Devil's Wind

by Patricia Wentworth

  “It is too hot,” groaned Richard, after complying with the lady’s request once or twice.

  “No, it isn’t; it really isn’t. Not for me. Do it, do it, Captain Dick.”

  “Megsie Lizzie, would you like me to turn all purple, and cockle up, and be a crumpled heap, and melt, and nothing be left of me at last but a pile of clothes, and a moist, moist pool?”

  “Can you? Is that what would happen?”

  Megsie Lizzie’s eyes were like saucers.

  “Dick!” protested Helen.

  “Most probably,” sighed Captain Morton, mopping his brow.

  “Oh, then do!” and Megsie Lizzie clasped beseeching hands whilst Richard and Helen broke into unmannerly laughter.

  “Cruel person! And I’ve had such a day already. Don’t you think it would do if I melted some other time, when I am not quite so busy?”

  Megsie Lizzie gave the question some earnest thought.

  “You are very busy?”

  “Yes, dreadfully.”

  “Oh!”

  A pause, during which Helen opened her workbag, and took out a strip of embroidery.

  Then Megsie Lizzie delivered her ultimatum.

  “Very well. You may tell me a story instead.”

  “Good Lord, I don’t know any!”

  “About a little boy and a girl. You haven’t got any little girl, have you?”

  “No.”

  “Nor any little boy?”

  “No,” said Richard Morton.

  A little mist came between Helen and her work. Through the mist she saw her needle tremble. Something in Dick’s voice hurt her dreadfully, she did not feel as if she could bear to look up and see him with the child on his knees. She wondered if Adela felt so. Perhaps that was why she had spoken so sharply of the child. Oh, poor Adela!

  Helen’s foolish, soft heart was stirred with compunction, but the next moment Helen’s clear brain told her truly enough that Adela had never been fond of children, and had made scarcely a pretence of regretting her baby’s death.

  Helen’s affection for her cousin had ceased to be the old blind, adoring love. It was more maternal now. Adela’s faults were clear—her weakness manifest. And Helen gave of her strength, and gave, and kept on giving. The time when she expected any return was quite gone by.

  These thoughts passed in her like a flash, and as she bent her head she heard Megsie Lizzie say calmly:

  “I thought you hadn’t any little boy or girl. When I am grown up, I am going to have eighteen children and six of them will be boys, and seven of them will be girls, and three of them will be grown-ups, so as to help look after the others.”

  “Very thoughtful arrangement,” murmured Richard.

  “Yes—and I must have plenty of stories to tell them. So now, please, will you tell me about when you was a little boy?”

  “You are a very dexterous person, Madam.”

  “What is dexerous?”

  “It means right-handed,” said Richard, with the utmost gravity.

  Megsie Lizzie looked at both her hands. They might have been cleaner.

  “Oh!” she said, in her solemn way. “And now will you please tell me about when you was a little boy.”

  “No escape!” groaned Captain Morton; he looked at Helen, and she smiled and shook her head.

  In spite of quickly lowered lids he had caught the dazzle of tears in her eyes when Megsie Lizzie had asked the question a few minutes before. An instant’s resentment had given place to a strange feeling of sympathy and companionship, oddly coupled with a quick memory of having seen Adela push away a child who was trying to climb on her lap. That was when they were just married. He had felt a little chill then. He felt it again now. He made haste to speak.

  “It is such a long time since I was a little boy that I have forgotten all about it.”

  “Is it a hundred years?” asked Megsie Lizzie with interest.

  “No, not quite.”

  “Then I’spect you could amember it if you tried; I don’t forget things even if they happened a hundred and fifty years ago.”

  “What can you remember that happened a hundred and fifty years ago? That would be much more interesting than my story.”

  “Lots of things,” said Megsie Lizzie shortly. “Heaps and heaps, and heaps, an’ jungles, an’ tigers, an’ snakes, an’ hippomuses—an’ now will you please tell me about when you was a little boy?”

  Richard capitulated.

  “When I was a little boy, I lived in a tent with my father and mother.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really. I thought it great fun. And my father used to go out and shoot leopards, and all sorts of wild beasts.”

  “Hippomuses?”

  “No—not—er—hippomuses.”

  Megsie Lizzie looked suspicious and he went on hastily:

  “One day my father was out for a ride in the morning, and a man ran out of a village and said that a leopard had clawed his little boy, and was lying up in some long grass not far away.”

  “Was the little boy all clawed up dead?”

  Captain Morton threw a despairing glance at Helen, who did not quite see how she could assist him.

  “Er—yes, I am afraid he was. But my father didn’t know that, and if he had, it wouldn’t have made any difference, so he rode into the long grass with nothing in his hand but a hogspear, which he always took with him when he went out riding.”

  “Why did he take it?”

  “To prick the pariah dogs with when they got in his way.”

  “Oh!” said Megsie Lizzie, “it’s very inresting. What did your father do?”

  “He always rode very fast. The natives called him the Lightning Sahib, and he rode right into the leopard, and speared it, and the spear broke off short in the leopard’s chest, and my father’s horse reared up, and fell over backwards with him.”

  “Was he killed dead?”

  “No, not that time, but he didn’t know what was happening until he opened his eyes and found the leopard lying dead, and the village shikari talking very fast to the man whose son had been clawed, and three or four women crying very loud indeed, and he sat up and said—”

  “What did he say?”

  “Er—I don’t exactly know. I wasn’t there, you see, but I rather fancy he was very angry with the shikari, because he had spoiled the leopard’s skin.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “Well, he got up and he rode home, and slipped in by the back door.”

  “Of a tent?”

  Megsie Lizzie was down on him in a flash.

  “No, this was when we were living in a house. We did have a house. Well, he slipped in by the back door, and he put on another coat—a dark coat.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the leopard had clawed his arm before the shikari shot it. And he went in and sat down to breakfast with my mother.”

  “And with you?”

  “Yes. And now comes the part that I can remember for myself. My mother poured out the tea, and said how late he was, and helped him to a chop, and he took the plate, and said it was a very hot day, and then all of a sudden, down he went on to the floor, like a ninepin, when you knock it over. And when my poor mother got round to him, she was frightened to death, for his coat was all wet, and when she touched it, it came off red on her fingers, and she very nearly fainted herself.”

  “And what did you do?”

  “I ran and called the servants, and they took off my father’s coat, and found the sleeve of it all full of blood, and his arm and shoulder all clawed.”

  “And was he melting?” asked Megsie Lizzie in tones of passionate interest.

  Helen’s head went down, almost into her lap, only this time it was to hide a laugh.

  Richard Morton made no struggle,
he roared, and Megsie Lizzie looked much shocked.

  “I shouldn’t laugh if my papa was clawed. Nor if he was melting. I shouldn’t,” she observed; and Helen, at least, felt rebuked. There was an impressive pause. Then Megsie Lizzie asked:

  “Is that all?”

  “Nearly all. My father was very angry indeed, and he wouldn’t go to bed, but he had to let the doctor tie up his arm. The doctor said all sorts of dreadful things would happen, but they didn’t. The arm healed up all right.”

  “And then you all lived happily ever afterwards,” said Megsie Lizzie, in the perfunctory tone of one who makes an accustomed response.

  She slipped off Captain Morton’s knee, put on her hat, and jumped down from the highest part of the verandah, just at the corner.

  “And now I will get you a buttonhole,” she announced, and disappeared from view in a little cloud of dust.

  Richard looked after her with a grim smile.

  “No, there wasn’t much ‘happy ever afterwards’ about it,” he said. “The poor old governor was killed out pig sticking a year later, and my mother, whom he had spoiled, and adored, and treated like a queen, had to go home, and live on the charity of relations, who never ceased girding at her because she was left so badly provided for. No,” as Helen looked up in surprise, “there was no pension. My father left the Army as an ensign. He never could keep out of debt. He was a regular free-lance, you know. The natives adored him, and the old King of Oude swore by him, and I suppose he made a lot of money one way and another, but he never could keep a penny of it—he couldn’t say no to a friend, and in the end it was my mother who paid.”

  Helen looked up, her face very soft.

  “I never heard you speak of her before. Did she die long ago, Dick?”

  “Ten years. She made a very unhappy second marriage. A wretched business. We are an unlucky lot.”

  Captain Morton pulled himself up. His eyes were sombre. There was a moment’s silence. Then with an abrupt change of tone he asked:

  “Where is Adela?”

  Helen looked fixedly at her embroidery. The light had begun to fail, and the fine work required attention.

  “She has gone out riding,” she said in cheerful commonplace tones.

  Richard’s brow darkened.

  “Riding? She hasn’t anything to ride. I’ve been so busy, but I saw a little mare to-day that might do. With whom is she riding?”

  “With Mr. Purslake.”

  “Purslake? Is she riding one of his horses?”

  “I believe so.”

  Richard lay back in his chair, and put up one hand to cover his mouth and chin.

  “Purslake is not a man I care for,” he said in a studiously quiet tone. “Also, he is a very new acquaintance, and I don’t care about Adela being under any obligation. Do you think, Helen, that you could give her a hint that I would rather she didn’t make a friend of Purslake?”

  Helen hesitated. She guessed the effort with which Richard Morton spoke to her of his wife. Her heart began to throb painfully, she was so much afraid of saying the wrong thing—of making matters worse. That they were bad enough already she was well aware. On her arrival in Peshawur she had found a degree of estrangement which appalled her, and she had begun by thinking Richard hard. In the months that passed since then she had found it easier to comprehend his attitude. Her own relations with Adela had undergone a change. There had been scenes and quarrels. Helen hated quarrels, and was clever at avoiding them, but once and again Adela had hurt her very deeply. Such hurts heal, but in healing they harden too.

  “I think Adela knew him before,” she said quickly, when the silence had lasted so long that she felt she must say something. Captain Morton offered no comment, but there was a sarcastic expression about his eyes that increased Helen’s discomfort and made her say:

  “I don’t care for him either. He is silly, but quite harmless, I should say”; and she tried to laugh.

  “He is a cad,” said Richard Morton shortly.

  He rose, and walked to the edge of the verandah, just as Megsie Lizzie appeared with a handful of drooping flowers, which she pressed upon him.

  “An’ I must go,” she explained, “I must go at once, or I shall be late for saying Good-night to my mamma, because she is going out to dinner, and if she didn’t have time to hug me and God bless me first she would cry all into her soup, and that wouldn’t be at all polite. Goodnight, Captain Dick. Good-night, Helen lady,” and she slipped away, humming a queer little tuneless song.

  “Isn’t she funny?” said Helen in tones of relief. When Richard did not answer she went on more from a desire to turn the conversation than from any other motive.

  “Dick, she told me such an odd thing. You know all the talk there has been about those chupattis, and how every one said they meant something different?”

  “Yes.”

  Captain Morton was listening now.

  “Dick, I noticed you didn’t talk, when every one else did. Was that because you thought it all too silly—or—or—”

  “A most expressive ‘or,’” said Richard Morton, with half a laugh.

  The light had fallen so much now that Helen could not see his face, but she had the feeling that his eyes were intent upon her.

  “Well, that child said she heard their bearer talking to a brother of his who is a Sepoy in the 114th, and he said the message had gone everywhere.”

  “The message?”

  “Sub lal hojaega.”

  Helen shivered ever so little as she spoke. There was quite a breeze springing up, and the evening air struck chill, after the heat of the day.

  “What does it mean, Dick?”

  Richard Morton did not move.

  “Doesn’t your Hindustani take you as far as that, Helen?” he said lightly. “It isn’t very abstruse, ‘Sub lal hojaega’—Everything will become red.”

  “Yes, I know. I didn’t mean that. Why did Ram Chand say that everything would become red, and why did his brother answer: ‘And our hands too?’”

  There was a pause.

  Then Captain Morton moved a little, and said in his usual voice:

  “My dear girl, one can never fathom these native superstitions.”

  Helen got up.

  “Dick, did you ever know a woman who wasn’t inquisitive?”

  “My dear girl, never.”

  “Well?”

  Helen was standing beside him on the edge of the verandah, her chin lifted, and her brows arched, but Richard looked past her at the sunset. The sun was gone, and a line of dark ferash trees stood out as black as cypresses against the western sky. Behind their gloomy foliage shone a belt of clear blood-red. It glowed, and changed, passing from rose to scarlet, and from scarlet to a hot and dusky orange. With every change of colour the trees darkened, the light failed, and the breeze increased.

  “Well, Dick?”

  “Well, Helen.”

  Helen came a step nearer. She spoke in a hesitating manner. “Dick, I’m not a child.”

  “You are not. You are positively elderly. Only don’t harp on the fact, because I am ten years older than you are, you know.”

  Helen turned with a swish of her full skirts, gathered up her work, and swept to the door.

  “Lift the chick for me, Dick, will you,” she said in her usual voice, and as she passed into the lighted room she turned her head rather suddenly and looked Richard Morton full in the face. As soon as she looked at him, he smiled, but she had seen his eyes first. They were very grave, and there was a deep vertical line between them. Helen looked away again at once, and moved farther into the room. The freshening breeze followed her, and stirred her dress. Outside, the trees rustled.

  “How the wind is rising,” she said.

  CHAPTER X

  THE RISING OF THE WIND

  We broke the power
of the Kings, we took the sword away,

  And beat it into a ploughshare, for ever and a day.

  Mussulman and Mahratta, Sikh and wild Pathan,

  They should live together in peace, neighbourly man by man.

  No more raiding for loot, no more justice by favour;

  Life was a sorry affair, woefully lacking in savour.

  And the King of Oude, his captains, their sons and heirs, instead

  Must learn the English drill, and wear the English red.

  Sepoys, not captains they, their fathers’ greatness gone,

  What wonder if under the English red a pulse of hate beat on.

  March went out, and India lay under the heat of April. Between the hazy sky and the parched earth, no breath stirred save that impalpable breath of approaching dread. Unheard, unfelt, the wind was rising, the wind which the natives called the “Devil’s breath.” The air was full of the dust of rumour, and the dust fell, silently, unheeded. No one knew where the rumours came from. They were not, and then they were. They came as the dust comes, and no one knew how.

  A district, peaceful and contented one week, would be full of buzzing talk the next. Was it true that the new water-mills which the Company had set up were accursed things? Ai, brothers, who could tell? But why should they grind so cheaply? Could that be answered? A cousin at Koti had said that his uncle at Cawnpore had said that there was bone dust mingled with the flour—dust of pigs’ bones! The man whose cousin’s uncle lived in Cawnpore tore his hair, and wept, and praised all the gods that he had taken no grain to be ground in the Company’s mills. Those who had done so, slunk away, or held their heads very high, and praised their gods louder still. And the district seethed like water that is going to boil.

  In the lines the Sepoys talked. Always they sat, or stood in groups, and talked volubly. When an officer passed they stopped talking. Here and there one would look away. If he failed to salute his officer he had his excuse. He had not seen him. What did they talk about? Perhaps about Mungul Pandy of the 34th who had cut down his adjutant and the quartermaster-sergeant, in front of the quarter-guard at Barrackpore, no man putting out a hand to stay him.