I did not turn the lamps out. I went into Strickland"s room first and allowed him to make the darkness. Then he followed me, and we lighted tobacco and thought. Strickland did the thinking. I smoked furiously because I was afraid.
"Imray is back," said Strickland. "The question is, who killed Imray?
Don"t talk--I have a notion of my own. When I took this bungalow I took most of Imray"s servants. Imray was guileless and inoffensive, wasn"t he?"
I agreed, though the heap under the cloth looked neither one thing nor the other.
"If I call the servants they will stand fast in a crowd and lie like Aryans. What do you suggest?"
"Call "em in one by one," I said.
"They"ll run away and give the news to all their fellows," said Strickland.
"We must segregate "em. Do you suppose your servant knows anything about it?"
"He may, for aught I know, but I don"t think it"s likely. He has only been here two or three days."
"What"s your notion?" I asked.
"I can"t quite tell. How the d.i.c.kens did the man get the wrong side of the ceiling-cloth?"
There was a heavy coughing outside Strickland"s bedroom door. This showed that Bahadur Khan, his body-servant, had waked from sleep and wished to put Strickland to bed.
"Come in," said Strickland. "It is a very warm night, isn"t it?"
Bahadur Khan, a great, green-turbaned, six-foot Mohammedan, said that it was a very warm night, but that there was more rain pending, which, by his honor"s favor, would bring relief to the country.
"It will be so, if G.o.d pleases," said Strickland, tugging off his hoots.
"It is in my mind, Bahadur Khan, that I have worked thee remorselessly for many days--ever since that time when thou first came into my service. What time was that?"
"Has the heaven-born forgotten? It was when Imray Sahib went secretly to Europe without warning given, and I--even I--came into the honored service of the protector of the poor."
"And Imray Sahib went to Europe?"
"It is so said among the servants."
"And thou wilt take service with him when he returns?"
"a.s.suredly, sahib. He was a good master and cherished his dependents."
"That is true. I am very tired, but I can go buck-shooting tomorrow.
Give me the little rifle that I use for black buck; it is in the case yonder."
The man stooped over the case, banded barrels, stock, and fore-end to Strickland, who fitted them together. Yawning dolefully, then he reached down to the gun-case, took a solid drawn cartridge, and slipped it into the breech of the .360 express.
"And Imray Sahib has gone to Europe secretly? That is very strange, Bahadur Khan, is it not?"
"What do I know of the ways of the white man, heaven-born?"
"Very little, truly. But thou shalt know more. It has reached me that Imray Sahib has returned from his so long journeyings, and that even now he lies in the next room, waiting his servant."
"Sahib!"
The lamp-light slid along the barrels of the rifle as they leveled themselves against Bahadur Khan"s broad breast.
"Go, then, and look!" said Strickland. "Take a lamp. Thy master is tired, and he waits. Go!"
The man picked up a lamp and went into the dining-room, Strickland following, and almost pushing him with the muzzle of the rifle. He looked for a moment at the black depths behind the ceiling-cloth, at the carca.s.s of the mangled snake under foot, and last, a grey glaze setting on his face, at the thing under the table-cloth.
"Hast thou seen?" said Strickland, after a pause.
"I have seen. I am clay in the white man"s hands. What does the presence do?"
"Hang thee within a month! What else?"
"For killing him? Nay, sahib, consider. Walking among us, his servants, he cast his eyes upon my child, who was four years old. Him he bewitched, and in ten days he died of the fever. My child!"
"What said Imray Sahib?"
"He said he was a handsome child, and patted him on the head; wherefore my child died. Wherefore I killed Imray Sahib in the twilight, when he came back from office and was sleeping. The heaven-born knows all things. I am the servant of the heaven-born."
Strickland looked at me above the rifle, and said, in the vernacular: "Thou art witness to this saying. He has killed."
Bahadur Khan stood ashen grey in the light of the one lamp. The need for justification came upon him very swiftly.
"I am trapped," he said, "but the offence was that man"s. He cast an evil eye upon my child, and I killed and hid him. Only such as are served by devils," he glared at Tietjens, crouched stolidly before him, "only such could know what I did."
"It was clever. But thou shouldst have lashed him to the beam with a rope. Now, thou thyself wilt hang by a rope. Orderly!"
A drowsy policeman answered Strickland"s call. He was followed by another, and Tietjens sat still.
"Take him to the station," said Strickland. "There is a case toward."
"Do I hang, then?" said Bahadur Khan, making no attempt to escape and keeping his eyes on the ground.
"If the sun shines, or the water runs, thou wilt hang," said Strickland.
Bahadur Khan stepped back one pace, quivered, and stood still. The two policemen waited further orders.
"Go!" said Strickland.
"Nay; but I go very swiftly," said Bahadur Khan. "Look! I am even now a dead man."
He lifted his foot, and to the little toe there clung the head of the half-killed snake, firm fixed in the agony of death.
"I come of land-holding stock," said Bahadur Khan, rocking where he stood. "It were a disgrace for me to go to the public scaffold, therefore I take this way. Be it remembered that the sahib"s shirts are correctly enumerated, and that there is an extra piece of soap in his washbasin. My child was bewitched, and I slew the wizard. Why should you seek to slay me? My honor is saved, and--and--I die."
At the end of an hour he died as they die who are bitten by the little kariat, and the policeman bore him and the thing under the table-cloth to their appointed places. They were needed to make clear the disappearance of Imray.
"This," said Strickland, very calmly, as he climbed into bed, "is called the nineteenth century. Did you hear what that man said?"