Part 2

For the rest. Had there really been a fourth snake? Was it true that serpents always revenged themselves for wrong charming? Or were those two faint blood spots on the rose leaves of young Bertram's lips ....

* * * * * "An 'E' willmakeit--plain."

Craddock's rolling baritone mingled with a shriek of steam welcoming a swift speck on the horizon.

With a roar and a rush it was on us, past us.

"Ef that 'ymn 'ad bin wrote these times, sir," remarked Craddock blandly, as he turned on steam, "the h'author might 'ave put in a H'engin. There ain't anythin' more mysterious in its goin's on--except per'aps wimmen. I'd ruther trust for grace to the mercy o' the Lord than to them any day."

SALT DUTY

I

"Lo! nigh on fifty years have passed since that dark night; just such a night as this, O! Children-of-the-Master! and yet remembering the sudden yell of death which rose upon the still air--just such an air as this, hot and still.... Nay! fear not, Children-of-the-Master! since I, Imân (the faithful one so named and natured), watch, as I watched then ... and yet, I say, the hair upon my head which then grew thick and now is bald, the down upon my skin which then was bloom and now is stubble, starts up even as I started to my feet at that dread cry, and catching Sonny-_baba_ in my arms fled to the safer shadows of the garden. And the child slept...."

The voice, declamatory yet monotonous, paused as if the speaker listened.

"It is always so with the Master-Children," it went on, tentatively, "they sleep...."

The second and longer pause which ensued allowed soft breathings to be heard from the darkness, even, unmistakable, and when the voice continued something of the vainglorious tone of the _raconteur_ had been replaced by a note of resignation.

"And wherefore not, my friends, seeing that as masters they know no fear?"

Wherefore, indeed?

Imân Khân, whilom major-domo to many sahibs of high degree, now in his old age factotum to the Eurasian widow and children of a conservancy overseer, asked himself the question boldly. Yet the heart which beat beneath the coarse white muslin coatee starched to crackle-point in the effort to conceal the poorness of its quality, felt a vague dissatisfaction.

In God's truth the memory of the great Mutiny still sent his old blood shivering through his veins, and some of the tribe of black-and-tan boys who slept around him in the darkness were surely now old enough to thrill, helplessly responsive, to the triumphal threnody of their race?

Yet it was not so. The tale, on the contrary, was a sure sleep-compeller; indeed, he was never able to reach his own particular contribution to the sum total of heroism before sleep came--except in his own dreams! _There_ he remembered, as he remembered so many things. How to decorate a ham, for instance--though it was an abomination to the Lord!--how to ice champagne--though that also was damnable!--when to say "Not at home," or dismiss a guest by announcing the carriage-- though these were foreign to him, soul and body.

Out there, beyond the skimp verandah, amid the native cots set in the dusky darkness in hopes of a breath of fresher air, old Imân's imagination ran riot in etiquette.

And yet the faint white glimmer of the Grand Trunk Road which showed beyond the cots was not straighter, more unswerving than the _khânsâman's_ creed as to the correct card to play in each and every circumstance of domestic life.

His present mistress, a worthy soul of the most doubtful Portuguese descent, knew this to her cost. It was a relief, in fact, for her to get away at times from his determination, for instance, to have what he called "sikkens" for dinner. But then she did not divide her world into the sheep who always had a savoury second course in their menu, and the goats who did not. To him it was the crux of social position.

So, an opportunity of escape having arisen in the mortal illness of a distant relation, she had gone off for a weeks holiday full of tears and determination, while away, to eat as much sweet stuff as she chose, leaving Imân Khân in charge of the quaint little bastion of the half-ruined caravanserai in which she was allowed free quarters in addition to her pension.

He was relieved also. He had, in truth, a profound contempt for her; but as this was palpably the wrong game, he covered his disapproval with an inflexible respect which allowed no deviation from duty on either side. Yet it was a hard task to keep the household straight. Sometimes even Imân's solid belief in custom as all-sufficing wavered, and he half regretted having refused the offers of easier services made him by rich natives anxious to ape the manner of the alien. But it was only for a moment. The claims of the white blood he had served all his life, as his forbears had before him, were paramount, and whatever his faults, the late _E-stink Sahib_, conservancy overseer, had been white--or nearly so! Did not his name prove it? Had not _Warm E-stink Sahib_ (Warren Hastings) left a reputation behind him in India for all time? Yea! he had been a real master. The name was without equal in the land--save, perhaps, that which came from the great conqueror, _Jullunder_ (Alexander).

Undoubtedly, _E-stink Sahib_ had been white; so it was a pity the children took so much after their mother; more and more so, indeed, since the baby girl born after her father's death was the darkest of the batch. It was as if the white blood had run out in consequence of the constant calls upon it. For Elflida Norma, the eldest girl--they all had fine names except the black baby, whom that incompetent widow had called Lily--was....

Ah! what was not Elflida Norma? The old man, drowsing in the darkness after a hard day of decorum, wandered off still more dreamily at the thought of his darling. _She_ did not sleep out on the edge of the high road. Her sixteen years demanded other things. Ah! so many things. Yet the Incompetent one could perceive no difference between the claims of the real Miss-_Sahiba_--that is, _E-stink Sahib's_ own daughter by a previous wife--and those of the girl-brat she herself had brought to him by a previous husband, and whom she had cheerfully married off to a black man with a sahib's hat! For this was Imân Khân's contemptuous classification of Xavier Castello, one of those unnecessarily dark Eurasians who even in the middle of the night are never to be seen without the huge pith hats, which they wear, apparently, as an effort at race distinction.

The Incompetent one was quite capable of carrying through a similar marriage for the Miss-_Sahiba_. Horrible thought to Imân; all the more horrible because he was powerless to provide a proper husband. He could insist on savouries for dinner; he could say "the door is shut" to undesirable young men; he could go so far in weddings as to provide a _suffer_ (supper) and a wedding cake (here his wrinkles set into a smile), but only God could produce the husband, especially here in this mere black-man's town where sahibs lived not. Where sahibs did not even seek a meal or a night's rest in these evil days when they were whisked hither and thither by rail trains instead of going decently by road.

Through the darkness his dim eyes sought the opposite bastion of the serai. In the olden days any moment might have brought someone....

But those days were past. It would need a miracle now to bring a sahib out of a post carriage to claim accommodation there. Yea! a real heaven-sent car must come.

Still, God was powerful. If he chose to send one, there might be a real wedding--such a wedding as--there had been--when--he....

So, tired out, Imân was once more in his dreams decorating hams, icing champagne, and giving himself away in the intricacies of sugar-piping.

When he woke, it was with a sense that he had somehow neglected his duty. But no! In the hot dry darkness there was silence and sleep. Even Lily-_baba_ had her due share of Horatio Menelaus' bed. He rose, and crept with noiseless bare feet to peep in through the screens of Elflida Norma's tiny scrap of a room that was tacked on to the one decent-sized circular apartment in the bastion, like a barnacle to a limpet. One glance, even by the dim light of the cotton wick set in a scum of oil floating on a tumbler of water, showed him that she was no longer where an hour or two before he had left her safe.

Without a pause he crept on across the room and looked through the door at its opposite end, which gave on the arcaded square of the serai.

All was still. Here and there among the ruined arches a twinkling light told of some wayfarer late come, and from the shadows a mixed bubbling of hookahs and camels could be heard drowsily.

She was not there, however, as he had found her sometimes, listening to a bard or wandering juggler; for she was not as the others, tame as cows, but rather as the birds, wild and flighty. So he passed on, out through the massive doorway, built by dead kings, and stood once more on the white gleam of the road, listening. From far down it, nearer the town, came the unmelodious hee-haw of a concertina played regardless of its keys.

"Hee, hee, haw! Haw, hee, hee!"

His old ear knew the rhythm. That was the dance in which the sahib-logue kicked and stamped and laughed. This was Julia Castello's doing. There was a "nautch" among the black people with the sahib's hats, and the Miss-_Sahiba_--his Miss-_Sahiba_--had been lured to it!

Once more, without a pause, the instinct as to the right thing to do coming to him with certainty, he turned aside to his cook-room, and, lighting a hurricane lantern, began to rummage in a battered tin box, which, bespattered still with such labels as "Wanted on the Voyage," proclaimed itself a perquisite from some past services.

So, ten minutes afterwards, a starched simulacrum of what had once been a Chief Commissioner's butler (even to a tarnished silver badge in the orthodox headgear shaped like a big pith quoit) appeared in the verandah of Mrs. Castello's house, and, pointing with dignity to the glimmer of a hurricane lantern in the dusty darkness by the gate, said, as he produced a moth-eaten cashmere opera-cloak trimmed with moulting swansdown:

"As per previous order, the Miss-Sahiba's ayah hath appeared for her mistress, with this slave as escort."

Elflida Norma, a dancing incarnation of pure mischief, looked round angrily on the burst of noisy laughter which followed, and the pausing stamp of her foot was not warranted by the polka.

"Why you laugh?" she cried, passionately. "He is my servant--he belongs to our place."

Then, turning to the deferential figure, her tone changed, and she drew herself up to the full of her small height.

"Nikul jao!" she said, superbly; which, being interpreted, is the opprobrious form of "get you gone."

The old man's instinct had told him aright. There, amid that company, the girl in the white muslin she had surreptitiously pinned into the semblance of a ball dress, her big blue eyes matching the tight string of big blue beads about her slender throat, showed herself apart absolutely, despite her dark hair and 'almost sallow complexion.

"The Huzoor has forgotten the time," said Imân, imperturbably; "it is just twelve o'clock, and _Sin-an-hella_ dances of this description"--here he looked round at the squalid preparations for supper with superlative scorn--"always close at midnight."

There was something so almost appalling in the answering certainty of his tone regarding Cinderellas, that even Mrs. Castello hesitated, looking round helplessly at her guests.

"In addition," added the old man, following up the impression, "is not the night Saturday? and even in the great _Lat-Sahib's_ house, where I have served, was there no nautch on Saturdays--excepting _Sin-an-hellas_."

He yielded the last point graciously, but the concession was even more confounding to Mrs. Castello than his previous claim. Besides, old Imân's darkling allusion to service with a Governor-General was a well-known danger-signal to the whole Hastings family, including Elflida Norma, who now hesitated palpably.

"I t'ought you more wise," insinuated her partner, who had actually laid aside his hat for the polka, "than to have such a worn-out poor fellow to your place. Pay no heed to him, Miss 'Astin', and polk again once more."

Elflida drew herself away from his encircling arm haughtily.

"No, thanks," she drawled, her small head, with its short curls in air. "I am tired of polking--and he is a more better servant than your people have in your place, anyhow."

"But Elfie!" protested Mrs. Castello.

The girl interrupted her step-sister with an odd expression in her big blue eyes.

"It will be Sunday, as he says, Julia; besides, the princess always goes home first from a Cinderella, you know, because----"

"Because why?" inquired Mrs. Castello, fretfully; "that will be some bob-dash from the silly books she adores so much, Mr. Rosario."

Elflida stood for a moment smiling sweetly, as it were appraising all things she saw, from the greasy tablecloth on the supper table to old Imân's starched purity; from the cocoanut oil on the head of one admirer, to the tarnished silver sign of service on the head of the other.

"Because she was a princess, of course," she replied, demurely; and straightway stooped her white shoulders for the yoke of cashmere and swansdown with a dignity which froze even Mr. Rosario's remonstrance.

"Thank you," she said, loftily in the verandah, when he suggested escort; "but my ayah and my bearer are sufficient. Good-night."

So down the pathway, inches deep in dust, she walked sedately towards the glimmer of the lantern by the gate, followed deferentially by Imân. But only so far; for once within the spider's web halo round the barred light, she sprang forward with a laugh. The next instant all was dark. Cimmerian darkness indeed to the old man as he struggled with the moulting swansdown and moth-eaten cashmere she had flung over his head.

"Miss-_Sahiba!_ Miss-_baba_! _norty_, _norty_ girl!" he cried after her, desperately, in his double capacity of escort and ayah. Then he consoled himself with the reflection that it was but a bare quarter of a mile to the serai along a straight deserted high road. Even a real Miss-Sahiba might go so far alone, unhurt; so, after pausing a moment from force of habit to re-light the lantern, he ambled after his charge as fast as his old legs could carry him. Suddenly he heard a noise such as he had never heard before close behind him. A horrid, panting noise, and then something between a bellow and a whistle. He turned, saw a red eye glaring at him, and the next instant the infernal monster darted past him, whirring, snorting. In pursuit, of course, of Elflida Norma!

What tyranny was here! What defiance of custom! Saw anyone ever the like?--on a decent metalled road--and only the ayah--God forgive him the lie!--wanting to make all things in order?

These confused, helpless thoughts ran swifter in the old man's mind that his legs carried his body, as he followed in pursuit of the monster. The lantern, swinging wildly, hindered such light as there might have been without it, but he knew the Thing was ahead of him, by the truly infernal smell it left behind it.

And then from the darkness ahead came a curiously familiar cry, "Hut, hut! (get out of the way). Oh, damn!"

A crash followed; then silence. A few seconds afterwards he was gazing, helplessly bewildered, at two figures who were looking at each other wrathfully across the white streak of road.

One he knew. It was Elflida Norma, her impromptu ball dress metamorphosed by her race into loose white draperies out of which the small dark head and slim throat, with its circlet of big blue beads, rose as from clouds. The other, unknown, was that of a tall, fair young man.

"If you had only stood still," the latter was saying angrily, "I could have managed, but you dodged about like--like----" His eyes had taken her in by this time, and he paused in his simile. But hers had wandered to the monster prone in the dust; and she stepped closer to it curiously.

"I suppose it is named a motor bicycle," she said, coolly. "I have not seen one in our place before, only in picture books. I am glad."

There were no regrets or apologies. And even Imân Khân, when he recovered his breath, made no inquiries as to whether the young man had hurt himself in getting out of the Miss-Sahiba's way He simply looked at the wheels of the bicycle and then at its stalwart young rider.

God had been kind and sent a husband in a miraculous car!

II

Imân Khân sate in the early dawn, putting such polish as never before was put on a pair of rather large size Oxford shoes. So far all had gone well. His own vast experience, aided by the stranger's complete ignorance of Indian ways, had sufficed for much; and Alexander Alexander Sahib (all the twelve Imâns be praised for such a name!) was now comfortably asleep in the bastion opposite the widow's quarters, under the impression that the hastily produced whisky and soda, with a "sand beef" (sandwich) in case hunger had come on the road, the simple but clean bedding, and briefly, all the luxuries of a night's sleep after a somewhat severe shaking, were due to the commercial instincts of a good old chap in charge of the usual rest-house: that being exactly what Imân had desired as a beginning.

The sequel required thought, and, as he polished, his brain was full of plans for the immediate future. One thing was certain, however, quite certain. The husband God had sent in a car must not be allowed to ride away on it before seeing more of the Miss-_Sahiba_. Arrangements must be made, as they always had to be made in the best families. Generally it began with a tennis party--but this, of course, was out of the question--and perhaps the accident on the road might be taken as an equivalent for that introduction. Then there were dances, and "fools-food" (picnics). The one might be considered as taken also, the others were out of season in the heats of May. There remained drives and dinners. Both possible, but both required time; therefore time must be had. The _chota-sahib_ must not ride away after breakfast, as he had settled on doing, should he and the monster be found fit for the road.

Now the _chota-sahib_ seemed none the worse for his fall, as Imân, in his capacity of valet, had had opportunities of judging. The inference, therefore, was obvious. It must be the monster who was incapable.

Imân gave a finishing glisten to the shoes and placed them decorously side by side, ready to be taken in when the appointed hour came for shaving water. Then he went over and looked at the motor bicycle, which was accommodated in the verandah. It did not pant or smell now as if it were alive, but for all that it looked horribly healthy and strong. It was evidently not a thing to be broken inadvertently by a casual push. Then a thought struck him, and he ambled off to the old blacksmith, who still lived in the serai arcade and boasted of his past trade of mending springs, shoeing horses, and selling to travellers his own manufactures in the way of wonderful soft iron pocket-knives with endless blades and corkscrews warranted to draw themselves instead of the corks!

"Ari Bhai," said Imân mildly to this worthy, "thou art a prince of workmen, truly; but come and see something beyond thy art in iron. Bâpri bâp! I warrant thou couldst not even guess at its inner parts."

Could he not? Tezoo, the smith, thought otherwise, and being clever as well as voluble, hit with fair correctness on pivots, cog-wheels, and such-like inevitables of all machinery, the result of the interview being that Imân, armed with his kitchen chopper and a bundle of skewers, had a subsequent _tête-à-tête_ with the monster, in which the latter came off second best; so that when its owner, fortified by a most magnificent breakfast (served in the verandah by reason of the central room of that bastion having an absolutely unsafe roof), went to overhaul his metal steed, he was fairly surprised.

"It is a verra remarkable occurrence," he said softly to himself as his deft hands busied themselves with nuts and screws (for he was a Scotch engineer on his way to take up an appointment as superintendent in a canal workshop), "most remarkable. And would be a fine example to the old ministers thesis that accident is not chance. There's just a method in it that is absolutely uncanny."

In short, even with the smithy on the premises, of which the good old chap in charge spoke consolingly, it was clear he could not start before evening, if then. Not that it mattered so much, since he had plenty of time in which to join his billet.

Thus, as he smoked his pipe, the question came at last for which the old matchmaker had been longing.

"And who would the young lady be who smashed me up last night?"

In his reply Imân dragged in _Warm E-stink Sahib Bahadur_ and a vast amount of extraneous matter out of his own past experiences. Regarding the present, however, he was distinctly selective without being actually untruthful. The late _E-stink Sahib's_ widow and children, for instance, being also at rest in the serai, were equally under his charge. And this being so, since there was but one public room in which dinner could possibly be served as it should be served--here Imân made a digression regarding the rights of the sahib-logue at large and _E-stink Sahib's_ family in particular--it was possible that the Huzoor might meet his fellow-lodgers and the Miss-_Sahiba_ again.

In fact, he--Imân--would find it more convenient if the meal were eaten together and at the same time, and the mem--her absence being one of the eliminated truths--would, he knew, fall in with any suggestion of his; which statement again was absolutely true.

Alec Alexander, lost in the intricacies of a piston-rod, acquiesced mechanically, though in truth the likelihood of seeing such a remarkably pretty face again was not without its usual unconscious charm to a young man.

This charm, however, became conscious half an hour afterwards, when hard at work in the smithy, his coat off, his sleeves rolled up, showing milk-white arms above his tanned wrists, he looked up from the bit of glowing iron on the anvil and saw a large pair of blue eyes and a large string of blue beads about an almost childish throat.

It struck him that both were as blue as the sky inarching the wide inarched square of the old serai. It struck him also that the eyes, anyhow, had more in common with the sky than with the house made with hands in which he stood, even though dead kings had built it. Yes! the whole figure did not belong somehow to its environment; to the litter of wasted forage, the ashes of dead fires, to the desertion and neglect of a place which, having served its purpose of a night's lodging, has been left behind on the road. It seemed worth more than that.

"I gave you a nice toss, didn't I?" said Elflida Norma, breaking in on his quasi-sentimental thought with a certain complacency. "If you had got out of my way it would have been more better."

"You mean if you hadn't got in mine," he replied, grimly. "But don't let us quarrel about that now. The mischief's done so far as I am concerned."

The blue eyes narrowed in eager interest.

"Have you broken things inside, too?" she asked, sympathy absent, pure curiosity present in her tone.

"No! I didn't," he said, shortly. "I'm not of the kind that breaks easily."

She considered him calmly from head to foot. "No-o-o," she admitted, sparingly. "I suppose not--but your arms look veree brittle, like china--I suppose that is from being so--being so chicken-white."