THE SQUIRE'S STORY (CONTINUED)
"I left the barracks and made my way into the lowest and commonest
quarter of the city. My own idea was to drown my thoughts, to forget
myself, Edith, and the world, even if only for an hour or so. The sight
of the familiar sign of the opium den over a low door stopped me in my
mad ramble. Here was the chance of banishing my thoughts and misery. I
entered. A hideous old Chinaman barred my way, but satisfying himself
that I was not an objectionable person, he turned and led me down into
the dark den itself. An unoccupied ottoman in a corner took my fancy. I
flung myself down. Simultaneously a soft voice asked me in English what
I required. At first I fancied I was a prey to my imagination. The voice
was so soft, so gentle, that I thought it was hers--Edith's.
"Then I looked round full into the face of a maiden who leaned over me,
so close that I felt her warm breath on my cheek as she repeated the
words that had roused me from my drowsiness. She was in all respects
the loveliest native girl I ever saw--so slim, so bright-eyed, and so
charmingly clad, that for the moment I forgot my misery in contemplation
of her exceptional beauty.
"'You speak English?' I remarked.
"'Yes, indeed,' she murmured, seating herself gracefully on the arm of
the couch; 'it is so much prettier than my own language.'
"'And what are you doing in this--er--hell?' I could not refrain from
asking. She formed such a striking contrast to her surroundings.
"'Hush!' she responded quietly, and raised her finger in warning,
placing it almost upon my lips. 'Hush, they may not all be asleep.' And
she waved her arm, bare to the elbow, in the direction of the motionless
forms recumbent on the other couches in the cellar.
"'What is your name?' I whispered, as I perceived that she was not
averse to conversation.
"'Lilla,' she replied, blushing under her dark skin. I noticed that she
had a little pipe in her hand. 'Half?' she asked.
"'No,' I said, 'not yet. I want a talk. That is, if you don't mind.'
"Again she blushed, and settled herself down at the foot of the ottoman.
'You know you're in danger here?' she muttered interrogatively.
"'Why?' I asked, in no way alarmed, though.
"'Well,' she replied, gazing into my eyes, 'queer things happen here
occasionally which would cause some talk were they to become known.' She
shrugged her little shoulders suggestively. She was certainly a
bewitching girl.
"'You are an officer?' she asked.
"'Yes,' I replied, foolishly betraying the fact, when, dressed as I was
in civilian attire, I might have passed as a merchant or some other
English resident of the city.
"For the moment I confess I was bewitched--powerless in the hands of the
dark-eyed girl whose life was spent in such strange surroundings.
"For many an hour we sat there--she at the foot, I at the head of the
couch, and our conversation disturbed a silence only broken occasionally
by the heavy breathing or moans of one or other of the motionless
figures stretched round us.
"'Lilla' told me much about herself and about those that kept the den.
The latter were a native and his Chinese wife, the parents of 'Lilla,'
which was an abbreviation of some eight-syllabled name by which she was
known in her peculiar family circle.
"Yes, she had always lived in the den, she told me, and had waited upon
the customers since a mere child. She was now only seventeen, and
confessed she was unmarried. She further told me that she intended doing
what the English call marrying money, even questioning me, to my
embarrassment, on my financial position.
"As the serpent bewitches, hypnotises, and eventually snares the rabbit,
so I began to feel that this maiden of the opium den was beginning to
bewitch me. Not that I was, or have been, an impressionable man,
unusually susceptible to feminine attack, though I have, as you, my son,
may have discovered, always been of a weak disposition. I do not know,
either, whether, by permitting myself to fall a victim to 'Lilla's'
charms, I was, in the words of a common expression, 'cutting off my nose
to spite my face'--impotently avenging Edith's treatment of me by
falling in love--no other words express my behaviour--with the first
female I met after learning of what I believed to be her fickle
inconstancy.
"I am more than inclined to think that the native girl was imbued with
those powers that so many of even the humblest Indian folks possess--a
power that, unfortunately, is getting a firm rooting in this
country--that of mesmeric influence over a weaker mind!
"It will be sufficient for me to say that I found myself quite
powerless in the girl's hands. I told her the story of my life and love
when she requested me to do so. I seemed unable to hide anything from
her. I went so far as to mention that a severe punishment would result
were it discovered that I had visited the den, the cholera then
ravishing the country, and the troops, including the officers, being
under special orders not to visit the particularly afflicted quarters of
the town.
"And this remark of mine must have been the cause of all my future
trouble and misery--and, probably, of my death!
"The first day I remained in ignorance of the secrets of the opium den,
and of that of opium smoking. But when I left, long after nightfall, it
was with a promise on my lips that I would return next day, and I did.
Strive as I might I could not battle against the invisible power that
drew me, on the following afternoon, to the low opium den.
"This time I was horrified on entering the dim cellar to see Lilla
curled up on a sofa with the stem of an opium pipe between her pearly
teeth. Otherwise the room was empty. Not until afterwards did I discover
the reason, which was that one of the visitors of the previous day had
been seized with the terrible disease, and that either he had
communicated the scourge to the other smokers who haunted the den, or
the habitues had been too frightened by what they saw to return!
"On closer investigation I discovered that a glass of neat spirit stood
on the table at the girl's right hand! That the lovely young girl was an
opium smoker and a drinker of undiluted spirit seemed too horrible.
Instinctively I recoiled from her, and as she seemed half asleep,
commenced to make my way from the room.
"The sounds I made caused her to awake.
"'Ah! it is the Sahib,' she murmured; 'come, come, and kiss Lilla.'
"How I had been deceived! How blind I had been! The girl who had
bewitched and fascinated me on the previous day was now revealed in her
true light. Now she seemed something despicable, hateful, loathsome. The
beauty that I admired seemed to have vanished. The creature now appeared
to be hideous. Whether the revulsion of feeling caused a permanent
blindness of my eyes to her beauty I cannot say. Knowing what I do of
India and its mysteries--mysteries that scientists have failed to
solve--I am more than inclined to think that the girl was never so
beautiful as she first appeared to me. My very eyes had been deceived
before now by the marvellous tricks of the native conjurers and fakirs.
In my own mind, I have no shadow of doubt that the girl Lilla, by the
powers she possessed, led me to imagine the charms I had only a day
before seen in her, and by means of which she had fascinated me.
"Her words and the sight of her enraged as well as disgusted me.
"'You she-devil!' I shouted. Then I stopped because words failed me.
"The girl showed no astonishment at the epithet I had bestowed upon her.
Instead, she softly stepped down from the sofa and glided, snake-like it
seemed to me, towards where I stood.
"'You shall kiss me,' she hissed, and again I was impressed by her
resemblance to a serpent.
"Even when I attempted to cast her away as she crept nearer and nearer
to me I felt that I was powerless. My loathing for this creature was
none the less, yet I could not prevent her from pressing those cruel
thin lips, that had seemed so rosy and fascinating on the previous day,
against my cheek.
"'There,' she whispered; 'I knew you loved me, Harold. You must marry
me!'
"You fiend!' I shrieked; 'I detest you--I loathe your very existence.
Away! I will not stay for another moment under the same roof with you.
Sorceress, you have ensnared me, but----'
"'My love,' she replied, beneath her breath, 'as you say, you are
ensnared. You are mine. You shall not leave this house until you are
even more mine--until you are my husband.'
"Then as she spoke I suddenly became aware of the fact that a face was
peering through the half-closed door of the den--a shrivelled, yellow
face, with oval slits of eyes, which were directed towards me.
"Then, evidently perceiving I was aware of this fact, the door was
pushed open, and a hideous Chinese woman shuffled in, at once engaging
Lilla in conversation in her native tongue.
"From what I gathered the woman was the mother of the girl!
"With startling suddenness the elder female turned on me after a
moment's conversation with Lilla.
"'Sahib likee mazinloree?' she said with an intonation that implied a
question.
"I shook my head, not understanding the creature's remark.
"'She says, "Does the gentleman like his mother-in-law?"' explained
Lilla, with a leering laugh.
"'I have had enough of this nonsense,' I shouted, bubbling over with
rage; 'let me pass or I shall clear you both out of the way.'
"'No marry this girlee?' asked the old hag.
"'No, once again,' I exclaimed, and I thrust the woman to one side, and
found myself in the dark passage.
"'Ha--ha--ha!' screamed Lilla; 'how will you like it when we tell the
General where you have been?'
"I stopped short, horrified by her words. At once I saw how I had been
'let in.' The diabolical cunning of the enchantress--the siren--was only
too plain. Unless I married Lilla she would report my visit to the
forbidden quarter to the commanding officer at the barracks.
"'Tell me,' I said, ill-disguising my rage, 'how much you want!'
"'Hundred thousand seventee hundred 'pees,' giggled the old woman.
"'Nothing,' laconically remarked Lilla.
"'Name your price, you witch,' I said to the girl.
"'Your love,' she replied, in a tone that caused me to exercise all my
self-control to prevent myself from striking her.
"There was the soft pat-pat of footsteps in the passage; then I felt a
tap on my shoulder.
"Turning, I confronted a gigantic Hindoo in gorgeous costume, who had
come upon us from whence I did not know.
"'This is the man?' he asked Lilla in Hindustani, a language with which
I had a passing acquaintance.
"The girl replied in the affirmative. 'He refuses,' she added.
"The other evidently knew who I was, for, learning this intelligence, he
at once sprang upon me, bearing me to the ground. Then I felt a sudden
sharp blow on my throat, and I lost consciousness."