"But the child--the child!" gasped Mr. Desborough, laying down his gun
and forcing his way into the tangled mass. No child was there. The
wolf had doubled upon them so swiftly and so stealthily, it seemed as if
the ground had opened to swallow it up. The scouts jumped down from
their trees, and all separated, taking different paths, to try and find
which way the wolf had gone,--all but the old shikaree and Oliver, who
was still aloft. Mr. Desborough was foremost; he no longer waited for
the hunter's guidance. Yes, he had seen his child. He believed now it
was his fair-haired boy. He had seen him and lost him again. The
thought was madness. The major, gun in hand, kept close beside him.
Tara Ghur, who seemed, like the owl, to possess the power of seeing in
the dark, was tracing the way the wolf had come, not the path by which
it had fled from them.
Oliver, beginning to be afraid of being left behind in so wild a spot,
climbed down again and followed the hunter, who was the last to leave
it. The sailor-boy had climbed so high into his tree, thinking to gain
a more commanding view, that he had not seen all that was taking place
at its foot. Having first met Oliver in the company of the Rana's son,
old Tara Ghur regarded him with something of the devotion and respect he
felt for his native chief. He knew the boy was safest by his side, and
invited him by gesture to follow. So the two crept on through the
pathless wild no foot but theirs had ever penetrated.
If Oliver had found it hard work forcing his way with Gobur through the
grass clump by the river, it was nothing to the task before him now.
There were sudden drops into unseen nullahs, or watercourses, and a
dangerous climb in the darkness up the steep bank, facing rolling stones
from the jagged heights above. Now and again their only course was to
climb the trees, and swing themselves from bough to bough. But through
it all the hunter traced out the path of the wolf with an unerring
dexterity that was perfectly marvellous to Oliver, tracking its course
to the sweeping boughs of the deserted korinda bush.
The bones about the gray wolf's home were gnawed and dry. It was
evident the hungry mother had suppered her young family on snails and
field-mice; and she must have gone far afield for these, for the
hunting-grounds about the hairy nest had been clearing fast of late.
Old Tara tried to explain his purpose, but Oliver did not half
understand. He could only watch what the hunter was doing, and second
his efforts whenever he could.
"Child been here, sahib!" exclaimed Tara Ghur suddenly, after carefully
groping round and round the well-made lair.
But their object was to capture, not to kill, and Oliver began to wonder
more and more how this could ever be effected.
The shikaree paused in perplexity. He had passed his life among the
wildest fastnesses of the district. He had watched the ways of the
living creatures who lorded it there. He had studied the tastes,
habits, and disposition of every creature in the forest. He was well
aware the wolves would draw to their lair with the return of day, and
prepared to watch the night out by the korinda bush. Then a sudden
thought seemed to strike him. He sprang up and began anew to examine
the ground around the path the wolf had chosen. A deep hole, the burrow
of some wild animal, gave him intense satisfaction. He heaved aside the
decaying arm of a tree which had fallen across it. Oliver came to his
help, and adding his strength to that of the wiry hunter, they dislodged
it altogether, and laid the burrow open.
Oliver saw that it was a dangerous pitfall, and wondered what was to be
done with it.
Tara leaped down and began to enlarge it with the hunting-knife he
carried in his belt. Then he tore off a huge piece of bark from a
neighbouring tree, and pulled up a shrub by the roots. With this
impromptu shovel and broom he set himself to clear out the loose earth
and stones which had collected in the bottom of the hole.
Oliver meanwhile was keeping guard over the shikaree's skin of meal and
the earthen pot, which on this particular occasion did not contain
water. What it did contain he could not imagine, for the edge was
sticky in the extreme. Before the moon began to wane the burrow was
enlarged to a good-sized pit. The shikaree grew exultant. He beckoned
to Oliver to follow him, and the two wandered about among the trees
until they found some giant leaves of a bauhinia creeper.
They stripped the stem as far as they could reach, and returned with
their load of leaves to the edge of the pit.
The shikaree spread them on the ground before it. Then he smeared them
over with the contents of his jar.
"What is it?" thought Oliver--"bird lime?"
Then he saw what the clever old man was about--making a wolf-trap.
*CHAPTER XIII.*
_*CAUGHT IN A TRAP.*_
Whilst Oliver and the old shikaree were working hard in the moonlight,
Mr. Desborough and his friends were in hot pursuit of the flying wolves.
The major, who was the keenest sportsman of the three, gave it as his
opinion that their wisest course was to keep the pack in sight. The
wolf with the child was rushing from its covert in answer to the
patriarch's call, and would be sure to join the others sooner or later.
Up came some of the jogies, breathless and panting, to declare they had
heard the cry of the child far up the hill, toward the temple ruins. If
so, the wolf must have been retreating to the second koond, on the other
side of the hill. The deputy, who was anxious to pick up his nephew,
turned back to beat it with another party of the jogies, who were
examining the tracks about the jheel.
"Mind you beat up stream," shouted the major, as he sprang into his
saddle, prepared to give chase to the wolves.
They came up with the pack at the head of a valley, where they were
picking the bones of a spotted deer some tiger had brought down. But no
child was among them. In a country so full of cover it was impossible
to say where the little fugitive might be hiding. So they posted
chakoos, or lookouts, all about, to give instantaneous notice if
anything showed.
In the gray of the dawn, disheartened and weary, the friends drew
together once again. Hunting-flasks were taken out, and counsel held in
the weed-grown court of the temple.
"Our hour is coming," said the major cheerily. "Wait until the day is
well up, and we shall find the child asleep under one of these bushes.
Now for some lure to make it show. We must beat them all."
"And frighten him into idiocy, if his dawning sense has not been scared
away already! He knew me no longer," exclaimed Mr. Desborough.
"Surely he would recognize his mother's voice," put in the deputy.
"I dare not risk the torture of suspense like this for her; but we might
have Kathleen. If he remembers anything, it would be Kathleen,"
answered Mr. Desborough.
"Send for her at once without alarming Mrs. Desborough," said the
deputy, taking out his pocket-book; and scribbling a note to his niece,
he despatched his syce with it to Runnangore.
At a very early hour, Bona's dandy appeared once more at the gate of the
compound at Noak-holly.
"I have come in the cool of the morning," she said, "to fetch your
little girl to spend the day at Runnangore. You must not refuse her to
me, dear Mrs. Desborough, for Mr. Desborough wishes her to accept my
invitation."
But Kathleen did not much like Bona, and did not want to go, until Bona
whispered, "Hush! not a word; but come you must. They are searching for
Carl in the jungle."
Oh how tedious it seemed to wait until the little beebee was bathed and
dressed!
In the meanwhile Oliver was nodding in his tree, waiting for the
shikaree's signal. The old man was listening for the faintest sound.
Not a quiver in the bush below escaped him; not the beat of a weary wing
as the night-birds drew to their haunts; not a tremble in the grass at
his feet, where the children of the day were awaking.
The wind changed with the daybreak, and the wary hunter changed his
position with it. He swung himself from tree to tree, leaving no
footprint on the ground that the keen scent of the wolf might detect.
Avoiding the trees where the branches grew low to the ground, he
stationed the boy at a far greater distance than before. Again they
watched and waited. A few sharp, trotting steps went by, and a dhole
sprang from the thicket.
"Bear," murmured Tara, as the creature turned aggressive, and dashing
out with a rush upon the wild dog, charged him fiercely.
In the noise of their scuffle other sounds were lost. But the flap of
the vulture's wing, the scream of the kite, and the hoarse gobble-gobble
of the still more numerous turkey-buzzards grew more and more distinct
as the red light of morning painted the eastern sky.
The sun arose, and the furry tyrants of the midnight fled before it.
The tiger was slumbering in the moonje grass he loves so well; the
spotted leopard chose out his favourite tree, uprising from the thickest
underwood, and coiled himself up for his mid-day rest; the bear trotted
off to his den behind the fallen rock; the spotted deer roamed freely;
and the peacocks, with which the jungle abounded, spread their glorious
tails in the sunlight.
Then Tara Ghur descended his tree, and signing to Oliver to follow,
stealthily approached the pit.
The large leaves of the bauhinia creeper and the pranes tree, a kind of
sycamore, with which he had carpeted the path of the wolf, had been
trampled down and displaced. Some had altogether vanished. The old
man's eyes were flashing with their steeliest blue as he felt success
was sure.
Avoiding the remnants of the bird-lime leaves, which were strewn about
in all directions, he led his young companion to the other edge of the
pit. Something had been caught. The sombre gloom around, the perpetual
twilight which reigned all day in those deep recesses, prevented him
from telling what it was. It seemed like blanket, not hair, that was
covering a dark heap in the corner, besmeared with many a leaf. There
was more than one denizen of the pit. How he smiled as he was bending
over it! Oliver was watching a foolish hare, which came with a light
bound across the treacherous pathway. As its feet touched a
well-smeared pranes leaf, they were set fast, and not all its frantic
endeavours could free itself. It rolled over and over, lifting the leaf
high into the air, as far as its paws could reach. It bit it
frantically; lips and paw were glued together. It struggled harder
still to regain its liberty, until it became a rolling ball of dirt and
leaves, every movement bringing it nearer and nearer to the sloping edge
of the pit, into which it must have fallen if Oliver had not caught it
in his arms and set it free.
The hunter recalled his attention. A faint sound was audible, like the
feeble fret of a weary child. Oliver's cap went high into the air. Tara
reminded him of the necessity for silence by laying his finger on his
lips. Then he took the hunting-knife from his belt and felt its edge.
Oliver's eyes were growing more accustomed to the all-pervading gloom,
and he began to see more clearly. He leaned over the edge of the pit.
There was the wolf crouching in one corner, and a shapeless bundle in
the other. Many a treacherous leaf was sticking fast about the shaggy
coat, and one hind leg was evidently broken by its fall. Was that a
bundle of leaves it was cuddling between its fore paws, and washing so
lovingly despite its pain?
"Child found--found!" whispered the old man triumphantly, as he returned
his knife to his belt and began to descend.
Swift as lightning the young sailor-boy slid down before him. He
guessed the hunter's purpose. He saw the gleam of the sharpened blade,
and seized the old man's arm.
"No, no; don't kill the wolf!" he entreated.
"Maro! maro!" shrieked a voice behind them, and a woman's face peeped
out of the dirty blanket. The jewels round her neck shone like stars in
the darkness. "Maro!" she reiterated.
"Maro." Oliver knew that word--"Kill it." The old shikaree was
muttering the same. But Oliver only grasped his arm the tighter.
"Should we be harder-hearted than a wolf?" he urged. "What are we, if
we reward the generosity that spared the victim in her very teeth, with
the knife?"
Tara Ghur looked at him in astonishment. "But the mighty lords that are
coming will make it eat their bullets," he answered under his breath.
Oliver knew he was arguing with a man who bent the knee to hideous idols
without number. Yet he was a man, and deep down in his heart the law of
God was written, "Do as you would be done by"--a law that is never quite
obliterated in any human breast, however persistently disobeyed.
Although of another race, Tara had learned something of the Hindu
tenderness for animal life, and he listened when Oliver still went on:
"You have caught the wolf so cleverly, Tara. If there is not another
hunter in all the hills that could do it, I am sure that you can get the
child away without killing the wolf, if you will only try. I want it
for Rattam," he added. The last argument was all-prevailing. The knife
went back into the old man's belt. They looked around. Their first
endeavour was to reassure the unfortunate woman.
She was crossing to Nataban, and had lost her way in the jungle, where
she had been wandering about all night. Her feet slipped on the
bird-lime, and she fell, as the wolf had fallen, into the hunter's trap,
where she was forced to remain huddled up in her blanket, expecting
every moment the brute would turn and devour her. But deliverance had
come with the morning. Her gratitude knew no bounds. Oliver scrambled
out of the pit, and gave her a hand from above, while Tara lifted her up
on his shoulder; and so between them they dragged her back to the
daylight, if daylight it might be called.
The dirty blanket was dropped in the pit, and the Thibetan woman stood
before them in her necklaces and rags. Oliver had not forgotten little
Kathleen and the mountain milkmaid. Could those three strings of beads
belong to any one else? But he dared not stay to question. He left her
seated and trembling on the root of a tree, and leaped down into the pit
again. The wolf was blinded by the birdlime, but she had heard their
voices. Like all wolves when caught in a pit, she was completely cowed.
Instead of offering the least resistance, she stretched herself at the
bottom of the pit, as if she were dead, with her fore paws over her
nursling, hiding him all she could.
The hunter, who knew what wolves will do under such circumstances,
guessed it was only pretence. She could not get out of the pit herself;
and he had known wolves artful enough to let him drag them out, without
showing the slightest sign of life, and when he had left them lying on
the ground, believing they were dead, they would suddenly start up and
run away.
Tara Ghur explained this to Oliver as well as he could, assuring him in
this state she would submit to be handled. It was clear she had not
attempted to touch the woman. Under any other circumstances she would
have torn her to pieces.
The boy's heart gave a great leap of joy. He saw a baby's foot
twitching between the outstretched paws. Old Tara saw it too. He took
from the bosom of his loose brown vest, which is the Hindu's pocket, a
coil of rope, and was tying a slip noose at one end, when Oliver guessed
his purpose. In another moment the noose would have been round the gray
wolf's throat. Oliver knew the old man was only doing his duty to those
who had employed him to find the child and destroy the wolf, but he
could not bear to see him kill the noble-hearted creature with the child
in her paws--the child she had spared and cherished and guarded from
unimaginable perils all those months! "We must, we ought to spare her in
our turn," he cried, pushing back the noose as far as her jaw. "We will
muzzle her; that's enough."
But the collar to fix the muzzle was wanting. Oliver was wearing
knickerbockers and a loose brown blouse, belted round his waist. He
tore off his belt and slipped the buckle down: there was the collar they
wanted. Whilst Tara still held the ends of the rope, securing the
wolf's mouth, Oliver slipped his belt under her chin, and buckled it
firmly at the back of her neck. Then they drew the two ends of the rope
over her forehead and knotted them to the belt, and the wolf was
securely muzzled. With the end of the rope which he still held Tara
pulled her backwards, and Oliver snatched up the child, all sticky with
the bird-lime, and covered with the dust and dirt in which it had been
rolled; but its limbs were warm and strong, for it resisted his attempts
to hold it. He was by far the stronger of the two, but the struggle
might rouse the wolf to animation. Oliver slipped two fingers into his
pocket, which he was in the habit of filling from the Rana's jars, and
pushed a bit of the beautiful sweetmeats with which they were filled
into the tiny mouth. The little creature, so long a stranger to the
taste of sugar, sucked its lips with pleasure. It must have been
hungry. He fed it with all he had, until Tara came and took it from him
to carry it out of the pit. Oliver watched him scramble to the top with
the child in his arms, but he did not follow when he saw them safely on
the bank. There was something else he wanted to do. He was not going
to leave the wolf down there, with a broken leg, to perish slowly from
hunger and thirst: that would be cruelty indeed. He stood a while
considering the broken limb.
"Sahib! sahib!" called the hunter. Oliver's plan was made; so he
grasped the dusky hand which was stretched out to him, and clambered up.
The ragged woman had taken the child in her arms, and was trying to rub
off some of the dirt which covered it with the corner of her chuddar,
the loose garment the Hindu women wear. Her own had once been pink, but
had now lost all trace of its original colour.
What child had they found? Was it black or white? Who could answer the
question in its state of dirt in that dim twilight? Had it been so long
with the wolves that it had learned their ways, or had it become dumb
with terror? No sound came from its lips but a low fret.
Old Tara drew his fingers over its shock of matted hair and parted its
toes; but its shape was enough for him--it was no Hindu. Not one white
spot was to be seen about it. No matter; the old man was confident he
had found the lost one.
They were now at the very head of the koond, far away from the rest of
their party, who were vainly beating the bushes about the sloping ground
below the temple. The long night-watch had made them hungry. Tara
looked about for a breakfast for his companions. The chasm which
divided the koond had changed to a rushing torrent during the rains, and
he searched along its banks for the nest of the black goose.
Date-trees, which abound in every part of Bengal, were not far to seek.
He quickly wove himself a basket of leaves, and brought back his spoil
in triumph. He found Oliver cutting up a strip of bark with his
penknife, talking to the woman as best he could.
He had discovered that her name was Kopatree. She had been tending cows
among the hills. A buffalo had attacked them; she fled for her life,
and lost her way. If they could only guide her back to the road or to
the village by the Rana's castle, she could find her way.
"Have you been working at the sanitarium high up on the hills?" asked
Oliver.
"Yes; before the rains began." She remembered the weeping beebee, and
her distress for the lost one.
All agreed it would not be safe to take the long walk through the jungle
towards the ruined temple, as the child might set up screaming any
moment, and bring the wolf's mate upon them, with the whole pack at his
heels. No; they must steal away while the wolves were well settled in
their mid-day sleep. Better climb the rocks under which they were
resting, and seek hospitality at the Rana's castle.
When this decision was reached, Oliver slid down into the pit, with his
strips of bark in his pocket. He had no scruple about appropriating the
dirty blanket, resolving to buy its luckless owner a better in
Noak-holly bazaar.
His father's sailors had so often brought back some strange pet from
foreign parts, to amuse them on their homeward voyage, that he was not
so afraid of touching the wolf as many boys would have been. Once they
had had a lion cub, and twice a bear, so that he had had a little
training as a menagerie-keeper. He tore off a strip of the blanket, and
knelt down, with his little bundle of splints by his side, and set the
poor broken leg as well as he was able, keeping the splints in place
with his blanket-bandages. This done, he clambered out of the pit with
the end of the rope in his hand, and tethered the wolf to the nearest
tree, for the rope uncoiled to a considerable length.
Tara Ghur was impatient to be gone, for he knew that a storm was
impending, was stealing over them, with the growing heat of the day.
Suddenly in a moment the mighty trees of the forest swayed hither and
thither, bowing their giant heads as a furious gust of wind swept
through their leafy arcades; and he knew it was time to be gone.
Making prize of the remainder of the dirty blanket, he slung the child
to his back. The bag of atta and the pot of bird-lime were left behind
under a heap of stones. The old man led them by a path the wild goats
had made. As they began to climb the steep ascent, he grasped Oliver by
one hand, Kopatree seized the other, and so between them they almost
carried him along, until the topmost height was reached.
*CHAPTER XIV.*
_*THE HOMEWARD ROAD.*_
The old hunter's forethought was apparent now; for the child at his back
began to howl most dismally as poor little Carl became aware that he was
being carried away from his forest home. Oliver's sweetmeats were
exhausted, and words, entreaties, and caresses were lavished on him in
vain.
Through his wonderful power of observation, and the experiences of his
adventurous life, old Tara knew as accurately as any scientific
professor how surely sound descends. Ah, what if the wolves should
awaken!
He knew the whole pack were sleeping in the dark shadows of the gorge
where he had found the child, and he knew also that nothing makes a wild
beast so angry as being wakened from its mid-day sleep. Carly's wild
howl grew louder and louder--it might bring death upon them all--and
nothing would still it.
But for the sudden breeze which had tempered the air, Oliver would have
dropped with the noonday heat. As it was, he found it almost impossible
to keep up with his companions. His thirst was becoming unbearable,
when Tara espied in the distance one of the water-sheds which are built
all over the sides of the hills where there is water. The little party
made their way towards it, grateful for the refreshing shade its roof
afforded. In the shed there was a range of stone troughs, filled from
the running stream by which it was built; and round these troughs were a
row of pipes, some made of reeds and some from hollow trees. It was a
curious sight to see them spouting out water with a gentle, trickling
fall. A native hill-man had brought up his oxen to drink, and whilst
they slaked their thirst, he was smoking his pipe in the cool, damp
shelter. Two women were filling their pitchers, and after the fashion
of hill-mothers, they had laid their babies to sleep under the
water-spouts. The Thibetan caught sight of the little black faces
sleeping so peacefully, and ran to place their howling burden beside
them. She laid little Carl down, with his head within a few inches of a
spouting reed. The effect was instantaneous. The eyes and mouth closed
slowly, and the child fell into a profound, sweet sleep, which she knew
would last as long as they left him under the spout.
Tara Ghur was talking to the herdsman, who lent him his pipe. Oliver
begged a draught of water from one of the women's pitchers, and washed
his face and hands at one of the many rills that were flowing so
prettily around him. He was thinking that Bona would consider herself a
queen in the plainest of the necklaces worn by the ragged and dirty
creature before him. He was wondering whether it would be safe to leave
her with the sleeping child whilst he went on with the shikaree to the
Rana's castle.
But no; he decided Mr. and Mrs. Desborough would never forgive him if he
lost sight of their scarcely recovered treasure. No; he must wait until
Carl was so soundly asleep that they could take him up and carry him
away without waking him.
"Rest, sahib," urged the hunter, pointing to the trickling reeds.
Hungry as he was, Oliver laid himself down, intending to watch, not to
sleep. But the heat and the drowsy influences of the gentle shower-bath
overcame the boy, and he was soon as fast asleep as the child. After his
night's adventures in the forest, the sensation was most delightful.
Care and fear seemed to vanish, and his dreams transported him to the
beauties of fairy-land. The horned heads of the oxen came alarmingly
near, but they did not disturb the blissful tranquillity in which he
lay, as if he were spell-bound.
Tara's hand upon his shoulder roused him at last. He heard the faint,
low musical tinkle of a distant bell from the idol-temple, where the
Rana worshipped his monkey-headed divinity; where he took his young sons
to be sprinkled with consecrated water, and have their limbs touched
with all imaginable substances, until Rattam was thoroughly cross. He
was crosser than usual this morning, being bored out with the tedious
childish ceremonies which he had had to sit through in stately silence.
It was delightful to receive a message from a native woman, as he came
out of the temple, to tell him the hunter had returned, and was waiting
with the young sahib at the water-shed.
When the shikaree touched Oliver on the shoulder, the milk-white ass,
the gold-fringed umbrella, and the crowd of dusky attendants were
advancing with Rattam across the intervening plateau.
"What does my brother in so mean a place," he asked, "when tiffin waits
him in our castle-hall?"
Oliver stretched himself and rubbed his eyes, not at once remembering
all that had happened. Then recollection came back, and he sprang to
his feet, pointing to the sleeping child, and gave Rattam's hand a
hearty Yorkshire grip.
The girlish young Oriental smiled, although he felt as if his fingers
would all be out of joint: and pointing to a led ass behind him, signed
to Oliver to mount.
The Thibetan had hid herself in the shed. But Rattam would not come
near poor Carl. "He will bite," he said warningly, and his attendants
shared in his belief. Not one of them dared touch Carl.
"Give him to me," shouted Oliver; for it was easy to see the Thibetan
was growing fearful by contagion.
Oliver tumbled into the saddle. The hunter gently lifted up the child
and laid it across his knees. A running syce led the ass, and another
carried an umbrella over it, shading Oliver and his novel burden from
the dazzling sun. Rattam rode beside him.
Tara Ghur came up, bending to the very ground before them. He was
anxious to be the first to carry the good news to the search-party below
the koond. He was thinking of his well-earned reward, and he did not
want another messenger to share it. So they bade him go.
Rattam called to his attendants to halt under the leafy arches of a
banyan tree, that they might watch Tara leaping down into the koond,
springing from bough to bough, as if food and sleep were luxuries, to be
enjoyed in leisure hours alone. Then Oliver blamed his sleepy head that
he had not spoken again about the wolf.
"O Rattam," he urged, "you have one empty den in the corner of your
lovely gardens; will you have it there? Think of the love that could
transform a wolf! You should have seen its face as I did, when we first
looked down into the pit. It made me feel there is nothing in the world
so beautiful as love--nothing so strong. And when we had got the child
away, I could not bear to let Tara hurt the wolf. The same God who made
us made it. God is love. Does not he care for the whole world around,
for everything he has made? How will he look on the cruelty of leaving
the noble brute to perish in the pit?--and I've done that."
"Forget it," said Rattam; "remember only you have rescued the child."
Oliver hugged the sleeping bundle of life in his arms. "Oh, don't
mistake me!" he said passionately. "But now we have got him away, it is
such cruelty to leave the wolf tied as I have tied it. Surely you must
see it is. And I have let the hunter go."
Perhaps Rattam did not see just what Oliver desired he should; but the
young idolater was struck by his companion's earnestness. With all a
Hindu's reluctance to take the life of the animals around him, he had no
care for the cruelty of leaving the wolf to perish; yet, like a flash in
the darkness, a sense of the difference between him and the English boy
was stirring in his heart.
"It is too much like striking a fallen foe," urged Oliver, as they
resumed their journey.
"Nay," returned Rattam; "I accept the gift: the wolf is mine. There is
my father."
The Rana in his everyday dress of ordinary white cotton could only be
distinguished from the headman of his village by the silver ring on his
finger and the fineness of the shawl about his waist. He was driving
back from the village when he encountered his son.
Meanwhile the old shikaree had raised the signal of success agreed upon.
He had sent up a tall column of smoke whilst Oliver slept, by setting
fire to a patch of grass. The nearest scout had seen and repeated it.
The tiny flags on the long bamboos which his companions carried had
waved the good news from the jagged cliffs across the temple ruins, from
point to point along the broken ground, until it reached the father's
ears.
The boys glanced round, and saw the wearied jogies swarming up the steep
ascent above the koond, towards the slip of table-land on the verge of
the forest behind the Rana's castle.
Foremost of all came Mr. Desborough up the precipitous path, until the
footing for the well-trained mule he rode became too precarious. Then
he sprang to the ground, flung the bridle to his syce, and hurried along
on foot. The two friends following copied his example.
Rattam and Oliver turned back to meet them; then they perceived the old
shikaree running before them as their guide. His tattered garments were
so exactly the colour of the waving grass and scattered bushes through
which he was leading them, that he looked more like some huge
grasshopper than a living man.
They saw him pointing to the castle wall and gesticulating frantically
in all the pride of his hardly-earned success, counting on the moment
when he should lay the rescued little one in its father's arms. Then far
down behind the lingerers of the scattered party they heard the echo of
the dandy-wallahs' song. Despite the stubborn temper of the thing he
was riding, Oliver did manage to press forward, and lifting up the
sleepy child, he held it conspicuously before him. Of course he waked
up Carl, and the howling wail again began.
Was ever any sound so grateful to Mr. Desborough's straining ears?
"There, there; listen!" he exclaimed, as he cleared the ground between
them and came up panting.
"Here is the child, Mr. Desborough!" cried Oliver. "Now tell us, is he
yours?"
"Turned nurse, my boy?" laughed the major.
Oliver answered with a shrug and a grimace, growing ridiculous, as he
felt their task was accomplished.
Mr. Desborough sat down with the child on a lichen-covered stone. Where
were the clear blue eyes? Gummed up.--Where was the soft fair hair? A
shock of dirt.
The child snapped savagely at the hand that was fondling him, and
renewed his wail.
"Take care," said Rattam. "I warned you it would be dangerous," backing
his ass as he spoke.
"Quiet!" The single word fell from the major's lips in the stern tones
of military command. The howl ceased, and the child lay passive in Mr.
Desborough's arms. They soon found out how well it had learned the
all-important lesson of obedience in the wild wolf's nest.
"A good scrub would be an improvement, I am thinking," remarked the
deputy, with more drollery in the corner of his eye than Oliver had
imagined him to possess.
The whole party were gathering now. They drew together under the banyan
tree. In its grateful shadow there was room for all; for its arching
branches had struck root as they touched the ground, forming a
succession of leafy cloisters, until a grove had grown from a single
tree. The overwhelming thankfulness in Mr. Desborough's heart lay far
too deep for words as he looked the child well over, and felt it was his
own--his Carl.
There were laughter and rejoicing all around him; but his brow was grave
with the depth of his gratitude when the dandy-wallahs came up. As
Kathleen peeped from her swinging carriage, she saw but one face, and
that was her father's.
What did it mean?
He looked up and smiled at her. His eye was off the child just for one
moment. Carl sprang into the air with a bound, leaping off like a frog
to the tufted grass. Everybody ran--even Rattam. But Kathleen and her
bearers faced him. They set the dandy on the ground, and ran round and
round, scaring the queer little creature back, but not daring to touch
him. Kathleen, peeping through the curtains of her dandy, saw it all.
The great love that was throbbing in her childish heart shut out every
thought of fear. The strange wild thing gave another leap. She tumbled
out of the dandy, and as it touched the grass, with hands outspread, she
caught it in her arms. The thing seemed nothing better than a human
frog, with half-blind eyes and champing teeth. Save where the leaves
clung to it, as if they had been glued, the little figure was completely
naked and covered with slimy dirt. What did it matter? she loved him
the more.
"You will have hard work to get the child home in safety yet," said
Major Iffley; "you will have to secure it somehow. Borrow a cummer-band
and swathe it round and round like a mummy."
"No bad thought," added the deputy; "something must be done."
Mr. Desborough was kneeling by his children. Before the major had
finished speaking, an elderly bearer in Rattam's train, who looked as if
he had huddled himself into a clean sheet to attend his young chieftain
at the temple service, threw off this additional covering at a sign from
his master and laid it at the sahib's feet.
"Put it round us both, papa," said Kathleen, "and then Carl won't mind
it." Mr. Desborough thought the sunbeam she had been trying to entrap
had made its home in the happy eyes uplifted so pleadingly to his. "He
will be good with me, papa; he always was," she added.
The deputy was searching in his niece's dandy. Yes; Bona had understood
all his hasty directions. At the back of the cushions there was the
store of cakes, sufficiently English-looking to delight a child. "Here,
Oliver," he said; "feed it."
"It." The word jarred on Kathleen's ears. "It is not it," she
persisted indignantly; "it is my pretty Carl."
Mr. Desborough took the cake from Oliver's hand and fed Carl himself.
The cake was devoured; and whilst he filled the hungry mouth, the major
passed the long length of calico quickly round Carl's neck, enveloping
arms and feet, until the wild little harlequin was reduced to a great
white ball, at least in appearance. How fast the cakes were vanishing!
"O Bona!" muttered Oliver, too proud to take the share he was longing
for, "she might have sent us more."
No one but Rattam heard the low-voiced grumble.
"Sahib," he said, "my father awaits you," waving his hand in the
direction of the castle wall.
But home was the word. "Yes, home," repeated Mr. Desborough--"home to
his mother."
"Try a tub first," suggested the major.
Rattam was speaking to his shikaree.
"You have done my bidding, and you have done it well," he said like a
prince. "Now bring me home the wolf you have caught. Bring it home
alive to the vacant den in the castle gardens."
Tara Ghur salaamed before his chieftain till the dust rose up in a cloud
between them. Oliver grasped the hand of his dusky friend once more.
How was it he was always feeling Rattam more of a man than himself, or
far too much of a girl?
Now that poor little Carl was made safe, so that he could not hurt any
one, Rattam alighted, and drew nearer to the group on the grass.
"Talk to Carly again, Kathleen," Mr. Desborough was saying; "I believe
he knows you. But you must not kiss him until I tell you it is safe,"
he added quickly, as she threw her arms around her long-lost brother.
Kathleen paused, and looked up in her father's face, bewildered for a
moment.
"Then I will not do it, papa. I'll never forget again to mind what you
say."
The hand which had snatched her back patted her fondly on the cheek, and
the bitter pain which Kathleen had felt so long vanished altogether as
her father answered,--
"Yes: I can trust you now, and I am going to trust you to take Carl
home, my darling."
He put them both into the dandy, and drew the curtains closely round, so
that nothing could be seen by the children. Bona's great bag of cakes
was on Kathleen's lap, and her father showed her how to give Carl a bite
without letting her fingers go near enough to his teeth to be in danger
of an angry snap.
Mr. Desborough had left himself a peep-hole, so that his eye was never
off his children for a moment as he walked by the side of the dandy.
Had ever father such a journey before?
"Now, Kathy," he said cheerily, "you can do what no one else can do: you
can make Carly listen. See how his eyes follow yours! Try and waken up
his old love; you were with him to the last. Think of all that he was
fond of in his nursery days; no one knows but you."
"Sahib! sahib!" entreated the coolies round, "no trust it with the
little beebee--no trust it; grow angry, tear and bite."
Even the major and the deputy looked on doubtfully. They had known
Kathleen only as a little wilful, heedless thing; but now they saw the
better, higher nature in the child, expanding through the sorrow and the
joy she had felt so deeply,--just as young plants grow and blossom when
sunshine follows rain.
"I should think myself a happy man, Desborough, if I had such another
fairy to call me father," observed the major, as they listened to
Kathleen's cooing voice as she chattered on.
"O Carly, don't you know your own, own sissy? Now eat this, you dear,
and Kath will give you plenty more, all so nice. There, there!"
"That sahib would blow the conch shell for a daughter," remarked Rattam
thoughtfully. "I remember how our people blew it loudly for joy when
Aglar was born; but when my little sister Deodee came, they all began to
sigh and lament. I really think it would be well for us if that were
changed."
"Then change it all you can," retorted Oliver. "Some day you and I will
be men. But you need not wait for that; you are a brother now."
Rattam went home with a shadow on his brow, and a hunger in his heart
for better things. We know of the promise that such hunger shall be
satisfied at last; but Rattam knew only the favourite Hindu saying, "As
it has always been, so it always will be," which fell like a wet blanket
on his new-born wish to try. Yet that one day had not been lived in
vain.
*CHAPTER XV.*
_*A LITTLE SAVAGE.*_
As the search-party were descending the hills, the Thibetan peeped out
from the water-shed. The sheen of her resplendent jewels caught Oliver's
eye, so he sent his uncle's syce to persuade her to go with them to the
Beebee Desborough, who knew her. She was mourning over her lost cows,
which she feared some of the wandering robber tribes would drive away if
they found them straying. They all wore necklets of red cloth, she
said, which she had sewn with cowries in patterns.
Oliver was counting up his money, to see if he could buy her a cow, when
one of the jogies declared he had seen them rush out from the jungle
when they were beating the second koond. He was certain she would find
them roaming amidst the bushes below the ruins. So on she went, for the
vultures and kites were sweeping round and round in great disorder--a
sure presage of the approach of the storm Tara Ghur had predicted. A
gust of cold wind swept down from the highest peaks, driving before it a
dark and whirling cloud, which covered the travellers with a thick pall
of dust.
They groped their way, afraid to linger in the dangerous neighbourhood
of the koonds, and still more afraid of losing each other.
Major Iffley rode about, looking up the stragglers; and making the men
close round the dandy, they marched on. A brooding silence filled the
air, only broken at intervals by the vulture's scream or the beat of
retreating wings. Mr. Desborough parted the curtains of the dandy and
felt about, to assure himself both children were safe. Carl waked with
the darkness, and began to howl--the same wild howl which had frightened
the old shikaree in the morning. He was not there now to point out its
danger. But the Thibetan put her hand to her ear again and again as she
listened. Was there an answer from the distant koond?
"Do you hear anything?" asked Oliver, as the first returning gleam of
light showed them the gate of Mr. Desborough's compound. They had
reached his home, and might have passed it unawares, so great was the
darkness of the coming storm. The trees in his garden bent their proud
heads, and swayed from side to side like jungle grass as the rain came
down at last in a mighty torrent. There was just light enough to
distinguish the white columns of the veranda through the open gate.
There was a general rush to shelter, for in those brief moments the
carriage drive had become a rushing river. The gleam of the lighted
lamps in Mr. Desborough's hall cast a glow of welcome on the sodden
curtains of the dandy. Mr. Desborough made his men carry it right
through the folding doors, and set it down on the middle of the floor,
whilst he carefully closed them behind it. Major Iffley had divined his
intention, and was already shutting every other door which opened into
the hall. Oliver and his uncle were both shut out, and groped their way
to the dining-room window, where Bona was standing watching the storm.
"You here!" they both exclaimed in surprise, as she opened it to let
them in.
"Why, yes," she hesitated. "I grew so impatient I came across to see if
you had got home. Have you found anything?"
"Yes, yes!" they reiterated, as Mrs. Desborough herself appeared behind
her.
"Where is Kathleen?" she asked, looking beyond the deputy--whom she
failed to recognize in the gloom of the storm--to the dripping coolies.
The men were crowding in the veranda, rubbing their wet feet and
wringing the water from their calico garments.
In the hubble-bubble of the many tongues she failed to understand
anything.
"Kathleen is all right," said Bona quickly. "I told you she was with
her father."
"Calm your anxiety, my dear Mrs. Desborough," began the deputy, with a
seriousness which he intended should prepare the way; but it only
startled her.
"What does all this mean?" she asked, looking from one to the other.
"It means--well, it means--" and the deputy coughed to gain time.--"Just
see, Oliver," he added aside.
"Bother it!" muttered the boy; "I can't open this door."
Bona hastened to his help; but they pushed against it in vain.
Mrs. Desborough, always apprehensive since Carl was lost, was growing
desperate. "Where is Kathleen?" she reiterated.
"Call her," suggested the coughing deputy to his nephew.
"Kathleen!" shouted Oliver. "Do come to your mother."
"Are the doors all shut?" demanded Mr. Desborough in return.
"Yes, yes!" echoed a chorus of voices as Mr. Desborough walked in,
carrying what seemed to his wife to be nothing but a big bundle of
calico.
Kathleen flew to her side. Mrs. Desborough caught hold of her by both
hands.
"Do not look at me, mamma; look at what we've found," said Kathleen
excitedly.
"A child," continued Mr. Desborough, speaking as quietly as he could.
"Come and look, my dear."
A flash of lightning lit up the darkened room for one brief moment, and
left it blacker than before.
"Bring lights," said Mr. Desborough.
"Yes; and order in the roast-joint, for this poor lad has scarcely
tasted food all day," put in Major Iffley, laying his hand on Oliver's
shoulder. "Besides," he added in a low aside, "nothing will be so
attractive to that young animal as the savoury smell of the roast. I
speak advisedly."
"Let us have our dinner, my dear," said Mr. Desborough, turning to Mrs.
Desborough as she bent over the bundle in his arms.
The lights quickly appeared, followed by the ayah with sponge, soap, and
towel.
He took the sponge from her hand, and gently washed the queer little
face that was hiding itself from the light under his arm. He turned
Carl slowly round towards Mrs. Desborough. But no amount of dirt, no
scars, no scratches, could hide the truth from his mother. She clasped
him to her, exclaiming, "It is ours--our own--our Carl!"
"Can it be possible?" cried Bona.
"With God all things are possible," said the deputy reverently. How
Kathleen listened! The servants were hurrying in with the steaming
dishes of roast-meat, game and fowl. The cloth had been laid an hour
ago, awaiting the return of the gentlemen. There was little to do, but
they made that little long in their eagerness to catch sight of the lost
and found. At last they were all dismissed, and the doors made fast.
"Now, Iffley," said Mr. Desborough; and they began to unwind the length
of calico with which poor Carly had been fettered. Between them they
got him at last into a clean pinafore of Horace's which the ayah had
brought.
Then his mother took him on her lap; but how to hold him was the
difficulty. He wriggled and twisted himself into all sorts of
contortions. He had struck with shoes and socks, and would have none of
them, and began his fearful howl once more.
"Quiet!" said Mr. Desborough, in a quick, decisive tone; and the noise
was hushed in a moment. But the light was obviously painful to Carl.
He put up his hands, flickering his fingers before his eyes.
"He will howl again," said the major, "if we all stand looking at him."
"Give him a bone," suggested Oliver, who was going in for a good feed, a
little quicker and faster than etiquette allowed; but a day's starvation
is no joke, and everybody told him to help himself, and he was just
doing it.
Carl slid down from his mother's lap and sat under the table sucking his
bone contentedly. Presently he gave a rough, hoarse cry that sounded
very much like "More." It was his first attempt to speak. The wing of
chicken on Kathleen's plate was in his other hand in a moment.
"We are getting on," said the major, looking down at the two small heads
beneath the table, whilst the deputy was explaining to Mrs. Desborough
where and how they had found her child. It was a never-to-be-forgotten
hour: the storm was raging without, thankfulness and wonder reigned
within.
Oliver grew eloquent as he described the amazing sagacity of Rattam's
old hunter. It was happiness now to look back and see how slender was
the thread on which the poor child's fate had depended, and how
singularly it had been preserved in the midst of unheard-of perils.
Mrs. Desborough's eyes were welling over as she thought of her long-lost
darling, in the midst of the wild beasts in a trackless koond, yet fed
and cherished! How?
By the mercy of our heavenly Father, as she truly said, in the fervour
of her mother's love. But she did not see the way in which the
wonderful escape had been brought about. She knew nothing of the double
nature in the wolf; and they told her it was safe in Rattam's cage.
That there was any danger yet for her child, from the very love of the
wolves, never crossed her mind; how could it?
She had enough to think about. Her child was at her feet, but it had
forgotten its home. She saw it, estranged and wild.
"Call him by his name," said Mr. Desborough. "Call him Carl every time
you give him anything to eat, and he will remember his name; if not, he
will soon learn it afresh. We must 'gentle' him, as the grooms say, my
dear. Never fear; we shall bring him round."
Carl had taken the wing of the chicken Kathleen had brought him, and
laid his other bone on the floor. Kathleen still sat on the carpet by
his side, with a patience she had never shown to any one before. He had
even rubbed his head against her shoulder, when the moongus, which had
been asleep in one corner of the room, aroused, and seeing an inviting
bone, stole up to it for a taste. Carl flew at it in savage fury,
tearing and raging. The scuffle which ensued before the two were parted
filled Mrs. Desborough with many fears for Horace, who was happily in
bed and asleep before his brother was brought home. But to the surprise
of every one present, when Mr. Desborough made his voice heard above the
din of the combatants, Carl was silent in a moment, and dropped back on
the floor in instantaneous obedience. After a little while he came
creeping to his father's feet. Oh, it was piteous to see him so, and
yet it was hopeful.
Kathleen, who was trembling all over, put her moongus out of the room,
and ran back with her lap full of playthings. She had brought Carl's
own old drum that he used to be so fond of, and his horse and cart, and
a new steam-engine he had never seen. "Perhaps," she thought, "he may
remember these. They were his favourites; and Racy always loves my
engine." She set it running on the floor before Carl's feet. The major
lifted up his corner of the tablecloth, that he might watch the
proceedings. Carl gave one of his frog-like leaps, pounced on the
swiftly-moving toy, and snapped it in two with a cry of delight.
"Never mind, dear," said Mrs. Desborough, turning to Kathleen.
"Mind, mamma!" repeated Kathleen desperately; "can I ever mind anything
he does, when I know that all this happened because I meddled with the
blind? You told me never to touch it, and all my crying would not undo
the mischief. Carl is better than I am, mamma, for he has minded every
word papa has spoken."
"This comforts me, Kathleen, more than anything else," answered her
mother fondly. "Always to obey is the one great lesson for every child
to learn, and it cannot be learned too early. It is the
foundation-stone of all that is good in after life--a young child's
safeguard and its shield. If you both are careful to obey, we shall
soon bring Carly round, and all be happy again."
Kathleen hung her head in her self-reproachful shame. She did not see
the joy in her mother's eyes; for there is no joy so dear to a mother's
heart as the joy of seeing her children try to overcome their faults,
and turn to all that is right and good.
No one else understood the whispered conversation; they were all intent
on Carl. Oliver took up the drum and beat a jolly tune.
Suddenly Carl sprang up and listened. Yes, there was a tiny creeping
sound. It was only the lizard from behind the picture-frame that hung
over the sideboard coming out for its crumbs, which Kathleen gathered
for it every day after dinner. It was a pretty rose-pink creature, with
a sharply-pointed tail and bead-like eyes. It had grown so tame it ran
between the plates, helping itself as it liked.
"Tic-tickee!" cried Carl, calling it by the Hindu name his ayah had
taught him, and grabbing at it with both his hands.
Strange that he should remember the lizard, when everything else was
forgotten! Had he played with the lizards in the forest? Oh, horror!
he was going to eat it. Bona nearly screamed. In her heart she was
almost as afraid of him as the Hindu servants, and was thankful when the
deputy talked of going, for the storm was over.
"If you want us, Desborough," said Major Iffley, "we are not so very far
away. But you will tame your young savage all the better when you are
alone."
They were careful even in the moment of departure not to leave a door
ajar, for fear little Carl should try to rush out.
"Come and look at him to-morrow," replied Mr. Desborough, "when a warm
bath and his mother's scissors have had their turn."
"Leave the shoes and socks for a day or two--that is my advice," laughed
the deputy as he rode away, splashing through the flood that still
surrounded the compound.
The horse which had been found for Oliver was tired with its day's hard
work, and would not keep pace with his uncle's and Bona's. As he lagged
behind he heard a cow lowing in the moonlight. He thought of the
Thibetan when he saw the horned head drinking at the stream which
drained the road. He rode up to it, looking for the scarlet necklet she
had described.
There it was, embroidered all over with tiny shells in a most fanciful
pattern. Laughing heartily to think of so much ingenuity being wasted
on a cow, he drove it before him into the gates of Runnangore, glad to
have recovered one of the scattered herd for their luckless owner. He
was sure that Mr. Desborough would look after her; but he meant to take
her a new blanket all the same.
*CHAPTER XVI.*
_*THE CONCLUSION.*_
The sunrise found Old Gray Legs roaming through the koond in search of
his missing mate, whilst the half-grown wolflings sat howling by the
korinda bush until the sun was high. The time for sleep had come. They
laid themselves down, but not to rest. The most adventurous of them all
had his ear on the ground listening. It heard Old Gray Legs give tongue
as he found himself at last on the track of his mate. Out they all
rushed, scattering themselves over bush and boulder to join him. They
were scenting the ground as they ran, and one of them alighted on the
path which Carl had taken with his furry protector. Once on the scent of
his lost playfellow, the keen young wolf pursued him through all its
windings to the pit, which it had just light enough to avoid, then up to
the heights, and back to the very gate of Mr. Desborough's compound,
where it lay crouching among the ferns.
The native servants were at their usual work. Bene Madho was returning
from the bazaar, with one or two of the coolies carrying home his
purchases. The dandy-bearers, who went into the patches of jungle to cut
grass for the horses every day, were coming back with their bundles on
their heads. The Thibetan was with them. She had gone out hoping to
see something of her straying cattle. Oliver, too, had risen early. He
wanted to tell her to come over to Runnangore and claim her cow. In
spite of her rags and her losses she was a rich woman. She had only to
sell a few of her beads to buy a new herd. Bona would gladly become
their purchaser, so he made this a reason for presenting himself at the
gate of Noak-holly by five o'clock in the morning. He did not expect to
see either Mr. or Mrs. Desborough at such an hour, but he thought he
might inquire of the servants how the night had gone.
In truth, it had gone queerly enough behind the nursery purdah, where
both father and mother had been working at their precious little savage
with sponge, soap, and towel. The cutting of his hair was terrible,
and, worse than all, the cutting of his nails, which had grown into
veritable claws. The poor wee child, so long a stranger to bath or
hair-brush, hated both. If his father had not been there to hold him,
it would not have been possible to wash him clean from Tara's bird-lime.
Painful as the tedious process must have been, he was singularly
obedient. He seemed to like nothing so well as coiling himself round on
his mother's lap. But to get him to sleep was an impossibility. Oh how
his father longed for the lulling influences of the water-shed on the
hills! Carl was continually racing after the toads and spiders, making
all sorts of strange noises, feeling his way about the darkened room,
and howling at each unfamiliar sound. But morning dawned, and he began
to yawn and blink in the growing light. Suddenly he gave one of his
frog-like leaps, parting the chintz curtains of the purdah with his
head, and peeping into the veranda. Mr. Desborough was nodding; but
mamma was close beside her boy, wondering what he would do next. The
servants were all astir, and the gate was locked, so she let him take
his first look round by daylight.
Another bound and he was over the veranda railing into the garden, where
he coiled himself round in the middle of a bed of mignonnette, and
settled for sleep at last.
"Better not disturb him," thought Mrs. Desborough. "After so many months
in the woods he could not sleep indoors."
So she opened a large white sunshade over his head, and sat down under
an acacia tree to watch his slumbers.
Mr. Desborough was sleeping too, having had no rest for two whole
nights. She could not bear to wake him, so she called up Kathleen. It
was early; but the early morning in India is delightful. The ayah
brought her, and returned to Horace, who had not yet seen his brother.
Swarms of young frogs had appeared in the veranda after last night's
storm. The bhisti was gathering them up, sweeping them into a pail to
carry away and put them somewhere outside the compound. Kathleen amused
herself with watching the round, red insects which covered the grass,
looking as if, instead of a hailstorm, there had been a shower of red
velvet buttons, the rain had brought them out in such numbers. The
gardener was hoeing within call.
"Yes," thought Mrs. Desborough; "all safe at home. All danger over
now." Yet she could not take her eyes off the little sleeper in the
mignonnette.
"When he awakens," she said to Kathleen, "we will let him see Horace at
play in the veranda. I fear they have forgotten each other; but they
are twins, and the old love will revive. It will be safer to have the
veranda railing between them at first. Racy is so trying, and if Carl
grew cross he might fly at his brother as he did at your moongus. We
will put the old red reins on Carl, so that he cannot leap away
unawares. Being with Racy will bring Carl round sooner than anything
else, if it is but safe to let them be together."
Whilst Mrs. Desborough was speaking the men came in with their bundles
of grass. As the gate opened, in rushed the wolf with a cry. Up flew
Carl with a bound of delight to meet it. They tumbled on the grass
together in a tumult of ecstasy. Mrs. Desborough's first thought was to
lift up Kathleen into the acacia under which they were sitting, while
she shrieked for help. At the sound of her voice and of the running
feet hurrying towards her from every direction, the wolf stopped in its
gambols, seized Carl in its mouth, and was dragging him away. They were
nearly at the gate.
"Come back, Carl! Carl, come back!" cried Kathleen from the acacia
boughs.
Mr. Desborough ran out with his gun. He was levelling it to take deadly
aim, when he perceived the close embrace with which Carl was clinging to
the wolf, and lowered it in despair.
"Shut the gate!" he shouted.
Oliver and the Thibetan rushed into the garden.
Mrs. Desborough saw Carl turn his head at the sound of his sister's
voice, and she repeated the call in her desperation. His name rang loud
and clear above the clamour the servants were raising in their usual
fashion. Carl came as a well-trained dog obeys his master, and, O
horror! the young wolf with him. She showered the cakes she had brought
with her across the grass towards him. Oliver snatched a pitchfork from
one of the grass-cutters and ran; but the Thibetan, who was the nearest,
seized the wolf by the hind legs and held it fast. Oliver put the
arching tines of the pitchfork over its neck like a collar, and drove
the points into the ground until its head was fixed but not hurt, and he
leaned on the handle with all his strength to keep it there. Oh for
Tara Ghur! but the old shikaree was far away, rejoicing in his
well-deserved and ample reward. Was there nobody to help?
"Hold hard!" shouted Mr. Desborough, as he rushed up white and resolute
to pull the child away. But Carl clung passionately to his furry
playfellow. The wolf had ceased to struggle, but it held his pinafore in
a grip of iron.
Mr. Desborough tore the thin muslin in two, and forced the child
backwards. Mrs. Desborough was close beside him. She pushed the
sweetest cake she had into Carl's mouth to try to divert his attention.
He threw it to the wolf as he struggled to free himself from his
father's arm.
"Booraba no hurt child," said the Thibetan, who had watched the wolf and
the child all night in the shikaree's pit. "Young booraba like its
bahee [brother]. Hurt it, and child hate you all its life. Cage it,
child stop, feed booraba; no run away from each other."
There was so much sense in what she urged so earnestly, Mr. Desborough
was afraid to disregard it. He looked around him, not knowing what to do
for the best. Then he shouted to the grass-cutters to fetch the iron
hurdles which divided the paddock behind the garden. They ran across,
pulled them up, and flung them over the hedge of roses.
Meanwhile Bene Madho had fetched old Gobur to the sahib's assistance.
Mrs. Desborough had taken off Kathleen's sash and knotted it round
Carl's waist, so that she could hold him whilst Mr. Desborough fixed the
hurdles firmly in the grass.
Gobur came up with another pitchfork and put it over the wolf's hind
legs, fixing them to the ground, as Oliver had fixed its head, to
release the courageous Thibetan. It was a trying moment for Oliver when
Mr. Desborough put down the fourth hurdle and shut him in with the wolf
and Gobur. It was a tremendous effort to hold the wolf down, and he was
getting exhausted.
Mr. Desborough saw this, and leaving his men to make a threefold fence
round the wolf, he leaned over the hurdle and took the handle of the
pitchfork from him. The boldest of the syces followed his example, and
released Gobur. It was a moment of intense relief to Mrs. Desborough
when she saw them both safely outside. The Thibetan was helping her to
control Carl, who was struggling to get free. Five or six men were
driving in the hurdles as fast as they could, and in the noise of their
hammering Mrs. Desborough could no longer make herself heard.
By Mr. Desborough's orders every hurdle on the place was brought, until
a perfect pyramid of iron was piled over the prostrate wolf. After the
three-fold fence a row of hurdles were set endways between the lines,
slanting inwards, and over these another tier was laid to form a roof,
and another and another, crossing each other in every direction. Before
the last corners were shut in the pitchforks were slowly withdrawn, and
young Fawnie was left unhurt to examine the iron house which had been
built over him.
One hurdle at the top was so placed that it could be withdrawn a little
way, like a window-shutter. Gobur climbed up and let down a pail of
water.
All the while the men were at work, Carl and the wolfling were crying to
each other.
The wolfling was not yet six months old, and had not learned to be so
wary as its mother. Yet it was strangely quieted when it found itself a
prisoner. Not so Carl: he stamped, and sobbed, and kicked in an agony of
distress, because he was shut out.
"Give him his liberty," said Mr. Desborough. "Let him run up to it if
he likes."
Carl flew to the hurdles and tried to push between their rails, whilst
Fawnie, as Oliver called the wolfling, worked at them from the inside.
But the iron walls of his prison were too firmly built to be shaken. A
frog leaped out of the grass. Fawnie snapped it up, and brought it to
give to Carl through his prison bars.
Then Mrs. Desborough realized how her darling had been fed and kept
alive in the trackless jungle.
Oliver was telling her of the old gray wolf now in Rattam's cage, and
the Thibetan repeated her story.
The mother's feelings can be better imagined than described when she saw
thus clearly that the love of the wild wolves had saved her child.
Could she doubt it?
"Ought we to think it impossible?" urged Oliver. "In spite of all its
savagery, the dog's nature is in the wolf. It is the strong family
feeling amongst them which makes the pack. You see, I have heard a
great deal about them from Tara Ghur; and I shall never forget that old
wolf's face as she turned to Carl in the pit."
Gobur and the gardener were cutting off some long branches from the
nearest trees, to thatch poor Fawnie's pyramid and shelter him from the
sun.
Oliver ran to help them, until Fawnie's den looked like a gigantic heap
of boughs. Then Oliver fetched the gardener's syringe and drenched it.
When Fawnie found it growing dark and cool as the nest beneath the
korinda bush, he laid himself down and fell into the sound mid-day sleep
of the wild beast.
But nothing short of force could drag Carl away, and that was not to be
thought of. Mr. Desborough saw it would only embitter the child, and
rouse and exasperate the wolfling. He was hoping that if Carl were left
to himself he too would fall asleep. But no; all sleep was gone. Carl
kept on raging round and round the pyramid, tugging with all his might
at the boughs which hid his furry friend.
Mr. Desborough lifted Kathleen down from the acacia. Her presence had
helped him so much in getting Carl safely through his journey home. But
her brave little heart was failing her; she had been terribly frightened
at the sight of Fawnie, and she clung to her mother, trembling.
"Fetch Racy," said Mr. Desborough in despair. "The sight of his
twin-brother may draw the child away. We must try something."
Mrs. Desborough went herself, not daring to trust any one else with the
rebellious Racy in such circumstances.
She soon reappeared, driving him before her on his pretty bicycle-horse;
while the ayah crept beside her, her black face puckered with anxiety
and fear as she looked at the group on the lawn, and above all at the
portentous pyramid.
Horace, who could not understand what had happened, flourished his whip
and shouted to his heart's content. He was highly delighted at having
got mamma to be his syce. She slowly drove him round the lawn. Of
course, he wanted to gallop off at once to his father and Kathleen; but
Mrs. Desborough turned him back, so that Carl might see him. The twins
perceived each other at last, and drew together, staring.
"Look, Racy, who is that sitting on the grass? Can it be Carl--Racy's
own lost Carl--come home at last?"
Carl's eyes followed every movement of the pretty brown horse with a
strange bewilderment.
Kathleen, with her father's arm round her, felt her courage revive. She
glanced up at him inquiringly. He nodded. Away she ran to meet the
young equestrian, calling Carl to follow. Again he obeyed.
"O Racy!" she exclaimed, "we've found poor Carl. Let us put him on your
horse, and you and I will drive him home, for fear we should lose him.
You push, and I will hold him on. Quick, dear, quick!"
"God bless her," said Mr. Desborough; "she has done it again."
Racy tumbled out of his saddle. Mrs. Desborough and the ayah lifted
Carl into his place. He made no resistance, but laid his face down and
began to bite the horse's ears. Kathleen seized the bridle. Racy
pushed manfully behind. Mrs. Desborough held one arm and the ayah the
other. Up ran the bhisti, who stretched over Horace's head and lifted
the horse and its rider right up the veranda steps. As usual, the hall
door stood wide; in rode Carl, and Mrs. Desborough locked it behind him.
"What is up now?" exclaimed Major Iffley, as he stopped at the familiar
gate. "You have found out something wrong about the place?"
"Yes, an imperative necessity to leave it. I want to make over the
indigo factory to you for at least a twelvemonth, whilst I take holiday
with my wife and children. We should never have rescued Carl if he had
not learned to obey, and now distance is our best defence," said Mr.
Desborough gravely.
"Done!" answered the major gaily.
"If you go," put in Oliver earnestly, "give Fawnie over to me. He is
young enough to tame and train, and I should be proud to own him. With
a stout chain and collar he will prove a noble dog."