‘I’m immensely grateful, Rao Sahib. I believe you’ve saved my life. How did Hitchcock –’
‘Oho! His hair was upon end. He rode to me in the middle of the night and woke me up in the arms of Morphus.48 I was most truly concerned, Finlinson, so I came too. My head-priest he is very angry just now. We will go quick, Mister Hitchcock. I am due to attend at twelve forty-five in the state temple, where we sanctify some new idol. If not so I would have asked you to spend the day with me. They are dam’-bore, these religious ceremonies, Finlinson, eh?’
Peroo, well known to the crew, had possessed himself of the wheel, and was taking the launch craftily up-stream. But while he steered he was, in his mind, handling two feet of partially untwisted wire rope; and the back upon which he beat was the back of his guru.
THE MALTESE CAT
They had good reason to be proud, and better reason to be afraid, all twelve of them; for, though they had fought their way, game by game, up the teams entered for the polo tournament, they were meeting the Archangels that afternoon in the final match; and the Archangels’ men were playing with half-a-dozen ponies apiece. As the game was divided into six quarters of eight minutes each, that meant a fresh pony after every halt. The Skidars’ team, even supposing there were no accidents, could only supply one pony for every other change; and two to one is heavy odds. Again, as Shiraz, the grey Syrian, pointed out, they were meeting the pink and pick of the polo-ponies of Upper India; ponies that had cost from a thousand rupees each, while they themselves were a cheap lot gathered, often from country carts, by their masters who belonged to a poor but honest native infantry regiment.
‘Money means pace and weight,’ said Shiraz, rubbing his black silk nose dolefully along his neat-fitting boot,1 ‘and by the maxims of the game as I know it –’
‘Ah, but we aren’t playing the maxims,’ said the Maltese Cat. ‘We’re playing the game, and we’ve the great advantage of knowing the game. Just think a stride, Shiraz. We’ve pulled up from bottom to second place in two weeks against all those fellows on the ground here; and that’s because we play with our heads as well as with our feet.’
‘It makes me feel undersized and unhappy all the same,’ said Kittiwynk, a mouse-coloured mare with a red browband and the cleanest pair of legs that ever an aged pony owned. ‘They’ve twice our size, these others.’
Kittiwynk looked at the gathering and sighed. The hard, dusty Umballa polo-ground was lined with thousands of soldiers, black and white, not counting hundreds and hundreds of carriages, and drags, and dog-carts,2 and ladies with brilliant-coloured parasols, and officers in uniform and out of it, and crowds of natives behind them; and orderlies on camels who had halted to watch the game, instead of carrying letters up and down the Station, and native horse-dealers running about on thin-eared Baluchi mares, looking for a chance to sell a few first-class polo-ponies. Then there were the ponies of thirty teams that had entered for the Upper India Free-for-All Cup – nearly every pony of worth and dignity from Mhow to Peshawur, from Allahabad to Multan; prize ponies, Arabs, Syrian, Barb, countrybred, Deccanee, Waziri, and Kabul ponies of every colour and shape and temper that you could imagine. Some of them were in mat-roofed stables close to the polo-ground, but most were under saddle while their masters, who had been defeated in the earlier games, trotted in and out and told each other exactly how the game should have been played.
It was a glorious sight, and the come-and-go of the little quick hoofs, and the incessant salutations of ponies that had met before on other polo-grounds or racecourses, were enough to drive a four-footed thing wild.
But the Skidars’ team were careful not to know their neighbours, though half the ponies on the ground were anxious to scrape acquaintance with the little fellows that had come from the North, and, so far, had swept the board.
‘Let’s see,’ said a soft, golden-coloured Arab, who had been playing very badly the day before, to the Maltese Cat, ‘didn’t we meet in Abdul Rahman’s stable in Bombay four seasons ago? I won the Paikpattan Cup next season, you may remember.’
‘Not me,’ said the Maltese Cat politely. ‘I was at Malta then, pulling a vegetable cart. I don’t race. I play the game.’
‘O-oh!’ said the Arab, cocking his tail and swaggering off.
‘Keep yourselves to yourselves,’ said the Maltese Cat to his companions. ‘We don’t want to rub noses with all those goose-rumped half-breeds of Upper India. When we’ve won this Cup they’ll give their shoes to know us.’
‘We shan’t win the Cup,’ said Shiraz. ‘How do you feel?’
‘Stale as last night’s feed after a musk-rat has run over it,’ said Polaris, a rather heavy-shouldered grey, and the rest of the team agreed with him.
‘The sooner you forget that the better,’ said the Maltese Cat cheerfully. ‘They’ve finished tiffin3 in the big tent. We shall be wanted now. If your saddles are not comfy, kick. If your bits aren’t easy, rear, and let the saises know whether your boots are tight.’
Each pony had his sais, his groom, who lived and ate and slept with the pony, and had betted a great deal more than he could afford on the result of the game. There was no chance of anything going wrong, and, to make sure, each sais was shampooing the legs of his pony to the last minute. Behind the saises sat as many of the Skidars’ regiment as had leave to attend the match – about half the native officers, and a hundred or two dark, black-bearded men with the regimental pipers nervously fingering the big be-ribboned bagpipes. The Skidars were what they call a Pioneer regiment; and the bagpipes made the national music of half the men. The native officers held bundles of polo-sticks, long cane-handled mallets, and as the grand-stand filled after lunch they arranged themselves by ones and twos at different points round the ground, so that if a stick were broken the player would not have far to ride for a new one. An impatient British cavalry band struck up ‘If you want to know the time, ask a p’leeceman!’ and the two umpires in light dust-coats danced out on two little excited ponies. The four players of the Archangels’ team followed, and the sight of their beautiful mounts made Shiraz groan again.
‘Wait till we know,’ said the Maltese Cat. ‘Two of ’em are playing in blinkers,4 and that means they can’t see to get out of the way of their own side, or they may shy at the umpires’ ponies. They’ve all got white web reins that are sure to stretch or slip!’
‘And,’ said Kittiwynk, dancing to take the stiffness out of her, ‘they carry their whips in their hands instead of on their wrists. Hah!’
‘True enough. No man can manage his stick and his reins and his whip that way,’ said the Maltese Cat. ‘I’ve fallen over every square yard of the Malta ground, and I ought to know.’ He quivered his little flea-bitten5 withers just to show how satisfied he felt; but his heart was not so light. Ever since he had drifted into India on a troopship, taken, with an old rifle, as part payment for a racing debt, the Maltese Cat had played and preached polo to the Skidars’ team on the Skidars’ stony polo-ground. Now a polo-pony is like a poet. If he is born with a love for the game he can be made. The Maltese Cat knew that bamboos grew solely in order that polo-balls might be turned from their roots, that grain was given to ponies to keep them in hard condition, and that ponies were shod to prevent them slipping on a turn. But, besides all these things, he knew every trick and device of the finest game of the world, and for two seasons he had been teaching the others all he knew or guessed.
‘Remember,’ he said for the hundredth time as the riders came up, ‘we must play together, and you must play with your heads. Whatever happens, follow the ball. Who goes out first?’
Kittiwynk, Shiraz, Polaris, and a short high little bay fellow with tremendous hocks and no withers worth speaking of (he was called Corks) were being girthed up, and the soldiers in the background stared with all their eyes.
‘I want you men to keep quiet,’ said Lutyens, the captain of the team, ‘and especially not to blow your pipes.’
‘Not if we win, Captain Sahib?’ asked a
piper.
‘If we win, you can do what you please,’ said Lutyens with a smile, as he slipped the loop of his stick over his wrist, and wheeled to canter to his place. The Archangels’ ponies were a little bit above themselves on account of the many-coloured crowd so close to the ground. Their riders were excellent players, but they were a team of crack players instead of a crack team; and that made all the difference in the world. They honestly meant to play together, but it is very hard for four men, each the best of the team he is picked from, to remember that in polo no brilliancy of hitting or riding makes up for playing alone. Their captain shouted his orders to them by name, and it is a curious thing that if you call his name aloud in public after an Englishman you make him hot and fretty. Lutyens said nothing to his men because it had all been said before. He pulled up Shiraz, for he was playing ‘back’, to guard the goal. Powell on Polaris was half-back, and Macnamara and Hughes on Corks and Kittiwynk were forwards. The tough bamboo-root ball was put into the middle of the ground one hundred and fifty yards from the ends, and Hughes crossed sticks, heads-up, with the captain of the Archangels, who saw fit to play forward, and that is a place from which you cannot easily control the team. The little click as the cane-shafts met was heard all over the ground, and then Hughes made some sort of quick wrist-stroke that just dribbled the ball a few yards. Kittiwynk knew that stroke of old, and followed as a cat follows a mouse. While the captain of the Archangels was wrenching his pony round Hughes struck with all his strength, and next instant Kittiwynk was away, Corks following close behind her, their little feet pattering like rain-drops on glass.
‘Pull out to the left,’ said Kittiwynk between her teeth, ‘it’s coming our way, Corks!’
The back and half-back of the Archangels were tearing down on her just as she was within reach of the ball. Hughes leaned forward with a loose rein, and cut it away to the left almost under Kittiwynk’s feet, and it hopped and skipped off to Corks, who saw that, if he were not quick, it would run beyond the boundaries. That long bouncing drive gave the Archangels time to wheel and send three men across the ground to head off Corks. Kittiwynk stayed where she was, for she knew the game. Corks was on the ball half a fraction of a second before the others came up, and Macnamara, with a back-handed stroke, sent it back across the ground to Hughes, who saw the way clear to the Archangels’ goal, and smacked the ball in before anyone quite knew what had happened.
‘That’s luck,’ said Corks, as they changed ends. ‘A goal in three minutes for three hits and no riding to speak of.’
‘Don’t know,’ said Polaris. ‘We’ve made ’em angry too soon. Shouldn’t wonder if they try to rush us off our feet next time.’
‘Keep the ball hanging then,’ said Shiraz. ‘That wears out every pony that isn’t used to it.’
Next time there was no easy galloping across the ground. All the Archangels closed up as one man, but there they stayed, for Corks, Kittiwynk, and Polaris were somewhere on the top of the ball, marking time among the rattling sticks, while Shiraz circled about outside, waiting for a chance.
‘We can do this all day,’ said Polaris, ramming his quarters into the side of another pony. ‘Where do you think you’re shoving to?’
‘I’ll – I’ll be driven in an ekka6 if I know,’ was the gasping reply, ‘and I’d give a week’s feed to get my blinkers off. I can’t see anything.’
‘The dust is rather bad. Whew! That was one for my off hock. Where’s the ball, Corks?’
‘Under my tail. Anyhow a man’s looking for it there. This is beautiful. They can’t use their sticks, and it’s driving ’em wild. Give old Blinkers a push and he’ll go over!’
‘Here, don’t touch me! I can’t see. I’ll – I’ll back out, I think,’ said the pony in blinkers, who knew that if you can’t see all round your head you cannot prop yourself against a shock.
Corks was watching the ball where it lay in the dust close to his near fore, with Macnamara’s shortened stick tap-tapping it from time to time. Kittiwynk was edging her way out of the scrimmage, whisking her stump of a tail with nervous excitement.
‘Ho! They’ve got it,’ she snorted. ‘Let me out!’ and she galloped like a rifle-bullet just behind a tall lanky pony of the Archangels, whose rider was swinging up his stick for a stroke.
‘Not to-day, thank you,’ said Hughes, as the blow slid off his raised stick, and Kittiwynk laid her shoulder to the tall pony’s quarters, and shoved him aside just as Lutyens on Shiraz sent the ball where it had come from, and the tall pony went skating and slipping away to the left. Kittiwynk, seeing that Polaris had joined Corks in the chase for the ball up the ground, dropped into Polaris’s place, and then time was called.
The Skidars’ ponies wasted no time in kicking or fuming. They knew each minute’s rest meant so much gain, and trotted off to the rails and their saises, who began to scrape and blanket and rub them at once.
‘Whew!’ said Corks, stiffening up to get all the tickle out of the big vulcanite7 scraper. ‘If we were playing pony for pony we’d bend those Archangels double in half an hour. But they’ll bring out fresh ones and fresh ones, and fresh ones after that – you see.’
‘Who cares?’ said Polaris. ‘We’ve drawn first blood. Is my hock swelling?’
‘Looks puffy,’ said Corks. ‘You must have got rather a wipe. Don’t let it stiffen. You’ll be wanted again in half an hour.’
‘What’s the game like?’ said the Maltese Cat.
‘Ground’s like your shoe, except where they’ve put too much water on it,’ said Kittiwynk. ‘Then it’s slippery. Don’t play in the centre. There’s a bog there. I don’t know how their next four are going to behave, but we kept the ball hanging and made ’em lather for nothing. Who goes next? Two Arabs and a couple of countrybreds! That’s bad. What a comfort it is to wash your mouth out!’
Kitty was talking with the neck of a leather-covered soda-water bottle between her teeth and trying to look over her withers at the same time. This gave her a very coquettish air.
‘What’s bad?’ said Grey Dawn, giving to the girth and admiring his well-set shoulders.
‘You Arabs can’t gallop fast enough to keep yourselves warm – that’s what Kitty means,’ said Polaris, limping to show that his hock needed attention. ‘Are you playing “back”, Grey Dawn?’
‘Looks like it,’ said Grey Dawn, as Lutyens swung himself up. Powell mounted the Rabbit, a plain bay countrybred much like Corks, but with mulish ears. Macnamara took Faiz Ullah, a handy short-backed little red Arab with a long tail, and Hughes mounted Benami, an old and sullen brown beast, who stood over in front more than a polo-pony should.
‘Benami looks like business,’ said Shiraz. ‘How’s your temper, Ben?’ The old campaigner hobbled off without answering, and the Maltese Cat looked at the new Archangel ponies prancing about on the ground. They were four beautiful blacks, and they saddled big enough and strong enough to eat the Skidars’ team and gallop away with the meal inside them.
‘Blinkers again,’ said the Maltese Cat. ‘Good enough!’
‘They’re chargers – cavalry chargers!’ said Kittiwynk indignantly. ‘They’ll never see thirteen-three again.’
‘They’ve all been fairly measured and they’ve all got their certificates,’ said the Maltese Cat, ‘or they wouldn’t be here. We must take things as they come along, and keep our eyes on the ball.’
The game began, but this time the Skidars were penned to their own end of the ground, and the watching ponies did not approve of that.
‘Faiz Ullah is shirking, as usual,’ said Polaris, with a scornful grunt.
‘Faiz Ullah is eating whip,’ said Corks. They could hear the leather-thonged polo-quirt lacing the little fellow’s well-rounded barrel. Then the Rabbit’s shrill neigh came across the ground. ‘I can’t do all the work,’ he cried.
‘Play the game, don’t talk,’ the Maltese Cat whickered; and all the ponies wriggled with excitement, and the soldiers and the grooms gripped the railings and
shouted. A black pony with blinkers had singled out old Benami, and was interfering with him in every possible way. They could see Benami shaking his head up and down and flapping his underlip.
‘There’ll be a fall in a minute,’ said Polaris. ‘Benami is getting stuffy.’
The game flickered up and down between goal-post and goal-post, and the black ponies were getting more confident as they felt they had the legs of the others. The ball was hit out of a little scrimmage, and Benami and the Rabbit followed it; Faiz Ullah only too glad to be quiet for an instant.
The blinkered black pony came up like a hawk, with two of his own side behind him, and Benami’s eye glittered as he raced. The question was which pony should make way for the other; each rider was perfectly willing to risk a fall in a good cause. The black who had been driven nearly crazy by his blinkers trusted to his weight and his temper; but Benami knew how to apply his weight and how to keep his temper. They met, and there was a cloud of dust. The black was lying on his side with all the breath knocked out of his body. The Rabbit was a hundred yards up the ground with the ball, and Benami was sitting down. He had slid nearly ten yards, but he had had his revenge, and sat cracking his nostrils till the black pony rose.
‘That’s what you get for interfering. Do you want any more?’ said Benami, and he plunged into the game. Nothing was done, because Faiz Ullah would not gallop, though Macnamara beat him whenever he could spare a second. The fall of the black pony had impressed his companions tremendously, and so the Archangels could not profit by Faiz Ullah’s bad behaviour.
But as the Maltese Cat said, when time was called and the four came back blowing and dripping, Faiz Ullah ought to have been kicked all round Umballa. If he did not behave better next time, the Maltese Cat promised to pull out his Arab tail by the root and eat it.
The Man Who Would Be King Page 41
