The Venus of Konpara

by John Masters

  He swore, finished the whisky, and poured another. He saw Huttoo Lall, the headman of Konpara, approaching across the lawn. The man made a salaam at the foot of the verandah, directly below Foster. Jim greeted him with a wave of the arm. Huttoo Lall was a good fellow. Didn’t look like much but everyone knew who was the boss in his village. ‘What is it? he asked in Hindi. He spoke with a bad accent and a limited vocabulary, but he could make himself understood.

  The headman said, ‘I have come to ask whether you wish me to strike those two men off the work lists from my village. The ones who were fighting in the conduit this morning.’

  Foster waved his hand. ‘No,’ he said. ‘You punish them with words. Swear at them.’

  The headman said, ‘Thank you, sahib. They are not bad men.’

  Foster said, ‘Your men work well... except for the drunk.’

  The headman said, ‘Work had not started then, sahib.’

  ‘No, it hadn’t,’ Jim agreed. ‘The drunk’ was a strange occasion, soon after the irrigation scheme had been agreed on and explained to the headman, when the whole village and all the Gonds on the upper plateau were drunk for five days and nights on end. Since then their work and sobriety had been exemplary. They had worked much better, in fact, than his imported Nagpur coolies, which was unusual. Well, when it was finished, and good land in the valley was ready for them, the whole village would be moved-down there, so they had something to work for. That must be the reason.

  The headman said, ‘That is all, sahib. I am on my way back to Konpara. Oh! I hesitate to mention it, but perhaps ... there are no tigers in the Pathan country, you see, and perhaps the foreman does not know how great a risk he runs...’

  Jim frowned,’ ‘What are you talking about?’

  The headman said, ‘Kendrick Sahib has not yet succeeded in slaying the man-eater. To move about at night, away from the village, is dangerous. As one of my people returned from wood-cutting in the jungle, he saw Shahbaz Khan and Ahmed driving a bullock cart along the old jungle road. It may be, of course, that...’

  ‘When?’ Jim asked.

  ‘Just now, not more than a quarter of an hour ago. It would...’

  That’s all right,’ Jim said. ‘I’ll see to it’

  The headman bowed and drifted away into the darkness, heading along the path that led past Southdown to Konpara.

  As soon as he had gone Jim jumped to his feet. Shahbaz Khan and Ahmed, with a bullock cart. On the old jungle road to Vishnuswara. What the hell were they doing, at this time of night? Moving earth? Going to fetch something? He stiffened. The blood flowed from his face and neck, leaving the skin a mottled red and white. Something had been found! And ten per cent wasn’t enough for the thieving swine. He ran into his room, found a pistol, made sure it was loaded, fastened on his belt and holster, and hurried out.

  In a moment he was in the darkness, but he had been walking these trails for over two years’ now, and he moved fast The thought of the tigress made his skin creep, but then he thought of gold. How much had they got? He broke into a heavy purposeful run.

  Charles Kendrick, dressed for dinner in white duck trousers, black tie, black waistcoat and dinner jacket, sat reading a government paper on the verandah of Southdown. His wife, in evening dress, sat a few feet farther along, staring out at the darkness, doing nothing, saying nothing.

  Kendrick could not hold his attention on the paper. Who had moved the Buddha? He wanted to see him, talk to him, privately. Mohan and Smith, working together, with Rukmini as assistant, had considerably enlarged the crevice in the pit wall, and the air current still flowed in. The systematic search of the ground had stopped, and would remain stopped until the man-eater was killed, but some new due might be unearthed at any minute... would be, if Rukmini was ‘planting’ them.

  The headman of Konpara drifted up out of the darkness, crossing the lawn on his way to the servants’ quarters. Kendrick watched him. He was going to tell the butler to announce him. Kendrick put down the paper and called, ‘Huttoo Lall’

  The headman changed direction, came to the foot of the verandah, and made salaam. ‘What is it?’ Kendrick asked.

  ‘I came to ask, sahib; whether you needed another buffalo or cow to use as bait for the tigress tomorrow.’

  Kendrick said, ‘Not yet The Gonds have lost track of her. She’s somewhere on the far side of the upper plateau, but Aitu can’t tell where with sufficient exactness to make it worth while putting out bait. But have one ready - a buffalo calf.’ - The headman said, ‘Yes, sahib.’ A frown creased his face and he spoke hesitantly. ‘If she is on the upper plateau... I wonder whether Foster Sahib knows.’

  ‘Foster Sahib?’ Kendrick said. ‘What do you mean?’

  The headman said, ‘I have just come from the Rest House, sahib, where I mentioned to Foster Sahib that the Pathans were putting themselves in some danger by going in a bullock cart on the old Vishnuswara road, in the dark. A little later I went back, having dropped something, and saw Foster Sahib run out with a pistol He went in the direction of the old jungle road, which, of course, crosses the upper plateau.’

  Kendrick said, ‘H’m. Very foolish. I’ll speak to the sahib.’ He nodded in dismissal.

  When the headman had disappeared in the darkness down the path to Konpara, Kendrick sat up, his hands moving convulsively. Something was going on. The two Pathans, with a bullock cart, heading north-west, at this time of night Foster - rushing off after them, with a pistol, the pursuit more important than the danger from the man-eater. Foster had found the steatite seals in Indra’s Rock Tumulus, and said nothing about them - or about the bones until circumstances forced him to. Foster had provided money for the excavation.

  He jumped up, went into the bungalow and to the gunroom, drew out a rifle from the rack, found the key of the safe on his key chain, opened the safe, drew out the bolt for that rifle, fitted it in, relocked the safe, seized a loaded cartridge belt off a numbered hook, loaded both barrels of the rifle, and walked out of the bungalow by the back way. He moved at a steady walk, not fast, not slow, the rifle cocked and held ready. He, at any rate, would not forget that the tigress could take a hand in this criminal enterprise - for that, surely, it must be. Treachery; he smelled it heavy and rancid in the air. An intrigue against him. Money also, he smelled. The darkness down the ridge swallowed him.

  A minute after he had disappeared, his wife rose, walked into the bungalow, went to her room, and quickly changed out of her evening slippers into strong walking shoes. Then she left the bungalow by the front door, strolled slowly across the lawn, and, as soon as she was out of range of the verandah lights, lifted her skirts and broke into a breakneck run, running as fast as she could, stumbling sometimes, the boughs of the trees reaching out in vain to slow her.

  Jim Foster strode up the old jungle road, the pistol now in his hand. He did not think the two Pathans would attack him, but it was possible. It depended on how much gold they had found - and stolen. One more bar? Two? It was very dark, and the jungle very silent. He walked fast for a hundred paces, and then stopped for a second to listen. The bullock cart could not travel faster than two miles an hour.

  There must be at least six bars of gold, or they would have fled on horseback. A hundred and eighty thousand rupees. He licked his lips, paused, listened. Not a sound. The hoofs of the bullocks would make more noise than his own feet on the dead leaves. But Ahmed might be walking a couple of hundred yards behind the cart, just to catch someone following. He gripped the revolver more tightly. The swine would get a bullet if he tried anything.

  He stopped again. Not a sound. Yes, there was though. Breathing. Jim pressed himself behind a tree, his own breath coming shallow and uneven. The other breathing was steady, deep, slow. Very loud for a man’s. A tiger’s. His knees shook with uncontrollable terror.

  A ruffling, blowing snort sent a convulsive jerk down both arms, so that he all but fired the revolver. In the same instant he recognised the sound - a bullock blowing through its n
ostrils. He raised his yoke. ‘Shahbaz Khan, I can see you.’ No answer. ‘Shahbaz Khan, Ahmed, don’t try anything. Several people know I’ve come out after you.’

  No answer.

  He waited, pressed against the tree. The bullocks steadily breathed. One of them blew again through his nostrils. Jim took a step forward. The cart couldn’t be more than fifteen paces off. He crept up the side of the track towards it. At ten paces he saw the white bulk of the bullocks and the vague shape of the can. Two more and he saw a pattern of blackness in the track beside the near wheel of the cart. One more, and he saw another shape spread over the front of the cart The bullocks snorted and jerked the cart into motion. He ran forward and caught them, and after a moment they stood again, patient Jim knelt beside the shape in the road and saw that it was Shahbaz Khan. He put out his left hand, nervously, and touched the face. Warm. ‘Shahbaz Khan,’ he muttered, ambling. The open mouth did not answer. Jim jumped up and looked at the other, the body sprawled over the front of the cart Ahmed. Ahmed did not answer, either. Jim stumbled to the front of the cart. A hurricane lantern was hanging from the usual place on the shaft. He unhooked it, found a match in his pocket, and lit it. The light spread, and he lifted it to Ahmed. The face was contorted, the body bent like a jack-knife. No wound. Yes, there was: a cut in the back of the neck and a deep gouge in his right heel, just above the tops of the battered European shoes he always wore. Neither could have killed him, but he was dead.

  He took the lamp again and knelt beside Shahbaz Khan. Again no wound. He felt very cold and frightened, with a kind of tenor that he had not known to exist, not fear of a definite thing like a tiger, not fear of the unknown, but fear that was breathed into the lungs like air, and that entered through the skin like heat. Every second it possessed him more strongly.

  He seized the lantern and leaned in over the back of the cart He threw aside some straw and a bundle, and saw the bars. A. row of five. And another. And another... The straw hid the front of the cart. There might be another row. A hundred and fifty thousand a row. Four hundred and fifty thousand rupees mere before his eyes. His mind leaped up and away, fear vanished. Gold, gold, gold, the jungle shining under a brilliant golden light, and himself the centre of it He scrambled up into the cart and pushed the forward straw aside.

  The flat snake head rose, swaying, rising just beyond his hand, higher and higher, level now with his knee, a foot away. The forked tongue flickered ceaselessly; the sharp eyes held his own. The hood began to spread, the strong neck to arch back. The cobra reached its full height, the heavy coils moving a little under the straw, on top of the gold. Jim’s right hand jerked. The pistol fired.

  The cobra’s raised body sagged, blood spurting from the torn pulp at the top. Jim hurled himself out of the cart, and fell, rolling over and over among the leaves and tree roots.

  For a minute he lay retching, holding the earth with his hands. The lantern still burned inside the cart. Jim climbed to his feet. Now he knew what had killed the two Pathans. The gold remained. The nausea left him. He had twenty bars of gold. Six lakhs of rupees. The golden light came back into the world. Six bloody lakhs. A country house in England, more suits of clothes than he would know what to do with, servants to boss about the way he’d been bossed about, pictures in golden frames. Barbara Kendrick’s pictures, they’d be.

  His mind began to race. He wouldn’t have one rupee if Kendrick got to hear of this. Or Mohan. The Pathans were dead. No one else knew gold had been found, or, if so, how much. Must leave some in the cart to explain why the Pathans were running away. Enough to need a cart Say four bars. Take the other sixteen into the jungle here, cover them with leaves, come back tomorrow.

  He jumped up into the cart, picked up the slowly writhing body of the cobra and heaved it over the side. He picked up a gold bar.

  He heard a swish of leaves and a patter of feet down the road, in the direction from which he had come. He put down the gold bar and drew the pistol from its holster. No one was going to take it. Not this much. Not when he was so close to...’

  ‘Jim,’ a voice called close. ‘Jim, is that you?’

  He stood, dumbfounded. Barbara Kendrick came out of the darkness. A meaningless tangle of thoughts whirled through his head. One stayed, made sense. He jumped down. ‘What are you doing here?’ He held her arm. ‘The tigress! You might have been killed!’

  She was out of breath, and leaned forward, drawing the air into her lungs with slow, painful gasps. After a few moments she stood up shakily. ‘My husband’s coming. With a rifle. He thinks he’s going to catch you doing something wrong. I know his face, every expression, every thought.’

  Jim’s shoulders slumped ‘Yes’ he said heavily ‘I was doing something wrong.’

  ‘I didn’t want him to catch you,’ she said.

  Staring at her, he saw that she meant it. She didn’t want him to do wrong, either, but saving him came first. He saw her eyes on the dead Pathans and said quickly, ‘I didn’t kill them. A cobra did. Now quick... get into the jungle here, out of sight, and when he comes I’ll delay.’

  ‘I’ll make my way back,’ she interrupted. ‘Don’t worry about me.’

  ‘But the tigress-’ he began.

  ‘I’m not afraid,’ she repeated, and slipped into the jungle. He followed her for a few paces and then stopped, listening to the fading fall of her feet, and afterwards, silence. He stood among the trees; motionless; thinking. She had come from Southdown through the jungle. Something stronger than liking made her do that. She had come several times during the week, to sketch where he was working. They had spoken more together in this week than in all last year.

  He heard a faint sound and. saw Charles Kendrick coming slowly up the track, his rifle in his hand. Jim made a small instinctive move, and all but a corner of his face was then hidden behind a tree, and that sheltered by leaves, and the tree in the darkness outside the circle of light thrown by the lantern in the cart Kendrick advanced steadily. If the light wasn’t burning, Jim thought I would think those stealthy steady sounds were the tigress stalking me. I would raise the pistol. He raised it Take careful aim at the sound. And wait. It would come on. I would swear it was the tigress. And afterwards, when I lighted the lantern. I would see my mistake; because I would see that I had shot Mr Charles Kendrick through the head and chest, with two or three shots fired in succession at ten-feet range. Then Mrs Kendrick would not have a husband, and Jim Foster would have several lakhs of rupees.

  The pistol held very steady in his hand. He noticed how steady it was, the barrel lined exactly with Kendrick’s right temple.

  And I would be farther from her than ever. A thief, I can stop myself being that. A murderer - she would like to kill him, but she doesn’t. It will have to come some other way. A force squeezed his finger against the trigger, and he pushed back against it. It was very strong, a force of the jungle, as strong and definite as the fear he had known before finding the cobra.

  Sweating, he won the silent battle. Kendrick passed, reached the cart Jim put the pistol carefully into the holster and called, ‘Mr Kendrick.’

  Kendrick swung round slowly. Jim walked out of the jungle. This is bad business,’ he said.

  Kendrick looked at him suspiciously. ‘What were you doing in there? What’s happened?’ He indicated the corpses with the barrel of the rifle. ‘Did you kill them?’

  Jim said, ‘I was looking to see whether they had hidden anything in the jungle. They were running off with twenty bars of gold. A cobra killed them.’

  Kendrick walked round the cart, examining the bodies and the gold. At length he said, ‘We will take everything back to the Rest House now.’ The two of them loaded the corpses into the cart. ‘The cobra, too,’ Kendrick said. ‘And its head.’ Jim had to hunt for several minutes before he found the shattered head and neck ten yards up the track.

  They turned the bullocks and headed back down the slope. Before they moved Kendrick broke off a sapling and stuck it into the centre of the path. H
e said, ‘That will mark the spot, to enable us to search the area carefully by daylight, in case some of the gold has been removed from the cart and hidden.’ They set off, walking beside the cart

  The bastard’s always suspicious, Jim thought, and always on the wrong track. None of the gold was concealed in the jungle; but the back of Kendrick’s head was there a few feet in front of him, and the pistol was still in his holster.... No, that was over, too. A whole way of life was over.

  The jungles were full of strange noises now, like birds stirring on their perches, or the slither of something, or a leaf falling. Barbara Kendrick had ran through these jungles over these rocks, to warn him. He acknowledged to himself, firmly, that he loved her. Encompassed in the same thought, without words, he acknowledged that a thief was not fit to love her.

  When, after another hour, they reached the Rest House, they found Mohan, Rukmini, and Barbara Kendrick there, all clothed for the jungle. Barbara Kendrick said, ‘You didn’t come back. I sent a messenger to Cheltondale...’

  ‘We were coming out to look for you,’ Smith said.

  Barbara Kendrick met Jim’s eye with a question. He nodded, and said aloud, ‘It’s all right,’ unable to contain his happiness or his new sense of determination.

  ‘What’s all right?’ Kendrick snapped. ’It looks very wrong to me.’

  Foster mumbled something, but Kendrick had already turned to the others. Servants bustled about carrying the gold bars into the bungalow. Smith was examining the bodies, and the two parts of the cobra, and untying the bundle.

  Kendrick said, ‘There are no other Mohammedans up here. You’ll have to send a message down to the mullah in Deori first thing in the morning, Foster.’ With Smith’s help he carried the bodies into a spare room. Jim noticed that Barbara did not flinch from them as they were taken past her. Rather, she bent to look more closely into their faces. By God, he thought with a sudden flash of intuition, I’m glad I’m not an artist. Barbara was. She had to understand and feel everything, including death.