Rung Ho! Part 22

"Will Jaimihr not be glad?"

"Glad to see me, the bearer of false news, impaled--or crushed beneath an elephant--ay--glad, indeed."

"The reward, were the Jaimihr-sahib warned in time, would be a great one."

"Then, why waitest thou not to have word with him. Art thou above rewards?"

"Have no fear! He will know in good time who it was brought thee the news."

They argued for ten minutes, Joanna threatening and coaxing and promising rewards, until at last the man consented. It was the thought, thoroughly encouraged by Joanna, that the penalty for not speaking would be greater than the beating he might get for bearing evil news that at last convinced him; and it was not until she had won him over and a.s.sured herself that he would not fail that it dawned on Joanna just what an edged tool she was playing with. While getting rid of Jaimihr, she was endangering the liberty and life of Alwa--the one man able to do anything for the McCleans!

That thought sent her scooting over housetops, diving down dark alleyways, racing, dodging, hiding, das.h.i.+ng on again, and brought her in the nick of time to a ditch, from whose shelter she sprang and seized the hand of Ali Partab. That incident, and her intimation that the missionaries were in Howrah's palace, took Alwa back up the black, blind side street; and before he emerged from it he saw Jaimihr and his ten go thundering past, their eyes on the sky-line for a hint of conflagration, and their horses--belly-to-the-earth--racing as only fear, or enthusiasm, or grim desperation in their riders' minds can make them race.

A little later, in groups and scattered fours, and one by one, his heavy-breathing troopers followed, cursing the order that had sent them abroad with-out their horses, d.a.m.ning--as none but a dismounted cavalryman can d.a.m.n--the earth's unevenness, their swords, their luck, their priests, the night, their boots, and Jaimihr. Forewarned, Alwa held on down the pitch-dark side street, into whose steep-sided chasm the moon's rays would not reach for an hour or two to come, and once again he led his party in a sweeping, wide-swung circle, loose-reined and swifter than the silent night wind--this time for Howrah's palace.

There was his given word, plighted to Mahommed Gunga, to redeem.

CHAPTER XX

Ha! my purse may be lean, but my 'scutcheon is clean, And I'm backed by a dozen true men; I've a sword to my name, and a wrist for the same; Can a king frown fear into me, then?

IT is the privilege of emperors, and kings and princes, that--however little real authority they have, or however much their power is undermined by men behind the throne--they must be accorded dignity. They must be, on the face of things, obeyed.

Inspection of the treasure finished and an hour-long mummery of rites performed, the thirty wound their way, chanting, in single file back again. The bronze-enforced door, that was only first of half a hundred barriers between approach and the semi-sacred h.o.a.rd, at last clanged shut and was locked with three locks, each of whose individual keys was in the keeping of a separate member of the three--Maharajah, Prince, and priest. The same keys fitted every door of the maze--made pa.s.sages, but no one door would open without all three.

Speaking like an omen from the deepest shadow, the sweeper called to Jaimihr.

"Sahib, thy palace burns! Sahib, thy prisoner runs! Haste, sahib! Call thy men and hasten back! Thy palace is in flames--the Rangars come to--"

As a raven, disturbed into night omen-croaking, he sent forth his news from utter blackness into nerve-strung tension. No one member of the thirty but was on the alert for friction or sudden treachery; the were all eyes for each other, and the croaking fell on ears strained to the aching point. He had time to repeat his warning before one of Jaimihr's men stepped into the darkness where he hid and dragged him out.

"Sahib, a woman came but now and brought the news. It was from the captain of the guard. The Rangars came to take their man away. They broke in. They burn. They loot. They--"

But Jaimihr did not wait another instant to hear the rest. To him this seemed like the scheming of his brother. Now he imagined he could read between the lines! That letter sent to Alwa had been misreported to him, and had been really a call to come and free the prisoner and wreak Rangar vengeance! He understood! But first he must save his palace, if it could be saved. The priests must have deceived him, so he wasted no time in arguing with them; he ran, with his guards behind him, to the outer wall of Siva's temple where the horses waited, each with a saice squatting at his head. The saices were sent scattering among the crowd to give the alarm and send the rest of his contingent hurrying back; Jaimihr and his ten drove home their spurs, and streaked, as the frightened jackal runs when a tiger interrupts them at their worry, h.e.l.l-bent-for-leather up the unlit street.

Then Maharajah Howrah's custom-accorded dignity stood him in good stead.

It flashed across his worried brain that s.p.a.ce had been given him by the G.o.ds in which to think. Jaimihr--one facet of the problem and perhaps the sharpest--would have his hands full for a while, and the priests--wish how they would--would never dare omit the after-ritual in Siva's temple. He--untrammelled for an hour to come--might study out a course to take and hold with those embarra.s.sing prisoners of his.

He turned--updrawn in regal stateliness--and intimated to the high priest that the ceremony might proceed without him. When the priests demurred and murmured, he informed them that he would be pleased to give them audience when the ritual was over, and without deigning another argument he turned through a side door into the palace.

Within ten minutes he was seated in his throne-room. One minute later his prisoners stood in front of him, still holding each other's hands, and the guard withdrew. The great doors opening on the marble outer hall clanged tight, and in this room there were no carved screens through which a hidden, rustling world might listen. There was gold-incrusted splendor--there were glittering, hanging ornaments that far outdid the peac.o.c.ks' feathers of the canopy above the throne; but the walls were solid, and the marble floor rang hard and true.

There was no nook or corner anywhere that could conceal a man. For a minute, still bejewelled in his robes of state and glittering as the diamonds in his head-dress caught the light from half a dozen hanging lamps, the Maharajah sat and gazed at them, his chin resting on one hand and his silk-clad elbow laid on the carved gold arm of his throne.

"Why am I troubled?" he demanded suddenly.

"You know!" said the missionary. His daughter clutched his hand tightly, partly to rea.s.sure him, partly because she knew that a despot would be bearded now in his gold-bespattered den, and fear gripped her.

"Maharajah-sahib, when I came here with letters from the government of India and asked you for a mission house in which to live and work, I told you that I came as a friend--as a respectful sympathizer. I told you I would not incite rebellion against you, and that I would not interfere with native custom or your authority so long as acquiescence and obedience by me did not run counter to the overriding law of the British Government."

Howrah did not even move his head in token that he listened, but his tired eyes answered.

"To that extent I promised not to interfere with your religion."

Howrah nodded.

"Once--twice--in all nine times--I came and warned you that the practice of suttee was and is illegal. My knowledge of Sanskrit is only slight, but there are others of my race who have had opportunity to translate the Sanskrit Vedas, and I have in writing what they found in them. I warned you, when that information reached me, that your priests have been deliberately lying to you--that the Vedas say: 'Thrice-blessed is she who dies of a broken heart because her lord and master leaves her.'

They say nothing, absolutely nothing, about suttee or its practice, which from the beginning has been a d.a.m.nable invention of the priests.

But the practice of suttee has continued. I have warned the government frequently, in writing, but for reasons which I do not profess to understand they have made no move as yet. For that reason, and for no other, I have tried to be a thorn in your side, and will continue to try to be until this suttee ceases!"

"Why," demanded Howrah, "since you are a foreigner with neither influence nor right, do you stay here and behold what you cannot change? Does a snake lie sleeping on an ant-hill? Does a woman watch the butchering of lambs? Yet, do ant-hills cease to be, and are lambs not butchered? Look the other way! Sleep softer in another place!"

"I am a prisoner. For months past my daughter and I have been prisoners to all intents and purposes, and you, Maharajah-sahib, have known it well. Now, the one man who was left to be our escort to another place is a prisoner, too. You know that, too. And you ask me why I stay! Suppose you answer?"

Rosemary squeezed his hand again, this time less to restrain him than herself. She was torn between an inclination to laugh at the daring or s.h.i.+ver at the indiscretion of taking to task a man whose one word could place them at the mercy of the priests of Siva, or the mob. But Duncan McClean, a little bowed about the shoulders, peered through his spectacles and waited--quite unawed by all the splendor--for the Maharajah's answer.

"Of what man do you speak?" asked Howrah, still undecided what to do with them, and anxious above all things to disguise his thoughts. "What man is a prisoner, and how do you know it?"

Before McClean had time to answer him, a spear haft rang on the great teak double door. There was a pause, and the clang repeated--another pause--a third reverberating, humming metal notice of an interruption, and the doors swung wide. A Hindoo, salaaming low so that the expression of his face could not be seen, called out down the long length of the hall.

"The Alwa-sahib waits, demanding audience!" There was no change apparent on Howrah's face. His fingers tightened on the jewelled cimeter that protruded, silk-sashed, from his middle, but neither voice nor eyes nor lips betrayed the least emotion. It was the McCleans whose eyes blazed with a new-born hope, that was destined to be dashed a second later.

"Has he guards with him?"

"But ten, Maharajah-sahib."

"Then remove these people to the place where they were, and afterward admit him--without his guards!"

"I demand permission to speak with this Alwa-sahib!" said McClean.

"Remove them!"

Two spear-armed custodians of the door advanced. Resistance was obviously futile. Still holding his daughter's hand, the missionary let himself be led to the outer hall and down a corridor, where, presently, a six-inch door shut prisoners and guards even from sound of what transpired beyond.

Alwa, swaggering until his long spurs jingled like a bunch of keys each time his boot-heels struck the marble floor, strode straight as a soldier up to the raised throne dais--took no notice whatever of the sudden slamming of the door behind him--looked knife-keenly into Howrah's eyes--and saluted with a flourish.

"I come from bursting open Jaimihr's buzzard roost!" he intimated mildly. "He held a man of mine. I have the man."

Merely to speak first was insolence; but that breach of etiquette was nothing to his manner and his voice. It appeared that he was so utterly confident of his own prowess that he could afford to speak casually; he did not raise his voice or emphasize a word. He was a man of his word, relating facts, and every line of his steel-thewed anatomy showed it.

"I sent a letter to you, by horseman, with a present," said Howrah. "I await the answer."

Alwa's eyes changed, and his attention stiffened. Not having been at home, he knew nothing of the letter, but he did not choose to acknowledge the fact. The principle that one only shares the truth with friends is good, when taken by surprise.