THE TEMPLE OF VISESHWAR
Chris had followed his wife into the supper-room with the vague hope of
feeling that he had a place somewhere, that he belonged to something,
even to her. He had found her surrounded by strangers, and evidently
forgetful of his very existence.
So a resentment had come to lessen his self-pity; resentment at many
things. What right, for instance, had that proud old semi-savage to say
that such as he were no friends to India? It was a lie. Such as he were
its best friends. Yet, as he made the assertion, he knew it needed
proof. What had such as he done to show their friendship? Very little.
Even he himself----
A sudden determination to act came upon him; a resolve not to let
another day pass without showing that he, at least, knew which way true
friendship lay.
So, partly in disgust at the trivialities around him, partly from a
restless desire to think the matter out once for all, he told his wife
curtly that he was leaving the dogcart at her disposal, and passed out
through the garden into the almost deserted roads beyond.
The very thought of Shark Lane, however, was repellent in his present
frame of mind; avoiding that direction, therefore, he wandered on
aimlessly, conscious only at first that--after the glare and the
noise--the darkness, the stillness, was restful to eyes, to heart, to
brain. He did not think at all. For the time he was absolutely at
fault, utterly depolarised.
So he felt startled, roused to a definite sensation of mingled pleasure
and pain, when, forced to pull up by a shadowy void before him, he
found it was the river; that, despite the confusion in his mind, his
body had led him to the old way of salvation, to the old purification.
The night was too dark for him to see what lay before him; but his
memory held its every detail. These were the bathing-steps, and below
him lay the oldest building in Nushapore, the temple of Viseshwar.
Here, to the insignificant block of rough-hewn stone tapered to a spire
which rose square and bare from the very water, his mother had brought
him as a child. Here, with childish delight in the action, childish
disregard of its meaning, he had hung his jasmin garlands round the
smooth upright black cone, which was all the shrine held for worship;
yet which, even so, had been to his child's ignorance a god; as such in
a way familiar, comprehensible, commonplace.
But now it was neither; now to his wider knowledge it had gained so
much in mystery, in awe, by being symbol of the great incomprehensible
problem of life and death, that, as he stood in that wedding-garment of
culture--a suit of dress-clothes--looking down through the darkness to
where he knew that _lingam_ must rise, smoother, more worn by worship
than ever, a shiver ran through him at the thought that there, among
the withered chaplets at its feet, humanity had knelt for ages and
found no answer to the riddle of life.
He sat down mechanically on the uppermost of the steps, and gave
himself up, as it were, to the night, conscious of a vague content that
it should be so dark.
To begin with, it hid many things best left unseen--himself most of
all! For that meant forgetfulness of much. His dress-clothes, for
instance, and things to be classed with them! Then it hid the railway
bridge--strange sight in such environment--which spanned the river a
few yards below the little spit of rock, ending the steps, on which the
more modern temple sacred to Kâli, Shiva's consort, had been built. But
something more modern still found foothold on that same spit of rock,
though farther out, hidden below the levels of the river. This was the
first pier of the railway bridge, from which the two drawbridges--one
towards the town, the other towards the river--were worked; thus
securing the passage against attack from either side. The pier itself
rose sheer from the water, a solid block of masonry, and was prolonged
into a tower, gated at each end.
Chris, picturing it in his mind's eye, thought how quaint a neighbour
it was even to Kâli's temple, though her cult could not claim the
mystery, the significance, of the other. Hers was the cult of
ignorance, of terror; and his----
He was a Smarrta Brahmin by birth, and as he sate there in the
darkness, thinking of that upright stone--severe, rigid in its
mysticism--and then of the many-armed, bloodstained idol in the temple
beyond, a proud exultation in his own priesthood to the older cult
surged up in him.
He had almost forgotten his birthright, forgotten that he had been
called by God to a place of honour--to the place of teacher; that his
was the right to explain the mystery to the people, to show them the
way of salvation.
But he remembered it now, and all insensibly a balm came to his pain
from the knowledge of what lay about him, unseen, yet familiar. He
sate, listening to the lap of the river on the foot-worn steps,
picturing to himself its fringe of dead flower-petals from the dead
day's worship: and even the stir in the vague shadow of the _pipal_
trees, telling of the sacred monkeys who with the dawn would descend to
claim their share of offerings with the gods, seemed to still his own
restlessness.
And as he listened, feeling, more than thinking, the asceticism of many
a holy ancestor who had left the world behind to follow his ideal of
good, rose up in suggestion that he should do so also.
Why not? Why not claim his inherited right of sainthood in order to
preach his doctrine? Was not that, after all, the only thing worth
doing in this life? Was not this the only reality? Was not all else
'_Maya_' or deception?
Such glimpses of the real beyond the unreal come to most of us at
times, making us feel the spin of the round world we have deemed so
steady beneath our feet, making us feel the fixity of the stars above
us, the mysterious denial of sunset, the illimitable promise of dawn.
And when they come, peace comes with them.
It came to Krishn Davenund, making him forget the red Hammersmith
omnibus and all things pertaining thereto, as he sat feeling the
familiar touch of the darkness, until in the east, beyond the river,
the grey glimmer of coming light in the sky showed him the curved
shadow of the world's horizon, and after a time the grey glimmer of the
curved river came to show him the straight shadow of the temple.
Then, in the vague light, he stood up, with a vague light in his mind
also. As he did so, something fell from his arm. It was his wife's
shawl, which he had been carrying unconsciously all the time. As he
picked it up, the coincidence of its faint pinkish colour banished the
regret which came to him at having forgotten to give it her ere
leaving. For this was _yogi_ colour, so called because it is worn by
all ascetics.
His English wife had admired the delicate salmon-pink, and he had
therefore had her white Rampore shawl dyed that tint. Strange indeed! A
thousand times strange, that this should be close to his hand now!
The cue thus given was followed, and with a passion which stifled
his sense of bathos, he was the next instant throwing off his
dress-clothes. So, with the thin, fine shawl about his nakedness, he
passed down the steps towards the river, towards the sacrament of his
race and caste.
The chill touch of the water sent his hot blood to heart and brain. He
could scarcely keep his voice to the orthodox whisper, as he began the
secret ritual which he had not repeated for years--
'_Om! Earth! Air! Heaven! Om!_
Let us worship the supreme splendour of the Sun.
May his light lighten our darkness.'
The words blent with the silvery tinkle of the water falling back from
his upraised hands, and at the familiar sound a stir came from the
branches of the _pipal_ trees behind him; and from the shadowy water
below them a couple of shelldrakes sailed out, with their echoing cry,
to the lighter level before him.
The sound of that first libation to the gods had awakened the temple
world.
As yet, however, he and nature had worship to themselves.
Therefore, waist deep in the water, he stood free to dream once more
that he was twice born, regenerate, raised high above the herd.
Yet free also to return to the new ways if he chose, since there was
none to see, as yet----
But ere he had finished the ritual, an old man, still half asleep, came
yawning down the steps, carrying a tray of little platters filled with
coloured powders. Having reached the water's very edge, he set these in
a row, and kept an eye on Chris; for he was the _pujâri_ of the temple,
with the right, for a small fee, to re-mark the bathers with their
proper caste marks.
'What race, my son?' he asked drowsily, as Chris came up out of the
river.
The question sent a vast pride through the young man. With bare limbs
scarce hidden by the dripping shawl, he stood hesitating for a brief
second, and then squatted down beside the familiar earthen platters.
'Brahmin. _Shiv-bakht_,'[11] he said.
The old man _salaamed_ ere reaching for the sacred white gypsum, which
is brought from the snows of Amar-nath; and once more that pride of
race swept through the soul whose body awaited its sign of election.
But the swift cold touch on his forehead which followed woke Chris to
realities, to the question 'Do I mean it?' And the whispering kiss of
other bare feet upon the steps warned him that, if he wished time for
deliberation, he must remove his tell-tale garments of civilisation
before the light made them manifest. If these were hidden away, he
himself, in his _yogi_ coloured shawl, could easily pass muster;
especially if he retreated to the least-frequented part of the steps,
where they ended in a ruined wall, split by the _pipal_ tree-roots.
Here, then, he found some convenient crevices for his clothes, and
after spreading his shawl to dry in orthodox fashion, sat down beside
it in the recognised attitude of meditation, his arms crossed on his
knees, his chin resting on them. He was not likely to be recognised,
even by broad daylight; for the companions of his later years were not
of those who worship.
He would have leisure therefore to think, to decide. But once more he
reckoned without himself, without the swift response of his senses to
the once familiar sights and sounds. The causeless laughter of women
filling their water-pots, the tinkle of their anklets, the cries of the
flower-sellers, the ceaseless splash of water falling on water, the
very leapings and chatterings of the monkeys, putting off time in play
till the bathings should end in offerings--all these made connected
thought impossible, while eyes and ears were open.
In despair at last, he flung the half-dried shawl over his head,
stuffed his fingers into his ears, and, leaning back against a
tree-trunk, tried to forget where he was; tried not to feel those white
bars on his forehead which seemed to burn into his brain. But, in the
effort to answer that question, 'Shall I go or stay?'--the effort to
remember and yet to forget, he fell into dreamland; finally into sleep.
And as he slept, Fate took the answer into her own hands, and turned
his tragedy into comedy; for a small and curious monkey who had watched
the secretion of those dress-clothes from afar, took advantage of his
slumbers to creep down stealthily to a crevice, and make off with its
contents--namely, a pair of trousers!
The monkey, however, being small, was soon dispossessed of his prize; a
bigger one claimed it, and sent the first owner to whimper and gibber
indignation from the topmost branches, and then grin fiendishly as a
yet bigger one despoiled _his_ despoiler. And so, unerringly, the
garment of culture passed to the stronger, till the biggest old male of
the lot, after inspecting every seam and trying to crack every button,
conceived that it _must_ be some kind of adornment, and, after hanging
the legs, stolewise, in front, the seat, cloakwise, behind, crossed its
arms over its stomach, feeling satisfied it had solved that problem.
Meanwhile, Chris had awakened to the impossibility of remaining where
he was; for even his brief return to the normal in sleep had been
sufficient to convince him of the hopelessness of attempting to return
to that older standpoint. So, the day having advanced with the giant
strides of an Indian dawn, he rose to retrieve his clothes, and sneak
off with them to some quiet spot.
As he did so, however, the sight of some one standing just above him
made him squat down again and cover himself once more with the shawl.
For it was his new foreman of works, John Ellison, who from the top of
the steps was looking down affably, nodding to the old _pujâri_ (who
had by this time a circle of customers awaiting hall-mark), and humming
the baptismal hymn which begins, 'In token that thou shalt not fear,'
between the salutations of '_Ram-ram_' (pronounced with a short _a_)
which he showered on the bathers as they passed and repassed.
''Tis Jân-Ali-shân,' said one in answer to a question from a stranger.
'He feeds the monkeys.'
'And when Sri Hunumân's monkeys are fed by him, the feasting of Sri
Yama's[12] crocodiles is not far off,' put in a listener, emphasising
his allusion to the God of Death by a placid look towards a
tinsel-bound corpse swung to a bamboo, which two men were carrying
slantways across the steps to the burning place below the railway
bridge.
More than one amongst the bathers, overhearing the remark, nodded
assent, and looked with a vague fear at the loafer who had seated
himself a few steps down, and taken off his battered billy-cock; for
being Sunday he was off duty and uniform.
'_Ram-ram_,' he said, with a general wave of the hand. So it's the old
game still. Sunlight soap, monkey brand, and A1 copper-bottomed at
Lloyd's doing a fire insurance! Lordy Lord! I might 'ave bin 'ere last
Sunday, instead o' last year. An' 'ows Mr. 'Oneyman?'
The last word, intended for Hunumân, evidently conveyed a meaning to
the whole remark, for many faces grinned, and the old _pujâri_ salaamed
with all the difficult gravity of a child who knows some time-worn jest
is nigh.
'Sri Hunumân hath been well, since the _Huzoor_ fed him on quinine
pills hid in Shiv-_jee's_ raisins last year. Ho! ho! ho! that was a
spectacle!'
A priest with a trident on his forehead chuckled too. 'Yea! he is
strong. He stole the sugar yesterday from Mai Kâli's very lap. Lo! even
the monkeys know that offerings should be left at Shiv-jee's feet!'
He spoke at a group of villagers who, in tow of a rival priest, were
taking their offerings to the further temple.
John Ellison laughed.
'"'Ow 'appy could I be with either,"'
he chanted. 'Wot! Ain't Shiver and Kâli settled that "_biz_" yet?
W'y don't they get a divorce for bigamy both sides? Not as I care a
d--n,'--he went on in his vile lingo in which all was English save the
nouns and verbs, the latter having but one tense--the imperative.
'Siree 'Oneyman's my fancy. He as 'its 'im 'its me, Jân-Ali-shân. An'
let me tell you that ain't no '_arnsiki bat_.[13] It's _zulm_ an'
_ficker_ an' _burra hurra affut_!'
These astounding equivalents for tyranny, trouble, and great
misfortune, he used with intent; for he liked to trade on his
reputation as a bird of ill-omen. 'Meanwhile,' he continued, chucking a
_pice_ to the _pujâri_ with that extreme affability which made even the
most alarmed exclude him, personally, from any share in the coming
evil, 'seeing as I was branded A1 as a babby I won't trouble you agin,
sonny; but there's your fee all the same. So now for Siree 'Oneyman!'
He drew out a paper of sugar drops as he spoke, and, scattering some on
the steps, began to sing
'Click, click!
Like a monkey on a stick.'
The effect was magical. Every leaf of the _pipals_ rustled as the
monkeys, recognising his call, swung themselves downward from branch to
branch.
The bathers paused, full of smiles for this common interest shown by
one of the aliens who are so often far beyond their simplicity.
Even Chris could not help a smile, despite the anxiety he was in, as he
watched the monkeys close in on the sugar drops, quarrelling, pouching,
reaching round with all four paws: with the exception of one monkey, a
very large male, which, coming lamentably last, only used three; the
fourth, meanwhile, clutching convulsively at its stomach.
'W'y, 'Oneyman?' came John Ellison's mellow voice, full of sympathy,
'w'ot 's up, sonny? Got the cramps?--ate somethin' yer don't
like?'--he paused, stared--'W'y! w'otever----' he paused again, and out
of the fulness of his bewilderment wandered off helplessly into--
'She wore a wreath of roses.'
But poor Chris, far off as he was, had grasped the truth and turned hot
and cold, long before Jân-Ali-shân said in an awed whisper--
'Wherever in the nation _did_ 'ole 'Oneyman raise them dress bags?' He
turned to the bystanders appealingly as he spoke, but their faces, as
they gathered round in a circle, echoed his own surprise.
'Well, I am dashed!' he said softly; 'this beats cockfightin'.'
It did, for Sri Hunumân having by this time grasped the fact that
dignity was incompatible with dinner, had thrown the former aside, and
having rolled the trousers hastily into a ball, had sat down on it, as
on a cushion, while he reached round for sugar drops with both paws.
Whereupon the original thief, thinking he saw an opportunity, made a
snatch at the braces, which still streamed over the steps. To no
purpose, however, since 'Oneyman only clapped both paws behind, and,
the cushion still _in situ_, hopped to another place.
A roar of amusement echoed out over the steps, and half-a-dozen
youngsters, fired with ambition, tried the same game; also without
success. Sri Honeyman eluded every clutch, even the despairing one
which Chris, muffled to the eyes in his ascetic's shawl, laid on those
streaming braces. They came off in his hands to the crowd's huge
delight.
"_Ari_, brother, thou hast the tail anyhow!" said some in
congratulation, but poor Chris cursed inwardly. What were braces
without the trousers to wear with them?
John Ellison, meanwhile, half choked with laughter, and drunk with
mirth, was rolling about, kicking legs and arms, and shouting, "Go it,
'Oneyman! Go it, sonny!" until from some of the disappointed came the
murmur that Jân-Ali-shân had better try and get the trousers himself,
though all Mai Kâli's priests with sticks and staves had not been equal
to making the old monkey give up the sugar! On this he rose
breathlessly and looked round.
"You bet," he said, "it's Rule Britannier, that's w'ot it is."
Whereupon he took another paper bag of sugar drops from his pocket and
walked up to the culprit.
"_Shab-bash!_ 'Oneyman," he said, with his usual affability, "you done
that uncommon well. If ever you're in want of the shiny, they'd give
you a fiver for that interlood at a music 'all. But time's up, sonny.
Your turn's over. So just you change bags like a good boy or "--The
rest of the sentence was a melodious whistling of
"Britons never, never will be slaves,"
a dexterous emptying of the bribe, and an equally dexterous clutch at
the trousers, accompanied by a forcible kick behind. The three combined
were instantly successful, and there was Jân-Ali-shân carefully dusting
his new possession. Then he held them up, and said suavely--
"Fair exchange ain't no robbery; but if any gent owns these pants, let
'im utter"--which remark he translated in hideous Hindustani into "_Koi
admi upna breeches hai, bolo!_"
For one short second Chris felt inclined to brave the situation. Then,
as usual, he hesitated; so the moment of salvation passed. John Ellison
rolled up his prize, put them under his arm, and with a general
"_Ram-ram_" to the bystanders, and an affectionate wave of the hand to
old 'Oneyman, walked off cheerily whistling,
"This is no my plaid, my plaid, my plaid."
Chris looked after him helplessly, then went back to his tree
hopelessly. He could not return home, by broad daylight, in any
possible permutation or combination of a swallow-tailed coat and a
devotee's _dhoti_. The only thing to be done was to wait for kindly
concealing night.
Being Sunday, he would not be missed till noon, for his wife was a late
riser. Even then she would not be alarmed; indeed, he had often stayed
out all day without her taking the trouble to ask where he had been.
That thought decided him to stay where and as he was. Besides, despite
the shameful absurdity of the cause, the result was in a way, pleasant.
It was something to be _sent_ back without responsibility to the old
life even for a few hours, and a spirit of adventure woke in him as he
remembered the things possible to one of his caste. Any one, for
instance, would feed a Brahmin; and so, after secreting the remainder
of his clothes beyond the reach of monkeys under a heap of the ruined
wall, until he found an opportunity of removing them altogether, he set
off boldly to beg breakfast in the city. The sun, now high in the
heavens, smote on his bare limbs--so long unaccustomed to the warm
stimulating caress--with all the intoxication of a new physical
pleasure. But there was another touch, still more stimulating, which
came to him first in a narrow side street close to the city gate; a
street all sun and shade in bars, with women's chatter, women's
laughter echoing from within the courtyard doors. Doors all closed save
this, the first, which had opened at his cry for alms, to let a woman's
hand slip through. That reverent touch on his palm, so soft, so kind;
that glimpse of a full petticoat, a jewel-covered throat, made his
brain reel with recollection, his heart leap with the possibilities it
suggested. How many years was it since he had seen a Brahmin woman
worshipping her husband? That had been his mother, and he might have
had such a wife as she had been to his father, if he had chosen;
almost, if he chose.
The suggestion repelled yet attracted him, and, after a time,
half in curiosity, half in affection, he turned his steps to the
well-remembered alley where his mother still lived. He had been to see
her, of course, when he first returned to India, but inevitably as an
alien; and after his refusal to do penance, he had not gone at all. She
had, in fact, refused to receive him. So his heart beat as he stood
muffled in his devotee's drapery before the door, through which he had
so often passed to worship clinging to her skirts, and gave his
beggar's cry--
'_Alakh!_ for Shiv's sake.'
There was no need to repeat it; for this was a pious house. The low
door opened wide, and a young girl held out an alms with the mechanical
precision of practice.
'For Shiv's sake,' she echoed monotonously, 'and for the sake of a son
who has wandered from the true fold.'
Her voice held no trace of feeling, but Chris fell back with a stifled
cry. For he knew what the words meant; knew that he was the wanderer.
So, for a second, the girl stood surprised, hesitating. She was
extraordinarily beautiful. A slender slip of a girl about fourteen,
with a long round throat poising the delicate oval of her face, and
black lashes sweeping to meet the bar of her brows above her soft
velvety eyes. There was a likeness still to the little orphan cousin
who had come to make one more mouth to feed in the patriarchal
household when he was a big boy just keen for college: the girl-child
over whom his mother had smiled mysteriously, and talked of the years
to come when the head of the house would have had his fill of education
for his boy, and permit marriage. Yes, this was she, his cousin, little
Naraini.
'There is naught amiss, my lord,' she said suddenly, drawing back in
her turn with an offended air. 'I too am Brahmin, my hand is pure.'
So, indignantly, she dropped her alms of parched wheat into the gutter,
and slammed the door.
Chris, down on his knees, his blood on fire, picked every grain up, and
then, his head in a greater whirl than ever, made his way back to the
river steps, to his hidden clothes, to the last hold he had on Western
life and thought.
The steps were almost deserted in the noontide; therefore, wearied out
with his vigil of the night and the excitement of the day, he lay down
deliberately to sleep, feeling even this--this possibility of going to
bed without one--to be a relief after all the paraphernalia of pillows,
mattresses, blankets, and sheets.
When he woke, the sun had begun to sink, and the stream of worship was
setting templewards again. But the crowd was a different one; more
temporal, less spiritual. More eager for gossip, less concerned with
salvation; and Chris, who had gained confidence in his disguise by this
time, left the shadow of the trees in order to listen to the talk. Even
to such as he, it was an opportunity of gauging the mind of the
multitude, which did not often present itself; and, being refreshed by
his long sleep, he saw clearly that he, personally, might find this a
useful experience.
The wildness of the rumours current, however, the absurdity of the
beliefs he heard put forward, were beyond his patience, and more than
once he drew down an unwelcome interest in himself by his flat denials.
His disguise, however--if it could be called a disguise seeing that he
was, indeed, what he professed to be--held out, and so, by degrees, he
grew bolder; telling himself that the day would not be lost if he could
begin to practise what he had preached in Shark Lane, and raise his
voice for the truth's sake.
It was not, however, till the first twinkling lights of the evening
service showed in the temples, and the red and green signals on the
railway bridge answered the challenge, that he found himself in the
position he had advocated; that is one in opposition to many.
He did not shrink from the situation when it came; he had too much grit
for that.
"It is a lie," he reasserted, and turning to the larger crowd beyond
the listening few, raised his voice.
"Listen, friends, and I will tell you why it is not true that this
golden paper fell from Heaven into Kâli's temple. Why, her priests lie
when they say it did. Listen, for I am Brahmin. I know the gods and
their ways, and I know the _Huzoors_ and their ways also."
"Who is the lad? he speaks well," passed in murmurs among the crowd
which closed in to see and hear better. Chris pulled himself together
as he stood, his figure showing clear against the light that lingered
on the river.
"Who am I?" he echoed. "Listen, and I will tell you; I am twice born,
regenerate--a Brahmin of the Brahmins."
There was sudden stir in the crowd, a murmur, 'Let her pass--she
knows.' And then in that clear space where he stood, a woman stood
also; a Hindoo widow, with bare arm uplifted from her white shroud.
'Lie not, Krishn Davenund!' she said. 'Thou art outcast, accursed! I,
thy mother, say it.' The face, clear cut, pale with continued fasting,
showed no pain, no regret, only stern reproof. 'Thou art not twice-born
now. Oh! son of my desolation,' she went on, her voice shrilling as she
spoke, 'thou art twice-dead. Go back to thy new ways, to thy new wife!'
A sudden stretch of her hand towards the scarlet-clad young girl,
shrinking by her side, told its tale of something more bitter than
bigotry; of a mother's jealousy.
Chris, who had fallen back from that unexpected betrayal, gave a hasty
glance round, and what he saw in the faces of the crowd made him
realise his position.
'Hush, mother!' he began; but it was too late.
Her story was well known among the priests. They were in arms at once,
and, ere a minute passed, Chris found himself at bay, ankle deep in the
water into which he had been driven, his back against the sacred temple
of Viseshwar: so adding to his crime by its defilement.
'Listen!' he called.
But the crowd were already past that, and the cries 'He is a spy!' 'He
hath defiled us!' 'Whom hath he not touched?' 'He hath been here all
day!' 'He is sent to make us Christians!' rose on all sides.
Chris, his back to the temple, set his teeth. Beyond the crowd, that
was kept at a yard's distance yet by something in his face, he could
see two women, scarlet and white robed, sobbing in each other's arms,
and the sight made him savage for their pain.
'How can I defile you?' he cried; 'I am Brahmin. Yonder is my mother.
My father all know. Who dares to take my birthright from me?'
'Who? thyself!' came viciously from the foremost row of priests. 'Where
is thy sacred thread, apostate?'
Chris flinched for the first time. It was true. In a fit of anger when
his own received him not, he had removed the badge of the twice-born
with his own hands. So he had nothing to which he could appeal. Nothing
old or new!
'Listen!' he began again helplessly, and the crowd feeling the
helplessness surged closer.
'Kill him!' said one voice, dominating the others by the very
simplicity of its advice. 'He is nothing. He is not of us, nor of the
_Huzoors_. Who wants him?'
Another instant and the advice might have been followed had not some
one claimed poor Chris--had not a voice from behind said softly--
'Well! I'm dashed if it ain't the guv'nor! Now then! you niggers!'
The next instant, with a plentiful if quite good-natured use of heels
and elbows, Chris Davenant's foreman of works was through the crowd
into the water, and so, facing round on those threatening faces, was
backing towards Chris, and making furious feints with his fists the
while.
'_Ram-ram_, gents,' he said affably. 'Now, w'ot you've got to do is to
tell me w'ot all this is about. W'ot are you doin' to my guv'nor? Don't
you speak, sir!' he added in a hasty whisper. 'I don't really want to
know nothing. You and me's got to get out o' this galley, thet's all.
An' if we don't,' he continued philosophically, 'you'll 'ave to explain
up top, and I kin listen then. Them kind o' words ain't no use down
'ere. Lem'me speak mine!'
With that he ceased sparring, walked two paces forwards in the water,
put his hands in his trousers-pockets, and began on his lingo coolly--
'_Dekko_ (look here), you want this _âdmi_ (man) _abhi_ (now), but you
ain't goin' to get 'im. _Tumhâra nahin_ (not yours). He's mine, _mera
âdmi_ (my man), _sumjha_? (do you understand?) If you want _lurro_
(fight), come on. You shall 'ave a bellyful, an' there'll be a plenty
on you to _phânsi_ (hang). But w'ot I say is, don't be _pârgul soors_
(foolish pigs). I don't do your bally 'ole temples any 'arm. It's
"_durm shaster ram-ram_[14] an' _hurry gunga_," so far's I care. But
this man's my guv'nor. You don't touch 'im. _Kubhi nahin_ (never). I'm
a _nek âdmi, burra usseel_ (virtuous man, very gentle) w'en I'm took
the right way; contrariwise I'm _zulm_ an' _ficker_ an' _burra burra
affut_. Now you ask ole 'Oneyman if I ain't. 'E knows both sides o'
Jân-Ali-shân, and 'e'll give 'is opinion, like the genl'eman 'e is.'
He paused, for an idea, a chance had suggested itself. Then at the top
of his voice, with a devil-may-care lilt in it, he began--
'Click, click?
Like a monkey on a stick.'
The answer followed in a second. With rustlings and boundings the
monkeys came to the rescue of the familiar voice; for the crowd behind,
weary of being unable to see what was passing in front, turned
instinctively to the new interest, and so, losing cohesion, the
multitude lost unity of purpose also for the moment.
'Now's your time, sir,' shouted John Ellison; 'keep close to me!' Then
with a wild yell of
'Clear the decks, comrades,'
he rushed head down at the fat stomach of the chief priest, bowled him
over, and treating the rest as he would have treated a crush at
football, found himself, with Chris at his heels, on the top of the
steps almost before the crowd had realised what was happening.
'Pull up, sir,' he said, pausing breathlessly; 'never run a hinch more
nor you can 'elp with niggers. An' they'll be all right now we're off
them steps. I know 'em! As peaceable a lot as ever lived, if you don't
touch their wimmin or their gods.'
And with that he turned to the peaceable lot with his usual urbanity.
'_Ram-ram_, gents. I done you no 'arm, and you done me no 'arm. That's
as it should be. So good afternoon. _Salaam alackoom!_--Now then, sir,
you come along to my diggin's an' get your pants.'
But as they hurried off to the Strangers' Home, he shook his head
gravely.
'If it hadn't bin for my bein' in a surplus chore seven year, and so
knowin'
"Lord a' mercy"
to the Ten Commandments, and my dooty to my neighbour, you'd never a
wore breeches agin, sir, for I wouldn't never ave come back to them
steps with a prick in my conshinse, sir, for fear as there was more in
them dress pants than meets the eye, as the sayin' is; though why the
nation, savin' your presence, sir, you come to took 'em off, beats me!'
Chris told him. Told him the whole story, as he might not, perhaps,
have told a better man, and John Ellison listened decorously,
respectfully. It was not till Chris, attired in the fateful garments,
with his subordinate's white uniform coat superadded and the devotee's
shawl twined as a turban (since it had not been deemed feasible to
recover the rest of the dress-suit that night), was ready to return to
civilisation, that John Ellison ventured on a parting remark.
'It's the onsartainty, sir, that does the mischief. Beer's beer, an'
whisky's whisky. It's when you come to mixin' 'em that you dun'no where
you are. It taste beastly to begin with, and then it don't make a chap,
so to speak, punctooal drunk. So it throws 'im out o' reckonin', and
makes 'im onsartin--an' that don't work in
"Hinjia's coral strand."'