THE SHIKARI'S DISCOVERIES
Very early the next morning the cavalcade divided. The released Ghoorka
escorts returned to their regiments. Hoosanee, with good store of
provisions and three mounted soldiers, went off in the direction of the
pass, and Tom, accompanied by Bâl Narîn, turned off the main road to
seek a byway through the jungle, which was known to his guide as having
been used by criminals and fugitives, but which was little frequented
by travellers.
It is the fortunes of this last detachment that I propose to follow, my
chief authority being Bâl Narîn, whom I met a few years ago--an old man
then, but wonderfully clear as to intellect and memory--in his native
city, Katmandoo.
That it was a forlorn hope he had felt from the beginning, and nothing
but his extraordinary regard for the young rajah, who, as he expressed
it, 'held him by his eye,' would have induced him to go on with it.
I find that he and others looked upon Tom as perfectly mad at the
time. Many Orientals, however, and Bâl Narîn was fortunately amongst
their number, look upon madness as men of a later time have looked
upon inspiration. The man himself, they think, is helpless, and the
Divine speaks and acts through him. This, no doubt, in addition to his
peculiar fascinating power, was the cause of the faithfulness with
which Tom was followed more than once in his desperate enterprises.
Having been prevailed upon to go forward, Bâl Narîn acted as Subdul
Khan and Hoosanee and Ganesh, and even Gambier Singh, so far as
possible, had done. He gave himself heart and soul to the task before
him.
He spent the night before they started, not in resting, but in drawing
out a plan of the Terai, as it was known to him, and making various
imaginary routes to and fro, so that, in the future, he might be able
to say that every spot within a certain area--the limits of which he
did not think any fugitives from the Doab could have crossed--had been
thoroughly explored. These he proposed to traverse, penetrating by
the way into the solitary haunts of the half-savage Aswalias, whose
language he knew, and of whose friendship he was sure. For if such
travellers as the English girl and boy had passed through the more
unfrequented ways, they would most certainly have been heard of. Even
in the jungle and amongst half-naked savages, extraordinary pieces of
news, as Bâl Narîn knew from experience, are apt to spread.
The following morning he detailed his plan to Tom, who listened with
hope, and said that he would be guided by him entirely. That was a
terrible day's march. To cross from the main road to the bypath that
Bâl Narîn knew, it was necessary to plunge into the jungle, and the
coolies had here and there literally to hack a way through it for the
horses and camels. Comparatively open spaces, which Tom would have set
himself to canter over gaily, were carefully avoided by the Ghoorkas,
and Bâl Narîn told him that they were dangerous morasses, into which
he might have disappeared without hope of rescue. It was still worse
when they reached tracts where the vegetation was larger, for now giant
creepers flung down from the trees sinuous arms, with thorny leaves
that cut into the flesh of the coolies who hacked them away, and that,
when they touched the flanks of the horses, made the poor creatures
plunge and snort with pain. The closeness of the atmosphere, the dank
vegetable smells, and the effluvium from decaying growths, were almost
unendurable. There was danger, too, from the dwellers in the jungle.
A man-eating tiger, had one been abroad that evening, would have made
short work of these weary men. So, when the darkness began to gather,
they set torches flaring to frighten all evil things away, and far off
in the cavernous recesses of the jungle-kingdom they could hear the
dull roaring of the disappointed beasts of prey. That night they rested
as best they could, for Bâl Narîn refused to accept the responsibility
of going on. With the first break of day, Tom, who was quivering
through every nerve with fierce impatience, stirred them up. He found
the Ghoorka soldiers, who believed themselves lost beyond hope of
redemption, deeply depressed; but Bâl Narîn was in excellent spirits.
He informed Tom that he had discovered some of his own traces--the
marks he had set upon certain trees in one of his latest hunting-frays;
and he knew that his instinct, by which alone he had been moving on
the previous day, had not deceived him. He was making straight for the
point he wished to reach. This was encouraging, even to the soldiers.
They set forward again, and went on for many hours at a rate of
progress terribly slow to the young rajah's excited nerves. He was
on the strain of expectation. Over and over again he would pull Bâl
Narîn up short and make him listen to the mysterious whisperings and
flutterings that he had heard himself. But the experienced guide could
explain them all. He said, moreover, that it was impossible they could
be found here. Not even an Aswalia could have his dwelling in the midst
of such a region. And Tom tried to control himself. It was immeasurably
hard. All day long--and never so much as now--he was haunted by a
sick dread of that failure at the very moment of what might, with a
little foresight, have been transcendent success which makes uncertain
enterprises so nerve-harrowing. If she were near him and he passed her
by--if, from her hiding-place, she could hear the very tramp of their
horses, and, thinking they were enemies, plunge more deeply into the
jungle!
For so it might be. There was no argument of Bâl Narîn, to whom he
poured out his fears, which could persuade him that he was cherishing a
phantom fear. Then sometimes, as I have heard, it would come over him
with sharp throbbing of pain that he was wrong, and that these were
right. It was madness--nay, it was the very insanity of folly--to
imagine that, wandering in this haphazard way without chart or compass,
he would ever succeed in finding her. She was dead! dead! dead! And
if he were near her, or if he were far away, what could it matter?
The dead hold no commune with the living. By day and by night the
awful word rang in his ears. Bâl Narîn heard him repeating it. Dead!
Grace was dead--all her loveliness and sweetness--all her heroism and
patience--with the love and passion and tenderness unutterable that
she had inspired in the hearts of others--gone!--lost to the earth for
ever and ever and ever! There were moments in those awful days when his
soul went out beyond the limits of its own despair, and when abysses of
sorrow--fathomless as the graves in which our beloved be buried--would
seem to open out before his feet. Mad! Was he mad? No, he would say to
himself: it was the world--dull of eye and ear--insensible--suffering
itself to be shrouded with the veil of spiritual blindness which nature
throws round her human children, as she woos them softly to fulfil her
behests--the world was mad--he was sane. To him, in his anguish, the
anguish of the universe had been revealed--a pandemonium of woe that
made him sicken and tremble and cry out for Death, even the Death of
eternity, to release him from the torturing memory.
But, miserable as his thoughts were, they did not delay his steps.
Guided by Bâl Narîn he plodded on quietly hour after hour.
On the evening of the second day, they emerged from the jungle, and,
to the great contentment of the whole party, came to opener ground. On
the banks of a sluggish stream, whose course they had been following
for some time, the weeds and shrub had been cleared away to give place
to scanty herbage and lush green paddy-fields. An Aswalia village--a
melancholy little group of tiny bark huts--had been planted in the
clearing. It was a landmark for which Bâl Narîn had been looking. As
soon as he caught sight of it, he made his party halt, and cantered on
to make inquiries, and to prepare the villagers, who were exceedingly
jealous of their rights, for the passage of strangers.
He was away long enough to make Tom impatient; but when he returned,
his radiant face showed that he brought good news with him.
'Are they in the village?' cried Tom, leaping at once to the conclusion
which, a moment before, had seemed too rapturous, even for a vision.
'No,' said Bâl Narîn, drawing rein. 'But they have been heard of.'
'Where? where? Let us set off at once! You are our saviour, our good
genius,' cried Tom.
'The Sahib must be pleased to have patience still,' said Bâl Narîn,
with dignity. 'I will tell him what I have heard, and then he shall
decide what we are to do. Two days ago----'
'Two days--only two days--you are sure----'
'I am telling my tale to the Sahib as it was told to me. Two days ago
a woman and a little girl, who said that they were servants of the
English, came into the village. A holy man was with them. He was from
the Doab, he said. He had met the woman flying from murderers, and he
had vowed to carry her safely across the mountains with her child. They
were afraid to go by the main road, and they were seeking the pass
known as the "robbers' road." The headman is quiet and good when he
sees no chance of plunder. I know him well. There was nothing about the
travellers to tempt him, and perhaps he would have been afraid to hurt
the holy man. They were given shelter and provisions, for which the
woman and child gave the bangles of silver that they still wore. The
headman pitied them, and he would not take all. He directed them to the
next village, let them rest for a night, and sent them on. I asked how
they were travelling, and he said they had a bullock-cart.'
'But how do you know----' began Tom.
'Patience, Sahib! I am coming to that. The child, they tell me, wore a
little embroidered cap under her muslin veil. The cap was of a pretty
red colour, and one of the women in the village took a fancy to it. She
came behind the child and lifted it off. Then, Sahib, all who stood
round were speechless with surprise, for the child gave a cry, and the
woman caught it to her arms, and long yellow curls fell down about its
shoulders. What does the Sahib say to that?'
'It was Kit,' said Tom. 'But go on, for heaven's sake. Did the
villagers show them any unkindness?'
'No, Sahib, none. I think, from what I hear, that they were more
friendly than before. Perhaps they thought they would gain a reward
by-and-by. The headman begged them to remain, offering to keep them
till the war was over. But the woman would not hear of it. She said,
for the child's sake, she must go on to the mountains. But, Sahib, they
could not travel fast, and I know the way they have gone----'
'You think it a miracle that they should have lived so long, Bâl Narîn?'
'Sahib, it is the strangest thing I have ever heard. The gods have
cared for their own.'
'And since they have got so far, am I mad in thinking they may go
farther?'
'Who said that his Excellency was mad?'
'No one said so. I have read it in your eyes, Billy. But we are both
sane now. Yes--it is no question of madness. Two days. What could they
have done in that time? They could not travel day and night as we will.'
'If we travel at night we may miss them, Sahib.'
'True; I had not thought of that. But, come on now. There are two good
hours of light before us. Then you shall rest, and I will watch. Have
you been able to get any fresh provisions?'
'They are bringing in bags of dal and rice, which will last us for six
more days. By that time we shall have reached the further boundaries of
the Terai.'
And so they went on once more.
I try to imagine it all sometimes, but I confess I find it hard,
although Bâl Narîn and the rajah himself, in the moments of confidence
that come to him on rare occasions, have again and again given me
narratives of their experiences.
They went on for two more days. This part of the jungle was haunted by
tigers. At night, when they made up their camp-fires, they could hear
them howling about the sluggish streams that crept through the jungle.
There were serpents, too. Tom slew one monster that reared itself up in
his path by striking its head with the butt-end of his musket. But to
him the most appalling feature of all this march was the swooping down
of the foul birds of prey that came from their eyrie in the hills in
search of such meat as the jungle would always yield. The creatures had
not the least fear; they came so near, sometimes, that he could have
struck at them with his cane. It seemed as if they were waiting for the
death that might presently fall upon their victims.
He shot down two of these mighty birds in one day, glorying over them
as he had gloried over the sepoys whom he had destroyed.
His mind, in the meantime, was oscillating between hope and despair.
Every hour increased his impatience, and added to his horror and
uncertainty. It was true that, only a few days before, they had been
seen living, and still, so far as he could gather, in good health;
but would not the difficulties and dangers of this further journey,
which taxed their own resources to the utmost, break these tender
wanderers down? And to fail at the last moment, when help was actually
within reach--how infinitely pitiful it would be! He had one comfort,
meanwhile--Bâl Narîn was with him. The news heard at the Aswalia
village had completely won over the wily Ghoorka guide. Hitherto he had
gone on with the enterprise to indulge his employer, and humour the mad
caprice of an Englishman who had cast his spell over him. While the
European rajah 'held him with his eye,' he could not refuse to follow
him. Now, first, he began to believe in a happy issue. He would not say
much about it, for he was fearful, if he gave an encouragement which
turned out to be unfounded, the young rajah would sicken and die of
despair; but Tom, who could read the minds of his people, knew that he
was going forward with renewed energy.
It was on the second day after they left the village behind them that
Bâl Narîn's experienced eye began to detect marks which led him to
believe that they were actually, at last, on the fugitives' track.
They were in the path known in this region as the robbers' road--a
path which, though distinct enough to the experienced, was difficult
to pass over, being much choked with vegetation. Kutcha-grass, growing
to an immense height, made dense walls on either side of the road.
They were in their usual marching order--the coolies in front beating
down obstructions, Tom riding behind them, and peering anxiously into
the recesses of the jungle, behind him the Ghoorka soldiers mounted on
camels, and Bâl Narîn bringing up the rear.
The guide was on foot, and studying the ground. He saw something
shining, and, stooping to pick it up, found that it was a silver
bead such as the women of these parts often wear in their bangles.
He has told me that the excitement caused by this apparently simple
discovery was so great that he could scarcely refrain from shouting
it aloud. But, in the next moment, he realised that it might not
mean anything--that, in any case, it would be unwise to place too
much reliance upon it. This was the robbers' road, and it was more
than possible that the bit of silver might have dropped from one of
their bags of spoil. He went on examining the ground, and carefully
scrutinising the walls of kutcha-grass. Presently he made another
discovery; but it was so small a thing that no eyes save those of
an experienced hunter of beasts and men, like Bâl Narîn, could have
discerned it. Low down, where a weed, whose fleshy leaves are armed
with spiked thorns, grew among the grass, he thought he saw a single
white thread. Eagerly he swooped upon it, and picked it up, and now he
could scarcely restrain his excitement, for the thread told the same
tale as the bead. A muslin saree, such as those worn by women of the
plains, had certainly swept those thorny weeds. It was probable that
the bead had been dropped by the woman who wore the muslin veil. Taking
them together, there could be little doubt that women dressed in the
Indian fashion had passed this way. But, if so, there would be other
signs that he could read--signs that might, perhaps, lead him straight
to their hiding-place.
So, with bent head and beating heart, he proceeded on his search.
About a hundred yards further on he picked up another bead, which
matched the first. He judged from its position--it was poised, as it
were, on a little blade of grass, and the least agitation of the air
would have dislodged it--that it had been only recently dropped.
Meanwhile, these narrow investigations had seriously delayed his
progress. When he made this last discovery, he looked up and found
himself alone. Those he was leading had gone on in front of him. The
sound of the whistle, with which the rajah was accustomed to keep his
little party together, came ringing down the lane at this moment. Bâl
Narîn answered it with a peculiar call of his own, and a few instants
later he heard the hoofs of his chief's horse, as Tom cantered back to
find him.
'Rajah Sahib!' he cried out, waving him back. 'I cannot come on yet.
You must have patience with me, and I may bring you news.'
'News here! You are dreaming, Billy,' answered Tom very sadly. 'Who
could bring us news in this wilderness?'
'That is my concern, master. Leave me, I entreat of you, and, as you
cannot go forward alone, let the men rest and eat! I will join you
by-and-by.'
Mournfully the rajah turned his horse's head. This, of course, was one
of Bâl Narîn's whims; but it would have to be indulged, for he was
completely in his hands.
It was now late in the afternoon, and the men, who had been riding hard
all day, were glad of rest and food. Languidly, for the air of these
pestilential regions has a numbing effect upon the energies of men, the
soldiers unsaddled and lighted a fire, round which they crouched, while
one of their number cooked the dal and chupatties that served them for
their meal. Tom dismounted, tethered his horse to a stake which his men
had driven into the ground, and, feeling it unwise to join Bâl Narîn,
who never liked to be disturbed when he was working out a fresh idea,
strolled about aimlessly. The camels and bullock-carts, carrying their
larger supplies, were coming up behind them, so he could not take his
own meal; but, in fact, he did not want to eat. The excitement that had
been working within him since Bâl Narîn sent him away made him feel
that food would choke him.
His restlessness, meanwhile, was terrible. He was possessed with those
miserable, impossible longings which come to most of us at the great
crises of our lives--when our senses and the faculties bestowed upon us
by Heaven seem too little for our need; when we crave madly for some
indefinite power--some loosening of the bonds of our humanity--some
super-sensuous divine knowledge and strength to carry us, at one leap,
to the bourne where our restless hearts would be. Secrets, deep as
the grave, and high as the infinite azure, are weighing down upon
our little lives. In the level light of every-day life we forget
them. They circle about us, and we see them not. It is when the light
departs--when the little life with its little interests becomes
tragic, that they come--this grey host of shadows--and mock us with
our impotence. Sometimes we strike out blindly, as children strike at
tables. We must know; we will know. It cannot be that we have reached
thus far, and that never, through all the infinite ages that must be,
we can reach any farther. That would be hideous--revolting to our moral
sense. 'Give us light, give us light!' we cry out to the Power which,
as God, or Nature, or blind Force, holds our destinies in its hand.
'Give us light, or kill us!' And only the awful silence answers us,
'Neither light nor death, poor soul; only a blind going forward to an
unknown goal!'
Such was Tom's condition that evening. As he looked round on this
desolate land, given up to monstrous growths and fierce animals,
with his hopes dwindling every moment, he felt a terror of his own
littleness that almost maddened him. Devoured by impatience, he could
do nothing. If he moved a few yards from his party he would be lost,
and without Bâl Narîn he would be more helpless and hopeless than ever.
The necessities of his humanity; the grossness and opacity of his
senses; his weakness and his ignorance, were such that, if the dear
prize for which he would willingly have laid down his life were in
his grasp, he might not be able to seize it. Many men in his position
would have cried out to their God. He could not. What he did actually
believe was not very clear, even to himself, at that time. The strange
mysticism, so fascinating to a high intelligence, that animates some
of the older Oriental philosophies had become curiously blended in his
mind with the cut-and-dried orthodoxy in which he had been brought up.
But he knew what he did not believe, and special providences, miracles
worked benevolently for favoured mortals, were amongst the things that
he had renounced long ago.
So, with neither hope nor help, only a vague determination to go on
until he died, he went to and fro, like a restless wild creature. When
he was out of his men's sight he would clench his fists and strike out
at an imaginary foe, and mutter fiercely; when he returned to them he
would be as they had always seen him--quiet and stern.
An hour passed by. A sickly evening dimness was creeping over the
desolate land; he fancied he could hear the animal-world of the jungle
rising up to meet the night, and his impatience grew to such a pitch
that he could scarcely restrain himself. Presently the camels and
bullock-carts came up. He asked the coolies if they had met Bâl Narîn.
They shook their heads. He had not certainly been seen on the road.
This made the young rajah exceedingly uneasy; but the Ghoorkas, whom
he consulted, did not share in his fear. Bâl Narîn, they said, knew
what he was about. Most likely he did not care to go any farther that
night, and he had laid down where he was, so as not to be ordered on.
If he did not join them in the evening, they would certainly see him at
daybreak. With this Tom tried to be satisfied, for it was quite evident
that he could do nothing. The men would not stir without Bâl Narîn, and
for him to do so alone would be as useless as it was dangerous.
They made him up his usual evening meal, a mess of rice and fried
vegetables; but he could not eat a morsel. Mounting his horse, he rode
slowly back to the point where he had seen Bâl Narîn last. Here he
whistled, cried out, tried to ride through the kutcha-grass; but was
driven back by the venomous tribes of insects that had come out with
the dying down of the day; then realising that these spasmodic efforts
were perfectly useless, he returned to the road, and paced back sadly
and slowly, seeing no signs of Bâl Narîn anywhere.
The camp was illuminated by gleaming brands set high on poles, and the
little cooking-fires were smouldering in its midst. It made a spot
of glowing red in the spectral darkness; where everything but it was
being slowly obliterated. Tom would have preferred the darkness; but
he knew very well that in the jungle he was surrounded with nameless
dangers. If he did not wish to give his body for a meal to the beasts
of prey that were ranging it, he must keep in the neighbourhood of his
companions. So, trying to still his fiery impatience, he lay down where
they had spread his canvas sheets, drew a gauze net over his face, and
lighted a pastile to keep the cloud of insects at a distance.
I have spoken of Tom's gift of sleeping at will. Even in this terrible
emergency it did not desert him. He had learned a few lessons, however,
in his life of adventure, and it would not have been so easy now as on
his first expedition to steal a march upon him.
The sleep, light and brief as it was, refreshed and invigorated him.
When, having indulged in it for about two hours, he sprang up and
looked round, he found that the feverish madness of excitement which,
if given place to, would have unfitted him for work that needed
decision and readiness, had gone. His brain was clear, and his limbs
had lost their languor.
In the encampment everything was as it had been. The fires were
smouldering and the torches flamed. Two Ghoorkas were on guard. The
rest slept, while the camel-drivers, syces, and coolies sat doubled up
together, their knees touching their noses, near the beasts of burden
which were tethered in the centre of the encampment.
It was dead night; but the darkness was not such as it had been
earlier, for a three-quarter moon had come up from her bed of snows
behind awful Himâla and was shedding over the desolate land a pale
light, which, defective as it was, Tom hailed with pleasure.
'You have often been my friend, Lady Moon,' he said, as he gazed up
into the vapour-veiled sky, 'and though you don't shine as you do in
the plains, I think you will give me light enough to see what I am
doing.'
One of the Ghoorka sentinels, in the meantime, seeing him on his feet,
had approached him. 'Does the Rajah Sahib require anything?' he asked.
'I want to know if Bâl Narîn has been seen,' said Tom.
'Bâl Narîn has not come back to camp,' answered the man.
'Then, of course, he has not been seen,' said Tom impatiently. 'Have
you heard anything?'
'We have heard nothing but the beasts of the jungle. Purtab killed a
serpent. It would have stung him. The gods grant that it may not bring
misfortune!'
'The gods have brought Purtab good fortune, my friend. His life is
better than a snake's--to himself at least.'
'That is as it may be, Sahib,' said the man enigmatically.
'Settle it your own way, but, in the meantime, listen to me! I don't
like this lengthened absence of Bâl Narîn's, and I fear some evil has
come to him. I will go and look round.'
'If you go far, Sahib, you will never return. This is the devil's
hunting-ground. Men in company they spare. Solitary men they destroy.'
'Then how about Bâl Narîn?'
'Even the devil will not slay his own offspring,' said the man with a
chuckle. 'Bâl Narîn is safe, wherever he goes.'
'Is he?' said Tom laughing. 'I wish I had such distinguished ancestry;
however, I am not afraid. I have my revolver and my sword. If I
whistle, try and find me.'
'Right, Sahib!' said the man, falling back.
END OF THE SECOND VOLUME.