"I"m afraid he must have thought us awfully ungrateful," said the man, regretfully. "But it couldn"t be helped at first; then afterwards one had to move on. But I did write, you know, more than once about him, after we got a grip on the place again; so I hope they have done something."
"They will have to now, at any rate," said the wearer of the pink dress, firmly.
The sight of the garden, changed, neglected as it was, had brought back the very picture of that grizzled head with the curved hair, slipping through the rose-bushes, the delicate dark hand holding the tray of rose-leaves, as it slid over the bushes with its luck-offering for the bride. Yes! even if justice had been slow, inevitably slow, it should come now. This very evening, though she and her husband had only arrived in the station that morning.
They went to the rose square first, but Hushmut was not there. Then, seeing by the lack of blossom that the time of roses was not yet, they went on to the orange groves.
No one was there. So, doubtfully, they pa.s.sed to the jasmine, to the lemon gra.s.s.
But no one was to be seen. Nothing was to be heard but the lazy yet insistent cry of some one scaring the birds from the pomegranates.
"Let us ask him. He may know," suggested the wearer of the pink dress.
So they called him and he came--an old man, wizened, careworn.
Yes, he said, he knew. Wherefore not, when he had guarded fruit in that garden since he was a boy? There was not much to guard now, owing to past evils. Hushmut the essence-maker--Hushmut was dead. No one made essences any more. How did he die? Very simply. He had seen it with his own eyes when he was guarding fruit. The _Huzoors_ had doubtless heard of the evil times, even though, as the coachman had told him, they had just come from _wilayet_. Well, it began quite suddenly one evening in May. It was the peaches he was guarding then.
There had been a "fool"s dinner" in the garden, and afterwards a young _sahib_ and a miss in a pink dress had come running in to take refuge from the troopers. He had seen them, but what could he do? But Hushmut had shown them the secret pa.s.sage, no doubt. Anyhow he had come out alone and closed the door, and sate beside it singing when the troopers rode up.
And doubtless they would have believed him, seeing that he was friends with all the bad walkers in the city through the selling of his essences; but for a bit of the Miss-_sahiba"s_ dress which had caught in the door hasp. So they knew what he had done, and being enraged, had killed him there, by the door. It was quite simple.
Quite. So simple that those two said nothing. Only their hands sought each other as they turned back to the summer-house.
"I should like to see the place again," said the wearer of the pink dress in a hard, even voice. "I wonder if the door is open?"
It was; for no one made essences now. So they entered.
The still stood in the corner as before. The pile of that strange fuel lay between it and the trays of rose-leaves. But there was no difference between them now. Both were yellow, scentless; and though the pink paper which Hushmut had pasted over the rose-shaped air-holes was all broken and torn by birds and winds and weather, the bees did not drift in.
For there was no scent to lead them on. None.
The winds of two long years had swept it away absolutely. What else was to be expected?
Yet a vague disappointment showed in the woman"s face as it had in the girl"s.
But this time the man"s voice trembled as he answered her look with the words--
"Only the actions of the just, Smell sweet and blossom in the dust."
LITTLE HENRY AND HIS BEARER
CHAPTER I
When I was a child I wept over a story--if I remember right, by Mrs.
Sherwood--which bore this t.i.tle.
Years after I came to man"s estate, I felt inclined to weep over an incident in real life which this t.i.tle seemed to fit.
Looking back on those first tears, I judge them uncalled for by what my maturer age condemns as false sentiment. Perhaps my later emotion is equally at fault. The reader had better judge for himself.
"Speak on, O Bisram, bearer! Wherefore dost not obey? Speak on about Mai Kali and the Noose--the Noose that is so soft, that never slips.
Wherefore dost not speak, son of an owl?"
The voice was childish, fretful. So was the listless little figure in a flannel dressing-gown, which lay half upon the reed mat spread on the verandah floor, half against the red and yellow livery coat of Bisram, bearer. The latter remained silent, his dark eyes fixed deprecatingly on a taller figure within earshot. It was the child"s mother, standing for a glance at her darling.
"Speak! Why dost not speak, base-born child of pigs? Lo! I will smite thee. Speak of Mai Kali and the Noose. Lo! Bisram, bearer, be not unkind. Remember I am sick. Show me the Noose. _Ai!_ Bisra! show it to Sonny Baba."
The liquid Urdu fell from the child"s lips with quaint precision, and ended in the coaxing wail of one who knows his power.
That was unmistakable. The man"s high-bred, sensitive face, which had not quivered under the parentage a.s.signed to him by the thin, domineering voice, melted at the appeal, and the red and yellow arms seemed to close round their charge at the very suggestion of sickness.
Bisram gave another deprecating glance at the tall white figure at the door, and then, from the folds of his waistcloth, took out a silk handkerchief crumpled into a ball. But a dexterous flutter left it in uncreased folds across the child"s knees.
"Lo! Protector of the Poor! such is the Noose of Kali," said Bisram, deferentially.
Seen thus, the handkerchief looked larger than one would have expected: or perhaps it is more correct to say longer, for, the texture being loose like canvas, even the slight drag across the child"s knees stretched the stuff lengthwise. It was of that curious Indian colour called _oodah_, which is not purple or crimson, but which looks as if it had been the latter and might become the former--the colour, briefly, of recently spilt blood. It looked well, however, in the soft l.u.s.trous folds lying upon the child"s white dressing-gown. He smiled down at it joyfully: yet not content, since there was more to come.
"Twist it for Mai Kali. Twist it, Bisram, bearer! _Ai!_ base-born, twist it or I will smite--"
"It is time for the Shelter of the World to take his medicine," began Bisram, interrupting the imperious little voice. "Lo! does his Honour not see the _mem_ waiting for him?"
Sonny gave a quick glance at his mother. He knew his power there also.
"I"se not goin" to take it, mum," he called decisively, "till he"s twisted a" Noose. I won"t--I want a" stw.a.n.gle somefin" first. Tell him, mum--please. Then I"ll "waller it like a good boy."
"Do what he wants, Bisram, and then bring him here," said Sonny"s mother, her eyes soft. For the child had but lately chosen the path of Life instead of the Valley of the Shadow, so even wayward footsteps along it were welcome.
"Now is it Government orders," boasted Sonny, reverting to the precisions and peremptoriness of Hindustani with a wave of his small hand. "So twist and strangle, and if thou dost it not, my father will cause hanging to come to thee."
"_Huzoor!_" a.s.sented Bisram, cheerfully, as he shifted his burden slightly so as to free his left hand. The next instant a purple crimson rope of a thing, circled on itself, settled down upon the neck of a big painted mud tiger, bright yellow with black stripes and fiery red eyes, which one of the native visitors had brought that morning for the magistrate"s little son.
"Now the Protector of the Poor can pull," said Bisram, bearer. "It will not slip."
But Sonny"s wan little face had perplexity and doubt in it. "But, Bisra, Mai Kali rides a tiger. She wouldn"t stw.a.n.gle it. Would she, mum? I wouldn"t stw.a.n.gle my pony. I"d wather stw.a.n.gle the gwoom; wouldn"t you, mum? I would. I"d wather like to stw.a.n.gle Gamoo."
"My dear Sonny!" exclaimed his mother, looking with amused horror at the still, helpless little figure which Bisram had brought to her.
"You wouldn"t murder poor Gamoo, surely!"
Sonny made faces over his quinine, as if that were a matter of much more importance.
""Ess, I would," he said, with his mouth full of sweet biscuits. "I"d stw.a.n.gle him, and then Mai Kali would be pleased for a fousand years; and then I"d stw.a.n.gle Ditto an" Peroo too; so she"d be pleased for a fousand fousand years--wouldn"t she, Bisra?"
"_Huzoor!_" a.s.sented Bisram, bearer.