The Three Sapphires Part 11

"It was an accident," the major replied. "Come to the bungalow to-night and you will be given the price of two dogs."

"Better make it the price of five dogs, major," Swinton called.

"I'll pay for a whole pack of hounds; I'll stock a kennel for him. I was too devilish quick on the trigger." Lord Victor emptied the black muck from his ears.

The Banjara, not understanding English, looked suspiciously at Finnerty, who hedged: "The sahib says you will be given the price of three dogs."

"Sahib, how shall we fix the price of Banda, that is a Banjara? Such are not sold. I have dogs that are just dogs, and if I had known that this sahib was young in the ways of the hunt I would have brought them for his practice. And was there a kill of tiger, or did the sahib also shoot somebody's dog?"

"Be careful!" Finnerty took a step toward the ironical one, who backed up. Then the major said in a mollifying way: "We'll kill the tiger to-morrow."

Muttering "_Kul, kul_--it is always to-morrow for a difficult work,"

the herdsman took under his arm his wounded dog and strode angrily away.

"Too devilish bad! He's fond of that cur," Lord Victor said mournfully.

"I had a corking good chance at Stripes," Finnerty offered, "but I muddled it when my elephant almost stepped on the smooth old cuss, who was lying doggo; he got up with a roar of astonishment and took a swipe at the beast's trunk. I was holding the ten-bore, loaded with shot to fire across the cane should Stripes try to break back, and, rattled by his sudden charge, I blazed away, peppering him with bird shot. So, you see, Gilfain, we're all liable to blunder in this game. We'll go back now and take up the hunt to-morrow."

As they went back Mahadua put his hand on Finnerty's foot and asked: "Did you see the spectacles on Pundit Bagh?"

Finnerty nodded, for he had seen the black rings when the tiger lifted his head.

"And did sahib put down the ball gun and take up the one that is for birds and shoot over Pundit's head because he, too, thinks that it is the spirit of a man?"

"It is not good to offend the G.o.ds, Mahadua, if one is to live with them, so we will save the killing of the pundit for the young sahib who soon goes back to Inglistan, where the anger of the G.o.ds cannot follow him," Finnerty answered solemnly.

In the other howdah, Lord Victor, in whose mind rankled the dog's shooting, brought up in extenuation this same matter of Finnerty's confessed blunder, for he had not caught the chivalry of the major's lie. "I didn't miss like the major, anyway," he began.

"No, you didn't--unfortunately." Swinton was holding a cheroot to a lighted match.

"Really, captain, I wasn't so bad. Fancy an old hunter like him getting fuzzled and banging at a tiger with bird shot."

Swinton shot a furtive look at the thin, long-nosed face that was still piebald with patches of caked lava; then he turned his eyes away and gazed out over the plain with its coloured gra.s.s and wild indigo scrub.

A pair of swooping jheel birds cut across, piping shrilly: "Did you do it, did you do it!"

"That'll be a corking fine yarn for the club when I get back," Lord Victor added.

"And will you tell them about the dog you shot?"

"Rather! I didn't miss, and the major did."

Swinton turned his brown eyes on the cheerful egoist. "Gilfain, you're young, therefore not hopeless."

"I say, old chap, what's the sequel to that moralising?"

"That probably before you get out of India you'll understand just how good a sportsman Major Finnerty is."

Their elephant had been traversing a well-worn path along the bottom of a hollow, and where it left the _nala_ to reach the plain they suddenly came upon the Banjara's encampment. It was a tiny village of dark-coloured tents; to one side of this was a herd of buffalo that had come in from the plain to be milked. They could see the herdsman sitting moodily on his black blanket, and beside him lay the dead dog.

The young Englishman viewed not without alarm the women who wore belts beneath which were stuck old-fashioned pistols and knives. This was the Banjara custom, but the guilty man feared it was a special course of punishment for him.

Finnerty's elephant had overtaken them, and now again the major had to explain that the dog would be paid for three times over, and the tiger would be surely shot on the morrow.

At this promise, a ponderous woman who had the airs of a gipsy queen pointed to the slayer of the dog and said: "Tomorrow the sahib will hunt again!"

The youngsters whooped with joy, catching the satire.

Finnerty ordered the march resumed.

At a turn, Mahadua pointed to some little red-and-white flags that fluttered above a square plinth of clay upon which was the crude painting of a vermilion tiger, saying: "That is the shrine of Pundit Bagh, and if the sahib wishes to slay him, it being necessary in the law of the jungle, it might avert evil if sacrifice were made at the shrine."

"An offering of sweetmeats and silver?"

"No, huzoor. If a goat is purchased by the sahib and a bottle of arrack, Mahadua will take the goat to the shrine, pour the wine on his head till he has bowed three times to the G.o.d, and cut his throat so that the blood falls upon the shrine to appease the G.o.d. Also I will hang up a foot of the goat."

"What becomes of the goat?" the major asked.

"We will make kabobs of the flesh in the little village yonder, and hold a feast to-night."

Finnerty remained silent, and the Ahnd, to secure a feast, fell back upon tangible arguments. "Sahib, if the villagers are full with feasting and happy because of a little arrack warm in their stomachs, they will not go forth in the early morning with conch horns and axes to beat upon trees to drive Pundit Bagh up into the hills so he may not be slain."

"All right, Mahadua, I'll furnish the goat."

PART TWO

Chapter VII

They had come to where the open plain gave way to patches of jungle and rolling land clad with oak and rhododendron.

The other elephant came alongside, and Finnerty suggested: "We might walk back to my bungalow from here on the chance of getting some game for the pot. There's quail, grey and painted pheasants, green pigeon, and perhaps a peac.o.c.k--I heard one call up in the jungle. I've got sh.e.l.ls loaded with number six for my 10-bore."

"Good!" Swinton answered. "I'm cramped sitting here."

"I'm game," Lord Victor agreed.

Finnerty sent the elephants on, keeping Mahadua, the shikari.

A hot sun was shooting rapidly down close to the horizon, glaring like a flaming dirigible. A nightjar was swooping through the air like a swallow, uttering his weird evening call, "Chyeece, chyeece, chyeece!"

as they went through a fringe of dwarf bamboos and up into the shadow of the trees.

Here Finnerty checked, saying: "I'm afraid I'll have to keep in the lead." He lifted a foot, showing a boot made of soft sambar skin with a cotton sole. "Every creature in the jungle is on the qui vive, and for stalking on foot one has to wear these silent creepers."