COBWEBS
The noonday sun lay shadowless in every nook of the narrow
evil-smelling courtyard which formed a common exit to Jehân Aziz's
bachelor quarters and three or four other houses whose fronts faced the
most disreputable bazaar in Nushapore. One of these belonged to
Dilarâm, the dancer, and the remaining ones were tenanted by folk of
similar tastes, such as Burkut Ali, the Delhi pensioner, whom Jack
Raymond had styled the biggest brute in Asia; but he had a double
reasoning for choosing the courtyard, in that it enabled him better to
play his part of Buckingham to the Rightful Heir.
Despite its character, however, the courtyard was peace and propriety
itself in the perpendicular glare of noon; peaceful and proper with a
dreamy drugged peace, a satiated propriety that was in keeping with the
heavy yellow sunshine.
And Dilarâm herself matched the general drowsiness as she sate, muffled
in a creased shawl, yawning, blowsy, ill-kempt, upon a wooden balcony
overlooking the courtyard. She matched the squalor of the scene also; a
squalor which seemed to put the pleasure that has its marketable value
out of possibility in such surroundings.
Jehân Aziz, who sate on a string bed below, looked a trifle less
dilapidated than Dilarâm, for his morning toilet had extended to the
making of that white parting down the middle of his oiled hair, and a
due shaving into line of his thin moustache. Not that these results
were due to any energy on his part. They were the work of the barber,
who was now occupied, nearer the door, in paring Burkut Ali's nails,
while the Heir to Nothingness, in no hurry to proceed, chewed betel
thoughtfully, and looked at a caged quail which he meant to fight
against a rival's so soon as he could rouse himself sufficiently to
dress; for he had got no further in the way of clothing than the
wrinkled white calico trousers which, by reason of their tightness,
have to be tenant's fixtures during the term of occupation.
'So Sobrai Begum hath flitted at last!' yawned Dilarâm (who was within
an aside of Jehân) with a sudden causeless access of indifference and
malice. 'And Nawâb Jehân Aziz, _Rukn-ud-dowla-Hâfiz-ul-Mulk_, hath in
consequence one less mouth to feed! Peace be with him!'
'Speak lower, fool, or the barber will hear, and the tale be spread
over the town,' muttered Jehân savagely, scowling at the sarcasm of the
titles.
A day and a night had passed since Aunt Khôjee, veiled to her
finger-tips and fluttering like any pigeon, had fled through the
bazaars to tell the head of her house that--not three hours after he
had left it in wrath--Sobrai had disappeared. Jehân Aziz, after
established custom, had kept the scandalous secret to himself and his
immediate family, with the exception of Dilarâm, to whom he had gone at
once, as the most likely person to have an inkling of the girl's
intentions. For the only way to deal with such cases is to get the
truant back as speedily as possible, and ensure a virtuous silence in
the future. The silence, as a rule, of the grave. So the chance of the
barber having extra long ears was horrible.
Dilarâm, however, glanced idly at the group by the door, which gave
unreservedly on the gutters of a cramped alley, and yawned again. 'Not
he! Burkut hath him gaping over signs and wonders that will be God's
truth ere the whole of Nushapore be shaved! They are more to the
barber's trade than a girl's flight; though that also goes far
nowadays, what with all the talk about such things. And _this_ would go
far indeed, if set agoing--with a head of lie, and sparks of truth in
its tail, like the powder in an E'ed[3] squib.'
'The truth!' echoed Jehân, in swift suspicion; 'then thou dost know
somewhat, after all?'
She yawned again, smiling. 'Not I! Had none but my sort danced, as in
old days, in kings' houses, Dilarâm would have known who else sought to
flutter in her footsteps. But with new pleasures, Nawâb-_sahib_, come
new pains. She is not of us in the city; that is sure. But there are
baggages with bleached hair and powdered faces outside it. Ask Miss
Leezie! I heard her say she lacked apprentices.' Her lazy spitefulness
was effective, and Jehân clenched his fine hands viciously. He did not
particularly desire to get Sobrai back--except for punishment--provided
scandal could be avoided. He was, indeed, well quit of a girl for whom
no suitor could be found, and who was not to his own personal taste;
but the suggestion of Dilarâm's words stung horribly.
'God smite their souls to the nethermost hell!' he muttered, making the
dancer flick her fingers with a giggle.
'Lo! hearken to virtue! "_Not a rag for the child and a coat for the
cat!_" Men be no worse in cantonments than here in the city!
Nevertheless the tale, as I said, could be told to a purpose by a
clever tongue. It would rouse the common folk more than Burkut's lies
about portents, or the _baboo's_ about the plague, if they only knew
it!'
Jehân Aziz turned on her like a snake, sleepy yet swift, ready for
dreams or death.
'If thou dost _dare_ to tell----'
She held out her bare brown arm in a quick gesture of silence, and
rising, swept him a _salaam_ that set the hidden anklets beneath her
dirty draperies a-jingling, and proclaimed her what she was--a passed
mistress in the oldest of professions for women.
'There is no need, my lord, she said superbly, 'to teach Dilarâm her
duty to the virtuous women who sit free of shame in the noble houses
where she dances. _We_ learn that first of all.'
There was an indescribable grace in her attitude, a cadence in her
utterance, which proved her claim. She was of the old school, educated
to her craft.
The jingle of anklets brought a man's face to a neighbouring balcony. A
face hollow-cheeked, haggard, with dissipation written on it. Brought
thither by curiosity, it remained in approval of the studiously-posed
figure in the creased shawl. Jehân's face, too, showed a like
attraction, and Burkut Ali, the nail-paring over, lounged up with a
savage sort of discontent at his own inward admiration--a regret, as it
were, for the vices of his ancestors. As a rule, Dilarâm and her
dancing did not amuse him in the very least. He had passed from the old
style to the new, and, indeed, was chiefly responsible for the
introduction of Miss Leezie and her like to the nobility and gentry of
Nushapore. But now he was conscious that this, in its way, was better;
and the fact formed a fresh item in his general grievance against those
who, having taken the reins of government from such as he, had driven
India into change--even in its wickedness!
The secret cherishing of this general grievance of his own in the minds
of others was Burkut Ali's whole occupation in life. The dilatory
disaffection of his neighbours, a disaffection inevitable in a society
which this change had literally ruined, could, he had discovered, be
turned to his own profit in two ways. First, because, as confidant to
seditious utterances, he gained a hold on the utterer; secondly,
because, as the repeater of them to persons in high places, he gained a
hold on the hearer. For the rest his manners were perfection, his
Persian a pure pleasure to the ear. And both these were at their best
when--his present part in the farce of vague conspirings being that of
general backer-up of Jehân's spasmodic belief in his own claims to
royalty--he paused before the heir in the most elaborately courtly
fashion and began mellifluously--
'Hath it, perchance, found place in the memory of the Most High that
this, being the death-day of the sainted lady ancestress Hâfiz Begum,
the dirge for her soul will be intoned by the appointed canons at the
family mausoleum? And as this will be the last time----'
'The last time?' echoed Jehân haughtily, 'how so?'
The man's face in the balcony sharpened with sudden interest. Between
his dissipations he was editor of the vilest broadsheet in the town, a
broadsheet which existed simply by virtue of its unfailing basis of
firm falsehoods.
Burkut knew this, and had cast his fly dexterously. Now, feeling the
rise, he allowed grave concern to overlay the yellow mask of his
face--it was one of those which never change except by an effort of
will. 'Because, sire,' he replied, in tones to be heard of all, 'it is
known, beyond doubt, that the English Government, being hard pressed by
reason of famines and the yearly tribute to the City of London, which
the low value of the rupee causes to be greater every year, hath an eye
on the endowment of the mausoleum.'
Govind the editor stifled a yawn of disappointment. 'That tale
is old,' he put in contemptuously, 'I heard it a week past from the
Secretariat Office. My cousin is clerk--as I should have been but for
injustice--and saw the papers. It is true; for see you, they closed the
mints so as to make the poor folk sell their silver hoards cheap, and
now the rupees are scarce.'
He nodded sagely over his own political economy, and as he spoke in
Urdu, the barber, as newsmonger of an older type, paused in the
sharpening of a razor to listen.
'Impossible!' interrupted Jehân angrily. 'The Government is bound to
uphold the shrines and services by strict promises. My fathers only
lent them the money on those conditions. The interest was to be
spent----'
Govind burst into boisterous laughter; for his head was muddled, his
nerves unstrung by an overnight debauch.
'Ay! Nawâb-_jee_. Crores and crores of rupees lent in the old days, and
the interest spent now in gardens for the _mems_ to play games in, and
statues to their own Queen! But it is no new thing, I tell you. I am no
ignoramus--I am _middle fail_.[4] I have read their histories, and I
know. They took all the religious endowments in their own land,
and'--he added louder, as an ash-smeared naked figure which had been
passing along the alley with the beggar's cry of '_Alâkh Alâkh_' paused
to listen--'would have killed the religious also but for those among
them like Gladstone and Caine-_sahib_ who say, as we do, that the
others are tyrants and have no right to India.'
The hotch-potch of history was interrupted by Dilarâm's yawn. '_Hai!
Hai!_ brother!' she said, 'keep that dreary stuff for Burkut or the
barber--they can spread it over folk's hot imaginings like butter on a
hearth cake! Or give it to _jogi-jee_ yonder,' she swept her fingers to
the weird figure at the door; a figure whose right hand and arm,
withered in the ceaseless task of appealing to high heaven for
righteousness, showed like a dry stick pointing upwards, 'though he and
his like are never at a loss for lies. Hast a new one to-day, Gopi? Or
is it still the old wonder of the golden paper which fell from the sky
into one of Mother Kali's many embraces!'
'Jest not of Her, sister,' said the _jogi_ in a theatrically hollow
voice, as he thrust his left arm--lean as a lath, yet round in
comparison with that raised claim to virtue--towards her in menace.
'Thou art Hers, even in thy denial of Her. Woman as She, spreading
disease and death. Mother of Pain, embracing the world, biding thy time
to slay.'
Despite the palpable striving for effect, something in the words
thrilled the woman beneath the courtesan; and though she flicked all
her supple fingers in derision, there was a note of triumph in her
voice.
'Talk not to me, saint, as to thy Hindoo widows who believe in golden
papers and gods. Yet 'tis true! We of the bazaar lead the world by the
nose! Govind may blacken what he likes with ink. Burkut's craft may
spend itself in spider's webs. The plague may come. Yea! even the
sniffing out of other folk's smells--ay! and the payment for
silence!--may be taken from the _Mimbrâns_-committee, and yet the world
will wag peaceful. But touch _us_ and it is different. Let none meddle
with the men's women or with our will, or they meddle to their cost!'
She tucked the creased shawl closer around her, and squatted down once
more in the sunshine; the heavy sunshine in which those others sate
also with a sudden fierce approval in their hearts.
It was highest noon, and the sky was a blaze of molten light; so that
the shadow from a wheeling kite overhead, as it sought with keen eyes
amid the refuse of the city for some prize, circled in sharp outline
about the squalid courtyard, falling on one figure, flitting to
another, linking them together, as it were, by its hungry restless
desire.
So, for a space, there was a drowsy silence, on which the beggar's cry
for alms, as he went on his way pausing at every door in the cramped
alley, rose monotonously.
After which, Burkut, stifling a yawn, suggested that if the Heir to all
Things wished to receive his due recognition as head of the family at
the mausoleum, it was time to commence dressing; whereupon Jehân yawned
also, and demanded his shoes from Lateefa, who had just come in with a
selected bundle of kites for choice against the evening flight.
'I shall need none to-day,' said Jehân sulkily. 'My good time hath to
be wasted in dirges and prayers for a dead old woman who is naught to
me. Then,' he added aside, half to himself, with a frown, 'I must see
Lucanaster--may he roast with fire!'
'If it please God!' assented Burkut piously. Then he added, 'If it is
aught I can do--the hell-doomed being in my debt for some things--I
might drive a better bargain, perhaps.'
Jehân had not breathed a word to any one of his windfall of pearls, but
certain evidences during the last two days that he had, or expected to
have cash, had raised Burkut's curiosity.
But Jehân had no intention of having any witness to his interview,
least of all one to whom he owed money, so he turned on Burkut
insolently.
'I need no man's offices, so keep thy right hand to wash thy left!'
If there was resentment behind Burkut Ali's yellow mask, the latter hid
it successfully. 'Then I will but accompany the Nawâb to the
mausoleum,' he said deferentially. 'Its owner cannot go unattended!'
It was a motley cargo which the rickety, red-flannel-lined wagonette
(which Jehân's usurer allowed him as part of the stock-in-trade
necessary for a pension-earner) carried to the stucco tombs of dead
kings--for everything, including the dynasty itself, had been stucco at
Nushapore! First there was the Heir in his second-best coatee of
flowered green satin, then Burkut, burly in a yellow one to match, and
Lateefa, despite his calico, gayer than either by reason of his
inevitable kites. Finally there was the coachman in ragged livery, and
three attendants in rags without the livery; literal hangers-on,
clinging to the great scraper-like steps which seemed the only reliable
portions of the vehicle.
It had not far to go, however, over the white road and through the
clouds of dust; for the mausoleum stood just outside the city in a
garden that was irresistibly suggestive of a _café chantant_ by reason
of its stucco statuary, its preparations for nightly illumination, and
a generally meretricious scheme of decoration.
The tomb itself--squat, and bulging with inconsequent domes--stood on a
plinth towards one end of the garden, and from it, as the wagonette
discharged its load at the gates, came the sound of monotonous
chanting. But this hesitated, paused, ceased in a murmur of 'the
Nawâb!' as Jehân, with a new dignity in his manner, passed up the
steps, and so--with a _posse_ of cringing officials who had hurried to
meet him buzzing round like bees--entered the wide hall; for despite
the domes, despite the minarets outside, this tomb of dead kings was
nothing else within. It was just a vast oblong hall hung throughout its
length with huge, dusty, cobwebbed, glass chandeliers which, taken in
conjunction with the empty polished floor, were suggestive of a
ballroom; the dancing-saloon of the _café chantant_!
In the very centre, however, of the emptiness was a low roly-poly tomb,
above which rose a musty-fusty baldequin which had once been stately in
velvet and pearls. But the moth had fretted new patterns on the
curtains, and the cobwebs lay like torn lace on the canopy.
Nevertheless, two faintly-smouldering silver censers, standing at the
foot of the tomb, showed it not all neglected. And something else,
witness to memory, lay between the censers, under a common glass shade
such as covers the marble-and-gilt timepiece of a bogus auction, or the
dusty waxen flowers of a cheap lodging.
It was the last Nawâb's turban of state.
For the rest, the hall lay empty save for its officials; the minor
canons as it were, who still received the stipends set apart by the
deceased kings for due daily chantings of dirges, and so clustered
round Jehân with courtier-like _salaams_.
But not for long; since almost before they had conducted him to the
royal pew--an inlaid square of flooring close to the baldequin--a fresh
arrival sent them cringing and fluttering to greet it, with greed in
their hungry faces; the faces of custodians to whom strangers give
tips.
And this party of English tourists looked promising, if only
from the reluctant way in which, in obedience to a notice
on the door, they took off their hats, and then glanced round with the
'Thank-the-goodness-and-the-grace-which-on-my-birth-hath-smiled'
expression which our race learns in the nursery. For this is a frame of
mind which leads to a contemptuous tipping of inferior races.
'Guide says that's the last Johnnie's cap--beastly dirty, isn't it?'
said one in a churchy whisper, and the others nodded in churchy
silence. So, decorously--barring a faint desire to try the waltzing
capabilities of the floor on the part of a brother and sister in one
corner--they hesitated round the building with the half-shy,
half-defiant, 'thus far I _will_ go but no further' reluctance to admit
any interest in strange places of worship, which is also a sign of
race.
And Jehân from his royal square watched them, oblivious of his prayers,
until quite calmly, innocently, they included him as part of the show.
Then he rose and said to Burkut, who was praying to perfection
behind----
'I stay not for this. And we are too soon, for all thy fuss of being
late. 'Twill be a good half-hour ere the dirge begins. So I go to
Lucanaster's.--Nay!' he added hastily, as Burkut began to rise also,
'thou canst stay here, and if any of note come in my absence, tell them
I return.'
So with a cunning smile leavening his scowl at the tourists, he passed
out. In truth he was glad of the excuse which made it possible to take
no one but Lateefa, who was to be trusted--who indeed had to be trusted
in all things, since he knew all things--with him to Mr. Lucanaster's
house; for even if he had left Burkut outside during his interview,
there was no saying what the latter might not have discovered, or say
he had discovered, which would answer his purpose of pressure quite as
well! For Jehân, like most of Burkut's acquaintances, was quite aware
of the latter's method.
Five minutes after, therefore (since Mr. Lucanaster's house lay
conveniently close to the city and his numerous clients there), Jehân
found himself _tête-à-tête_ with a shrewd commercial face intent on the
scientific counting of a string of pearls with a paper-knife.
'Three, six, nine, twelve,' came Mr. Lucanaster's voice as the ivory
slipped between the triplets of pearls.
'Fifty and five,' he said finally, and Jehân nodded.
'Fifty and five,' he assented. 'What will you give me for them,
_Huzoor_?'
Mr. Lucanaster drew a despatch-box towards him, opened it, looked at a
paper, and smiled lavishly.
'Nothing, Nawâb-_sahib_,' he said calmly; 'for, to begin with, there
are five short on the string. There were sixty on it when it was
stolen.'
Jehân nearly jumped from his chair. 'Stolen!' he echoed. 'It is a
lie--they are mine--they were my mother's.'
The lavish smile continued. 'Exactly, Nawâb-_sahib_, the description
says so; and they were stolen from Government House two nights ago.'
'But I tell you it is impossible--my house was wearing them----'
'Excuse me; but you sold your mother's pearls last year! I happen to
know, because Gunga Mull, who bought them, was acting for me. You had
refused my direct offer, if you remember, and you lost a thousand
rupees in consequence. It is safer to trust me in the end,
Nawâb-_sahib_,' put in Mr. Lucanaster suavely.
'But not one string,' protested Jehân, trying to be haughty. 'This one
I kept, and if the _Huzoor_ does not wish to buy, I can sell it
elsewhere, as I did before.'
He stretched his hand for the string, but Mr. Lucanaster sate back in
his chair dangling the pearls, and looked at the Rightful Heir as a
spider looks at a fly.
'I wouldn't try if I were you, Nawâb-_sahib_,' he said slowly. 'It
might lead to--to difficulties. And the coincidence is not very--very
credible. But if you are really in need of money'--he spoke still more
slowly--'there is always the emerald. Let me see! I offered you six
thousand, didn't I?--well, let us say eight; and--and nothing to be
said about--about these----' He passed the pearls deftly through his
fingers as if appraising them, and added, 'They are really very fine
pearls, Nawâb-_sahib_, quite noticeable pearls. I haven't seen better
for a long time, so it is a pity they are unsaleable at present. By and
by, perhaps, or in some other place----'
'Does the _Huzoor_ mean----' began Jehân blusteringly.
Mr. Lucanaster looked up suddenly, sharply, drew the open despatch-box
closer, dropped the pearls into it, and closed the box with a snap. 'I
mean nothing, Nawâb-_sahib_, except that, for your own sake, those
pearls had better stay there for the present. You will only be tempted
to raise money on them in the bazaar, and as I--if I were asked my
opinion, as I certainly should be--would say they were the stolen
pearls, it is better not to run the risk of my having to give
evidence.'
'I--I will complain--I will go to the commissioner,' stammered Jehân,
completely taken aback.
'I wouldn't if I were you; a police inquiry would be the devil
to a man of your character; and meanwhile--until you let me have the
emerald--here's something for current expenses.'
Jehân looked for a moment as if he would dearly have liked to fling the
notes which Mr. Lucanaster pushed over the table to him back in the
donor's face; but he refrained. Money was always something, and some of
it might even go to pay the poisoning of this hell-doomed infidel, who
dared to pretend he thought the pearls were stolen; for Jehân was
shrewd enough to see the other's game. Not that it mattered whether he
pretended to think, or really thought. The pinch lay in that threat of
a police inquiry; and neither the truth nor the falsehood of a charge
mitigated or increased the sheer terror of that possibility.
So Jehân, _minus_ his pearls, but with five hundred rupees in his
pocket, drove back to the tomb of his dead ancestors in a tumult of
impotent anger. He felt himself closer in the toils than he had been,
and--naturally enough in a man of his sort--the utmost of his rage was
expended on the person over whom he had most power of retaliation--that
is, on Noormahal.
Why, he asked himself, had he been fool enough to let her get hold of
the emerald again? It had been within his reach, and now it was gone
again--hoarded by a foolish woman for the sake of a barren honour.
Barren? No! not altogether barren! As he stood once more in the arched
doorway of the mausoleum, this feeling came to assuage the sting of his
treatment by Mr. Lucanaster, and yet to make its smart more poignant.
For the assemblage had gathered. The chandeliers were lit, and the
myriad-hued flash of their prisms hid the dust, hid the cobwebs, and
gave a new brilliance to the mourners gathered in their appointed
places. The tourists were gone now. These were his own people. They
were waiting for him.
As he paused, a new arrival entering by a side door paused also--paused
right in front of him before the glass case containing the last king's
turban of state. So, after _salaam_-ing to it profoundly, sought the
square belonging to his rank.
Jehân gave a low savage laugh of satisfaction, and passed on to his.
Here it was the first! Here, at any rate, honour was his!
Burkut, watching him swagger over to his prayers, smiled. If this sort
of thing went on, he would have his choice of fostering a real
conspiracy or denouncing it. That was the best of having an open mind;
at least two courses were always open to one.
So, when the dirge was sung, he went and paid his respects to one or
two officials, and then, the time for gossip and kite-flying having
arrived, joined the worst company in Nushapore, where he talked
sedition and backed the paper nothingnesses as they dipped and rose an
inch or two, only to fall again, until the dusk blotted their gay
colours from the sky. But below the bastioned river wall abutting on
the railway bridge, which was the favourite meeting-place of
kite-flyers, the dusk brought out other colours to take their place;
close at hand and farther off, half-way across the river, and right
upon its farther shore, came red and green lights, steady as stars.
Until, in the far distance, a red changed to green, the signals which
had stood against the evening express dropped, and it showed upon the
bridge like some huge glowworm, slackening speed as it came; for the
station lay not two hundred yards from where the bridge ended in a
semi-fortified gateway.
So the train slid past below the bastioned wall almost at a foot's
pace, and half a dozen or more English lads, part of a fresh draft from
England just up from Bombay, thrust their heads out of the window
curious to see what this strange place, what this strange race with
which they were to have so much to do, were like.
'Well! I am blowed if they aren't flyin' kites like Christians,' said
one in a hushed voice, an' I thought they was all 'eathen, I did----'