Snake and Sword Part 32

"Catter wot? You drunken 'og," drawled the Corporal. "Catter_waulin'_ more like it. Under arrest you goes, my lad. Now you _'ave_ done it.

'Ere, 'Awker, run down an' call up the Sergeant o' the Guard an' tell 'im Maffewson's left 'is post. 'E'll 'ave to plant annuvver sentry.

Maffewson goes ter clink."

"Yes--but send for the Surgeon and the key of the mortuary too,"

begged Dam. "I give you fair warning that Priddell is alive and groaning and off the bier--"

"Pity _you_ ain't 'off the beer' too," said the Corporal with a yawn.

"Well--there are witnesses that I brought the report to you. If Priddell is found dead on the ground to-morrow you'll have to answer for manslaughter."

"'Ere, _chuck_ it you snaike-seeing delirying trimmer, _will_ yer!

Give anyone the 'orrers to listen to yer! When Priddell is wrote off as 'Dead' 'e _is_ dead, whether 'e likes it or no," and he turned to give orders to the listening guard to arrest Trooper Matthewson.

The Sergeant of the Guard arrived at the "double," followed by Trooper Bear carrying a hurricane-lamp.

"What's the row?" panted the Sergeant. "Matthewson on the booze agin?"

"I report that there is a living man in the mortuary, Sergeant,"

replied Dam. "Priddell is not dead. I heard him groan, and I scrambled up to the grating and saw him lying on the ground by the door."

"Well, you'll see yerself groanin' an' lyin' on the ground in the Digger, now," replied the Sergeant, and, as much in sorrow as in anger, he added, "An' _you_'re the bloke I signed a pet.i.tion for his permotion are yer? At it agin a'ready!"

"But, good Heavens, man, can't you see I'm as sober as you are, and much less excited? Can't you send for the key of the mortuary and call the doctor? The poor chap may die for your stupidity."

"You call _me_ a 'man' again, my lad, an' I'll show you what a Sergeant can do fer them as 'e don't like! As fer 'sober'--I've 'ad enough o' you 'sober'. W'y, in two ticks you may be on the ground 'owlin' and bellerin' and squealin' like a Berkshire pig over the blood-tub. _Sober_! Yus--I seen you at it."

"Why on earth can't you come and _prove_ I'm drunk or mad," besought Dam. "Open the mortuary and prove I'm wrong--and then put me under arrest. Call the Surgeon and say the sentry over the mortuary reports the inmate to be alive--_he_ has heard of catalepsy and comatose collapse simulating death if _you_ haven't."

"Don' use sech 'orrible languidge," besought the respectable Corporal Prag.

"Ho, yus! _I_'m agoin' to see meself whipt on the peg fer turnin' out the Surgin from 'is little bed in the middle o' the night--to come an'

'ave a look at the dead corpse 'e put in orders fer the Dead 'Ole, ain't I? Jest becos the champion snaike-seer o' E Troop's got 'em agin, wot?"

Corporal Prag laughed merrily at the wit of his superior.

Turning to Bear, whom he knew to be as well educated as himself, Dam remarked:--

"Poor chap has rallied from the cholera collapse and could probably be saved by stimulants and warmth. This suspended animation is common enough in cholera. Why, the Brahmins have a regular ritual for dealing with cases of recovery on the funeral pyre--purification after defilement by the corpse-washers or something of the sort. These stupid oafs are letting poor Priddell die--"

"What! you drunken talkin' parrot," roared the incensed Sergeant.

"'Ere, sling 'is drunken rotten carkis--"

"What's the row here?" cut in a quiet curt voice. "Noise enough for a gang of crows----"

Surgeon-Captain Blake of the Royal Army Medical Corps had just left the Hospital, having been sent for by the night Nursing Sister. The men sprang to attention and the Sergeant saluted.

"Drunk sentry left 'is post, Sir," he gabbled. "'Spose the Dead 'Ole--er--Morshuerry, that is, Sir, got on 'is nerves. 'E's given to secret boozin', Sir----"

"Excuse me, Sir," broke in Dam, daring to address an Officer unbidden, since a life was at stake, "I am a total abstainer and Trooper Priddell is not dead. It must have been cataleptic trance. I heard him groan and I climbed up and saw him lying on the ground."

"This man's not drunk," said Captain Blake, and added to himself, "and he's an educated man, and a cultured, poor devil."

"Oh, that's how 'e goes on, Sir, sober as a judge you'd say, an' then nex' minnit 'e's on the floor aseein' blue devils an' pink serpients----"

"The man's dying while we talk, Sir," put in Dam, whose wrath was rising. (If these dull-witted ignorant louts could not tell a drunken man from a sober, nor realize that a certified dead man may _not_ be dead, surely the doctor could.)

The Sergeant and the Corporal ventured on a respectful sn.i.g.g.e.r.

"Bring me that lamp," said Captain Blake, and Trooper Bear raised it to his extended hand. Lifting it so that its light shone straight in Dam's face the doctor scanned the latter and examined his eyes. This was not the face of a drunkard nor was the man in any way under the influence of liquor now. Absurd! Had he fever? Was he of deranged intellect? But, alas, the light that shone upon Dam's face also shone upon Captain Blake's collar and upon the badge of his Corps which adorned it--and that badge is a serpent entwining a rod.

It was the last straw! Dam had pa.s.sed through a most disturbing night; he had kept guard in the lonely Snake-haunted darkness, guard over a mortuary in which lay a corpse; he had had to keep knocking at the corpse's door, his mind had run on funerals, he had thought he heard the dead man groan, he believed he had seen the dead man moving, he had wrestled with thick intelligences who held him drunk or mad while precious moments pa.s.sed, and he had had the Snake before his mental vision throughout this terrible time--and here was another of its emissaries _wearing its badge_, an emissary of high rank, an Officer-Emissary!... Well, he was in the open air, thank G.o.d, and could put up a fight as before.

Like a panther he sprang upon the unfortunate officer and bore him to the ground, with his powerful hands enclosing the astounded gentleman's neck, and upon the couple sprang the Sergeant, the Corporal, and the Hospital Guard, all save the sentry, who (disciplined, well-drilled man!) brought his carbine to the "order"

and stood stiffly at "attention" in a position favourable for a good view of the proceedings though strictly on his beat.

Trooper Bear, e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.n.g. "Why do the heathen rage furiously together," took a running jump and landed in sitting posture on the heap, rolled off, and proceeded to seize every opportunity of violently smiting his superior officers, in his apparent zeal to help to secure the dangerous criminal-lunatic. Thoughts of having just _one_ punch at a real Officer (if only a non-combatant still a genuine Commissioned Officer) flashed across his depraved mind.

It was a Homeric struggle. Captain Blake was himself an old Guy's Rugger three-quarter and no mean boxer, and the Sergeant, Corporal, and Guard, were all powerful men, while Dam was a Samson further endowed with the strength of undeniable madness. When at length he was dragged from Captain Blake's rec.u.mbent form, his hands torn from that officer's throat, and the group stood for a second panting, Dam suddenly felled Corporal Prag with such a blow as had been the undoing of the Gorilla, sent Sergeant Wotting head over heels and, ere the Guard could again close with him, drove his fist into the face of the supposed myrmidon of the Snake and sprang upon his body once more....

It was some time before seven strong men could pinion him and carry him on a stretcher to the Guard-room, and, of those seven strong men, only Trooper Bear bore no mark of serious damage. (Trooper Bear had struck two non-commissioned officers with great violence, in his misdirected zeal, and one Commissioned Officer--though only playfully and for the satisfaction of being able to say that he had done so.) That night, half dead, wholly mad, bruised and bleeding, Damocles de Warrenne lay in the dark cell awaiting trial on a charge of a.s.saulting an Officer, striking his superior officers, resisting the Guard, deserting his sentry-post, and being drunk and disorderly.

"What'll he get, d'you think?" sadly asked Trooper Goate of Trooper Hawker.

"Two stretch 'ard laiber and discharged from the Army wiv'

iggernerminny," groaned Trooper Hawker. "Lucky fer 'im floggin's erbolished in the British Army."

When the mortuary door was unlocked next morning a little force was required to open it, some obstacle apparently r.e.t.a.r.ding its inward movement. The obstacle proved to be the body, now certainly the dead body, of Trooper Priddell who had died with his fingers thrust under the said door.[26]

PART III.

THE SAVING OF A SOUL

CHAPTER XII.

VULTURES AND LUCK--GOOD AND BAD.