by Talbot Mundy
Gup reached into the tent and drew out Jonesey by the beard. “Search him,” he said, and Tom O’Hara went farther than that; he stripped him, using the Afghan woman’s knife to cut the clothing from his back.
“No,” he said, “no weapons.” Then, to Harriet Dover: “Lend the man a blankut, he’s indecunt.” Jonesey shrugged himself into a blanket and sat perfectly calm with his back to the moonlight. “In the name of Allah, what next?” he remarked. “Myself and two ladies — three innocents — what will you do with us?”
Said Gup: “If I felt free to follow inclination, I would kick all three of you and turn you loose to walk to Kabul!”
“We could walk to Kabul better if you didn’t kick,” said Jonesey. “You have big feet.”
Gup stared hard at Harriet Dover. “Do you trust Glint?” he asked.
“No.”
“Then why did you write to him?”
“I hoped to be able to blackmail him. If he had sent a compromising answer — —”
“I have ut — I have his answer,” said Tom O’Hara. “There’s enough in ut to break him when the burrasahib sees ut. They’re all looking for a chance to jump on Glint. Negotiating on his own — trying to steal the credut — watch him — Glint goes home on half-pay! Hope I travel by the same ship. I’ve a girl in Copenhagen and my long leave’s overdue.”
“What do you want?” Gup asked, and Harriet Dover stared at him. “Shall I send you back to Lottie with a letter telling all I know about you?”
“No,” she answered. “I will go with Jonesey.”
“I am not sure I will not kick Jonesey over that cliff.”
She laughed. “Then let me tell you. You won’t do it. Why? Because you are a coward. You are afraid to kill a man.”
Gup knew then how much he had risen above what he had been when he whipped Glint. Her sneer made no impression on him. He knew, and he knew it so well that he did not have to prove it, that he was capable of throwing all three of them over the cliff if that should appear to him wise. He could do it without malice, anger or regret. But he did not have to do it. He could see no probable danger in letting all three go. He could prevent their returning to the caverns to make trouble there. No goal was open to them except Kabul, and the Amir’s army probably would seize them on its way south.
“The Amir,” he said, “is welcome to you — you three and the Russian. The four of you leave this ledge when I do and you shall have a week’s provisions.”
“Mules, I suppose?” she suggested.
“No,” said Gup. “You walk. I need the mules.” He summoned the guards and posted them much closer to the tent, then strode away with Tom O’Hara to where coffee and hot cakes waited. To the captain of his guard he said: “If Jonesey, those two women and the Russian steal mules to-night, permit it. When you change the sentries at the tent, tell the relief to pretend to go to sleep.”
“Why did you change your mind?” asked Tom O’Hara.
“I didn’t change it. But if they think they are running away they will keep on running. I hope I’ve seen the last of ’em. I don’t want to have to do anything drastic.”
“Sure,” said O’Hara, “I get you. Men in love are always that way. I’ve a girl of my own in Copenhagen. Me — I wouldn’t bump a pimp off if I didn’t have to. Gup, do you know this is the first coffee I’ve had since I left Peshawar! Hey-yeh! But it warms the hungry cockles o’ y’r inner man! Here’s to the man who invented ut!”
There came a day — a day of wakening
Wherein the essences of knowledge won
By travail set the Soul within the Thing
So swelling, as the seeds swell in the sun,
That habit like a split shell yielded. Deeds
Were as inevitable then as doubt had been.
It dawned in consciousness that all man needs
Is work to do and faith in Force Unseen.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“Now I’ll be in Copenhagen inside of a month!”
GUP and Tom O’Hara shared one tent that night, Gup on the cot because O’Hara insisted that to “sleep soft” while on a job would ruin him; he seemed to fall asleep the very second that he curled up in a heap of horse-blankets. But Gup did not sleep until he saw four mules go stealing off into the night. The captain of his guard came and whispered to him to make sure that he knew it. Gup sent men to follow and make sure that the mules turned northward.
“Pursue them if they try to get back to the caverns. Otherwise let them go.”
Then he, too, slept until the sunlight touched the mountain peaks with silver. When he awoke he saw Tom O’Hara sitting like a vulture in the tent-opening. Before he could speak to him O’Hara had a prayer-mat spread and was setting the example for all the camp, performing the Moslem prayer ritual, bowing toward Mecca.
“You ought to have joined in ut,” he said presently. “You never can understand ’em until you pray with ’em. I used to act ut, but I’ve a girl in Copenhagen that’s a saint. She taught me better. She heals ’em — laying on o’ hands. She taught me to pray with any man, with ’em, mind you — no tongue in your cheek. I’ve learned ’em good since I took to doing ut. Cuss ’em and they cuss you. Bless ’em and they maybe wonder who gave you the right. But pray with ’em — I mean pray, not play at ut — and you can tune in on their emotions — catch yourself thinking their thoughts — if you’re awake, you think ’em first — forestall ’em. Then the gov’ment says: That fellow’s crazy, but he knows his stuff — he knows ut. And I do know ut. How do I understand you? I was an ostrich once myself. I’d be one yet if I hadn’t one-time got a crazy notion to spend a sick-leave in Denmark.”
“How about being seen here, Tom?”
“That’s all right. Jonesey was the only man who knew me. All the others think I’m a mullah, who can talk English from having been in Delhi prison, convicted o’ murder. The story is, I escaped by a miracle. But that’s dangerous. They have a way of asking for another miracle. I’m good at prophesying, and I’ve the Koran pretty near by heart. But I can’t heal ’em the way my girl does, and tricks — hell, they’re too risky. All the same, we’re going to have to stage a miracle. Listen to me, now.”
They strolled together to the wall and looked over but nothing could be seen. The fluffy mist had gathered in the gorge and lay there like cotton wadding.
Eagles sat preening their wings on the crags, waiting for wind to move the mist and make things visible.
“Midnight to-night,” said Tom O’Hara, “there’ll be upward of thirty thousand men in that valley below. Maybe you knew ut. I’ve been there talking with ’em, when they first began to drift in. They say fifty thousand, not counting the Ranee’s regulars. I say thirty thousand all told, and I’m nearer the mark. That’s thirty thousand sticks o’ dynamite. How did you leave the Ranee?”
Gup told him in full detail all that had happened since they last met. The only detail he avoided was the intimate personal one, but Tom O’Hara, with a strange reddish gleam in his eyes, filled in those gaps easily.
“I knew ut. If you scratch a Moslem in Morocco, Gup, a Moslem bleeds in Kandahar. Did you suppose you could even like that woman and all these hills not know you love her? Ostrich! It’s all over the hills that you went in there and took her, honest outlaw fashion. Hell! D’you know how fast a rumor travels? It’s in Kabul by this time. The Amir knows all about ut, multiplied by x and carried to the nth. He’s on his way, behind a screen o’ cavalry. He’s not moving, I’ll bet you, as fast as he thought he would. You can’t run India, you know, and snooze on the job. Our folks sent some lively lads a while ago to stir up the Shinwari tribesmen, and some others, and the Amir hasn’t got it all his own way. Besides, I fixed um. I wrote ut and they did ut — for a wonder. He had lots o’ spies in India and we fed ’em full o’ strictly secret information, most o’ which was: that if he comes we’ll lay the country waste in front of um. You see the force o’ that? He thinks he can’t live off the country, so he has to b
ring an awful heavy baggage-train and all the money in the Kabul treasury. Do you know how those lads love looting? Some of his nominal subjects are on his flanks like flies on a sore horse. He has to use half his men, I’m betting you, to guard that baggage-train. That’s me — I did ut. He’s moving slow; and every hour is an hour against um. Our folks are mobilizing troops along the border faster than the Amir thinks. Now what was your plan?”
Gup hesitated. He had told his plan to no one. He was almost afraid to tell it to Tom O’Hara, dreading Tom’s caustic comments. Almost any plan evolved in mental solitude looks good until it is spread before competent eyes.
“I’m to be sworn in to-night as commander-inchief,” he answered. “I propose to tell them that the Amir is coming to seize their Ranee with all her caverns, weapons and supplies. I am hoping to get them to follow me against the Amir, on the ground of izzat — honor. Probably can’t stop him, but — I think he’ll wish he hadn’t started.”
“And afterward?”
“Not likely there’ll be any afterward. Lottie refused to be persuaded.”
“Ostrich!”
“Lots of the men may refuse to follow me instead of her. I’ll do what I can with the remainder. And of course, you can’t lead men like those from the rear. I’m pretty sure to get mine. But I think I’ll stop the Amir long enough to let our Indian army mobilize against him.”
“All right. Suppose you get yours. Nobody minds dying — except me; I’m off for Copenhagen soon as this show’s over. What about Lottie, as you call her. What’s she to do?”
“Depends on me, Tom. If I pull off what I hope, to-night, she may give in. That will mean I shall have all the troops — perhaps, as you say, thirty thousand. It’s no secret from her that I think she has been doing wrong. She knows I intend to try to right it. I’ve given her the chance to find out whether or not she loves me. If she does, she will come with me — against the Amir. With thirty thousand men we will have a reasonable chance to make things hot for him. If she doesn’t love me, what she will do will be none of my business. If she loves me, she will die with me rather than not undo the harm she has done. But we may not have to die.”
“And then what?”
“I shall expect the Indian Government to do the decent thing by both of us.”
Tom O’Hara’s nose behaved exactly like an owl’s beak, when he chuckled. His eyes almost vanished amid wrinkles and the reddish stubble of a five-day beard.
“Gov’ments,” he said, “aren’t decent. They can’t afford to be. Gup, you’re a cross between a bloody fool, a genius, a good sport and an ostrich. But I like you first rate. Now listen — Lord, look at that mist!”
The morning wind was moving and the mist rolled up in front of it in mother-of-pearl waves, green and the gray of rocks and pinnacle-crags showing where it eddied and broke. Then the sun arose over the range and tinted it with gold and opal. Into that glory an eagle plunged and came up sparkling with his feathers dew-wet.
“And there’s idiots who say there isn’t any God!” said Tom O’Hara.
Then the wind blew chill and gusty from the northern snow, and in a moment the mist scattered into tails and drifts, until only thin hurrying streams of it were left and the gorge lay naked.
“See um?” Tom O’Hara never pointed but the movement of his head was like an owl’s.
Streaming along toward the broken gap that opened into the valley of last night’s bivouac fires were men, looking like insects, hurrying in single file and shapeless with the loads they carried. First there were tens — then scores — then hundreds, answering the Ranee’s summons.
“Mind you,” said Tom O’Hara, “most of ’em are poor. They’re tired. They’re hungry. Some of ’em, I’ll bet you, have met Jonesey on the way. He and the Dover woman and that Afghan she-devil will have told ’em three or four different tales to set ’em by the ears. They know by now the Amir’s on the march, likely enough he’ll loot the home of every man who isn’t loyal to him. They’re taking a long chance and they know ut. Soon as they reach the valley they’ll hear the tale I told there yesterday.”
“What’s the matter with my plan, Tom?”
“Might be worse — not bad for an amateur. Let’s patch ut. Listen, Gup: no plan’s any good that doesn’t lead direct to what you want. I want my long leave and a tickut to Copenhagen. You want Lottie. Am I right? Then get her, you big ostrich! Listen: I crossed the border with three thousand dibs in my wallet, a cake o’ chocolate and half a loaf of bread. I gave away the bread and chocolate and spent a thousand dibs. That gave me five-and-thirty first-class hairy liars and five fair-to-middling information men. I don’t pay liars to sit still and scratch ‘emselves. They’ve gone to work. And I don’t pay information men to keep me ignorant. At my game ignorance ain’t bliss. So there’s five-and-thirty different stories circumlocuting around the hills, not counting the ones I’ve told. And I know most of what’s been happening. I know what the Dover woman did — and you don’t know the half of ut. I knew Jonesey’s game — and you’d never guess the half o’ that. They’re both cracked — they’re as cracked as coots. She tried to sell you to Glint; she tried to sell the Ranee to the Amir. Unknown to you or the Dover woman or the Ranee, Jonesey tried to sell the whole outfit, you included, to a Shinwari named Bakar Sakao, who’s a dark horse and might start a rebellion behind the Amir’s back. And what for? She wants power. Jonesey’s in love with her. The Afghan female is in love with Jonesey. Don’t argue — I know ut. I knew ut three days ago.”
“Is that the tale you’ve been spreading?” Gup asked.
“Hell, no. I’ve told fairy-tales. But you always have to have some truth in ’em — about as much as you’d put salt on meat. Too much is a mistake. Too little is stoopid. I’ve sent out five-and-thirty versions of a story that the Amir is on his way to bag the Ranee for his harem and to loot those caverns to supply his ragamuffin army. And I’ve paid two mullahs — paid ’em handsome — to go into that bivouac yonder and say — they pretending, mind you, that they have ut from the Amir straight — that the Amir intends to burn the homes, sell the wives and daughters and cut the throats of all the men who don’t join his army before he gets here. There’ll be some who won’t believe that — there are always some sensible men — but they’ll be outnumbered ten to one. So you see, it’s all set for you. All you have to do to-night, at midnight, is to play your ace of trumps.”
“What if they take the mullahs at their word and flock over to the Amir?” Gup suggested.
“What if ut snows ink? Things don’t happen quite as suddenly as that. Don’t they think she’s a wonder? Aren’t you another wonder? Do you think I haven’t spread a yam about you, too? Do you think they won’t wait to see to-night what happens? If you do, you don’t know Hillmen. They’ll be all there, ready for you to turn the trick on ’em to-night.”
“Looks pretty much like my plan,” Gup answered. “Yes, but there’s more to ut. You’ve got to keep ’em idle until the Amir passes, if you can. Then swoop down on his baggage-train. That’s the worst that can happen if you play your hand right. Better yet, hold ’em and frighten the Amir back to Kabul! Try ut —
I doubt you can do ut — he’d lose his control of his own men if he ordered a retreat — but you can try ut. And above all, don’t let him seize those caverns! If he gets those he’ll have a base that might take us years to smoke him out of. Now you know ut. You know the whole layout. Hullo — see that? Three of our planes. They’re following the Khyber, looking for the Amir’s cavalry. But they’re too high to see much. They’re afraid of the broken air among these peaks. Do you know what the Amir did? He has no planes. He made some dummies in the arsenal in Kabul, no engines in ’em, and stood ’em around for the army to see, to give ’em confidence. Fact!”
They breakfasted beside a small fire, and all that morning they watched the gathering lashkar pouring in droves and driblets through the gap into the Valley of Doab. Several times during the day a messenger found T
om O’Hara with news of the Amir’s movements, but the news was never twice the same and for the most part Tom ignored it. He appeared to have a sort of instinct for discrimination between true and false. He also appeared to feel that he had shot his own bolt, and he had the rather rare gift of being able to sit still and await events when he had done his utmost.
“What’s the tale about me that you’ve told?” Gup asked him.
“I’ve said you’re Allah’s sending. Mind you, I’m a mullah. What I don’t know ain’t in the Book. I’ve said you’re sent to save the Ranee from the Amir. Listen: Look at me and look at you. You’re six foot and how many inches? You’re handsome. Have you ever seen an uglier specimun than me?”
“Heart of gold, Tom. Heart of gold,” said Gup.
“Heart of impudence. My girl’s a saint and she’s as sweet to look at as a lily-o’-the-valley. I went up and took her. She thinks I’m wonderful. The Danish bloods were after her like hawks after a partridge. I met her one day, and the second day she was mine and she knew ut. I could whistle her half around the world from Copenhagen and she’d come.”
Gup glared moodily across the valley. “Women vary, Tom.”
It was then, at last, that Tom O’Hara sprang his knock-out blow at indecision. Even then he did not quite reveal the depth of the anxiety that had kept him all one night and all one valuable morning perched on a ledge while the Afghan army advanced hour by hour on India.
“Don’t you see, you ostrich, that unless you grab her you haven’t a chance? You walked out on her, and that was genius. And you took Jonesey and the Dover woman; that was genius. It leaves your Ranee up against her own problum. You challenged her, and that was all right if you meant ut. But she’s a woman; she’s going to have to know you meant ut. Idiot! While you’ve sat here she’s been thinking and doing!”
“What do you mean, Tom?”
“Is she a suicider? No. Is she proud? Yes. Does she want to get caught by our crowd and put in prison for the rest of her life? Not likely! Has she brains? You bet she has. Is she desperut? O’ course! She’s just about had time to realize what Jonesey and the Dover woman did to her grip on things. Does she want to lose you? If she does, I’ll eat my dagger! But will she give in to you or any other man without being made to? Hell! If she’s that kind she couldn’t have done what she has done. It’s her privilege to be conquered — slap-up, good and proper. She has earned ut! And because you’re half a genius and half an ostrich, you’ve made her think you’re too romantuc to do any dirty work. Hell! Women aren’t romantuc, they’re ruthless and they want ut ruthless.”
