One of Clive's Heroes Part 20

[#] Evil spirit.

[#] Spirit of fire.

"'Now upon a certain day, when the wise men, in sore trouble of heart, were met in council, there appeared among them the ill.u.s.trious Vikramaditya, newly returned from long travel, who, when he had heard what was toward, said: "O ye wise men and faithful, make me king without ado." And the wise men, seeing that Vikramaditya was worthy of that dignity, thus spake: "From this day, O excellency, thou art king of the realm of Avanti." Having in this fashion become king of Avanti, Vikramaditya busied himself all that day with the affairs of his kingdom, tasting the sweets of power; and at the fall of night he prepared, against the visit of the Vetala Agni, great store of heady liquors, all kinds of meat, fish, bread, confections, rice boiled with milk and honey, sauces, curded milk, b.u.t.ter refined, sandalwood, bouquets and garlands, divers sorts of sweet-scented things; and all these he kept in his palace, and himself remained therein, reclining in full wakefulness upon his fairest bed.

"'Then into this palace came the Vetala Agni, sword in hand, and went about to slay the august Vikramaditya. But the king said: "Hearken, O Vetala Agni; seeing that thy excellency has come for to cause me to perish, it is not doubtful that thou wilt succeed in thy purpose; albeit, all these viands thou dost here behold have been brought together for thy behoof; eat, then, whatsoever thou dost find worthy; afterwards thou shalt work thy will." And the Vetala Agni, having heard these words, filled himself with this great store of food, and, marvellously content with the king, said unto him: "Truly I am content, and well-disposed towards thee, and I give thee the realm of Avanti; sit thou in the highest place and taste its joys; but take heed of one thing: every day shalt thou prepare for me a repast like unto this."

With these words, the Vetala Agni departed from that spot and betook him unto his own place.

"'Then for a long s.p.a.ce did Vikramaditya diligently fulfil that command; but by and by growing aweary of feeding the Vetala Agni, he sought counsel of the jogi Trilokanatha, who had his dwelling on the mount of Kanahakrita. The jogi, perceiving the manifold merits of the incomparable Vikramaditya, was moved with compa.s.sion towards him, and when he had long meditated and recited sundry mantras,[#] he thus spake and said: "Hearken, O king. From the sacred tank of Shakravatar spring alleys four times seven, as it were branches from one trunk, to wit, seven to the north, seven to the east, seven to the west, and seven to the south. Of the seven alleys springing to the north do thou choose the seventh, and in the seventh alley the seventh tree from the sacred tank, and on the seventh branch of the seventh tree thou shalt find the nest of a bulbul. Within that nest thou shalt discover a golden key.'"

[#] Hymns and prayers.

The Babu was now speaking very slowly, and an observer watching Desmond would have perceived that his eyes were fixed with a strange look of mingled eagerness and anxiety upon the story-teller. But no one observed this; every man in the group was intent upon the story, hanging upon the lips of the eloquent Babu.

"'Having obtained the golden key,'" continued the narrator, "'thou shalt return forthwith to thy palace, and the same night, when the Vetala Agni has eaten and drunk his fill, thou shalt in his presence lay the key upon the palm of thy left hand, thus----'" (here the Babu quietly took up a key hanging from the bunch attached to the warder's girdle, and laid it upon his left palm). "'Then shalt thou say to the Vetala: "O ill.u.s.trious Vetala, tell me, I pray thee, what doth this golden key unlock?" Then if the aspect of the Vetala be fierce, fear not, for he must needs reply: such is the virtue of the key; and by his words thou shalt direct thy course. Verily it is for such a trial that the G.o.ds have endowed thee with wisdom beyond the common lot of men.

"'Vikramaditya performed in all points the jogi's bidding; and having in the presence of the Vetala laid the golden key upon the palm of his hand, a voice within bade him ask the question: "O Vetala, what art thou apt to do? What knowest thou?" And the Vetala answered: "All that I have in my mind, that I am apt to perform. I know all things." And the king said: "Speak, then; what is the number of my years?" And the Vetala answered: "The years of thy life are a hundred." Then said the king: "I am troubled because in the tale of my years there are two gaps; grant me, then, one year in excess of a hundred, or from the hundred take one." And the Vetala answered: "O king, thou art in the highest degree good, liberal, merciful, just, lord of thyself, and honoured of G.o.ds and Brahmans; the measure of the days that are ordained to fill thy life is full; to add anything thereto, to take anything therefrom, are alike impossible." Having heard these words the king was satisfied, and the Vetala departed unto his own place.

"'Upon the night following the king prepared no feast against the coming of the Vetala, but girt himself for fight. The Vetala came, and seeing nothing in readiness for the repast, but, on the contrary, all things requisite to a combat, he waxed wroth and said: "O wicked and perverse king, why hast thou made ready nothing for my pleasure this night?" And the king answered: "Since thou canst neither add to my length of years, nor take anything therefrom, why should I make ready a repast for thee continually and without profit?" The Vetala made answer: "Ho!--'tis thus that thou speakest! Now, truly, come fight with me; this night will I devour thee."

"'At these words the king rose up in wrath to smite the Vetala, and held him in swift and dexterous combat for a brief s.p.a.ce. And the Vetala, having thus made proof of the might and heroism of the king, and being satisfied, spake and said: "O king, thou art mighty indeed; I am content with thy valour; now, then, ask me what thou wilt." And the king answered: "Seeing that thou art well-disposed towards me, grant me this grace, that when I shall call thee, thou wilt in that same instant stand at my side." And the Vetala, having granted this grace to the king, departed unto his own place.'"

The Babu waved his hands as a sign that the story was ended. He was damp with perspiration, and in his glance at Desmond there was a kind of furtive appeal for approval.

"Thou speakest well, Babu," said the warder. "But what befell King Bhoya when the graven image had thus ended his saying?"

"That, good jailer, is another story, and if you please to hear it another night I will do my poor best to satisfy you."

"Well, the hour is late." The warder rose to his feet and resumed his official gruffness. "Come, rise; it is time I locked your fetters; and, in good sooth, mine is no golden key."

He chuckled as he watched the prisoners file one by one into the shed.

Following them, he quickly locked each in turn to his staple in the wall and went out, bolting and double locking the door behind him.

"You did well, my friend," whispered Desmond in English to the Babu.

"My heart flutters like the wings of a bulbul," answered the Babu; "but I am content, sahib."

"But say, Surendra Nath," remarked one of the Maratha captives, "last time you told us that story you said nothing of the golden key."

"Ah!" replied the Babu, "you are thinking of the story told by the second graven image in King Vikramaditya's throne. I will tell you that to-morrow."

CHAPTER THE TWELFTH

*In which our hero is offered freedom at the price of honour; and Mr.

Diggle finds that he has no monopoly of quotations.*

Next morning, when Desmond left the shed with his fellow-prisoners, he took with him, secreted in a fold of his dhoti, a small piece of clay.

It had been given him overnight by the Babu. An hour or two later, happening to be for a moment alone in the tool-shop, he took out the clay and examined it carefully. It was a moment for which he had waited and longed with feverish impatience. The clay was a thin strip, oval in shape, and slightly curved. In the middle of it was the impression, faint but clear, of a key. A footstep approaching, he concealed the clay again in his garment, and, when a workman entered, was busily plying a chisel upon a deal plank.

Before he left the tool-shop, he secreted with the clay a sc.r.a.p of steel and a small file. That day, and for several days after, whenever chance gave him a minute or two apart from his fellow-workmen, he employed the precious moments in diligently filing the steel to the pattern on the clay. It was slow work: all too tedious for his eager thought. But he worked at his secret task with unfailing patience, and at the week's end had filed the steel to the likeness of the wards of a key.

That night, when his "co-mates in exile" were asleep, he gently inserted the steel in the lock of his ankle-band He tried to turn it. It stuck fast; the wards did not fit. He was not surprised. Before he made the experiment he had felt that it would fail; the key was indeed a clumsy, ill-shapen instrument. But next day he began to work on another piece of steel, and on this he spent every spare minute he could s.n.a.t.c.h. This time he found himself able to work faster. Night and morning he looked searchingly at the key on the warder's bunch, and afterwards tried to cut the steel to the pattern that was now, as it were, stamped upon his brain.

He wished he could test his second model in the morning light before the warder came, and correct it then. But to do so would involve discovery by his fellow-captives; the time to take them into his confidence was not yet. He had perforce to wait till dead of night before he could tell whether the changes, more and more delicate and minute, made upon his key during the day were effective. And the Babu was fretful; having done his part, admirably, as Desmond told him, in working the key into his story, he seemed to expect that the rest would be easy, and did not make account of the long labour of the file.

At length a night came when, inserting the key in the lock, Desmond felt it turn easily. Success at last! As he heard the click, he felt an extraordinary sense of elation. Quietly unclasping the fetter, he removed it from his ankle and stood free. If it could be called free--to be shut up in a locked and barred shed in the heart of one of the strongest fortresses in Hindustan! But at least his limbs were at liberty. What a world of difference there was between that and his former state!

Should he inform the Babu? He felt tempted to do so, for it was to Surendra Nath's ingenuity in interpolating the incident of the key into a well-known story that he owed the clay pattern of the warder's key.

But Surendra Nath was excitable; he was quite capable of uttering a yell of delight that would waken the other men and force a premature disclosure. Desmond decided to wait for a quiet moment next day before telling the Babu of his success. So he replaced his ankle-band, locked the catch, and lay down to the soundest and most refreshing sleep he had enjoyed for many a night.

He had only just reached the workshop next morning when a peon came with a message that Angria Rao[#] required his instant attendance at the palace. He began to quake in spite of himself. Could the prince have discovered already that the lock of his fetters had been tampered with?

Desmond could scarcely believe it. He had made his first test in complete darkness; nothing had broken the silence save the one momentary click; and the warder, when he unloosed him, had not examined the lock.

What if he were searched and the precious key were found upon him? It was carefully hidden in a fold of his dhoti. There was no opportunity of finding another hiding-place for it; he must go as he was and trust that suspicion had not been aroused. But it was with a galloping pulse that he followed the peon out of the dockyard, within the walls of the fort, and into the hall where he had had his first interview with the Pirate.

[#] A chief or prince.

His uneasiness was hardly allayed when he saw that Angria was in company with Diggle. Both were squatting on the carpeted dais; no other person was in the room. Having ushered him in, the peon withdrew, and Desmond was alone with the two men he had most cause to fear. Diggle was smiling, Angria's eyes were gleaming, his mobile lips working as with impatience, if not anxiety.

The Pirate spoke quickly, imperiously.

"You have learnt our tongue, Firangi[#] boy?" he said.

[#] Originally applied by the natives to the Portuguese, then to any European.

"I have done my best, huzur," replied Desmond in Urdu.

"That is well. Now hearken to what I say. You have pleased me; my jamadar[#] speaks well of you; but you are my slave, and, if I will it, you will always be my slave. You would earn your freedom?"

[#] Lieutenant.

"I am in your august hands, huzur," said Desmond diplomatically.

"You may earn your freedom in one way," continued Angria in the same rapid impatient tone. "My scouts report that an English fleet has pa.s.sed up the coast towards Bombay. My spies tell me that in Bombay a large force is collected under the command of that soor ka batcha[#]

Clive. But I cannot learn the purpose of this armament. The dogs may think, having taken my fortress of Suvarndrug, to come and attack me here. Or they may intend to proceed against the French at Hyderabad.