The Jungle Girl Part 4

On the verandah Wargrave was introduced to him by the Colonel and took his outstretched hand with reluctance; for Frank felt stirring in him a faint jealousy of the man who was Violet's legal lord and an indefinite hostility to him for not appreciating his charming wife as he ought. And while the Resident was shaking hands with the others Wargrave looked at him with interest.

Major Norton was a very ordinary-looking man, more elderly in appearance than his years warranted. He was bald and clean-shaved but for sc.r.a.ps of side-whiskers that gave him a resemblance to the traditional stage-lawyer of amateur theatricals, a likeness increased by his heavy and prosy manner. It was hard to believe that he had ever been a young subaltern, though such had once been the case, for the Indian Political Department is recruited chiefly from officers of the Indian Army. But he was never the gay and light-hearted individual that most junior subs.

are at the beginning of their career. Even then he had been a sober and serious individual, favourably noted by his superiors as being earnest and painstaking. And now he was well thought of by the Heads of his Department; for his plodding and methodical disposition and his slavish adherence to rules and regulations had earned him the reputation of being an eminently "safe" man. How such a gay, laughter-loving, coquettish and attractive woman as Violet Dering came to marry one so entirely her opposite puzzled everyone who did not know the inner history of a girl, one of a large family of daughters, given "her chance in life" by being sent out to relatives in Calcutta for one season, with a definite warning not to return home unmarried under penalty of being turned out to face the world as a governess or hospital nurse. And Violet liked comfort and hated work.

During dinner Wargrave found himself instinctively criticising Norton's manner and conversation, and rapidly arrived at the conclusion that Raymond had described him accurately. The Resident, though a very worthy individual, was undoubtedly a bore; and Colonel Trevor, beside whom he sat, strove in vain to appear interested in his conversation. For he had heard his opinions on every subject on which Norton had any opinions over and over again. As the Resident was the only other European in the station he dined regularly at the Mess on the weekly Guest Night with one or other of the officers. He was not popular among them, but they considered it their duty to be victimised in turn to uphold the regiment's reputation for hospitality; and in consequence each resigned himself to act as his host.

After dinner, as the Resident played neither cards nor billiards, the Colonel sat out on the verandah with him, all the while longing to be at the bridge-table inside; and, as his guest was a strict teetotaller, he did not like to order a drink for himself. So he tried to keep awake and hide his yawns while listening to a prosy monologue on insects until the Residency carriage came to take Major Norton away.

When his guest had left, the Colonel entered the anteroom heaving a sigh of relief.

"Phew! thank G.o.d that's over!" he exclaimed piously. "Really, Norton becomes more of a bore every day. I'm sick to death of hearing the life-story of every Indian insect for the hundredth time. I'll dream of _coleoptera_ and Polly 'optera and other weird beasties to-night."

The other officers looked up and laughed. Ross rose from the bridge-table and said:

"Come and take my place, sir; we've finished the rubber. Have a drink; you want something to cheer you up after that infliction. Boy!

whiskey-soda Commanding Sahib _ke waste lao_. (Bring a whiskey and soda for the Commanding officer.)"

"You've my entire sympathy, Colonel," said Major Hepburn, the Second in Command. "It's my turn to ask the Resident to dinner next. I feel tempted to go on the sick-list to escape it."

"I say, sir, I've got a good idea," said an Irish subaltern named Daly, who was seated at the bridge-table. "Couldn't we pa.s.s a resolution at the next Mess meeting that in future no guests are ever to be asked to dinner? That will save us from our weekly penance."

The others laughed; but the Colonel, whose sense of humour was not his strong point, took the suggestion as being seriously meant.

"No, no; we couldn't do that," he said in an alarmed tone. "The Resident would be very offended and might mention it to the General when he comes here on his annual inspection."

The remark was very characteristic of Colonel Trevor, who was a man who dreaded responsibility and whose sole object in life was to reach safely the time when, his period of command being finished, he could retire on his full pension. He was always haunted by the dread that some carelessness or mistake on his part or that of any of his subordinates might involve him in trouble with his superiors and prevent that happy consummation of his thirty years of Indian service. This fear made him merciless to anyone under him whose conduct might bring the censure of the higher authorities on the innocent head of the Commanding Officer who was in theory responsible for the behaviour of his juniors. It was commonly said in the regiment that he would cheerfully give up his own brother to be hanged to save himself the mildest official reprimand.

Perhaps he was not altogether to blame; for he was not his own master in private life. It was hinted that Colonel Trevor commanded the battalion but that Mrs. Trevor commanded him. And unfortunately there was no doubt that this lady interfered privately a good deal in regimental matters, much to the annoyance of the other officers.

Now, relieved of the incubus that had hitherto spoiled his enjoyment of the evening, the Colonel gratefully drank the whiskey and soda brought him by Ross's order and sat down cheerfully to play bridge. He always liked dining in the Mess, where he was a far more important person than he was in his own house.

It did not take Wargrave long to settle down again into the routine of regimental life and the humdrum existence of a small Indian station. But he had never before been quartered in so remote and dull a spot as Rohar. The only distractions it offered besides the shooting and pigsticking were two tennis afternoons weekly, one at the Residency, the other at the Mess. Here the dozen or so Europeans, who knew every line of each other's faces by heart gathered regularly from sheer boredom whether the game amused them or not. Neither Mrs. Trevor nor her bosom-friend Mrs. Baird, the regimental surgeon's better half, ever attempted it; but they invariably attended and sat together, usually talking scandal of Mrs. Norton as she played or chatted with the men.

Mrs. Trevor's chief grievance against her was that the General Commanding the Division, when he came to inspect the battalion, took the younger woman in to dinner, for, as her husband the Resident was the Viceroy's representative, she could claim precedence over the wife of a mere regimental commandant. No English village is so full of petty squabbles and malicious gossip as a small Indian station.

Like everyone else in the land Wargrave hated most those terrible hours of the hot weather between nine in the morning and five in the afternoon. He and Raymond pa.s.sed them, like so many thousands of their kind elsewhere, shut up in their comfortless bungalow, which was darkened and closely shuttered to exclude the awful heat and the blinding glare outside. Too hot to read or write, almost to smoke, they lay in long cane chairs, gasping and perspiring freely, while the whining _punkah_ overhead barely stirred the heated air. One exterior window on the windward side of the bungalow was filled with a thick mat of dried and odorous _kuskus_ gra.s.s, against which every quarter of an hour the _bheestie_ threw water to wet it thoroughly so that the hot breeze that swept over the burning sand outside might enter cooled by the evaporation of the water.

But Frank found alleviation and comfort in frequent visits to the Residency, where Mrs. Norton and he spent the baking hours of the afternoon absorbed in making music or singing duets. For Violet had a well-trained voice which harmonised well with his. No thought of s.e.x seemed to obtrude itself on them. They were just playmates, comrades, nothing more.

Yet it was only natural that the woman's vanity should be flattered by the man's eagerness to seek her society and by his evident pleasure in it. And it was delightful to have at last a sympathetic listener to all her little grievances, one who seemed as interested in her petty household worries or the delinquencies of her London milliner in failing to execute her orders properly as in her greater complaint against the fate that condemned a woman of her artistic and gaiety-loving nature to existence in the wilds and to the society of persons so uncongenial to her as were the majority of the white folk of Rohar.

To a man the role of confidant to a pretty woman is pleasant and flattering; and Wargrave felt that he was highly favoured by being made the recipient of her confidences. It never occurred to him that there might be danger in the situation. He regarded her only as a friend in need of sympathy and help. His chivalry was up in arms at the thought that she was not properly appreciated by her husband, who, he began to suspect, was inclined to neglect her and treat her as a mere chattel.

The suspicion angered him. True, Violet had never definitely told him so; but he gathered as much from her unconscious admissions and revered her all the more for her bravery in endeavouring to keep silent on the subject.

Certainly Major Norton did not seem to him to be a man capable of understanding and valuing so sweet and rare a woman as this. After their introduction in the Mess Frank's next meeting with him was at his own table at the Residency, when in due course Wargrave was invited to dinner after his duty call. Raymond was asked as well; and the two subalterns were the only guests.

Their hostess looked very lovely in a Paris-made gown of a green shade that suited her colouring admirably. England did not seem to the young soldiers so very far away when this charming and exquisitely-dressed woman received them in her large drawing-room from which all trace of the East in furniture and decoration was carefully excluded. For the English in India try to avoid in their homes all that would remind them of the Land of Exile in which their lot is cast.

Major Norton came into the room after his guests, muttering an unintelligible apology. He shook hands with them with an abstracted air and failed to recall Wargrave's name. At table he asked Frank a few perfunctory questions and then wandered off into his inevitable subject, entomology, but finding him ignorant of and uninterested in it he engaged in a desultory conversation with Raymond. He soon tired of this and for the most part ate his dinner in silence. He never addressed his wife; and Wargrave, watching them, pitied her if her husband was as little companionable at meal-times when they were alone. He pictured her sitting at table every day with this abstracted and uncommunicative man, whose thoughts seemed far from his present company and surroundings and who was scarcely likely to exert himself to talk to and entertain his wife when he made so little effort to do so to his guests.

Determined that on this occasion at least his hostess should be amused Frank did his best to enliven the meal. He described to her as well as he could all that he remembered of the latest fashions in England, told her the plots of the newest plays at the London theatres, repeated a few laughable stories to make her smile and provoked Raymond, who had a dry humour of his own, to a contest of wit. Between them the two subalterns brightened up what had threatened to be a dull evening. Mrs.

Norton laughed gaily and helped to keep the ball rolling; and even the host in his turn woke up and actually attempted to tell a humorous story. It certainly lacked point; but he seemed satisfied that it was funny, so his guests smiled as in duty bound. But Wargrave noted Mrs.

Norton's look of astonishment at this new departure on the part of her husband and thought that there was something very pathetic in her surprise. When the meal was ended she laughingly declined to leave the men over their wine and stayed to smoke a cigarette with them.

When they all quitted the dining-room the Resident asked his guests to excuse him for returning to his study, pleading urgent and important work; and his wife led the subalterns up to the drawing-room and out on to the verandah that ran alongside its French windows. Here easy chairs and a table with a big lamp had been placed for them. As soon as they were seated one of the stately _chupra.s.sis_ brought coffee, while another proffered cigars and cigarettes and held a light from a silver spirit-lamp. Then both the solemn servitors departed noiselessly on bare feet.

After some conversation Mrs. Norton said to the adjutant:

"Do you remember, Mr. Raymond, that you have promised to take me out shooting one day?"

"I haven't forgotten," he replied; "but I was not able to arrange it, as the Maharajah had pigsticking meets fixed up for all our free days. But I don't think we'll have another for some time; for I hear that His Highness is laid up from the effects of his fall. So we might go out some day soon."

"Good. When shall we go?" asked Wargrave. "Let's fix it up now."

"What about next Thursday?" said his friend, turning to Mrs. Norton.

"Yes; that will suit me. Where shall we go?"

"There are a lot of partridge and a few hares, I'm told, near the tank at Marwa, where there is a good deal of cultivation," answered Raymond.

Then turning to his friend he continued:

"You are not very keen on small game shooting, Frank; so you can bring your rifle and try for _c.h.i.n.kara_. I saw a buck and a couple of doe there not very long ago. A little venison would be very acceptable in Mess."

"The tank is about eight miles away, isn't it?" said the hostess. "I'll write to the Maharajah and ask him to lend us camels to take us out. My cook will put up a good cold lunch for us."

She rose from her chair and continued:

"Now, Mr. Wargrave, come and sing something. I've been trying over those new songs of yours to-day."

She led the way into the drawing-room and Raymond was left alone on the verandah to smoke and listen for the rest of the evening, while the others forgot him as they played and sang.

Suddenly he sat up in his chair and with a queer little pang of jealousy in his heart stared through the open window at the couple at the piano.

He watched his friend's face turned eagerly towards his hostess.

Wargrave was gazing intently at her as in a voice full of feeling and pathos, a voice with a plaintive little tone in it that thrilled him strangely, she sang that haunting melody "The Love Song of Har Dyal."

Wistfully, sadly, she uttered the sorrowful words that Kipling puts into the mouth of the lovelorn Pathan maiden:

"My father's wife is old and harsh with years, And drudge of all my father's house am I.

My bread is sorrow and my drink is tears, Come back to me, Beloved, or I die!

Come back to me, Beloved, or I die!"

And the singer looked up into the eager eyes bent on her and sighed a little as she struck the final chords. Out on the verandah Raymond frowned as he watched them and wondered if this woman was to come between them and take his friend from him. Just then the bare-footed servants entered the room, carrying silver trays on which stood the whiskies and sodas that are the stirrup-cups, the hints to guests that the time of departure has come, of dinner-parties in India.

As the two subalterns drove home in Raymond's trap through the hot Indian night under a moon shining with a brilliance that England never knows, Wargrave hummed "The Love Song of Har Dyal."

Suddenly he said:

"She's wonderful, Ray, isn't she? Fancy such a glorious woman buried in this hole and married to a dry old stick like the Resident! Doesn't it seem a shame?"

The adjutant mumbled an incoherent reply behind his lighted cheroot.