CHAPTER IV
THE MAN PERDU
A shadow swept swiftly across one of the windows, and the stranger atthe door was aware of a slight jarring as though some more thanordinarily brutal gust of wind had shaken the house upon itsfoundation, or an inner door had been slammed violently. But otherwisehe had so little evidence that his summons had fallen on aught butempty walls or deaf ears that he had begun to debate his right to enterwithout permission, when a chain rattled, a bolt grated, and the doorswung wide. A flood of radiance together with a gust of heated airstruck him in the face. Dazzled, he reeled across the threshold.
The door banged, and again the house in the dunes shuddered as thestorm fell upon it with momentarily trebled ferocity; as if, cheated ofits foreordained prey, it would rend apart his frail refuge to regainhim.
Three paces within the room Amber paused, waiting for his eyes toadjust themselves to the light. Vaguely conscious of a presence behindhim, he faced another--the slight, spare silhouette of a man's figurebetween him and the lamp; and at the same time felt that he was beingsubjected to a close scrutiny--both searching and, at its outset, thereverse of hospitable. But he had no more than become sensitive to thisthan the man before him stepped quickly forward and with two stronghands clasped his shoulders.
"David Amber!" he heard his name pronounced in a voice singularlyresonant and pleasant. "So you've run me to earth at last!"
Amber's face was blank with incredulity as he recognised the speaker."Rutton!" he stammered. "Rutton--why--by all that's strange!"
"Guilty," said the other with a quiet laugh. "But sit down." He swungAmber about, gently guiding him to a chair. "You look pretty well doneup. How long have you been out in this infernal night? But never mindanswering; I can wait. Doggott!"
"Yes, sir."
"Take Mr. Amber's coat and boots and bring him my dressing-gown andslippers."
"Yes, sir."
"And a hot toddy and something to eat--and be quick about it."
"Very good, sir."
Rutton's body-servant moved noiselessly to Amber's side, deftly helpinghim remove his shooting-jacket, whereon snow had caked in thin andbrittle sheets. His eyes, grey and shallow, flickered recognition andsoftened, but he did not speak in anticipation of Amber's kindly"Good-evening, Doggott." To which he responded quietly: "Good-evening,Mr. Amber. It's a pleasure to see you again. I trust you are well."
"Quite, thank you. And you?"
"I'm very fit, thank you sir."
"And"--Amber sat down again, Doggott kneeling at his feet to unlace andremove his heavy pigskin hunting-boots--"and your brother?"
For a moment the man did not answer. His head was lowered so that hisfeatures were invisible, but a dull, warm flush overspread his cheeks.
"And your brother, Doggott?"
"I'm sorry, sir, about that; but it was Mr. Rutton's order," mutteredthe man.
"You're talking of the day you met Doggott at Nokomis station?"interposed his employer from the stand he had taken at one side of thefireplace, his back to the broad hearth whereon blazed a gratefuldriftwood fire.
Amber looked up inquiringly, nodding an unspoken affirmative.
"It was my fault that he--er--prevaricated, I'm afraid; as he says, itwas by my order."
Rutton's expression was masked by the shadows; Amber could make nothingof his curious reticence, and remained silent, waiting a furtherexplanation. It came, presently, with an effect of embarrassment.
"I had--have peculiar reasons for not wishing my refuge here to bediscovered. I told Doggott to be careful, should he meet any one weknew. Although, of course, neither of us anticipated...."
"I don't think Doggott was any more dumfounded than I," said Amber. "Icouldn't believe he'd left you, yet it seemed impossible that youshould be here--of all places--in the neighbourhood of Nokomis, I mean.As for that--" Amber shook his head expressively, glancing round themean room in which he had found this man of such extraordinaryqualities. "It's altogether inconceivable," he summed up hisbewilderment.
"It does seem so--even to me, at times."
"Then why--in Heaven's name--"
By now Doggott had invested Amber in his master's dressing-gown andslippers; rising he left them, passing out through an inner door whichled, evidently, to the only other room in the cottage. Rutton delayedhis reply until the man had shut the door behind him, then suddenly,with the manner of one yielding to the inevitable, drew a chair up toface Amber's and dropped into it.
"I see I must tell you something--a little; as little as I can help--ofthe truth."
"I'm afraid you must; though I'm damned if I can detect a glimmer ofeither rhyme or reason in this preposterous situation."
Rutton laughed quietly, lounging in his armchair and lacing before himthe fingers of hands singularly small and delicate in view of theirvery considerable strength--to which Amber's shoulder still bore achingtestimony.
"In three words," he said deliberately: "I am hiding."
"Hiding!"
"Obviously."
Amber bent forward, studying the elder man's face intently. Thin anddark--not tanned like Amber's, but with a native darkness of skin likethat of the Spanish--it was strongly marked, its features at onceprominent and finely modelled. The hair intensely black, the eyes asdark and of peculiar fire, the lips broad, full, and sympathetic, thecheekbones high, the forehead high and something narrow: these combinedto form a strangely striking ensemble, and none the less striking forits weird resemblance to Amber's own cast of countenance.
Indeed, their likeness one to the other was nothing less than weird inthat it could be so superficially strong, yet so elusive. No two menwere ever more unalike than these save in this superficial accident offacial contours and complexion. No one knowing Amber (let us say) couldever have mistaken him for Rutton; and yet any one, strange to both,armed with a description of Rutton, might pardonably have believedAmber to be his man. Yet manifestly they were products of alien races,even of different climes--their individualities as dissimilar as thepoles. Where in Rutton's bearing burned an inextinguishable, almost aninsolent pride, beneath an ice-like surface of self-constraint, inAmber's one detected merely quiet consciousness of strength andbreeding--his inalienable heritage from many generations of Anglo-Saxonforebears; and while Rutton continually betrayed, by look or tone orgesture, a birthright of fierce passions savagely tamed, from Amber oneseldom obtained a hint of aught but the broad and humourous toleranceof an American gentleman.
But to-night the Virginian had undergone enough to have lost much ofhis habitual poise. "Hiding!" he reiterated in a tone scarcely louderthan a whisper.
"And you have found me out, my friend."
"But--but I don't--"
Rutton lifted a hand in deprecation; and as he did so the door in therear of the room opened and Doggott entered. Cat-like, passing behindAmber, he placed upon the table a small tray, and from a steamingpitcher poured him a glass of hot spiced wine. At a look from hisemployer he filled a second.
"There's sandwiches, sir," he said; "the best I could manage at shortnotice, Mr. Amber. If you'll wait a bit I can fix you up something'ot."
"Thank you, Doggott, that won't be necessary; the sandwiches lookmighty good to me."
"Thank you, sir. Will there be anything else, Mr. Rutton?"
"If there is, I'll call you."
"Yes, sir. Good-night, sir. Good-night, Mr. Amber."
As Doggott shut himself out of the room, Amber lifted his fragrantglass. "You're joining me, Rutton?"
"With all my heart!" The man came forward to his glass. "For old sake'ssake, David. Shall we drink a toast?" He hesitated, with a marked airof embarrassment, then impulsively swung his glass aloft. "Drinkstanding!" he cried, he voice oddly vibrant. And Amber rose. "To theKing--the King, God bless him!"
"To the King!" It was more an exclamation of surprise than an echo tothe toast; nevertheless Amber drained his drink to the final drop. Ashe resumed his seat, the room rang with the crash of splintering
glass;Rutton had dashed his tumbler to atoms on the hearthstone.
"Well!" commented Amber, lifting his brows questioningly. "You _are_sincere, Rutton. But who in blazes would ever have suspected you ofbeing a British subject?"
"Why not?"
"But it seems to me I should have known--"
"What have you ever really known about me, David, save that I ammyself?"
"Well--when you put it that way--little enough--nothing." Amber laughednervously, disconcerted.
"And I? Who and what am I?" No answer was expected--so much was plainfrom Rutton's tone; he was talking to himself more than addressing hisguest. His long brown fingers strayed to the box and conveyed acigarette to his lips; staring dreamily into the fire, he smoked alittle ere continuing. "What does it mean, this eternal 'I' round whichthe world revolves?" His voice trailed off into silence.
Amber snapped the tension with a chuckle. "You can search me," he saidirreverently. And his host returned his smile. "Now, will you pleasepay attention to me, my friend? Or do you wish me to turn and rendmyself with curiosity--after I've attended to these excellentsandwiches?... Seriously, I want to know several things. What have youbeen doing with yourself these past three years?"
Rutton shook his head gravely. "I can't say."
"You mean you won't?"
"If you will have it that way."
"Well ... I give you up."
"That's the most profitable thing you could do, David."
"But, seriously now, this foolish talk about hiding is all a joke,isn't it?"
"No," said Rutton soberly; "no, it's no joke." He sighed profoundly."As for my recent whereabouts, I have been--ah--travellingconsiderably; moving about from pillar to post." To this the man addeda single word, the more significant in that it embodied the nearestapproach to a confidence that Amber had ever known him to make:"Hunted."
"Hunted by whom?"
"I beg your pardon." Rutton bent forward and pushed the cigarettes toAmber's elbow. "I am--ah--so preoccupied with my own mean troubles,David, that I had forgotten that you had nothing to smoke. Forgive me."
"That's no matter, I--"
Amber cut short his impatient catechism in deference to the other'smute plea. And Rutton thanked him with a glance--one of those lookswhich, between friends, are more eloquent than words. Sighing, he shookhis head, his eyes once more seeking the flames. And silently studyinghis face--the play of light from lamp and hearth throwing its featuresinto salient relief--for the first time Amber, his wits warmed back toactivity from the stupor the bitter cold had put upon them, noticed howtime and care had worn upon the man since they had last parted. He hadnever suspected Rutton to be his senior by more years than ten, at themost; to-night, however, he might well be taken for fifty were his ageto be reckoned by its accepted signs--the hollowing of cheek andtemple, the sinking of eyes into their sockets, the deepening of themaze of lines about the mouth and on the forehead.
Impulsively the younger man sat up and put a hand upon the arm ofRutton's chair. "What can I do?" he asked simply.
Rutton roused, returning his regard with a smile slow, charming,infinitely sad. "Nothing," he replied; "absolutely nothing."
"But surely----!"
"No man can do for me what I cannot do for myself. When the timecomes"--he lifted his shoulders lightly--"I will do what I can. Tillthen...." He diverged at a tangent. "After all, the world is quite astiny as the worn-out aphorism has it. To think that you should find mehere! It's less than a week since Doggott and I hit upon this place andsettled down, quite convinced we had, at last, lost ourselves ... andmight have peace, for a little space at least!"
Amber glanced curiously round the room; sparely furnished, bare,unlovely, it seemed a most cheerless sort of spot to be considered ahaven of peace.
"And now," concluded Rutton, "we have to move on."
"Because I've found you here?"
"Because you have found me."
"I don't understand."
"My dear boy, I never meant you should."
"But if you're in any danger--"
"I am not."
"You're not! But you just said--"
"I'm in no danger whatever; humanity is, if I'm found."
"I don't follow you at all."
Again Rutton smiled wearily. "I didn't expect you to, David. But thismisadventure makes it necessary that I should tell you something; youmust be made to believe in me. I beg you to; I'm neither mad nor makinggame of you." There was no questioning the sane sincerity of the man.He continued slowly. "It's a simple fact, incredible but absolute,that, were my whereabouts to be made public, a great, a staggering blowwould be struck against the peace and security of the world.... Don'tlaugh, David; I mean it."
"I'm not laughing, Rutton; but you must know that's a pretty largeorder. Most men would--"
"Call me mad. Yes, I know," Rutton took up his words as Amber paused,confused. "I can't expect you to understand me: you couldn't unless Iwere to tell you what I may not. But you know me--better, perhaps, thanany living man save Doggott ... and one other. You know whether or notI would seek to delude you, David. And, knowing that I could not, youknow why it seems to me imperative that, this hole being discovered,Doggott and I must betake ourselves elsewhere. Surely there must besolitudes----!" He rose with a gesture of impatience and beganrestlessly to move to and fro.
Amber started suddenly, flushing. "If you mean--"
Rutton's kindly hand forced him back into his chair. "Sit down, David.I never meant that--never for an instant dreamed you'd intentionallybetray my secret. It's enough that you should know it, shouldoccasionally think of me as being here, to bring misfortune down uponme, to work an incalculable disaster to the progress of thiscivilisation of ours."
"You mean," Amber asked uncertainly, "thought transference?"
"Something of the sort--yes." The man came to a pause beside Amber,looking down almost pitifully into his face. "I daresay all this soundshopelessly melodramatic and neurotic and tommyrotic, David, but ... Ican tell you nothing more. I'm sorry."
"But only let me help you--any way in my power, Rutton. There's nothingI'd not do...."
"I know, David, I know it. But my case is beyond human aid, since I ampowerless to apply a remedy myself."
"And you _are_ powerless?"
Rutton was silent a long moment. Then, "Time will tell," he saidquietly. "There is one way...." He resumed his monotonous round of theroom.
Mechanically Amber began to smoke, trying hard to think, to penetrateby reasoning or intuition the wall of mystery which, it seemed, Ruttonchose to set between himself and the world. The intense earnestness ofthe man's hopeless confession had carried conviction. Amber believedhim, believed in the reality of his trouble; and, divining it dimly, amonstrous, menacing shape in the vagueness of the unknown, was himselfdismayed and a little fearful. He owed much to this man, was bound tohim by ties not only of gratitude but of affection, yet, finding himdistressed, found himself simultaneously powerless to render aid.Inwardly mutinous, he had to school himself to quiescence; lacking theconfidence which Rutton so steadfastly refused him, he was impotent.
Presently he grew conscious that Rutton was standing as if listening,his eyes averted to the windows. But when Amber looked they showed,beneath their half-drawn muslin shades, naught save the grey horizontalrush of snow beyond the panes. And he heard nothing save the endlessraving of the maniac wind.
"What is it?" he inquired at length, unable longer to endure thetensity of the pause.
"Nothing. I beg your pardon, David." Rutton returned to his chair,making a visible effort to shake off his preoccupation. "It's an uglynight, out there. Lucky you blundered on this place. Tell me how ithappened. What became of the other man--your friend?"
The thought of Quain stabbed Amber's consciousness with a mental pangas keen as acute physical anguish. He jumped up in torment. "God!" hecried chokingly. "I'd forgotten! He's out there on the bay, poordevil!--freezing to death if not drowned. Our boat went adrift
somehow;Quain would insist on going after her in a leaky old skiff we found onthe shore ... and didn't come back. I waited till it was hopeless, thenconcluded I'd make a try to cross to Shampton by way of the tidal bar.And I must!"
"It's impossible," Rutton told him with grave sympathy.
"But I must; think of his wife and children, Rutton! There's a chanceyet--a bare chance; he may have reached the boat. If he did, everyminute I waste here is killing him by inches; he'll die of exposure!But from Shampton we could send a boat--"
"The tide fulls about midnight to-night," interrupted Rutton,consulting his watch. "It's after nine,--and there's a heavy surfbreaking over the bar now. By ten it'll be impassable, and you couldn'treach it before eleven. Be content, David; you're powerless."
"You're right--I know that," groaned Amber, his head in his hands. "Iwas afraid it was hopeless, but--but--"
"I know, dear boy, I know!"
With a gesture of despair Amber resumed his seat. For some time heremained deep sunk in dejection. At length, mastering his emotion, helooked up. "How did you know about Quain--that we were together?" heasked.
"Doggott saw you land this morning, and I've been watching you all daywith my field-glasses, prepared to take cover the minute you turned myway. Don't be angry with me, David; it wasn't that I didn't yearn tosee you face to face again, but that ... I didn't dare."
"Oh, that!" exclaimed Amber with an exasperated fling of his hand."Between the two of you--you and Quain--you'll drive me mad withworry."
"I'm sorry, David. I only wish I might say more. It hurts a bit to haveyou doubt me."
"I don't doubt," Amber declared in desperation; "at least, I mean Iwon't if you'll be sensible and let me stand by and see you throughthis trouble--whatever it is."
Rutton turned to the fire, his head drooping despondently. "That maynot be," he said heavily. "The greatest service you can do me is toforget my existence, now and henceforth, erase our friendship from thetablets of your memory, pass me as a stranger should our ways evercross again." He flicked the stub of a cigarette into the flames."Kismet!... I mean that, David, from my heart. Won't you do this forme--one last favour, old friend?"
"I'll try; I'll even promise, on condition that you send me word ifever you have need of me."
"That will be never."
"But if--"
"I'll send for you if ever I may, David; I promise faithfully. And inreturn I have your word?"
Amber nodded.
"Then...." Rutton attempted to divert the subject. "I think you saidQuain? Any relation to Quain's 'Aryan Invasion of India?"
"The same man. He asked me down for the shooting--owns a country placeacross the bay: Tanglewood."
"A very able man; I wish I might have met him.... What of yourself?What have you been doing these three years? Have you married?"
"I've been too busy to think of that.... I mean, till lately."
"Ah?"
Amber flushed boyishly. "There was a girl at Quain's--a guest.... Butshe left before I dared speak. Perhaps it was as well."
"Why?"
"Because she was too fine and sweet and good for me, Rutton."
"Like every man's first love."
The elder man's glance was keen--too keen for Amber to dissimulatesuccessfully under it. "You're right," he admitted ruefully. "It's thefirst sure-enough trouble of the sort I ever experienced. And, ofcourse, it had to be hopeless."
"Why?" persisted Rutton.
"Because--I've half a notion there's a chap waiting for her at home."
"At home?"
"In England." The need for a confidant was suddenly imperative upon theyounger man. "She's an English girl--half English, that is; her motherwas an American, a schoolmate of Quain's wife; her father, anEnglishman in the Indian service."
"Her name?"
"Sophia Farrell." A peculiar quality, a certain tensity, in Rutton'smanner, forced itself upon Amber's attention. "Why?" he asked. "Do youknow the Farrells? What's the matter?"
Rutton's eyes met his stonily; out of the ashen mask of his face, thatsuddenly had whitened beneath the brown, they glared, afire butunseeing. His hands writhed, the fingers twisting together with cruelforce, the knuckles grey. Abruptly, as if abandoning the attempt toreassert his self-control, he jumped up and went quickly to a window,there to stand, his back to Amber, staring fixedly out into thestorm-racked night. "I knew her father," he said at length, his toneconstrained and odd, "long ago, in India."
"He's out there now--a Political, I believe they call him, or somethingof the sort."
"Yes."
"She's going out to rejoin him."
"What!" Rutton came swiftly back to Amber, his voice shaking. "What didyou say?"
"Why, yes. She travels with friends by the western route to joinColonel Farrell at Darjeeling, where he's stationed just now. Shortlyafter I came down she left; Mrs. Quain had a wire a day or so ago,saying she was on the point of sailing from San Francisco.... GoodLord, Rutton! are you ill?"
Something in the man's face had brought Amber to his feet, a prey toinexpressible concern; it was as if a mask had dropped and he werelooking upon the soul of a man in mortal torture.
"No," gasped Rutton, "I'm all right. Besides," he added beneath hisbreath, so that Amber barely caught the syllables, "it's too late."
As rapidly as he had lost he seemed to regain mastery of hisinexplicable emotion. His face became again composed, almost immobile,and stepping to the table he selected a cigarette and rolled it gentlybetween his slim brown fingers. "I'm sorry to have alarmed you," hesaid, his tone a bit too even not to breed a doubt in the mind of hishearer. "It's nothing serious--a little trouble of the heart, of longstanding, incurable--I hope."
Perplexed, yet hesitating to press him further, Amber watched himfurtively, instinctively assured that between this man and the Farrellsthere existed some extraordinary bond; wondering how that could be,convinced in his soul that somehow the entanglement involved the womanhe loved, he still feared to put his suspicions to the question, lesthe should learn that which he had no right to know ... and while hewatched was startled by the change that came over Rutton. At ease, onemoment, outwardly composed if absorbed in thought, the next he wasrigid, every muscle taut, every nerve tense as a steel spring, hiskeen, thoughtful face hardening with a look of brutal hatred, his eyesnarrowing until no more than a glint of fire was visible between thelashes, lips straining apart until they showed thin and bloodless, witha gleam of white, set teeth between. His head jerked back suddenly, hisgaze fixing itself first upon the window, then shifting to the door.And his fingers, contracting, tore the cigarette in half.
"Rutton, what the deuce is the matter?"
Rutton seemed not to hear; Amber got his answer from the door, whichwas swung wide and slammed shut. A blast of frosty air and a flurry ofsnow swept across the room. And against the door there leaned a manpuffing for breath and coughing spasmodically--a gross and monstrousbulk of flesh, unclean and unwholesome to the eye, attired in anextravagant array of coloured garments, tawdry silks and satinsclinging, sodden, to his ponderous and unwieldy limbs.
"The babu!" cried Amber unconsciously; and was rewarded by a flash ofrecognition from the coal-black, beady, evil eyes of the man.
But for that involuntary exclamation the tableau held unbroken for aspace; Rutton standing transfixed, the torn halves of the cigarettebetween his fingers, his head well up and back, his stare level,direct, uncompromising, a steady challenge to the intruder; the baburesting with one shoulder against the door, panting stertorously andtrembling with the cold and exposure he had undergone, yet with hisattention unflinchingly concentrated upon Rutton; and, finally, Amber,a little out of the picture and quite unconsidered of the others, notwithout a certain effect as of a supernumerary standing in the wingsand watching the development of the drama.
Then, demanding Amber's silence with an imperative movement of hishand, Rutton spoke. "Well, babu?" he said quietly, the shadow of abitter and weary smile curving hi
s thin, hard lips.
The Bengali moved a pace or two from the door, and plucked nervously atthe throat of his surtout, finally managing to insert one hand in thefolds of silk across his bosom.
"I seek," he said distinctly in Urdu, and not without a definite noteof menace in his manner, "the man calling himself Rutton Sahib?"
Very deliberately Rutton inclined his head. "I am he."
"Hazoor!" The babu laboriously doubled up his enormous body in profoundobeisance. Having recovered, he nodded to Amber with the easyfamiliarity of an old acquaintance. "To you, likewise, greeting, AmberSahib."
"What!" Rutton swung sharply to Amber with an exclamation of amazement."You know this fellow, David?"
The babu cut in hastily, stimulated by a pressing anxiety to clearhimself. "Hazoor, I did but err, being misled by his knowledge of ourtongue as well as by that pale look of you he wears. And, indeed, is itstrange that I should take him for you, who was told to seek you inthis wild land?"
"Be silent!" Rutton told him angrily.
"My lord's will is his slave's." Resignedly the babu folded his fatarms.
"Tell me about this," Rutton demanded of Amber.
"The ass ran across me in the woods south of the station, the day Icame down," explained Amber, summarising the episode as succinctly ashe could. "He didn't call me by your name, but I've no doubt he'stelling the truth about mistaking me for you. At all events hehazoor-ed me a number of times, talked a lot of rot about some silly'Voice,' and finally made me a free gift of a nice little bronze boxthat wouldn't open. After which he took to his heels, saying he'd calllater for my answer--whatever he meant by that. He did call by nightand stole the box. That's about all I know of him, thus far. But I'dwatch out for him, if I were you; if he isn't a raving lunatic, I missmy guess."
"Indeed, my lord, it is all quite as the sahib says," the babu admittedgraciously, his eyes gleaming with sardonic amusement. "Circumstancesconspired to mislead me; but that I was swift to discover. Nor did Ilose time in remedying the error, as you have heard. Moreover--"
He shut up suddenly at a sign from Rutton, with a ludicrous shrug ofhis huge shoulders disclaiming any ill-intent or wrong-doing; and whileRutton remained deep in thought by the table, the babu held silence,his gaze flickering suspiciously round the room, searching the shadows,questioning the closed door behind which Doggott lay asleep (evidenceof which fact was not wanting in his snores), resting fleetingly onAmber's face, returning to Rutton. His features were composed; hisface, indeed, might have been taken as a model for some weird mask ofunctuous depravity, but for his eyes, which betrayed a score ofdiffering phases of emotion. He was by turns apparently possessed byfear, malice, distrust, a subtle sense of triumph, contempt for Amber,deference to Rutton, and a feeling that he was master not alone of thesituation but of the man whom he professed to honor so extravagantly.
At length Rutton looked up, suppressing a sigh. "Your errand, babu?"
"Is it, then, your will that I should speak before this man?" TheBengali nodded impudently at Amber.
"It is my will."
"Shabash! I bear a message, hazoor, from the Bell."
"You are the Mouthpiece of the Voice?"
"That honor is mine, hazoor. For the rest I am--"
"Behari Lal Chatterji," interrupted Rutton impatiently; "solicitor ofthe Inner Temple--disbarred; anointed thief, liar, jackal, lickspittle,and perjurer--I know you."
"My lord," said the man insolently, "omits from his catalogue of myaccomplishments my chiefest honour; he forgets that, with him, I am anaccepted Member of the Body."
"The Body wears strange members that employs you, babu," commentedRutton bitterly. "It has fallen upon evil days when such as you arecharged with a message of the Bell."
"My lord is harsh to one who would be his slave in all things.Fortunate indeed am I to own the protection of the Token." A slow leerwidened greasily upon his moon-like face.
"Ah, the Token!" Rutton repeated tensely, beneath his breath. "It istrue that you have the Token?" "Aye; it is even here, my lord." Theheavy brown hand returned to the spot it had sought soon after thebabu's entrance, within the folds of silk across his bosom, and gropedtherein for an instant. "Even here," he iterated with a maddeningmanner of supreme self-complacency, producing the bronze box andwaddling over to drop it into Rutton's hand. "My lord is satisfied?" hegurgled maliciously.
Without answering Rutton turned the box over in his palm, his slenderfingers playing about the bosses of the relief work; there followed aclick and one side of it swung open. The Bengali fell back a pace witha whisper of awe--real or affected: "The Token, hazoor!" Amber himselfgasped slightly.
Unheeded, the box dropped to the floor. Between Rutton's thumb andforefinger there blazed a great emerald set in a ring of red old gold.He turned it this way and that, inspecting it critically; and thelamplight, catching on the facets, struck from it blinding shafts ofintensely green radiance. Rutton nodded as if in recognition of thestone and, turning, with an effect of carelessness, tossed it to Amber.
"Keep that for me, David, please," he said. And Amber, catching it,dropped the ring into his pocket.
"My lord is satisfied with my credentials, then?" the babu persisted.
"It is the Token," Rutton assented wearily. "Now, your message. Bebrief."
"The utterances of the Voice be infrequent, hazoor, its words few--butcharged with meaning: as you know of old." The Bengali drew himself up,holding up his head and rolling forth his phrases in a voice of greatresonance and depth. "These be the words of the Voice, hazoor:
"'_To all my peoples:
"'Even now the Gateway of Swords yawns wide, that he who is withoutfear may pass within; to the end that the Body be purged of the ScarletEvil.
"'The Elect are bidden to the Ordeal with no exception._'"
The sonorous accents subsided, and a tense wait ensued, none speaking.Rutton stood in stony apathy, his eyes lifted to a dim corner of theceiling, his gaze--like his thoughts--perhaps ranging far beyond thedreary confines of the cabin in the dunes. Minute after minute passed,he making no sign, the babu poised before him in inscrutable triumph,watching him keenly with his black and evil eyes of a beast. Amber hungbreathless upon the issue, sensing a conflict of terrible forces inRutton's mind, but comprehending nothing of their natures. In the hushwithin-doors he became acutely conscious of the war of elementswithout: the mad elfin yammering of the gale tearing at the cabin asthough trying to seize it up bodily and whirl it off into the witches'dance of the storm; the deep and awful booming of the breakers, whoseincessant impact upon the beach seemed to rock the very island on itsbase. Somehow he divined a similitude between the struggle within andthe struggle without, seemed to see the contending elements personifiedbefore his eyes--the spirit of evil incarnate in the Bengali, vast,loathsome, terrible in his inflexibility of malign purpose; the forceof right symbolized in Rutton, frail of stature, fine of mould, strongin his unbending loyalty to his conception of honour and duty. TheVirginian could have predicted the outcome confidently, believing as hedid in his friend. It came eventually on the heels of a movement of thebabu's; unable longer to hold his pose, he shifted slightly. And Ruttonawoke as from a sleep.
"The Voice has spoken, babu," he said, not ungently, "and I haveheard."
"And your answer, lord?"
"There is no answer."
"Hazoor!"
"I have said," Rutton confirmed evenly, "there is no answer."
"You will obey?"
"That is between me and my God. Go back to the Hall of the Bell, BehariLal Chatterji, and deliver your report; say that you have seen me, thatI have listened to the words of the Voice, and that I sent no answer."
"Hazoor, I may not. I am charged to return only with you."
"Make your peace with the Bell in what manner you will, babu; it is noconcern of mine. Go, now, while yet time is granted you to avoid alonger journey this night."
"Hazoor!"
"Go." Rutton pointed to the door, hi
s voice imperative.
Upon this the babu abandoned argument, realising that furtherresistance were futile. And in a twinkling his dignity, his Urdu andhis cloak of mystery, were discarded, and he was merely anover-educated and over-fed Bengali, jabbering babu-English.
"Oah, as for thatt," he affirmed easily, with an oleaginous smirk, "Idaresay I shall be able to make adequate explanation. It shall be asyou say, sar. I confess to fright, however, because of storm." Heincluded Amber affably in his confidences. "By Gad, sar, thees climateiss most trying to person of my habits. The journey hither _via_causeway from mainland was veree fearful. Thee sea is most agitated.You observe my wetness from association with spray. I am of opinion ifI am not damn-careful I jolly well catch-my-death on return. But_thatt_ is all in day's work."
He rolled sluggishly toward the door, dragging his inadequate overcoatacross his barrel-like chest; and paused to cough affectingly, with onehand on the knob. Rutton eyed him contemptuously.
"If you care to run the risk," he said suddenly, "you may have a chairby the fire till the storm breaks, babu."
"Beg pardon?" The babu's eyes widened. "Oah, yess; I see. 'If I care torun risk.' Veree considerate of you, I'm sure. But as we say in Bengal,'thee favour of kings iss ass a sword of two edges.' Noah, thanks; theservants of thee Bell do not linger by wayside, soa to speak. Besides,I am in great hurree. Mister Amber, good night. Rutton Sahib"--with aflash of his sinister humour--"_au revoir_; I mean to say, till we meetin thee Hall of thee Bell. Good night."
He nodded insolently to the man whom a little time since he had hailedas "my lord," shrugged his coat collar up round his fat, dirty neck,shivered in anticipation, jerked the door open and plunged ponderouslyout.
A second later Amber saw the confused mass of his turban glide past thewindow.
The Bronze Bell Page 4