Part 2 (2/2)
The cold grey eyes of the Frenchman rested for a second upon the burning black eyes of the speaker, and again he s.h.i.+vered. He knew that the careless words meant that Hunsa was an instrument, if needs be.
But the Prince's teeth were gleaming in a smile. And he was saying: ”If the play is over, Sirdar, turn your mount over to the _syce_ and pop up here beside Captain Barlow--I'll tool you home. The Captain might like a peg.”
The bay Arabs swirled the brake along the smooth roadway that lay like a wide band of coral between giant green walls of gold-mohr and tamarind; and sometimes a pipal, its white bole and branches gleaming like the bones of a skeleton through leaves of the deepest emerald, and its roots daubed with the red paint of devotion to the tree G.o.d. Here and there a neem, its delicate branches dusted with tiny white star blossoms, cast a sensuous elusive perfume to the vagrant breeze. Once a gigantic jamon stretched its gnarled arms across the roadway as if a devilfish held poised his tentacles to s.n.a.t.c.h from the brake its occupants.
When they had swung in to the Sirdar's bungalow and clambered down from the brake, Elizabeth said: ”If you don't mind, General Baptiste, I'll just drift around amongst these beautiful roses while you men have your pegs. No, I don't care for tea,” she said, in answer to his suggestion. There was a mirthless smile on her lips as she added: ”I'm like Captain Barlow, I like the rose.”
The three men sat on the verandah while a servant brought brandy-and-soda, and Nana Sahib, with a restless perversity akin to the torturing proclivity of a Hindu was quizzing the Frenchman about his recruits.
”You'll find them no good,” he a.s.sured Baptiste--”rebellious cusses, worthless thieves. My Moslem friend, the King of Oudh, tried them out.
He got up a regiment of them--Budhuks, Bagrees--all sorts; it was named the Wolf Regiment--that was the only clever thing about it, the name.
They stripped the uniforms from the backs of the officers sent to drill them and kicked them out of camp; said the officers put on sw.a.n.k; wouldn't clean their own horses and weapons, same as the other men.”
Then he switched the torture--made it more acute; wanted to know what Sirdar Baptiste had got them for.
The Frenchman fumed inwardly. Nana Sahib was at the bottom of the whole murderous scheme, and here, like holding a match over a keg of powder, he must talk about it in front of the Englishman.
When the brandy was brought Nana Sahib put hand over the top of his gla.s.s.
”Not drinking, Prince?” Barlow asked.
”No,” Nana Sahib answered, ”a Brahmin must diet; holiness is fostered by a shrivelled skin.”
”But pardon me, Prince,” Barlow said hesitatingly, ”didn't going across the black-water to England break your caste anyway--so why cut out the peg?”
”Yes, Captain Sahib,”--the Prince's voice rasped with a peculiar harsh gravity as though it were drawn over the jagged edge of intense feeling,--”my caste _was_ broken, and to get it back I drank the dregs; a cup of liquid from the cow, and not milk either!”
Baptiste coughed uneasily for he saw in the eyes of Nana Sahib smouldering pa.s.sion.
And Barlow's face was suffused with a sudden flush of embarra.s.sment.
Perhaps it had been the sight of the blood sacrifice that had started Nana Sahib on a line of bitter thought; had stirred the smothering hate that was in his soul until frothing bubbles of it mounted to his lips.
”I was born in the shadow of Parvati,” Nana Sahib said, ”and when I came back from England I found that still I was a Brahmin; that the songs of the Bhagavad Gita and the philosophy of the Puranas was more to me than what I had been taught at Oxford. So I took back the caste, and under my s.h.i.+rt is the _junwa_ (sacred thread).”
A quick smile lighted his face, and he laid a hand on Barlow's arm, saying in a new voice, a voice that was as if some one spoke through his lips in ventriloquism: ”And all this, Captain, is a good thing for my friends the English. The Brahmins, as you know, sway the Mahrattas, and if I am of them they will listen to me. The English boast--and they have reason to--that they have made a friend of Nana Sahib. Here, Baptiste, pour me a gla.s.s of plain soda, and we'll drink a toast to Nana Sahib and the English.”
”By Jove! splendid!” and Captain Barlow held out a hand.
But Baptiste, saying that he would find Miss Hodson, went out into the suns.h.i.+ne cursing.
”Now we will go back,” Nana Sahib was saying as the French General brought Elizabeth from among the oleanders and crotons.
CHAPTER IV
The day after the Bagrees had taken the oath of allegiance to Sindhia the jamadars were summoned to the Dewan's office to receive their instructions for the carrying out of the mission.
<script>