When the merchant's tent had been erected, and he had gone to its
shelter, the jamadars, sitting well beyond the reach of his ears, held
a council of war. Ajeet was opposed to the killing of Ragganath and
his men, but Hunsa pointed out that it was the only way: they were
either decoits or they were men of toil, men of peace. Dead men were
not given to carrying tales, and if no stir were made about the decoity
until they were safely back in Karowlee they could enjoy the fruits Of
their spoils, which would be, undoubtedly, great. By the use of the
strangling cloth there would be no outcry, no din of battle; they of
the village would think that the camp was one of sleep. Then when the
bodies had been buried in a pit, the earth tramped down flat and solid,
and cooking fires built over it to obliterate all traces of a grave,
they would strike camp and go back the way they had come.
Ajeet was forced to admit that it was the one thorough way, but he
persisted that they were decoits and not thugs.
At this Sookdee laughed: "Jamadar," he said, "what matters to a dead
man the manner of his killing? Indeed it is a merciful way. Such as
Bhowanee herself decreed--in a second it is over. But with the spear,
or the sword--ah! I have seen men writhe in agony and die ten times
before it was an end."
"But a caste is a caste," Ajeet objected, "and the manner of the caste.
We are decoits, and we only slay when there is no other way."
Hunsa tipped his gorilla body forward from where it rested on his heels
as he sat, and his lowering eyes were sullen with impatience:
"Chief Ajeet," he snarled, "think you that we can rob the _seth_ of his
treasure without an outcry--and if there is an outcry, that he will not
go back to those of his caste in Poona, and when trouble is made, think
you that the Dewan will thank us for the bungling of this? And as to
the matter of a thug or a decoit, half our men have been taught the art
of the strangler. With these,"--and extending his massive arms he
closed his coarse hands in a gnarled grip,--"with these I would, with
one sharp in-turn on the _roomal_, crack the neck of the merchant and
he would be dead in the taking of a breath. And, Ajeet, if this that
is the manner of men causes you fear--"
"Hunsa," and Ajeet's voice was constrained in its deadliness, "that
ass's voice of yours will yet bring you to grief."
But Sookdee interposed:
"Let us not quarrel," he said. "Ajeet no doubt has in his mind Bootea
as I have Meena. And it would be well if the two were sent on the road
in the cart, and when our work is completed we will follow. Indeed
they may know nothing but that there is some jewel, such as women love,
to be given them."
"Look you," cried Hunsa thrusting his coarse hand out toward the road,
"even Bhowanee is in favour. See you not the jackal?"
Turning their eyes in the direction Hunsa indicated, a jackal was seen
slinking across the road from right to left.
"Indeed it is an omen," Sookdee corroborated; "if on our journeys to
commit a decoity that is always a good omen."
"And there is the voice!" Hunsa exclaimed, as the tremulous lowing of a
cow issued from the village.
He waved a beckoning hand to Guru Lal, for they had brought with them
their tribal priest as an interpreter of omens chiefly. "Is not the
voice of the cow heard at sunset a good omen, Guru?" he demanded.
"Indeed it is," the priest affirmed. "If the voice of a cow is heard
issuing at twilight from a village at which decoits are to profit, it
is surely a promise from Bhowanee that a large store of silver will be
obtained."
"Take thee to thy prayers, Guru," Ajeet commanded, "for we have matters
to settle." He turned to Sookdee. "Your omens will avail little if
there is prosecution over the disappearance of the merchant. I am
supposed to be in command, the leader, but I am the led. But I will
not withdraw, and it is not the place of the chief to handle the
_roomal_. We will eat our food, and after the evening prayers will sit
about the fire and amuse this merchant with stories such as honest men
and holy ones converse in, that he may be at peace in his mind. As
Sookdee says, the women will be sent to the grove of trees we came
through on the road."
"We will gather about the fire of the merchant," Sookdee declared, "for
it is in the mango grove and hidden from sight of the villagers. Also
a guard will be placed between here and the village, and one upon the
roadway."
"And while we hold the merchant in amusement," Hunsa added, "men will
dig the pits here, two of them, each within a tent so that they will
not be seen at work."
"Yes, Ajeet," Sookdee said with a suspicion of a sneer, "we will give
the merchant the consideration of a decent burial, and not leave him to
be eaten by jackals and hyenas as were the two soldiers you finished
with your sword when we robbed the camel transport that carried the
British gold in Oudh."
"If it is to be, cease to chatter like jays," Ajeet answered crossly.
In keeping with their assumed characters, the evening meal was ushered
in with a peace-shattering clamour from the drums and a raucous blare
from conch-shell horns. Then the devout murderers offered up prayers
of fervency to the great god, beseeching their more immediate branch of
the deity, Bhowanee, to protect them.
And at the same time, just within the mud walls of Sarorra, its people
were placing flowers and cocoanuts and sweetmeats upon the shrine of
the god of their village.
Just without the village gate the elephant-nosed Ganesh sat looking in
whimsical good nature across his huge paunch toward the place of crime,
the deep shadow that lay beneath the green-leafed mango trees.
In the hearts of the Bagrees there was unholy joy, an eager
anticipation, a gladsome feeling toward Bhowanee who had certainly
guided this rapacious merchant with his iron box full of jewels to
their camp.
Indeed they would sacrifice a buffalo at her temple of Kajuria, for
that was the habit of their clan when the booty was great. The taking
of life was but an incident. In Hindustan humans came up like flies,
returning over and over to again encumber the crowded earth. In the
vicissitudes of life before long the merchant would pass for a
reincorporation of his soul, and probably, because of his sins as an
oppressor of the poor, come back as a turtle or a jackass; certainly
not as a revered cow--he was too unholy. In the gradation of humans he
was but a merchant of the caste of the third dimension in the great
quartette of castes. It would not be like killing a Brahmin, a sin in
the sight of the great god.
This philosophy was as subtle as the perfume of a rose, unspoken, even
at the moment a floaty thought. Like their small hands and their erect
air of free-men, the Rajput atmosphere, it had grown into their created
being, like the hunting instinct of a Rampore hound.
The merchant, smoking his _hookah_, having eaten, observed with keen
satisfaction the evening devotions of the supposed mendicants. As it
grew dark their guru was offering up a prayer to the Holy Cow, for she
was to be worshipped at night. The merchant's appreciation was largely
a worldly one, a business sense of insurance--safety for his jewels and
nothing to pay for security--men so devout would have the gods in their
mind and not robbery. When the jamadars, and some of the Bagrees who
were good story tellers, and one a singer, did him the honour of coming
to sit at his camp-fire he was pleased.
"Sit you here at my right," he said to Hunsa, for he conceived him to
be captain of the Raja's guard.
Sookdee and the others, without apparent motive, contrived it so that a
Bagree or two sat between each of the merchant's men, engaging them in
pleasant speech, tendering tobacco. And, as if in modesty, some of the
Bagrees sat behind the retainers.
"This is indeed a courtesy," the merchant assured Hunsa; "a poor trader
feels honoured by a visit from so brave a soldier as the captain of the
Raja's guard."
He noticed, too, with inward satisfaction, that the jamadars had left
their weapons behind, which they had done in a way of not arousing
their victim's fears.
"Would not it be deemed a courtesy," the merchant asked, "if one like
myself, who is a poor trader, should go to pay his respects to the Raja
ere he retires, for of course it would be beneath his dignity to come
to his servant?"
"No, indeed," declared Hunsa quickly, thinking of the graves that were
even then being dug; "he is a man of a haughty temper, and when he is
in the society of the beautiful dancing girl who is with him, he cares
not to be disturbed. Even now he is about to escort her in the cart
down the road to where there is a shrine that women of that caste make
offering to."
It had been arranged that Ajeet would escort Bootea, with two Bagrees
as attendants, to the grove of trees half a mile down the road. He had
insisted on this in the way of a negative support to the murder. As
there would be no fighting this did not reflect on his courage as a
leader. And as to complicity, Hunsa knew that as the leader of the
party, Ajeet would be held the chief culprit. It was always the leader
of a gang of decoits who was beheaded when captured, the others perhaps
escaping with years of jail. And Hunsa himself, even Sookdee, would be
safe, for they were in league with the Dewan.
There was an hour of social talk; many times Hunsa fingered the
_roomal_ that was about his waist; the yellow-and-white strangling
cloth with which Bhowanee had commanded her disciples, the thugs, to
kill their victims. In one corner of it was tied a silver rupee for
luck. The natural ferocity of his mind threw him into an eager
anticipation: he took pride in his proficiency as a strangler; his
coarse heavy hands, like those of a Punjabi wrestler, were suited to
the task. Grasping the cloth at the base of a victim's skull, tight to
the throat, a side-twist inward and the trick was done, the spine
snapped like a pipe-stem. And he had been somewhat out of practice--he
had regretted that; he was fearful of losing the art, the knack.
About the fat paunch of the merchant was a silver-studded belt. Hunsa
eyed this speculatively. Beyond doubt in its neighbourhood would be
the key to the iron box; and when its owner lay on his back, his
bulbous eyes glaring upward to where the moon trickled through the
thick foliage of the mango tree beneath which they sat, he would seize
the keys and be first to dabble his grimy fingers in the glittering
gems.
Beyond, the village had hushed--the strident call of voices had ceased.
Somewhere a woman was pounding grain in a wooden mortar--a dull
monotonous "thud, thud, swish, thud" carrying on the dead air.
Night-jars were circling above the trees, their plaintive call,
"chy-eece, chy-e-ece!" filtering downward like the weird cry of
spirits. Once the deep sonorous bugling note of a _saurus_, like the
bass pipe of an organ, smote the stillness as the giant crane winged
his way up the river that lay beyond, a mighty ribbon of silver in the
moonlight. A jackal from the far side of the village, in the fields,
raised a tremulous moan.
Sookdee looked into the eyes of Hunsa and he understood. It was the
_tibao_, the happiest augury of success, for it came over the right
shoulder of the victim.
Hunsa, feeling that the moment to strike had come, rose carelessly,
saying: "Give me tobacco."
That was a universal signal amongst thugs, the command to strike.
Even as he uttered the words Hunsa had slipped behind the merchant and
his towel was about the victim's neck. Each man who had been assigned
as a strangler, had pounced upon his individual victim; while Sookdee
stood erect, a knife in his hand, ready to plunge it into the heart of
any one who was likely to overcome his assailant.
Hunsa had thrown the helpless merchant upon his face, and with one knee
between his shoulder-blades had broken the neck; no sound beyond a
gurgling breath of strangulation had passed the Hindu's lips. There
had been no clamour, no outcry; nothing but a few smothered words,
gasps, the scuffle of feet upon the earth; it was like a horrible
nightmare, a fantastic orgy of murderous fiends. The flame of the
campfire flickered sneers, drawn torture, red and green shadows in the
staring faces of the men who lay upon the ground, and the figures of
the stranglers glowed red in its light, like devils who danced in hell.
Hunsa had turned the merchant upon his back and his evil gorilla face
was thrust into the face of his victim. No breath passed the thick
protruding lips upon which was a froth of death.
As the Jamadar tore the keys from the waist-band, snapping a silver
chain that was about the body, he said: "Sookdee, be quick. Have the
bodies carried to the pits. Do not forget to drive a spear through
each belly lest they swell up and burst open the earth."
"You have the keys to the chest, Hunsa?" Sookdee said, with suspicion
in his voice.
"Yes, Jamadar; I will open it. We will empty it, and place the iron
box on top of the bodies in a pit, for it is too heavy to carry, and if
we are stopped it might be observed."
"Take the dead," Sookdee commanded the Bagrees; "lay them out; take
down the tents that are over the pits, and by that time I will be there
to count these dead things in the way of surety that not one has
escaped with the tale.
"Come," he said to Hunsa, "together we will go to the iron box and open
it; then there can be no suspicion that the men of Alwar have been
defrauded."
Hunsa turned malignant eyes upon Sookdee, but, keys in hand, strode
toward the tent.
Sookdee, thrusting in the fire a torch made from the feathery bark of
the _kujoor_ tree, followed.
Hunsa kneeling before the iron box was fitting the keys into the double
locks. Then he drew the lids backward, and the two gasped at a glitter
of precious stones that lay beneath a black velvet cloth Hunsa stripped
from the gems.
Sookdee cried out in wonderment; and Hunsa, slobbering gutturals of
avarice, patted the gems with his gorilla paws. He lifted a large
square emerald entwined in a tracery of gold, delicate as the
criss-cross of a spider's web, and held it to his thick lips.
"A bribe for a princess!" he gloated. "Take you this, Sookdee, and
hide it as you would your life, for a gift to the son of the Peshwa,
who, methinks, is behind the Dewan in this, we will be men of honour.
And this"--a gleaming diamond in a circlet of gold--"for Sirdar
Baptiste," and he rolled it in his loin cloth. "And this,"--a string
of pearls, that as he laid it on the black velvet was like the tears of
angels,--"This for the fat pig of a Dewan to set his four wives at each
other's throats. Let not the others know of these, Sookdee, of these
that we have taken for the account."
Suddenly there was a clamour of voices, cries, the clang of swords, the
sharp crash of a shot, and the two jamadars, startled, eyes staring,
stood with ears cocked toward the tumult.
"Soldiers!" Sookdee gasped. His hand brushed Hunsa's bare arm as he
thrust it into the chest and brought it forth clasping jewels, which he
tied in a knot of his waistcloth. "Take you something, Hunsa, and lock
the box till we see," he said darting from the tent.
Hunsa filled a pocket of his brocaded Jacket, but he was looking for
the Akbar Lamp, the ruby. He lifted out a tray and ran his grimy hands
through the maze of gold and silver wrought ornaments below. His
fingers touched, at the very bottom, a bag of leather. He tore it
open, and a blaze of blood-red light glinted at him evilly where a ruby
caught the flame of the torch that Sookdee had thrown to the earth
floor as he fled.
With a snarl of gloating he rolled the ruby in a fold of his turban,
locked the box, and darted after Sookdee.
He all but fell over the seven dead bodies of the merchant and his men
as he raced to where a group was standing beyond. And there three more
bodies lay upon the ground, and beside them, held, were two horses.
"It is Ajeet Singh," Sookdee said pointing to where the Chief lay with
his head in the lap of a decoit. "These two native soldiers of the
English came riding in with swiftness, for behind them raced Ajeet who
must have seen them pass."
"And here," another added, "as the riders checked at sight of the dead,
Ajeet pulled one from his horse and killed him, but the other, with a
pistol, shot Ajeet and he is dead."
"The Chief is not dead," said the one who held his head in his lap; "he
is but shot in the shoulder, and I have stopped the blood with my hand."
"And we have killed the other soldier," another said, "for, having seen
the bodies, we could not let him live."
From Sookdee's hand dangled a coat of one of the dead.
"This that is a leather purse," he said, "contains letters; the red
thing on them I have looked upon before--it is the seal of the Englay.
It was here in the coat of that one who is a sergeant--the other being
a soldier."
He put the leather case within the bosom of his shirt, adding: "This
may even be of value to the Dewan. Beyond that, there was little of
loot upon these dogs of the Englay--eight rupees. The coats and the
turbans we will burn."
Hunsa stooped down and slipped the sandals from the feet of the one
Sookdee had pointed out as the officer.
"The footwear is of little value, but we will take the brass cooking
pots of the merchant," Sookdee said, eyeing this performance; there was
suspicion in his eyes lighted from the flare of their camp fires.
"Sookdee," Hunsa said, "you have the Englay leather packet, but they do
not send _sowars_ through the land of the Mahratta with the real
message written on the back of the messenger. In quiet I will rip
apart the soles of this footwear. Do you that with the saddles;
therein is often hidden the true writing. In the slaying of these two
we have acquired a powerful enemy, the English, and the message, if
there be one, might be traded for our lives. Here are the keys to the
box, for it is heavy."
Into Hunsa's mind had flashed the thought that the gods had opened the
way, for he had plotted to do this thing--the destruction of Ajeet.
"Have all the bodies thrown into the pit, Sookdee," he advised; "make
perfect the covering of the fire and ash, and while you prepare for
flight I will go and bring Bootea's cart to carry Ajeet."
Then Hunsa was swallowed up in the gloom of the night, melting like a
shadow into the white haze of the road as he raced like a grey wolf
toward the Gulab, who now had certainly been delivered into his hands.
Soon his heart pumped and the choke of exertion slowed him to a fast
walk. The sandals, bulky with their turned-up toes, worried him. He
drew a knife from his sash and slit the tops off, muttering: "If it is
here, the message of value, it will be between the two skins of the
soles."
Now they lay flat and snug in his hand as he quickened his pace.