The Old Man of the Mountain Part 2

CHAPTER II

A COUNCIL OF WAR

Forrester sat musing on what he had learnt from the sick man's broken phrases and the sc.r.a.p of paper. It was little enough. The stranger's companion, Beresford, had been captured, presumably by natives, at a spot four days' march distant in the hills. His friend had come alone over at least a hundred miles of wild country to seek help. The pencil line traced his course; the names no doubt roughly described conspicuous natural features that would serve as landmarks on his return. But who were the captors? Where was the place of durance? What did he mean by "the shutter"? In what direction lay the point on the route called "Monkey Face"? Without answers to these questions it seemed to Forrester that nothing could be attempted on behalf of the prisoner.

A glance at the invalid showed that he was either asleep or fallen into a stupor. Forrester rose, and paced to and fro, half inclined to wake his friends before the time. The dismal hoot of an owl close at hand, several times repeated, jarred his nerves; by the natives the bird was suspected of possessing the power to scent out those about to die.

Though scouting such superst.i.tions, Forrester felt oppressed and uneasy, so that it was with real relief he heard, as he pa.s.sed the tent, Mackenzie's voice rasp out from the interior:--

"De'il take the fowl!"

"You're awake, Mac?" he said, putting his head in.

"Who could sleep through yon soul-terrifying clamour?"

"Neither soft nor sweet," murmured Jackson. "How is he, d.i.c.k?"

"Asleep now, but he's been talking. As you're awake, get up, and I'll tell you."

Throwing rugs about them, they joined him, and all three returned to the fire. Forrester repeated the man's words, and showed them the paper.

"He's not daft, think ye, with his camels and monkeys?" said Mackenzie.

"He was sane enough when he drew this diagram," Forrester replied.

They examined it in turn.

"I say, here's a word you've missed," said Jackson, suddenly. "It's very faint, and badly smudged. I can hardly make it out, but it's 'Falls,' isn't it?"

They scrutinised the paper eagerly in the firelight.

"You're right," said Forrester. "That's his starting-point, by the look of it: some waterfall or other."

The stranger's pocket-book was lying on the ground where Forrester had placed it after removing the paper. Mackenzie picked it up.

"Don't you think we might?" he asked.

"It's the only way," said Jackson. "Find out who he is, and make inquiries about him as soon as we get back."

Mackenzie opened the case. From one of its pockets he drew forth a roll of rouble notes, from another a couple of letters addressed to Captain Redfern at Peshawar, and finally a small note-book.

"There's his name," said Forrester. "The note-book may help us."

He found, however, on opening this, that the leaves contained nothing but jottings of words and phrases in unfamiliar tongues, with their English equivalents. There was no clue to his destination or the object of his journey, no mention of his companion.

"We're not much forarder," said Forrester. "The only thing to do is to get home as quickly as possible to-morrow, and wire through to Sadiya or Calcutta. Somebody will know something about him."

They talked for a few minutes longer; then Forrester and Jackson returned to the tent, leaving Mackenzie to take his spell of watching.

The camp was astir early. While the coolies were packing up, and Hamid was preparing breakfast, Forrester sent Sher Jang to the village half a mile away to enlist carriers for the sick man. In an hour the s.h.i.+kari returned with four lithe, well-developed young Mishmis, whose only clothing was a loin-cloth of bark and strips of bamboo coiled about their arms and legs. The villagers' grat.i.tude for the destruction of the man-eater disposed them to undertake any service for their deliverers, especially when that service was to be rewarded with pay.

After breakfast, a litter was quickly constructed of a blanket and two bamboo stalks cut from the border of the stream. On this they placed Captain Redfern; he was still unconscious, and neither spoke nor stirred; and by eight o'clock the caravan was in movement.

Their way led them through the village. Here they waited to receive the thanks of the head-man, who presented them with a number of fowls in token of his grat.i.tude. A crowd of men gathered around the litter, chattering excitedly in sing-song tones. Sher Jang presently drew Forrester aside.

"They talk of prisoners, sahib," he said in a whisper. "There are two strangers; may one of them be the captain sahib's friend?"

"Ask the head-man," said Forrester, eagerly.

The s.h.i.+kari's question seemed to cause the head-man some embarra.s.sment.

At first he denied that there was any truth in his young men's gossip, but on Sher Jang's insisting, with threats which Forrester would hardly have countenanced, he confessed that two strangers had indeed been brought into the village the night before. A party of the villagers had been away on an excursion some fifteen miles across the Brahmaputra.

(He did not disclose the object of the expedition, but the s.h.i.+kari guessed that it was not unconnected with head hunting.) They were marching through the jungle when suddenly they heard a rustle and hid themselves. Two men came in sight, not naked Abors, as they had expected to see, but strangers, clothed. They had captured them without difficulty, for the men bore no weapons and one of them had lost his right arm, and brought them back to the village.

"Where are they?" asked Forrester, when Sher Jang repeated this story to him.

"In the _moshup_," the head-man replied, pointing to a s.p.a.cious building in the heart of the village. It was built on piles, the walls and the sloping roof made of plantain leaves laid one upon another like the tiles of a European house. There the affairs of the community were discussed by day, and the unmarried men slept at night.

"Let me see them," said Forrester, hoping that by some strange coincidence Captain Redfern's friend, having escaped from captivity, had wandered in much the same direction.

The head-man besought the sahib not to be angry with him. The presence of the strangers was a trouble to him, for he did not know what to do with them. He could not speak their speech, and he was afraid. His young men ought not to have laid hands on men who were clothed.

Forrester cut short his apologies, promising that he should suffer no harm; whereupon the head-man sent a messenger to the building aforesaid, to bring forth the prisoners.

The Englishmen awaited their coming with mingled hope and anxiety. By and by two figures emerged from the building.

"Chinamen, by Jinks!" Jackson e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

Disappointed at the das.h.i.+ng of their hopes, the three were no longer much interested in the Mishmis' prisoners, through whom their journey was being delayed. But they could not help remarking a certain strangeness in the Chinamen's manner of approach. They did not hasten across the open s.p.a.ce with the eager gait of men to whom had come sudden deliverance from a terrible fate (for there was not much doubt that the villagers would ultimately have solved their dilemma by adding the Chinamen's heads to their collection). After leaving the _moshup_, and perceiving the unmistakable forms of Englishmen in the distance, the two men halted and appeared to consult together. Then they advanced slowly, one before the other, in the manner of a shepherd driving a solitary sheep.

The first comer was a young man, well grown, but curiously slack in his gait and bearing. His head hung forward a little; his arms drooped limply at his sides; and in his eyes, as he drew nearer, the Englishmen discerned a languorous and sleepy expression. The second man presented a striking contrast. His age was between fifty and sixty, but he was upright as a dart; and his features, his eyes, his whole mien bespoke energy and determination. The right sleeve of his coat was empty, and lay pinned across his breast.

Escorted by a noisy crowd of the villagers, the Chinamen came up to the Englishmen, and bowed in salutation. Then, before Forrester could utter a word, the younger man began to speak in a breathless, jumpy fas.h.i.+on, strangely unlike the stolidity which is usually a.s.sociated with the Chinese.

"We ask your a.s.sistance, gentlemen," he said in good English; only his reedy tone, the usual difficulty with the letter "r," and a certain formality of phrase proclaimed him a Chinaman. "Being accused of sedition we were on our way from Yunan to Tibet with a small caravan; but a week ago we were pursued by Government troops, and with difficulty escaped, leaving our men and stores behind us."

This was uttered rapidly, as if he were repeating a lesson. At the end of the sentence he glanced timidly at the elder man, who had stood the while gazing unswervingly upon his companion. In his eyes there was a hard, metallic glitter, under which the younger man appeared to droop.

Turning again to the Englishmen he went on:--

"Driven from our course by the presence of regular troops near the frontier, we diverged to the south-west towards the borders of a.s.sam.

But when we were making our way north-west again towards Tibet, we fell into the hands of these people, and we thank you very much for rescuing us from our terrible plight."

"That's all right," said Forrester, with the Englishman's usual anxiety to avoid any display of feeling. "Does your friend speak English?"

"No," returned the man with a momentary energy. "I myself----"

He broke off suddenly, with a look of apprehension at his companion, who had not spoken, but whose eyes had never left the young man's face.

Hurriedly he went on:--

"These people searched us, but did not find the little gold we carry, and the bundle of notes they found have no value for them, though they have not returned them to us. There is plenty of money to pay our way if we are a.s.sured of safety, and we ask to be allowed to accompany you until we can resume our journey."