‘Peroo, I have forgotten much. I was under the guard-tower watching the river; and then— Did the flood sweep us away?’
‘No. The boats broke loose, Sahib, and’ (if the Sahib had forgotten about the opium, decidedly Peroo would not remind him) ‘in striving to retie them, so it seemed to me – but it was dark – a rope caught the Sahib and threw him upon a boat.Considering that we two, with Hitchcock Sahib, built, as it were, that bridge, I came also upon the boat, which came riding on horseback, as it were, on the nose of this island, and so, splitting, cast us ashore. I made a great cry when the boat left the wharf, and without doubt Hitchcock Sahib will come for us. As for the bridge, so many have died in the building that it cannot fall.’
A fierce sun, that drew out all the smell of the sodden land, had followed the storm, and in that clear light there was no room for a man to think of dreams of the dark. Findlayson stared upstream, across the blaze of moving water, till his eyes ached. There was no sign of any bank to the Ganges, much less of a bridge-line.
‘We came down far,’ he said. ‘It was wonderful that we were not drowned a hundred times.’
‘That was the least of the wonder, for no man dies before his time. I have seen Sydney, I have seen London, and twenty great ports, but’ – Peroo looked at the damp, discoloured shrine under the peepul – ‘never man has seen that we saw here.’
‘What?’
‘Has the Sahib forgotten; or do we black men only see the Gods?’
‘There was a fever upon me.’ Findlayson was still looking uneasily across the water. ‘It seemed that the island was full of beasts and men talking, but I do not remember. A boat could live in this water now, I think.’
‘Oho! Then it is true. “When Brahm ceases to dream, the Gods die.” Now I know, indeed, what he meant. Once, too, the guru said as much to me; but then I did not understand. Now I am wise.’
‘What?’ said Findlayson over his shoulder.
Peroo went on as if he were talking to himself. ‘Six – seven – ten monsoons since, I was watch on the fo’c’sle of the Rewah – the Kumpani’s big boat – and there was a big tufan, green and black water beating; and I held fast to the life-lines, choking under the waters. Then I thought of the Gods – of Those whom we saw tonight’ – he stared curiously at Findlayson’s back, but the white man was looking across the flood. ‘Yes, Isay of Those whom we saw this night past, and I called upon Them to protect me. And while I prayed, still keeping my look-out, a big wave came and threw me forward upon the ring of the great black bow-anchor, and the Rewahrose high and high, leaning towards the left-hand side, and the water drew away from beneath her nose, and I lay upon my belly, holding the ring, and looking down into those great deeps. Then I thought, even in the face of death, if I lose hold I die, and for me neither the Rewah nor my place by the galley where the rice is cooked, nor Bombay, nor Calcutta, nor even London, will be any more for me. “How shall I be sure,” I said, “that the Gods to whom I pray will abide at all?” This I thought, and the Rewah dropped her nose as a hammer falls, and all the sea came in and slid me backwards along the fo’c’sle and over the break of the fo’c’sle, and I very badly bruised my shin against the donkey-engine: but I did not die, and I have seen the Gods. They are good for live men, but for the dead— They have spoken Themselves. Therefore, when I come to the village I will beat the guru for talking riddles which are no riddles. When Brahm ceases to dream, the Gods go.’
‘Look upstream. The light blinds. Is there smoke yonder?’
Peroo shaded his eyes with his hands. ‘He is a wise man and quick. Hitchcock Sahib would not trust a rowboat. He has borrowed the Rao Sahib’s steam-launch, and comes to look for us. I have always said that there should have been a steam-launch on the bridge-works for us.’
The territory of the Rao of Baraon lay within ten miles of the bridge; and Findlayson and Hitchcock had spent a fair portion of their scanty leisure in playing billiards and shooting Black-buck with the young man. He had been bear-led by an English tutor of sporting tastes for some five or six years, and was now royally wasting the revenues accumulated during his minority by the Indian Government. His steam-launch, with its silver-plated rails, striped silk awning, and mahogany decks, was a new toy which Findlayson had found horribly in the way when the Rao came to look at the bridge-works.
‘It’s great luck,’ murmured Findlayson, but he was none the less afraid, wondering what news might be of the bridge.
The gaudy blue-and-white funnel came downstream swiftly. They could see Hitchcock in the bows, with a pair of opera-glasses, and his face was unusually white. Then Peroo hailed, and the launch made for the tail of the island. The Rao Sahib, in tweed shooting-suit and a seven-hued turban, waved his royal hand, and Hitchcock shouted. But he need have asked no questions, for Findlayson’s first demand was for his bridge.
‘All serene! ’Gad, I never expected to see you again, Findlayson. You’re seven koss downstream. Yes, there’s not a stone shifted anywhere; but how are you? I borrowed the Rao Sahib’s launch, and he was good enough to come along. Jump in.’
‘Ah, Finlinson, you are very well, eh? That was most unprecedented calamity last night, eh? My royal palace, too, it leaks like the devil, and the crops will also be short all about my country. Now you shall back her out, Hitchcock. I – I do not understand steam-engines. You are wet? You are cold, Finlinson? I have some things to eat here, and you will take a good drink.’
‘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 Morpheus. 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 upstream. 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 BRUSHWOOD BOY
Girls and boys, come out to play:
The moon is shining as bright as day!
Leave your supper and leave your sleep.
And come with your playfellows out in the street!
Up the ladder and down the wall –
A child of three sat up in his crib and screamed at the top of his voice, his fists clenched and his eyes full of terror. At first no one heard, for his nursery was in the west wing, and the nurse was talking to a gardener among the laurels. Then the housekeeper passed that way, and hurried to soothe him. He was her special pet, and she disapproved of the nurse.
‘What was it, then? What was it, then? There’s nothing to frighten him, Georgie dear.’
‘It was – it was a policeman! He was on the Down – I saw him! He came in. Jane said he would.’
‘Policemen don’t come into houses, dearie. Turn over, and take my hand.’
‘I saw him – on the Down. He came here. Where is your hand, Harper?’
The housekeeper waited till the sobs changed to the regular breathing of sleep before she stole out.
‘Jane, what nonsense have you been telling Master Georgie about policemen?’
‘I haven’t told him anything.’
‘You have. He’s been dreaming about them.’
‘We met Tisdall on Dowhead when we were in the donkey-cart this morning. P’r’aps that’s what put it into his head.’
‘Oh! Now you aren’t going to frighten the child into fits with your silly tales, and the master know nothing about it. If ever I catch you again,’ etc.
A child of six was telling himself stories as he lay in bed. It was a new power, and he kept it a secret. A month before it had occurred to him to carry on a nursery tale
left unfinished by his mother, and he was delighted to find that the tale as it came out of his own head was just as new and surprising as though he were listening to it ‘all new from the beginning.’ There was a prince in that tale, and he killed dragons, but only for one night. Ever afterward Georgie dubbed himself prince, pasha, giant-killer, and all the rest (you see, he could not tell any one, for fear of being laughed at), and his tales faded gradually into dreamland, where adventures were so many that he could not recall the half of them. They all began in the same way, or, as Georgie explained to the shadows of the night-light, there was ‘the same starting-off place’ – a pile of brushwood stacked somewhere near a beach; and round this pile Georgie found himself running races with little boys and girls. These ended, things began to happen, such as ships that ran high up the dry land and turned into cardboard boxes; or gilt-and-green iron railings that surrounded beautiful gardens, but were all soft and could be walked through and overthrown so long as he remembered it was only a dream. He could never hold that knowledge more than a few seconds before things became real, and instead of pushing down houses full of grownup people (a just revenge), he sat miserably upon gigantic doorsteps trying to sing the multiplication-table up to four times six. It was most amusing at the very beginning, before the races round the pile, when he could shout to the others, ‘It’s only make-believe, and I’ll smack you!’
The princess of his tales was a person of wonderful beauty (she came from the old illustrated edition of Grimm, now out of print), and as she invariably looked on at Georgie’s valor among the dragons and buffaloes and so forth, he gave her the two finest names he had ever heard in his life – Annie and Louise, pronounced ‘Annieanlouise.’ When the dreams swamped the stories, she would change into one of the little girls round the brushwood pile, still keeping her title and crown. She saw Georgie drown once in a dream-sea by the beach (it was the day after he had been taken to bathe in a realsea by his nurse); and he said as he sank: ‘Poor Annieanlouise! She’ll be sorry for me now!’ But ‘Annieanlouise,’ walking slowly on the beach, called, ‘ “Ha! ha!” said the duck, laughing,’ which to a waking mind might not seem to bear on the situation. It consoled Georgie at once, and must have been some kind of spell, for it raised the bottom of the deep, and he waded out with a twelve-inch flower-pot on each foot. As he was strictly forbidden to meddle with flower-pots in real life, he felt triumphantly wicked.
The movements of the grownups, whom Georgie tolerated, but did not pretend to understand, removed his world, when he was seven years old, to a place called ‘Oxford-on-a-visit.’ Here were huge buildings surrounded by vast prairies, with streets of infinite length, and, above all, something called the ‘buttery,’ which Georgie was dying to see, because he knew it must be greasy, and therefore delightful. He perceived how correct were his judgments when his nurse led him through a stone arch into the presence of an enormously fat man, who asked him if he would like some bread and cheese. Georgie was used to eat all round the clock, so he took what ‘buttery’gave him, and would have taken some brown liquid called ‘auditale’ but that his nurse led him away to an afternoon performance of a thing called ‘Pepper’s Ghost,’ This was intensely thrilling. People’s heads came off and flew all over the stage, and skeletons danced bone by bone, while Mr Pepper himself, beyond question a man of the worst, waved his arms and flapped a long gown, and in a deep bass voice (Georgie had never heard a man sing before) told of his sorrows unspeakable. Some grownup or other tried to explain that the illusion was made with mirrors, and that there was no need to be frightened. Georgie did not know what illusions were, but he did know that a mirror was the looking-glass with the ivory handle on his mother’s dressing-table. Therefore the ‘grownup’ was ‘just saying things’ after the distressing custom of ‘grownups,’ and Georgie cast about for amusement between scenes. Next to him sat a little girl dressed all in black, her hair combed off her forehead exactly like the girl in the book called ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ which had been given himon his last birthday. The little girl looked at Georgie, and Georgie looked at her. There seemed to be no need of any further introduction.
‘I’ve got a cut on my thumb,’ said he. It was the first work of his first real knife, a savage triangular hack, and he esteemed it a most valuable possession.
‘I’m tho thorry!’ she lisped. ‘Let me look – pleathe.’
‘There’s a di-ack-lum plaster on, but it’s all raw under.’ Georgie answered, complying.
‘Dothent it hurt?’ – her gray eyes were full of pity and interest.
‘Awf’ly. Perhaps it will give me lockjaw.’
‘It lookth very horrid. I’m tho thorry!’ She put a forefinger to his hand, and held her head sidewise for a better view.
Here the nurse turned, and shook him severely. ‘You mustn’t talk to strange little girls, Master Georgie.’
‘She isn’t strange. She’s very nice. I like her, an’ I’ve showed her my new cut.’
‘The idea! You change places with me.’
She moved him over, and shut out the little girl from his view, while the grownup behind renewed the futile explanations.
‘I am not afraid, truly,’ said the boy, wriggling in despair; ‘But why don’t you go to sleep in the afternoons, same as the Provost of Oriel?’
Georgie had been introduced to a grownup of that name, who slept in his presence without apology. Georgie understood that he was the most important grownup in Oxford; hence he strove to gild his rebuke with flatteries. This grownup did not seem to like it, but he collapsed, and Georgie lay back in his seat, silent and enraptured. Mr Pepper was singing again, and the deep, ringing voice, the red fire, and the misty, waving gown all seemed to be mixed up with the little girl Who had been so kind about his cut. When the performance was ended she nodded to Georgie, and Georgie nodded in return. He spoke no more than was necessary till bedtime, but meditated on new colours and sounds and lights and music and things as far as he understood them, the deep-mouthedagony of Mr Pepper mingling with the little girl’s lisp. That night he made a new tale, from which he shamelessly removed the Rapunzel-Rapunzel-let-down-your-hair princess, gold crown, Grimm edition, and all, and put a new Annieanlouise in her place. So it was perfectly right and natural that when he came to the brushwood pile he should find her waiting for him, her hair combed off her forehead more like Alice in Wonderland than ever, and the races and adventures began.
Ten years at an English public school do not encourage dreaming. Georgie got his growth and chest measurement, and a few other things which did not appear in the bills, under a system of compulsory cricket, football, and paper-chases, from four to five days a week, which provided for three lawful cuts of a ground-ash if any boy absented himself from these entertainments without medical certificate or master’s written excuse. From the child of eight, timid and shrinking, consoled by the sick-house matron as he wept for his mother, Georgie shot up into a hard-muscled, pugnacious little ten-year-old bully of the preparatory school, and was transplanted to the world of three hundred boys in the big dormitories below the hill, where the cheek so brazen and effective among juniors had to be turned to the smiter many times a day. There he became a rumple-collared, dusty-hatted fag of the Lower Third, and a little half-back at Little Side football; was pushed and prodded through the slack backwaters of the Lower Fourth, where all the raffle of a school generally accumulates; won his ‘second-fifteen’ cap at football, enjoyed the dignity of a study with two companions in it, and began to look forward to office as a sub-prefect. At this crisis he was exhorted to work by the headmaster, who saw in him the makings of a good man. So he worked slowly and systematically, and in due course sat at the prefects’ table with the right to carry a cane, and, under restrictions, to use it. At last he blossomed into full glory as head of the school, ex-officio captain of the games; head of his house, where he and his lieutenants preserved discipline and decency among seventy boys from twelve to seventeen; general arbiter in thequarrels that spring
up among the touchy Sixth – quarrels which on no account the vulgar must hear discussed; and intimate friend and ally of the head himself. He had a study of his own, where the black-and-gold ‘first-fifteen’ cap hung on a bracket above the line of hurdle, long-jump, and half-mile cups that he had picked up year after year at the yearly sports; he used real razors, which the fags stropped with reverence; and outside his door were laid the black-and-yellow match goal-posts carried down in state to the field when the school tried conclusions with other teams. When he stepped forth in the black jersey, white knickers, and black stockings of the first fifteen, the new match-ball under his arm, and his old and frayed cap at the back of his head, the small fry of the lower forms stood apart and worshipped, and the ‘new caps’ of the team talked to him ostentatiously, that the world might see. And so, in summer, when he came back to the pavilion after a slow but eminently safe game, it mattered not whether he had made nothing in, as once happened, a hundred and three, the school shouted just the same, and womenfolk who had come to look at the match looked at Cottar – Cottar major;‘that’s Cottar!’ – and the day-boys felt that though home and mother were pleasant, it were better to live life joyously and whole, a full-blooded boarder in Cottar’s house. Above all, he was responsible for that thing called the tone of the school, and few realise with what passionate devotion a certain type of boy throws himself into this work. Home was a faraway country, full of ponies and fishing and shooting, and men-visitors who interfered with one’s plans; but school was the real world, where things of vital importance happened, and crises arose that must be dealt with promptly and quietly. Not for nothing was it written, ‘Let the consuls look to it that the republic takes no harm,’ and Georgie was glad to be back in authority when the holidays ended. Behind him, but not too near, was the wise and temperate head, now suggesting the wisdom of the serpent, now counseling the mildness of the dove; leading him on to see, more by half-hints than by any direct word, how boys and men are all of a piece, and how he who can handle the one will assuredly in time control the other. On the other side – Georgie did not realise this till later – was the wiry drill-sergeant, contemptuously aware of all the tricks of ten generations of boys, who ruled the gymnasium through the long winter evenings when the squads were at work. There, among the rattle of the single-sticks, the click of the foils, the jar of the spring-bayonet sent home on the plastron, and the incessant ‘bat-bat’ of the gloves, little Schofield would cool off on the vaulting-horse, and explain to the head of the school by what mysterious ways the worth of a boy could be gauged between half-shut eyelids.
The Mark of the Beast and Other Fantastical Tales Page 42
