Complete Works of Talbot Mundy

by Talbot Mundy

  “The pardon is for deserters,” King objected, “not for political offenders.”

  “Haugh!” said the Pathan, bringing down his flat hand hard on the hakim’s thigh. “I will attend to that for thee. I will obtain my pardon first. Then will I lead thee by the hand to the karnal sahib and lie to him and say, ‘This is the one who persuaded me against my will to come back to the regiment!”’

  “And he will believe? Nay, I would be afraid!” said King.

  “Would a pardon not be good?” the Pathan asked him. “A pardon and leave to swagger through the bazaars again and make trouble with the daughters and wives of fat traders — a pardon — Allah! It would be good to salute the karnal sahib again and see him raise a finger, thus; and to have the captain sahib call me a scoundrel — or some worse name if he loves me very much, for the English are a strange race—”

  “Thou art a dreamer!” said King. “Untie my hands; the thong cuts me.” The Pathan obeyed.

  “Dreamer, am I? It is good to dream such dreams. By Allah, I’ve a mind to see that dream come true! I never slew a man on Indian soil, only in these ‘Hills.’ I will go to them and say ‘Here I am! I am a deserter. I seek that pardon!’ ‘Truly I will go! Come thou with me, little hakim!”

  “Nay,” said King, “I have another thought.”

  “What then?”

  “You, who were seen to slay a man a yard this side of the border—”

  “Nay; half a mile this side!”

  “Half a mile, then. You who were seen to slay a fellow soldier of your regiment, and I who am a political offender, do not win pardons so easily as that.”

  “Would they hang us?”

  That was the first squeamishness the Pathan had shown of any kind, but men of his race would rather be tortured to death than hanged in a merciful hempen noose.

  “They would hang us,” said King, “unless we came bearing gifts.”

  “Gifts? Has Allah touched thee? What gifts should we bring? A dozen stolen rifles? A bag of silver? And I am the dreamer, am I?”

  “Nay,” said King. “I am the dreamer. I have seen a good vision.”

  “Well?”

  “There are others in these Hills — others in Khinjan who wear British medals?”

  The Pathan nodded.

  “How many?” asked King.

  “Hundreds. Men fight first on one side, then on the other, being true to either side while the contract lasts. In all there must be the makings of many regiments among the ‘Hills.’”

  King nodded. He himself had seen the chieftains come to parley after the Tirah war. Most of them had worn British medals and had worn them proudly.

  “If we two,” he said, speaking slowly, “could speak with some of those men and stir the spirit in them and persuade them to feel as thou dost, mentioning the pardon for deserters and the probability of bonuses to the time-expired for reenlistment; if we could march down the Khyber with a hundred such, or even with fifty or with twenty-five or with a dozen men — we would receive our pardon for the sake of service rendered.”

  “Good!”

  The Pathan thumped him on the back so hard that his eyes watered.

  “We would have to use much caution,” King advised him, when he was able to speak again.

  “Aye! If Bull-with-a-beard got wind of it he would have us crucified. And if she heard of it—”

  He was silent. Apparently there were no words in his tongue that could compass his dread of her revenge. He was silent for ten minutes, and King sat still beside him, letting memory of other days do its work — memory of the long, clean regimental lines, and of order and decency and of justice handed out to all and sundry by gentlemen who did not think themselves too good to wear a native regiment’s uniform.

  “In two days I could do the drill again as well as ever,” he said at last. Then there was silence again for fifteen minutes more. “I could always shoot,” he murmured; “I could always shoot.”

  When Muhammad Anim came back they had both forgotten to replace the lashing on King’s wrists, but the mullah seemed not to notice it.

  “Come!” he ordered, with a sidewise jerk of his great ugly head, and then stood muttering impatiently while they obeyed.

  He had twice the number of women with him, but none of them the same; and he had brought five ruffians to guard them, who pounced on the captured rifles and claimed one apiece, to the Pathan’s loud-growled disgust. Then the women were made to gather up King’s belongings, and at a word from the mullah they started in single file — the mullah leading, then two men, then King, then the Orakzai Pathan, and then the other three. The Pathan began to whisper busily to the man next behind and noticing that King looked straight forward and contented himself; his heart was singing within him unexplainedly; he wanted to sing and dance, as once David did before the ark. He did not feel in the least like a prisoner.

  They marched downward through interminable tunnels and along ledges poised between earth and heaven, until they came at last to the tunnel leading to the one entrance into Khinjan Caves. Just before they entered it two more of the mullah’s men came up with them, leading horses. One horse was for the mullah, and they helped King mount the other, showing him more respect than is usually shown a prisoner in the “Hills.”

  Then the mullah led the way into the tunnel, and he seemed in deadly fear. The echo of the hoof-beats irritated him. He eyed each hole in the roof as if Yasmini might be expected to shoot down at him or drench him with boiling oil and hurried past each of them at a trot, only to draw rein immediately afterward because the noise was too great.

  It became evident that his men had been at work here too, for at intervals along the passage lay dead bodies. Yasmini must have posted the men there, but where was she? Each of them lay dead with a knife wound in his back, and the mullah’s men possessed themselves of rifles and knives and cartridges, wiping off blood that had scarcely cooled yet.

  When they came to the end of the tunnel it was to find the door into the mosque open in front of them, and twenty more of Muhammad Anim’s men standing guard over the eyelashless mullah. They had bound and gagged him. At a word from Muhammad Anim they loosed him; and at a threat the hairless one gave a signal that brought the great stone door sliding forward on its oiled bronze grooves.

  Then, with a dozen jests thrown to the hairless one for consolation, and an utter indifference to the sacredness of the mosque floor, they sought outer air, and Muhammad Anim led them up the Street of the Dwellings toward Khinian’s outer ramparts. They reached the outer gate without incident and hurried into the great dry valley beyond it. As they rode across the valley the mullah thumbed a long string of beads. Unlike Yasmini, he was praying to one god; but he seemed to have many prayers. His back was a picture of determined treachery — the backs of his men were expressions of the creed that “He shall keep who can!” King rode all but last now and had a good view of their unconsciously vaunted blackguardism. There was not a hint of honor or tenderness among the lot, man, woman or mullah. Yet his heart sang within him as if he were riding to his own marriage feast!

  Last of all, close behind him, marched his friend, the Orakzai Pathan, and as they picked their way among the boulders across the mile-wide moat the two contrived to fall a little to the rear. The Pathan began speaking in a whisper and King, riding with lowered head as if he were studying the dangerous track, listened with both ears.

  “She sent her man Rewa Gunga toward the Khyber with a message,” he whispered. “He took a few men with him, and he is to send them with the message when they reach the Khyber, but he is to come back. All he went for is to make sure the message is not intercepted, for Bull-with-a-beard is growing reckless these days. He knew what was doing and said at once that she is treating with the British, but there were few who believed that. There are more who wonder where she hides while the message is on its way. None has seen her. Men have swarmed into the Cavern of Earth’s Drink and howled for her, but she did not come. Then the mullah w
ent to look for his ammunition that he stored and sealed in a cave. And it was gone. It was all gone. And there was no proof of who had taken it!

  “Hakim, there be some who say — and Bull-with-a-beard is one of them — that she is afraid and hides. Men say she fears vengeance for the stolen ammunition, because it was plenty for a conquest of India. So men say. So say these here, for I have asked them.”

  “And thou?” asked King, struggling to keep the note of exultation from his voice. He did not believe she was hiding. She might be staring into a crystal in some secret cave — she might be planning new mischief of any kind. But afraid she was surely not. And just as surely he could vow she was working out her own undoing.

  “I?” said the Pathan. “I swear she is afraid of nothing. If she has taken all the ammunition, then we shall hear from it again and from her too!”

  “And what of me?” asked King. “What will the mullah do with me?”

  “His men say he is desperate. His own are losing faith in him. He snatched thee to be a bait for her, having it in mind that a man whom she hides in her private part of Khinjan must be of great value to her. He has sworn to have thee skinned alive on a hot rock should she fail to come to terms!”

  That being not such a comforting reflection, King rode in silence for a while, with the Pathan trudging solemnly beside his stirrup keeping semblance of guard over him. When they reached the steep escarpment he had to dismount, although the mullah in the lead tried to make his own beast carry him up the lower spur and was mad — angry with his men for laughing when the horse fell back with him.

  Far in the rear King and the Pathan shoved and hauled and nearly lost their horse a dozen times at that. But once at the top the mullah set a furious pace and the laden women panted in their efforts to keep up, the men taking less notice of them than if they had been animals.

  The march went on in single file until the sun died down in splendid fury. Then there began to be a wind that they had to lean against, but the women were allowed no rest.

  At last at a place where the trail began to widen, the mullah beckoned King to ride beside him. It was not that he wished to be communicative, but there were things King knew that he did not know, and he had his own way of asking questions.

  “Damned hakim!” he growled. “Pill-man! Poulticer! That is a sweeper’s trade of thine! Thou shalt apply it at my camp! I have some wounded and some sick.”

  King did not answer, but buttoned his coat closer against the keen wind. The mullah mistook the shudder for one of another kind.

  “Did she choose thee only for thy face?” he asked. “Did she not consider thy courage? Does she love thee well enough to ransom thee?”

  Again King did not answer, but he watched the mullah’s face keenly in the dark and missed nothing of its expression. He decided the man was in doubt — even racked by indecision.

  “Should she not ransom thee, hakim, thou shall have a chance to show my men how a man out of India can die! By and by I will lend thee a messenger to send to her. Better make the message clear and urgent! Thou shalt state my terms to her and plead thine own cause in the same letter. My camp lies yonder.”

  He motioned with one sweep of his arm toward a valley that lay in shadow far below them. As far as the slope leading down to it was visible in the moonlight it was littered with what the “Hills” call “hell-stones,” that will neither lie flat nor keep on rolling, and are dangerous to man and beast alike. Nothing else could be made out through the darkness but a few twisted tamarisk trees, that served to make the savagery yet more savage and the loneliness more desolate. The gloom below the trees was that of the very underdepths of hell itself.

  The mullah pointed to a rock that rose like a shadow from the deeper blackness.

  “Yes,” said King, “I have seen.” And the mullah stared at him. Then he shouted, and the top of the rock turned into a man, who gave them leave to advance, leaning on his rifle as one who had assured himself of their identity long minutes ago.

  As they approached it the rock clove in two and became two great pillars, with a man on each. And between the pillars they looked down into a valley lit by fires that burned before a thousand hide tents, with shadows by the hundred flitting back and forth between them. A dull roar, like the voice of an army, rose out of the gorge.

  “More than four thousand men!” said the mullah proudly.

  “What are four thousand for a raid into India?” sneered King, greatly daring.

  “Wait and see!” growled the mullah; but he seemed depressed.

  He led the way downward, getting off his horse and giving the reins to a man. King copied him, and part-way sliding, part stumbling down they found their way along the dry bed of a water-course between two spurs of a hillside, until they stood at last in the midst of a cluster of a dozen sentries, close to a tamarisk to which a man’s body hung spiked. That the man had been spiked to it alive was suggested by the body’s attitude.

  Without a word to the sentries the mullah led on down a lane through the midst of the camp, toward a great open cave at the far side, in which a bonfire cast fitful light and shadow. Watchers sitting by the thousand tents yawned at them, but took no particular notice.

  The mouth of the cave was like a lion’s, fringed with teeth. There were men in it, ten or eleven of them, all armed, squatting round the fire.

  “Get out!” growled the mullah. But they did not obey. They sat and stared at him.

  “Have ye tents?” the mullah asked, in a voice like thunder.

  “Aye!” But they did not go yet.

  One of the men, he nearest the mullah, got on his feet, but he had to step back a pace, for the mullah would not give ground and their breath was in each other’s faces.

  “Where are the bombs? And the rifles? And the many cartridges?” he demanded. “We have waited long, Muhammad Anim. Where are they now?”

  The others got up, to lend the first man encouragement. They leaned on rifles and surrounded the mullah, so that King could only get a glimpse of him between them. They seemed in no mood to be treated cavalierly — in no mood to be argued with. And the Mullah did not argue.

  “Ye dogs!” he growled at them, and he strode through them to the fire and chose himself a good, thick burning brand. “Ye sons of nameless mothers!”

  Then he charged them suddenly, beating them over head and face and shoulders, driving them in front of him, utterly reckless of their rifles. His own rifle lay on the ground behind him, and King kicked its stock clear of the fire.

  “Oh, I shall pray for you this night!” Muhammad Anim snarled. “What a curse I shall beg for you! Oh, what a burning of the bowels ye shall have! What a sickness! What running of the eyes! What sores! What boils! What sleepless nights and faithless women shall be yours! What a prayer I will pray to Allah!”

  They scattered into outer gloom before his rage, and then came back to kneel to him and beg him withdraw his curse. He kicked them as they knelt and drove them away again. Then, silhouetted in the cave mouth, with the glow of the fire behind him, he stood with folded arms and dared them shoot. He lacked little in that minute of being a full-grown brute at bay. King admired him, with reservations.

  After five minutes of angry contemplation of the camp he turned on a contemptuous heel and came back to the fire, throwing on more fuel from a great pile in a corner. There was an iron pot in the embers. He seized a stick and stirred the contents furiously, then set the pot between his knees and ate like an animal. He passed the pot to King when he had finished, but fingers had passed too many times through what was left in it and the very thought of eating the mess made his gorge rise; so King thanked him and set the pot aside.

  Then, “That is thy place!” Muhammad Anim growled, pointing over his shoulder to a ledge of rock, like a shelf in the far wall. There was a bed upon it, of cotton blankets stuffed with dry grass. King walked over and felt the blankets and found them warm from the last man who had lain there. They smelt of him too. He lifted them and l
aughed. Taking the whole in both hands he carried it to the fire and threw it in, and the sudden blaze made the mullah draw away a yard; but it did not make him speak.

  “Bugs!” King explained, but the mullah showed no interest. He watched, however, as King went back to the bed, and subsequent proceedings seemed to fascinate him.

  Out of the chest that one of the women had set down King took soap. There was a pitcher of water between him and the fire; he carried it nearer. With an improvised scrubbing brush of twigs he proceeded to scrub every inch of the rock-shelf, and when he had done and had dried it more or less, he stripped and began to scrub himself.

  “Who taught thee thy squeamishness?” the mullah asked at last, getting up and coming nearer. It was well that King’s skin was dark (although it was many shades lighter than his face, that had been stained so carefully). The mullah eyed him from head to foot and looked awfully suspicious, but something prompted King and he answered without an instant’s hesitation.

  “Why ask a woman’s questions?” he retorted. “Only women ask when they know the answer. When I watched thee with the firebrand a short while ago, oh, mullah, I mistook thee lor a man.”

  The mullah grunted and began to tug his beard. But King said no more and went on washing himself.

  “I forgot,” said the mullah then, “that thou art her pet. She would not love thee unless thy smell was sweet.”

  “No,” said King quite cheerfully — going it blind, for he did not know what had possessed him to take that line, but knew he might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb. “No, if I stank like thee she would not love me.”

  The mullah snorted and went back to the fire, but he took King’s cake of soap with him and sat examining it.

  “Tauba!” he swore suddenly as if he had made a gruesome discovery. “Such filthy stuff is made from the fat of pigs!”

  “Doubtless!” said King. “That is why she uses it, and why I use it. She is a better Muhammadan than thou. She would surely cleanse her skin with the fat of pigs!”