Umar Khan was a Baluchi who bore a very bad record indeed.
One of his earlier exploits, in fact, that which was destined to start
him in his career of _budmashi_, and ultimately, in all probability,
land him on the scaffold and faggot pyre [Note 1], had taken place many
years before the events narrated in our story. He had been summoned
before the Political Agent to answer for complicity--real or alleged--in
the raiding upon and blackmailing of certain wandering herdsmen,
belonging to a weaker clan. The British official found him guilty, and
sentenced him to a term of imprisonment, a terrible punishment to the
free, wild man of the deserts and mountains.
The manner in which this one received the penalty to which he was doomed
was characteristic. His eyes blazed, and, his features working with
demoniacal fury, he spat forth a volume of curses and threats.
"What does he say?" inquired the Political Agent.
The interpreter replied that, apart from calling down all the most
forcible anathemas known to the Moslem creed upon the heads of those
concerned in his then discomfiture, the substance of the prisoner's
declaration was as follows:--The _Sirkar_ [Ruling power, _i.e._,
Government] was strong, but those who had borne witness against him were
not. Let them beware. He would have ten lives for that day's work.
The _Sirkar_ could not shut him up for ever. It could kill him, but
there were plenty left--several, even, who heard him that day--who would
accept his legacy of vengeance; and the witnesses against him had better
go across the wide sea, if haply they might, for no corner of the land
wherein they now dwelt was remote enough to hide them from the vengeance
of Umar Khan.
To this manifesto the Political Agent replied in words of weighty
warning. As the prisoner had said, the _Sirkar_ was strong--strong to
punish, as he had already discovered. If, on the expiration of his term
of imprisonment he continued his evil ways, or made any attempt to
fulfil his threat, he would speedily find that there was no corner of
the land remote enough to hide him from the vengeance of the _Sirkar_,
which in that case would be swift, condign, and terrible--in fact the
most terrible that could overtake him, viz: death with ignominy.
So Umar Khan duly served his term, and in the fulness of time was
released. For a while the authorities kept an eye on him, and all went
well. He was in no hurry, this wild, brooding, vindictive mountaineer.
He employed his period of enforced quietude in secretly locating every
one of those who had borne witness against him, and when the
surveillance over his movements had relaxed, he became as good as his
word. One night he started for some of the objects of his feud, and,
taking them by surprise, killed three. Two more he found in a
neighbouring village, and these also felt the weight of his _tulwar_.
But now things grew too lively. With half of his account of vengeance
settled, Umar Khan found himself forced to flee, unless he were prepared
to forego--and that forever--the other half. So flee he did, both fast
and far, hotly pursued by the Political Agent and a strong posse of Levy
sowars.
Now, the said Political was a staff corps man who had seen some service,
and, moreover a very energetic and zealous official; consequently, he
allowed the fugitive no more start than he could help, with the result
that the latter had no time to collect any following so as to afford him
the satisfaction of selling his life dearly. So day and night fled Umar
Khan; but turn and double as he would, the avenging force pressed him
hard, for the Levy sowars were men of the country, and knew all the
twists and turns of the mountains as well as he did; and their commander
was a seasoned campaigner, and as hard as nails. However, fortune
favoured him, and the hunted man succeeded in reaching a place of refuge
and of safety--as he thought.
As he thought! For, persistent as bloodhounds, that avenging band held
steadily upon his track. Finally they came up with him. Umar Khan was
in a tent asleep. Stealthily the pursuers drew up in crescent
formation, and their commander summoned Umar to come forth. For a
moment there was dead silence. Then swift as thought, a rifle muzzle
was poked through the flap of the tent. A loud report, and a bullet
sang past the official's ear. The latter, more than ever bent on
securing his prisoner alive, reiterated the summons, with the
alternative in the event of noncompliance, of ordering a volley to be
fired into the tent. The reply came as before, in the shape of another
bullet, which this time killed the horse of one of the sowars. The
order was given to fire.
The rattle and smoke of the volley rolled away--and lo! the sides of the
tent were riddled like a sieve. There was a moment or two of silence,
and again the officer challenged any who might be left alive to come
forth. There emerged from the tent door, a figure clad in the full
voluminous draperies and close veil of an Afghan woman.
She did not even look at the troop. She fled away over the plain as
fast as her legs could carry her, uttering shrill screams. Those who
looked on were filled with wild amaze. How could any living thing have
escaped that volley? A movement made to pursue her was simultaneously
checked, and then the Political Agent and some of the sowars entered the
tent, but cautiously.
Their caution in this instance was unnecessary. One human being alone
was in that tent--lying on the ground in a pool of blood. Such rude
furniture and utensils as there were had been riddled, and the ground
itself ploughed up with bullets. The human figure was limp and
lifeless, and--it was that of another woman.
An idea struck the official. He leaped outside the tent; his gaze
directed at the fast fleeing figure, now some distance away. He--and
those present--saw it drag out a horse from among the rocks and stones
of a dry nullah, and, flinging off the female attire, spring upon the
animal's back. Then darting forth a hand with defiant gesture, and
hurling back a final curse and menace, the fugitive--a wiry, muscular
male--flogged his steed into a furious gallop, and was speedily out of
range of the hurried volley sent after him.
The officer stared, and, we fear, cursed. The Levy sowars stared, and
certainly invoked Allah and his Prophet; while laughing at both, yet
storing up deeper vengeance for the slaughter of one of his most
faithful wives--who had shared and aided his flight, and eventually laid
down her life for him--fled Umar Khan far over the plains of
Afghanistan--further and further into that welcome land of refuge.
There lay the rub. They dare not pursue him further. Already a
violation of international law had been committed in carrying the
pursuit thus far. Well might the official feel foolish. That their
bird should be allowed to skip off right under their very noses in the
garb of the supposed female whom they had so very humanely spared was
enough to make him feel foolish. But he was destined to feel more so
subsequently, when an acrid representation from the Amir of Kabul
entailed upon him a Departmental wigging, although but a technical one.
After all, a man may be too zealous.
After that Umar Khan disappeared for a while. The Amir of Kabul, when
mildly requested to hand him over, declined crustily, on the ground that
an armed force had pursued a fugitive over his border without so much as
a by-your-leave. If the English attempted to police his country and
failed, he was not going to step in where they left off.
So the years went by, and Umar Khan was lost sight of and forgotten.
Then, suddenly, he reappeared in his old haunts.
Changes of administration had supervened. The Government did not care
to bother itself over a man who had been a desperate outlaw under its
predecessors, as long as he behaved himself and showed a disposition to
amend the error of his ways. Moreover, he was a member of one of the
most powerful and turbulent tribes in Baluchistan. The _Sirkar_
concluded to let sleeping dogs lie. So it shut its eyes, and Umar Khan
was left in peace.
In peace? Yes, so far as he was concerned. But he fixed his dwelling
among the wildest and most impracticable of mountain deserts--always
ensuring for himself a safe retreat--and thence he began to prey upon
all and any who had the wherewithal to pay up smartly for further
immunity.
Then complaints began to reach Shalalai. Peaceable _banyas_ had been
plundered of all the gains they had made during a travelling trade.
Merchants on a larger scale trading with Kabul had been relieved on a
proportionate scale, or even held to ransom. Umar Khan adopted a method
of his own for putting a stop to the complaints of such. It was the
method best expressed by the saw, "Dead men tell no tales"--and by way
of doing the thing thoroughly, he seized the whole of the plunder
instead of merely the half as heretofore, but took care that the owner
should not be on hand to lay any complaint. And leaving out many other
unchronicled misdeeds, we think we have said enough to establish our
opening statement, viz: that Umar Khan was a Baluchi who bore a very bad
record indeed.
He was not a sirdar, nor even a malik. He was, in fact, a nobody, who--
as not unfrequently happens among barbarian races--had raised himself to
a sort of sinister eminence by a daring fearlessness and a combination
of shrewdness and luck in evading the consequences of his countless acts
of aggression. Added to this, his enforced outlawry and the exploits,
half mythical, wherewith rumour credited him during that period, had
thrown a kind of halo around him in the eyes of his wild, predatory
fellow-tribesmen. Nominally he lived under and was responsible to the
Sirdar Yar Hussain Khan, who was chief over a large section of the
powerful Marri tribe; actually he was responsible to nobody in the wide
world. His own particular following was made up of all the "tough"
characters of the tribe, which is saying much, for the Marris bore the
reputation of numbering in their midst some very "tough" characters.
The saw relative to the endowment of anybody with a sufficiency of rope
was beginning to hold good in the matter of Umar Khan. Things were
going badly with him. He had been obliged to be more than liberal with
his ill-gotten gains in order to retain the adherence of his following,
and the shoe was beginning to pinch. Then his tribal chief had given
him a hint to sit tight; in short, had given him two alternatives--
either to behave himself or clear out.
He had about concluded to embrace the latter of these--and the motive
which had led him up to this conclusion was dual--and akin to that which
tells with like effect upon men far more civilised than the Baluchi
ex-outlaw. Umar Khan was hard up; likewise he was hipped. He was
perfectly sick of sitting still. Times were too peaceful altogether.
So he sold what few possessions he had left, and with the proceeds laid
in a stock of Snider rifles and ammunition.
Umar Khan sat in his village at sunrise. It was the hour of prayer, and
several of the faithful, dotted about, were devoutly prostrating
themselves, in the most approved fashion; indeed Umar himself had only
just finished the performance of his devotions, for your Moslem is a
logician in such matters, and has no idea of heaping up great damnation
to himself by committing two sins instead of one, as would be the case
were he to omit the prescribed devotion simply because he had just cut
somebody's throat. The low, flat, mud-walled houses were in keeping
with the surroundings--looking indeed as if they had but been dumped
down and left to dry, like other piles of earth and stones which had
rolled down the arid slopes and remained where they fell. A flock of
black goats and fat-tailed sheep, mingled together, was scattered over
the plain, though where they could find sustenance in such a desert,
Heaven alone knew. Camels, too, were stalking around, also making what
seemed an ironical attempt at browsing.
The sun had just risen beyond the far off limit of the desert plain,
tinging blood-red the line of jagged peaks shooting skyward behind the
village. Umar Khan sat in gloomy silence, smoking a narghileh, and,
like most Orientals, indulging in much expectoration. His grim,
hawk-like face, with the shaggy hanging brows meeting over his hooked
nose, looked more cruel and repulsive than ever, as he stroked his
beard, or pulled at the long black tresses, which hung down on each side
of his face. Then he looked up. A fellow-tribesman was coming towards
him. Umar Khan's glance now lit up with animation. The man came to him
and sat down. Their talk was short, but the ex-outlaw's expression of
countenance grew positively radiant, as the new arrival went on
unfolding his tidings.
Umar Khan rose and ordered his best horse to be saddled. As he rose, it
might have been noticed that he suffered from a slight limp. Then
taking with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself--if that
were possible--he rode forth.
For many hours they fared onward, avoiding the more frequented ways, and
travelling over precipitous mountain path and through wild _tangi_, by
routes well known to themselves, halting at convenient places to rest
and water their horses. All had rifles, as well as their curved
tulwars, and this savage band of hook-nosed, scowling copper-coloured
ruffians, armed to the teeth, looked about as forbidding, even terror
striking a crew as the peaceable wayfarer would _not_ wish to meet--say
half way through a _tangi_ where there was precious little room to pass
each other.
The sun was now considerably past the meridian, and at length the band,
at a word from Ihalil Mohammed--the man who had brought the news which
had led to this undertaking--halted amid some rock overlooking a broad
high-road.
Far away along its dusty length a speck appeared, growing larger as it
drew rapidly nearer, until it took the shape of a vehicle, containing
but one man, and he the driver. It was an ordinary "gharri," or hackney
cab. To meet this Ihalil and four others now rode down.
"Salaam, brother," they exclaimed, drawing up across the road.
"Salaam, Sirdar sahib," returned the driver, in tremulous tones, turning
pale at the sight of these fierce armed figures barring his way. The
man was an ordinary specimen of the low caste Hindu, and as such held in
utter contempt by these stalwart sons of the desert, and in repulsion as
a heathen and an idolater.
"Who art thou, brother; and whither faring?" queried Ihalil.
The man replied, in quaking tones, that he was but a poor
"gharri-wallah" hired to meet a certain holy _mullah_ who was travelling
from Shalalai to a village away far out in the desert. He was to bring
him on a stage of his journey, and expected to meet him not far from
that point.
"Good. Now turn thine old box on wheels out of the road and follow to
where we shall lead thee," commanded Ihalil.
The poor wretch dared not so much as hesitate, and presently the rickety
old rattle trap was drawn up behind the rocks. At sight of the rest of
the band the miserable Hindu gave himself up for dead.
"Salaam, Sirdar sahib," he faltered, cowering before the grim stare of
Umar Khan.
The latter then questioned him, in process of which one of the
freebooters stole up behind, his tulwar raised. The badly scared
"gharri-wallah," his eyes starting from his head, had no attention to
spare from the threatening scowl and searching questions of Umar Khan;
and of danger from behind was utterly unconscious. Then, at a nod from
Umar Khan, down came the tulwar upon the neck of the doomed Hindu.
It was badly aimed and did not sever the head, but cut far and deep into
the neck and shoulder. The miserable wretch fell to the ground, deluged
with a great spout of blood, but yet wailing dismally in agony and
terror. In a moment two more tulwars swung through the air, and the
sufferings of the murdered man--literally cut to pieces--were over,
though his limbs still beat the ground in convulsive struggles.
Umar Khan spat in derision, while the other barbarians laughed like
demons over this atrocious deed. The murderers wiped their swords on
the garments of their victim, and examined the keenly-ground edges
solicitously, lest they should be in any way notched or turned. But now
their attention was diverted. Another speck was growing larger and
larger on the road, this time advancing from the direction in which
their late victim had been proceeding. Drawing nearer it soon took
shape. Another "gharri" similar to the one whose driver they had
slaughtered.
The whole band rode down to meet it. Besides the driver it contained
another man.
"Peace, my sons," said the latter as they drew up.
"And on you peace," returned Umar Khan. "But first--for this dog.
Hold--Alight, both of ye."
There was that about the aspect of these armed brigands that would admit
of no hesitation. Both obeyed. This driver, too, was a low caste
Hindu. His "fare" was an old man, white-bearded, and wearing a green
turban.
No sooner were both fairly out of the "gharri," than Ihalil Mohammed
rode at the Hindu and cut him down. Others fell upon him with their
tulwars, and the miserable wretch, like his fellow-craftsman, was
literally hewn to pieces then and there. With savage shouts the
murderers waved their bloodstained weapons aloft, curvetting their
steeds around the survivor.
The latter turned pale. Quick as thought, however, he had drawn a
volume of the Koran from beneath his garments, and placed it upon his
head.
"La illah il Allah"--he began.
"--Mohammed er rasool Allah," [Note 2] chorused the blood thirsty
savages, as though in one fierce war shout, turning to hack once more at
the mangled carcase of the miserable Hindu.
"Hearken, my father," said Umar Khan, pointing his rifle at the
traveller. "A true believer is safe at the hands of other believers.
But, father, delay not to deliver over the seven hundred rupees which
are in thy sash."
The other turned paler still.
"Seven hundred rupees?" he exclaimed, holding up his hands. "What
should a poor _mullah_ do with such a sum?"
"Thou hast said it, my father. What indeed?" sneered Umar Khan. "What
indeed, save as alms for the poor, and the debtors and the insolvent, as
enjoins the holy Koran? And such thou seest before thee. Wherefore we
will receive them, father, and pray the blessing of Allah, and a rich
place in the seventh heaven for thee and thine."
"Do ye not fear God, O impious ones, that ye would rob His servant?"
said the _mullah_, waxing wroth in his desperation.
"We fear nobody," returned Umar Khan, with an evil sneer. "Yet, my
father, delay not any longer, lest this gun should go off by accident."
"Wah--wah!" sighed the _mullah_. "Be content my children--it may be ye
are poorer than I. Receive this packet, and the blessing of a servant
of the Prophet go with it. And now I will proceed upon my way."
"Wait but a few moments," replied Umar Khan, receiving the bag which the
other tendered him, and which he immediately handed to Ihalil with one
word--"Count!"
"It may not be, for the hour of evening prayer draws near. Peace be
with you, my children." And he made as though to move on.
"We will say it together then," replied Umar Khan, barring the way.
"What is this? Two hundred and fifty rupees? Two more packets hast
thou forgotten, my father, and--delay not, for the hour of evening
prayer draws near."
There was a grim, fell significance in the speaker's tone and
countenance. The _mullah_ no longer hesitated. With almost trembling
alacrity he drew forth the remaining bags, which being counted, were
found to contain the exact sum named.
"We give thee five rupees as an alms, my father," said Umar Khan,
tendering him that amount. Gloomily the _mullah_ pocketed it. "And
surely God is good to thee, that in these days thou hast been able to
relieve the necessities of Umar Khan."
A start of surprise came over the face of the other, at the mention of
the name of the dreaded ex-outlaw. He had more than a shrewd suspicion
that but for his sacred office he would be now even as his Hindu
driver--which went far to console him for the loss of his substance.
"Wah--wah!" he moaned, sitting down by the roadside. "My hard earned
substance which should comfort my old age--all gone! all gone!"
"The faithful will provide for thine old age, my father. And now, peace
be with thee, for we may not tarry here. But,"--sinking his voice to a
bloodcurdling whisper--"it is well to give alms in secret, for he who
should boast too loud of having bestowed them upon Umar Khan, not even
the holy sanctuary of Mecca would avail to shelter him."
"Blaspheme not, my son," cried the _mullah_, affecting great horror, and
putting his fingers to his ears--though, as a matter of fact, the
warning was one which he thoroughly understood.
They left him seated there by the roadside, despondent over his loss.
They left the two mangled bodies of their victims to the birds and
beasts of prey, and gave vent to their glee as they dashed off, in
shouts and blood thirsty witticisms. They were in high good humour,
those jovial souls. They had slain a couple of human beings--that was
to keep their hands in. They had robbed another of seven hundred
rupees--that would replenish the wasted exchequer for a time; and now
they cantered off to see if they could not do a little more in both
lines--and the goal for which they were heading was the Kachin valley.
Umar Khan had burnt his boats behind him.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. To lend additional terror to capital punishment in the eyes of
Moslems on the northern border, the dead bodies of those executed for
fanatical murder were sometimes burned.
Note 2. "God is the God of gods--Mohammed the Prophet of God."--The
Moslem confession of faith.