by John Buchan
CHAPTER XXI
IN THE HEART OF THE HILLS
All around was stone and scrub, rising in terraces to the foot of sheercliffs which opened up here and there in nullahs and gave a glimpse ofgreat snow hills behind them. On one of the flat ridge-tops a littlevillage of stunted, slaty houses squatted like an ape, with a vigilanteye on twenty gorges. Thin, twisting paths led up to it, and before, onthe more clement slopes, some fields of grain were tilled as our Aryanforefathers tilled the soil on the plains of Turkestan. The place wasat least 8,000 feet above the sea, so the air was highland, clear andpleasant, save for the dryness which the great stone deserts forced uponthe soft south winds. You will not find the place marked in any map,for it is a little beyond even the most recent geographer's ken, but itis none the less a highly important place, for the nameless village isone of the seats of that most active and excellent race of men, theBada-Mawidi, who are so old that they can afford to look down on theirneighbours from a vantage-ground of some thousands of years. It is wellknown that when God created the earth He first fashioned this tangle ofhill land, and set thereon a primitive Bada-Mawidi, the first of theclan, who was the ancestor, in the thousandth degree, of the excellentFazir Khan, the present father of the tribe.
The houses clustered on the scarp and enclosed a piece of well-beatenground and one huge cedar tree. Sounds came from the near houses, butaround the tree itself the more privileged sat in solemn conclave. Foodand wine were going the round, for the Maulai Mohammedans have no taboosin eating and drinking. Fazir Khan sat smoking next the tree trunk, ashort, sinewy man with a square, Aryan face, clear-cut and cruel. Hischiefs were around him, all men of the same type, showing curiously fairskins against their oiled black hair. A mullah sat cross-legged, hisstraggling beard in his lap, repeating some crazy charm to himself andlooking every now and again with anxious eyes to the guest who sat onthe chief's right hand.
The guest was a long, thin man, clad in the Cossacks' fur lined militarycloak, under which his untanned riding-boots showed red in themoonlight. He was still busy eating goat's flesh, cheese and fruits,and drinking deeply from the sweet Hunza wine, like a man who had comefar and fast. He ate with the utmost disregard of his company. Hemight have been a hunter supping alone in the solitary hills for all thenotice he took of the fifty odd men around him.
By and by he finished, pulled forth a little silver toothpick from aninner pocket, and reached a hand for the long cherry-wood pipe which hadbeen placed beside him. He lit it, and blew a few clouds into the calmair.
"Now, Fazir Khan," he said, "I am a new man, and we shall talk. First,have you done my bidding?"
"Thy bidding has been done," said the great man sulkily. "See, I amhere with my chiefs. All the twenty villages of my tribe have beenwarned, and arms have been got from the fools at Bardur. Also, I havethe Yarkand powder I was told of, to give the signals on the hills. TheNazri Pass road, which we alone know, has been widened. What more couldman do?"
"That is well," said the other. "It is well for you and your peoplethat you have done this. Your service shall not be forgotten.Otherwise--"
"Otherwise?" said the Fazir Khan, his hand travelling to his belt at thesound of a threat.
The man laughed. "You know the tale," he said. "Doubtless your mothertold you it when you clutched at her breast. Some day a great whitepeople from the north will come down and swallow up the disobedient.That day is now at hand. You have been wise in time. Therefore I sayit is well."
The stranger spoke with perfect coolness. He looked round curiously atthe circle of dark faces and laughed quietly to himself. The chiefstole one look at him and then said something to a follower.
"I need not speak of the reward," said the stranger. "You are ourservants, and duty is duty. But I have authority for saying that weshall hold your work in mind when we have settled our business."
"What would ye be without us?" said the chief in sudden temper. "Whatdo ye know of the Nazri gates or the hill country? What is this talk ofduty, when ye cannot stir a foot without our aid?"
"You are our servants, as I said before," said the man curtly. "Youhave taken our gold and our food. Where would you be, outlaws, vagrantsthat you are, hated of God and man, but for our help? Your bodies wouldhave rotted long ago on the hills. The kites would be feeding on yoursons; your women would be in the Bokhara market. We have saved you adozen times from the vengeance of the English. When they wished to comeup and burn you out, we have put them past the project with smoothwords. We have fed you in famine, we have killed your enemies, we havegiven you life. You are freemen indeed in the face of the world, butyou are our servants."
Fazir Khan made a gesture of impatience. "That is as God may directit," he said. "Who are ye but a people of yesterday, while theBada-Mawidi is as old as the rocks. The English were here before you,and we before the English. It is right that youth should reverenceage."
"That is one proverb," said the man, "but there are others, and inespecial one to the effect that the man without a sword should bowbefore his brother who has one. In this game we are the people with thesword, my friends."
The hillman shrugged his shoulders. His men looked on darkly, as iflittle in love with the stranger's manner of speech.
"It is ill working in the dark," he said at length. "Ye speak of thisattack and the aid you expect from us, but we have heard this talkbefore. One of your people came down with some followers in my father'stime, and his words were the same, but lo! nothing has yet happened."
"Since your father's time things have changed, my brother. Then theEnglish were very much on the watch, now they sleep. Then there were noroads, or very bad ones, and before an army could reach the plains thewhole empire would have been wakened. Now, for their own undoing, theyhave made roads up to the very foot of yon mountains, and there is a newrailway down the Indus through Kohistan waiting to carry us into theheart of the Punjab. They seek out inventions for others to enjoy, asthe Koran says, and in this case we are to be the enjoyers."
"But what if ye fail?" said the chief. "Ye will be penned up in thatHunza valley like sheep, and I, Fazir Khan, shall be unable to unlockthe door of that sheepfold."
"We shall not fail. This is no war of rock-pigeons, my brothers. Ouragents are in every town and village from Bardur to Lahore. Thefrontier tribes, you among the rest, are rising in our favour. There isnothing to stop us but isolated garrisons of Gurkhas and Pathans, with afew overworked English officers at their head. In a week we shallcommand the north of India, and if we hold the north, in another week weshall hold Calcutta and Bombay."
The chief nodded his head. Such far-off schemes pleased his fancy, butonly remotely touched his interest. Calcutta was beyond his ken, but heknew Bardur and Gilgit.
"I have little love for the race," he said. "They hanged two of myservants who ventured too near the rifle-room, and they shot my son inthe back when we raided the Chitralis. If ye and your friends cross theborder I will be with you. But meantime, till that day, what is myduty?"
"To wait in patience, and above all things to let the garrisons alone.If we stir up the hive in the valleys they may come and see things toosoon for our success. We must win by secrecy and surprise. All is lostif we cannot reach the railway before the Punjab is stirring."
The mullah had ceased muttering to himself. He scrambled to his feet,shaking down his rags over his knees, a lean, crazy apparition of a manwith deep-set, smouldering eyes.
"I will speak," he cried. "Ye listen to the man's words and ye aresilent, believing all things. Ye are silent, my children, because yeknow not. But I am old and I have seen many things, and these are mywords. Ye speak of pushing out the English from the land. Allah knowsI love not the breed! I spit upon it, I thirst for the heart of everyman, woman, and child, that I might burn them in the sight of all ofyou. But I have heard this talk before. When I was a young priest atKufaz, there was word of this pushing out of the foreigner, and Irejoiced, being unwise. Then there was much fighting, and at the endmore Engl
ish came up the valleys and, before we knew, we were payingtribute. Since then many of our people have gone down from themountains with the same thought, and they have never returned. Only theEnglish and the troops have crept nearer. Now this stranger talks ofhis Tsar and how an army will come through the passes, and foreignerwill fight with foreigner. This talk, too, I have heard. Once therecame a man with a red beard who spoke thus, and he went down to Bardur,and lo! our men told me that they saw him hanged there for a warning.Let foreigner war on foreigner if they please, but what have we to do inthe quarrel, my children? Ye owe nothing to either."
The stranger regarded the speaker with calm eyes of amusement.
"Nothing," said he, "except that we have fed you and armed you. By yourown acts you are the servants of my master."
The mullah was rapidly working himself into a frenzy. He swung his longbony arms across his breast and turned his face skywards. "Ye hearthat, my children. The free people, the Bada-Mawidi, of whose loinssprang Abraham the prophet, are the servants of some foreign dog in thenorth. If ye were like your fathers, ye would have long ago ere thiswiped out the taunt in blood."
The man sat perfectly composed, save that his right hand had grasped arevolver. He was playing a bold game, but he had played it before. Andhe knew the man he had to deal with.
"I say again, you are my master's servants by your own confession. Idid not say his slaves. You are a free people, but you will serve agreater in this affair. As for this dog who blasphemes, when we havesettled more important matters we will attend to him."
The mullah was scarcely a popular member of his tribe, for no onestirred at the call. The stranger sat watching him with very bright,eager eyes. Suddenly the priest ceased his genuflexions, there was agleam of steel among his rags, then something bright flashed in the air.It fell short, because at the very moment of throwing, a revolver hadcracked out in the silence, and a bullet had broken two of his fingers.The man flung himself writhing on the ground, howling forthimprecations.
The stranger looked half apologetically at the chief, whose glumdemeanour had never relaxed. "Sorry," he said; "it had to be done inself-defence. But I ask your pardon for it."
Fazir Khan nodded carelessly. "He is a disturber of peace, and to onewho cannot fight a hand matters little. But, by Allah, ye northernersshoot quick."
The stranger relinquished the cherry-wood pipe and filled a meerschaumfrom a pouch which he carried in the pocket of his cloak. He took along drink from the loving-cup of mulled wine which was passing round.
"Your mad priest has method in his folly," he said. "It is true that weare attacking a great people; therefore the more need of wariness foryou and me, Fazir Khan. If we fail there will be the devil to pay foryou. The English will shift their frontier-line beyond the mountains,and there will be no more lifting of women and driving of cattle for theBada-Mawidi. You will all be sent to school, and your guns will betaken from you."
The chief compressed his attractive features into a savage scowl. "Thatmay not be in my lifetime," he said. "Besides, are there no mountainsall around? In five hours I shall be in China, and in a little more Imight be beyond the Amu. But why talk of this? The accursed Englishshall not escape us, I swear by the hilt of my sword and the hearts ofmy fathers."
A subdued murmur of applause ran around the circle.
"You are men after my own heart," said the stranger. "Meanwhile, a wordin your own ear, Fazir Khan. Dare you come to Bardur with me?"
The chief made a gesture of repugnance. "I hate that place of mud andlime. The blood of my people cries on me when I enter the gates. Butif it is your counsel I will come with you."
"I wish to assure myself that the place is quiet. Our success dependsupon the whole country being unsuspicious and asleep. Now if word hasgot to the south, and worse still to England, there will be questionsasked and vague instructions sent up to the frontier. We shall find astir among the garrisons, and perhaps some visitors in the place. Andat the very worst we might find some fool inquiring about the NazriPass. There was once a man in Bardur who did, but people laughed at himand he has gone."
"Where?" asked the chief.
"To England. But he was a harmless man, and he is too old to have anyvigour."
As the darkness grew over the hills the fires were brightened and thecurious game of _khoti_ was played in groups of six. The women came tothe house-doors to sit and gossip, and listened to the harsh laughter oftheir lords from beside the fires. A little after midnight, when thestars were picked out in the deep, velvet sky, Fazir Khan and thestranger, both muffled to the ears, stole beyond the street andscrambled down the perilous path-ways to the south.