by Talbot Mundy
“You realize you are a prisoner?” asked the Delhi man.
“You need not be afraid. We do not beat our prisoners.”
“I am not the least afraid,” the judge answered, “but I would appreciate your providing a chair for my wife.”
One or two of the committee had the grace to look uncomfortable, but the man from Delhi grinned meanly. The judge began to be very nearly sure he recognized him, and was glad he had not made overtures.
“She shall have a chair, certainly. Many an Indian has been made to stand at her whim, but we are not vindictive!”
He clapped his hands and a boy brought a broken chair from inside the temple. The judge, who was weary almost beyond endurance, was left standing. Mrs. Wilmshurst sat down, speechless almost for the first time in her life.
“If you are not afraid, your case is different from that of the unfortunates who so frequently stand before you for sentence — unfortunates whom you punish drastically for breaking laws they had no voice in making,” said the man from Delhi; and at last Wilmshurst did recognize him. But he contrived to keep the recognition from his eyes.
“What do you propose to do with us?” the judge asked.
“Why should we propose at all?” the other retorted. “You are a prisoner. You should ask mercy.”
He evidently meant to inflict as much verbal torture as possible, for he was settling himself comfortably, cross-legged. Nevertheless, he did not enjoy the paramountcy that he hoped for. There was sturdy opposition from a graybeard facing him, who wore the white head-dress of an educated man and was big enough to have made about three of him from Delhi.
“They are hostages,” he said in English. “Make no error about that. I will agree to nothing else. They are hostages.”
The man from Delhi smiled with lean lips, accepting the suggestion, but obviously reserving venom for later on.
“Do you realize what it means to be a hostage?” he asked the judge. “For every outrage perpetrated by the British troops against us you are liable to be made to suffer in your own body.”
Wilmshurst smiled, rather wryly — because his feet were in agonies — but genuinely none the less. He was not such a fool as to suppose that men of the type before him would torture valuable prisoners. The suggestion was too absurd for him to answer with the obvious threat of what the British troops might accomplish in return. The point was not worth arguing.
Graybeard in opposition opened fire again, laying his fist on the table manfully and forestalling the Delhi man’s next remark.
“You will write a letter,” he said. “You will say in it that your wife and you are prisoners. You will say you have been well treated—”
“That will depend on the facts,” Wilmshurst interrupted. “My wife has been disgracefully ill-treated, and so have I. We have had no food — no rest. If I write a letter I shall say in it what I consider true.”
“Say what you like!” the graybeard answered. “You write the letter. Your friends will know you are a prisoner, and that is what we want.”
“I shall read the letter, of course, before you seal it up,” said the man from Delhi.
“I am willing to write,” said the judge after a moment’s reflection. His legal mind could see no possible objection to communicating with British Headquarters, wherever that might be. He rather suspected a trick, because the man from Delhi was connected with it, but for the life of him he could not see through the trick, so he supposed that none existed.
The man from Delhi, watching Wilmshurst with a quizzical expression that seemed to hint at ultimate consequence foreseen as yet only by himself, pushed paper, pen and ink toward the judge, who ignored them.
The Moplah at the head of the table said something in his own tongue, and there was a moment’s discussion in which the man from Delhi did not join.
“You are promised good treatment and anything you want in reason that is in our power to do until we shall have formulated our final demands. That is not yet. We will discuss them. When our final demands go to the British, your treatment after that will depend on the British reply. Now write,” said the man who sat between the chairman and the graybeard.
He had obviously had legal training, and seemed more than usually proud of his command of English, for he smirked self-complacently when he had done his speech.
The judge wrote:
To whom it may concern: My wife and I are prisoners in the hands of Moplahs, who have notified us that we are hostages, but have promised us good treatment for the present. Hitherto the treatment has not been good.
“Cross that out!” commanded the Delhi man, coming round to look over the judge’s elbow.
“Certainly not,” Wilmshurst answered, and signed his name. “Send that or nothing.”
They were in a quandary whether or not to use that letter, and some of them did not care to argue the point in the prisoner’s presence; so two of the committee — Moplahs, who knew no English — were told off to take them to the quarters assigned to them inside the temple. There were basins, great quantities of water, some soap, two towels, and two string-beds with cotton-stuffed mattresses and clean white sheets.
“Oh well, this might be worse!” said his wife, growing almost cheerful as the Moplahs locked them in.
“Might be worse? Yes. Might be better,” said the judge. “That fellow from Delhi who did the talking is a man whom I once sentenced to twenty years for forgery and arson. He escaped from prison. His name was Aurung Ali in those days, but he has probably changed it.”
CHAPTER 11. “Yours truly, John Linkinyear.”
Ommony returned to first principles — to his forest — cherished it. As a military man he was nothing. As a forester he had work, and knew that he could do it better than anyone else, or otherwise he would have gone long ago to learn from the better man. War, and especially rebellion, means fire; fire in the forest means a generation’s increase gone, and possibly baked earth in which no tree will root again. He went to work.
Many of the Hindus in the scattered villages had been murdered. Others had run away toward the coast, where in due course a warship put in appearance and produced an impression of safety where there was none. But it is impressions that count. Even a pitched battle is for no other purpose than to convince the enemy.
Ommony convinced his friends, which is always equally important. The one lone cruiser that dropped anchor off Calicut accomplished no more in its way than Ommony in his. He was a refuge in a stricken land — one white man unafraid. You could go to him and have your panic laughed at — then listen to strong sympathy and reassuring wisdom.
It was Ommony, leisurely regarding life from a wicker chair on his veranda, who pointed out that, whereas a village could be burned and its women carried off, the junglis who had no villages were safe.
“You can rebuild your villages,” he said, “but can you come to life again? Moreover, will the Moplahs burn an empty village?”
Thereafter, whoever had overheard him might have understood why the Christian missionaries have no kind word for Ommony; for he talked to those pagans in the terms of their own understanding, so that they knew him for an elder brother, not a representative of unintelligible wrath.
“The gods of the woods are afraid for their trees,” he announced. “I, who have served their forest, am protected. You have seen how the Moplahs spare me and my house, although they murder the white men in the trains. The gods are grateful. But how about you? Is it better to serve the gods with little cakes and withered flowers, or to go and look after the trees that the gods love? How do I know that the gods love the trees? People of no discernment! If the gods did not love the trees, why should they live among them?”
The logic of that was so much easier to grasp than the Moslem theory of one revengeful, flattery-loving Allah; and, moreover, it was so much more like what they were used to than the ordinary admonitions of a white man preaching allegiance to an incomprehensible Government, that they felt comforted and listened on,
instead of shrugging their shoulders at the great gulf fixed between them and whatever gods there be.
“If you care for the trees, the trees will hide you,” said Ommony. “That is the way of the gods, who reward for service rendered. If you let the trees burn, the gods will forget you. Pray, and the gods will laugh like the money- lender. Keep the fire-lanes clear; find the Moplahs’ deserted watch-fires and slake the ashes; search for the heat where smoke is, and the gods will protect you, even as they do me. Moreover, the Deepartament, whose servant I am, will pay wages by the month.”
So they left their miserable villages, cached their scant belongings, drove their cattle and goats into forest clearings under Ommony’s directions, and submitted to be formed into gangs. The junglis, who are so wise that they have no homes and will not work unless the work amuses them, were set to guarding the cattle, driving them from clearing to clearing out of the way of the raiding Moplahs and not losing more than a fair percentage to the lords of the jungle. Leopards must eat, and the terrified buck were much harder to kill since the fighting started.
Other junglis, scouting to discover which way the Moplahs might come next — in order to give notice to the herdsmen — were told to keep a bright eye lifted for Mahommed Babar, and to discover what had been done with the body of Sirdar Mahommed Akbar Khan — for none of the junglis understood that King was an Englishman. Some of them had seen him in English clothes when he first came, and with a rifle when he helped to execute Shere Ali, but that only led to the logical inference that he was an Indian who could play a white man’s part.
And meanwhile, the British authorities were not idle, although every precedent had been upset. Precedents are British gods, and it is distressing to see all your little deities broken on the earth, faces downward. Nevertheless, you can distress the British without immobilizing them, and they have this characteristic: that when the old gods are quite worn out and in disrepute they adopt nice new ones promptly.
The railways were out of commission, along with nearly all the bridges and a good proportion of the rolling-stock. The roads, too, were blocked with felled trees and great rocks loosened from the hills, for brother Moplah, who had seen the white man practicing his creed in France, had learned at last how to do a job thoroughly. Wherever a barricade of rocks and trees could be arranged to check the advance of troops, there it was. There, too, were trenches very skillfully designed and placed.
The torn-up railway track was about the only practicable line of advance; and as there were hardly any troops available, and such as there were were mostly needed to garrison fixed posts and protect defenseless small towns, the only possible course was to send junior officers in charge of small parties of men to patrol the line and keep the Moplahs worried.
Left to himself without a nurse in red tabs and brass hat a British subaltern can lead men. Whether wisely or not is not the question. He can be depended on to go three times as far as suggested and to have much less trouble with his men than if there were a canteen and a court-martial within reach.
So Lieutenant John Linkinyear, marching jauntily at the head of eleven men — having lost three en route and buried them — arrived at Ommony’s one early morning just as Ommony was coming down the steps with a gun under his arm.
“Bacon and eggs!” demanded Linkinyear, whose last meal was a supper of dry biscuit. “For twelve of us! Section-halt! Stand easy! Let your mouths run!”
Ommony shouted to his cook to continue bringing hot food until further notice, and demanded news.
“I’m three days out, thank God, and out of touch,” said Linkinyear. “The last I heard was that Sutherland of the Rutlandshires and twenty men got theirs — and a rumor about old Kadi Wilmshurst and his missus. It’s true about Charley and his Ruts. We found their bones in the ashes of a first-class railway carriage. Gave ’em full military honors — loaded salute. They’d earned it. Charley was a first-class man. He’d actually thrown up earthworks with the railway carriage on one wing and the station building on the other — telegraph wire entanglement — iron off the station roof to keep the gravel and sand heaped up — no end good! Must have moppled ’em too — made ’em so sore they left the wire and stuff behind ’em — probably hadn’t enough men left to drag it away.”
“What was the rumor about Wilmshurst and his wife?” asked Ommony.
“They were in a train that didn’t get through. I’m supposed to be sniffing for kubber* of them. Morning I left there was a note supposed to be from him saying he was a prisoner, missus along with him, and both safe. But nobody could swear to his signature and it was suspected to be a forgery.”
“What good would the forgery do the Moplahs?” demanded Ommony. [* News]
“Dunno. Everybody’s mad — Moplahs maddest of all— ‘xcept of course the D.A.A.G. acting everything. He’s no longer human. Theory was that Moplahs might be tempting us into a trap. Letter was dated from Podanaram or some such place. Never heard of it. Know where it is?”
Ommony nodded and led him into breakfast, leaving the men to wolf food on the veranda.
“How did you come to be here?” Linkinyear demanded between mouthfuls. “Why aren’t you killed or circumcised? Are you a Moplah chief — wizard — mad mullah — what’s the secret? You’ll come away with me, of course?”
Ommony laughed and waved the suggestion aside.
“I’ve news of Wilmshurst and his wife. One of my junglis brought word last night of two white prisoners locked up in the temple of Podanaram.”
“Man and wife?”
“Male and female made he them,” said Ommony.
“Any description?” asked Linkinyear, pulling out his memorandum book. “Let’s see — warts — age fifty-two—”
“No description, but who else could it be?”
“All right,” said Linkinyear, “that’s my next objective then. Which would you rather do, stay here or come with us? I’ll have to borrow some sort of guide from you. Perhaps you know the way? You might be safer on the march with us.”
For his own amusement Ommony mentioned the denseness of the jungle, describing it as pretty much one huge ambush. Then he described Podanaram and guessed at the number of troops that would be needed to assault the place. It all went by Linkinyear like so much weather.
“So you know the way. The luck holds! If Charley Sutherland had had my luck he’d have snaffled promotion out of this instead of making room. You know, these High Court kadis have influence — kadis’ missuses even more so — what? You get me? Rescue a kadi and his beldame out of durance vile and the tide in the affairs of — what’s your name again? — Ommony, and Linkinyear starts rising forthwith. Princesses in enchanted castles are possibly all right, but for practice give John Linkinyear, yours truly, one fat kadi and his wife in one tight fix. Return tickets, please, for Podanaram — but perhaps you can’t march?”
Ommony thought he could march, but sensed a predicament unseen by the proponent of direct action.
“Some of the Moplah chiefs are my friends,” he said. “Suppose I try to get word to them.”
“Get word? Why? They’ll know our game then. No. Let’s steal a march on ’em. Nothing like unexpectedness — wins every time! We won’t hurt your friends as long as they behave.”
Ommony laughed again.
“They won’t hurt me as long as I behave,” he answered. “There’s a truce that covers me, my house, property, and servants. Any one may come or go unmolested from here to the station. I can go unarmed anywhere, but they would consider I had broken the truce if I led a raid on Podanaram.”
“I thought you were some kind of a wizard when you turned on bacon and eggs. All right, you stay here and I’ll take another guide. If Podanaram contains Wilmshurst and his wife I’m off there to acquire merit. I see an extra star for this on the shoulder of John Linkinyear.”
“I see you and your men face upward looking at the crows!” answered Ommony. “You’ve no chance, Linkinyear. I’ll send word to the Moplah chiefs.
Perhaps they’ll come here to talk things over. Your wise course is to march back along the railway line and report. By the time you come this way again I’ll have more news for you.”
“Rats!” answered Linkinyear rudely. “Your eggs are good, Mr. Ommony. Your advice is rotten!”
Ommony produced cigars and summoned his reserves of patience, which exceeded those of his visitor by the amount of twenty years’ accretion at compound interest. His trump card was that Linkinyear would never be able to find Podanaram without a guide, and none could possibly be obtained unless he, Cotswold Ommony, consented. With that for final argument, and a fund of experienced geniality for front line, he wore the younger man down, while eleven of the rank and file smoked pipes and listened through the open window.
The dispute lasted nearly all morning, with interruptions when Ommony went out to render off-hand justice between quarreling village folk, or to give orders for the guidance of the gangs. Whenever a native sent in word for Ommony, Linkinyear would follow out to the veranda and demand to know in his best attempt at the vernacular if he knew the way to Podanaram. He had no success. They all looked equally stupid. And he never once caught Ommony making signals with hand or eye, although he was smart enough to be suspicious and to watch for them. Ommony was not smart — merely wise.
Linkinyear would not return to G.H.Q. as long as it was humanly possible to remain away. His orders were to give the Moplahs something to think about, and if possible to make them believe that an attack in force was already under way against them. He would not sit down and be quiet in Ommony’s bungalow while Ommony went to Podanaram to make inquiries, even if that should be permitted by Ommony’s Moplah friends. Nor would he let Ommony go alone on any terms.
In fact, he vowed and declared that if Ommony’s refusal to produce a guide should oblige him to return to G.H.Q. it would be his duty to take Ommony along with him. Whether or not it was his duty, he would do it. He convinced Ommony of that.
