by Talbot Mundy
Chullunder Ghose jerked at the man’s hair. As an afterthought he groped for the club and laid it out of reach. “For instance?” he demanded.
“First, a sahib might come. It might be Smith sahib, who would command the services of many people and much food for his servants, who would beat us. And the servants would pay us nothing, even though their sahib might give them money for the purpose. Or perhaps the Rajah himself might come, and that would be much worse.”
“Yes, and — ?”
“She would put a curse on us for having made complaint.”
“Who? Soonya? That priestess?”
“Yes, sahib. She might carry out her threat to loose on us a second tiger — a she-one — much worse.”
“Uh-huh.”
“So it seemed best—”
“To silence me by killing me, eh? How did you cross the river?”
“That was easy, since your honor let the raft get caught to the far bank by a tree-root. Was there not the rope? We drew that tight and I crossed by it, hand over hand, being better used to such dangerous work than the others. Was it not I who received a reward for rescuing a Prince in mid-stream? And having crossed I sought a club, but it was difficult to find one in the darkness. The one I cut at last was too light. Thus the blow I struck was feeble and your honor—”
“Where is your knife, with which you cut that club?” the babu asked him.
“It was in my loin-cloth. But it fell in the mud when I slipped, as I tried to crawl silently into the cart. Otherwise I could have used it, and your honor—”
“I will give you a new knife,” said the babu.
“That is generous. But it is only fair. I—”
“With which to cut your own throat for being such a frog-brained jungli!”
“Nay, I will need it badly for my work in the fields when the rains are over.”
“If I let you sit there near the cart-tail will you jump off and run home?”
“Nay, I need a new knife, sahib. Where can we buy it unless in the city?”
“Then what?”
“I will go home. I will tell them in the village you are one whose heart is so big that it swells your belly. They will excuse my failure when I show the new, expensive knife.”
“Clothe yourself with sacks. Sit silent. I am sick of talking to you.”
So the cart creaked on and there was no more conversation. Wind, rain, trees, and frogs united in an ocean-chorus; it was easy to imagine that the cart was a boat on a storm-tossed sea. The villager, almost invisible even against the sky at the open cart-end; sat with his chin on his knees and seemed to meditate. Chullunder Ghose, wrapped in his blanket, cuddled himself at the front end, in a corner, undiscoverable even to a bat’s eyes, it was so dark. Even when the jolting of the cart-wheels moved him he was quite invisible.
The cart stopped. Someone spoke to the driver. Chullunder Ghose, ear to the curtain, caught the driver’s answer.
“Nay, I am from this side of the ford. I know not who he is.”
“Is he a fat man?”
“Look within the cart and judge that for yourself.”
Footsteps splashed around the cart. Someone hooded in a flour sack leaned in, from the rear. At the same time there was a faint click, but to the trained ears of the babu it was clearly not a pistol. It was probably a flashlight, damaged by rain, short-circuited, useless. A man swore scurrilously.
“Who is in here?” he demanded.
The villager stirred uneasily. The man seized him and dragged him out into the darkness.
“Who are you? Who else is in there?”
“No one,” said the villager.
“Not a babu? Not a very fat man? Not he who was camped beyond the river?”
“Nay, nay! I am from that village. I have seen that fat one — I have spoken with him. He is still there. How could he have crossed the river?”
“How did you cross?”
“On a horse — but it drowned the horse. I, clinging to its tail, was thrown up on the bank on this side.”
“Why are you traveling?”
“To reach the dok-i-tar. My eyes fail and I fear I go blind. I have heard there is a sahib—”
Stealthily Chullunder Ghose moved to the cart-tail, the villager’s club in his fist. The frog-noise and the rain that spattered on the roof effectually drowned any noise he made. He crouched in the corner opposite to where the villager had sat.
“You jungli, you are lying!” said the voice in outer darkness. “He who drives said—”
Unexpectedness was two-thirds of Chullunder Ghose’s method, and the other third was use of intuition. He decided there was only one man to be dealt with. He sprang — two hundred and fifty pounds of suddenness and muscle. He struck with the club with all his might. Luck aided him. Square on the top of a skull the club broke in two and the man went down into a puddle like a pole- axed steer. The babu set a foot on him. He waited; there might be someone else; although he guessed not.
“See who he is,” he commanded presently. The villager knelt — felt — pulled at something.
“Nay, your honor means, who was he? He is dead now. And he had this.”
He thrust a heavy, old-fashioned revolver into the babu’s hand. By its weight — by the balanceless feel of it Chullunder Ghose guessed, almost beyond the possibility of error, that it came from the Rajahs armory. The Rajah’s private weapons were as new and costly as caprice could dictate and his credit provide, but his soldiers and policemen — and his murderers and bullies — had to use what other armies sold as bargains fifty years ago. However, the babu struck a match to make sure, recognized the Rajah’s monogram on the holster worn by a man in plain clothes who lay prone in a puddle, and then threw the revolver away. He heard it splash into a deep hole.
“Are you sure he is dead? I also think so. Get into the cart.”
He climbed in too, and resumed his blanket in the corner.
“Cheloh!” he commanded, drawing aside the curtain. “Why do we wait? Are the horses as stupid as you?”
The driver whipped and yelled. The cart creaked forward and the rain came down in blustering squalls that almost blew the roof off. It was several minutes before Chullunder Ghose even attempted to make his voice heard. Then he moved a little closer to the villager and asked him:
“Did I say you are a frog-brained jungli?”
“Yes, but it is not true.”
“I repeat it. You wished to kill me. That man would have done it for you.”
“Yes, I guessed that, sahib.”
“Why, then, did you tell those lies and say I was not in here?”
“I need a new knife, don’t I?”
“Krishna! You shall have a good one,” said the babu. “I can use such a madman as you are!”
CHAPTER 6. “The trouble with impossibilities is that they so often happen”
Major Eustace Smith, aged fifty-four and rather seedy for his years, lay in bed at the Residency. There was nothing much wrong except for a boil on the back of his neck, which made him irritable. The damp and the dripping of rain depressed him; and, since the doctor went on leave, he had been lonely, although he and the doctor detested each other as only two bachelors can who have no other society than each other for months at a time. He enjoyed not having to have breakfast with the doctor, even though he missed him and needed his attentions now. Bed was comfortable. Office details were obnoxious to a military man — of the old school, dammit! — and there was nothing his clerk could not attend to; his successor, three months hence, might suit himself and find as much fault with the clerk as he pleased. In the meantime, the less business the better. Three months — then a pension, thank God! — and a little cottage in Madeira, where a fellow can live cheaply and enjoy the climate.
However, as he reached for a book and a cigarette he saw a scorpion on the pillow. Scorpions made him half-hysterical. He slew the thing and yelled for his servant; and by the time the servant came he was too upset to take things easy any long
er. He swore at the servant and made him examine everything — clothes in the closet, boots, suitcases, curtains. Then he put on slippers and his bathrobe, changed the bandage on his boil and decided to try the veranda that faced the Residency garden — a mere patch of shrubbery and draggled flowers circled by a high stone wall. He ordered tea brought out there.
It always annoyed him to be interrupted at his morning tea. As a soldier he had had to rise at five a.m. or earlier and attend to all sorts of details. But “political life,” according to Smith’s view, called for military dignity, not military rigor. He still wore his graying moustache in fierce, waxed points, and he was ramrod-straight, however lazy he might feel. But business before eleven in the morning? No, sir! Not except in grave emergency.
So he swore when his servant brought out word to the veranda that Hawkes sahib wished to see him. It was bad enough to be expected to interview any one at that hour. But he especially detested retired infantry sergeants who eked out their pensions by staying in India and getting jobs in Native States. Such fellows ought to live in England, where they have equals and where their rotten manners consequently clash less with the social standards of their betters.
However, he knew Hawkes could not be exactly looking forward to the interview; he had been to particular pains to impress on Hawkes that he was not a welcome visitor. So he supposed there was some news that Hawkes, at any rate, believed important.
“Show the man in,” he commanded. “Take that other chair away. I’ll keep him standing.”
Hawkes stood five feet ten in heavy boots and a ready-made English serge suit. He had left his waterproof outside, and he came to attention from old habit, so that his fine figure showed to advantage and made Smith look and feel slack as he sat staring at him in pajamas, stocking-less feet, slippers, not yet shaven. Smith, conscious of the contrast, decided to begin by taking Hawkes down a peg or two.
“A pity,” he said, “that a man of your physique should loaf his days away when England needs guts and muscle. Native States are no place for pensioned soldiers. What good are you doing here?”
“I seem to satisfy His Highness, sir.”
“Don’t you flatter yourself?”
“And I’m keeping off the dole two sisters, one down with tuberculosis — and my mother.”
“Keeping them in idleness, I don’t doubt.”
“Well, sir, I’m not idle. And I didn’t come here to waste your time. There is something I think you ought to know, sir.”
Smith’s eyes glared with irritation.
“I have told you before, Hawkes, I have very reliable sources of information. Nothing goes on in the state that I don’t know about before you know it. I resent your interference. Unless you know of something that I don’t know—”
“It’s about that tiger near the village beyond the river.”
“Bah! That old wives’ story! Let me tell you something for your own good. The political significance of tales like that is wrapped up in obscurity too deep for inexperience to penetrate. I heard it long ago: a woman in the jungle is supposed to possess a man-eating tiger that destroys whole villages. Well, put it in your pipe and smoke it! It’s a mare’s nest. It’s a bit of local politics, in which His Highness and the priests are engaged in jockeying for influence. If I hear of you taking a hand, I warn you, I shall insist on the Rajah getting rid of you at once.”
“You threatened that before, sir; but he can’t. I’ve a contract. I don’t wish to show you disrespect—”
“You’d better not!”
“And politics don’t mean a thing to me,” said Hawkes, “but I intend to do my job. When I tell you that there’s a tiger killing people — and that the Rajah nor anyone else’ll do a thing about it — you may make up your mind that I’m telling the truth.”
“Is that so? Very well, Sergeant Know-it-all, why don’t you go yourself and shoot the tiger?”
“Because of politics and me not touching ’em. My job is inspecting stores and checking sales and purchases.”
“Ah! Why not, then, attend to business?”
“Very well, sir. I’ve reported. Thank you for the interview. Good morning.”
Smith did not even answer him. He scowled. As soon as Hawkes had left he got up and began pacing the veranda.
“Dammit, I suppose I ought to go myself and shoot the bloody tiger; that ‘ud stop this particular feud for a while. The brute is killing people — no doubt of that. But in this weather? And with boils on my neck! Mud — rain — snakes — malaria — and then a tiger in a ruined temple? Fat chance for a pension I’d have! Somebody would draw my life- insurance! And I’m not here to do the Rajah’s dirty work. I think I’ll send for Syed-Suraj. That’s it. He’s a slimy devil, but he has tact. He can put it to the Rajah unofficially that something has got to be done about this — and done now. That’s it. Diplomacy. Nothing in writing that would call for explanations to the Foreign Office. Keep away from red tape. Yes, I’ll send for Syed-Suraj.”
Europe, profligacy, and the need to refinance himself by stealth had educated Syed-Suraj to an understanding of the value, among other things, of promptness in his dealings with the nervous, Nordic blonde. He arrived almost too soon for Smith to be shaved, and he had to wait in the outer office, where he fingered correspondence while the office babu’s back was turned. He was amused to read that the C.I.D. requested prompt attention to the forwarding of Number D.3’s confidential reports; and the Department authorized D.3 to draw whatever sums he might need up to Rs. 250, against his own voucher.
One other letter equally amused him. The Foreign Office, in view of strained political conditions, urged that foreigners — particularly doctors — should be discouraged from entering Native States unless provided with a special Foreign Office passport. The attention of the Foreign Office had been called to instances where aliens, possessed of medical skill and enthusiasm, but having no political experience, had acted indiscreetly and contributed to local unrest by exciting caste prejudice. Smith came in before he had a chance to read the other letters. Smith invited him into the library, replete with volumes of the Indian Census, law-books, and the works of Edgar Wallace. They sat down facing each other in front of the oil-stove.
“How are you?”
“How is His Highness?”
The polite formalities took half a minute. Then there was a rather awkward pause, unbroken by Syed-Suraj, who was half afraid that the news of the death of Chullunder Ghose already might have reached Smith’s ears. It was news that would have to break sooner or later. His eyes were alert, hard, less simian, more brilliant.
“Suppose you and I have a friendly chat,” said Smith; “no witnesses.”
“A pleasure, I assure you.”
“Unofficial, of course.”
“That condition imposes itself, since I have no official standing.”
“Understood. Do you mind telling me how matters stand at the moment as regards the quarrel between His Highness and the priests?”
Syed-Suraj chuckled, visibly relieved. “Why shouldn’t I tell?” he answered. “It’s no secret. They insist on his building a temple, and he has no money. They insist he purify himself by an expensive ritual. He will not.”
“Why not?” Smith asked. “Is his personal ease so important to him that he can’t concede a bit to superstition? Church and State must hold together, dammit, — or we’ll all be Gandhi-ized. The next thing will be Communism. Nobody requires His Highness to believe in gods that were thought good enough for his ancestors. But he might at least pretend a bit. How else, in these difficult times, are we going to preserve our sacred institutions? How shall aristocracy survive in the face of Communism, if the Native Princes don’t stand with the Church? Do you recall what James the First of England said? ‘No bishop, no king!’ Tell that to His Highness.”
Syed-Suraj placed the tips of his fingers together, as he had seen the English lawyers do in consultation. He imagined it impressed the English. He particularly wanted to impre
ss Smith, not that he admired or trusted him, but he admired and trusted his present royal patron even less. It might be time to consider safety. British practice, which is frequently above-board, is invariably based, at least politically, on careful underground investigation — spy-work, to put it bluntly. Why had Chullunder Ghose been sent by the C.I.D. to snoop and listen? Smith, as Resident, was the unacknowledged but none- the-less actual — even if duly incompetent — link in that part of the world between spies and their secretive but immensely powerful masters — men with misleading titles, who can make or ruin any one by hinting at the existence of mysterious, anonymous reports. Syed-Suraj hoped to have his own name inscribed on the list of desirables. But he was shrewd enough to know that to betray his present patron unadroitly would be to destroy his own chances. Treachery, if it is to succeed among gentlemen, has to be cloaked in decency and faithful phrases.
“It occurs to me,” he said, “that this might be your opportunity to crown your career with a ribbon.”
“Pah!” Smith’s scorn of decorations was proportioned to the probabilities. “My dear fellow, I have never let such considerations influence me for a moment.”
He believed that, perhaps. But Syed-Suraj did not. “Even governments,” said Syed-Suraj, “now and then are grateful. Many of us who have experienced your tact and kindliness would dearly love to see you receive some official recognition before you retire.”
“Tut-tut — let us talk of more important matters.”
“The forced abdication of the Maharajah of Indore,” said Syed-Suraj, coming promptly to the point, “undoubtedly has strengthened British influence in some ways. It has drawn attention to the fact that the British-Indian Government can, when it pleases, discipline — by removal — any Rajah who ignores what we might call the rules of the game.”
“Yes, Yes.” Smith shifted nervously. The conversation was getting a bit too serious to suit him. Even minor issues, such as tigers, were a nuisance; major ones were anathema. However, he had started it; he had to listen.