Tweed said tae Till:
“What gars ye rin sae still?”
Till said tae Tweed:
“Though ye rin wi’ speed
An’ I rin slaw—
Yet where ye droon ae man
I droon twa.”
There is no getting over the river to-night, Sahib. They say that a
bullock-cart has been washed down already, and the _ekka_ that went over
a half hour before you came has not yet reached the far side. Is the
Sahib in haste? I will drive the ford-elephant in to show him. Ohe,
mahout there in the shed! Bring out Ram Pershad, and if he will face the
current, good. An elephant never lies, Sahib, and Ram Pershad is
separated from his friend Kala Nag. He, too, wishes to cross to the far
side. Well done! Well done! my King! Go half way across, _mahoutji_, and
see what the river says. Well done, Ram Pershad! Pearl among elephants,
go into the river! Hit him on the head, fool! Was the goad made only to
scratch thy own fat back with, bastard? Strike! Strike! What are the
boulders to thee, Ram Pershad, my Rustum, my mountain of strength? Go
in! Go in!
No, Sahib! It is useless. You can hear him trumpet. He is telling Kala
Nag that he cannot come over. See! He has swung round and is shaking his
head. He is no fool. He knows what the Barhwi means when it is angry.
Aha! Indeed, thou art no fool, my child! _Salaam_, Ram Pershad, Bahadur!
Take him under the trees, mahout, and see that he gets his spices. Well
done, thou chiefest among tuskers! _Salaam_ to the Sirkar and go to
sleep.
What is to be done? The Sahib must wait till the river goes down. It
will shrink to-morrow morning, if God pleases, or the day after at the
latest. Now why does the Sahib get so angry? I am his servant. Before
God, _I_ did not create this stream! What can I do! My hut and all that
is therein is at the service of the Sahib, and it is beginning to rain.
Come away, my Lord. How will the river go down for your throwing abuse
at it? In the old days the English people were not thus. The
fire-carriage has made them soft. In the old days, when they drave
behind horses by day or by night, they said naught if a river barred the
way, or a carriage sat down in the mud. It was the will of God—not like
a fire-carriage which goes and goes and goes, and would go though all
the devils in the land hung on to its tail. The fire-carriage hath
spoiled the English people. After all, what is a day lost, or, for that
matter, what are two days? Is the Sahib going to his own wedding, that
he is so mad with haste? Ho! Ho! Ho! I am an old man and see few Sahibs.
Forgive me if I have forgotten the respect that is due to them. The
Sahib is not angry?
His own wedding! Ho! Ho! Ho! The mind of an old man is like the
_numah_-tree. Fruit, bud, blossom, and the dead leaves of all the years
of the past flourish together. Old and new and that which is gone out of
remembrance, all three are there! Sit on the bedstead, Sahib, and drink
milk. Or—would the Sahib in truth care to drink my tobacco? It is good.
It is the tobacco of Nuklao. My son, who is in service there, sent it to
me. Drink, then, Sahib, if you know how to handle the tube. The Sahib
takes it like a Musalman. Wah! Wah! Where did he learn that? His own
wedding! Ho! Ho! Ho! The Sahib says that there is no wedding in the
matter at all? Now _is_ it likely that the Sahib would speak true talk
to me who am only a black man? Small wonder, then, that he is in haste.
Thirty years have I beaten the gong at this ford, but never have I seen
a Sahib in such haste. Thirty years, Sahib! That is a very long time.
Thirty years ago this ford was on the track of the _bunjaras_, and I
have seen two thousand pack-bullocks cross in one night. Now the rail
has come, and the fire-carriage says _buz-buz-buz_, and a hundred lakhs
of maunds slide across that big bridge. It is very wonderful; but the
ford is lonely now that there are no _bunjaras_ to camp under the trees.
Nay, do not trouble to look at the sky without. It will rain till the
dawn. Listen! The boulders are talking to-night in the bed of the river.
Hear them! They would be husking your bones, Sahib, had you tried to
cross. See, I will shut the door and no rain can enter. _Wahi!_ _Ahi!_
_Ugh!_ Thirty years on the banks of the ford! An old man am I, and—where
is the oil for the lamp?
* * * * *
Your pardon, but, because of my years, I sleep no sounder than a dog;
and you moved to the door. Look then, Sahib. Look and listen. A full
half _kos_ from bank to bank is the stream now—you can see it under the
stars—and there are ten feet of water therein. It will not shrink
because of the anger in your eyes, and it will not be quiet on account
of your curses. Which is louder, Sahib—your voice or the voice of the
river? Call to it—perhaps it will be ashamed. Lie down and sleep afresh,
Sahib. I know the anger of the Barhwi when there has fallen rain in the
foot-hills. I swam the flood, once, on a night ten-fold worse than this,
and by the Favour of God I was released from death when I had come to
the very gates thereof.
May I tell the tale? Very good talk. I will fill the pipe anew.
Thirty years ago it was, when I was a young man and had but newly come
to the ford. I was strong then, and the _bunjaras_ had no doubt when I
said, “This ford is clear.” I have toiled all night up to my
shoulder-blades in running water amid a hundred bullocks mad with fear,
and have brought them across, losing not a hoof. When all was done I
fetched the shivering men, and they gave me for reward the pick of their
cattle—the bell-bullock of the drove. So great was the honour in which I
was held! But to-day, when the rain falls and the river rises, I creep
into my hut and whimper like a dog. My strength is gone from me. I am an
old man, and the fire-carriage has made the ford desolate. They were
wont to call me the Strong One of the Barhwi.
Behold my face, Sahib—it is the face of a monkey. And my arm—it is the
arm of an old woman. I swear to you, Sahib, that a woman has loved this
face and has rested in the hollow of this arm. Twenty years ago, Sahib.
Believe me, this was true talk—twenty years ago.
Come to the door and look across. Can you see a thin fire very far away
down the stream? That is the temple-fire in the shrine of Hanuman, of
the village of Pateera. North, under the big star, is the village
itself, but it is hidden by a bend of the river. Is that far to swim,
Sahib? Would you take off your clothes and adventure? Yet I swam to
Pateera—not once, but many times; and there are _muggers_ in the river
too.
Love knows no caste; else why should I, a Musalman and the son of a
Musalman, have sought a Hindu woman—a widow of the Hindus—the sister of
the headman of Pateera? But it was even so. They of the headman’s
household came on a pilgrimage to Muttra when She was but newly a bride.
Silver tires were upon the wheels of the bullock-cart, and silken
curtains hid the woman. Sahib, I made no haste in their conveyance, for
the wind parted the curtains and I saw Her. When they returned from
pilgrimage the boy that was Her husband had died, and I saw Her again in
the bullock-cart. By God, these Hindus are fools! What was it to me
whether She was Hindu or Jain—scavenger, leper, or whole? I would have
married Her and made Her a home by the ford. The Seventh of the Nine
Bars says that a man may not marry one of the idolaters? Is that truth?
Both Shiahs and Sunnis say that a Musalman may not marry one of the
idolaters? Is the Sahib a priest, then, that he knows so much? I will
tell him something that he does not know. There is neither Shiah nor
Sunni, forbidden nor idolater, in Love; and the Nine Bars are but nine
little fagots that the flame of Love utterly burns away. In truth, I
would have taken Her; but what could I do? The headman would have sent
his men to break my head with staves. I am not—I was not—afraid of any
five men; but against half a village who can prevail?
Therefore it was my custom, these things having been arranged between us
twain, to go by night to the village of Pateera, and there we met among
the crops; no man knowing aught of the matter. Behold, now! I was wont
to cross here, skirting the jungle to the river bend where the railway
bridge is, and thence across the elbow of land to Pateera. The light of
the shrine was my guide when the nights were dark. That jungle near the
river is very full of snakes—little _karaits_ that sleep on the sand—and
moreover, Her brothers would have slain me had they found me in the
crops. But none knew—none knew save She and I; and the blown sand of the
river-bed covered the track of my feet. In the hot months it was an easy
thing to pass from the ford to Pateera, and in the first Rains, when the
river rose slowly, it was an easy thing also. I set the strength of my
body against the strength of the stream, and nightly I ate in my hut
here and drank at Pateera yonder. She had said that one Hirnam Singh, a
thief, had sought Her, and he was of a village up the river but on the
same bank. All Sikhs are dogs, and they have refused in their folly that
good gift of God—tobacco. I was ready to destroy Hirnam Singh that ever
he had come nigh Her; and the more because he had sworn to Her that She
had a lover, and that he would lie in wait and give the name to the
headman unless She went away with him. What curs are these Sikhs!
After that news, I swam always with a little sharp knife in my belt, and
evil would it have been for a man had he stayed me. I knew not the face
of Hirnam Singh, but I would have killed any who came between me and
Her.
Upon a night in the beginning of the Rains, I was minded to go across to
Pateera, albeit the river was angry. Now the nature of the Barhwi is
this, Sahib. In twenty breaths it comes down from the Hills, a wall
three feet high, and I have seen it, between the lighting of a fire and
the cooking of a _chupatty_, grow from a runnel to a sister of the
Jumna.
When I left this bank there was a shoal a half mile down, and I made
shift to fetch it and draw breath there ere going forward; for I felt
the hands of the river heavy upon my heels. Yet what will a young man
not do for Love’s sake? There was but little light from the stars, and
midway to the shoal a branch of the stinking deodar tree brushed my
mouth as I swam. That was a sign of heavy rain in the foot-hills and
beyond, for the deodar is a strong tree, not easily shaken from the
hillsides. I made haste, the river aiding me, but ere I had touched the
shoal, the pulse of the stream beat, as it were, within me and around,
and, behold, the shoal was gone and I rode high on the crest of a wave
that ran from bank to bank. Has the Sahib ever been cast into much water
that fights and will not let a man use his limbs? To me, my head upon
the water, it seemed as though there were naught but water to the
world’s end, and the river drave me with its driftwood. A man is a very
little thing in the belly of a flood. And _this_ flood, though I knew it
not, was the Great Flood about which men talk still. My liver was
dissolved and I lay like a log upon my back in the fear of Death. There
were living things in the water, crying and howling grievously—beasts of
the forest and cattle, and once the voice of a man asking for help. But
the rain came and lashed the water white, and I heard no more save the
roar of the boulders below and the roar of the rain above. Thus I was
whirled downstream, wrestling for the breath in me. It is very hard to
die when one is young. Can the Sahib, standing here, see the railway
bridge? Look, there are the lights of the mail-train going to Peshawur!
The bridge is now twenty feet above the river, but upon that night the
water was roaring against the lattice-work and against the lattice came
I feet first. But much driftwood was piled there and upon the piers, and
I took no great hurt. Only the river pressed me as a strong man presses
a weaker. Scarcely could I take hold of the lattice-work and crawl to
the upper boom. Sahib, the water was foaming across the rails a foot
deep! Judge therefore what manner of flood it must have been. I could
not hear. I could not see. I could but lie on the boom and pant for
breath.
After a while the rain ceased and there came out in the sky certain new
washed stars, and by their light I saw that there was no end to the
black water as far as the eye could travel, and the water had risen upon
the rails. There were dead beasts in the driftwood on the piers, and
others caught by the neck in the lattice-work, and others not yet
drowned who strove to find a foothold on the lattice-work—buffaloes and
kine, and wild pig, and deer one or two, and snakes and jackals past all
counting. Their bodies were black upon the left side of the bridge, but
the smaller of them were forced through the lattice-work and whirled
down-stream.
Thereafter the stars died and the rain came down afresh and the river
rose yet more, and I felt the bridge begin to stir under me as a man
stirs in his sleep ere he wakes. But I was not afraid, Sahib. I swear to
you that I was not afraid, though I had no power in my limbs. I knew
that I should not die till I had seen Her once more. But I was very
cold, and I felt that the bridge must go.
There was a trembling in the water, such a trembling as goes before the
coming of a great wave, and the bridge lifted its flank to the rush of
that coming so that the right lattice dipped under water and the left
rose clear. On my beard, Sahib, I am speaking God’s truth! As a
Mirzapore stone-boat careens to the wind, so the Barhwi Bridge turned.
Thus and in no other manner.
I slid from the boom into deep water, and behind me came the wave of the
wrath of the river. I heard its voice and the scream of the middle part
of the bridge as it moved from the piers and sank, and I knew no more
till I rose in the middle of the great flood. I put forth my hand to
swim, and lo! it fell upon the knotted hair of the head of a man. He was
dead, for no one but I, the Strong One of Barhwi, could have lived in
that race. He had been dead full two days, for he rode high, wallowing,
and was an aid to me. I laughed then, knowing for a surety that I should
yet see Her and take no harm; and I twisted my fingers in the hair of
the man, for I was far spent, and together we went down the stream—he
the dead and I the living. Lacking that help I should have sunk: the
cold was in my marrow, and my flesh was ribbed and sodden on my bones.
But _he_ had no fear who had known the uttermost of the power of the
river; and I let him go where he chose. At last we came into the power
of a side-current that set to the right bank, and I strove with my feet
to draw with it. But the dead man swung heavily in the whirl, and I
feared that some branch had struck him and that he would sink. The tops
of the tamarisk brushed my knees, so I knew we were come into
flood-water above the crops, and, after, I let down my legs and felt
bottom—the ridge of a field—and, after, the dead man stayed upon a knoll
under a fig-tree, and I drew my body from the water rejoicing.
Does the Sahib know whither the backwash of the flood had borne me? To
the knoll which is the eastern boundary-mark of the village of Pateera!
No other place. I drew the dead man up on the grass for the service that
he had done me, and also because I knew not whether I should need him
again. Then I went, crying thrice like a jackal, to the appointed place
which was near the byre of the headman’s house. But my Love was already
there, weeping. She feared that the flood had swept my hut at the Barhwi
Ford. When I came softly through the ankle-deep water, She thought it
was a ghost and would have fled, but I put my arms round Her, and—I was
no ghost in those days, though I am an old man now. Ho! Ho! Dried corn,
in truth. Maize without juice. Ho! Ho![1]
Footnote 1:
I grieve to say that the Warden of Barhwi Ford is responsible here for
two very bad puns in the vernacular.—_R. K._
I told Her the story of the breaking of the Barhwi Bridge, and She said
that I was greater than mortal man, for none may cross the Barhwi in
full flood, and I had seen what never man had seen before. Hand in hand
we went to the knoll where the dead lay, and I showed Her by what help I
had made the ford. She looked also upon the body under the stars, for
the latter end of the night was clear, and hid Her face in Her hands,
crying: “It is the body of Hirnam Singh!” I said: “The swine is of more
use dead than living, my Beloved,” and She said: “Surely, for he has
saved the dearest life in the world to my love. None the less, he cannot
stay here, for that would bring shame upon me.” The body was not a
gunshot from Her door.
Then said I, rolling the body with my hands: “God hath judged between
us, Hirnam Singh, that thy blood might not be upon my head. Now, whether
I have done thee a wrong in keeping thee from the burning-ghat, do thou
and the crows settle together.” So I cast him adrift into the
flood-water, and he was drawn out to the open, ever wagging his thick
black beard like a priest under the pulpit-board. And I saw no more of
Hirnam Singh.
Before the breaking of the day we two parted, and I moved towards such
of the jungle as was not flooded. With the full light I saw what I had
done in the darkness, and the bones of my body were loosened in my
flesh, for there ran two _kos_ of raging water between the village of
Pateera and the trees of the far bank, and, in the middle, the piers of
the Barhwi Bridge showed like broken teeth in the jaw of an old man. Nor
was there any life upon the waters—neither birds nor boats, but only an
army of drowned things—bullocks and horses and men—and the river was
redder than blood from the clay of the foot-hills. Never had I seen such
a flood—never since that year have I seen the like—and, O Sahib, no man
living had done what I had done. There was no return for me that day.
Not for all the lands of the headman would I venture a second time
without the shield of darkness that cloaks danger. I went a _kos_ up the
river to the house of a blacksmith, saying that the flood had swept me
from my hut, and they gave me food. Seven days I stayed with the
blacksmith, till a boat came and I returned to my house. There was no
trace of wall, or roof, or floor—naught but a patch of slimy mud. Judge,
therefore, Sahib, how far the river must have risen.
It was written that I should not die either in my house, or in the heart
of the Barhwi, or under the wreck of the Barhwi Bridge, for God sent
down Hirnam Singh two days dead, though I know not how the man died, to
be my buoy and support. Hirnam Singh has been in Hell these twenty
years, and the thought of that night must be the flower of his torment.
Listen, Sahib! The river has changed its voice. It is going to sleep
before the dawn, to which there is yet one hour. With the light it will
come down afresh. How do I know? Have I been here thirty years without
knowing the voice of the river as a father knows the voice of his son?
Every moment it is talking less angrily. I swear that there will be no
danger for one hour or, perhaps, two. I cannot answer for the morning.
Be quick, Sahib! I will call Ram Pershad, and he will not turn back this
time. Is the paulin tightly corded upon all the baggage? Ohe, mahout
with a mud head, the elephant for the Sahib, and tell them on the far
side that there will be no crossing after daylight.
Money? Nay, Sahib. I am not of that kind. No, not even to give
sweetmeats to the baby-folk. My house, look you, is empty, and I am an
old man.
_Dutt_, Ram Pershad! _Dutt! Dutt! Dutt!_ Good luck go with you, Sahib.