“What are those youngsters talking about, back there? Tigers, I’ll be bound,” said Mr. Ghyrkins to me. Sure enough, they were.
“What do you suppose I found when we got back this afternoon, Mr. Griggs? Why, this hair-brained young Kildare has been proposing to my niece — —” his horse stumbled, but recovered himself in a moment.
“You don’t mean it,” said I, rather startled.
“Oh no, no, no. I don’t mean that at all. Ha! ha! ha! very good, very good. No, no. Lord Steepleton wants us all to go on a tiger-hunt to amuse John, and he proposes — ha! ha! — really too funny of me — that Miss Westonhaugh should go with us.”
“I suppose you have no objection, Mr. Ghyrkins? Ladies constantly go on such expeditions, and they do not appear to be the least in the way.”
“Objections? Of course I have objections. Do you suppose I want to drag my niece to a premature grave? Think of the fever and the rough living and all, and she only just out from England.”
“She looks as if she could stand anything,” I said, as just then an open space in the trees gave us a glimpse of Miss Westonhaugh and Isaacs ambling along and apparently in earnest conversation. She certainly looked strong enough to go tiger-hunting that minute, as she sat erect but half turned to the off side, listening to what Isaacs seemed to be saying.
“I hope you will not go and tell her so,” said Ghyrkins. “If she gets an idea that the thing is possible, there will be no holding her. You don’t know her. I hardly know her myself. Never saw her since she was a baby till the other day. Now you are the sort of person to go after tigers. Why do you not go off with my nephew and Mr. Isaacs and Kildare, and kill as many of them as you like?”
“I have no objection, I am sure. I suppose the Howler could spare me for a fortnight, now that I have converted the Press Commissioner, your new deus ex machina for the obstruction of news. What a motley party we should be. Let me see. — a Bombay Civil Servant, an Irish nobleman, a Persian millionaire, and a Yankee newspaper man. By Jove! add to that a famous Revenue Commissioner and a reigning beauty, and the sextett is complete.” Mr. Ghyrkins looked pleased at the gross flattery of himself. I recollected suddenly that, though he was far from famous as a revenue commissioner, I had read of some good shooting he had done in his younger days. Here was a chance.
“Besides, Mr. Ghyrkins, a tiger-hunting party would not be the thing without some seasoned Nimrod to advise and direct us. Who so fitted for the post as the man of many a chase, the companion of Maori, the slayer of the twelve foot tiger in the Nepaul hills in 1861?”
“You have a good memory, Mr. Griggs,” said the old fellow, perfectly delighted, and now fairly launched on his favourite topic. “By Gad, sir, if I thought I should get such another chance I would go with you to-morrow!”
“Why not? there are lots of big man-eaters about,” and I incontinently reeled off half a page of statistics, more or less accurate, about the number of persons destroyed by snakes and wild beasts in the last year. “Of course most of those deaths were from tigers, and it is a really good action to kill a few. Many people can see tigers but cannot shoot them, whereas your deeds of death amongst them ate a matter of history. You really ought to be philanthropic, Mr. Ghyrkins, and go with us. We might stand a chance of seeing some real sport then.”
“Why, really, now that you make me think of it, I believe I should like it amazingly, and I could leave my niece with Lady — Lady — Stick-in-the-mud; what the deuce is her name? The wife of the Chief Justice, you know. You ought to know, really — I never remember names much;” he jerked out his sentences irately.
“Certainly, Lady Smith-Tompkins, you mean. Yes, you might do that — that is, if Miss Westonhaugh has had the measles, and is not afraid of them. I heard this morning that three of the little Smith-Tompkinses had them quite badly.”
“You don’t say so! Well, well, we shall find some one else, no doubt.”
I was certain that at that very moment Isaacs and Miss Westonhaugh were planning the whole expedition, and so I returned to the question of sport and inquired where we should go. This led to considerable discussion, and before we arrived at Mr. Ghyrkins’ bungalow — still in the same order — it was very clear that the old sportsman had made up his mind to kill one more tiger at all events; and that, rather than forego the enjoyment of the chase, he would be willing to take his niece with him. As for the direction of the expedition, that could be decided in a day or two. It was not the best season for tigers — the early spring is better — but they are always to be found in the forests of the Terai, the country along the base of the hills, north of Oude.
When we reached the house it was quite dark, for we had ridden slowly. The light from the open door, falling across the verandah, showed us Miss Westonhaugh seated in a huge chair, and Isaacs standing by her side slightly bending, and holding his hat in his hand. They were still talking, but as we rode up to the lawn and shouted for the saices, Isaacs stood up and looked across towards us, and their voices ceased. It was evident that he had succeeded in thoroughly interesting her, for I thought — though it was some distance, and the light on them was not strong — that as he straightened himself and stopped speaking, she looked up to his face as if regretting that he did not go on. I dismounted with the rest and walked up to bid Miss Westonhaugh good-night.
“You must come and dine to-morrow night,” said Mr. Ghyrkins, “and we will arrange all about it. Sharp seven. To-morrow is Sunday, you know. Kildare, you must come too, if you mean business. Seven. We must look sharp and start, if we mean to come back here before the Viceroy goes.”
“Oh in that case,” said Kildare, turning to me, “we can settle all about the polo match for Monday, can’t we?”
“Of course, very good of you to take the trouble.”
“Not a bit of it. Good-night.” We bowed and went back to find our horses in the gloom. After some fumbling, for it was intensely dark after facing the light in the doorway of the bungalow, we got into the saddle and turned homeward through the trees.
“Thank you, Griggs,” said Isaacs. “May your feet never weary, and your shadow never be less.”
“Don’t mention it, and thanks about the shadow. Only it is never likely to be less than at the present moment. How dark it is, to be sure!” I knew well enough what he was thanking me for. I lit a cheroot.
“Isaacs,” I said, “you are a pretty cool hand, upon my word.”
“Why?”
“Why, indeed! Here you and Miss Westonhaugh have been calmly planning an extensive tiger-hunt, when you have promised to be in the neighbourhood of Keitung in three weeks, wherever that may be. I suppose it is in the opposite direction from here, for you will not find any tigers nearer than the Terai at this time of year.”
“I do not see the difficulty,” he answered. “We can be in Oude in two days from here; shoot tigers for ten days, and be here again in two days more. That is just a fortnight. It will not take me a week to reach Keitung. I am much mistaken if I do not get there in three days. I shall lay a dâk by messengers before I go to Oude, and between a double set of coolies and lots of ponies wherever the roads are good enough, I shall be at the place of meeting soon enough, never fear.”
“Oh, very well; but I hardly think Ghyrkins will want to return under three weeks; and — I did not think you would want to leave the party.” He had evidently planned the whole three weeks’ business carefully. I did not continue the conversation. He was naturally absorbed in the arrangement of his numerous schemes — no easy matter, when affairs of magnitude have to be ordered to suit the exigencies of a grande passion. I shrank from intruding on his reflections, and I had quite enough to do in keeping my horse on his feet in the thick darkness. Suddenly he reared violently, and then stood still, quivering in every limb. Isaacs’ horse plunged and snorted by my side, and cannoned heavily against me. Then all was quiet. I could see nothing. Presently a voice, low and musical, broke on the darkness, and I thought I could distinguish a tall fig
ure on foot at Isaacs’ knee. Whoever the man was he must be on the other side of my companion, but I made out a head from which the voice proceeded.
“Peace, Abdul Hafiz!” it said.
“Aleikum Salaam, Ram Lal!” answered Isaacs. He must have recognised the man by his voice.
“Abdul,” continued the stranger, speaking Persian. “I have business with thee this night; thou art going home. If it is thy pleasure I will be with thee in two hours in thy dwelling.”
“Thy pleasure is my pleasure. Be it so.” I thought the head disappeared.
“Be it so,” the voice echoed, growing faint, as if moving rapidly away from us. The horses, momentarily startled by the unexpected pedestrian, regained their equanimity. I confess the incident gave me a curiously unpleasant sensation. It was so very odd that a man on foot — a Persian, I judged, by his accent — should know of my companion’s whereabouts, and that they should recognise each other by their voices. I recollected that our coming to Mr. Ghyrkins’ bungalow was wholly unpremeditated, and I was sure Isaacs had spoken to none but our party — not even to his saice — since our meeting with the Westonhaughs on the Annandale road an hour and a half before.
“I wonder what he wants,” said my friend, apparently soliloquising.
“He seems to know where to find you, at all events,” I answered. “He must have second sight to know you had been to Carisbrooke.”
“He has. He is a very singular personage altogether. However, he has done me more than one service before now, and though I do not comprehend his method of arriving at conclusions, still less his mode of locomotion, I am always glad of his advice.”
“But what is he? Is he a Persian? — you called him by an Indian name, but that may be a disguise — is he a wise man from Iran?”
“He is a very wise man, but not from Iran. No. He is a Brahmin by birth, a Buddhist by adopted religion, and he calls himself an ‘adept’ by profession, I suppose, if he can be said to have any. He comes and goes unexpectedly, with amazing rapidity. His visits are brief, but he always seems to be perfectly conversant with the matter in hand, whatever it be. He will come to-night and give me about twenty words of advice, which I may follow or may not, as my judgment dictates; and before I have answered or recovered from my surprise, he will have vanished, apparently into space; for if I ask my servants where he is gone they will stare at me as if I were crazy, until I show them that the room is empty, and accuse them of going to sleep instead of seeing who goes in and out of my apartment. He speaks more languages than I do, and better. He once told me he was educated in Edinburgh, and his perfect knowledge of European affairs and of European topics leads me to think he must have been there a long time. Have you ever looked into the higher phases of Buddhism? It is a very interesting study.”
“Yes, I have read something about it. Indeed I have read a good deal, and have thought more. The subject is full of interest, as you say. If I had been an Asiatic by birth, I am sure I should have sought to attain moksha, even if it required a lifetime to pass through all the degrees of initiation. There is something so rational about their theories, disclaiming, as they do, all supernatural power; and, at the same time, there is something so pure and high in their conception of life, in their ideas about the ideal, if you will allow me the expression, that I do not wonder Edwin Arnold has set our American transcendentalists and Unitarians and freethinkers speculating about it all, and wondering whether the East may not have had men as great as Emerson and Channing among its teachers.” I paused. My greatest fault is that if any one starts me upon a subject I know anything about, I immediately become didactic. So I paused and reflected that Isaacs, being, as he himself declared, frequently in the society of an “adept” of a high class, was sure to know a great deal more than I.
“I too,” he said, “have been greatly struck, and sometimes almost converted, by the beauty of the higher Buddhist thoughts. As for their apparently supernatural powers and what they do with them, I care nothing about phenomena of that description. We live in a land where marvels are common enough. Who has ever explained the mango trick, or the basket trick, or the man who throws a rope up into the air and then climbs up it and takes the rope after him, disappearing into blue space? And yet you have seen those things — I have seen them, every one has seen them, — and the performers claim no supernatural agency or assistance. It is merely a difference of degree, whether you make a mango grow from the seed to the tree in half an hour, or whether you transport yourself ten thousand miles in as many seconds, passing through walls of brick and stone on your way, and astonishing some ordinary mortal by showing that you know all about his affairs. I see no essential difference between the two ‘phenomena,’ as the newspapers call them, since Madame Blavatsky has set them all by the ears in this country. It is just the difference in the amount of power brought to bear on the action. That is all. I have seen, in a workshop in Calcutta, a hammer that would crack an eggshell without crushing it, or bruise a lump of iron as big as your head into a flat cake. ‘Phenomena’ may amuse women and children, but the real beauty of the system lies in the promised attainment of happiness. Whether that state of supreme freedom from earthly care gives the fortunate initiate the power of projecting himself to the antipodes by a mere act of volition, or of condensing the astral fluid into articles of daily use, or of stimulating the vital forces of nature to an abnormal activity, is to me a matter of supreme indifference. I am tolerably happy in my own way as things are. I should not be a whit happier if I were able to go off after dinner and take a part in American politics for a few hours, returning to business here to-morrow morning.”
“That is an extreme case,” I said. “No man in his senses ever connects the idea of happiness with American politics.”
“Of one thing I am sure, though.” He paused as if choosing his words. “I am sure of this. If any unforeseen event, whether an act of folly of my own, or the hand of Allah, who is wise, should destroy the peace of mind I have enjoyed for ten years, with very trifling interruption, — if anything should occur to make me permanently unhappy, beyond the possibility of ordinary consolation, — I should seek comfort in the study of the pure doctrines of the higher Buddhists. The pursuit of a happiness, so immeasurably beyond all earthly considerations of bodily comfort or of physical enjoyment, can surely not be inconsistent with my religion — or with yours.”
“No indeed,” said I. “But, considering that you are the strictest of Mohammedans, it seems to me you are wonderfully liberal. So you have seriously contemplated the possibility of your becoming one of the ‘brethren’ — as they style themselves?”
“It never struck me until to-day that anything might occur by which my life could be permanently disturbed. Something to-day has whispered to me that such an existence could not be permanent. I am sure that it cannot be. The issue must be either to an infinite happiness or to a still more infinite misery. I cannot tell which.” His clear, evenly modulated voice trembled a little. We were in sight of the lights from the hotel.
“I shall not dine with you to-night, Griggs. I will have something in my own rooms. Come in as soon as you have done — that is if you are free. There is no reason why you should not see Ram Lal the adept, since we think alike about his religion, or school, or philosophy — find a name for it while you are dining.” And we separated for a time.
It had been a long and exciting day to me. I felt no more inclined than he did for the din and racket and lights of the public dining-room. So I followed his example and had something in my own apartment. Then I settled myself to a hookah, resolved not to take advantage of Isaacs’ invitation until near the time when he expected Ram Lal. I felt the need of an hour’s solitude to collect my thoughts and to think over the events of the last twenty-four hours. I recognised that I was fast becoming very intimate with Isaacs, and I wanted to think about him and excogitate the problem of his life; but when I tried to revolve the situation logically, and deliver to myself a verdict, I found myself ca
rried off at a tangent by the wonderful pictures that passed before my eyes. I could not detach the events from the individual. His face was ever before me, whether I thought of Miss Westonhaugh, or of the wretched old maharajah, or of Ram Lal the Buddhist. Isaacs was the central figure in every picture, always in the front, always calm and beautiful, always controlling the events around him. Then I entered on a series of trite reflections to soothe my baffled reason, as a man will who is used to understanding what goes on before him and suddenly finds himself at a loss. Of course, I said to myself, it is no wonder he controls things, or appears to. The circumstances in which I find this three days’ acquaintance are emphatically those of his own making. He has always been a successful man, and he would not raise spirits that he could not keep well in hand. He knows perfectly well what he is about in making love to that beautiful creature, and is no doubt at this moment laughing in his sleeve at my simplicity in believing that he was really asking my advice. Pshaw! as if any advice could influence a man like that! Absurd.
I sipped my coffee in disgust with myself. All the time, while trying to persuade myself that Isaacs was only a very successful schemer, neither better nor worse than other men, I was conscious of the face that would not be banished from my sight. I saw the beautiful boyish look in his deep dark eyes, the gentle curve of the mouth, the grand smooth architrave of the brows. No — I was a fool! I had never met a man like him, nor should again. How could Miss Westonhaugh save herself from loving such a perfect creature? I thought, too, of his generosity. He would surely keep his promise and deliver poor Shere Ali, hunted to death by English and Afghan foes, from all his troubles. Had he not the Maharajah of Baithopoor in his power? He might have exacted the full payment of the debt, principal and interest, and saved the Afghan chief into the bargain. But he feared lest the poor Mohammedans should suffer from the prince’s extortion, and he forgave freely the interest, amounting now to a huge sum, and put off the payment of the bond itself to the maharajah’s convenience. Did ever an Oriental forgive a debt before even to his own brother? Not in my experience.
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 9