little Mildred, settling the man in a chair. It seemed most improper
to all present that Dirkovitch should sip brandy as he talked in
purring, spitting Russian to the creature who answered so feebly and
with such evident dread. But since Dirkovitch appeared to understand
no one said a word. All breathed heavily, leaning forward, in the long
gaps of the conversation. The next time that they have no engagements
on hand the White Hussars intend to go to St. Petersburg in a body to
learn Russian.
'He does not know how many years ago,' said Dirkovitch facing the
mess, 'but he says it was very long ago in the war. I think that there
was an accident. He says he was of this glorious and distinguished
regiment in the war.'
'The rolls! The rolls! Holmer, get the rolls!' said little Mildred,
and the Adjutant dashed off bareheaded to the orderly-room, where the
muster-rolls of the regiment were kept. He returned just in time to
hear Dirkovitch conclude, 'Therefore, my dear friends, I am most sorry
to say there was an accident which would have been reparable if he had
apologised to that our colonel, which he had insulted.'
Then followed another growl which the Colonel tried to beat down. The
mess was in no mood just then to weigh insults to Russian colonels.
'He does not remember, but I think that there was an accident, and so
he was not exchanged among the prisoners, but he was sent to another
place--how do you say?--the country. _So_, he says, he came here. He
does not know how he came. Eh? He was at Chepany'--the man caught the
word, nodded, and shivered--'at Zhigansk and Irkutsk. I cannot
understand how he escaped. He says, too, that he was in the forests
for many years, but how many years he has forgotten--that with many
things. It was an accident; done because he did not apologise to that
our colonel. Ah!'
Instead of echoing Dirkovitch's sigh of regret, it is sad to record
that the White Hussars livelily exhibited un-Christian delight and
other emotions, hardly restrained by their sense of hospitality.
Holmer flung the frayed and yellow regimental rolls on the table, and
the men flung themselves at these.
'Steady! Fifty-six--fifty-five--fifty-four,' said Holmer. 'Here we
are. "Lieutenant Austin Limmason. _Missing._" That was before
Sebastopol. What an infernal shame! Insulted one of their colonels,
and was quietly shipped off. Thirty years of his life wiped out.'
'But he never apologised. Said he'd see him damned first,' chorussed
the mess.
'Poor chap! I suppose he never had the chance afterwards. How did he
come here?' said the Colonel.
The dingy heap in the chair could give no answer.
'Do you know who you are?'
It laughed weakly.
'Do you know that you are Limmason--Lieutenant Limmason of the White
Hussars?'
Swiftly as a shot came the answer, in a slightly surprised tone, 'Yes,
I'm Limmason, of course.' The light died out in his eyes, and the man
collapsed, watching every motion of Dirkovitch with terror. A flight
from Siberia may fix a few elementary facts in the mind, but it does
not seem to lead to continuity of thought. The man could not explain
how, like a homing pigeon, he had found his way to his own old mess
again. Of what he had suffered or seen he knew nothing. He cringed
before Dirkovitch as instinctively as he had pressed the spring of the
candlestick, sought the picture of the drum-horse, and answered to the
toast of the Queen. The rest was a blank that the dreaded Russian
tongue could only in part remove. His head bowed on his breast, and he
giggled and cowered alternately.
The devil that lived in the brandy prompted Dirkovitch at this
extremely inopportune moment to make a speech. He rose, swaying
slightly, gripped the table-edge, while his eyes glowed like opals,
and began:--
'Fellow-soldiers glorious--true friends and hospitables. It was an
accident, and deplorable--most deplorable.' Here he smiled sweetly all
round the mess. 'But you will think of this little, little thing. So
little, is it not? The Czar! Posh! I slap my fingers--I snap my
fingers at him. Do I believe in him? No! But in us Slav who has done
nothing, _him_ I believe. Seventy--how much--millions peoples that
have done nothing--not one thing. Posh! Napoleon was an episode.' He
banged a hand on the table. 'Hear you, old peoples, we have done
nothing in the world--out here. All our work is to do; and it shall be
done, old peoples. Get a-way!' He waved his hand imperiously, and
pointed to the man. 'You see him. He is no good to see. He was just
one little--oh, so little--accident, that no one remembered. Now he
is _That_! So will you be, brother soldiers so brave--so will you be.
But you will never come back. You will all go where he is gone,
or'--he pointed to the great coffin-shadow on the ceiling, and
muttering, 'Seventy millions--get a-way, you old peoples,' fell
asleep.
'Sweet, and to the point,' said little Mildred. 'What's the use of
getting wroth? Let's make this poor devil comfortable.'
But that was a matter suddenly and swiftly taken from the loving hands
of the White Hussars. The lieutenant had returned only to go away
again three days later, when the wail of the Dead March, and the tramp
of the squadrons, told the wondering Station, who saw no gap in the
mess-table, that an officer of the regiment had resigned his new-found
commission.
And Dirkovitch, bland, supple, and always genial, went away too, by a
night train. Little Mildred and another man saw him off, for he was
the guest of the mess, and even had he smitten the Colonel with the
open hand, the law of that mess allowed no relaxation of hospitality.
'Good-bye, Dirkovitch, and a pleasant journey,' said little Mildred.
'_Au revoir_,' said the Russian.
'Indeed! But we thought you were going home?'
'Yes, but I will come again. My dear friends, is that road shut?' He
pointed to where the North Star burned over the Khyber Pass.
'By Jove! I forgot. Of course. Happy to meet you, old man, any time
you like. Got everything you want? Cheroots, ice, bedding? That's all
right. Well, _au revoir_, Dirkovitch.'
'Um,' said the other man, as the tail-lights of the train grew small.
'Of--all--the--unmitigated----!'
Little Mildred answered nothing, but watched the North Star and hummed
a selection from a recent Simla burlesque that had much delighted the
White Hussars. It ran:--
I'm sorry for Mister Bluebeard,
I'm sorry to cause him pain;
But a terrible spree there's sure to be
When he comes back again.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE COURTING OF DINAH SHADD
What did the colonel's lady think
Nobody never knew.
Somebody asked the sergeant's wife
An' she told 'em, true.
When you git to a man in the case
They're like a row o' pins,
For the colonel's lady an' Judy O'Grady
Are sisters under their skins.
_Barrack Room Ballad._
All day I had followed at the heels of a pursuing army engaged on one
of the finest battles that ever camp of exercise beheld. Thirty
thousand troops had by the wisdom of the Government of India been
turned loose over a few thousand square miles of country to practise
in peace what they would never attempt in war. Consequently cavalry
charged unshaken infantry at the trot. Infantry captured artillery by
frontal attacks delivered in line of quarter columns, and mounted
infantry skirmished up to the wheels of an armoured train which
carried nothing more deadly than a twenty-five pounder Armstrong, two
Nordenfeldts, and a few score volunteers all cased in three-eighths-inch
boiler-plate. Yet it was a very lifelike camp. Operations did not
cease at sundown; nobody knew the country and nobody spared man or
horse. There was unending cavalry scouting and almost unending forced
work over broken ground. The Army of the South had finally pierced the
centre of the Army of the North, and was pouring through the gap
hot-foot to capture a city of strategic importance. Its front extended
fanwise, the sticks being represented by regiments strung out along
the line of route backwards to the divisional transport columns and
all the lumber that trails behind an army on the move. On its right
the broken left of the Army of the North was flying in mass, chased by
the Southern horse and hammered by the Southern guns till these had
been pushed far beyond the limits of their last support. Then the
flying sat down to rest, while the elated commandant of the pursuing
force telegraphed that he held all in check and observation.
Unluckily he did not observe that three miles to his right flank a
flying column of Northern horse with a detachment of Gurkhas and
British troops had been pushed round, as fast as the failing light
allowed, to cut across the entire rear of the Southern Army, to break,
as it were, all the ribs of the fan where they converged by striking
at the transport, reserve ammunition, and artillery supplies. Their
instructions were to go in, avoiding the few scouts who might not have
been drawn off by the pursuit, and create sufficient excitement to
impress the Southern Army with the wisdom of guarding their own flank
and rear before they captured cities. It was a pretty manoeuvre,
neatly carried out.
Speaking for the second division of the Southern Army, our first
intimation of the attack was at twilight, when the artillery were
labouring in deep sand, most of the escort were trying to help them
out, and the main body of the infantry had gone on. A Noah's Ark of
elephants, camels, and the mixed menagerie of an Indian transport
train bubbled and squealed behind the guns, when there appeared from
nowhere in particular British infantry to the extent of three
companies, who sprang to the heads of the gun-horses and brought all
to a standstill amid oaths and cheers.
'How's that, umpire?' said the Major commanding the attack, and with
one voice the drivers and limber gunners answered 'Hout!' while the
Colonel of Artillery sputtered.
'All your scouts are charging our main body,' said the Major. 'Your
flanks are unprotected for two miles. I think we've broken the back of
this division. And listen,--there go the Gurkhas!'
A weak fire broke from the rear-guard more than a mile away, and was
answered by cheerful howlings. The Gurkhas, who should have swung
clear of the second division, had stepped on its tail in the dark, but
drawing off hastened to reach the next line of attack, which lay
almost parallel to us five or six miles away.
Our column swayed and surged irresolutely,--three batteries, the
divisional ammunition reserve, the baggage, and a section of the
hospital and bearer corps. The commandant ruefully promised to report
himself 'cut up' to the nearest umpire, and commending his cavalry and
all other cavalry to the special care of Eblis, toiled on to resume
touch with the rest of the division.
'We'll bivouac here to-night,' said the Major; 'I have a notion that
the Gurkhas will get caught. They may want us to re-form on. Stand
easy till the transport gets away.'
A hand caught my beast's bridle and led him out of the choking dust; a
larger hand deftly canted me out of the saddle; and two of the hugest
hands in the world received me sliding. Pleasant is the lot of the
special correspondent who falls into such hands as those of Privates
Mulvaney, Ortheris, and Learoyd.
'An' that's all right,' said the Irishman calmly. 'We thought we'd
find you somewheres here by. Is there anything av yours in the
transport? Orth'ris'll fetch ut out.'
Ortheris did 'fetch ut out,' from under the trunk of an elephant, in
the shape of a servant and an animal, both laden with medical
comforts. The little man's eyes sparkled.
'If the brutil an' licentious soldiery av these parts gets sight av
the thruck,' said Mulvaney, making practised investigation, 'they'll
loot ev'rything. They're bein' fed on iron-filin's an' dog-biscuit
these days, but glory's no compensation for a belly-ache. Praise be,
we're here to protect you, Sorr. Beer, sausage, bread (soft an' that's
a cur'osity), soup in a tin, whisky by the smell av ut, an' fowls!
Mother av Moses, but ye take the field like a confectioner! 'Tis
scand'lus.'
''Ere's a orficer,' said Ortheris significantly. 'When the sergent's
done lushin' the privit may clean the pot.'
I bundled several things into Mulvaney's haver-sack before the Major's
hand fell on my shoulder and he said tenderly, 'Requisitioned for the
Queen's service. Wolseley was quite wrong about special
correspondents: they are the soldier's best friends. Come and take
pot-luck with us to-night.'
And so it happened amid laughter and shoutings that my well-considered
commissariat melted away to reappear later at the mess-table, which
was a waterproof sheet spread on the ground. The flying column had
taken three days' rations with it, and there be few things nastier
than government rations--especially when government is experimenting
with German toys. Erbswurst, tinned beef of surpassing tinniness,
compressed vegetables, and meat-biscuits may be nourishing, but what
Thomas Atkins needs is bulk in his inside. The Major, assisted by his
brother officers, purchased goats for the camp and so made the
experiment of no effect. Long before the fatigue-party sent to collect
brushwood had returned, the men were settled down by their valises,
kettles and pots had appeared from the surrounding country and were
dangling over fires as the kid and the compressed vegetable bubbled
together; there rose a cheerful clinking of mess-tins; outrageous
demands for 'a little more stuffin' with that there liver-wing'; and
gust on gust of chaff as pointed as a bayonet and as delicate as a
gun-butt.
'The boys are in a good temper,' said the Major. 'They'll be singing
presently. Well, a night like this is enough to keep them happy.'
Over our heads burned the wonderful Indian stars, which are not all
pricked in on one plane, but, preserving an orderly perspective, draw
the eye through the velvet darkness of the void up to the barred doors
of heaven itself. The earth was a gray shadow more unreal than the
sky. We could hear her breathing lightly in the pauses between the
howling of the jackals, the movement of the wind in the tamarisks, and
the fitful mutter of musketry-fire leagues away to the left. A native
woman from some unseen hut began to sing, the mail-train thundered
past on its way to Delhi, and a roosting crow cawed drowsily. Then
there was a belt-loosening silence about the fires, and the even
breathing of the crowded earth took up the story.
The men, full fed, turned to tobacco and song,--their officers with
them. The subaltern is happy who can win the approval of the musical
critics in his regiment, and is honoured among the more intricate
step-dancers. By him, as by him who plays cricket cleverly, Thomas
Atkins will stand in time of need, when he will let a better officer
go on alone. The ruined tombs of forgotten Mussulman saints heard the
ballad of _Agra Town_, _The Buffalo Battery_, _Marching to Kabul_,
_The long, long Indian Day_, _The Place where the Punkah-coolie died_,
and that crashing chorus which announces,
Youth's daring spirit, manhood's fire,
Firm hand and eagle eye,
Must he acquire, who would aspire
To see the gray boar die.
To-day, of all those jovial thieves who appropriated my commissariat
and lay and laughed round that waterproof sheet, not one remains. They
went to camps that were not of exercise and battles without empires.
Burmah, the Soudan, and the frontier,--fever and fight,--took them in
their time.
I drifted across to the men's fires in search of Mulvaney, whom I
found strategically greasing his feet by the blaze. There is nothing
particularly lovely in the sight of a private thus engaged after a
long day's march, but when you reflect on the exact proportion of the
'might, majesty, dominion, and power' of the British Empire which
stands on those feet you take an interest in the proceedings.
'There's a blister, bad luck to ut, on the heel,' said Mulvaney. 'I
can't touch ut. Prick ut out, little man.'
Ortheris took out his housewife, eased the trouble with a needle,
stabbed Mulvaney in the calf with the same weapon, and was swiftly
kicked into the fire.
'I've bruk the best av my toes over you, ye grinnin' child av
disruption,' said Mulvaney, sitting cross-legged and nursing his feet;
then seeing me, 'Oh, ut's you, Sorr! Be welkim, an' take that
maraudin' scutt's place. Jock, hold him down on the cindhers for a
bit.'
But Ortheris escaped and went elsewhere, as I took possession of the
hollow he had scraped for himself and lined with his greatcoat.
Learoyd on the other side of the fire grinned affably and in a minute
fell fast asleep.
'There's the height av politeness for you,' said Mulvaney, lighting
his pipe with a flaming branch. 'But Jock's eaten half a box av your
sardines at wan gulp, an' I think the tin too. What's the best wid
you, Sorr, an' how did you happen to be on the losin' side this day
whin we captured you?'
'The Army of the South is winning all along the line,' I said.
'Then that line's the hangman's rope, savin' your presence. You'll
learn to-morrow how we rethreated to dhraw thim on before we made thim
trouble, an' that's what a woman does. By the same tokin, we'll be
attacked before the dawnin' an' ut would be betther not to slip your
boots. How do I know that? By the light av pure reason. Here are three
companies av us ever so far inside av the enemy's flank an' a crowd av
roarin', tarin', squealin' cavalry gone on just to turn out the whole
hornet's nest av them. Av course the enemy will pursue, by brigades
like as not, an' thin we'll have to run for ut. Mark my words. I am av
the opinion av Polonius whin he said, "Don't fight wid ivry scutt for
the pure joy av fightin', but if you do, knock the nose av him first
and frequint." We ought to ha' gone on an' helped the Gurkhas.'
'But what do you know about Polonius?' I demanded. This was a new side
of Mulvaney's character.
'All that Shakespeare iver wrote an' a dale more that the gallery
shouted,' said the man of war, carefully lacing his boots. 'Did I not
tell you av Silver's Theatre in Dublin, whin I was younger than I am
now an' a patron av the drama? Ould Silver wud never pay actor-man or
woman their just dues, an' by consequince his comp'nies was
collapsible at the last minut. Thin the bhoys wud clamour to take a
part, an' oft as not ould Silver made them pay for the fun. Faith,
I've seen Hamlut played wid a new black eye an' the queen as full as a
cornucopia. I remimber wanst Hogin that 'listed in the Black Tyrone
an' was shot in South Africa, he sejuced ould Silver into givin' him
Hamlut's part instid av me that had a fine fancy for rhetoric in those
days. Av course I wint into the gallery an' began to fill the pit wid
other peoples' hats, an' I passed the time av day to Hogin walkin'
through Denmark like a hamstrung mule wid a pall on his back.
"Hamlut," sez I, "there's a hole in your heel. Pull up your
shtockin's, Hamlut," sez I. "Hamlut, Hamlut, for the love av decincy
dhrop that skull an' pull up your shtockin's." The whole house begun
to tell him that. He stopped his soliloquishms mid-between. "My
shtockin's may be comin' down or they may not," sez he, screwin' his
eye into the gallery, for well he knew who I was. "But afther this
performince is over me an' the Ghost'll trample the tripes out av you,
Terence, wid your-ass's bray!" An' that's how I come to know about
Hamlut. Eyah! Those days, those days! Did you iver have onendin'
devilmint an' nothin' to pay for it in your life, Sorr?'
'Never, without having to pay,' I said.
'That's thrue! 'Tis mane whin you considher on ut; but ut's the same
wid horse or fut. A headache if you dhrink, an' a belly-ache if you
eat too much, an' a heart-ache to kape all down. Faith, the beast only
gets the colic, an' he's the lucky man.'
He dropped his head and stared into the fire, fingering his moustache
the while. From the far side of the bivouac the voice of Corbet-Nolan,
senior subaltern of B company, uplifted itself in an ancient and much
appreciated song of sentiment, the men moaning melodiously behind him.
The north wind blew coldly, she drooped from that hour,
My own little Kathleen, my sweet little Kathleen,
Kathleen, my Kathleen, Kathleen O'Moore!
With forty-five O's in the last word: even at that distance you might
have cut the soft South Irish accent with a shovel.
'For all we take we must pay, but the price is cruel high,' murmured
Mulvaney when the chorus had ceased.
'What's the trouble?' I said gently, for I knew that he was a man of
an inextinguishable sorrow.
'Hear now,' said he. 'Ye know what I am now. _I_ know what I mint to
be at the beginnin' av my service. I've tould you time an' again, an'
what I have not Dinah Shadd has. An' what am I? Oh, Mary Mother av
Hiven, an ould dhrunken, untrustable baste av a privit that has seen
the reg'ment change out from colonel to drummer-boy, not wanst or
twice, but scores av times! Ay, scores! An' me not so near gettin'
promotion as in the first! An' me livin' on an' kapin' clear av clink,
not by my own good conduck, but the kindness av some orf'cer-bhoy
young enough to be son to me! Do I not know ut? Can I not tell whin
I'm passed over at p'rade, tho' I'm rockin' full av liquor an' ready
to fall all in wan piece, such as even a suckin' child might see,
bekaze, "Oh, 'tis only ould Mulvaney!" An' whin I'm let off in
ord'ly-room through some thrick of the tongue an' a ready answer an'
the ould man's mercy, is ut smilin' I feel whin I fall away an' go
back to Dinah Shadd, thryin' to carry ut all off as a joke? Not I!
'Tis hell to me, dumb hell through ut all; an' next time whin the fit
comes I will be as bad again. Good cause the reg'ment has to know me
for the best soldier in ut. Better cause have I to know mesilf for the
worst man. I'm only fit to tache the new drafts what I'll niver learn
myself; an' I am sure, as tho' I heard ut, that the minut wan av these
pink-eyed recruities gets away from my "Mind ye now," an' "Listen to
this, Jim, bhoy,"--sure I am that the sergint houlds me up to him for
a warnin'. So I tache, as they say at musketry-instruction, by direct
and ricochet fire. Lord be good to me, for I have stud some throuble!'
'Lie down and go to sleep,' said I, not being able to comfort or
advise. 'You're the best man in the regiment, and, next to Ortheris,
the biggest fool. Lie down and wait till we're attacked. What force
will they turn out? Guns, think you?'
'Try that wid your lorrds an' ladies, twistin' an' turnin' the talk,
tho' you mint ut well. Ye cud say nothin' to help me, an' yet ye niver
knew what cause I had to be what I am.'
'Begin at the beginning and go on to the end,' I said royally. 'But
rake up the fire a bit first.'
I passed Ortheris's bayonet for a poker.
'That shows how little we know what we do,' said Mulvaney, putting it
aside. 'Fire takes all the heart out av the steel, an' the next time,
maybe, that our little man is fighting for his life his bradawl'll
break, an' so you'll ha' killed him, manin' no more than to kape
yourself warm. 'Tis a recruity's thrick that. Pass the clanin'-rod,
Sorr.'
I snuggled down abashed; and after an interval the voice of Mulvaney
began.
'Did I iver tell you how Dinah Shadd came to be wife av mine?'
I dissembled a burning anxiety that I had felt for some months--ever
since Dinah Shadd, the strong, the patient, and the infinitely tender,
had of her own good love and free will washed a shirt for me, moving
in a barren land where washing was not.
'I can't remember,' I said casually. 'Was it before or after you made
love to Annie Bragin, and got no satisfaction?'
The story of Annie Bragin is written in another place. It is one of
the many less respectable episodes in Mulvaney's chequered career.
'Before--before--long before, was that business av Annie Bragin an'
the corp'ril's ghost. Niver woman was the worse for me whin I had
married Dinah. There's a time for all things, an' I know how to kape
all things in place--barrin' the dhrink, that kapes me in my place wid
no hope av comin' to be aught else.'
'Begin at the beginning,' I insisted. 'Mrs. Mulvaney told me that you
married her when you were quartered in Krab Bokhar barracks.'
'An' the same is a cess-pit,' said Mulvaney piously. 'She spoke thrue,
did Dinah. 'Twas this way. Talkin' av that, have ye iver fallen in
love, Sorr?'
I preserved the silence of the damned. Mulvaney continued:--