A BORDER OUTPOST
"What a beautiful spot!" thought Frank as he gazed entranced at the
scenery. "I've never seen anything like it. It looks like Heaven after
the ugliness of Rohar. And how delightfully cool it is, too, up in the
mountains! Well, with this climate and good shooting in the forest below
life won't be as dreadful as I thought. I wish poor Violet were here out
of the heat and glare. How she'd love all this beauty, these trees,
these gardens, the glorious mountains!"
He sighed as he thought of the woman who was so far away.
"_Huzoor_, that is the Mess" broke in the voice of his _mahout_, as he
pointed to a long, red-tiled building half-hidden among the trees a few
hundred feet above them. To reach it they had to pass a large,
well-built stone bungalow, two-storied, unlike all the others and
standing in a lovely garden glowing with the vivid hues of the flowers,
the flaming red of huge bushes of bougainvillea and poinsettia. Frank,
glancing towards it, was about to ask the _mahout_ who lived in it when
he started in horror and cried to the man:
"Stop! Stop your animal! Look there!"
And he snatched at his rifle. For on the farther side of the house a
huge tusker elephant in the garden stood over a little European boy
about four years old, who was sprawling almost under the huge feet. And
high above its head the brute held in its curved trunk a younger child,
a girl with long golden curls, as if about to dash it to the ground.
As Frank grasped the rifle the _mahout_, who had turned at his cry,
seized the barrel and said with a smile:
"_Durro mut_, Sahib! Do not fear, sir. Those are Durro Mut Sahib's
babies and the elephant is their playmate."
And as he spoke Wargrave saw the elder child spring up from the ground
and beat the great animal's legs with his tiny hands, crying:
"_Mujh-ko bhi_, Badshah! _Mujh-ko bhi! Uth! Uth!_ (Me too, Badshah! Me
too! Take me up!)"
And the baby held aloft was crowing in glee and kicking its fat little
legs frantically. The elephant lowered it tenderly to the ground and
picked up the boy in its stead and lifted him into the air, while he
laughed and clapped his hands. The two _mahouts_ raised their palms
respectfully to their foreheads and cried to their animals:
"_Salaam kuro_! (Salute!)"
And the two trunks were lifted together in the _Salaamut_, the royal
salute given to Kings and Viceroys.
Frank's _mahout_ explained.
"_Gharib Parwar_ (Protector of the Poor), the pagan ignorant Hindus
around here say that the elephant is a god. Aye, and that his master,
Durro Mut Sahib, is one too. _That's_ like enough. Well, Allah alone
knows the truth of everything. But those two are more than mere man and
animal, that is certain. _Mul, Moti_! (Go on, Pearl!)"
And he kicked his elephant under the ears with his bare feet to quicken
her pace. But Frank bade him stop. Despite the man's optimism he could
not believe it wise to allow tiny tots like that to play with such a
huge, clumsy animal. He was sure that their mother would be horrified if
she knew it. He loved children, and felt that it was madness to allow
these babies to continue their dangerous pastime.
"Have they a mother?" he asked the _mahout_.
"Yes, _Huzoor_. The _mem-Sahib_ (lady) is doubtless within the house."
"I want to dismount," said Frank; and he grasped the surcingle rope as
the elephant sank jerkily to its knees. Then sliding down from the pad
he entered the gate and passed up through the garden towards the
bungalow. As he did so a dainty little figure in white, a charmingly
pretty girl with golden hair and blue eyes, came out on the verandah.
Seeing him she walked down the steps to meet him and held out her hand,
saying in a pleasant, musical voice:
"You are Mr. Wargrave, of course? Welcome to Ranga Duar."
Frank, uncomfortably conscious of his dishevelled appearance and
travel-stained attire, almost blushed as he took off his hat and
quickened his steps to meet her, wondering who this delightful young
girl--she looked about nineteen--could be. Possibly an elder sister of
the children outside. But as they shook hands she said:
"I am the wife of the Political Officer here. My husband, Colonel
Dermot, has just gone up to the Mess to see your C.O., Major Hunt."
Frank was astonished. This pretty young girl, scarcely more than a child
herself, the mother of the two chubby babies! Touched by her kind manner
he shook her hand warmly and said:
"Thank you very much for your welcome, Mrs. Dermot. It's awfully good of
you, and I--I assure you I appreciate it a lot just now. I was coming to
tell you--I wonder do you know that your babies--I suppose they _are_
yours--are playing what seems to me rather a dangerous game with an
elephant at the side of the house."
Mrs. Dermot smiled; and the dimples that came with the smile carried his
mind back for an instant to Violet.
"Yes, they are my chicks," she said. "I left them in Badshah's charge."
Frank was not altogether reassured. The young mother evidently did not
know what was happening.
"But--pardon me--is it quite safe? I was a bit scared when I saw them.
The animal was tossing them up in the air."
"You needn't be alarmed, Mr. Wargrave--though it's very good of you to
be concerned and come to tell me," she replied. "But Badshah--that's the
elephant's name--is a most careful nurse and I know that my babies are
quite safe when they are in his care. He has looked after them since
they were able to crawl. Come and be introduced to him. I must tell you
that he is a very exceptional animal. Indeed, we almost forget that he
is an animal. He has saved our lives, my husband's and mine, on more
than one occasion. Next to the children and me I think that Kevin loves
him better than anyone or anything else in the world. And after my
chicks and Kevin and my brother I believe I do, too. As for the babies,
I'm not sure that he doesn't come first with them."
She led the way round the house, and in spite of her assurances Wargrave
felt a little nervous when they came in sight of the strange nurse and
its charges. The tiny girl was seated on the ground tightly clasping one
huge foreleg; while the boy was beating the other with his little fists,
crying:
"_Mujk-ko uth! Pir! Pir!_ (Lift me up! Again! Again!)"
When he saw his mother he ran to her and said:
"Mummie, bad, naughty Badshah won't lift me up."
He suddenly caught sight of the stranger and paused shyly.
"Brian darling, this is a new friend," said his mother, bending down to
him. "Won't you shake hands with him?"
The child conquered his shyness with an effort and walked over to Frank,
holding out his little hand.
"How do you do?" he said politely.
The subaltern gravely shook the proffered hand. The little girl
scrambled to her fat little legs and finger in mouth, surveyed him
solemnly. Then satisfied with her inspection she toddled forward to him
and said:
"Tiss me."
Frank laughed joyously.
"With all my heart, you darling," he cried.
This delightful welcome in the dreaded place of exile was inexpressibly
cheering. He swung the dainty mite up in his arms and kissed her. She
put her arms around his neck and hugged him.
"Me like 'oo," she said.
"You little flirt, Eileen," exclaimed her mother laughing. "Now it's
Badshah's turn."
She walked to the elephant, a splendid specimen of its race, though it
had only one tusk, the right. She held out her hand to it. The long
trunk shot out, brushed her fingers and then her cheek with a light
touch that was almost a caress. She stroked the trunk affectionately.
"Now, Badshah, this is a new Sahib."
Frank, with the baby girl seated on his shoulder, stepped forward and
extended his hand. The animal smelt it and then laid its trunk for a
moment on his free shoulder.
"Badshah accepts you, Mr. Wargrave," said Mrs. Dermot seriously. "And
there are few whom he takes to readily."
Eileen, with one arm around Frank's neck, stretched out the other to the
elephant.
"Me love Badshah," she said.
The snake-like trunk lingered caressingly on her golden head. The baby
caught and kissed it.
"Now then, chickies, time for bed," said their mother. "Say goodnight to
Badshah."
The little boy ran to the great animal and hugged its leg tightly, while
the snaky trunk touched the child's face affectionately.
"Come along, Brian. Let him go now"; and at his mother's bidding the boy
released his clasp and ran to her.
"Goodnight, Badshah. _Salaam_!" said Mrs. Dermot, waving her hand to the
mammoth, while her little daughter on Wargrave's shoulder imitated her.
The big animal raised its trunk in salute and, turning, walked with
swaying stride out of sight behind the bungalow.
"By Jove, what a splendid beast!" exclaimed Frank. "And how wonderfully
well trained he is. I'm not surprised now that you let the kiddies play
with him."
Mrs. Dermot smiled.
"You would be even less so if you knew his story," she said. "He is my
husband's private property now. The Government of India presented him to
Kevin. Now come back to the house and have tea. Oh, no, after your long
ride you'll prefer a whiskey and soda."
"I'd really rather have the tea, I think, Mrs. Dermot. I don't feel
thirsty up in this deliciously cool air. It's awful down in the Plains
now. But what about my elephants and baggage?"
"Tell the _mahouts_ to go to the Mess. You are to have a room there."
Frank did so; and the two animals lumbered away up the hill after the
_mahouts_ had brought the Colonel's guns into the bungalow.
Mrs. Dermot led the way into the house. The little boy had possessed
himself of Wargrave's free hand, the other one being engaged in holding
Eileen, who was perched on the subaltern's shoulder. Mrs. Dermot found
it difficult to separate the children from their new friend when at
last she bore them off to bed.
Left to himself, Frank examined with deep interest and admiring envy the
splendid display of Colonel Dermot's trophies of big game shooting that
filled the bungalow. From the walls many heads of bison and buffalo, of
_sambhur_ and _barasingh_, those fine Indian stags, looked mildly at him
with their glass eyes; while tigers, bears and panthers snarled at him
from the ground. Long elephant-tusks leaned in corners, smoking and
liqueur-tables made up from the mammoths' legs and feet stood about, and
crossed from ceiling to floor; on the walls were the skins of enormous
snakes such as Frank had never seen or imagined. He had thought a
six-foot cobra or an eight-foot python long--here were reptiles sixteen
or eighteen feet in length, and he hoped that he would never meet their
equals alive in the jungle.
While he was gazing with admiration at the fine collection of trophies
Mrs. Dermot returned.
"What a magnificent lot of heads and skins you've got here!" he
exclaimed. "All your husband's, I suppose?"
She laughed as she glanced round the room, while pouring out the tea
that her butler had brought.
"I'm afraid they make the house rather like a museum of natural
history," she answered. "Yes, they are all Kevin's, or nearly all.
There are a few of mine among them."
He looked at her in open admiration.
"Oh, you shoot? How splendid!" he said. "Have you ever got a tiger?"
"A couple," she replied, smiling.
"I envy you awfully," he said. "I've never even seen one--out of a
cage."
"Well, if you are keen on shooting, Mr. Wargrave, you ought to have
little difficulty in bagging a tiger or two before long," she said.
"I'd love to have the chance of going after big game. I'm hoping for it
here. Shall I? I've never had any, although I've shot a panther or two
and a few black buck and _chinkara_."
"You will have every opportunity of good sport here. Neither of the
other two Europeans, your Commanding Officer and the doctor of your
detachment, go in for it, the latter because his sight is very bad,
Major Hunt because he doesn't care for it. I'm sure my husband will be
glad to take you out with him; and nobody in the whole Terai knows more
about big game than he."
"By Jove; how ripping," exclaimed Frank eagerly. "Would he?"
"I'm sure he would. He'll be only too delighted to have someone for
company. I used to go with him always, until my babies came. Now Kevin
has no one but Badshah."
"Badshah? Oh, yes, that ripping elephant. I don't know much about those
animals, but isn't it unusual for him to have only a single tusk?"
"Yes; Badshah is what the natives call a 'Gunesh.' You know that Gunesh
is the Hindu God of Wisdom and is represented as having an elephant's
head with only the right tusk? Consequently any of these animals born
with a single tusk, and that the right, is considered sacred and looked
upon as a god."
"One of the _mahouts_ said that the Hindus here regard your husband as
one, too," said Frank, "and he seemed inclined to believe it himself. I
like the name they've given Colonel Dermot--Durro Mut Sahib, Fear Not
Sahib."
A look of pride came in the young wife's eyes as she repeated the name
softly to herself.
"Fear Not Sahib. Yes, it suits him." Then aloud she continued:
"I think you'll like my husband, Mr. Wargrave. All men do. He's a man's
man. The hill and jungle people worship him. He understands them. Ah!
here he is, I think."
Her face brightened, and Frank saw the light of love shine in her eyes
as she turned expectantly to the door. He sprang up as a tall man with
handsome, clear-cut features, dark complexion and eyes, and
close-cropped black hair touched at the temples with grey, entered the
room. With a pleasant smile the newcomer walked towards the subaltern
with outstretched hand, saying in a friendly voice:
"Glad to welcome you to Ranga Duar, Wargrave."
"Thank you very much, sir," replied Frank gripping his hand and greatly
taken at once by the Political Officer's appearance and friendly manner.
"It was very kind of you to send those guns for me. But I had no luck.
We saw nothing on the way."
After greeting him Colonel Dermot bent over his wife and kissed her
fondly. It was obvious to the subaltern that after their five years of
married life they were lovers still. Frank looked at them a little
enviously. He wondered would it be so with Violet and him after the same
lapse of time; for the sight of their happiness sent his thoughts flying
to the woman who loved him.
"Are you keen on shooting, Wargrave?" said the Colonel.
"Oh, yes, he is, Kevin," broke in his wife. "I told him that I was sure
you'd be glad to take him with you into the jungle sometimes."
"I'll be happy to do so, if you care to come with me, Wargrave," said
the Colonel.
"I'd love to, sir. It would be awfully good of you," replied the
subaltern eagerly. "But I've only a Mannlicher rifle."
"Ah, you'll need a bigger bore than that. But I can lend you a .470 high
velocity cordite weapon. You want something with great hitting power
for dangerous game," said Dermot.
He went on to speak of the jungle and its denizens; and his conversation
was so interesting that Wargrave forgot the flight of time until his
hostess reminded him that he had to report his arrival to his commanding
officer and find his new quarters. Her husband volunteered to show him
the way to the Mess and introduce him to Major Hunt.
As Wargrave shook hands with Mrs. Dermot, she said:
"I wanted to ask you to dinner this evening; but Kevin thought you might
prefer to spend your first night with your brother officers. But we
shall expect you to-morrow, when they are coming, too."
On their way up the steep road from his bungalow the Political Officer
spoke of the great forest below them and the sport to be found in it.
Then he said:
"It's lucky you like shooting, Wargrave, for Ranga Duar is very isolated
and life in it dull to a person who has no resources. Still, it has its
advantages, and chief among them is the climate. It's delightful in the
cold weather and pleasant in the hot."
"By Jove, it is indeed, sir! It's like Heaven after the heat in the
Plains below. I don't know how I lived through it coming across India."
"The rainy season is the hardest to bear. We have five months of it and
over three hundred inches of rain during them. One never sees a strange
face then--not that we ever do have many visitors here at any time.
Still, you'll like your C.O., and Burke the doctor is a capital fellow.
Here we are."
He turned in through a narrow gate leading to a pretty though neglected
garden in which stood the Mess, a long, single-storied building raised
on piles. On the broad wooden verandah to which a flight of steps led
from the ground two men were reclining in long chairs reading old
newspapers. On seeing Dermot and his companion they rose, and the
Colonel introduced Frank. They shook hands with him and gave him a
hearty welcome, which, coming on the top of the Dermot's, cheered the
subaltern exceedingly and for the time made him forget the circumstances
of his coming.
"It's mighty glad I am to see you here, Wargrave," said Burke, the
doctor, in a mellow brogue, "aven av it's only to have someone living in
the Mess wid me. The Major there lives in solitary state in his little
bungalow; and I'm all alone here at night wid _shaitans_ (devils) and
wild beasts walking on the verandah."
"What? Has that panther been prowling round the Mess again?" asked the
Political Officer.
"Faith! and he has that. Sure, I heard him sniffing at me door last
night. I wish to the Powers ye'd shoot him, sir."
"I can't get him. I've tried often enough."
"Troth! and it's waking up one fine morning I'll be to find he's made a
meal av me. Keep your door shut at night, Wargrave. Merrick, who lived
in the room you'll have, forgot to do it once and the divil nearly had
him."
"Is that really a fact?" asked Frank, delighted at the thought of having
come to a place with such possibilities of sport.
"Yes; we're plagued by a brute of a panther that prowls about the
station at night, jumps the wall of the Fort and carries off the sepoys'
dogs, and has actually entered rooms here in the Mess. He has killed
several Bhuttia children on the hills around here. Nobody can ever get a
shot at him. He's too cunning. Will you have a drink, Colonel?" said
Hunt.
The Political Officer thanked him but declined, and, reminding them all
of his wife's invitation for the morrow, bade them goodnight.
"That's one av the finest men in India," exclaimed Burke, as they
watched Dermot's figure receding down the road. The doctor had a
pleasant, ugly face and wore spectacles.
"He is, indeed. He keeps the whole Bhutan border in order," said the
commandant, Major Hunt, a slight, grey-haired man with a quiet and
reserved manner. "The Bhuttias are more afraid of a cross look from him
than of all our rifles and machine-guns. Have a drink, Wargrave? Yes?
And you, Burke? Hi, boy!"
A Gurkha servant with the ugly, cheery face of his race appeared and was
ordered to bring three whiskeys and sodas.
"Ranga's not a bad place if you can stand the loneliness," continued the
Major. "Are you fond of shooting."
"Yes, sir, awfully."
"Hooray! That's good," cried Burke. "Now we'll have someone to go down
to the jungle and shoot for the Mess. We want a change from tinned Army
rations and the tough ould hins that these benighted haythins call
chickens."
"Yes, you'll be a Godsend to us if you're a good shot, Wargrave," added
the Commandant. "We never get meat here unless someone shoots a stag or
a buck in the jungle; and for that we generally have to rely on Dermot.
But he is away such a lot, wandering along the frontier, keeping an eye
on the peace of the Border. Now we'll be able to look to you. We have
three transport elephants with the detachment, all steady to shoot
from."
Frank was delighted.
"I'd love to go into the jungle if you'd let me, sir."
"Yes, I'll be glad if you do. There's not much work for you here; and
this is a dull place for a youngster unless he's keen on sport. I'm not,
myself; and Burke's as blind as a bat. But you can always have an
elephant when they aren't wanted to bring up supplies from the railway."
The subaltern thanked him gratefully and inwardly decided that his new
commanding officer was a great improvement on Colonel Trevor.
"Now, Burke, I'm off to my bungalow. Show Wargrave his quarters," said
the Major rising. "See you at dinner."
Burke showed the subaltern his room, one of the four into which the Mess
was divided. Like the doctor's quarters, it was at one end of the
building, the centre apartment being the officers' anteroom and
dining-room. Frank found that his "boy," with the ready deftness of
Indian servants, had unpacked his trunks, hung up his clothes and stowed
his various belongings about the scantily-furnished room. He had stood
Violet's photo on the one rickety table and laid out his Master's white
mess uniform on the small iron cot.
Major Hunt, Wargrave learned, lived in a bungalow a few hundred yards
away, but, being unmarried, took his meals in the Mess. The Indian
officers and sepoys of the detachment were quartered in barracks in the
Fort.
Frank dressed and entered the anteroom or officers' sitting-room, from
which a door led into the messroom. Both apartments were poorly
furnished, but the walls were adorned with the skulls and skins of many
beasts of the jungle, presented by Colonel Dermot, as Frank learned.
Shelves filled with books ran across one end of the anteroom.
As the interior of the Mess was rather hot at that time of year--though
to Wargrave it seemed very cool after Rohar--the dinner-table was laid
on the verandah; and while the officers sat at their meal the pleasant
mountain breeze played about them. Frank thought with gratitude of his
escape from the burning heat which at that moment was tormenting the
hundreds of millions in the furnace of the Plains of India stretching
away from the foot of the cool hills.
The meal was not luxurious, for it consisted almost exclusively of
tinned provisions, fresh meat being unprocurable in Ranga Duar--except
fowls of exceeding toughness--and vegetables and bread being rare
dainties.
During dinner Wargrave learned how completely isolated his new station
was. Their only European neighbours were the planters on tea-gardens
scattered about in the great forest below, the nearest thirty miles off.
The few visitors that Ranga Duar saw in the year were the General on his
annual inspection, an occasional official of the Indian Civil Service,
the Public Works or the Forest Department, or some planter friend of the
Dermots.
The reason of the existence of this outpost and its garrison was the
guarding of the _duars_, or passes, through the Himalayas against
raiders from Bhutan, that little-known independent State lying between
Tibet and the Bengal border. Its frontier was only two miles from, and a
few thousand feet above, Ranga Duar.
"You are just in time for our one yearly burst of gaiety, Wargrave,"
said the Commandant, "the visit of the Deb Zimpun."
"What on earth is that, sir?" asked the subaltern.
"Sounds like a new disease, doesn't it?" said Burke laughing. "But it
isn't. The Deb Zimpun is a gintleman av high degree, the Heridithary Cup
Bearer to the Deb Raja."
"To the what?" demanded the bewildered Frank.
Major Hunt smiled.
"Bhutan is supposed to be ruled by a temporal monarch called the Deb
Raja and also by a spiritual one, known in India as the Durma Raja. In
reality it is under the sway of the most powerful of the several great
feudal lords of the land, the Tongsa Penlop or Chief of Tongsa, whom we
regard as the Maharajah of Bhutan. He has placed himself, as far only as
the foreign relations of the country go, under the suzerainty of the
Government of India; and in return we grant him a subsidy of a _lakh_ of
rupees a year. It used to be fifty thousand, but the sum was doubled
years ago. To get the money one of the State Council comes every year.
He is an official called the Deb Zimpun."
"Faith! he's a rum old beggar, Wargrave," broke in Burke. "Looks like
the Pope av Rome in his thriple crown, for he wears a high gold-edged
cap and a flowing red robe av Chinese silk, out av which sticks a pair
av hairy bare legs."
"The Political Officer receives him in _durbar_; and we furnish a Guard
of Honour. The Colonel gives a dinner to him and us, and we have another
spread in the Mess. That reminds me. I suppose Dermot will be going into
the jungle soon to shoot for the pot, as the _durbar_ is next week.
You'd better get him to take you. You can have one of our elephants and
provide for our larder."
"Thanks very much, Major," said the delighted subaltern. "The Colonel
promised to let me accompany him and lend me a rifle."
When he went to his room that night the subaltern turned up the oil lamp
that lighted it and before he undressed sat down before Violet's
photograph. As he looked at it he thought affectionately and a little
sadly of the lonely woman so far away from him now. He pitied her for
the isolation in which she lived, an isolation far completer than his
own, for she had few friends, no intimates, and a husband worse than a
stranger in his lack of understanding of her. Surely it would be only
right to take her from such a man, right to give her a fresh chance of
finding the happiness that she had missed; for the warm-hearted,
intelligent and artistic-natured woman would be far happier with him in
this beautiful spot, remote from the world though it was. And his new
comrades would appeal to her, Dermot, strong, capable, one who would
always stand out from his fellows; Hunt grave, kindly, well-read; Burke
witty, clever and good-hearted. And, little though Violet cared for her
own sex, as a rule, surely in Mrs. Dermot she would find a friend. This
happy wife, this loving mother, was so sweet and sympathetic that she
would win the older woman's liking, while the two delightful children
would take her heart by storm. Poor, lonely Violet, so beautiful, so
ill-fated! Frank sighed as he took up her portrait and kissed it.
When he extinguished the lamp and lay down in bed it was pleasant, after
the heat in Rohar, to find it so cool that he was obliged to pull a
blanket over him. Only those who have endured the torment of hot nights
in the tropics can appreciate his thankfulness as in the silence broken
only by the monotonous cry of the nightjars he drowsed contentedly to
sleep. Already he was reconciled to Ranga Duar.