Chronicles of Dustypore Part 20

She drank it all the same and found it too sweet to put it from her lips.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

BAD TIMES IN THE PLAINS.

Where nature sickens, and each air is death.

While the fortunate Elysians were thus bravely keeping up their own and one another's spirits by a round of gaieties, the people in the Plains were busy with a round of work of quite a different description. Cholera having broken out, all leave in the infected regiments had been cancelled, and many a luckless officer had come back to his cantonment, grumbling at a curtailed holiday and the stern mandate which recalled him just as he had reached the snow scenery of which he had dreamed for months, or established himself in some happy hunting-ground for a two months' campaign against ibex or bison. Back they all came, however, poor fellows, to take their equal chance with rank and file against an enemy of whom even the bravest men are not ashamed to be afraid.

The prevalence of illness and the precautions ordered to prevent its increase entailed a deal of extra labour, and kept all the officers busily employed. The hospitals required constant visiting, for the men were moody and disheartened, and stood in need of all the encouragement that their leaders could give them. Sutton, always thinking of every one but himself, had ordered two of his 'boys' away to an outpost forty miles off, nominally to look after a turbulent Zamindar, really to be out of harm's way. This threw all the more work on his hands, and it was work that he felt himself specially capable of doing with good effect.

His visits at the hospital were, he knew, eagerly looked for, and a few kind words from the Colonel Sahib often inspired cheerfulness and hope at a moment when gloom and despondency were telling with mortal effect on men's minds and bodies. His regiment had already lost several men, and they had died happy in the thought that the well-loved leader was ever close at hand, and ever on the look-out for something to alleviate their suffering. Many a gaunt visage, with death already written in each ghastly feature, lighted up with sudden brightness as he came, and, when exhaustion had gone too far for speech, smiled him a heartfelt benediction of grat.i.tude and love. The scene was, indeed, one full of pathos, even to a less interested looker-on than the Colonel. It was horrible to see these st.u.r.dy, joyous, much-enduring, dare-devil troopers lying so utterly prostrated, unnerved and helpless. Death, it seemed, should have come to them in the form of steel or bullet, the thrust of lance, the crashing sword-cut or wild cavalry charge; not as a pestilence, creeping on them unawares and slaying them in their beds.

Sutton, who had looked death in the face a hundred times with perfect indifference, began to understand why people feared it. After all some aspects of life are, he felt, too delightful to leave without a sigh.

For the last few months he had been, for the first time in his life, completely happy. A new era had begun for him, new vistas of pleasure had opened up. All that had gone before had been duty, excitement, hard work; not, indeed, without its enjoyment, but, after all, something far from happiness in the sense in which Sutton had now begun to understand it. Fighting was all well enough, and the hazardous ambition of a soldier's career delightfully spirit-stirring; but it was not here that the real end of life was to be found. Sutton's real end of life was now the little being who was flirting away at the Hills, in happy forgetfulness of all but the present moment. Sutton, however, thought of her only as he had seen her, tender, affectionate, devoted to himself.

Since the half-quarrel about her departure for the Hills and the reconciliation which followed it, his life with her had been one of perfect happiness. Maud had been raised by her conquest over herself into a sweeter, n.o.bler mood, and was more than ever mistress of her husband's heart. Her departure, peremptorily insisted on by her husband, had none the less cost them both a bitter pang; though Sutton promised that it should be for a few weeks at the utmost, a promise which cheered Maud more than it did himself, as she knew not, as he did, how easily its fulfilment might be rendered impossible. So Sutton went about his work in his own determined, loyal fashion, but with his heart no longer in it. His treasure was elsewhere and his heart with it. The collection of materials for his Report gave him a deal of trouble and involved many weary rides. He had to see District officers, Zamindars, police inspectors, heads of villages, spies, and then to determine what the real necessities of the case were and where the posts should be fixed.

Everything depended on his work being well, wisely, and thoroughly done.

The responsibility weighed on him: the peace, safety, prosperity of a whole District was hanging on his judgment. This is the kind of work which tries conscientious and loyal men far more than physical exertion.

Then the cholera, which had shown symptoms of abatement, broke out all of a sudden with more violence than ever, and it became apparent that Sutton's regiment was thoroughly infected. Then all real hopes of his getting up to the Hills for the present, at any rate, had to be abandoned; but of this he said nothing to his wife. It was of no use to distress her beforehand with bad news, which she would be certain to learn quite soon enough.

One evening, when Sutton had returned, thoroughly tired with a long, hot expedition, the orderly, whose task it was to bring him the returns of the sick for the day, told him that in the list of seizures for that afternoon was a Pathan boy, who had been picked up years before by some of the troopers in a suddenly deserted village, and who had lived as a pet child of the regiment ever since. Sutton had been kind to the lad, had defrayed such small charges as his maintenance in the lines involved, and had secured him the beginning of an education in the regimental school. Sutton on hearing the news went off at once to the hospital. Already the disease had made fearful progress, and he saw in a moment that the boy was in the most critical condition. He bent over the exhausted, helpless form, and said a few kind words of hopefulness and sympathy. The boy listened with glistening eyes and lips quivering with agitation; and as Sutton turned to go he sprang up in bed, forgetful of everything but the master-feeling which overpowered him, and clasped his protector round the neck with a single outburst of affection: 'Ma-Bap,'

'My father and mother!'

Two hours later they came to say that the boy was dead, and before the next morning Sutton began to be aware that that last embrace had been a deadly one, and that the dread malady had laid its hand upon himself.

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

AN ELYSIAN PICNIC.

Nay, the world--the world, All ear and eye, with such a stupid heart To interpret ear and eye, and such a tongue To blaze its own interpretation!

Three gallant officers, who had been enjoying the hospitality of Elysium for many weeks, were fired one day with a n.o.ble resolve to show their grat.i.tude to the gentlemen and their devotion to the ladies by whom they had been so pleasantly entertained. It was an inspiration, everybody felt at once, and all Elysium thrilled with conscious responsiveness at the happy thought. There is a little valley near Elysium, a mile or two from the mountain's summit, where a green, smooth sward invites the weary climber to repose; where venerable deodars, towering on the steep hillside, stretch their limbs to ward off the fierce afternoon sun; where a headlong stream comes bubbling down among the thick-grown ferns and falls in a feathery cascade and disappears in the gorge below; where the Genius of the Mountains has, in fact, its chosen haunt. There you may sit and watch the rose-tipped snowy range warming into fresh life and beauty as the sun goes down, and fading into cold gloom as he disappears. Here, in a hundred suggestive nooks, Nature has hinted at a sylvan _tete-a-tete_, or spread a verdant curtain of wild growth to festoon an _al fresco_ banquet; and here it was that the three inspired officers resolved to give an entertainment that should at once do justice to the warmth of their feelings, the correctness of their tastes, and the profuseness of their liberality.

It was to be a picnic--the picnic of the season--the picnic of the world; and if enchanting scenery, a cloudless sky, enthusiastic hosts, a crowd of pretty women, an army of devoted men, a community not too blase to be easily amused, nor yet so unused to pleasure as not to know how to take it--if all these ingredients, backed with the music of a lovely band crashing out among the rocks, cookery over which, by gracious permission, the Viceroy's own chef presided, and champagne, iced to perfection in Himalayan snows, could make a success, then it would, as Maud expected, be indeed an era in the lives of all concerned.

Mrs. Vereker, though perhaps less sanguine than her more youthful companion, determined to have a new dress for the occasion; and a committee of adorers discussed the rival merits of half-a-dozen projected costumes. Mrs. Vereker, however, treated all their suggestions with contempt, and determined in the depths of her own consciousness on something that should be a sweet surprise.

Maud, happily, had one of her English treasures which was still unknown to the admiring public, and which she felt at once would be the very thing.

For some days nothing but the picnic could be talked of in Elysium; what to wear at it, how to get to it, how to return, were topics of the liveliest interest to all. A hundred pleasant plans in connection with it shaped themselves into being. General Beau, who liked being beforehand with the world, secured for himself the honour of escorting Mrs. Vereker; and Desvoeux, as a matter of course, established his claim to act as Maud's gentleman-in-waiting on the occasion. By this time her spirits were very high and impatient of all that seemed to check their flow. She was flirting with Desvoeux, she knew, in the most open manner, yet she resented any notice being taken of it. Boldero had met her at a croquet party and been very disagreeable. He confessed to having been two days in Elysium, and could or would give no account of why he had not been to call. 'How unkind and unlike the old Mr Boldero whom we all liked so much! How you are changed!'

'Yes,' Boldero said, flushing up quite red, so that Maud knew that he meant more than met the ear, 'and some one else is changed too and might not care about her former friends.'

'What do you mean?' Maud said, disturbed at Boldero's serious air; 'how can I care about you, if you won't come and see me? Come now, and take me across the lawn for an ice, and tell me what it is that is the matter.'

'I do not think I can tell you,' said Boldero, greatly alarmed at finding himself committed to a lecture; 'you will not like it; you want a scolding.'

'Well,' said Maud, 'I like scoldings from my friends, and I often deserve them, and often get them, goodness knows. Give me one now; only you must be quick, please, because there is Mr. Desvoeux signalling me, and I have promised to go for a ride with him.'

'Don't,' said Boldero, with great alacrity; 'stay and hear my lecture.

Let me go and say you would rather not.'

'Not for the world!' cried Maud; 'I am looking forward to it immensely; he would be broken-hearted if I disappointed him, poor fellow. How would you like it yourself?'

'Broken-hearted!' said Boldero, with that peculiar turn of contempt in his voice with which her husband and his friends always vexed Maud by speaking of Desvoeux.

'How disagreeable you are!' said Maud. 'Don't you know he is my particular friend?'

'Friend!' said Boldero; 'he is the very worst enemy you have, believe me. Forgive me, as your husband's old friend, if I tell you the truth when, it seems, no one else will. He is making you talked of; and if you could only know how people talk! He knows it, and he likes it, and it is what he is always doing.'

'And what you are always doing,' said Maud in a pa.s.sion, 'is coming and saying the most horrid things in the most disagreeable way and joining the horrid people who gossip about one. Do they talk of me? Then why don't you make them eat their words--you, who used to be my friend?'

'I am your friend,' said the other with a grave persistence, 'and Sutton's too. It is because I am that I risk your displeasure by telling you that you are doing wrong.'

'Doing wrong?' cried Maud, by this time quite flushed with excitement and hardly mistress of her words; 'how dare you say so? You know it is false. I am alone, or you would not venture to insult me.'

'Come,' said Boldero, unmoved by the taunt, of which Maud herself felt the outrageous injustice, 'be sensible, and let me take care of you this evening: do me a kind act for once.'

'Thank you,' said Maud, the tears gleaming in her eyes, 'and hear such things as you have been saying over again? Take care of me, indeed!

Please never speak to me again!'

She was gone, leaving her companion discomfited. In another instant Desvoeux was at her side, and, as he lifted her to her pony, said something which made her laugh and blush. Boldero would have liked to throttle him.

Maud's conscience, however, prevented her full enjoyment of the ride.

She knew as well as possible that Boldero was telling her truth: she _was_ doing wrong, she felt only too distinctly. Boldero would have cut his fingers off to please her, and she had chosen to misunderstand him.

Still it was too provoking to be lectured. When she got home there was a letter from Dustypore, which told her that Felicia too had heard of her proceedings and was wanting to warn her. 'You must not forget, dear Maud,' the letter said, 'what a home of gossip Elysium is, and how all that is young and pretty and interesting is what gossip busies itself most about. Some men, like Mr. Desvoeux, for instance, have only to look at one for the gossipers to begin; but I know you will be very judicious, even at the expense of being somewhat too particular. How I wish I were with you!'

'They all want to tease me with their horrid advice and hints,' Maud thought, in vexation of heart; 'as for Mr. Boldero, he was too odious: I can never, never forgive him.'

Then, as if all the world were in a conspiracy, Mrs. Fotheringham, whom Maud met at a dinner-party that night, pounced upon her as the ladies were filing into the drawing-room and made her come and sit down on a remote sofa.

Maud always believed, probably not without justice, that Mrs.

Fotheringham bore her a grudge for being married before the two Miss Fotheringhams. She was, accordingly, quite indisposed to be lectured.

'My dear,' Mrs. Fotheringham said, 'an old woman may sometimes give a young one a friendly hint. You don't know the world as I do, with my twenty years of India. Now, don't be angry with me if I give you a bit of advice. Take care! Young wives whose husbands are in the Plains cannot take too much.'

This seemed the last drop in the overflowing cup of annoyance and humiliation. Maud felt excessively indignant. It was an impertinence surely for Mrs. Fotheringham to venture to speak so.

'And what am I to take care of?' she said; 'and what right have you to speak to me in this way?'

'Take care of your companions, my dear. You have chosen the most dangerous, the worst you could find--Mr. Desvoeux.'

'Stop, stop!' cried Maud, jumping up in a fury; 'he is my friend, my kind friend. I will not hear him abused.'