by Talbot Mundy
Followed much laughter. It was funny to remember with what haste the headmen had scrambled to make friends with Mahommed Babar after the first one had shown the way. Hah! With what jealousy they competed for recognition! How they had flattered, who but ten minutes before were mouthing hot threats! How they had striven and intrigued for the privilege of being host to him!
Even now all the headmen were crowded together uncomfortably into one small room rather than let one man have Mahommed Babar’s private ear. Allah, what a stifling heat in there!
What a mess of argument! If Mahommed Babar were indeed a leader he would drive those headmen forth and claim his privacy! By Allah, that was a brilliant proposal! Who had thought of it?
They all had, since somebody said it was brilliant. Each nudged the other and insisted on having been the author of the praised remark.
Why — how was it brilliant? Hah! Any man with half an eye could understand that. Let there be a sign from Heaven. Was not that the authorized, established, ancestral way of deciding knotty issues? If Mahommed Babar should up and drive those headmen forth, thus proving himself greater and braver and wiser than the headmen, then let him be accepted as their leader! If not, then no.
Let Allah, Lord of Life, decide the issue. Then if Mahommed Babar drove the headmen forth it would be the verdict of Allah and —
The speaker was interrupted by the arrival of the headmen in more or less of a cluster, each doing his best to seem the most important without offering the others too much inducement to challenge him. For a while they all whispered and talked at once, unable to elect a spokesman, until at last the youngest of them seized the advantage, speaking very rapidly and loud to avoid interruption.
“We advise that you engage this man Mahommed Babar to be leader for the present,” he announced.
“We recommend it.”
“We have considered the proposal in council and we strongly advise it.”
“We will continue to be a council. He may do nothing without our approval. Subject to that, we advise you to appoint him leader for the present.”
“We are unanimous.”
“We urge you to agree to this at once.”
The headmen were undoubtedly unanimous, but in nothing so much as preventing any one of their number from rising a little higher than the rest.
There came another man into the mosque. He was laughing and full of communicative malice.
“He drove them forth! I saw! I heard! From the street I saw and heard! He called them bellies full of wind and said he will appeal to less opinionative folk! He said he will offer himself as leader before us all, and we may leave or take him. If we take him he will lead. By Allah, he will lead, said he. If we reject him he will go away and we may stew in our own juice! So he said, standing in the door with legs apart, and they went away and held a council afterwards.”
“Good! Let him be leader!” shouted someone, and they shouted agreement.
“But he must change that part about doing no violence to civilians! We must be allowed to loot or kill unhindered!” They agreed to that, too, unanimously.
“Let someone bring him and we will tell him so to his—”
The speaker’s jaw dropped. There was silence. In the door Mahommed Babar stood, with head bent a little forward and hands behind him. He appeared to meet the eyes of every man in the mosque before he spoke. Then:
“I told these headmen that I will be your leader,” he said quietly. “Does anyone object?”
None did. At least none cared to voice his disapproval.
“Very well, then,” he said after a full minute. “I will lead. Henceforth there will be no killing of unarmed civilians. But there will be a plan and a purpose, and no back talk. I will give my orders to the headmen, who will enforce them. By Allah, since you have named me leader, I will lead!”
CHAPTER 10. “Hostages.”
People live on the slopes of Vesuvius. They speak of the volcano’s cruelty, its sudden anger, its destructive outbursts — of the names of its slain, of the square leagues of vanished orchards, and of the cities buried under lava. They continue to live on the slopes of Vesuvius. The profits while peace lasts are greater than on the crowded plains, and the human gambling instinct draws them to settle again among the smoking lava beds between eruptions.
Hindus live in Moplah country. They speak of the Moplahs’ cruelty, their sudden anger, their destructive outbursts — of the names of the slain, of the square leagues of vanished cultivation, and of the cities buried in jungle that once hummed with Hindu life. Hindus continue, nevertheless, to live in Moplah country. The profits while peace lasts are greater than on the crowded plains, the gambling instinct draws them to resettle the smoking villages between outbursts of fanaticism.
The Hindus were there first, just as people were there before Vesuvius. Once in every fifty years or so since the Moplahs’ first invasion, which is oftener than Vesuvius breaks loose, the Moplahs have readjusted the balance in their own favor, adding to themselves new wives, new cattle, new money, and new blood in the shape of compulsory converts. Estimates of the number of Hindus killed on those occasions vary from a score to a million, according to whether Hindu or Moslem makes the estimate and whether the inquirer is merely curious or a British Government official.
Undoubtedly there is more looting than murder, just as Vesuvius impoverishes more people than it slays. The Hindu can run and, moreover, has a merry little way of accepting the creed of Islam temporarily, together with its permanent brand, and reverting to Hinduism when the storm is over.
For the profits are prodigious. The Moslem is literal-minded. The Koran forbids charging interest, so he never charges it, but he will pay it willingly. And whereas under the ancient Moslem law no man’s land or house could be attached for debt, the British have changed all that; a mortgage has become the money-lender’s chief security. And a Hindu would rather lend money than till fields, especially with the legal maximum at twenty-four percent.
So once in a generation or so the balance really calls for readjustment, and it is only the Moplah’s method that is reprehensible. Like Artemus Ward’s kangaroo, he is an “amoosin’ cus.” He redistributes the money-lender’s surplus and converts the villager to Islam, but is careful to leave the money-lender unconverted, in order to have someone from whom to borrow by and by. And although he plunders the towns and villages and puts priests to the sword, he as often as not leaves the Hindoo temples unharmed, in order to tempt the Hindu back again when recurrent peace sets in.
It was so at Podanaram, which the legends say was an enormous city before the Moplahs came. That may be true, for the Hindu temple that stands in the midst with narrow streets criss-crossing around it in every direction is much too big and well-built for a town of the present size. Some of its stones are enormous. There are evidences of its being an ancient Buddhist temple made over by the Hindus, although the Hindu carving has suffered, too, where the iconoclastic Moslem has knocked off ears and noses.
The temple appears suddenly and sets you wondering, just as Podanaram appears unexpectedly amid the jungle at the end of a winding forest path. The jungle has invaded the ancient city in sections, gaining foothold where it may, and enormous trees make it impossible to gain any idea of the size of the present community, or even to see the temple from anywhere except in front; the temple’s rear is plunged into impenetrable gloom, and from overhead the monkeys drop down on to its pagoda-like roof, which in places has been rubbed into grooves by the action of branches and wind.
Podanaram now was headquarters of the most radical Moplah puritan reformists. The Hindu temple was official G.H.Q. Just as Cromwell stabled horses in cathedrals, the pupils of the Ali Brothers chose the most sacred Hindu shrine available for their designs against the Hindus, and the famous Alis being in hail elsewhere, those who carried on the good work were much more thorough than their teachers might have been.
The Moplahs, being sons of their sires, were split into factions, of cours
e, although not so badly as usual. The rabid, self-elected G.H.Q. at Podanaram was aiming at unity by force of a good example. So they seized a hundred Hindus, men and women, and made them clean that temple from cellar to roof, there being nothing under the blue sky filthier than a Hindu place of worship, nor anything cleaner than a Mahommedan mosque.
Having cleaned the temple thoroughly, the Hindus were marched in procession to distant villages, where a dozen or so in each place were publicly and painfully executed, to the greater glory of Allah, who is the Father of mercies and men, and never sleeps.
Very ingenious, that. There was not a village in the radius of twenty miles thereafter that could claim no Hindus had been butchered in its midst. All being equally guilty, all must unite in repudiating foreign rule, repelling British troops and raking the coals of Jehannum. Nothing like blood-guiltiness to stir fanaticism, which was stirred accordingly.
Meanwhile, in a clean-swept G.H.Q., the puritan reformers began their bid for power, as such gentry always did and do. Loot, rapine, reformation, destruction of idolatry — those were the wages of the blind-obedient. Power was the reward of brainwork, and the key of all contentment. They chose, and would take nothing less. Control. The Key of Everything.
There were the individuals who had been taught by the cleverest agitators in the East. That their teachers were in jail only keened their appetite for vengeance and rebellion. Supplied with funds from the common Hindu-Moslem purse, they urged the butchery of Hindus, not because they cared, but because that was sure to be obeyed, and obedience is the very bones of power.
Schooled by shrewd demagogues, they knew that the outcome must be defeat. Therefore they planned for such disaster as should make the Moplahs turn toward themselves more desperately. For such outrage as should force the British hand and oblige retaliation. Then for such advertisement of British ruthlessness as should set alight the whole fire of Moslem India. By that light they expected to see their way to power indeed.
But little by little! First Moplah-land. Power first over the factious villages, never forgetting for a moment the obligation to provide for their own individual safety in any event. Better jail than death, for a man may use his brains between four walls. Knowing defeat was inevitable, they could plan for the days beyond defeat, and did.
And the first consideration of G.H.Q. must be intelligence. Village by village they arranged for spies, mullahs mostly, who kept them informed of every development. In the beginning, when a village sent its men-folk on a raid, G.H.Q. invariably sent a messenger in pursuit, who ordered just that raid in the name of G.H.Q. emphatically — only they called themselves the Khalifate Committee, which sounded more orthodox. So the suggestion of obedience was imposed and grew. None seemed to know exactly who the Khalifate Committee were, which helped immensely, and almost from the start men who would have defied their own headmen to their teeth obeyed the Khalifate Committee without murmur.
There are principles for winning the control of men, just as there are for training dogs. There are men who teach them; other men who study them as keenly as bankers investigate the laws of money. You take away a bone from a puppy, and presently give it back perhaps, to demonstrate your absolute authority, and by and by the puppy lets you do it with an air of resignation, almost reverence. You must do the same thing to a crowd if you hope ever to exercise unquestioned sway.
There came along a fire-lane through the forest a crowd of a hundred and fifty men carrying the plunder of a mixed train, dragging an elderly white man with them, who had warts and a butler’s face, and carrying the prisoner’s unconscious wife on an improvised litter. There were other prisoners, but those were the important ones. Incidentally they were also the greatest nuisance, since it took four men to bear the litter and four more to drag and shove the judge along.
He had said he was a judge, which was why they had spared his life from the start, and there was no precedent in living memory for killing or mishandling a white woman, so they had brought his wife along too.
The loot was very good indeed, including rifles. Most of the other prisoners were young women from a Hindu village down along the railway line — entirely satisfactory. The judge and his wife were a speculative quantity — perhaps profitable, perhaps not; certainly a cause for pride, but as inconvenient as a pair of European boots and quite likely dangerous, if one only knew.
They had sent word by runner concerning the judge and his wife, partly in spirit of boastfulness, but also to see what the reply would be — not to the Khalifate Committee in Podanaram, for that would have conceded too much, but to a village whose mullah they well knew would forward the news to the Khalifate Committee. Thus they could obtain a professional opinion without confessing themselves in need of it.
The professional opinion met them in the form of a stern command delivered to them in a forest clearing by a sub-committee headed by an ex-Brahman who had been forcibly converted twenty years before and wisely had made the best of the situation. A Brahman is constitutionally bent on self-assertion and inclined to reach the top, like scum on water. Nearly always an adept, too, at establishing his claim over ignorant men.
He told them to give up their white prisoners — to surrender them to the Khalifate Committee, who would take charge of them and be responsible. The men who carried the litter, and who shoved and dragged the judge, complied without demur; so the headmen were presented with a fait accompli, which like possession is nine points of almost any argument. The ex-Brahman ordered his own party to take the prisoners away, and himself stood guarding the retreat exactly in the middle of a narrow jungle path, like a swag-bellied Cerberus.
“The Khalifate Committee takes charge of all white prisoners,” he announced. “Whoever conceals or neglects to hand over a white prisoner will be punished. You are allowed to keep all other loot,” he added, as if that were a concession granted by incontrovertible authority.
It was cleverly done. The moment was accurately chosen. The raiders wanted to go home and eat, brag, sleep. They decidedly did not want to go to Podanaram and argue with men who were almost certain to have the best of any argument except possibly force. The headmen could have accomplished nothing by going without their following, who would almost certainly have refused to go, and all who were in favor of not carrying litters or pully-hauling corpulent kadis* said, “Aye.” The “Ayes” had it. The raiders sought their own villages, one of which was that in which King lay nursing a bruised head and Mahommed Babar was establishing himself. [* Judges]
And so it happened that after many hot hours and much imprecation the judge and his wife were presented like captured animals before the door of a temple that would have stirred the judge’s archaeological lees on any other occasion.
Mrs. Wilmshurst had recovered consciousness. In fact she had done that some hours ago, but had played ‘possum for fear of being made to walk again in high-heeled shoes. The litter lay on the stones of the temple forecourt, and she sat on it, staring and being stared at by a row of Moslems, who varied all the way from cardinal-like sanctity to perfect ruffianism.
They broke no rules. As ever in such cases, they were nearly all foreigners — mostly from places as far removed as New York is from Mexico. The sprinkling of native-born Moplahs among them was enough to lend a skimpy patriotic flavor to the whole, as if a Moplah or two had felt obliged to import advisers. Enough Moplahs, in fact, were there to take full blame for the whole committee’s actions, and being ignorant savages they were swamped meanwhile — bewildered — almost ignored — but kept in a suitable state of amenity by dint of flattery and bribes.
Their day of disillusionment was coming, when the time should come to surrender and send in those responsible for outrages. For the present the Moplahs stood long-haired, open-mouthed, marveling at fortune that had sent them British prisoners.
The men from Calcutta, Bombay, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Aden, Peshawar and the far North saw fit to be more polite to the judge and his wife than the Moplahs might have bee
n if left to themselves. More polite and less agreeable. The Moplahs would have grinned and gloated, but would have fed them and let them wash.
There was a table, looted from where Allah only knew, but a good, teak, Christian table, set under the temple portico on the thousand-year-old flagstones just within the limit of the shade so as to have the advantage of whatever breeze was moving. Around that were chairs — one each for the committee, some of whom, Moplahs especially, had never sat on chairs until fate pitch-forked them into such prominence. They took their places, with an oily-haired Moplah at the table head for sake of the advertisement, nearly all cross-legged but some enduring the European posture as, for instance, Mrs. Wilmshurst endured her shoes, and the judge and his wife were requested to stand at the end of the table opposite the chairman.
The language elected was English, probably because the choice implied a patronizing air toward the judge.
The chairman had nothing to say. He stuck his tongue in his cheek, displayed his magnificent teeth, and lolled with his elbows on the table, making an occasional scrawl on paper with a quill pen, perhaps to disguise the fact that he could neither read nor write. He was a very obvious figurehead and none too beautiful.
The man who opened on the judge was an under-sized dapper little Delhi Moslem, seated on the chairman’s right, who looked and spoke as if he might have been a practising lawyer. His mild brown eyes were only mild at the first impression. They were unflinching really — bold — calculating — afraid of nothing — and a lot too shrewd to take his share of the risks. That dark shade of brown that grows harder and darker as you look at it.
He recognized the judge, instantly, but gave no sign. The judge was not sure. There was something about the man’s deliberate impudence that seemed familiar, but of course he had seen hundreds of the same type from the bench, and he did not care to run the risk of appearing to curry favor by recognizing someone whom he was not sure he knew. He stood with his hand on his wife’s shoulder, helping to support her, and glanced from face to face, but always back again to the brown eyes of the undersized man from Delhi.