THE PHOTOGRAPH
While Baram Singh was clearing the table Ballantyne lifted the box of
cheroots from the top of the bureau and held it out to Thresk.
"Will you smoke?"
Thresk, however, though he smoked had not during his stay in India
acquired the taste for the cheroot; and it interested him in later times
to reflect how largely he owed his entanglement in the tragic events
which were to follow to that accidental distaste. For conscious of it he
had brought his pipe with him, and he now fetched it out of his pocket.
"This, if I may," he said.
"Of course."
Thresk filled his pipe and lighted it, Ballantyne for his part lit a
cheroot and replaced the box upon the top, close to a heavy
riding-crop with a bone handle, which Thresk happened now to notice
for the first time.
"Be quick!" he cried impatiently to Baram Singh, and seated himself in
the swing-chair in front of the bureau, turning it so as not to have his
back to Thresk at the table. Baram Singh hurriedly finished his work and
left the marquee by the passage leading to the kitchen. Ballantyne waited
with his eyes upon that passage until the grass-mat screen had ceased to
move. Then taking a bunch of keys from his pocket he stooped under the
open writing-flap of the bureau and unlocked the lowest of the three
drawers. From this drawer he lifted a scarlet despatch-box, and was just
going to bring it to the table when Baram Singh silently appeared once
more. At once Ballantyne dropped the box on the floor, covering it as
well as he could with his legs.
"What the devil do you want?" he cried, speaking of course in Hindustani,
and with a violence which seemed to be half made up of anger and half of
fear. Baram Singh replied that he had brought an ash-tray for the Sahib,
and he placed it on the round table by Thresk's side.
"Well, get out and don't come back until you are called," cried
Ballantyne roughly, and in evident relief as Baram Singh once more
retired he took a long draught from a fresh tumbler of whisky-and-soda
which stood on the flap of the bureau beside him. He then stooped once
more to lift the red despatch-box from the floor, but to Thresk's
amazement in the very act of stooping he stopped. He remained with his
hands open to seize the box and his body bent over his knees, quite
motionless. His mouth was open, his eyes staring, and upon his face such
a look of sheer terror was stamped as Thresk could never find words to
describe. For the first moment he imagined that the man had had a stroke.
His habits, his heavy build all pointed that way. The act of stooping
would quite naturally be the breaking pressure upon that overcharged
brain. But before Thresk had risen to make sure Ballantyne moved an arm.
He moved it upwards without changing his attitude in any other way, or
even the direction of his eyes, and he groped along the flap of the
bureau very cautiously and secretly and up again to the top ledge. All
the while his eyes were staring intently, but with the intentness of
extreme fear, not at the despatch-box but at the space of carpet--a
couple of feet at the most--between the despatch-box and the tent-wall.
His fingers felt along the ledge of the bureau and closed with a silent
grip upon the handle of the riding-crop. Thresk jumped to the natural
conclusion: a snake had crept in under the tent-wall and Ballantyne dared
not move lest the snake should strike. Neither did he dare to move
himself. Ballantyne was clearly within reach of its fangs. But he looked
and--there was nothing. The light was not good certainly, and down by the
tent-wall there close to the floor it was shadowy and dim. But Thresk's
eyes were keen. The space between the despatch-box and the wall was
empty. Nothing crawled there, nothing was coiled.
Thresk looked at Ballantyne with amazement; and as he looked Ballantyne
sprang from his chair with a scream of terror--the scream of a
panic-stricken child. He sprang with an agility which Thresk would never
have believed possible in a man of so gross a build. He leapt into the
air and with his crop he struck savagely once, twice and thrice at the
floor between the wall and the box. Then he turned to Thresk with every
muscle working in his face.
"Did you see?" he cried. "Did you see?"
"What? There was nothing to see!"
"Nothing!" screamed Ballantyne. He picked up the box and placed it on the
table, thrusting it under Thresk's hand. "Hold that! Don't let go! Stay
here and don't let go," he said, and running up the tent raised his voice
to a shout.
"Baram Singh!" and lifting the tent-door he called to others of his
servants by name. Without waiting for them he ran out himself and in a
second Thresk heard him cursing thickly and calling in panic-stricken
tones just close to that point of the wall against which the bureau
stood. The camp woke to clamour.
Thresk stood by the table gripping the handle of the despatch-box as he
had been bidden to do. The tent-door was left open. He could see lights
flashing, he heard Ballantyne shouting orders, and his voice dwindled and
grew loud as he moved from spot to spot in the encampment. And in the
midst of the noise the white frightened face of Stella Ballantyne
appeared at the opening of her corridor.
"What has happened?" she asked in a whisper. "Oh, I was afraid that
you and he had quarrelled," and she stood with her hand pressed over
her heart.
"No, no indeed," Thresk replied, and Captain Ballantyne stumbled back
into the tent. His face was livid, and yet the sweat stood upon his
forehead. Stella Ballantyne drew back, but Ballantyne saw her as she
moved and drove her to her own quarters.
"I have a private message for Mr. Thresk's ears," he said, and when she
had gone he took out his handkerchief and wiped his forehead.
"Now you must help me," he said in a low voice. But his voice shook and
his eyes strayed again to the ground by the wall of the tent.
"It was just there the arm came through," he said. "Yes, just there," and
he pointed a trembling finger.
"Arm?" cried Thresk. "What are you talking about?"
Ballantyne looked away from the wall to Thresk, his eyes incredulous.
"But you saw!" he insisted, leaning forward over the table.
"What?"
"An arm, a hand thrust in under the tent there, along the ground reaching
out for my box."
"No. There was nothing to see."
"A lean brown arm, I tell you, a hand thin and delicate as a woman's."
"No. You are dreaming," exclaimed Thresk; but dreaming was a euphemism
for the word he meant.
"Dreaming!" repeated Ballantyne with a harsh laugh. "Good God! I wish I
was. Come. Sit down here! We have not too much time." He seated himself
opposite to Thresk and drew the despatch-box towards him. He had regained
enough mastery over himself now to be able to speak in a level voice. No
doubt too his fright had sobered him. But it had him still in its grip,
for when he opened the despatch-box his hand so shook that he could
hardly insert the key in the lock. It was done at last however, and
feeling beneath the loose papers on the surface he drew out from the very
bottom a large sealed envelope. He examined the seals to make sure they
had not been tampered with. Then he tore open the envelope and took out a
photograph, somewhat larger than cabinet size.
"You have heard of Bahadur Salak?" he said.
Thresk started.
"The affair at Umballa, the riots at Benares, the murder in Madras?"
"Exactly."
Ballantyne pushed the photograph into Thresk's hand.
"That's the fellow--the middle one of the group."
Thresk held up the photograph to the light. It represented a group of
nine Hindus seated upon chairs in a garden and arranged in a row facing
the camera. Thresk looked at, the central figure with a keen and
professional interest. Salak was a notorious figure in the Indian
politics of the day--the politics of the subterranean kind. For some
years he had preached and practised sedition with so much subtlety and
skill that though all men were aware that his hand worked the strings of
disorder there was never any convicting evidence against him. In all the
three cases which Thresk had quoted and in many others less well-known
those responsible for order were sure that he had devised the crime,
chosen the moment for its commission and given the order. But up till a
month ago he had slipped through the meshes. A month ago, however, he had
made his mistake.
"Yes. It's a clever face," said Thresk.
Ballantyne nodded his head.
"He's a Mahratta Brahmin from Poona. They are the fellows for brains, and
Salak's about the cleverest of them."
Thresk looked again at the photograph.
"I see the picture was taken at Poona."
"Yes, and isn't it an extraordinary thing!" cried Ballantyne, his face
flashing suddenly into interest and enjoyment. The enthusiasm of the
administrator in his work got the better of his fear now, just as a
little earlier it had got the better of his drunkenness. Thresk was
looking now into the face of a quite different man, the man of the
intimate knowledge and the high ability for whom fine rewards were
prophesied in Bombay. "The very cleverest of them can't resist the
temptation of being photographed in group. Crime after crime has been
brought home to the Indian criminal both here and in London because they
will sit in garden-chairs and let a man take their portraits. Nothing
will stop them. They won't learn. They are like the ladies of the light
opera stage. Well, let 'em go on I say. Here's an instance."
"Is it?" asked Thresk. "Surely that photograph was taken a long
time ago."
"Nine years. But he was at the same game. You have got the proof in your
hands. There's a group of nine men--Salak and his eight friends. Well,
of his eight friends every man jack is now doing time for burglary, in
some cases with violence--that second ruffian, for instance, he's in for
life--in some cases without, but in each case the crime was burglary.
And why? Because Salak in the centre there set them on to it. Because
Salak nine years ago wasn't the big swell he is now. Because Salak
wanted money to start his intrigues. That's the way he got
it--burglaries all round Bombay."
"I see," said Thresk. "Salak's in prison now?"
"He's in prison in Calcutta, yes. But he's awaiting his trial. He's not
convicted yet."
"Exactly," Thresk answered. "This photograph is a valuable thing to have
just now."
Ballantyne threw up his arms in despair at the obtuseness of his
companion.
"Valuable!" he cried in derision. "Valuable!" and he leaned forward on
his elbows and began to talk to Thresk with an ironic gentleness as if he
were a child.
"You don't quite understand me, do you? But a little effort and all will
be plain."
He got no farther however upon this line of attack, for Thresk
interrupted him sharply.
"Here! Say what you have got to say if you want me to help you. Oh, you
needn't scowl! You are not going to bait me for your amusement. I am not
your wife." And Ballantyne after a vain effort to stare Thresk down
changed to a more cordial tone.
"Well, you say it's a valuable thing to have just now. I say it's an
infernally dangerous thing. On the one side there's Salak the great
national leader, Salak the deliverer, Salak professing from his prison in
Calcutta that he has never used any but the most legitimate
constitutional means to forward his propaganda. And here on the other is
Salak in his garden-chair amongst the burglars. Not a good thing to
possess--this photograph, Mr. Thresk. Especially because it's the only
one in existence and the negative has been destroyed. So Salak's friends
are naturally anxious to get it back."
"Do they know you have it?" Thresk asked.
"Of course they do. You had proof that they knew five minutes ago when
that brown arm wriggled in under the tent-wall."
Ballantyne's fear returned upon him as he spoke. He sat shivering; his
eyes wandered furtively from corner to corner of the great tent and came
always back as though drawn by a serpent to the floor by the wall of the
tent. Thresk shrugged his shoulders. To dispute with Ballantyne once more
upon his delusion would be the merest waste of time. He took up the
photograph again.
"How do you come to possess it?" he asked. If he was to serve his host in
the way he suspected he would be asked to, he must know its history.
"I was agent in a state not far from Poona before I came here."
Thresk agreed.
"I know. Bakuta."
"Oh?" said Ballantyne with a sharp look. "How did you know that?"
He was always in alarm lest somewhere in the world gossip was whispering
his secret.
"A Mrs. Carruthers at Bombay."
"Did she tell you anything else?"
"Yes. She told me that you were a great man."
Ballantyne grinned suddenly.
"Isn't she a fool?" Then the grin left his face. "But how did you come to
discuss me with her at all?"
That was a question which Thresk had not the slightest intention to
answer. He evaded it altogether.
"Wasn't it natural since I was going to Chitipur?" he asked, and
Ballantyne was appeased.
"Well, the Rajah of Bakutu had that photograph and he gave it to me when
I left the State. He came down to the station to see me off. He was too
near Poona to be comfortable with that in his pocket. He gave it to me on
the platform in full view, the damned coward. He wanted to show that he
had given it to me. He said that I should be safe with it in Chitipur."
"Chitipur's a long way from Poona," Thresk agreed.
"But don't you see, this trial that's coming along in Calcutta makes all
the difference. It's known I have got it. It's not safe here now and no
more am I so long as I've got it."
One question had been puzzling Thresk ever since he had seen the look of
terror reappear in Ballantyne's face. It was clear that he lived in a
very real fear. He believed that he was watched, and he believed that he
was in danger; and very probably he actually was. There had, to be sure,
been no attempt that night to rob him of it as he imagined. But none the
less Salak and his friends could not like the prospect of the production
of that photograph in Calcutta, and would hardly be scrupulous what means
they took to prevent it. Then why had not Ballantyne destroyed it?
Thresk asked the question and was fairly startled by the answer. For it
presented to him in the most unexpected manner another and a new side of
the strange and complex character of Stephen Ballantyne.
"Yes, why don't I destroy it?" Ballantyne repeated. "I ask myself that,"
and he took the photograph out of Thresk's hands and sat in a sort of
muse, staring at it. Then he turned it over and took the edge between his
forefinger and his thumb, hesitating whether he would not even at this
moment tear it into strips and have done with it. But in the end he cast
it upon the table as he had done many a time before and cried in a voice
of violence:
"No, I can't. That's to own these fellows my masters and I won't. By God
I won't! I may be every kind of brute, but I have been bred up in this
service. For twenty years I have lived in it and by it. And the service
is too strong for me. No, I can't destroy that photograph. There's the
truth. I should hate myself to my dying day if I did."
He rose abruptly as if half ashamed of his outburst and crossing to his
bureau lighted another cheroot.
"Then what do you want me to do with it?" asked Thresk.
"I want you to take it away."
Ballantyne was taking a casuistical way of satisfying his conscience, and
he was aware of it. He would not destroy the portrait--no! But he
wouldn't keep it either. "You are going straight back to England," he
said. "Take it with you. When you get home you can hand it to one of the
big-wigs at the India Office, and he'll put it in a pigeon-hole, and some
day an old charwoman cleaning the office will find it, and she'll take it
home to her grandchildren to play with and one of them'll drop it on the
fire, and there'll be an end of it."
"Yes," replied Thresk slowly. "But if I do that, it won't be useful at
Calcutta, will it?"
"Oh," said Ballantyne with a sneer. "You've got a conscience too, eh?
Well, I'll tell you. I don't think that photograph will be needed at
Calcutta."
"Are you sure of that?"
"Yes. Salak's friends don't know it, but I do."
Thresk sat still in doubt. Was Ballantyne speaking the truth or did he
speak in fear? He was still standing by the bureau looking down upon
Thresk and behind him, so that Thresk had not the expression of his face
to help him to decide. But he did not turn in his chair to look. For as
he sat there it dawned upon him that the photograph was the very thing
which he himself needed. The scheme which had been growing in his mind
all through this evening, which had begun to grow from the very moment
when he had entered the tent, was now complete in every detail except
one. He wanted an excuse, a good excuse which should explain why he
missed his boat, and here it was on the table in front of him. Almost he
had refused it! Now it seemed to him a Godsend.
"I'll take it," he cried, and Baram Singh silently appeared at the outer
doorway of the tent.
"Huzoor," he said. "Railgharri hai."
Ballantyne turned to Thresk.
"Your train is signalled," and as Thresk started up he reassured him.
"There's no hurry. I have sent word that it is not to start without you."
And while Baram Singh still stood waiting for orders in the doorway of
the tent Ballantyne walked round the table, took up the portrait very
deliberately and handed it to Thresk.
"Thank you," he said. "Button it in your coat pocket."
He waited while Thresk obeyed.
"Thus," said Thresk with a laugh, "did the Rajah of Bakutu," and
Ballantyne replied with a grin.
"Thank you for mentioning that name." He turned to Baram Singh. "The
camel, quick!"
Baram Singh went out to the enclosure within the little village of tents
and Thresk asked curiously:
"Do you distrust him?"
Ballantyne looked steadily at his visitor and said:
"I don't answer such questions. But I'll tell you something. If that man
were dying he would ask for leave. And if he would ask for leave because
he would not die with my scarlet livery on his back. Are you answered?"
"Yes," said Thresk.
"Very well." And with a brisk change of tone Ballantyne added: "I'll see
that your camel is ready." He called aloud to his wife: "Stella! Stella!
Mr. Thresk is going," and he went out through the doorway into the
moonlight.