Voices in the Night Part 36

CHAPTER XV

THE RaM RUCKI

Jack Raymond's admission, '_C'est la peste, mademoiselle_,' had been made under compulsion. Lesley, he had recognised, was not one to be put off by evasion; and yet his first impulse had been to keep his discovery to himself. For the sense of authority to deal with men and things, which he had had in the past, was apt to return to him when he found himself in a tight place. Therefore, the necessity for avoiding a scare had seemed to him paramount, and he had followed up his low-toned admission by a rapid request that Lesley should take Jerry home to bed, and say nothing to anybody of the adventure.

But by the time the green sleeves had disappeared, obediently, over the dim lawns that were just becoming visible in the dawn, his sense of responsibility had pa.s.sed.

He told himself it was none of his business and that once he had handed over the case to the police, the matter would be ended so far as he was concerned. So far, also, as every one was concerned, if the authorities had any sense; since Lesley would hold her tongue, Jerry's ghost could be laid and laughed at, Budlu bribed, and Jan-Ali-shan----

He looked round, wondering if the latter had gone or not, but could see nothing. An elaborately conscientious hawking and spitting, however, from the shadow of a distant bush, told him not only that John Ellison was there, but that he had grasped the situation.

''Ave a quid o' bitter yerbs, sir,' came the loafer's voice resignedly.

'It's a camphor bush, sir, an' there ain't no good in givin' in to plague an' pestilence without a

"Good Lord deliver us."

Is there, sir?'

The question had an almost pathetic apprehension in it.

'Not a bit,' a.s.sented Jack Raymond. 'Have a cigar instead, Ellison.

I'll light one for you and chuck it over.' He knew his man; knew that without being a coward he was for the moment desperately afraid. Two very different things; since time cures one, and the other is persistent.

So for a minute or two there was silence. Then from the shadow of the camphor bush came a more confident cough.

'If you did 'appen to 'ave a drop o' brandy,' began the voice tentatively, 'though if you 'aven't, sir, it's "Thy will be done!" An'

that bein' so, there's nothin' left but w'ot the nation you an' me's got to do next? 'Ow many corpses is there, sir?'

Jack Raymond smiled, feeling he had judged his man rightly.

'There is only the poor devil we chased left alive,' he answered; 'the two children, the woman, and a servant are dead. They have been there nearly a week. Refugees from down country who managed to slip past quarantine. He is a Nushapore man by birth, and, just as they were coming to the journey's end, one child fell sick. So, to escape inspection, he alighted at the last roadside station and walked in at night. He had to pa.s.s the Garden Mound, of course, and it struck him it would be safer to find out first if his people would take him in. So he, knowing the ropes, hid his family here for the day. Then his people were alarmed, another child sickened, _et cetera_. So he stopped on here, getting to and from the bazaar for what he wanted at night, dressed in an old white uniform----'

A low whistle came from the camphor bush, and a murmur, 'No, you don't, sonny! No, you don't!'

'Yes! it was rather a 'cute dodge, but he's an educated man. Well! the last child died yesterday, and he went off to get medicine for his wife, hoping to sneak back as usual. But the garden was full up with Chinese lanterns and bands; and they were dancing----'

'Deary dear!' interrupted the distant voice sympathetically, 'so 'e 'ad to lounge around, awaitin' for "Gord save our gracious Queen" to let 'im see if 'is lawful wife 'ad chucked it! Well, sir, black or white, it do seem cruel 'ard'--there was a pause, another ostentatious clearing of the throat--'but 'e knows the worst now, sir,' went on Jan-Ali-shan, 'so why not 'ave the pore soul out

"where the breezes blow,"

on 'is parallel, as the sayin' is? It 'ud be more 'olesome, special if 'e's got to be took in 'and. As it say in 'Oly Writ,

"Separate ye the livin' from the dead an' the plague was stayed."

Beg pardin', sir, but 'avin' bin seven year in a surplus ch.o.r.e, it come natural-like.'

Jack Raymond thought that it did; thought, as he sat waiting, that the loafer, given a free hand, would probably settle the business as well as any one else. His suggestion was sound, anyhow. So, after a bit, there were three shadowy figures planted out on the lawns at respectful distances from each other. The last one, a dejected heap, huddled up on the gra.s.s, whimpering softly.

'If you 'ad another o' them hanti-microbber-tail-twisters about you, sir,' came the suggestive voice between vehement puffings at a cigar, 'it 'ud tickle 'im up, like as it done me. An' bein' a Bombay duck, as the sayin' is, 'e 'd smoke 'is grandmother's curl-papers! I know them down-country _baboos_. "Week in, week out, you can 'ear their bellows blow." An' "Gord save our gracious Queen" 'as bin cruel 'ard on 'em, sir--to say nothin' o' its bein' a sight safer to pizen 'is bla'ck-sill'ys.'

Jack Raymond smiled. Jan-Ali-shan was wisdom itself. So the further shadow was supplied with a cigar, while a comparatively reckless voice hummed cheerfully--

'Tobacco is an Indian weed, Grows green at morn, cut down at eve; Thus we decay, we are but clay, Think of this when you smoke tobacco!'

'Seems to me, sir,' it broke off at last to say, 'that there's only us three to take count on, so to speak. Them pore things in there 'as sum-totalled up their little bills. An', as the minister's man said when they come worryin' round for a grave, an' 'e busy plantin'

sprouts--"Corpses'll keep an' kebbiges won't!" so why not leave 'em comfortable for to-night? We don't want no crowd comin' round to see the place where we laid 'em, do we, sir? An' Madam Toosaw's ain't nothin' to bazaar folk for the chamber o' 'orrers if they get the chanst. Then as for 'im, pore devil, 'e _must_ go to quarantine camp as a suspect anyhow, so it wouldn't make any odds to 'im, would it, sir?

An' we could tell 'im to 'old 'is tongue or worse befall, couldn't we, sir? An' that 'ud tone down the colour a bit, as the sayin' is, more nor lettin' the police send round the town-crier.'

'How about Budlu?' asked Jack Raymond tentatively; but Jan-Ali-shan was ready for him.

'Give 'im in charge 'isself, as 'e ought ter be, for disreliction o'

duty in allowin' ghosts. That 'ud stop 'is mouth, sir; special as 'e don't know nothin'.'

The simplicity of the plan was obvious. It would even, Jack Raymond felt, take the responsibility of informing the police off his shoulders. He need only give the stowaway in charge, then go round to the civil surgeon, tell him the truth, and leave him to decide whether or not to hush up the matter absolutely--as he could easily do by the aid of quicklime and a few stones.

'In that case,' he said, after a pause for deliberation, 'the sooner we move off from this particular place----'

'Just so, sir!' interrupted Jan-Ali-shan. 'Dro'r the enemy's fire h'off the weak spot. So, if you'll take 'im over to the general's 'ouse, an'

settle 'is an' Budlu's 'ash when the perlice come, I'll 'ang round about them pore things inside, an' warble 'ymns an' psalms an'

spiritooal songs till you've done the job. It won't 'urt 'em, sir,' he added apologetically, 'an' it'll kinder keep up my sperits.'

It appeared to do so, for when, a quarter of an hour afterwards Jack Raymond, after finishing his task, returned to that part of the garden on his way to the civil surgeon, he heard quite a cheerful version of 'Wrap me up in my tarpaulin jacket' coming from the camphor bush. And when, just as the sky was primrose with the first sunbeams, he returned once more to release Jan-Ali-shan from his voluntary lyke-wake, he found him seated on the plinth of the mutiny memorial going methodically through 'John Brown's body,' as sung by convivial parties, with the elision of a word at each verse.

It was near its end, so that only 'John' had to be vocalised when Jack Raymond came up; but the beating of the silent tune went on vigorously while he told Jan-Ali-shan that the civil surgeon had expressed his entire approval of the plan, which he characterised as a stroke of administrative genius!

'"But 'is soul goes marchin' on!"' burst out Jan-Ali-shan, finishing his song at the proper beat. Then he rose, pulled his sleeves over his cuffs, and nodded his head gravely. 'That's 'ow it is, sir. 'Is soul goes marchin' on. That sort o' strokes come to a feller, they do, in the Garding Mound, an' will do, please G.o.d, as long as there's a white face among the black.'

So, singing 'Silver threads among the gold,' he sloped off through the cemetery, then over the wall to his work citywards, feeling that, so far as he was concerned, the incident was over.

But to Jack Raymond, as he went back to the club, came the remembrance that Lesley Drummond must be told that her question and his answer were to remain a secret between them. The idea annoyed him, all the more so because of the remembrance of Grace Arbuthnot's guilty face when Lesley had let the cat out of the bag concerning the origin of the green sleeves! Nevertheless, it was inevitable, so he sat down in an ill-humour, wrote a stiff explanatory note suggesting that Jerry's midnight chase should be treated as a nightmare due to turkey and ham, and sent it over to Government House. Yet, before doing so, he fumigated it carefully with tobacco, feeling the while a trifle ashamed of his own smile at the remembrance of those green sleeves.

But the wearer of them, restored to the dignity of a tailor-made coat and skirt, receiving the note while the tell-tale odour was still fresh on it--for she had found sleep impossible--frowned at the recollection of the figure in the political uniform which had refused even to touch those green sleeves. Frowned, not from displeasure, but from impatience at her own sense of pleasure in his thoughtfulness; for it was unfamiliar to her, that sense of rest in another person's care.

Treat it as a nightmare! Of course! How else could one treat that wild medley of green sleeves, political uniforms, ghosts, boys, _valses a deux temps_, Jan-Ali-shans!

Only, no sane person would ever dream of dreaming such nonsense!

And yet, what was this unfamiliar tingle to her finger-tips, this curious elation, this sense of personal gain, as if she had found something new and precious--as if a child, idly unfolding a flower-bud, had found a fairy at its heart?

She turned from this fancy still more impatiently, resolving to set the whole incident aside. But this, she soon found, was quite impossible.