by Talbot Mundy
Then he bowed himself out, and Quorn followed. “Look the other way,” he ordered. “Never recognize policemen when they are doing for you what they shouldn’t!” Then when they were out of earshot of the window: “Breaking hearts is not this babu’s special pastime. Self am masochist, not sadist. But she had to have it. If I hadn’t spanked her, she would have spanked me. And I don’t need it. I have been kicked around too much by destiny — the hussy!”
XXVI
“Give Her The Works And God Will Bless You!”
Quorn followed down the well-head ladder and let the cover of the well fall shut. In the darkness he could see nothing but the eyes of Gunpat Rao until the babu switched on a flashlight.
“Zero!” said the babu. The word went rumbling along the tunnel— “Ero — ero — ero.”
Quorn laughed. “Heroes? We’re a brace o’ cheap bums buying trouble.”
“Uble-uble-uble,” said the tunnel. “That’s what we are.”
“We are — we are.”
“That Maharajah will hire us murdered, that’s what he’ll do, even supposing we do pull this off. How much did he promise you?”
“Incalculable scads of money,” said the babu. “He expected to be blackmailed afterwards, so what did it matter what he promised? Yes, of course he means to murder us. But that is not what troubles me. He is too quiet. Even if he is drunk, he must be feeling like Macbeth. He must be getting lots of good and bad and worse advice, from people whom he detests, and all of whom detest him. And he certainly fears the Resident may get here too soon. It is time he hesitated. It is time he should do something silly. He doesn’t.”
The babu paused at the open entrance of the two-mile tunnel. He turned the flashlight into it. There was no sound — no sign of Ratty and the tiger.
“Maybe he knows something,” Quorn suggested.
“There was a danger,” said the babu, “that he might reinstate the head mahout and order the elephants kept in their compound. But I foresaw that. The head mahout is in the lock-up on a charge of murder. He is booked under a false name. The police made a little mistake.”
“How about his soldiers?”
“They foresee advantage if he should lose. Their commander is in favor of the Princess although he hasn’t the courage to say so openly. And the police are thoroughly against him. He blundered into their bad books a little while ago by pocketing the red light district conscience money. That had been their perquisite for ages. No.” He walked on. “I wish I could guess what he will do. It will be something silly. But it is the silly things that are unpredictable.”
He said no more until they reached the outer courtyard, where the elephants stood swaying quietly, now that the disgusting smell of tiger had disappeared. Moses had finished scrubbing out the van and had mopped it dry. He was admiring his handiwork.
“Put in a chair,” said the babu. Quorn’s best armchair was produced and Moses nailed it in place.
“Oxen?” Quorn asked.
“In the lavatory, using the wash-bowls as mangers. They are too slow. I have sent for a longer pole and we will use two elephants. They should be here soon. The mahouts are — oh, I think I have it!”
Quorn waited. He had never seen the babu self-confessedly perplexed, and he rather enjoyed the revelation, even though the menace of irresolution was deadly at that late hour. The sun was already down below the mission roofs and the courtyard lay in deepening shadow. At last the babu spoke slowly; almost as if he tasted the words before he uttered them.
“I ordered elephants for tonight, but food for them for three days. The Maharajah’s fear is that I won’t move soon enough. He won’t know any sooner than the crowd does that tonight’s the night. He is worried for fear the Resident may turn up. He has stationed watchmen on the palace roof; and by night he will have listeners there, although it is hardly likely that a plane will come by night. But if the plane should come — he must get rid of you and me.”
“Give us the works, eh?”
“He has probably arranged to have us shot. Oh well — people seldom shoot straight. Tempo will beat the Maharajah — tempo — tempo! I am more afraid of Gunpat Rao. It is Czars and Kaisers, not priests, who believe in destiny. And Bughouse Bill might be a little reckless. But Gunpat Rao — he believes in holding five aces! Oh, why can’t I be in ten places at once! I am afraid of Gunpat Rao. He can pinch hit, also.
“I must speak to Moses.”
“See here.” Quorn took the babu by the arm. “I don’t want Moses in on this. He’s all right in his own way, but he’s easy scared. I’m scared enough without him there to add to it.”
“I have a little special business for him that he can do as well as anyone,” the babu answered; and he went and talked to Moses, who looked frightened but presently straightened himself. He even grinned, as if he had been given something safe to do that made him feel important. He walked away toward the gate-house.
Then there was considerable tumult in the street and the heads of mahouts were visible over the high wall. The babu went to the gate and cautiously admitted three men, but after he had talked to the three men he sent them away again. Then he talked through the gate to the soldier outside. He was sweating — thinking furiously. His gestures were nervous — less dynamic than they had been.
“Are you cracking?” Quorn thought. “Oh Lord!”
The babu set his back against the gate and wiped his forehead.
“I have lighted the fuse,” he said. “The news is spreading through the city. It is too late now to hesitate. We must go on with it. But they have sent ten elephants. I only ordered six. There is something cooking. Krishna! Gunpat Rao easily could bribe a couple of mahouts! You keep away from the elephants! Go into the gate-house. Stay there, and let Moses come out here to me. Don’t you come until I tell you.”
So Quorn went into the gate-house glumly. It was no use disobeying or asking questions.
“It’s a dam-fool business, and I’ll get a fool’s desserts, and serve me proper! Hell, I wisht I had the guts to say the hell with it, and back down. Wonder what being dead’s like. No use wondering, I reckon. I’ll know soon enough!”
He discovered Moses cutting a section off the rubber hose that had been fitted in place of a broken water pipe.
“What for?” he demanded angrily.
“It was too lengthee. It was inconvenientlee leng-thee.”
“It’s a darned strange time to choose to cut it. Get outside and find the babu. He wants you.”
He examined the hose. It was a lie about its being too long. It was too short now, and the cut-off piece was missing.
“Can’t trust half-breeds. Damn ’em, they’re all alike. They steal when you least expect it.”
He heard the big gate open and the elephants come swaying in. The gate slammed shut behind the last one. It was dark inside the gate-house, and when he tried to light the lamp he found no oil in it.
“Unwise virgins, that’s us! I’ll lay a million dollars that the babu’s euchred. He’s a heathen. ‘Tain’t in nature for heathen to run things, or they’d all be giving orders instead o’ taking ’em.”
He sat and smoked, with his hands in his pockets, until he began seeing Gunpat Rao’s eyes again. He tried all sorts of ways to drive them out of mind, but failed, until it suddenly occurred to him that the babu might be murdered by the mahouts. Then he picked up the iron ankus that was almost heavy enough to brain Asoka with, and walked out. Indian darkness had come. The stars and the rather low moon were a little pale as yet, but the courtyard was utterly dark because of the high walls. The mahouts were at work by lantern light, and he could see they had already put a howdah on Asoka; it was a big one — big enough for half-a-dozen people. There was a regular dump of corn and hay, and there were two sacks full of enormous loaves; he took one of the loaves and gave it to Asoka, keeping a very careful eye on the mahouts meanwhile. He was not quite sure in the darkness, but he suspected one of them was a stranger. Presently he heard the babu’s
voice from the direction of the van, so he walked over there to see what was happening. They had brought a long pole for the van, and there were two elephants standing by, but there was some trouble about fitting the pole, and the elephants’ harness needed some adjustments. The babu landed one of his terrific kicks and sent a man staggering away into the dark; then he tackled the pole himself and it was in place in a minute.
“Where’s Moses?” Quorn asked. “I’ve a mind to lick him. He’s been cutting my rubber water pipe when he reckoned my back was turned.”
“I have given Moses work to do,” he answered, a bit irritably. Then he watched the elephants being harnessed up and ordered the mahouts to mount and draw the van toward the main gate. He and Quorn followed, and when they drew near the gate he threatened the mahouts with awful forms of mayhem if they should dare to dismount or to move without further orders. Then he turned on Quorn explosively:
“Where is your turban? Oh, my God, have I to think of everything? Come — hurry, hurry, hurry!”
He ran into the gate-house and used the flashlight. “That’s the sissy-yellow turban,” Quorn objected. “You said blood-red.”
“Too late! Too late now.” He bound the turban on by flashlight, Quorn holding the light and keeping it directed at the mirror. “There now — look at yourself in the glass. Remember it is yellow! If you wish one blood-red, earn it! And now listen. I have changed plans.”
“Oh Lord!”
“Yes, I had to. Those two mahouts are spying on us. They believe our tiger is in that van, so I daren’t open it to let the Princess enter. She must hide in the howdah behind you, which is what they will expect her to do anyhow, and they will see her do it. They are probably prepared to signal to the priests that she is in the howdah. They will signal as they turn the corner of the Pulke-nichi. You must watch for the signal. And then she must show herself, at the last minute, when it is too late for the priests to think of what to do about it. Tempo! If you give a priest time he’s got you. You must tell her Tempo! Tempo!”
“Tell her yourself. She won’t obey me.”
“I will tell her. But you hit her with the ankus if she forgets! And now this last word: Two elephants go ahead of you to clear the way. Their mahouts are also spies, and you will have to watch them. That is why I chose those two to go in front. If they should try to change position you must raise hell — pinch hit — don’t let them get behind you. But they are likely to be most dangerous when you reach the temple gate. They may try something there, so watch them! Next goes the van. And then you on Asoka. All the other elephants will follow, just to make up a procession. When you reach the temple, and the priests discover there is nothing in the van, remember tempo! Make it snappy! Turn in through the temple gate, and let us pray they shut it! Then we pinch hit — all of us! And she knows her part.”
“How’s she to get down off Soaker?” Quorn demanded. “He’ll go crazy when he sees their tiger.”
“Anyone can get down! It is getting up that is not so easy,” said the babu. “She must swing from the howdah and jump.”
“And she a Princess! Hell, if she was raised in a circus she couldn’t do it.”
“She must pinch hit!” said the babu. “Come on. You mount now, and bring Asoka to the stair-head. She will have to stand on my shoulders to reach the howdah. You watch the mahouts and look innocent; that will make them doubly sure that we are loading her in secret. Don’t turn your head to look at her, or they will think we don’t mind their knowing.”
“Okay.”
“One more last word: When you reach the temple, be the first through the gate. They may try a trick at the temple gate. Don’t let any other elephant push past you.”
“Okay.”
“Be the first in, even if you have to charge in.”
“Okay.”
“Go ahead then.”
Quorn surprised the mahouts by ordering Asoka loosed. He led him by the trunk into the darkness and then made Asoka lift him into place there where there was no risk of anyone stabbing or pricking the animal; he thought he knew of many nicer ways of being killed than to be hurled to the earth by an elephant’s trunk. However, Asoka seemed calm and was quite obedient, and Quorn felt better once he was up behind the huge head. He moved Asoka over to the wall, as close as he could get him to the stone trap. He could see the babu then; he was down on the stairway, listening. Quorn whistled softly but he did not answer. It was four or five minutes before anything happened. Quorn peered over the high wall, where the voices of a waiting crowd were like the sound of water pouring among rocks. There was motion, and there were a few lanterns, but he could not see much. Whichever way he looked he saw not much more than the eyes of Gunpat Rao. They were growing more distinct, and he began to hate them, and as he hated them he felt less nervous.
“Hell, I’ll kill him!” he muttered.
Suddenly the babu switched the light on. He went hurrying down into the tunnel. Two or three minutes later he was on the way up with the Princess, although she was hardly visible beside him. He could hear the babu talking to her; he had switched the light off. They stood for at least two minutes, talking, in total darkness between the elephant and the wall, before Quorn heard her chuckle as she struggled on to the babu’s shoulders and began to scramble into the howdah.
“Some folks ‘ud laugh at their own funerals,” he reflected. “Wisht I felt merry!”
She was into the howdah in no time and he heard her settle down amid the cushions.
“Gunga sahib!” said the babu. “Tempo! Then extemporize and pinch hit! Make it snappy! If in doubt, do the craziest thing you can think of! Something certainly will go wrong! This babu will meet you in the next world, maybe, if there is one. If there isn’t, who cares? Toujours l’audace! That is German for ‘Give her the works and God will bless you!’”
Then he took Asoka by the trunk and led him to his proper place in the procession. He marshalled it by lantern light, gave the mahouts their orders, threatened complicated mayhem for the slightest breach of discipline, and then shouted to the guard to open the gate from the outside. Quorn rode out into a sea of sound — of dense, packed shadow that swayed and surged. There was a stench of hot humanity, and of dust uprising. But the only face he saw was Gunpat Rao’s. It was the face of the night — of the crowd. He hated it. And when he looked ahead it backed away from him, leading.
“God!” he remarked to himself. “I wisht I’d punched him when I had the chance to do it!”
XXVII
“Soak Him, Soaker!”
Blue-black Indian night — heat — uproar — and the sway of the ponderous elephants. Torch light — lantern light — leaping figures frantic with excitement — a whole population surging into one street and choking the crossings. Impotent policemen, hoarse, hot, frightened, borne along by hysterical crowds half-glimpsed by window-light. Smashed street-lamps. Hundreds fighting to approach the van and peer in through the slatted shutters. Quorn had to order two elephants forward, one to each side of the van, to keep the crowd at bay. And but that there were elephants ahead of him, Asoka would have cut loose; he detested the din; the miracle that nobody was killed beneath his feet in all those winding streets was even greater than the one the crowd was there to see. But there were scores of accidents, and there were fights where the eager crowds came pouring in from side-streets and were forced back. There were fires from smashed lanterns, and one big house burned like a volcano, so that when he looked back Quorn could see a thousand faces reddened by the flames.
But he looked back seldom, and he felt like a man in a dream, with Gunpat Rao’s hateful eyes examining his soul.
“The eyes o’ doom, I reckon!”
So he thought of tigers, but the high priest’s eyes refused to vanish. Then he tried to rehearse the program in his mind; but his own part of it was too vague, and he found he could not concentrate on anything except the danger that Asoka might get out of control and charge into the crowd. He tried to think about the babu, and
for about two minutes he did imagine him, below there in the tunnel, with the draggled Ratty in a blue dress.
“He can’t do it! Hell, he can’t begin to do it! He’s crazy! There’ll be a tiger-fight — him and a brace o’ Bengal bobcats, one of ’em scared ugly and the other raving — him with a rifle six-foot long that likely goes off both ends. Then what? What can she and I do without that babu?”
Uproar — tumult — blue-black darkness, lit by myriads of stars and swaying lanterns — smeared with the smoky glare of torch-light — and a smell that choked, intoxicated and condensed it all in one delirious emotion.
“Stink makes East East. Lack of it makes West West! Hell’s bells, this is East o’ Suez and a vengeance! This beats Armistice night! And they don’t care who’s ‘et by tigers, nor who’s ruler, nor if school keeps, nor nothing! God, what a sight! It’s almost worth it! Gee — if I could lay my hands on Bughouse Bill I’d die easy-minded. Him and me — we’d mix it, and the hell with what next!”
The procession was slow. It was as slow as a funeral. The elephants were almost wading in a sea of yelling humans. They loomed along. Their special gift — their contribution to the cosmic whole — was conscious pageantry. Asoka gradually caught the spirit of the thing and moved along like time evolving destiny — enormous, solemn — as impersonal as darkness. But Quorn mistrusted that mood.
“Gee–if they should touch him with a torch! If he should cut loose!”
Once or twice he knew the Princess tried to speak to him, but he could not hear what she said, for the tumult. It might have been safe to turn and answer her; the crowd imagined she was in the van; but there were hundreds staring at himself, and his name made more thunder than hers: