Part 21 (2/2)
I noticed they were all very clean indeed, their clothes spotless, and the scent of their tobacco quite good.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
I had sent my Boy round to find a place where we might stay, and on our return to the steamer he told me the Dak bungalow was occupied, likewise the circuit house, so we were stranded and homeless on the banks of the Irrawaddy. We then went up to the club, and there found to our relief our Boy was ... mistaken, and that the Dak bungalow was available. A member of the club kindly introduced himself and entertained us whilst we waited for our host, we noticed his hands were both in bandages, but of this more anon. From the club we went back in the starlight to our home on the s.h.i.+p for one more night, our minds at rest and bodies refreshed. The ladies drove in a bullock cart, the writer walked behind--the sand and track were too rough for The Bhamo gharry, and truly we considered our cart was more picturesque and comfortable. The grey wood of the cart and the ladies' white hats and dresses, and the natives' white robes and the grey white sand and white oxen, all blended into a very pretty moth-like harmony; and overhead the sky was mat blue with many solemn stars twinkling. As we crossed the little desert of sand we pa.s.sed the camp and fires of the Northern peoples, beside their scores of ponies, and bales of cotton, and pack saddles; everything uncovered and open on the dry sand, no need here at this season for shelter excepting from the sun at mid-day.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A Chinese Joss House]
Miss B. leaves us here, going south by what is called the Ferry Boat, a most excellent little steamer, with roomy, comfortable cabins. It goes down to Katha, thence she goes by train to Mandalay, and straight on to Rangoon, and her R.E. brother in India. We decide to stick to steamers in Burmah as long as we can, the extra time spent on steamers is well balanced by their comfort as against the dust and racket of a train.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
The morning fog gave us a little respite--let us have an extra half-hour on board before landing our goods and chattels--but the horn was let off pretty often before we got our luggage up the loose sand on to the level. Chinese coolies in blue dungaree tunics, wide straw hats and ditto shorts carried it in baskets slung from either end of bamboo poles balanced over their shoulders. They are st.u.r.dy, cheery fellows, with well-shaped calves and muscular short feet. When the steamer cleared off we were fairly marooned on the sandbank.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
No bullock-carts had come, so G. and I sat on her saddle-box and sketched a departing caravan of mules and ponies, each laden with two bales of cotton,--a Chinaman to every four ponies. There were eighty-four ponies, and they filed away, jingling into the morning mist that hung low on the sand flat. It was a little cold, but we got warmer as the sun rose over the Bhamo trees, and paG.o.da, and Joss House. At first the coolies stood round us, and our baggage, and took stock of us, but gradually the interest flagged, and they sat down, and we drew them, and G. made this sketch of Bhamo, and the sunrise over China.
... A Burmese woman came to the sand's edge with her baby, and built a shelter with a few bamboos, and some matting for roof, and the baby played in the patch of shadow. As it got hotter we grew wearied of waiting. At last our _Boy_ got the two errant bullock-carts, and we went off in procession, a big bullock-cart with our luggage in front, a Burman youth on top with long black hair escaping from a wisp of pink silk, a Macpherson tartan putsoe round his legs, a placid expression, and a cheroot, of course. G. and her maid came behind with recent fragile purchases; pottery, in another bullock-cart, with an older Burman whose face was a delight--so wrinkled, and wreathed with smiles.
I tailed behind and sketched as per margin, as we went through the sand--shockingly unacademical wasn't it, to draw walking?
[Ill.u.s.tration]
Our first Dak bungalow experience was short. We had just settled down when word came we were to occupy the Deputy-Commissioner's bungalow which is apparently empty, so we only had tiffin in the Dak bungalow.
CHAPTER x.x.xII
The D. C. Bungalow is certainly very nice, bar _The Mystery_. The roses are splendid, in ma.s.ses; and orchids hang everywhere. I suppose the interest in them at home accounts for their being hung here on every cottage. We had almost a deck load of them on board this morning; roots that may cost a great price in Britain may be bought here for a few pence. They say the road over to China is festooned with orchids, and jungle-fowl sit amongst them and crow. G. intends to get some, and take them home, which means more gla.s.s, of course: and I hope to pot the jungle-fowl, so we both feel we have an object in life, and an apology for our itinerance.
But first, a word about THE MYSTERY. It was very delightful being asked to put up in such a charming bungalow--the invitation came by heliograph from a little fort up in the woods on the mountains, many miles away to the north-west, where the Deputy-Commisioner, Mr Levison, was going his rounds.
There was a silence and a stillness about the house that was almost eerie; the impress on a cus.h.i.+on, the cigarette ash, and torn letters on the verandah looked as if the house was in use; but a second glance showed that fine dust lay over all, and made the house feel deserted.
The old Burmese man-servant disappeared when we arrived, so G. and I went through the house alone, to fix on our room. We had done this, and I had gone downstairs when G. called me. She had turned over a mattress, and on it was a great s.p.a.ce of _congealed blood_ just where a man's throat might have been! I only gathered afterwards how much alarmed she was, and she only gathered afterwards how much alarmed I was. When G.
went downstairs I made an exhaustive inspection; the blood was barely a day old! and on the floor I found spots, then gouts, and then marks of naked, gory feet leading to, and from the little bathroom--it looked horribly like ”withered murder!” Had the silent bare-footed Burman...?
And what had been done with the.... Yes! there was a streak along the foot of the door--it had been dragged out!--Or was it floor varnish?
Should I question the servant--would he, or could he, explain? No--I decided it was too late to do anything. So we both pretended we thought little of the matter, turned over the mattress, put our own on top, bolted the doors, put two Colt-Browning repeaters under our pillows, and went asleep, and in the morning were so pleased to find our throats were not slit.
When Captain Kirke and Lieutenant Carter came round later, I had to thank them for their Bundabust, and casually inquired if the last resident in the bungalow was known to be still alive; for the bedroom was so b.l.o.o.d.y! ”Why--Baines!” they said, ”of course; he was here two nights! you saw him yesterday at the Club--the man with his hands bandaged; that's Baines; he's always getting into pickles--he nearly bled to death! We had a farewell evening at the Club, and in the night he got up for soda water, the bottle burst and cut his hands, then he cut his feet on the broken gla.s.s going to the bathroom to bandage his hands, got into bed, and the bandages came off in the night, and in the morning he was found in a faint--therefore the blood on the mattress.”
_The mystery_ was explained--And there had nearly been a tragedy.
These deputy hosts of the Deputy-Commissioner, after so kindly relieving our minds, drove us to the polo grounds in their brake, behind unbroken ponies, along a half-made road, which was highly exhilarating--but we feared nothing after our late escape--were we not each a neck to the good?
The Maidan was pretty--a pleasant plain of green gra.s.s, beautifully framed with distant jungle and mountains. G. and I made the audience at first, with two or three dozen Burmans and Sikhs. Then General Macleod and Mrs Macleod came, and his aide-de-camp (the General is on an inspection round, of the military police stations), and Mr and Mrs Algy of the Civil Police, a man whose name I can't remember, and that was all the gallery, so there was little to take away from the interest of the game, which was fast, and the turf perfection.
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