by Talbot Mundy
“We’re alone,” he remarked.
“You are an evil man — a foreigner without right here,” said Jannath.
“That’s a question of opinion. Time presses. We should talk of facts,” Ommony answered.
Then he baited his hook shrewdly and cast warily.
“I have you beaten,” he said with an air of super-wisdom.
None more readily than Jannath would have scorned a mere show of diplomatic trumps. But an air of super-wisdom was something that the Brahman could not tolerate. His lip curled. Ommony looked wiser than before and sat down.
“I’ve outwitted you,” he told him, and the priest’s thin smile grew vague as he dallied with a dozen thoughts of how to overcome this boaster.
“Sir William Molyneux will come and will demand Memsahib Craig alive at the hands of you priests,” said Ommony. “I know all about the boatmen. I was there listening when you came last night and paid them fifty rupees each. I overheard every word you said.”
A look of astonishment, almost incredulity, escaped the priest’s control; but it was gone in a second.
“Parumpadpa will be in a tight place, won’t he?” said Ommony dryly. “Now if Parumpadpa had been wise enough to yield in the matter of the revenue from cut trees all this might have been avoided — mightn’t it?”
The glare of an insane ambition leaped into Jannath’s eyes. He almost gave assent, but checked himself.
“Parumpadpa has betrayed his office. Why don’t you act sensibly and hand over Mrs. Craig?” asked Ommony.
“You know I don’t know where she is!” sneered Jannath.
Ommony was no such fool as to admit his own knowledge, nor to enter into any bargain with an utterly relentless enemy. Fish catch themselves. That is the angler’s whole art, making it look tempting to the fish to do so.
“If I could have my way about the trees I might — perhaps — put information in your way that—”
Enough. The hook went home.
“I will not treat with you about the revenue from trees,” said Jannath, and his eyes assumed that insolent, inscrutable, superior stare that advertises treason in high places.
Outwitted? He had Ommony tricked two ways! He proceeded to emit a smoke- screen for his further confusion.
“Neither you nor I know where she is — nor anyone! You are an impudent impostor!”
He drew his white garments, symbolical of purity, about him, and without another glance in Ommony’s direction walked out, prefiguring high-priesthood in his stride. The door slammed at his back, and after a minute the diwan came in through the other door.
“What happened?” he asked.
“I hooked him!”
“The danger is that the priests will arouse the mob. They may think that by killing Sir William Molyneux—”
“No fear now,” laughed Ommony. “Jannath thinks he has the whole solution in his own head. He’ll restrain the orders until Brass-Face gets here. I’ve managed to fool him.”
“How?”
“To the Queen’s taste!” answered Ommony, who keeps in his inner man a quite peculiar regard for the late, by him, for one, lamented, Queen Victoria.
CHAPTER 11. “Think it over!”
That afternoon Ommony strolled down the street that leads by the Temple of Siva. The city was strangely quiet, lulled into an ominous unrest and doing nothing while it waited for the gods to make the next move within a day or two. That was what the priests had recommended busily since less than an hour after Jannath’s interview with Ommony.
In the temple portico stood Jannath, talking to his sycophants. He had stood there for an hour, since a spy brought word that Ommony was on the prowl; but Ommony, not knowing of that spy and only aware of another one who dogged him, took great pains to call attention to himself, examining old carvings on walls and doorposts all along the street. He appeared not to see Jannath, but continued his inspection of antiquities in that aggravating, superciliously interested way that white men have when they hope to prove they are not Philistines.
The moment he caught sight of him Jannath stepped into the shadow and slunk thence into the gloom inside the temple door. He watched. It was nearly five o’clock, so Ommony was very clearly outlined against house walls by the westering sun. A man with a carbine hidden under his cotton cloak stepped up beside the priest and showed the muzzle end suggestively, but Jannath shook his head.
“Leave this to me,” he said, dropping his lower lip until all the small, betel-stained teeth showed.
There was no objection to that. It was known Parumpadpa had imposed on Jannath the problem of confounding Ommony; suspected that the job was more than usually risky; well understood, too, that Jannath was ambitious; and remembered against him that by jealous habit he would bite the hand that helped him to success.
Jannath desired no witness. He beckoned off the spy who was dogging Ommony about the city, and gave orders none was to follow himself. Then when Ommony turned a corner out of sight Jannath set out alone in pursuit.
The sycophants laughed.
“So much he thinks of dignity!” sneered someone. “Is it possible to think of Parumpadpa acting thus?”
And they sat down in the cool shade of the portico to gossip of the two men, taking sides, not sparing either. Ommony, with one of those small mirrors in his hand that women carry in vanity bags in public, began to hurry. Soon after Jannath turned the corner behind him he pulled out his watch and made a gesture of alarm.
Thereafter Jannath had to put best foot forward, aping dignity how he might, while Ommony grinned to himself, as hard as nails from perpetual exercise. He had a notion to tire his hooked fish early in the game, and no idea of the extent of Jannath’s forethought. As they passed a great old archway that gave on to a stable-yard an ekka* drawn by a lean, dun pony came bumping out over the cobbles and followed the priest at a respectful distance.
—— — * A two-wheeled conveyance drawn by one horse —— —
So, though Jannath was blown and angry, he consoled himself when Ommony at last reached the clump of trees near the diwan’s office where he had tethered his horse. There was a mattress full length of the ekka, and a cover stretched over it on iron hoops. The priest climbed in, and lay full length.
Maybe the diwan saw through the window. Someone from the diwan’s office brought what might have been a map and handed it to Ommony, who studied it for a minute or two, sitting horseback so that the sun might shine from behind him over his shoulder.
Then, shoving the map, if it was that, into his pocket, he rode away. The ekka followed, the pony loping to keep up, and if Jannath did not grow seasick from the pitching it must have been because he had been a sailor in a recent incarnation.
Ommony set the pace just fast enough to keep the pony loping and the passenger worried. Time for undisturbed reflections might make Jannath reconsider his course, because, to put it mildly, it was risky and infra dig for a priest to do his own out-of-town espionage. There were obedient and reverent devotees by the score who would do that kind of thing for almost nothing.
But once more Ommony had banked on the inevitable. Pickpockets, footpads, common cheats and all the small fish hunt in schools. Big fish, aiming to supplant the biggest, stand or fall alone. They must. They know too much of their own treason to dare employ an underling who might betray.
If Parumpadpa were to learn that Jannath thought he held a key to the mystery, that key would have to be explained in council; or at very least in the high priest’s private ear, and gone would be all hope of Jannath’s using it for his own ends.
On the face of it Ommony’s moves might seem connected up with gossamer that the slightest accident would break. In fact he was depending on known habits of his quarry, such as fishermen and hunters use. The only risk now was that Jannath might grow fearful on account of distance.
Even the document sent down from the diwan’s office was a ruse. Ommony needed no map. He had had full directions from the diwan, and his woodsman�
�s head retained that sort of information as some minds remember limericks.
There is art in being hunted as in hunting. It required that touch of suggestion to make Jannath think perhaps Ommony was not quite sure of the way — a strong incentive to pursuit; ask any hunter — and to heighten conviction that the diwan, too, knew where Elsa Craig was hidden.
Two pigeons in one shot! If Jannath could discover her, use that information for his own ends and also convict the diwan, he was a made high priest! The only course left open then for Parumpadpa would be to resign, adopt the begging-bowl and wander for his soul’s sake.
“High time!” thought Jannath, lying on his elbows, holding his chin in both hands to offset jarring, and worrying the ekka’s driver with lay advice as to how to keep the horseman in view.
Ommony, holding that small mirror in his fist, had no need to look behind him until darkness fell. Then, in the short, fast deepening twilight he made believe there was a stone in his horse’s shoe, and so let the priest catch up.
When night fell, and no moon yet, he lighted a cigar and let the glow of that serve for navigating-light, for there were no roads, only cart-trails leading between field and field with the farmer folk’s small fires aglow at intervals.
The wonder of it was that Ommony, with only the diwan’s verbal outline and perhaps a map illegible in darkness, could lead unerringly. Life in the forests adds that gift to a man’s own birthright — that, or, if he has no birthright, makes a beast of him.
They splashed through fords. The priest in the ekka made nothing of the fact that Ommony did not look round or wait to see who followed. White men act so, riding up and down the land all-ignorant of what is in it for the sake of a, to them, agreeable aloofness — white men and priests. The rest wonder, waiting on Karma, the Law of Cause and Effect that compensates all errors in the end.
“He’s as selfish and blind and exclusive as all other white men,” thought Jannath. “Truly, whom the gods intend to ruin they insert into a white skin!”
He, too, believed in Karma, but you have to do a lot more than believe in it to profit by its absolute precision.
There was one incident that might have given Jannath an inkling that he was fish, not fisherman. The ekka wheels stuck between stones in a ford, and Ommony waited while driver and priest got down knee-deep in the muddy stream to lift the wheel clear. He could not afford to let them lose sight of him.
A new cigar was the excuse, but if the priest had thought at all he might have known that the first one was hardly half finished. Truly, whom the gods intend to ruin they make eager and ambitious, and too sure of their own cleverness.
Not long after that the moon rose and Ommony increased the distance between them, satisfied that he was silhouetted against the enormous amber lantern of the sky. He could hear the crack-crack-crack of a stick on the wearying dun, and put his own horse to a canter presently, for he saw an outline etched with moonlight that answered a description. It was nearly time to land his fish.
He was a long half-mile in the lead when he came to an ancient gate under an almost prehistoric arch, above whose gloom great trees stood luminous in the moon’s rays — but too far within the wall to be of use to intruders. He struck on the gate a dozen times with the butt-end of a riding-whip and then called out a dozen words that the diwan had entrusted to him. They acted like “Open, sesame!”
There was an answer from within, and the door swung open about an inch for an eye to peer through. Then it shut tight. Ommony’s voice had accomplished more than one thing. Out of the dark along the shadow of the wall a great beast bigger than a wolf came in ten-foot leaps and landed in front of the saddle, like a devil out of Scripture, on Ommony’s lap!
“Down, Di! Down!”
Diana licked his face and whined and wriggled like a puppy, leaped to the ground again and sprang back. Then, when Ommony dismounted, lay down to have her feet felt over in the dark for thorns. Ommony pulled two. There was no hurry.
The noise of the dun pony’s cantering had ceased. Jannath had dispensed with the ekka now, lest the driver share his information, and was coming forward on foot.
Ommony calmed the dog’s excitement; just one of her rare, exultant barks might have spoiled everything. Then, with her muzzle in his hand to make sure, he knocked on the gate again.
Once more it opened about an inch. He spoke through it, and shoved in a sheet of paper that bore the diwan’s seal. An old voice answered him:
“Sahib, beware! There is a great beast that none ever saw before. He-she- it is a female — has besieged this gate since morning. I am fearful—”
“That’s all right. I’m a tamer of such beasts. This one is sent by the gods to do the diwan’s bidding. See — I hold her with one hand!”
“Now listen: close the gate. Wait there. When I knock again three times, open it wide! But if I speak when I knock, don’t open it!”
There was no appeal beyond the diwan’s orders over his seal and signature. The old man grumbled an affirmative. The gate closed tight, and one bolt clanged in place.
Ommony faced about to school Diana, whose fault now was eagerness. She was willing to go forth and conquer — even to lie down and keep still, if only Ommony were close at hand. But he planned division of effort and did not dare raise his voice. It was a stick that made her understand at last. She went and lay watching where he told her to.
Ommony stayed at the gate, not still, but moving up and down impatiently, ascending and descending the brick steps; pacing irritably to and fro in front of it; ascending again to strike on the gate and demand admission in the proper manner of a sahib who can’t wake the gateman.
“I tell you I’ve the diwan sahib’s authority! Open, do you hear me!” he shouted.
Once he had to whisper, for the old man was alarmed and wondered what it all might mean — whether he had his orders right or had perhaps mistaken them. But only Jannath was mistaken. He came nearer — much too near. He had a dagger in his hand, contending there was no least need for Ommony in this world when once the secret of Elsa Craig’s whereabouts should be betrayed beyond all question.
Jannath avoided moonlight, kicked off his sandals, crept so close he hardly dared breathe for fear of discovering himself. Came closer — nearly trod on something in the dark that moved away an inch or two — and felt the goose-flesh rise as an unseen creature sniffed his leg! He raised the dagger instinctively. Moonlight glinted on the blade.
“Down him, Di!” Ommony yelled, and sprang too, to save the dog’s life.
No need! Diana was as sudden as a mine exploded under the feet of scouts in No Man’s Land. The priest’s heel caught in a root of undergrowth and he went down backward with a thump.
“Hold him!” yelled Ommony.
When he reached the place at a run the priest was on knees and one hand, swiping right and left with the dagger and jibbering obscenity, Diana growling and dancing this and that way with jaws going like castanets to keep him where he was. Ommony sent the dagger spinning with a blow of the riding-whip and caught the priest’s leg, turning him over on his back, where he lay still, breathing through his nose. There was very little said. Ommony said all of it.
“Get up! Hands above your head! Now walk in front of me! That way!”
Jannath obeyed, much less afraid of Ommony than of the dog, who growled at his heels. Long intimacy with the tricks to which men easily succumb makes Jannath’s kind complacent in the presence of force majeure. They know too many subtle ways of turning force against itself. But a dog is a different matter. The corners of Jannath’s eyes were on Diana’s teeth, not Ommony’s riding-whip.
Not speaking, Ommony struck three times on the gate. The bolt came clanging back. The gate opened half-timidly, as if the very wood had grown unused to intrusion.
“Forward!” Ommony commanded; and Diana went in first to make sure there were no traps for her master.
Instantly the priest switched round like an eel, aiming at Ommony’s eyes with th
e heels of both hands, with all his might. Ommony stepped back, and the closing door caught him between the shoulder-blades.
The double blow missed, but Jannath was behind it with another dagger snatched from inside his clothes, and again Diana saved the night. She heard and, swerving like a wolf, snapped hold of the dagger-wrist before the blade could quite touch Ommony.
The priest screamed, for the fangs bit bone. Ommony relieved him of the dagger and then ordered the dog to let go. The old gate-keeper, trembling as he barred the gate, gave tongue to his displeasure.
“But this is all unseemliness. Here should be peace! No strife! No quarreling! The diwan sahib—”
“Desires this!” Ommony interrupted. “Now! Where’s a safe place to lock this man up?”
“All is safe here, sahib. None can enter, none escape.”
“I’ll wager the rats get in and out. This priest is twice as smart! Show me a place with no window and a floor he can’t dig through with his fingers!”
The old man led the way down a path between shrubbery and flowers to a stone hut shaped like a little wayside temple. It was full of gardeners’ tools. Ommony pulled them all out, piling them in confusion on the path, and asked the old man to bring water “in something he can’t use to dig a hole with.” Then he spoke to Jannath.
“You’re a Brahman. Shall I dress that wrist for you?”
The laws of caste are iron — the higher, the more rigid. Jannath hesitated. He was afraid of dog-bites.
“All right, think it over,” said Ommony. “I’ll think too,” he added, grinning.
Then he shut the priest in along with a bowl of water the old man brought, padlocked the thick door himself, and put the key into his pocket.
“The memsahib? You came to see her?”
“Presently,” said Ommony. “Take her my compliments. Ask her to be ready to receive a sahib. Let me out first. I must go out and return.”
Outside he set Diana quartering the ground, for he guessed the priest had not come all that way barefooted. One pair of sandals look much like the next, but there are significant small differences, and the very last thing he wanted was a hue-and-cry.