The Native Born; or, the Rajah's People Part 41

"I was in the New Bazaar last night," he began curtly. "I go there regularly, as you know, disguised as one thing or another, just for the sake of having a look at the people when they don't know they are being watched. Last night there was no one there--not so much as a child or a woman. The place was dead. I admit that I was not particularly startled. I knew that there was a great festival at hand.

Pilgrims have been streaming in for days past, and it was quite conceivable that some ceremony was taking place in the temple.

Curiosity fortunately led me to investigate further. Myself disguised as a traveling fakir, I made my way to the Rajah's palace gates.

Already on the road I was joined by a hurrying stream of men and women, princ.i.p.ally men. My suspicions were aroused. I knew from experience that it was not a usual crowd of pilgrims. Every man was armed, not only with knives, but guns and revolvers. Some of them were undoubtedly deserted sepoys who had stolen their weapons. Moreover, they exchanged a signal which I recognized and, in order to escape detection, imitated. It was the signal which in past generations revealed one member of the Thug fraternity to another."

"Thugs!" exclaimed Stafford, with a faintly skeptical smile.

"Do not misunderstand me," Nicholson said. "I am not going to recall to your minds the nursery horrors with which our ayahs regaled our childish imaginations. I will only emphasize one fact. The Thugs were not and are not merely a band of murderous and treacherous robbers.

They belong to the priesthood, they are the deputed servants of the G.o.ddess Kali, and their task is the extermination of the enemy--of the foreigner, that is to say--in this case, of ourselves."

Stafford glanced at the Colonel. The latter's face was set and grave.

"I do not for a moment suggest that the crowd with which I traveled were Thugs," Nicholson continued. "I know that they were not. But they had adopted the Thug sign because they had adopted the Thug mission.

Not, however, till we had pa.s.sed the gates and reached the palace did I realize the gravity of the situation. The Rajah stood on the great steps, surrounded by a body-guard of torch-bearers. He was dressed in full native costume, a blaze of gems, and wearing the royal insignia.

The expression on his face was something I shall not easily forget, and at the time it was inexplicable to me. I can not describe it. I can only say that I was instantly reminded of Milton's fallen Satan as he stands above his followers, superb, dauntless, but tortured by hatred, contempt and G.o.d knows what strange minglings of remorse and anger. He greeted the crowd with the sign of death. His first words revealed to me that his allegiance to us was at an end, and that he meant to follow in his father's b.l.o.o.d.y footsteps."

Stafford stretched out his hand, catching hold of the back of a chair as if seeking support.

"Go on!" he said sharply.

"I have very little more to say. I did not wait, for I had heard enough to know that Marut was in instant danger. I made my escape as best I could, but in order to avoid notice I had to resort to circuitous paths, and only reached here this morning."

Colonel Carmichael brought his hand down angrily upon the table.

"To think that the scoundrel should have been pretending friendship all the time that he was preparing to murder us!" he exclaimed. "This comes of trusting a native!"

"Excuse me, Colonel," Nicholson answered, with emphasis. "I have every reason to believe that until yesterday Nehal Singh was our sincere ally."

"You mean to say that he stamped an armed crowd out of the earth in half an hour?"

"No. That armed crowd was the silent work of years. It was the tool which has been held ready for a long time--but not by Nehal Singh--"

"By whom, then, in the name of all--"

Nicholson drew out an old and faded photograph and handed it to the Colonel.

"Do you recognize that face?" he asked.

"Certainly I do. It is the Rajah's father--Behar Singh. How did you come by this?"

"It belonged to my father. He gave it me, and I kept it as a curiosity. Colonel, I saw that man last night at the Rajah's side."

The photograph fluttered from the Colonel's powerless fingers. He looked at Nicholson, and there flashed into his old eyes a terrible primitive pa.s.sion of revenge and hatred.

"My G.o.d! He is alive--and I never knew!"

"He is alive, Colonel. And I believe that, hidden from us all, he has been working steadily and stealthily at the task which saw its completion last night. So long as Nehal Singh stood on our side he could do nothing. The people believe Nehal to be an incarnation of Vishnu, and they will only follow where he leads. Behar knew that--probably he himself had fostered the idea. He guessed, probably, that one day Nehal Singh would turn from us. He waited. Last night I saw a face of devilish triumph which told its own tale. He had not waited in vain."

Colonel Carmichael turned to Stafford and held out his hand. For the first time old friendship shone out of his eyes mingled with a fire of thirsty revenge.

"You and I have a debt to pay before we die, Stafford," he said.

Stafford's hand touched his coldly and powerlessly.

"I have nothing against the Rajah," he said hoa.r.s.ely. "I can not carry out a revenge against the son--"

Colonel Carmichael interrupted him with a hard laugh.

"They are all of a piece," he said. "Say what you will, Nicholson, Nehal Singh is a traitor. We were fools to trust him. We are always fools when we do not treat a native as a dangerous animal. They murder us for our silly, sentimental confidence."

Nicholson bent down and, picking up the photograph, replaced it in his pocket.

"Do you think so, Colonel?" he said significantly. "From, my experience I have learned that you can always trust a native. You can treat him as your friend and equal so long as the inequality is there and obvious to him. I mean, so long as in everything--in generosity, in courage, and in honor--he realizes that you are his superior."

Colonel Carmichael's face darkened with anger.

"Do you mean, perhaps, that--that we are not all that?" he demanded.

"Surely not all of us. How many men think that any sort of conduct is good enough to show a native? What did Behar Singh see of our honor?

He was our friend until an Englishman who had eaten and drunk his hospitality repaid him by a dishonorable theft. What has Nehal Singh seen of our superiority? In spite of his father's influence, he came to us prejudiced in our favor. He saw heroes in us all, and he trusted himself blindly in our hands. What has been the consequence?

Look at yesterday's scene, as you have described it to me, Colonel.

His best friend had proved himself a mean and treacherous swindler.

The woman whom as I judge he regarded as a saint--forgive me, Stafford, I must be honest--no more than a heartless flirt, who had led him on from one folly to another for the sake of a little excitement--"

"Rubbish!" Colonel Carmichael burst out. "What are exceptions in a whole race?"

"In a strange country no one is an exception, Colonel. One coward, one thief, one drunkard is quite enough to cast the blackest slur upon the whole nation in the eyes of another race. As sincerely as he believed yesterday that we were all heroes, as sincerely Nehal Singh believes to-day that there isn't an honest man among us."

This time Colonel Carmichael made no answer. He went over to the window and stood there frowning obstinately out over the neglected garden. His eyes fell on the ruined bungalow, and he called Nicholson to his side.

"Look at that!" he said. "In that place Behar Singh murdered my best and only friend, Steven Caruthers. I have not forgotten and I can not forget. It has branded every native for me as a murderer. No doubt this proves your argument. From the first I shrank from all contact with the present Rajah. I distrusted him, and it is obvious now that my distrust was well founded. What do you say, Stafford? You, too, were against having anything to do with him."

To his surprise and annoyance, Stafford did not respond. He stood there with his hands clasping the back of the chair, his brows knitted in painful thought.

"Come, Stafford, what have you to say?" the Colonel repeated impatiently.

"I think there is a good deal in what Nicholson says," Stafford answered, speaking as though he had only just heard that he was being addressed. "The Rajah has not been well treated. He has a right to feel bitter. And he seemed a fine sort of man. Without prejudice, Colonel, one can not withhold a certain admiration for him. He has behaved better than some of us."

Colonel Carmichael frowned, but his sense of justice forced him to a reluctant admission.

"Yes, he has a few showy virtues. Yesterday, for instance. Under the circ.u.mstances, he behaved like a gentleman and a man of honor.

Before nightfall the English share-holders in the mine got their money back in gems and rupees--he must have pulled the palace to pieces. In fact, everything might have gone off smoothly if it hadn't been for that--that--" He coughed and glanced at Stafford, not without a touch of malicious satisfaction.

"You are alluding to Miss Cary, Colonel," Stafford said, returning his glance with dignity, "and you are at liberty to say what you like, for I have no longer the right to champion her. At her request, our engagement is at an end. But as her friend I can not refrain from saying this much--she has not spared herself, and, G.o.d knows, she also has not been treated well."

What memories pa.s.sed before the Colonel's mind as he stood there gazing absently in front of him! Recollections of mean and envious criticisms, ugly underhand slanders, petty intrigue, his own shame-faced patronage!

And then the vision of a lovely, white-faced woman making her desperate self-accusal, and of a terrible, vulgar mother trying to hold her back with threats and pleadings! He turned at last to the two men, his own face red and troubled.

"I apologize," he said. "I apologize all around. I seem to have been insulting everybody in turn. I dare say you are all right. The Rajah may be ill-used and Miss Cary well-meaning. I don't know. And what on earth does it matter? The fat is in the fire, and here we stand chattering like old women about how it got there. Something must be done. The regiment is a day's march from here, and with a company of your Gurkhas, Nicholson, we shan't do much--scarcely hold out if they dare attack us."