The Elephant God Part 34

"Hullo! A mongoose? You think they'll try the same trick again?" asked Dermot.

He glanced at the bed and picked up his cane.

"Just stand still, Major, and watch. If there's anything in the snake line about our young friend here will attend to it."

The mongoose trotted forward for a few steps, then sat down and scratched itself. It rose, yawned, stretched its legs, and looked up at the two men, betraying no fear of them. Then it lifted its sharp nose into the air, sniffed, and pattered about the room, stopping to smell the legs of the dressing-table and a cap of Dermot's lying on the floor. It investigated several rat-holes at the bottom of the walls and approached the bed. Under it a pair of the soldier's slippers were lying. The mongoose, pa.s.sing by them, turned to smell them. Suddenly it sprang back, leaping a couple of feet into the air. When it touched the floor it crouched with bared teeth, the hair on its back bristling and its tail fluffed out until it was bigger than the body of the fierce little animal.

"By Jove, it has found something!" exclaimed Barclay.

The two men leant forward and watched intently. The mongoose approached the slippers again in a series of bounds, jumped around them, crouched, and then sprang into the air again.

Suddenly there was a rush and a scurry. The mongoose had pounced on one slipper and was shaking it savagely, beating it on the floor, rolling over and over and leaping into the air with it. Its movements were so rapid that for a few moments the watchers could distinguish nothing in the miniature cyclone of slipper and ball of fluffy hair inextricably mingled. Then there was a pause. The mongoose stood still, then backed away with stiffened legs, its sharp teeth fixed in the neck of a small snake about ten inches long, which it was trying to drag out of the slipper.

"Good heavens! This is worse than last night," cried Barclay. "It's a _karait_."

This reptile is almost more poisonous than a cobra, and, as it is thin and rarely exceeds twelve inches in length, it can hide anywhere and is an even deadlier menace in a house.

The mongoose backed across the room, dragging the snake and with it the slipper.

"Why the deuce doesn't it pull the _karait_ out?" said Dermot, bending down to look more closely, as the mongoose paused. "By George! Look at this, Barclay. The snake's fastened to the inside of the slipper by a loop and a bit of thin wire."

"What a devilish trick!" cried Barclay.

"Well, I hope that concludes the entertainment for tonight," said Dermot.

"Enough is as good as a feast."

When next morning the servant brought in his tray, Dermot was smoking a cigarette in an easy chair, and he fancied that there was a scared expression in the man's eyes, as the fellow looked covertly at the slippers on the Major's feet.

CHAPTER XVII

A TRAP

In the forenoon of the fifth day of the Durga-Puja Festival the _Dewan_ and Chunerb.u.t.ty sat on the thick carpet of the Rajah's apartment, which was in that part of the Palace facing the wing given up to the visitors. It formed one of the sides of the square surrounding the paved courtyard below, which was rarely entered. Only one door led into it from the buildings which lined it on three sides, a door under the Rajah's suite of apartments.

That potentate was sprawling on a pile of soft cushions, glaring malevolently at his Chief Minister, whom he hated and feared.

"Curses on thee, _Dewan-ji_!" he muttered, turning uneasily and groaning with the pain of movement. For he was badly bruised, sore, and shaken, from his treatment by the crowd on the previous day.

"Why on me, O Maharaj?" asked the _Dewan_, looking at him steadily and with hardly-veiled contempt.

"Because thine was the idea of this foolish celebration yesterday. Mother Durga was angry with me for introducing this foreign way of worship,"

answered the superst.i.tious atheist, conveniently forgetting that the idea was his own. "It will cost me large sums to these greedy priests, if she is not to punish me further."

"Not for that reason, but for another, is the Holy Mother enraged, O Maharaj," replied his Minister. "For the lack of a sweeter sacrifice than we offered her yesterday."

"What is that?" demanded the Rajah suspiciously. He distrusted his _Dewan_ more than any one else in his service.

"Canst thou ask? Thou who bearest on thy forehead the badge of the Saktas?"

"Thou meanest a human sacrifice?"

"I do."

"I have given Durga many," grumbled the Rajah. "But if she be greedy, let her have more. There are girls in my _zenana_ that I would gladly be rid of."

"The Holy Mother demands a worthier offering than some wanton that thou hast wearied of."

Chunerb.u.t.ty spoke for the first time.

"She wants the blood of one of the accursed race; of a _Feringhi_; of this soldier and spy."

The Rajah shifted uneasily on his cushions. He hated but he feared the white men, and he had not implicit faith in the _Dewan's_ talk of their speedy overthrow.

"Mother Durga has rejected him," he said. "Have ye not all tried to slay him and failed?"

The _Dewan_ nodded his head slowly and stared at the carpet.

"There is some strange and evil influence that sets my plans at naught."

"The G.o.ds, if there be G.o.ds as you Brahmins say, protect him. I think evil will come to us if we harm him. And can we? Did he not lie down with the hooded death itself, a cobra, young, active, full of venom, and rise unhurt?"

"True. But perhaps the snake had escaped from the bed before the _Feringhi_ entered it," said the _Dewan_ meditatively.

"To guard against that, did they not fasten the _karait_ in his shoe?"

"He may have discovered it in time," said the engineer. "Englishmen fear snakes greatly and always look out for them."

"Ha! and did he not eat and drink the poisoned meal prepared for him by our skilfullest physician?"

There was no answer to this. The mystery of Dermot's escape from death was beyond their understanding.

"There is certainly something strange about him," said Chunerb.u.t.ty. "At least, so it is reported in our district, though to me he seems a fool. But there all races and castes fear him. Curious tales are told of him. Some say that _Gunesh_, the Elephant-headed One, protects him. Others hold that he is _Gunesh_ himself. Can it be so?"

The _Dewan_ smiled.

"Since when hast thou believed in the G.o.ds again?" he asked.

"Well, it is hard to know what is true or false. If there be no G.o.ds, perhaps there are devils. My Christian friends are more impressed by the latter."

The Rajah shook his head doubtfully.

"Perhaps he is a devil. Who knows? They told me that he summoned a host of devils in the form of elephants to slay my soldiers. Pah! it is all nonsense. There are no such things."

With startling distinctness the shrill trumpeting of an elephant rang through the room.