As the party from the school drew nearer they could hear the occasional
crack of a whip and a loud order given in a rather highly pitched tone
to the beast, bidding him come out.
Then followed the snapping of twigs and a peculiarly dull grumbling
sound as if the elephant were muttering his objections to the orders of
his master, the bald-headed man, who still held his hat in one hand, his
yellow handkerchief in the other, and dabbed the big white
billiard-ball-like expanse as if he felt that it was very warm work.
Then there was a _crunch, crunch, crunch_, as if pippins were being
reduced to pulp, and more twigs were heard to snap.
"Let him hear the whip again, Jem," shouted Mr Ramball.
"Oh, he won't come for that, sir," growled the man addressed; but he
made the long cart-whip he carried crack loudly three times in obedience
to the order; and as the fresh party drew as near to the orchard as they
cared to go, after all had given a furtive glance round for a way to
escape, the low grumbling muttering grew louder; while as the animal
moved right into sight so did those who were watching him, and Slegge
and his companions saw Glyn and Singh approach.
There was another movement on the part of the elephant, whose towering
form came through the thickly growing orchard trees to one whose burden
was of a deep rich-red, and here it stood bowing its head up and down,
and slowly shaking it from side to side, while the trunk swung and
turned and turned and swung here and there, till its owner had selected
the fruit most pleasing to its little pig-like eye, when with
serpent-like motion it rose in the air, and the end curled round the
selected fruit, which was lowered and tucked out of sight on the
instant.
"Now, look here, my lads," cried the proprietor of the menagerie to his
men, "I can't have you all standing here gaping like a set of idiots as
if you had never seen the brute before. Go in round behind him with
your whips and drive him out."
There was a murmur of grumbles from the men, that seemed to be echoed by
the elephant, which went on swinging its head up and down as if it were
balanced on a spring. But no one stirred.
"Do you hear me?" cried the proprietor, his highly pitched voice growing
quite shrill. "Here, I shall have no end of damages to pay for what
he's doing. They'll be putting it in the lawyers' hands, and they'll be
charging me a shilling for every apple he eats.--Eh! what's that? Not
safe?"
"No; he's got one of his nasty fits o' temper on," said the driver of
the great van which had come to grief.
"Tchah! Nonsense! You are a coward, Jem."
"Mebbe I am," grumbled the man; "but, coward or no, he knocked me flat
over on my back, and once is quite enough for one day."
"Yah!" shouted his master. "You are ready enough to come on Saturday
night for your pay; but if I want anything a little extra done, where am
I?--Here, give me the whip." And he snatched it from the man's hand and
walked towards the great beast, half-hidden among the trees.
"Say, you boys," growled the driver, "if I was you I'd just be ready to
run. You've only just got to dodge him. Stop and make sure which way
he's going, and then get in among the trees."
"Yes, quick: in amongst the trees," cried Morris, and he set the
example.
"Nay," growled the man. "Not yet. Wait and see first which way he
means to go."
Morris set the example of running in another direction, followed by his
boys and by the voice of the driver.
"Why, that's worse," he cried. "That's about the way he'd go."
"Then which--what--why--Here, what are you two laughing at?" This to
Glyn, who was stamping about with delight.
"Oh, I couldn't help it, sir," cried the boy, and before he could say
more there was another loud crack of the whip as Ramball made his way
round behind his rebellious beast and shouted at him to "Come out of
that."
He had hardly uttered the words when there was a crashing and breaking
of wood as if the elephant were making its way quickly through the trees
in obedience to the command; and as the sounds ceased, the menagerie
proprietor came staggering out without his handkerchief or whip, to
stand in the middle of his men looking half-stunned and confused.
"Did he ketch you, sir?" said the driver, with a laugh of satisfaction
in his twinkling eyes.
"Brought down his trunk across my back," panted the proprietor. "My
word, he can hit hard!"
"Yes, sir; I know. Knocked me flat on my back, he did."
"Knocked me on my face," cried the proprietor angrily. "Look here," he
said, "is there any skin off my nose? I fell against a tree."
"Took a little bit of the bark off," grumbled the man, who did not seem
at all sympathetic. "Hadn't you better let him fill hisself full, sir,
and have a rest? He'll come easy, perhaps, then."
"Do you want me to stand still here and see a devouring elephant go on
eating till he ruins me? We must all join together and drive him out."
"But he'll drive us out, sir," said the man in a tone full of
remonstrance.
"Then we must try again. I am not going to be beaten by a beast like
that."
"Look here, my man," said Morris, "hadn't you better tie him up to one
of the trees and leave him till to-morrow? They do this sort of thing
abroad, I hear, by tying the elephant's legs or ankles to the trunks of
trees."
"What!" shouted Ramball. "Why, he'd take them all up by the roots and
go cantering through the town, doing no end of mischief, with them
hanging to his legs. Think I want to have to pay for the trees as well
as the apples?"
"Then--er--lasso him and lead him home."
"Lass which, sir?"
"Lasso him, my man, with ropes."
"Why, he ain't a wild ostrich of the desert, sir. Look at him!--Here,
one on yer run off and fetch the longest cart-rope. This 'ere gentleman
would like to have a try."
The boys were roaring with laughter by this time, the mathematical
master's parasites joining in as heartily as Glyn and Singh.
"Don't be rude, fellow," said Morris.
"Don't be rude?" cried Ramball, who was fuming with disappointment and
rage. "Rude yourself. If you give me much more of your sarce I'll set
the animile at you."
As this was proceeding, the elephant, whose taste for apples had been
satiated, came slowly out into the open, to stand bending and bowing his
massive head, which he swayed slowly from side to side and blinked and
flapped his ears, as he watched the assembly with his little reddish
eyes in a way which made the mathematical master grip Slegge by the arm.
"I am getting uneasy," he whispered, "about you boys. Don't run, but
follow me slowly back to the fence. Tell the other boys, and we will go
at once."
"Can't you coax him out, sir?" said Glyn, as he approached the
proprietor.
"No, I can't coax him out," cried Ramball snappishly; "but you mind your
own business, I know mine. I have had enough of you putting your spoons
in my porridge."
"Here, Mr Severn! Mr Singh!" shouted the mathematical master. "This
way! We are going back to the college." But he did not go far.
"But I want to see the elephant brought out, sir," replied Singh. "He
oughtn't to be left like this. He may do mischief."
"Oh, now you've begun, have you?" yelped the proprietor, whose voice in
his anger had gradually reached the soprano. "I suppose you would like
to have a try?"
"Oh, I don't want to interfere," replied Singh coolly. "Where do you
want the elephant to go?"
"Where do I want him to go? Why, home of course, before he does any
more mischief. I wish he was dead; that I do! And he shall be too.
Here, Jem, run back to Number One--here's the key--and bring my rifle
and the powder-flask and bullet-bag. I'm sick of him. He'll be killing
somebody before he's done--a beast!--Tigers is angels to him, sir," he
continued appealingly to Morris. "He's the wickedest elephant I ever
see, and I've spent more on him in damages than I paid for him at first;
but he's played his last prank, and if I can't drive him I can
shoot.--'Member that lion, my lads, as killed the gentleman's hoss?"
"Ay, ay, ay!" came in a low murmured growl.
"Got out, sir," continued the proprietor, waving one hand about
oratorically, and dabbing his bald head with his hand. "Here, some of
you, where's my yellow handkerchy? Oh, I know; I left it in that there
apple-wood, and I'd lay sixpence, he's picked it up and swallowed it
because it's yellow and he thinks it's the skin of a big orange. Got
out of his cage, he did, sir, that there lion--been fiddling all night,
I suppose, at the bolts and bars--and we followed him up to where he got
in the loose-box of a gentleman's stable; and there was the poor horse
down--a beauty he was--and that there lion--Arena his name was--lying on
him with his face flattened out and teeth buried in the poor hoss's
throat, so that when I got to the stable door there he was, all eyes and
whiskers, and growling at you like thunder. I knowed what my work was,
sir," continued the proprietor, addressing his conversation entirely to
Morris, "and you can ask my men, sir; they was there."
"Ay, ay, ay!" was growled.
"It warn't the time for showing no white feathers when a lion's got his
monkey up like that. I brought my gun with me--fine old flint-lock
rifle it is, and I got it now--and the next minute that there dead horse
had got a dead lion lying beside him. But I sold his skin to a gent for
a ten-pun note, to have it stuffed, and it's in his front hall now, near
Lungpuddle, in Lancashire.--Well, you, are you going to fetch that there
rifle, or am I to fetch it myself?" he yelled at his man.
"Oh, I wouldn't shoot him, guv'nor," growled the man.
"What's it got to do with you?" almost shrieked his master.
"Oh, I aren't going to lose nothing, guv'nor, only a bit of a chum.
He's knocked me about a bit, and tried to squeeze all the wind out of me
two or three times; but that was only his fun. I shouldn't like to see
him hurt."
"Then perhaps you'd like to go and fetch him out of that there urcherd?"
cried his master.
"He aren't in," said the man sturdily; "and if he were, no, thank you,
to-day. To-morrow morning perhaps I shouldn't mind; but I do say that
it'd be a burning shame to shoot the finest elephant there is in
England. The one at the Slogical Gardens in London is nothing to him,
and you know, master, that that's the truth."
"You fetch my rifle."
"I wouldn't talk quite so loud, guv'nor, if I was you," replied the man.
"Elephants is what they call 'telligent beasts, and you don't know but
what that there annymile is a-hearing every word you say and only
waiting till I'm gone to make a roosh, knock you down, and do his
war-dance all over you."
"Hah! The same as they trample the life out of the tigers at home."
Every one turned sharply upon the speaker, whose voice sounded clear and
ringing, as he stood there frowning angrily at the elephant's master.
"Bah! Stuff!" cried the man in his high-pitched voice. "I have read
anecdotes about animals, and I know all them stories by heart. They
look as if they could; but them beasts can't think, and the stories are
all lies.--You be off and fetch that rifle before I send somebody else;
and look here, Jem, if you don't obey my orders you take a fortnight's
notice to quit from next Saturday, when you are paid."
"Then you are going to shoot the elephant," cried Glyn, "because you
don't know how to manage him?"
"What!" half-shrieked the man. "Here, I say, where do you go to school?
Things are coming to a pretty pass when boys like you begin teaching
me, who've been nigh forty year in the wild-beast trade! What next?"
"Glyn Severn's right," said Singh sternly.
"Here's another of them!" cried the man, looking round from face to
face.
"Quite right," continued Singh. "Why, the poorest coolie in my father's
dominions would manage one of the noble beasts far better."
"Ho!" said Ramball sarcastically. "Then perhaps the biggest swell out
of my father's dominions would like to show me how to do it himself."
"I don't know that I can," said Singh quietly; "but I dare say the poor
beast would obey me if I tried."
"Oh, pray try, then, sir.--Only, look here, governor," continued the
man, addressing Morris, who was not far off, "I don't know whether he's
your son or your scholar--I wash my hands of it. I warn you; he's a
vicious beast, and I aren't a-going to pay no damages if my young
cock-a-hoop comes to grief."
Singh laughed a curious, disdainful laugh. Then he took a step in the
direction of the elephant, but Glyn caught him by the arm.
"Don't do that, Glyn," said the boy quietly. "I don't believe he would
hurt me. Come with me if you like. You know what he'll do if he's
going to be savage, and you run one way and I'll run the other."
This was in a low voice, unheard by any one but him for whom it was
intended; and the next moment, amidst a profound hush, the two boys
moved towards the elephant, who was swaying his head slowly from side to
side, and looking "ugly," as the man Jem afterwards said.
Then out of the silence, urged by a sense of duty, Morris cried in a
harsh, cracked, emotional voice, not in the least like his own, "Severn!
Prince! Come back! What are you going to do?"
His last words came as if he were half-choked, and then like the rest he
stood gazing, with a strange clammy moisture gathering in his hands and
upon his brow, for as the two boys drew near, the elephant suddenly
raised its head, threw up its trunk, and uttered a shrill trumpeting
sound.
As the defiant cry ceased, Singh stepped forward in advance of his
companion, and shouted a few words in Hindustani.
The elephant lowered its trunk and stood staring at the boy, as if
wonderingly, before coming slowly forward in its heavy, ponderous way,
crashing down the green herbage beneath the orchard trees, and its great
grey bulk parting the twigs of a tree that stood alone, and beneath
whose shade the monster stopped.
The boys stood still now, and Singh uttered a short, sharp order in
Hindustani once more.
Instantly, but in a slow, ponderous way, the great beast slowly
subsided, kneeling in the long grass, while Singh went up quite close,
with the animal watching him sharply the while, and laying out its trunk
partly towards him, so that when close up the boy planted one of his
feet in the wrinkling folds of the monstrous nose, caught hold of the
huge flapping ear beside him, climbed quickly up, and the next minute
was astride the tremendous neck and uttering another command in the
Indian tongue. The result was that the elephant raised its ears
slightly so that Singh could nestle his legs beneath; and as he settled
himself in position a merry smile spread about his lips.
"Come on, Glyn," he cried. "It's all right. Take my hand."
Glyn obeyed, and as if fully accustomed to the act, he rapidly climbed
up and settled himself behind his companion.
There was another sharp order, and the great beast slowly heaved himself
up, muttering thunder, and grumbling the while.
"Well, I _am_ blessed!" cried the proprietor. "You, Jem, did you ever
see such a game as this?"
The man addressed did not say a word, but gave one thigh a tremendous
slap, while the elephant stretched out his trunk towards them, took a
step or two in their direction, and uttered a squeal.
Singh shouted out a few words angrily, and the long serpent-like trunk
hung pendent once again, with the tip curled up inward so that it should
not brush the ground.
"Now then," cried Singh to the proprietor, "where do you want him to
go?"
"Right up into the show-field, squire," cried the man excitedly. "Think
you can take him?"
"Try," replied the boy with a scornful laugh; "but I ought to have an
_ankus_. But never mind, I can do it with words.--I say, Glyn," he
continued, speaking over his left shoulder, "we are going to ride in the
procession after all. If the Colonel knew, what would he say?"
"But--but--" cried Morris. "My dear boys, pray, pray come down! Think
of the consequences to yourselves--and what will be said to me."
"Oh, it's all right, Mr Morris," cried Glyn confidently; "we must take
the elephant now. Singh and I have ridden on elephants hundreds of
times, though we have never acted the parts of mahouts.--There, go on,
Mr What's-your-name, and Singh here will make him carry us back right
to where you wish."
There was no further opposition. In fact, it would have been a bold man
who would have dared to offer any; but the proprietor came as close as
he thought prudent, panting hard, as the huge beast swept along in its
stately stride.
"I beg your pardons, young gents--beg your pardons! Honour bright,
sirs, I didn't know. Oh, thank you; thank you kindly. You are saving
me a hundred pounds at least, and if you'd like a nice silver watch
apiece, or a monkey, or a parrot, only say the word, and you shall have
the pick of the collection. And look here, gentlemen, I'll give you
both perpetual passes to my show."
"Thank you! thank you!" Glyn shouted back. "We will come and see it;"
while Singh sat as statuesque as a native mahout, and an imaginative
Anglo-Indian would have forgotten his Eton costume and pictured him in
white cotton and muslin turban; while, as they neared the great
elm-trees where the gap showed grimly in the fence and the boughs hung
low, the amateur driver uttered a warning cry in Hindustani, with the
result that his great steed threw up its trunk, twined it round a
pendent branch that was in their way, snapped it off, and trampled it
under foot.