Produced by Al Haines
[Illustration: Cover art]
THE OUTCASTE
BY
F. E. PENNY
AUTHOR OF
"THE SANYASI," "THE RAJAH," "THE MALABAR MAGICIAN," ETC.
SPECIAL EDITION
For sale only in India and the British Colonies
LONDON
CHATTO & WINDUS
1912
[_The Portrait on the Cover is reproduced from a Miniature by G. I.
Penny_]
_All rights reserved_
DEDICATED
TO THE
STUDENTS OF HINDU THEOLOGY AND ETHICS
WHOSE WRITINGS
HAVE ASSISTED ME TO TELL
THIS STORY
_The scene is laid in the Native State of Chirakul._
CHIRAPORE . . . Chief Town of Chirakul.
ANANDA . . . . . A Convert to Christianity.
BOPAUL . . . . . Friend of Ananda, and of the same Caste.
COOMARA . . . . Married to Bopaul's Sister.
DR. WENASTON . . Principal of the Maharajah's College at Chirapore.
EOLA WENASTON . His Sister.
PROFESSOR TWYFORD
MRS. HULVER . . Housekeeper to Dr. Wenaston.
DORAMA . . . . . Ananda's Wife.
PANTULU . . . . His Father.
GUNGA . . . . . His Mother.
SOOBA . . . . . His Uncle.
MAYITA . . . . . Coomara's Widow.
THE OUTCASTE
CHAPTER I
The aviation ground was thronged with spectators. Eyes were turned
skywards and men held their breath. Women uttered ejaculations, drawn
unconsciously from them in their intense excitement. The wind blew
gustily with an upward sweep that sent dead leaves and fragments of
paper into the air. A furious blast heralding the coming storm seized
one of the aviators as he was in the act of turning. It seemed to
shake him with a living enmity. Under the violent motion the tips of
the delicate wings of his machine snapped. He recognised the
seriousness of the accident; and the breathless multitude watched his
efforts to avoid impending catastrophe. As well might the dying bird,
winged by the October sportsman, try to sustain its arrested flight.
The machine ceased its horizontal movement, folded its broken planes
about its struggling guide, and dropped almost vertically to the ground.
Some, fascinated by the horror of it all, stared at the falling wreck.
Others withdrew their gaze, but could not shut their ears to the thud
and crash in which the earthly life of a human being came to an abrupt
end.
The hush was followed by a murmur as emotion found expression in speech
and exclamation. Many of the women shed tears; some screamed; a few
fainted. Ten minutes later there was a general stir as the sightseers,
sick at heart, began to depart.
Eola Wenaston beckoned to her brother, who stood at a little distance
talking to a couple of men. He approached the motor car into which she
had just stepped. Before she could speak he hastened to reassure her,
anticipating the question that was on the lips of all.
"It's all right; the man is not dead. Of course he has had a shock,
falling from such a height, and the machine is smashed to atoms. You
need not be nervous----"
"I'm not nervous. It was a horrid sight, but I'm not troubled with
nerves. The man must be dead after such a fall."
"Well, no one can say how----"
She interrupted him with a touch of impatience born of anxiety.
"Would you mind going home by train? Mrs. Greenford is thoroughly
unhinged. She is in that tent over there crying her heart out, and she
ought to be taken away at once."
"She doesn't know him, does she?"
"Yes, slightly. It appears that he dined with her and her husband last
night."
"What do you wish to do?"
"Drive her home at once; but it leaves you to go by rail. You won't
mind giving her your seat in the motor?"
She did not doubt for a moment that he would object. The car was a new
purchase made by Wenaston on his arrival in England on furlough. He
intended to take it back to India on his return to his work.
"Not a bit," he replied readily.
"I can't ask Miss Stuart to give up her place in the car."
"Of course not; I'll join Ananda and his friends. They are travelling
up by the special leaving in about an hour's time."
"You need not journey in their company. Now-a-days, when our blood is
curdled by assassinations----"
He interrupted her.
"They are all right--three of the nicest fellows I know."
She made a little grimace, not noticing that a Hindu, faultlessly
frock-coated and top-hatted, had approached on the other side of the
motor, and was waiting for an opportunity to speak, waiting with the
courtesy of good breeding that happily is not the monopoly of the
European.
"Still, one cannot forget----" she mentioned the name of a well-known
public man who had been done to death by an Oriental fanatic.
The blood rushed to the temples of the Hindu. He raised his hat as he
said quietly--
"You must not suppose that we are all assassins, Miss Wenaston, any
more than I may suppose you English to be all murderers like----" and
he in his turn named a notorious criminal who had recently been
convicted of a murder perpetrated under circumstances of peculiar
cruelty.
"Of course not! I beg your pardon, Mr. Ananda. I ought not to have
said it."
In her contrition she turned and held out her hand. She felt the
nervous close grip, momentary as it was, and the friendliness of the
Englishwoman warmed towards the exile.
"My brother proposes to travel home with you by rail and give his seat
in the motor to Mrs. Greenford, who is upset by the accident. Have you
heard how the aviator is?"
"I am afraid from all accounts he is in a bad way. The committee has
decided to stop the competitions for to-day. Visitors ought to have no
objection."
"It is sad to have an ending like this!" She turned to Wenaston.
"Please go and find Mrs. Greenford; Miss Stuart is with her. Bring
them both here. Tell them I am in a hurry to start. I should like to
get Mrs. Greenford away before she hears worse news. Oh! I wish he
hadn't attempted that last flight! It was quite unnecessary, and not
on the programme--a mere show to please the people."
Ananda stood by the motor whilst Wenaston went to do his sister's
bidding.
"You take these things too seriously, Miss Wenaston. If you were a
fatalist you would believe that it was preordained by the gods; and you
would be resigned. It is of no use to fight against fate. He had to
meet it whether he flew upon an aeroplane or whether he remained in his
own house. We are taught that we cannot escape the fulfilment of our
destiny."
She looked at him, her attention suddenly rivetted.
"You are taught, you say; but do you believe your teacher in these days
of greater enlightenment?"
A reply was not immediately forthcoming. Perhaps he would have left
the question unanswered if she had not uttered an interrogatory,
"Well?" in a tone that held something more than mere curiosity.
"I am trying to retain my belief in all that my guru instilled into my
mind before I left India."
"You find it hard to keep the old faith unshaken?"
"Not exactly. The difficulty is to graft the new teaching on the old.
We of the advanced school cannot stand still; we must progress."
"And then comes the difficulty of putting new wine into old bottles."
She glanced in the direction of the tent, and he knew that he had lost
half her attention. Wenaston was visible in the distance with Mrs.
Greenford and Miss Stuart. The sympathy that was so marked a
characteristic in Eola had tempted the Hindu to say more than was his
wont. It was deflected from himself and turned towards the unnerved
woman, whom she was charitably befriending.
Mrs. Greenford was allowed no time to plunge into fresh tears and
regrets. She was prevailed upon to enter the car without delay.
Wenaston gave his orders to the chauffeur and the motor glided from the
field.
"It is too early in the day to make gala shows of this aviation
business. An accident such as has just happened upsets the women with
their highly strung nerves. Even men feel it to be a bit of a shock,"
remarked Wenaston, as he glanced round at the white faces of the
spectators.
"Anyway, women should not be present where there is a likelihood of
accidents," replied Ananda. "It seems to me that you Englishmen go to
the opposite extreme from us. We shut up women and overdo the purdah
business. You give them too much liberty."
"My dear fellow! They take it without asking our permission!"
They were slowly moving towards the exit. There was no need of haste
as their train was not due to start for another half-hour, and the
station was but ten minutes' walk. Before Ananda could reply they were
joined by two more Hindus. In appearance these men were like Ananda,
although there was no blood relationship between them. Their
complexions were of the wheaten tint that frequently goes with high
caste and good birth. They were equally well dressed in the latest
English fashion, without extravagance or display. To Wenaston they
were well known, and he greeted them as old acquaintances.
"The show is at an end, Dr. Wenaston. It is reported that the poor
fellow is dead. It only remains for us to go back to town," said one
who was called Bopaul by his friends.
"I am sorry it has ended fatally. I suppose every new scientific
venture must have its victims. The claims of aviation will be every
whit as heavy as were the claims of steam and electricity," responded
Wenaston.
"The death dues of the gods!" murmured the other, known as Coomara.
Bopaul laughed lightly but Ananda turned a pair of serious eyes upon
Wenaston.
"You don't believe that the higher power ruling our destinies requires
to be propitiated by a holocaust of victims, do you?" he asked.
"Certainly not. Accidents occur through the imperfection of machines;
and with each accident it is only natural that an important step is
made towards a more perfect knowledge."
"Exactly so," rejoined Coomara, eagerly. "In return for a life, the
Fountain of all knowledge in his justice and rectitude gives knowledge."
"Life is not demanded in exchange or in payment for knowledge,"
objected Wenaston. "Knowledge might be acquired without loss of life
if men were more careful and less rash. The death of the experimenter
is due to his own ignorance, to his rashness, or to the imperfection of
the machine in its inception."
"You do not believe that it is the direct act of God?"
Wenaston did not reply. They were threading their way through the
crowd that had gathered near the exit of the field, and conversation
was not easy. On all sides they heard comments upon the accident.
Regrets were expressed freely that the new cult had lost one of its
cleverest pioneers. His death--by this time it was known that the
fallen aviator had breathed his last even as they carried him from the
field--his death was sad from every point of view. He was a good, a
thoroughly good fellow; clever beyond most men. Married? no; but there
was a girl--he was living at home with his people, and he was going to
be married shortly. Money? Oh yes, plenty, or he could not have
experimented as he did. And the cause of the accident? Ignorance of
air currents and the power of the wind. His wings were broken, and
there was no hope from the very first of salvation. Although he
struggled with the machine he must have been aware that he had no
chance of escape. The next thing to invent must be some life-saving
apparatus.
Among their acquaintances the three Hindus were spoken of as A, B, and
C; or as Ananda, Bopaul, and Coomara. In addition to these names they
possessed others unfamiliar to the English ear and difficult of
pronunciation. The men were of good birth and high caste; they
belonged to a native State south of Poona, called Chirakul, the chief
town being Chirapore. Under pressure of modern times the
parents--people of substance and wealth--had sent their sons to Poona
and Bombay to be educated. Later on, arrangements were made for a
visit to England. It was due to the friendly offices of Wenaston that
they entered the house of Dr. Twyford, professor of oriental languages.
Their future was assured without the necessity of taking up any of the
professions. It was the intention of their parents to make homes for
them under the ancestral roof, where they would lead the life of the
leisured Hindu landowner. If any occupation were adopted it would be
of a political nature--some appointment of importance and trust under
the Maharajah's Government.
Although the three men were alike in dress, complexion and features,
and belonged to the same caste, they were very dissimilar in character
and temperament.
Ananda was gentle and speculative. His nerves were finely strung, and
he shrank like a woman from physical pain and discomfort, and from
anything that was of a rough and discordant nature. The timidity of
the Hindu peeped out on various occasions, a timidity that was not so
much cowardice as an inbred loathing of coarseness and brutality. The
strong religious instinct, which seems to bring the Asiatic close to
his strangely conceived deities in worship and propitiation, underlaid
all his actions.
In early youth he had been married to the sister of his friend Coomara.
The marriage had been consummated, and there was a child, a son four
years of age; and during his absence mother and son found a happy home
with his parents.
Bopaul was a fair specimen of the product of modern education.
Untainted with disloyalty towards the ruling power, he was never likely
to become a disciple of disaffection, and join with ambitious men of
lower caste. Aristocratic to his finger-tips, he believed in his
Prince, and hoped to find a place on his council at some time in the
future.
By nature he was sunny and buoyant, taking life as he found it. Eager
to listen to the latest theories and ready to argue, he nevertheless
proved elusive and disappointing to the serious propagandist.
Tolerant, without being weak, courteous and even-tempered, he seemed to
be flexible; but when it came to uprooting inherited beliefs, he proved
immovable. The casual observer accused him of flippancy and
infidelity. His host and guardian, Professor Twyford, knew better.
"Bopaul is an extraordinary fellow," he used to say. "I introduce him
to all the latest theories, to all the facts most recently revealed by
science; he receives them with intelligence and avidity, not to
exchange new lamps for old, but to graft them on to the old Hindu
stock. I can understand when I look at Bopaul the wonderful
receptivity of the Hindu nature. It has preserved the caste system for
the last three thousand years, a unique survival that has no equal in
the history of the world. The Hindus absorb and orientalise theories
that ought to deal their social and religious system a death blow. I
can see Bopaul fitting the latest and most revolutionary ideas into
niches in his mind without permitting any conflict with the tenets of
his ancient faith. He is a very interesting character."
Coomara was unlike either of his companions. He held to the letter of
his faith; listened courteously but without interest to modern
teaching; wherever it clashed with the teaching of the Vedas, he
rejected it as being incompatible, and therefore useless to himself.
He refused to discuss the subject of religious differences. It was
waste of time if nothing else. When he first fell under the influence
of the professor he showed a disinclination to speak on religion at
all. Gradually he gained confidence as he discovered that Twyford had
no design of converting him to the Christian faith, and became more
communicative. Somewhat to his astonishment he learned that the
Englishman possessed a greater and more intimate knowledge of the
sacred books of his nation than himself. As his confidence
strengthened, he became more communicative and less afraid of listening
to other doctrines.
Coomara had been married to Bopaul's sister when he was ten years old;
hence the link that bound the three men together. The period of exile
appointed by their respective parents was within a few months of its
termination, and they were looking forward to their return to Chirakul,
when the ceremonies necessary to restore their caste would be performed
and Coomara's wedding be completed; for his marriage had been
practically only a betrothal from the European point of view. The
honeymoon had yet to be spent.