half a bottle of
whiskey, but the things which he invented on the
opium were quite worth the money. He was in reduced
circumstances. Among other people's he told the fort-
une of an Englishman who had once been interested
in the Simla Creed, but who, later on, had married
and forgotten all his old knowledge in the study of
babies and things. The Englishman allowed Dana Da
to tell a fortune for charity's sake, and gave him five
rupees, a dinner, and some old clothes. When he had
eaten, Dana Da professed gratitude, and asked if there
were anything he could do for his host — in the esoteric
line.

' Is there any one that you love ? ' said Dana Da.
The Englishman loved his wife, but had no desire to
drag her name into the conversation. He therefore
shook his head.

' Is there any one that you hate ? ' said Dana Da.
The Englishman said that there were several men
whom he hated deeply.

' Very good,' said Dana Da, upon whom the whiskey
and the opium were beginning to tell. ' Only give me
their names, and I will despatch a Sending to them
and kiU them.'

Now a Sending is a horrible arrangement, first in-

286 THE SENDING OF DANA DA

vented, they say, in Iceland. It is a Thing sent by a
wizard, and may take any form, but, most generally,
wanders about the land in the shape of a little purple
cloud till it finds the Sendee, and him it kills by chang-
ing into the form of a horse, or a cat, or a man without
a face. It is not strictly a native ■ patent, though cha-
mars of the skin and hide castes can, if irritated, de-
spatch a Sending which sits on the breast of their
enemy by night and nearly kills him. Very few natives
care to irritate chamars for this reason.

' Let me despatch a Sending,' said Dana Da ; ' I am
nearly dead now with want, and drink, and opium;
but I should like to kHl a man before I die. I can
send a Sending anywhere you choose, and in any fonn
except in the shape of a man.'

The Englishman had no friends that he wished to
kill, but partly to soothe Dana Da, whose eyes were
rolling, and partly to see what would be done, he asked
whether a modified Sending could not be arranged for
— such a Sending as should make a man's life a burden
to him, and yet do him no harm. If this were possible,
he notified his willingness to give Dana Da ten rupees
for the job.

' I am not what I was once,' said Dana Da, ' and I
must take the money because I am poor. To what
Englishman shall I send it ? '

' Send a Sending to Lone Sahib,' said the Englishman,
naming a man who had been most bitter in rebuking
him for his apostasy from the Tea-cup Creed. Dana
Da laughed and nodded.

' I could have chosen no better man myself,' said he.
' I will see that he finds the Sending about his path
and about his bed.'

THE SENDING OF DANA DA 287

He lay down on the hearth-rug, turned up the whites
of his eyes, shivered all over and began to snort. This
was Magic, or Opium, or the Sending, or all three.
When he opened his eyes he vowed that the Send-
ing had started upon the war-path, and was at that
moment flying up to the town where Lone Sahib
lives.

' Give me my ten rupees,' said Dana Da wearily,
' and write a letter to Lone Sahib, telling him, and all
who believe with him, that you and a friend are using
a power greater than theirs. They will see that you
are speaking the truth.'

He departed unsteadily, with the promise of some
more rupees if anything came of the Sending.

The Englishman sent a letter to Lone Sahib, couched
in what he remembered of the terminology of the
Creed. He wrote : ' I also, in the days of what you held
to be my backsliding, have obtained Enlightenment, and
with Enlightenment has come Power.' Then he grew
so deeply mysterious that the recipient of the letter
could make neither head nor tail of it, and was propor-
tionately impressed ; for he fancied that his friend had
become a 'fifth-rounder.' When a man is a 'fifth-
rounder' he can do more than Slade and Houdin
combined.

Lone Sahib read the letter in five different fashions,
and was beginning a sixth interpretation when his
bearer dashed in with the news that there was a cat on
the bed. Now if there was one thing that Lone Sahib
hated more than another, it was a cat. He scolded the
bearer for not turning it out of the house. The bearer
said that he was afraid. All the doors of the bedroom
had been shut throughout the morning, and no real cat

288 THE SENDING OF DANA DA

could possibly haye entered the room. He would pre-
fer not to meddle with the creature.

Lone Sahib entered the room gingerly, and there, on
the pillow of his bed, sprawled and whimpered a wee
white kitten; not a jumpsome, frisky little beast, but a
slug-like crawler with its eyes barely opened and its
paws lacking strength or direction — a kitten that ought
to have been in a basket with its mamma. Lone Sahib
caught it by the scrufE of its neck, handed it over to the
sweeper to be drowned, and fined the bearer four annas.

That evening, as he was reading in his room, he
fancied that he saw something moving about on the
hearth-rug, outside the circle of light from his reading-
lamp. When the thing began to myowl. Be realised
that it was a kitten — a wee white kitten, nearly blind
and very miserable. He was seriously angry, and
spoke bitterly to his bearer, who said that there was
no kitten in the room when he brought in the lamp,
and real kittens of tender age generally had mother-
cats in attendance.

, ' If the Presence will go out into the veranda and
listen,' said the bearer, 'he will hear no cats. How,
therefore, can the kitten on the bed and the kitten on
the hearth-rug be real kittens ? '

Lone Sahib went out to listen, and the bearer followed
him, but there was no sound of any one mewing for her
children. He returned to his room, having hurled the
kitten down the hillside, and wrote out th^jncidents
of the day for the benefit of his co-religionists. Those
people were so absolutely free from superstition that
they ascribed, anything a little out of the common
to Agencies. As it was their business to know all about
the Agencies, they were on terms of almost indecent

THE SENDraG OP DANA DA 289

familiarity with Manifestations of every kind. Their
letters dropped from the ceiling — unstamped — and
Spirits used to squatter up and down their staircases
all night ; but they had never come into contact with
kittens. Lone Sahib wrote out the facts, noting the
hour and the minute, as every Psychical Observer is
bound to do, and appending the Englishman's letter
because it was the most mysterious document and might
have had a bearing upon anything in this world or the
next. An outsider would have translated all the tangle
thus : ' Look out ! You laughed at me once, and now
I am going to make you sit up.'

Lone Sahib's co-religionists found that meaning in it ;
but their translation was refined and full of four-syllable
words. They held a sederunt, and were filled with
tremulous joy, for, in spite of their familiarity with all.
the other worlds and cycles, they had a very human
awe of things sent from Ghost-land. They met in Lone
Sahib's room in shrouded and sepulchral gloom, and
their conclave was broken up by a clinking among the
photo-frames on the mantelpiece. A wee white kitten,
nearly blind, was looping and writhing itself between
the clock and the candlesticks. That stopped all
investigations or doubtings. Here was the Manifesta-
tion in the flesh. It was, so far as could be seen, devoid
of purpose, but it was a Manifestation of undoubted
authenticity.

They drafted a Round Robin to the Englishman, the
backslider of old days, adjuring him in the interests of
the Creed to explain whether there was any connection
between the embodiment of some Egyptian God or other
[I have forgotten the name] and his communication.
They called the kitten Ra, or Toth, or Tum, or some-

290 THE SENDING OF DANA DA

thing; and when Lone Sahib confessed that the first
one had, at his most misguided instance, been drowned
by the sweeper, they said consolingly that in his next
life he would be a 'bounder,' and not even a 'rounder'
of the lowest grade. These words may not be quite
correct, but they accurately express the sense of the
house.

When the Englishman received the Round Robin —
it came by post — he was startled and bewildered. He
sent into tJie bazar for Dana Da, who read the letter
and laughed. ' That is my Sending,' said he. ' I told
you I would work well. Now give me another ten
rupees.'

' But what in the world is this gibberish about Egyp-
tian Gods ? ' asked the Englishman.

' Cats,' said Dana Da with a hiccough, for he had dis-
covered the Englishman's whiskey bottle. 'Cats, and
cats, and cats ! Never was such a Sending. A hundred
of cats. Now give me ten more rupees and write as I
dictate.'

Dana Da's letter was a curiosity. It bore the English-
man's signature, and hinted at cats — at a Sending of
Cats. The mere words on paper were creepy and
uncanny to behold.

'What have you done, though?' said the English-
man; 'I am as much in the dark as ever. Do you mean
to say that you can actually send this absurd Sending
you talk about ? '

' Judge for yourself,' said Dana Da. ' What does that
letter mean ? In a little time they will all be at my feet
and yours, and I — O Glory ! — will be drugged or
drunk all day long.'

Dana Da knew his people.

THE SENDING OF DANA DA 291

When a man who hates cats wakes up in the morn-
ing and finds a little squirming kitten on his breast, or
puts his hand into his ulster-pocket and finds a little
half-dead kitten where his gloves should be, or opens
his trunk and finds a vile kitten among his dress-shirts,
or goes for a long ride with his mackintosh strapped on
his saddle-bow and shakes a little squawling kitten from
its folds when he opens it, or goes out to dinner and
finds a little blind kitten under his chair, oiT stays at
home and finds a writhing kitten under the quilt, or
wriggling among his boots, or hanging, head down-
wards, in his tobacco-jar, or being mangled by his terrier
in the veranda, — when such a man finds one kitten,
neither more nor less, once a day in a place where no
kitten rightly could or should be, he is naturally upset.
When he dare not murder his daily trove because he
believes it to be a Manifestation, an Emissary, an Embod-
iment, and half a dozen other things all out of the reg-
ular course of nature, he is more than upset. He is
actually distressed. Some of Lone "Sahib's co-religion-
ists thought that he was a highly favoured individual ;
but many said that if he had treated the first kitten
with proper respect — as suited a Toth-Ra-Tum-Sen-
nacherib Embodiment — all this trouble would have been
averted. They compared him to the Ancient Mariner,
but none the less they were proud of him and proud of
the Englishman who had sent the Manifestation. They
did not call it a Sending because Icelandic magic was
not in their programme.

After sixteen kittens, that is to say after one fort-
night, for there were three kittens on the first day to
impress the fact of the Sending, the whole camp was
uplifted by a letter — it came flying through a window

292 THE SENDING OF DANA DA

— from the Old Man of the Mountains — the Head of
all the Creed — explaining the Manifestation in the
most beautiful language and soaking up all the credit of
it for himself. The Englishman, said the letter, was
not there at all. He was a backslider without Power
or Asceticism, who couldn't even raise a table by force
of volition, much less project an army of kittens through
space. The entire arrangement, said the letter, was
strictly orthodox, worked and sanctioned by the highest
Authorities within- the pale of the Creed. There was
great joy at this, for some of the weaker brethren seeing
that an outsider who had been working on independent
lines could create kittens, whereas their own rulers had
never gone beyond crockery — and broken at best —
were showing a desire to break line on their own trail.
In fact, there was the promise of a schism. A second
Round Robin was drafted to the Englishman, beginning:
' Scoffer,' and ending with a selection of curses from
the Rites of Mizraim and Memphis and the Commina-
tion of Jugana, who was a 'fifth-rounder,' upon whose
name an upstart ' third-rounder ' once traded. A papal
excommunication is a billet-doux compared to the Com-
mination of Jugana. The Englishman had been proved,
under the hand and seal of the Old Man of the Moun-
tains, to have appropriated Virtue and pretended to
have Power which, in reality, belonged only to the
Supreme Head. Naturally the Round Robin did not
spare him.

He handed the letter to Dana Da to translate into
decent English. The effect on Dana Da was curious.
At first he was furiously angry, and then he laughed
for five minutes.

' I had thought,' he said, ' that they would have come

THE SENDING OF DANA DA 293

to me. In another week I would have shown that I
sent the Sending, and they would have discrowned the
Old Man of the Mountains who has sent this Sending
of mine. Do you do nothing. The time has come for
me to act. Write as I dictate, and I will put them to
shame. But give me ten more rupees.'

At Dana Da's dictation the Englishman wrote noth-
ing less than a formal challenge to the Old Man of the
Mountains. It wound up : ' And if this Manifestation
be from your hand, then let it go forward ; but if it be
from my hand, I will that the Sending shall cease in
two days' time. On that day there shall be twelve kit-
tens and thenceforward none at all. The people shall
judge between us.' This was signed by Dana Da, who
added pentacles and pentagrams, and a crux ansata, and
half a dozen swastikas, and a Triple Tau to his name,
just to show that he was all he laid claim to be.

The challenge was read out to the gentlemen and
ladies, and they remembered then that Dana Da had
laughed at them some years ago. It was officially an-
nounced that the Old Man of the Mountains would
treat the matter with contempt; Dana Da being an
Independent Investigator without a single 'round' at
the back of him. But this did not soothe his people.
They wanted to see a fight. They were very human
for all their spirituality. Lone Sahib, who was really
being worn out with kittens, submitted meekly to his
fate. He felt that he was being ' kittened to prove the
power of Dana Da,' as the poet says.

When the stated day dawned, the shower of kittens
began. Some were white and some were tabby, and all
were about the same loathsome age. Three were on his
hearth-rug, three in his bath-room, and the other six

294 THE SENDING OP DANA DA

turned up at intervals among the visitors wio came to
see the prophecy break down. Never was a more satis-
factory Sending. On the next day there were no kit-
tens, and the next day and all the other days were
kittenless and quiet. The people murmured and looked
to the Old Man of the Mountains for an explanation.
A letter, written on a palm-leaf, dropped from the ceil-
ing, but every one except Lone Sahib felt that letters
were not what the occasion demanded. There should
have been cats, there should have been cats, — full-
grown ones. The letter proved conclusively that there
had been a hitch in the Psychic Current vrhich, collid-
ing with a Dual Identity, had interfered with the Per-
cipient Activity all along the main line. The kittens
were still going on, but owing to some failure in the
Developing Fluid, they were not materialised. The air
was thick with letters for a few days afterwards. Un-
seen hands played Gliick and Beethoven on finger-bowls
and clock-shades; but all men felt that Psychic Life
was a mockery without materialised Kittens. Even
Lone Sahib shouted with the majority on this head.
Dana Da's letters were very insulting, and if he had
then offered to lead a new departure, there is no know-
ing what might not have happened.

But Dana Da was dying of whiskey and opium in
the Englishman's godown, and had small heart for
honours.

' They have been put to shame,' said he. ' Never was
such a Sending. It has killed me.'

' Nonsense,' said the Englishman, ' you are going to
die, Dana Da, and that sort of stuff must be left behind.
I'll admit that you have made some queer things come
about. Tell me honestly, now, how was it done ? '

THE SENDING OF DANA DA 295

'Give me ten more rupees,' said Dana Da faintly,
' and if I die before I spend them, bury them with me.'
The silver was counted out while Dana Da was fight-
ing with Death. His hand closed upon the money and
he smiled a grim smile.

' Bend low,' he whispered. The Englishman bent.

'■Bunnia — Mission-school — expelled — box -wallah
(peddler) — Ceylon pearl-merchant — all mine Eng-
lish education — out-casted, and made up name Dana
Da — England with American thought-reading man and
— and — you gave me ten rupees several times — I
gave the Sahib's bearer two-eight a month for cats —
little, little cats. I wrote, and he put them about —
very clever man. Very few kittens now in the bazar.
Ask Lone Sahib's sweeper's wife.'

So saying, Dana Da gasped and passed away into a
land where, if all be true, there are no materialisations
and the making of new creeds is discouraged.

But consider the gorgeous simplicity of it all!

ON THE CITY WALL

Then she let them down by a cord through the window ; for her
house was upon the town-wall, and she dwelt upon the wall. — Joshua
ii. 15.

Laltjn is a member of the most ancient profession in
the world. Lilith was her very-great-grandmamma,
and that was before the days of Eve as every one
knows. In the West, people say rude things about
Laliin's profession, and write lectures about it, and
distribute the lectures to young persons in order that
Morality may be preserved. In the East where the
profession is hereditary, descending from mother to
daughter, nobody writes lectures or takes any notice ;
and that is a distinct proof of the inability of the East
to manage its own affairs.

Lalun's real husband, for even ladies of Lalun's
profession in the East must have husbands, was a big
jujube-tree. Her Mamitia, who had married a fig-tree,
spent ten thousand rupees on Lalun's wedding, which
was blessed by forty-seven clergyman of Mamma's
church, and distributed five thousand rupees in charity
to the poor. And that was the custom of the land.
The advantages of haviag a jujube-tree for a husband
are obvious. You cannot hurt his feelings, and he
looks imposing.

Lalun's husband stood on the plain outside the City
walls, and Lalun's house was upon the east wall facing

296

ON THE CITY WALL 297

the river. If you fell from the broad window-seat you
dropped thirty feet sheer Lato the City Ditch. But if
you stayed where you should and looked forth, you
saw all the cattle of the City being driven down to
water, the students of the Government College play-
ing cricket, the high grass and trees that fringed the
river-bank, the great sand bars that ribbed the river,
the red tombs of dead Emperors beyond the river,
and very far away through the blue heat-haze, a glint
of the snows of the Himalayas.

Wall Dad used to lie in the window-seat for hours
at a time watching this view. He was a young
Muhammadan who was suffering acutely from educa-
tion of the English variety and knew it. His father
had sent him to a Mission- school to get wisdom; and
Wali Dad had absorbed more than ever his father or
the Missionaries intended he should. When his father
died, Wali Dad was independent and spent two years
experimenting with the creeds of the Earth and reading
books that are of no use to anybody.

After he had made an unsuccessful attempt to enter
the Roman Catholic Church and the Presbyterian fold
at the same time (the Missionaries found him out and
called him names, but they did not understand his
trouble), he discovered Lalun on the City wall and
became the most constant of her few admirers. He
possessed a head that English artists at home would
rave over and paint amid impossible surroundings —
a face that female novelists would use with delight
througli nine hundred pages. In reality he was only
a clean-bred young Muhammadan, with pencilled eye-
brows, small-cut nostrils, little feet atnd hands, and a
very tired look in his eyes. By virtue of his twenty-

298 ON THE CITY WALL

two years he had grown a neat black beard which he
stroked with pride and kept delicately scented. His
life seemed to be divided between borrowing books
from me and making love to Lalun in the window-
seat. He composed songs about her, and some of the
songs are sung to this day in the City from the Street
of the Mutton-Butchers to the Copper-Smiths' ward.

One song, the prettiest of all, says that the beauty
of Lalun was so great that it troubled the hearts of
the British Government and caused them to lose their
peace of mind. That is the way the song is sung in
the streets ; but, if you examine it carefully and know
the key to the explanation, you will find that there are
three puns in it — on 'beauty,' 'heart,' and 'peace of
mind,' — so that it runs : ' By the subtlety of Lalun
the administration of the Government was troubled
and it lost such and such a man.' When Wall Dad
sings that song his eyes glow like hot coals, and Lalun
leans back among the cushions and throws bunches of
jasmine-buds at Wall Dad.

But first it is necessary to explain something about
the Supreme Government which is above aU and below
all and behind all. Gentlemen come from England,
spend a few weeks in India, walk round this great
Sphinx of the Plains, and write books upon its ways
and its works, denouncing or praising it as their own
ignorance prompts. Consequently all the world knows
how the Supreme Government conducts itself. But
no one, not even the Supreme Government, knows
everything about the administration of the Empire.
Year by year England sends out fresh drafts for the first
fighting-line, which is officially called the Indian Civil
Service. These die, or kill themselves by overwork, or

ON THE CITY WALL 299

are worried to death or broken in health and hope in
order that the land may be protected from death and
sickness, famine and war, and may eventually become
capable of standing alone. It will never stand alone,
but the idea is a pretty one, and men are willing to die
for it, and yearly the work of pushing and coaxing and
scolding and petting the country into good living goes
forward. If an advance be made all credit is given to
the native, while the Englishmen stand back and wipe
their foreheads. If a failure occurs the Englishmen
step forward and take the blame. Overmuch tender-
ness of this kind has bred a strong belief among many
natives that the native is capable of administering the
country, and many devout Englishmen believe this also,
because the theory is stated in beautiful English with
all the latest political colour.

There be other men who, though uneducated, see
visions and dream dreams, and they, too, hope to ad-
minister the country in their own way — that is to say,
with a garnish of Red Sauce. Such men must exist
among two hundred million people, and, if they are not
attended to, may cause trouble and even break the great
idol called Pax Britannic, which, as the newspapers say,
lives between Peshawur and Cape Comorin. Were the
Day of Doom to dawn to-morrow, you would find the
Supreme Government ' taking measures to allay popular
excitement' and putting guards upon the graveyards
that the Dead might troop forth orderly. The young-
est Civilian would arrest Gabriel on his own responsi-
bility if the Archangel could not produce a Deputy
Commissioner's permission to 'make music or other
noises" as the license says.

Whence it is easy to see that mere men of the flesh

300 ON THE CITY WALL

who would create a tumult must fare badly at the hands
of the Supreme Government. And they do. There
is no outward sign of excitement ; there is no confu-
sion ; there is no knowledge. When due and sufficient
reasons have been given, weighed and approved, the
machinery moves forward, and the dreamer of dreams
and the seer of visions is gone from his friends and
following. He enjoys the hospitality of Government ;
there is no restriction upon his movements within cer-
tain limits ; but he must not confer any more with his
brother dreamers. Once in every six months the
Supreme Government assures itself that he is well
and takes formal acknowledgment of his existence.
No one protests against his detention, because the few
people who know about it are in deadly fear of seem-
ing to know him ; and never a single newspaper ' takes
up his case ' or organises demonstrations on his behaK,
because the newspapers of India have got behind that
lying proverb which says the Pen is mightier than the
Sword, and can walk delicately.

So now you know as much as you ought about
Wall Dad, the educational mixture, and the Supreme
Government.

Lalun has not yet been described. She would need,
so Wall Dad says, a thousand pens of gold and ink
scented with musk. She has been variously compared
to the Moon, the Dil Sagar Lake, a spotted quail, a
gazelle, the Sun on the Desert of Kutch, the Dawn, the
Stars, and the young bamboo. These comparisons imply
that she is beautiful exceedingly according to the native
standards, which are practically the same as tiiose of the
West. Her eyes are black and her hair is black, and
her eyebrows are black as leeches ; her mouth is tiny

ON THE CITY WALL 301

and says witty things , her hands are tiny and have
saved much money ; her feet are tiny and have trodden
on the naked hearts of many men. But, as Wali Dad
sings : ' Lalun i» Lalun, and when you have said that,
you have only come to the Beginnings of Knowledge.'

The little house on the City wall was just big enough
to hold Lalun, and her maid, and a pussy-cat with a sil-
ver collar. A big pink and blue cut-glass chandelier
hung from the ceiling of the reception room. A petty
Nawab had given Lalun the horror, and she kept it for
politeness' sake. The floor of the room was of polished
chunam, white as curds. A latticed window of carved
wood was set in one wall ; there was a profusion of
squabby pluffy cushions and fat carpets every-where,
and Lalun's silver huqa, studded with turquoises, had a
special little carpet all to its shining self. Wali Dad
was nearly as permanent a fixture as the chandelier.
As I have said, he lay in the window-seat and meditated
on Life and Death and Lalun — specially Lalun. The
feet of the young men of the City tended to her door-
ways and then — retired, for Lalun was a particular
maiden, slow of speech, reserved of mind, and not in the
least inclined to orgies which were nearly certain to end
in strife. ' If I am of no value, I am unworthy of this
honour,' said Lalun. ' If I am of value, they are un-
worthy of Me.' And that was a crooked sentence.

In the long hot nights of latter April and May all
the City seemed to assemble in Lalun's little white room
to smoke and to talk. Shiahs of the grimmest and
most uncompromising persuasion; Sufis who had lost
all belief in the Prophet and retained but little in God ;
wandering Hindu priests passing southward on their
way to the Central India fairs and other affairs ; Pun-

302 ON THE CITY WALL

dits in black gowns, witli spectacles on their noses and
undigested wisdom in their insides ; bearded, headmen
of the wards ; Sikhs with all the details of the latest
ecclesiastical scandal in the Golden Temple ; red-eyed
priests from beyond the Border, looking like trapped
wolves and talking like ravens; M.A.'s of the Uni-
versity, very superior and very voluble — all these peo-
ple and more also you might find in the white room.
Wall Dad lay in the window-seat and listened to the
talk.

' It is Lalun's salon,^ said Wall Dad to me, ' and it
is electic — is not that the word? Outside of a Free-
mason's Lodge I have never seen such gatherings.
There I dined once with a Jew — a Yahoudi ! ' He
spat into the City Ditch with apologies for allowing
national feelings to overcome him. ' Though I have
lost every belief in the world,' said he, ' and try to be
proud of my losing, I cannot help hating a Jew. Lalun
admits no Jews here.'

' But what in the world do all these men do ?' I asked.

'The curse of our country,' said Wall Dad. 'They
talk. It is like the Athenians — always hearing and
telling some new thing. Ask the Pearl and she will
show you how much she knows of the news of the City
and the Province. Lalun knows everything.'

'Lalun,' I said at random — she was talking to a
gentleman of the Kurd persuasion who had come in
from God-knows-where — ' when does the 175th Regi-
ment go to Agra? '

' It does not go at all,' said Lalun, without turning
her head. ' They have ordered the 118th to go in its
stead. That Regiment goes to Lucknow in three
months, unless they give a fresh order.'

ON THE CITY WALL 303

'That is so,' said Wali Dad without a shade of
doubt. ' Can you, with your telegrams and your news-
papers, do better? Always hearing and telling some
new thing,' he went on. 'My friend, has your God
ever smitten a European nation for gossiping in the
bazars ? India has gossiped for centuries — always
standing in the bazars until the soldiers go by. There-
fore — you are here to-day instead of starving in your
own country, and I am not a Muhammadan — I am a
Product — a Demnition Product. That also I owe to
you and yours : that I cannot make an end to my sen-
tence without quoting from your authors.' He pulled
at the Jiuqa and mourned, half feelingly, half in earnest,
for the shattered hopes of his youth. Wali Dad was
always mourning over something or other — the coun-
try of which he despaired, or the creed in which he
had lost faith, or the life of the English which he could
by no means understand.

Lalun never mourned. She played little songs on
the sitar, and to hear her sing, ' Peacock, cry again,'
was always a fresh pleasure. She knew all the songs
that have ever been sung, from the war-songs of the
South that make the old men angry with the young
men and the young men angry with the State, to the
love-songs of the North where the swords whinny-
whicker like angry kites in the pauses between the
kisses, and the Passes fill with armed men, and the
Lover is torn from his Beloved and cries, Ai, Ai, Ai!
evermore. She knew how to make up tobacco for the
huqa so that it smelt like the Gates of Paradise and
wafted you gently through them. She could embroider
strange things in gold and silver, and dance softly with
the moonlight when it came in at the window. Also

304 ON THE CITY WALL

slie knew the hearts of men, and the heart of the City,
and whose wives were faithful and whose untrue, and
more of the secrets of the Government Offices than are
good to be set down in this place. Nasiban, her maid,
said that her jewelry was worth ten thousand pounds,
and that, some night, a thief would enter and murder
her for its possession ; but Lalun said that all the City
would tear that thief limb from limb, and that he,
whoever he was, knew it.

So she took her sitar and sat in the window-seat and
sang a song of old days that had been sung by a girl
of her profession in an armed camp on the eve of a
great battle — the day before the Fords of the Jumna
ran red and Sivaji fled fifty miles to Delhi with a
Toorkh stallion at his horse's tail and another Lalun
on his saddle-bow. It was what men call a Mahratta
laonee, and it said : —

Their warrior forces Chimnaiee

Before the Peishwa led,
The Children of the Sun and Fire

Behind him turned and fled.

And the chorus said : —

With them there fought who rides so free

With sword and turban red,
The warrior-youth who earns his fee

At peril of his head.

' At peril of his head, said "Wall Dad in English to
me. ' Thanks to your Government, aU our heads are
protected, and with the educational facilities at my
command ' — his eyes twinkled wickedly — ' I might
be a distinguished member of the local administration.
Perhaps, in time, I might even be a member of a Legis
lative Council.'

ON THE CITY WALL 305

' Don't speak English,' said Lalun, bending over her
sitar afresh. The chorus went out from the City wall
to the blackened wall of Fort Amara which dominates
the City. No man knows the precise extent of Fort
Amara. Three kings built it hundreds of years ago,
and they say that there are miles of underground rooms
beneath its walls. It is peopled with many ghosts, a
detachment of Garrison Artillery and a Company of
Infantry. In its prime it held ten thousand men and
filled its ditches with corpses.

' At peril of his head,' sang Lalun again and again.

A head moved on one of the Ramparts — the gray
head of an old man — and a voice, rough as shark-skin
on a sword-hilt, sent back the last line of the chorus
and broke into a song that I could not understand,
though Lalun and Wall Dad listened intently.

' What is it ? ' I asked. ' Who is it ? '

' A consistent man,' said Wall Dad. ' He fought you
in '46, when he was a warrior-youth ; refought you in
'57, and he tried to fight you in '71, but you had learned
the trick of blowing men from guns too well. Now he
is old; but he would stUl fight if he could.'

' Is he a Wahabi, then ? Why should he answer to a
Mahratta laonee if he be Wahabi — or Sikh?' said I. ^

' I do not know,' said Wall Dad. ' He has lost,
perhaps, his religion. Perhaps he wishes to be a
King. Perhaps he is a King. I do not know his
name.'

' That is a lie, Wall Dad. If you know his career
you must know his name.'

'That is quite true. I belong to a nation of liars.
I would rather not teU you his name. Think for
yourself.'

306 ON THE CITY WALL

Lalun finished her song, pointed to the Fort, and
said simply : ' Khem Singh.'

' Hm,' said Wali Dad. ' If the Pearl chooses to tell
■ you the Pearl is a fool.'

I translated to Lalun, who laughed ' I choose to
tell what I choose to tell. They kept Khem Singh in
Burma,' said she. ' They kept him there for many
years until his mind was changed in him. So great
was the kindness of the Government. Finding this,
they sent him back to his own country that he might
look upon it before he died. He is an old man, but
when he looks upon this his country his memory will
come. Moreover, there be many who remember him.'

' He is an Interesting Survival,' said Wali Dad, pull-
ing at the huqa. ' He returns to a country now full
of educational and political reform, but, as the Pearl
says, there are many who remember him. He was once
a great man. There will never be any more great men
in India. They will all, when they are boys, go whor-
ing after strange gods, and they will become citizens —
" fellow-citizens " — " illustrious f eUow-citizens. " What
is it that the native papers call them ?

Wali Dad seemed to be in a very bad temper.
Lalun looked out of the window and smiled into the
dust-haze. I went away thinking about Khem Singh
who had once made history with a thousand followers,
and would have been a princeling but for the power of
the Supreme Government aforesaid.

The Senior Captain Commanding Fort Amara was
away on leave, but the Subaltern, his Deputy, had
drifted down to the Club, where I found him and
enquired of him whether it was really true that a polit-
ical prisoner had been added to the attractions of the

ON THE CITY WALL 307

Fort. The Subaltern explained at great length, for
this was the first time that he had held Command of
the Fort, and his glory lay heavy upon him.

'Yes,' said he, 'a man was sent in to me about a
week ago from down the line — a thorough gentleman
whoeyer he is. Of course I did all I could for him.
He had his two servants and some silver cooking-pots,
and he looked for all the world like a native officer. I
called him Subadar Sahib ; just as well to be on the
safe side, y'know. "Look here, Subadar Sahib," I said,
"you're handed over to my authority, and I'm sup-
posed to guard you. Now I don't want to make your
life hard, but you must make things easy for me. All
the Fort is at your disposal, from the flagstaff to the
dry ditch, and I shall be happy to entertain you in any
way I can, but you mustn't take advantage of it. Give
me your word that you won't try to escape, Subadar
Sahib, and I'll give you my word that you shall have
no heavy guard put over you.'' I thought the best
way of getting at him was by going at him straight,
y'know , and it was, by Jove ! The old man gave me
his word, and moved about the Fort as contented as a
sick crow. He's a rummy chap — always asking to be
told where he is and what the buildings about him are.
I had to sign a slip of blue paper when he turned up,
acknowledging receipt of his bodj^ and all that, and I'm
responsible, y'know, that he doesn't get away. Queer
thing, though, looking after a Johnnie old enough to
be your grandfather, isn't it ? Come to the Fort one
of these days and see him ?

For reasons which will appear, I never went to the
Fort while Khem Singh was then within its walls. I
knew him only as a gray head seen from Lalun's win-

308 ON THE CITY WALL

dow — a gray head and a harsh voice. But natives
told me that, day by day, as he looked upon the fair
lands round Amara, his memory came back to him and,
with it, the old hatred against the Government that
had been nearly effaced in far-ofE Burma. So he raged
up and down the West face of the Fort from morning
tiU noon and from evening till the night, devising
vain things in his heart, and croaking war-songs when
Lalun sang on the City wall. As he grew more
acquainted with the Subaltern he unburdened his old
heart of some of the passions that had withered it.
' Sahib,' he used to say, tapping his stick against the
parapet, ' when I was a young man I was one of twenty
thousand horsemen who came out of the City and rode
round the plain here. Sahib, I was the leader of a hun-
dred, then of a thousand, then of five thousand, and
now ! ' — he pointed to his two servants. ' But from
the beginning to to-day I would cut the throats of aU the
Sahibs in the land if I could. Hold me fast. Sahib,
lest I get away and return to those who would foUow
me. I forgot them when I was in Burma, but now
that I am in my own country again, I remembeit every-
thing.'

' Do you remember that you have given me your
Honour not to make ^our tendance a hard matter ? '
said the Subaltern.

' Yes, to you, only to you, Sahib,' said Khem Singh.
' To you because you are of a pleasant countenance. If
my turn comes again. Sahib, I will not hang you nor
cut your throat.'

' Thank you,' said the Subaltern gravely, as he looked
along the line of guns that could pound the City to
powder in half an hour. 'Let us go into our own

ON THE CITY WALL 309

quarters, Khem Singh. Come and talk with me after
dinner.'

Khem Singh would sit on his own cushion at the
Subaltern's feet, drinking heavy, scented anise-seed
brandy in great gulps, and telling strange stories of
Fort Amara, which had been a palace in the old days,
of Begums and Ranees tortured to death — aye, in the
very vaulted chamber that now served as a Mess-room ;
would tell stories of Sobraon that made the Subaltern's
cheeks flush and tingle with pride of race, and of the
Kuka rising from which so much was expected and the
foreknowledge of which was shared by a hundred thou-
sand souls. But he never told tales of '57 because, as
he said, he was the Subaltern's guest, and '57 is a year
that no man, Black or White, cares to speak of. Once
only, when the anise-seed brandy had slightly affected
his head, he said : ' Sahib, speaking now of a matter
which lay between Sobraon and the affair of the Kukas,
it was ever a wonder to us that you stayed your hand at
all, and that, having stayed it, you did not make the
land one prison. Now I hear from without that you do
great honour to all men of our country and by your own
hands are destroying the Terror of your Name which is
your strong rock and defence. This is a foolish thing.
Will oil and water mix ? Now in '57 '

' I was not born then, Subadar Sahib,' said the Subal-
tern, and Khem Singh reeled to his quarters.

The Subaltern would tell me of these conversations
at the Club, and my desire to see Khem Singh increased.
But Wali Dad, sitting in the window-seat of the house
on the City wall, said that it would be a cruel thing to
do, and Lalun pretended that I preferred the society of
a grizzled old Sikh to hers.

310 ON THE CITr WALL

' Here is tobacco, here is talk, here are many friends
and all the news of the City, and, above all, here is my-
self. I will tell you stories and sing you songs, and
Wall Dad will talk his English nonsense in your ears.
Is that worse than watching the caged animal yonder ?
Go to-morrow then, if you must, but to-day such and
such an one will be here, and he will speak of wonderful
things.'

It happened that To-morrow never came, and the
warm heat of the latter Rains gave place to the chUl of
early October almost before I was aware of the flight of
the year. The Captain commanding the Fort returned
from leave and took over charge of Khem Singh accord-
ing to the laws of seniority. The Captain was not a
nice man. He called all natives ' niggers,' which, besides
being extreme bad form, shows gross ignorance.

' What's the use of telling off two Tommies to watch
that old nigger ? ' said he.

'I fancy it soothes his vanity,' said the Subaltern.
' The men are ordered to keep well out of his way, but
he takes them as a tribute to his importance, poor old
vn-etch.'

'. I won't have Line men taken off regular guards in
this way. Put on a couple of Native Infantry.'

' Sikhs ? ' said the Subaltern, lifting his eyebrows.

'Sikhs, Pathans, Dogras — they're all alike, these
black vermin,' and the Captain talked to Khem Singh
in a manner which hurt that old gentleman's feelings.
Fifteen years before, when he had been caught for the
second time, every one looked upon him as a sort of
tiger. He liked being regarded in this light. But he
forgot that the world goes forward in fifteen years, and
many Subalterns are promoted to Captaincies.

ON THE CITY WALL 311

'The Captain-pig is in charge of the Fort?' said
Khem Singh to his native guard every morning. And
the native guard said: 'Yes, Subadar Sahib,' in defer-
ence to his age and his air of distinction ; but they did
not know who he was.

In those days the gathering in Lalun's little
white room was always large and talked more than
before.

' The Greeks,' said Wali Dad who had been borrow-
ing my books, ' the inhabitants of the city of Athens,
where they were always hearing and telling some new
thing, rigorously secluded their women — who were
fools. Hence the glorious institution of the heterodox
women — is it not? — who were amusing and not fools.
All the Greek philosophers delighted in their company.
Tell me, my friend, how it goes now in Greece and the
other places upon the Continent of Europe. Are your
women-folk also fools ? '

'Wali Dad,' I said, 'you never speak to us about
your women-folk and we never speak about ours to you.
That is the bar between us.'

' Yes,' said Wali Dad, ' it is curious to think that our
common meeting-place should be here, in the house of a
common — how do you call her ? ' He pointed with the
pipe-mouth to Lalun.

'Lalun is nothing but Lalun,' I said, and that was
perfectly true. ' But if you took your place in the
world, Wali Dad, and gave up dreaming dreams '

' I might wear an English coat and trouser. I might
be a leading Muhammadan pleader. I might be received
even at the Commissioner's tennis-parties where the Eng-
lish stand on one side and the natives on the other, in
order to promote social intercourse throughout the Em-

312 ON THE CITY WALL

pire. Heart's Heart,' said he to Lalun quicklj^, 'the
Sahib says that I ought to quit you.'

.' The Sahib is always talking stupid talk,' returned
Lalun with a laugh. ' In this house I am a Queen and
thou art a King. The Sahib ' — she put her arms above
her head and thought for a moment — ' the Sahib shall
be our Vizier — thine and mine, Wali Dad — because
he has said that thou shouldst leave me.

Wali Dad laughed immoderately, and I laughed too.
' Be it so,' said he. ' My friend, are you willing to take
this lucrative Government appointment? Lalun, what
shall his pay be?'

But Lalun began to sing, and for the rest of the time
there was no hope of getting a sensible answer from her
or Wali Dad. When the one stopped, the other began
to quote Persian poetry with a triple pun in every other
line. Some of it was not strictly proper, but it was all
very funny, and it only came to an end when a fat per-
son in black, with gold pince-nez, sent up his name to
Lalun, and Wali Dad dragged me into the twinkling
night to walk in a big rose-garden and talk heresies
about Religion and Governments and a man's career in
life. ■

The Mohurrum, the great mourning-festival of the
Muhammadans, was close at hand, and the things that
Wali Dad said about religious fanaticism would have
secured his expulsion from the loosest-thinking Muslim
sect. There were the rose-bushes round us, the stars
above us, and from every quarter of the City came the
boom of the big Mohurrum drums. You must know
that the City is divided in fairly equal proportions
between the Hindus and the Musalmans, and where
both creeds belong to the fighting races, a big religious

ON THE CITY WALL 313

festival gives ample chance for trouble. When they
can — that is to say when the authorities are weak
enough to allow it — the Hindus do their best to arrange
some minor feast-day of their own in time to clash with
the period of general mourning for the martyrs Hasan
and Hussain, the heroes of the Mohurrum. Gilt and
painted paper presentations of their tombs are borne
with shouting and wailing, music, torches, and yells,
through the principal thoroughfaretj of the City ; which
fakements are called tazias. Their passage is rigorously
laid down beforehand by the Police, and detachments
of Police accompany each tazia, lest the Hindus should
throw bricks at it and the peace of the Queen and the
heads of Her loyal subjects should thereby be broken.
Mohurrum time in a ' fighting ' town means anxiety to
all the officials, because, if a riot breaks out, the officials
and not the rioters are held responsible. The former
must foresee everything, and while not making their
precautions ridiculously elaborate, must see that they
are at least adequate.

' Listen to the drums ! ' said Wall Dad. ' That is the
heart of the people — empty and making much noise.
How, think you, will the Mohurrum go this year ? I
think that there will be trouble.'

He turned down a side-street and left me alone with
the stars and a sleepy Police patrol. Then I went to
bed and dreamed that Wall Dad had sacked the City
and I was made Vizier, with Lalun's silver huqa for
mark of office.

All day the Mohurrum drums beat in the City, and
all day deputations of tearful Hindu gentlemen besieged
the Deputy Commissioner with assurances that they
would be murdered ere next dawning by the Muhamma-

314 ON THE CITY WALL

dans. ' Which,' said the Deputy Commissioner, in con-
fidence to the Head of Police, ' is a pretty fair indication
that the Hindus are going to make 'emselves unpleas-
ant. I think we can arrange a little surprise for them.
I have given the heads of both Creeds fair warning. If
they choose to disregard it, so much the worse for
them.'

There was a large gathering in Lalun's house that
night, Jbut of men that I had never seen before, if I
except the fat gentleman in black with the gold pince-
nez. Wali Dad lay in the window-seat, more bitterly
scornful of his Faith and its manifestations than I had
ever known him. Lalun's maid was very busy cutting
up and mixing tobacco for the guests. We could hear
the thunder of the drums as the processions accompany-
ing each tazia marched to the central gathering-place in
the plain outside the City, preparatory to their trium-
phant re-entry and circuit within the walls. All the
streets seemed ablaze with torches, and only Fort Amara
was black and silent.

When the noise of the drums ceased, no one in the
white room spoke for a time. ' The first tazia has
moved off,' said Wali Dad, looking to the plain.

' That is very early,' said the man with the pince-nez.

' It is only half-past eight.' The company rose and
departed.

' Some of them were men from Ladakh,' said Lalun,
when the last had gone. ' They brought me brick-tea
such as the Russians sell, and a tea-urn from Pesha-
wur. Show me, now, how the English Memsahibs
make tea.'

The brick-tea was abominable. When it was finished
Wali Dad suggested going into the streets. 'I am

ON THE CITY WALL 316

nearly sure that there will be trouble to-night,' he said.
' All the City thinks so, and Vox Populi is Vox Dei, as
the Babus say. Now I tell you that at the corner of
the Padshahi Gate you will find my horse all this night
if you want to go about and to see things. It is a most
disgraceful exhibition. Where is the pleasure of saying
"Ya Hasan, Ta Mussain" twenty thousand times in a
night?'

All the processions — there were two and twenty of
them;— were now well within the City walls. The
drums were beating afresh, the crowd were howling
^YaMasan! Ya Sussain ! ' and beating their breasts,
the brass bands were playing their loudest, and at every
corner where space allowed, Muhammadan preachers
were telling the lamentable story of the death of the
Martyrs. It was impossible to move except with the
crowd, for the streets were not more than twenty feet
wide. In the Hindu quarters the shutters of all the
shops were up and cross-barred. As the first tazia, a
gorgeous erection ten feet high, was borne aloft on the
shoulders of a score of stout men into the semi-dark-
ness of the Gully of the Horsemen, a brickbat crashed
through its talc and tinsel sides.

'Into thy hands, O Lord?' murmured Wall Dad pro-
fanely, as a yell went up from behind, and a native
officer of Police jammed his horse through the crowd.
Another brickbat followed, and the tazia staggered and
swayed where it had stopped.

'Go on ! In the name of the Sirkar, go forward ! '
shouted the Policeman ; but there was an ugly cracking
and splintering of shutters, and the crowd halted, with
oaths and growling^s, before the house whence the brick-
bat bad been thrown.

316 ON THE CITY WALL

Then, without any warning, broke the storm — not
only in the Gully of the Horsemen, but in half a dozen
other places. The tazias rocked like ships at sea, the
long pole-torches dipped and rose round them while the
men shouted : ' The Hindus are dishonouring the tazias !
Strike ! Strike ! Into their temples for the faith ! '
The six or eight Policemen with each tazia drew their
batons, and struck as long as they could in the hope of
forcing the mob forward, but they were overpowered,
and as contingents of Hindus poured into the streets,
the fight became general. Half a mile away where the
tazias were yet untouched the drums and the shrieks of
' Ya Hasan ! Ta Mussain ! ' continued, but not for long.
The priests at the corners of the streets knocked the
legs from the bedsteads that supported their pulpits and
smote for the Faith, while stones fell from the silent
houses upon friend and foe, and the packed streets
bellowed : 'Z>iw .' Bin ! Bin ! ' A tazia caught fire, and
was dropped for a flaming barrier between Hindu and
Musalman at the corner of the Gully. Then the crowd
surged forward, and Wall Dad drew me close to the
stone pillar of a well.

' It was intended from the beginning ! ' he shouted in
my ear, with more heat than blank unbelief should be
guilty of. 'The bricks were carried up to the houses
beforehand. These swine of Hindus ! We shall be
gutting kine in their temples to-night ! '

Tazia after tazia, some burning, others torn to pieces,
hurried past us and the mob with them, howling, shriek-
ing, and striking at the house doors in their flight. At
last we saw the reason of the rush. Hugonin, the
Assistant District Superintendent of Police, a boy of
twenty, had got together thirty constables wd was

ON THE CITY WALL 317

forcing the crowd through the streets. His old gray
Police-horse showed no sign of uneasiness as it was
spurred breast-on into the crowd, and the long dog-whip
with which he had armed himself was never stiU.

' They know we haven't enough Police to hold 'em,'
he cried as he passed me, mopping a cut on his face.
' They know we haven't ! Aren't any of the men from
the Club coming down to help? Get on, you sons
of burnt fathers ! ' The dog-whip cracked across the
writhing backs, and the constables smote afresh with
baton and gun-butt. With, these passed the lights and
the shouting, and Wali Dad began to swear under his
breath. From Fort Amara shot up a single rocket ;
then two side by side. It was the signal for troops.

Petitt, the Deputy Commissioner, covered with dust
and sweat, but calm and gently smiling, cantered up
the clean-swept street in rear of the main body of
the rioters. 'No one killed yet,' he shouted. 'I'll
keep 'em on the run till dawn! Don't let 'em halt,
Hugonin ! Trot 'em about till the troops come.'

The science of the defence lay solely in keepiag the
mob on the move. If they had breathing-space they
would halt and fire a house, and then the work of
restoring order would be more difficult, to say the least
of it. Flames have the same effect on a crowd as blood
has on a wild beast.

"Word had reached the Club and men in evening-
dress were beginning to show themselves and lend a
hand in heading off and breaking up the shouting
masses with stirrup-leathers, whips, or chance-found
staves. They were not very often attacked, for the
rioters had sense enough to know that the death of a
European would not mean one hanging but many, and

318 ON THE CITY WALL

possibly the appearance of the thrice-dreaded Artillery.
The clamour in the City redoubled. The Hindus had
descended into the streets in real earnest and ere long
the mob returned. It was a strange sight. There were
no tazias — only their riven platforms — and there were
no Police. Here and there a City dignitary, Hindu or
Muhammadan, was vainly imploring his co-religionists
to keep quiet and behave themselves — advice for which
his white beard was pulled. Then a native officer of
Police, unhorsed but still using his spurs with effect,
would be borne along, warning all the crowd of the
danger of insulting the Government. Everywhere men
struck aimlessly with sticks, grasping each other by
the throat, howling and foaming with rage, or beat with
their bare hands on the doors of the houses.

'It is a lucky thing that they are fighting with
natural weapons,' I said to Wali Dad, ' else we should
have half the City killed.'

I turned as I spoke and looked at his face. His nos-
trils were distended, his eyes were fixed, and he was
smiting himself softly on the breast. The crowd poured
by with renewed riot — a gang of Musalmans hard-
pressed by some hundred Hindu fanatics. Wali Dad
left my side with an oath, and shouting: 'Fa Hasan!
Ya JBussain ! ' plunged into the thick of the fight where
I lost sight of him.

I fled by a side alley to the Padshahi Gate where I
found Wali Dad's house, and thence rode to the Fort.
Once outside the City wall, the tumult sank to a dull
roar, very impressive under the stars and reflecting great
credit on the fifty thousand angry able-bodied men who
were making it. The troops who, at the Deputy Com-
missioner's instance, had been ordered to rendezvous

ON THE CITY WALL 319

quietly near the Fort, showed no signs of being im-
pressed. Two companies of Native Infantry, a squad-
ron of Native Cavalry and a company of British Infantry
were kicking their heels in the shadow of the East face,
waiting for orders to march in. I am sorry to say that
they were all pleased, unholily pleased, at the chance
of what they called ' a little fun.' The senior officers,
to be sure, grumbled at having been kept out of bed,
and the English troops pretended to be sulky, but
there was joy in the hearts of all the subalterns, and
whispers ran up and down the line : ' No ball-cartridge
— what a beastly shame ! ' ' D'you think the beggars
will really stand up to us?' ''Hope I shall meet
my money-lender there. I owe him more than I can
afford.' ' Oh, they won't let us even unsheathe swords.'
' Hurrah ! Up goes the fourth rocket. Fall in, there ! '
The Garrison Artillery, who to the last cherished a
wUd hope that they might be allowed to bombard the
City at a hundred yards' range, lined the parapet above
the East gateway and cheered themselves hoarse as the
British Infantry doubled along the road to the Main
Gate of the City. The Cavalry cantered on to the
Padshahi Gate, and the Native Infantry marched slowly
to the Gate of the Butchers. The surprise was in-
tended to be of a distinctly unpleasant nature, and to
come on top of the defeat of the Police who had been
just able to keep the Muhammadans from firing the
houses of a few leading Hindus. The bulk of the riot
lay in the north and north-west wards. The east and
south-east were by this time dark and silent, and I rode
hastily to Lalun's house for I wished to tell her to send
some one in search of Wali Dad. The house was
unlighted, but the door was open, and I climbed up-

320 ON THE CITY WAXL

stairs in the darkness. One small lamp in the white
room showed Lalun and her maid leaning half out of
the window, breathing heavily and evidently pulling at
something that refused to come.

' Thou art late — very late,' gasped Lalun without
turning her head. ' Help us now, O Fool, if thou hast
not spent thy strength howling among the tazias.
Pull ! Nasiban and I can do no more ! O, Sahib, is
it you ? The Hindus have been hunting an old Muham-
madan round the Ditch with clubs. If they find him
again they will kill him. Help us to pull him up.'

I put my hands to the long red silk waist-cloth that
was hanging out of the window, and we three pulled
and pulled with all the strength at our command.
There was something very heavy at the end, and it
swore in an unknown tongue as it kicked against the
City wall.

' Pull, oh, pull ! ' said Lalun at the last. A pair of
brown hands grasped the window-sill and a venerable
Muhammadan tumbled upon the floor, very much out
of breath. His jaws were tied up, his turban had fallen
over one eye, and he was dusty and angry.

Lalun hid her face in her hands for an instant and
said something about Wall Dad that I could not catch.

Then, to my extreme gratification, she threw her arms
round my neck and murmured pretty things. I was in
no haste to stop her ; and Nasiban, being a handmaiden
of tact, turned to the big jewel-chest that stands in the
corner of the white room and rummaged among the con-
tents. The Muhammadan sat on the floor and glared.

' One service more, Sahib, since thou hast come so
opportunely,' said Lalun. ' Wilt thou ' — it is very nice
to be thou-ed by Lalun — ' take this old man across the

ON THE CITY WALL 321

City — the troops are everywhere, and they might hurt
him for he is old — to the Kumharsen Gate ? There I
think he may find a carriage to take him to his house.
He is a friend of mine, and thou art — more than a
friend — therefore I ask this.'

Nasihan bent over the old man, tucked something
into his belt, and I raised him up, and led him into the
streets. In crossing from the east to the west of the
City there was no chance of avoiding the troops and
the crowd. Long before I reached the Gully of the
Horsemen I heard the shouts of the British Infan-
try crying cheeringly : ' Hutt, ye beggars ! Hutt, ye
devils ! Get along ! Go forward, there ! ' Then fol-
lowed the ringing of rifle-butts and shrieks of pain.
The troops were banging the bare toes of the mob with
their gun-butts — for not a bayonet had been fixed.
My companion mumbled and jabbered as we walked on
until we were carried back by the crowd and had to
force our way to the troops. I caught him by the wrist
and felt a bangle there — the iron bangle of the Sikhs
— but I had no suspicions, for Lalun had only ten
minutes before put her arms round me. Thrice we
were carried back by the crowd, and when we made
our way past the British Infantry it was to meet the
Sikh Cavalry driving another mob before them with
the butts of their lances.

' What are these dogs? ' said the old man.

' Sikhs of the Cavalry, Father,' I said, and we edged
our way up the line of horses two abreast and found
the Deputy Commissioner, his helmet smashed on his
head, surrounded by a knot of men who had come down
from the Club as amateur constables and had helped
the Police mightily.

322 ON THE CITY WALL

'We'll keep 'em on the run till dawn,' said Petitt.
' Who's your villainous friend ? '

I had only time to say : ' The Protection of the
Sirhar ! ' when a fresh crowd flying before the Native
Infantry carried us a hundred yards nearer to the
Kumharsen Gate, and Petitt was swept away like a
shadow.

' I do not know — '■ I cannot see — this is all new to
me ! ' moaned my companion. ' How many troops are
there in the City?'

' Perhaps five hundred,' I said.

' A lakh of men beaten by five hundred — and Sikhs
among them ! Surely, surely, I am an old man, but —
the Kumharsen Gate is new. Who pulled down the
stone lions? Where is the conduit? Sahib, I am a
very old man, and, alas, I — I cannot stand.' He
dropped in the shadow of the Kumharsen Gate where
there was no disturbance. A fat gentleman wearing
gold pince-nez came out of the darkness.

' You are most kind to bring my old friend,' he said
suavely. 'He is a landholder of Akala. He should
not be in a big City when there is religious excitement.
But I have a carriage here. You are quite truly kind.
Will you help me to put him into the carriage ? It is
very late.'

We bundled the old man into a hired victoria that
stood close to the gate, and I turned back to the house
on the City wall. The troops were driving the people
to and fro, while the Police shouted, ' To your houses !
Get to your houses ! ' and the dog-whip of the Assistant
District Superintendent cracked remorselessly. Terror-
stricken hunnias clung to the stirrups of the cavalry,
crying that their houses had been robbed (which was a

ON THE CITY WALL 323

lie), and the burly Sikh horsemen patted them on the
shoulder, and bade them return to those houses lest a
worse thing should happen. Parties of five or six
British soldiers, joining arms, swept down the side-
gullies, their rifles on their backs, stamping, with shout-
ing and song, upon the toes of Hindu and Musalman.
Never was religious enthusiasm more systematically
squashed; and never were poor breakers of the peace
more utterly weary and footsore. They were routed
out of holes and corners, from behind well-pillars and
byres, and bidden to go to their houses. If they had
no houses to go to, so much the worse for their toes.

On returning to Lalun's door I stumbled over a man
at the threshold. He was sobbing hysterically and his
arms flapped like the wings of a goose. It was Wall
Dad, Agnostic and Unbeliever, shoeless, turbanless, and
frothing at the mouth, the flesh on his chest bruised
and bleeding from the vehemence with which he had
smitten himself. A broken torch-handle lay by his side,
and his quivering lips murmured, 'la Hasan! Ya
Hussain !' as I stooped over him. I pushed him a few
steps up the staircase, threw a pebble at Lalun's City
window and hurried home.

Most of the streets were very stUl, and the cold wind
that comes before the dawn whistled down them. In
the centre of the Square of the Mosque a man was
bending over a corpse. The skull had been smashed in
by gun-butt or bamboo-stave.

'It is expedient that one man should die for the
people,' said Petitt grimly, raising the shapeless head.
' These brutes were beginning to show their teeth too
much.'

And from afar we could hear the soldiers singing

324 ON THE CITY WALL

' Two Lovely Black Eyes,' as they drove the remnant
of the rioters within doors.

*********

Of course you can guess what happened ? I was not
so clever. When the news went abroad that Khem
Singh had escaped from the Fort, I did not, since I was
then living this story, not writing it, connect myself, or
Lalun, or the fat gentleman of the gold pince-nez, with
his disappearance. Nor did it strike me that Wali Dad
was the man who should have convoyed him across the
City, or that Lalun's arms round my neck were put
there to hide the money that Nasiban gave to B|^pn
Singh, and that Lalun had used me and my white face
as even a better safeguard than Wali Dad who
proved himself so untrustworthy. All that I knew at
the time was that, when Fort Amara was taken up with
the riots, Khem Singh profited by the confusion to get
away, and that his two Sikh guards also escaped.

But later on I received full enlightenment ; and so did
Khem Singh. He fled to those who knew him in the
old days, but many of them were dead and more were
changed, and all knew something of the Wrath of the
Government. He went to the young men, but the
.glamour of his name had passed away, and they were
entering native regiments of Government offices, and
Khem Singh could give them neither pension, decora-
tions, nor influence — nothing but a glorious death with
their backs to the mouth of a gun. He wrote letters
and made promises, and the letters fell into bad hands,
and a wholly insignificant subordinate officer of Police
tracked them down and gained promotion thereby.
Moreover, Khem Singh was old, and anise-seed brandy
was scarce, and he had left his silver cooking-pots in

ON THE CITY WALL 325

Fort Amara with his nice warm bedding, and the gentle-
man with the gold pince-nez was told by those who had
employed him that Khem Singh as a popular leader was
not worth the money, paid.

' Great is the mercy of these fools of English ! ' said
Khem Singh when the situation was put before him.
' I will go back to Fort Amara of my own free will and
gain honour. Give me good clothes to return in.'

So, at his own time, Khem Singh knocked at the
wicket-gate of the Fort and walked to the Captain and
the Subaltern, who were nearly gray-headed on account
of correspondence that daily arrived from Simla marked
' Private.'

' I have come back. Captain Sahib,' said Khem Singh.
'Put no more guards over me. It is no good out
yonder.'

A week later I saw him for the first time to my
knowledge, and he made as though there were an
understanding between us.

'It was well done, Sahib,' said he, 'and greatly I
admired your astuteness in thus boldly facis^ the
troops when I, whom they would have doubtless torn
to pieces, was with you. Now there is a man in Fort
Ooltagarh whom a bold man could with ease help to
escape. This is the position of the Fort as I draw it on
the sand '

But I was thinking how I had become Lalun's Vizier
after all.

WORKS BY RUDYARD KIPLING.

PLAIN TALES FROM THE HILLS.

New Edition, liimo, Clotb, S1.25.

Mr. Kipling knows and appreciates the English in India, and is a born
story-teller and a man of humour into the bargain. ... It would be hard
to find better reading. — The Saturday Review, London.

Every one knows that it is not easy to write good short stories. Mr.
Kipling has changed all that. Here are forty of them averaging less than
eight pages apiece; there is not a dull one in the lot. Some are tragedy,
some broad comedy, some tolerably sharp satire. The time has passed to
ignore or undervalue Mr. Kipling. He has won his spurs and taken his
prominent place in the arena. This, as the legitimate edition, should be
preferred to the pirated ones by all such as care for honesty in letters. —
Churchman, New York.

One of the first things that strikes the reader is the exceptional excellence
of the tales. In so large a collection as forty stories one naturally expects
to find some two or three of peculiar power dwarfing the rest. It is the
fate of most collections, but here there are at least a dozen, possibly even a
score, with regard to which it would be quite impossible to say that this or
that is the most powerful or the most beautiful. The explanation re simple
— the variety equals the intensity, the imaginative insight, the literary tact.
Indeed, we are not sure whether this variety — inexhaustible it seems —
is not by far and away the most striking and the most satisfactory character-
istic of the volume. The man who wrote these tales has manifestly num-
berless others to tell. . . Character, situation, incident, humour, pathos,
tragic force, are all in abundance; words alone are at a minimum. Of
course these are "plain" tales, — lightning-flash tales. A gleam, and
there the whole tragedy or comedy is before you — elaborate it for your-
self afterwards. — Glasgow Herald.

MACMILLAN & CO.,

66 Pii'TH AVEMXTB, ITB'W YORK.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

THE LIGHT THAT FAILED.

New Edition, liimo, Ciotli, S1.S5.

If he had written only his short stories, he would have had the satisfac-
tion of knowing that he had permanently enriched our literature; but we
were from the first of those who believed that it was in him to produce
more imposing, if not more enduring, work. The Light that Failed is
an organic whole — a book with a backbone — and stands out boldly
among the nerveless, flaccid, invertebrate things that enjoy an expensive
but ephemeral existence in the circulating libraries. — The Athenaum.

LIFE'S HANDICAP.

STOBIES OF Tvmvrp. 0"W"ir PEOPLE.
New Edition. ISmo, Cloth, S1.%S.

No volume of his yet published gives a better illustration of his genius,
and of the weird charm which has given his stories such deserved popular-
ity. — Boston Daily Traveler.

Some of Mr. Kipling's best work is in this volume. Mr. Kipling is a

literary artist of the first rank, and everything in the way of short stories

he has written thus far has proved itself to be well worth reading. — Boston

Beacon.
»

The merit of intense vision and original literary art would still be un-
deniably Mr. Kipling's own. As a tale of sheer terror, The Mark of the
Beast could not easily be surpassed. . . . The City of Dreadful Night is a
powerful picture, and several of the shorter sketches are in Mr. Kipling's
best manner. — Pall Mall Gazette.

Life's Handicap contains much of the best work hitherto accomplished
by the author. ... In this collection Mr. Kipling displays, even more
weightily than ever, his militant humour, his rude galloping power, and his
intense faculty of vivid portrayal. There is none other among us who can
depict in a single sweep, can open up at a word, can suggest and intimate
so fiercely and yet so reticently. — Black and White.

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£Y THE SAME AUTHOR.

THE NAULAHKA.

A STORY OF EAST AND WEST.

By RUDYARD KIPLING and WOLCOTT BALESTIER.

l»mo, Clotli, Sl.SO.

It is a novel which, once taken up, will not be laid down till finished,
and more than one reader will turn to it again with delight. — Boston
Traveler.

What is the most surprising, and at the same time most admirable, in
this book, is the manner in which Mr. Kipling seems to grasp the character
of the native women; we know of nothing in the English language, of its
kind, to compare with Chapter XX. in its delicacy and genuine sympathy.
There is no need to recommend this book; the names of its authors are its
own guarantee. — The Week.

There is no one but Mr. Kipling who can make his readers taste and
smell, as well as see and hear, the East; and in this book (if we except
the description of Tarvin's adventures in the deserted city of Gunnaur,
which is perhaps less clear-cut than usual) he has surely surpassed him-
self. — Athenaum, London.

BALLADS AND BARRACK-ROOM BALLADS.

l^mo, Cloth, Sl.»5.

It is distinguished by qualities which we should have expected from his
prose, but it is distinguished by other and higher qualities which we should
not have expected from his prose, or the prose of any living English writer,
they are so purely poetical, so admirable, so noble, so exquisite. . . . Mr.
Kipling possesses the instinct of balladry in a greater degree than any
living English poet, for beyond all his contemporaries he understands the
poetic value of pathetic, heroic actions . . . such as he himself celebrates
in his Ballad of East and West, which stirs the blood like the sound of a
trumpet, it is so noble, so heroic, so magnificent. — Richard Henry
Stoddard, in the Mail and Express.

Mr. Kipling differs from other ballad-writers of the day in that he has
that rare possession, imagination, and he has the temerity to speak out
what is in him with no conventional re^rvations or deference to the hypoc-
risies of public opinion. — Boston Beacon.

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