Part 32 (1/2)

'Would three rupees twelve annas pay for the used cartridges?' said the Havildar-Major.

'Attar Singh knew the just price. All Baynes Sahib's gear was in his charge. They expended one tin box of fifty cartouches, lacking two which were returned. As I said--as I say--the arrangement was made not with heat nor blasphemies as a Mussulman would have made it; not with cries nor caperings as an idolater would have made it; but conformably to the ritual and doctrine of the Sikhs. Hear you! _”Though hundreds of amus.e.m.e.nts are offered to a child it cannot live without milk. If a man be divorced from his soul and his soul's desire he certainly will not stop to play upon the road, but he will make haste with his pilgrimage_.” That is written. I rejoice in my disciples.'

'True! True! Correct! Correct!' said the Subadar-Major. There was a long, easy silence. One heard a water-wheel creaking somewhere and the nearer sound of meal being ground in a quern.

'But he--' the Chaplain pointed a scornful chin at the Havildar-Major--'_he_ has been so long in England that--'

'Let the lad alone,' said his uncle. 'He was but two months there, and he was chosen for good cause.'

Theoretically, all Sikhs are equal. Practically, there are differences, as none know better than well-born, land-owning folk, or long-descended chaplains from Amritsar.

'Hast thou heard anything in England to match my tale?' the Chaplain sneered.

'I saw more than I could understand, so I have locked up my stories in my own mouth,' the Havildar-Major replied meekly.

'Stories? What stories? I know all the stories about England,' said the Chaplain. 'I know that _terains_ run underneath their bazaars there, and as for their streets stinking with _mota kahars_, only this morning I was nearly killed by Duggan Sahib's _mota-kahar_. That young man is a devil.'

'I expect Grunthi-jee,' said the Subadar-Major, 'you and I grow too old to care for the Kahar-ki-nautch--the Bearer's dance.' He named one of the sauciest of the old-time nautches, and smiled at his own pun. Then he turned to his nephew. 'When I was a lad and came back to my village on leave, I waited the convenient hour, and, the elders giving permission, I spoke of what I had seen elsewhere.'

'Ay, my father,' said the Havildar-Major, softly and affectionately. He sat himself down with respect, as behoved a mere lad of thirty with a bare half-dozen campaigns to his credit.

'There were four men in this affair also,' he began, 'and it was an affair that touched the honour, not of one regiment, nor two, but of all the Army in Hind. Some part of it I saw; some I heard; but _all_ the tale is true. My father's brother knows, and my priest knows, that I was in England on business with my Colonel, when the King--the Great Queen's son--completed his life.

'First, there was a rumour that sickness was upon him. Next, we knew that he lay sick in the Palace. A very great mult.i.tude stood outside the Palace by night and by day, in the rain as well as the sun, waiting for news.

'Then came out one with a written paper, and set it upon a gate-side--the word of the King's death--and they read, and groaned.

This I saw with my own eyes, because the office where my Colonel Sahib went daily to talk with Colonel Forsyth Sahib was at the east end of the very gardens where the Palace stood. They are larger gardens than Shalimar here'--he pointed with his chin up the lines--'or Shahdera across the river.

'Next day there was a darkness in the streets, because all the city's mult.i.tude were clad in black garments, and they spoke as a man speaks in the presence of his dead--all those mult.i.tudes. In the eyes, in the air, and in the heart, there was blackness. I saw it. But that is not my tale.

'After ceremonies had been accomplished, and word had gone out to the Kings of the Earth that they should come and mourn, the new King--the dead King's son--gave commandment that his father's body should be laid, coffined, in a certain Temple which is near the river. There are no idols in that Temple; neither any carvings, nor paintings, nor gildings.

It is all grey stone, of one colour as though it were cut out of the live rock. It is larger than--yes, than the Durbar Sahib at Amritsar, even though the Akal Bunga and the Baba-Atal were added. How old it may be G.o.d knows. It is the Sahibs' most sacred Temple.

'In that place, by the new King's commandment, they made, as it were, a shrine for a saint, with lighted candles at the head and the feet of the Dead, and duly appointed watchers for every hour of the day and the night, until the dead King should be taken to the place of his fathers, which is at Wanidza.

'When all was in order, the new King said, ”Give entrance to all people,” and the doors were opened, and O my uncle! O my teacher! all the world entered, walking through that Temple to take farewell of the Dead. There was neither distinction, nor price, nor ranking in the host, except an order that they should walk by fours.

'As they gathered in the streets without--very, very far off--so they entered the Temple, walking by fours: the child, the old man; mother, virgin, harlot, trader, priest; of all colours and faiths and customs under the firmament of G.o.d, from dawn till late at night. I saw it. My Colonel gave me leave to go. I stood in the line, many hours, one _koss_, two _koss_, distant from the temple.'

'Then why did the mult.i.tude not sit down under the trees?' asked the priest.

'Because we were still between houses. The city is many _koss_ wide,'

the Havildar-Major resumed. 'I submitted myself to that slow-moving river and thus--thus--a pace at a time--I made pilgrimage. There were in my rank a woman, a cripple, and a lascar from the s.h.i.+ps.

'When we entered the Temple, the coffin itself was as a shoal in the Ravi River, splitting the stream into two branches, one on either side of the Dead; and the watchers of the Dead, who were soldiers, stood about It, moving no more than the still flame of the candles. Their heads were bowed; their hands were clasped; their eyes were cast upon the ground--thus. They were not men, but images, and the mult.i.tude went past them in fours by day, and, except for a little while, by night also.

'No, there was no order that the people should come to pay respect. It was a free-will pilgrimage. Eight kings had been commanded to come--who obeyed--but upon his own Sahibs the new King laid no commandment. Of themselves they came.

'I made pilgrimage twice: once for my Salt's sake, and once again for wonder and terror and wors.h.i.+p. But my mouth cannot declare one thing of a hundred thousand things in this matter. There were _lakhs_ of _lakhs_, _crores_ of _crores_ of people. I saw them.'