Complete Works of Talbot Mundy

by Talbot Mundy

  “Get a move on!” he commanded. Deborah thought she had beaten him, did she? She would have to prove it, to the hilt. His jaw and eyes assumed their fighting look. He could endure a tactical defeat from Pennyweather; that would be all in a day’s work, something to shrug shoulders at and learn a lesson from. But from Deborah? Well, hardly. Not if he knew it! And he rather thought she’d know it, too, before the showdown. That and more was in his eyes and on the firm line of his lips; the babu, very wise in script of that kind, read it all and, judging what was best for his own peace, got a very urgent move on forthwith.

  By midnight they had reached Hanadra and the babu’s pony had already wilted under his prodigious weight. Duncannon left the foundered beast in charge of the dak-bungalow attendant and made Chullunder Ghose ride a spare mule. He was mocked unmercifully by the saises when the mule kicked. It needed a man on either side to keep him in the saddle, and their comments annoyed him even worse than the motion which shook and blistered him. At the end of ten miles he rebelled and insisted on walking, comically sorry for himself, but good-natured again the moment his feet were on the ground.

  “Blistered feet are less distressing than calamitous behime-end, same being solitary instance known to this babu of two evils being less than one. But no wonder we want to be gods. I would swap with a devil, I think, or even would consent to be a bird for sake of his wings, and be lousy and eat insects.”

  Duncannon did not spare him. Until an hour after the sun had risen the babu trudged the dust, using his umbrella like a walking-stick. And he was plucky. It was not he who called a halt at last. The sight of scrawny trees and of a thatch-roofed shed, with a well not far away, reminded Duncannon he must rest his horses; from that point as far as the eye could see over the hot plain there was not another scrap of shelter.

  “How far to Erinpura?” he demanded.

  Chullunder Ghose, sitting to nurse tortured feet, answered offhandedly:

  “None measures miles in Rajputana — none, that is to say, except the Government that levies taxes on them and the railway company that sells uncomfortable transportation by the inch. Nevertheless, I could forgive a railway at the moment, were there one. I heard you, sahib. Do you mean, when can we arrive at Erinpura? I assure you, never, unless you rest us! This babu will die and you will lose the way, in addition to other contingencies. A little whisky and quinine and, leaving here at three this afternoon, we can be there a little after sunset. Mind you, I said can, not shall, having ascertained there is many a slip between this-ishness and that-ishness — verb. very sap. indeed.”

  However, the babu knew no rest for an hour. He wandered off alone toward some huts, whence he returned with four protesting villagers, thin-legged, middle-aged and underfed. Bulk for bulk he was as big as all the four together.

  “Sahib, I have told these people that your honor is a stepson of the King of the United States. They disbelieve me. They are therefore scoundrels. Shall I smite them on the shins?”

  Duncannon was in no mood to be interested. He was thinking of Deborah, gritting his teeth, self-contemptuous, set on demonstrating that he who laughs last laughs longest, and assuring himself that there were other nice girls, lots of them.

  “Send ’em away,” he commanded.

  “And find four more in this wilderness? It has been difficult to find these jackal’s leavings! They are to have conferred on them the only honor left remaining in my gift. Unbelievably unfortunate, they are to carry this babu to Erinpura, they themselves providing poles, like Hebrews in Egyptian brick-factory, your Honor substituting blanket in place of canvas which is non est. Please act kinglike, without changing expression of countenance; that scowl is excellent. I have tempted these abominable rogues with annas eight each, think of it! They are not mercenary. They affect ironic scorn for such unheard-of opportunity to enrich their exchequer at your Honor’s opulent expense. They assure me, nothing doing. I assure them, plenty doing with your Honor’s stick, unless—”

  Duncannon raised the bid to two rupees for each man. Promptly they demanded twice as much, unwittingly assenting to the theory of work. Duncannon nodded. They demanded twice as much again, with sundry stipulations, as that meals were extra and that they should start the next day, or the next. Duncannon might have yielded, as far as the price was concerned, but Chullunder Ghose intervened in the name of righteousness and all his pantheon of gods —

  “Sahib, give me that riding-whip!”

  He seized it, used it, beat them until they knew and admitted it would be a royal honor to carry a babu belonging to a Grand Mogul of the United States. They leisurely proceeded to construct a litter out of poles and blanket.

  Then the babu grew impatient, drawing diagrams in the dust with a fat fore-finger.

  “Necessity is mother of indignity, so we must make haste. Thus. There are two ways to Erinpura, of which we took the longest, being males. Females would take shortest route, because women will always do the most difficult thing in order to save themselves distance. We may count on their meeting difficulties, for I know that other road. I know it well. I have left pieces of my skin as souvenirs along it. Therefore, if we go now we may get there first.”

  Duncannon glared at him. He knew the babu had not read Deborah’s letter. How did he know, how did he dare to know, that Deborah and Mrs. Bisbee — ?

  “Am not ignoramus,” said the babu, keeping his distance. It appeared to him that John Duncannon’s toe was itching.

  They presently resumed the march, against a wind that scorched them. The unhappy Rajput peasants groaned as the babu leaned out of the litter to assure them they were fortunate:

  “For you have shade under the litter, ingrates. I must fry like an egg.”

  But heat was less than half the difficulty. Wind like blasts from a painter’s torch brought dust with it, until they struggled against a stinging golden mist that radiated heat and dimmed the daylight, obscuring all landmarks. The mules became rebellious, turning their rumps to it. Some lay down and had to be kicked and dragged up. The four wretches toiling with the litter swore the way was lost; they set the litter down and lay with cloths over their faces, crying nothing could be done until the wind should change at night. They, too, were induced by uncivilized means to continue the march.

  There was not much consolation in the thought that Deborah and Mrs. Bisbee must be similarly handicapped. No man worthy of his sex can reconcile himself to the thought that a woman, even an athletic, modern, up-to-date young woman, can or should endure what he can. Chivalrous ideas die hard; if unfashionable, they are nonetheless assertive. John Duncannon told himself repeatedly that he was not responsible for Deborah. He remarked it with blasphemous emphasis. He swore, as he spat out the grit from his teeth, that it served her well right if she were in the devil’s own mess. A darned good dose of calamity might do her good and make her see sense.

  Then, of course, the high-falutin, grandiose thoughts had their way with him. He saw himself arriving in the nick of time to rescue two lorn women, being cordial to Mrs. Bisbee, formally polite to Deborah. He drew enormous satisfaction from the mental picture of himself with Deborah recumbent in his arms, she hero-worshipping and he, as grim as Ajax, bearing her to safety, where he would leave her. He would stride out of her life. Maybe she would remember him in years to come; he rather thought so. Not that he cared. No, sir. There were other women.

  At the next halt he questioned the babu, trying to get him to describe that other route. But the babu read his intention perfectly and defeated it, having neither chivalry nor craving to prolong the march.

  “Am lost already. Why get lost more? Devil take hindermost, women included! ‘Magnificent out of the dust we came.’ So says poet, doubtless very truthful person. Dust is therefore native element of female women, who can thrive in same as easily as we. If they remain in it, and we not, we shall get there first, and rupees thirty thousand is provoking cause of unsentimental disposition; likewise of forgetfulness, it may be. Sahib, I cannot r
emember where the other road is, but I do know how to get to Erinpura. You may whip me. I don’t bloody care. I care rupees thirty thousand. I go get same.”

  And the wind grew worse. The dust rose like a wall of grinding particles, with stinging insects mingled in it, insects maddened by the heat and motion, clinging, digging in and fighting anything they touched. There was no track visible. They had to guess direction vaguely by the sunlight, which was all diffused into an orange-colored blur — orange and ominous gray. They had to lie down where they were, amid the animals and it was gloaming when the wind dropped. Presently it changed and the air grew cooler.

  But the track was all obliterated, and in the short Indian twilight, and later, in the gloom of the moonless night, they were very hard put to find the way. Duncannon kept leaving such track as there was to explore for some by-way that led to the hills, where the women were probably lost. Forgetting that they certainly had servants who would probably be loyal and resourceful, he imagined them half-dead and at the mercy of wild animals. But perceiving his intention to digress in search of the women, the babu gave private instructions to one of the saises who, at so much per vision, saw shadowy figures ahead in the distance and, persuading the others to see what he imagined, almost convinced Duncannon.

  So they came at last to Erinpura and pitched camp, without knowing it, exactly on the spot that Galloway had used two nights before.

  There was no sign of Deborah’s tents nor of any other human beings, although a tom-tom drumming in the distant gloom suggested that they were somewhere near a village. The partly ruined temple, a blot of utter darkness against a purple-black sky, loomed beyond the river-bed, conveying neither information nor encouragement, and except for that pulsing drum-beat there was stillness that seemed almost to possess weight.

  “Chivalry be damned, since we are here first!” said the babu blandly. “It is the least chivalrous who become immortals, because it is the gods who are the greatest cynics. If Kant did not say so, he should have. I could teach Kant many things.”

  Duncannon watched the saises digging down into the river-bed for water for the animals.

  “Abercrombie’s map said ‘underneath the temple,’ “ he remarked. “Is there another temple?”

  “Many,” the babu answered. “But that one just beyond the river is the very holy Gnani’s, anciently owned by horribly unholy party known as the Red Flame of Erinpura.”

  Duncannon stared. The outlines of the place were growing more distinct, or else his eyes were more accustomed to the gloom. Strange memories were asserting themselves and then almost evading his brain.

  “It’s the place,” he remarked, “yes, I’ll swear it’s the place that I entered that day after I shot the Gnani’s tiger. For the life of me I can’t recall what happened inside. I remember their attacking me — and then the old boy came and called them off. He gave me some darned strange stuff to drink — I needed it, I guess! It tasted a bit like English beer. And I awoke at Hanadra! Do you feel fit?” he demanded suddenly.

  “No fat man ever feels fit when a lean man asks in that tone of voice!” said the babu. “Specify nature of fitness. For what purpose do you wish my fitness now? I can tell you something I am very good at without extra payment; I can say no in several languages.”

  Duncannon shrugged his shoulders.

  “All right, stay here. Show me where that other road comes in. I’m going in search of the women.”

  Only with the aid of point-blank mutiny, and even so not easily, Chullunder Ghose persuaded him to stay and eat before exerting himself further.

  “Chivalry is buncombe, sahib! Be a cynic, like myself. If you have empty belly, will that feed two women? If you are tired, will that refresh them? And besides, I observe that these up-to-date females think better of you if you give them credit for being Joans of Arc and she-pirates and Amazons all rolled into one.”

  “I believe you’re afraid,” said Duncannon.

  The babu smirked at him, his features screwed up in the lantern light, his head a little to one side.

  “That illustrates the difference,” he said, “between speculative mind of U.S.A. American and concrete realistic faculties of this babu, for instance. A belief is imbecility. I know I am afraid. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but in this case I know all about it!”

  “Afraid of what? Tigers?”

  “Of myself. And of the very holy Gnani. Has the sahib any whisky? It is said that strong drink is an insult to the soul because it deadens spiritual thinking. But it is spiritual thinking that weakens this babu’s resolution. Therefore I will deaden same, thus snapping fingers at my higher self.”

  He drank immoderately. Then what, he was pleased to call his lower self predominating, he started off at a run across the river-bed. Out of sight in the gloom almost instantly, he began calling to Duncannon.

  “I am surrounded, sahib — tigers! Do come swiftly!”

  There was nothing else to do. Duncannon, loosening his pistol in the holster strode toward him, minded to make an example of him for the benefit of the servants, who were all too likely to get out of hand unless the babu were dealt with sternly. But presently he thought he heard the footfall of a tiger, and when he came on the babu crouching in some reeds the babu clutched him by the legs and nearly threw him.

  “Lie down, sahib! Lie down!”

  He kicked himself free and advanced to where other sounds were emanating from — snorty, stealthy sounds not easy to explain.

  “Only an old water-buffalo,” he called back. But his brain was busy wondering why a villager should tie his valuable beast and leave him in the river-bed.

  Before he could suggest an answer to that puzzle another presented itself. A heavy weight went charging past him, straight toward the far bank; it was almost a minute before he realized that the babu, apparently panic-stricken, had gone headlong into danger.

  “Damn the man! I’ll fetch him back and thrash him,” he exploded, following. He did not analyze his own emotions at the time, but afterward, reviewing the night’s happenings, he did not try to blink the fact that friendship for Chullunder Ghose was the impelling motive. The fat rascal had endeared himself to him; he was as kickable as any rogue, as likeable as any one he knew and to have lost him would have been a tragedy.

  Behind him, the old water-buffalo grew angry at the white-man smell as all Indian cattle do, particularly in the dark. It snorted, stamped and tried to free itself, mowing down dry reeds with clumsy horns that can rip more neatly than a butcher’s knife.

  “Supper for the tigers!” cried the babu from the far bank. “Oh, come swiftly, sahib!”

  Two minutes later Duncannon reached him where he lay sprawling and gasping for breath. It occurred to Duncannon he was rather overacting the exhaustion, the more so as he suddenly grew still and gripped Duncannon’s ankle. Both men listened.

  Came a crashing among the reeds, somewhere down in the river-bed where the buffalo was tied; then a bellow that died to a groan, a coughing snarl, much plunging — followed by the thud of a falling carcass and a few spasmodic sounds of kicks.

  “Oh Krishna!” exclaimed the babu, “we are easier to kill than buffalo! And there are two tigers; that is only one of them. Come on!”

  Duncannon refused to be hurried. He dreaded the Gnani more than tigers. More than all he dreaded the thought of Deborah advancing in the dark into unknown peril. If she had survived the hot wind she was likely to be near at hand.

  Chullunder Ghose pulled at him and made him look toward the temple. There were shadows moving there, moving away from the temple to right and left — shadows suggestive of scene-shifters hurrying on a darkened stage. They vanished with the noiseless speed of bats.

  “We are here first!” said the babu, trembling with excitement. For the moment he seemed to have overcome fear.

  Suddenly a new noise broke the stillness. There came the thud of hoofs on dust. From along the river-bank a rider spurred a tired horse out of the purple gloom, swer
ved toward the temple, reined, leaped to the ground, whipped the horse to make him gallop off and vanished.

  “Straight into the temple! Man or woman?” Duncannon wondered. He was thinking aloud. The rider’s figure was about the size of Deborah’s, but where was Mrs. Bisbee?

  There was another sound — voices from across the river and the noise that a string of horses and their chattering saises make when they reach camp and find a party there ahead of them.

  “That was Deborah sure enough,” remarked Duncannon. “That’s her outfit across the river. But why in the name of mystery did she chase her horse away?”

  He did not know whether he felt more relieved to know that she was safe or more mystified by her actions. Then he began to feel indignant that she should treat him as an enemy.

  “Damn women! There’s no understanding them!” he muttered.

  The tired horse came out of the shadows, stood a moment, snorted, ears pricked, and before Duncannon could get near enough to see him clearly, cantered off to where the other horses neighed beyond the river. There appeared to be an English riding saddle on his back, but Duncannon was not sure, nor could he remember what kind of saddle Deborah used. However, one thing now was certain: Deborah was in danger.

  “Come on,” he said, hurrying forward. “Do you remember the temple plan? The entrance to the crypt is at the rear end, down an incline that begins behind a great carved idol.”

  “My belly turns to water. Courage I have none!” said the babu. “Cupidious, yes, very! Lead on, sahib!”

  He kept pace, breathing through his nose, and kicked his sandals off against the temple steps. The act was orthodox, yet comical; it looked as if he were about to disrobe for a bath. He peeled off his jacket and dropped that beside the sandals.

  “European,” he said, kicking it. “Offensive to the very holy Gnani. One sacrilege at a time is plenty!”

  For a moment he seemed to be praying. His lips moved and his attitude was meek, as if his knees could hardly hold his weight. Duncannon shoved him.