TRAGEDY
The annual Durbar for the reception of the Bhutan Envoy and the payment of the subsidy had come and gone again. The Deb Zimpun, who had not been accompanied by the Chinese Amban on this occasion, had departed; and of the few European visitors only Muriel Benson remained. Colonel Dermot had been called away to Simla, to confer with officials of the Foreign Department on matters of frontier policy. Major Hunt was ill with fever, leaving Wargrave, who was still nominally attached to the Military Police, in command of the detachment.
It was delicious torture to Frank to be in the same place again with Muriel, to see her from the parade ground or the Mess verandah playing in the garden with the children, to meet her every day and talk to her and yet be obliged to school his lips and keep them from uttering the words that trembled on them.
A few nights after the Durbar he dined with Mrs. Dermot and Muriel and was sitting on the verandah of the Political Officer's house with them after dinner. He was wearing white mess uniform. The evening was warm and very still, and whenever the conversation died away, no sound save the monotonous note of the nightjars or the sudden cry of a barking-deer, broke the silence since the echoes of the "Lights Out" bugle call had died away among the hills.
Wargrave looked at his watch.
"It's past eleven o'clock," he said. "I'd no idea it was so late. I ought to get up and say goodnight; but I'm so comfortable here, Mrs. Dermot."
His hostess smiled lazily at him but made no reply. Again a peaceful hush fell on them.
With startling suddenness it was broken. From the Fort four hundred yards away a rifle-shot rang out, rending the silence of the night and reverberating among the hills around. Wargrave sprang to his feet as shouts followed and a bugle shrilled out the soul-gripping "Alarm," the call that sends a thrill through every soldier's frame. For always it tells of disaster. Heard thus at night in barracks swift following on a shot it spoke of crime, of murder, the black murder of a comrade.
The two women had risen anxiously.
"What is it? Oh, what is it?" they asked.
The subaltern spoke lightly to re-assure them.
"Nothing much, I expect. Some man on guard fooling with his rifle let it off by accident," he said quietly. "Excuse me. I'd better stroll across to the Fort and see."
But Mrs. Dermot stopped him.
"Wait a moment please, Mr. Wargrave," she said, running into the house. She returned immediately with her husband's big automatic pistol and handed it to him. In her left hand she held a smaller one. "Take this with you. It's loaded," she said.
Frank thanked her, said goodnight to both calmly, and walked down the garden path; but the anxious women heard him running swiftly across the parade ground.
"What is it, Noreen? What does it mean?" asked the girl nervously.
"A sepoy running amuck, I'm afraid," replied her friend. "He's shot someone——."
She swung round, pistol raised.
"Kohn hai? (Who's that?)" she called out.
A man had come noiselessly on to the shadowed end of the verandah.
"It is I, mem-sahib," answered Sher Afzul, her Punjaubi Mahommedan butler. He had been in her service for five years and was devoted to her and hers. He was carrying a rifle, for his master at his request had long ago given him arms to protect his mem-sahib. Before her marriage he had once fought almost to the death to defend her when her brother's bungalow had been attacked by rebels during a rising.
"It would be well to go into the house and put out the lights, mem-sahib," he said quietly in Hindustani. "There is danger to-night."
As he spoke he extinguished the lamp on the verandah and closed the doors of the house. A second armed servant came quietly on to the verandah and the butler melted into the darkness of the garden; but they heard him go to the gate as if to guard it.
"You had better go inside, Muriel," said Mrs. Dermot, but made no move to do so herself.
The girl did not appear to hear her. She was listening intently for any sound from the Fort. But silence had fallen on it.
"Muriel, won't you go into the house?" repeated her hostess.
"Eh? What? No, I couldn't. I must stay here," replied Miss Benson impatiently. In the black darkness the other woman could not see her; but she felt that the girl's every sense was alert and strained to the utmost. She moved to her and put her arm about her. Against it she could feel Muriel's heart beating violently.
Suddenly from the Fort came the noise of heavy blows and a crash, instantly followed by a shot and then fierce cries.
"Oh, my God! What is happening?" murmured the girl, her hand on her heart.
Presently there came the sound of running feet, and heavy boots clattered up the rocky road towards the Mess past the gate.
Then the butler's voice rang out in challenge:
"Kohn jatha? (Who goes there?)"
A panting voice answered:
"Wargrave Sahib murgya. Doctor Sahib ko bulana ko jatha"—(Wargrave Sahib is killed. I go to call the Doctor Sahib)—and the sepoy ran on in the darkness.
"O God! O God!" cried the girl, and tried to break from her friend's clasp. "Let me go! Let me go!"
"Where to?" asked Noreen, holding the frenzied girl with all her strength.
"To him. He's dead. Didn't you hear? He's dead. I must go to him."
She struggled madly and beat fiercely at the hands that held her.
"Let me go! Let me go! Oh, he's dead," she wailed. "Dead. And I loved him so. Oh, be merciful! Let me go to him!" and suddenly her strength gave way and she collapsed into Noreen's arms, weeping bitterly.
They heard the clattering steps meet others coming down the hill and a hurried conversation ensue. Noreen recognised one of the voices. Then both men came running down.
"It's the doctor," said Mrs. Dermot. "Come to the gate and we'll ask him what has happened."
"Mr. Macdonald! Mr. Macdonald!" she cried as the hurrying footsteps drew near.
"Who's that? Mrs. Dermot? For God's sake get into the house. There's a man running amuck. Wargrave's killed. I'm wanted"; and the doctor, taking no thought of danger to himself when there was need of his skill, ran on into the darkness.
"I must—I will go!" cried Muriel.
"Very well. Perhaps it's not true. We must know. We may be able to help," replied her friend.
And with a word to Sher Afzul to guard her babies from danger she seized Muriel's hand, and the two girls ran towards the Fort in the track that Wargrave had followed to his death, it seemed.
Pistol in hand Wargrave had raced across the parade ground. At the gate of the Fort he was challenged; and when he answered an Indian officer came out of the darkness to him.
"Sahib," he said hurriedly. "Havildar Mahommed Ashraf Khan has been shot in his bed in barracks. The sentry over the magazine is missing with his rifle."
Wargrave entered the Fort. Opposite the guard-room the detachment was falling in rapidly, the men carrying their rifles and running up from their barrack-rooms in various stages of undress. By the flickering light of a lantern held up for him a non-commissioned officer was calling the roll, and his voice rumbled along in monotonous tones. The guard were standing under arms.
"Put out that lamp!" cried the subaltern sharply. It would only serve to light up other marks for the invisible assassin if, like most men who run amôk, he meant to keep on killing until slain himself. "No; take it into the guard-room and shut the door."
In the darkness the silence was intense, broken only by the heavy breathing of the unseen men and the clattering of the feet of some late-comer. Suddenly there rang out through the night the most appalling sound that had ever assailed Wargrave's ears. It was as the cry of a lost soul in all the agony of the damned, an eerie, unearthly wail that froze the blood in the listeners' veins. In the invisible ranks men shuddered and clutched at their neighbours.
"Khuda ke Nam men, kiya hai? (In the Name of God, what is that?)" gasped the subaltern.
The Indian officer at his side answered in a low voice:
"It is Ashraf Khan crying out in pain, Sahib. He is not yet dead."
"Subhedar sahib, come with me," said Wargrave. "Let your jemadar (lieutenant) take the men one by one into the guard-room and examine the rifles to see if any have been fired. We don't know yet if the missing sentry did the deed."
The Subhedar (company commander) gave the order to his subordinate and followed Wargrave to the barrack-room in which the crime had been committed. The sight that met the subaltern's eyes was one that he was not easily to forget.
The high-roofed chamber was in darkness save at one end where a small lamp cast weird shadows on the walls and vaulting ceiling. At this end and under the flickering light a group of figures stood round a bed on which a man was writhing in agony. He was struggling in delirious frenzy to hurl himself to the stone floor, and was only held down by the united efforts of three men. From a bullet wound in his bared chest the life-blood welled with every movement of his tortured body. He had been shot in the back as he lay asleep. The lips covered with a bloody froth were drawn back tightly over the white teeth clenched in agony, and red foam lay on the black beard. Out of the sweat-bathed, ghastly face the eyes glared in frenzy. The features were contorted with pain. Again and again the wild shrieks like the howl of a mad thing rang through the long room and out into the night.
With tear-filled eyes and heart torn with pity Wargrave looked down at him in silence. Ashraf Khan was one of his best men. "But where is the doctor sahib?" he asked the native officer suddenly.
The subhedar stared and shook his head. In the excitement no one had thought of sending for the medical officer. Wargrave turned to one of the men around the bed.
"Mahbub Khan, run hard to the Mess and call the doctor sahib. Here, stop!" He remembered that Macdonald did not possess a revolver. For all one knew he might encounter the murderer on his way. Wargrave thrust Mrs. Dermot's pistol into the sepoy's hand, saying, "Give the sahib that."
The man, who was barefoot, ran out of the chamber and went to his own barrack-room for his shoes, for the road was rocky and covered with sharp stones. The subaltern turned away with a sigh from the bedside of his poor comrade. He could do nothing now but avenge him. As he walked away from the group he trod on an empty cartridge case and picked it up. It had recently been fired. It told its tale; for it showed that the assassin had reloaded over his victim and intended that the killing should not end there. If he were the missing sentry then he had nine more cartridges left—nine human lives in his blood-stained hand. And as the subaltern crossed the verandah outside the barrack-room the jemadar met him and reported that all the rifles of the detachment had been examined and found clean except the missing weapon of the sentry, a young Pathan sepoy called Gul Mahommed. It was remembered that the dying havildar (sergeant) had reprimanded him hotly on the previous day for appearing on parade with accoutrements dirty. So little a cause was needed to send a man to his death!
The first thing to be done now was to hunt for the murderer. While he went free no one's life was safe. Wargrave shuddered at the thought of danger coming to Muriel or her friend, and he hoped that they were safely shut in their house. It was a difficult problem to know where to begin the search. The Fort was full of hiding-places, especially at night. And already the assassin might have escaped over the low wall surrounding it. As Wargrave stood perplexed another Indian officer ran up, accompanied by two men with rifles.
"Sahib! Sahib!" he whispered excitedly. "The murderer is in my room, the one next that in which Ashraf Kahn was shot. I left the door wide open when I ran out. It is now shut and bolted from the inside and someone is moving about in it."
The subaltern went along the verandah to the door and tried it. It was firmly fastened.
"Here, sahib!" cried a sepoy who ran up with a comrade carrying a heavy log.
"Shahbash! (Well done!) Break in the door," said Wargrave.
Other men, who had come up, seized the long log and dashed it violently against the door. The bolt held, but the frail hinges gave way and the door fell in.
"Stand back!" cried Wargrave.
It seemed certain death to enter the room in which a murderer lurked in darkness, armed with a rifle and fixed bayonet and resolved to sell his life dearly. But the subaltern did not hesitate. He was the only sahib there and of course it was his duty to go in. He could not ask his men to risk a danger that he shirked himself. That is not the officer's way, whose motto must ever be "Follow where I lead."
Wargrave sprang into the room unarmed. He was outlined against the faint light outside. A spurt of flame lit the darkness; and the subaltern, as he tripped over the raised threshold, felt that he was shot. He staggered on. A rifle lunged forward and the bayonet stabbed him in the side; but with a desperate effort he closed with his unseen assailant and grappled fiercely with him. Struggling to overpower the assassin before his ebbing strength left him he fought madly. The Indian officers and sepoys blocking up the doorway could see nothing; but they could hear the choking gasps, the panting breaths, the muttered curses and the stamping feet of the combatants locked in the death-grapple. They could not interfere, they dared not fire. In impotent fury they shouted:
"Bring lamps! Bring lamps!"
Then, groaning in their powerlessness to aid their beloved officer, they listened, as a light danced over the stones from a lantern in the hand of a running sepoy. The moment it came and lit up the scene they rushed on the murderer wrestling fiercely with Wargrave and dragged him off as the subaltern collapsed and fell to the ground. The glare of the lantern shone on his white face.
"The sahib is dead!" cried a sepoy, and sprang at the murderer who was struggling in the grip of the two powerfully-built Indian officers. Others followed him, and his captors had to fight hard and use all their authority to keep the prisoner from being killed by the bare hands of his maddened comrades. Only the arrival of the armed men of the guard saved him.
Frenzied with grief the sepoys bent over their officer lying motionless and apparently dead on the stone floor. They loved him. Many of them wept openly and unashamed. The subhedar knelt beside him and opened his shirt. The blood had soaked through the white mess-jacket that Wargrave wore.
The native officer looked up into the ring of brown faces bent over him. Suddenly he cried angrily:
"Mahbub Khan, why hast thou not gone for the doctor sahib as thou wert told, O Son of an Owl?"
The face staring in horror between the heads of the sepoys was hurriedly withdrawn, and Mahbub Khan, who had lingered to see the end of the tragedy, turned and pushed his way out of the crowd.
Macdonald found the subaltern lying to all appearances dead on the broken door out in the open, where they had gently carried him.
"Hold a light here," he cried as he knelt down beside the body.
By now a dozen lanterns or more lit up the scene. The doctor laid his ear against Wargrave's chest and held a polished cigarette case to his lips. Then he pulled back the shirt to examine his injuries.
"Oh, is he dead? Is he dead?" cried a trembling voice.
The doctor, looking up angrily, found Miss Benson and Mrs. Dermot standing over him. The sepoys had silently made way for them.
"You shouldn't be here, ladies," he said with justifiable annoyance. "This is no place for you. No; he's not dead. And I hope and think that he won't die."
"Oh, thank God!" cried the two women.
The sepoys crowding round and hanging on the doctor's verdict could not understand the words but saw the look of joyous relief on their faces and guessed the truth. A wild, confused cheer went up to the stars.
"Mr. Macdonald," said Mrs. Dermot bending over him again. "Will you bring him to my house? There is no accommodation for him in your little hospital, you know; and he'd have no one to look after him in the Mess. I can nurse him."
The doctor straightened himself on his knee and looked down at the unconscious man.
"Yes, Mrs. Dermot, it's a good idea," he replied. "There is nowhere else where he'd get any attention. My hands are full with Major Hunt. He's taken a turn for the worse. His temperature went up dangerously high to-night; and he was almost delirious."
He stood up.
"I can't examine Wargrave properly here. He seems to be wounded in two places. But I hope it's not—I mean, I think he'll pull through. His pulse is getting stronger. I've put a first dressing on; and I think we can move him. Hi! stretcher idher lao. (Bring the stretcher here!)"
Suddenly Wargrave opened his eyes and looked up in the doctor's face.
"Is that you, Macdonald?" he asked dreamily. "Never mind me; I'm all right. Go to poor Ashraf Khan. If he must die, at least give him something to put him out of his misery. I can wait."
His voice trailed off, and he relapsed into unconsciousness. Ordering him to be carried away the doctor, after a word with the Indian officers, entered the barrack-room. It was useless. Ashraf Khan had just died.
The crowd fell back in a wide circle to let the two hospital orderlies bring up the stretcher for Wargrave and, as they did, left a group of men standing isolated in the centre. All of these were armed, except one whose hands were pinioned behind his back. His head was bare, his face bruised and bleeding, and his uniform nearly torn off his body. It needed no telling that he was the murderer.
Miss Benson walked up to him with fierce eyes.
"You dog!" she cried bitterly in Urdu.
The man who had smiled defiantly when the hands of his raging comrades were seeking to tear the life out of his body and had shouted out his crime in their faces, cowered before the anger in the flaming eyes of this frail girl. He shrank back between his guards. The sepoys looking on howled like hungry wolves and, as Mrs. Dermot drew the girl back, made a rush for the murderer. The men of the guard faced them with levelled bayonets and ringed their prisoner round; and the sepoys fell back sullenly.
Suddenly a shrill voice cried in Hindustani:
"Make way! Make way there! What has happened?"
The circle of men gapped and through the opening came Major Hunt, white-faced, wasted, shaking with fever and clad only in pyjamas and a great coat and with bare feet thrust into unlaced shoes. He staggered feebly in among them, revolver in hand.
"Heaven and Earth! Is Wargrave dead?" he cried and tottered towards the stretcher.
Suddenly the pistol dropped from his shaking hand and he fell forward on the stones before Macdonald could catch him.
"This is madness," muttered the doctor. "It may kill him. I hoped he wouldn't hear the alarm."
"Bring him to my house too," said Mrs. Dermot.
Another stretcher was fetched, the Major lifted tenderly into it, and the sad procession started, the sepoys falling back silently to make way.
Major Hunt having been put to bed in one of the guest-rooms of the Political Officer's house, Macdonald, with the aid of the subaltern's servant, undressed Wargrave and examined his injuries, Noreen holding a basin for him while Muriel, shuddering, carried away the blood-tinged water and brought fresh. The shot-wound, though severe, was not necessarily dangerous, and the bullet had not lodged in him. The doctor was relieved to find that the bayonet had not penetrated deeply but had only glanced along a rib, tearing the intercostal muscles and inflicting a long, jagged but superficial wound which bled freely. Indeed, the most serious matter was the great loss of blood, which had weakened the subaltern considerably.
Wargrave did not recover consciousness until early morning. When he opened his eyes they fell on Muriel sitting by his bed. He showed no surprise and the girl, scarce daring to believe that he was awake and knew her, did not venture to move. But as he continued to look steadily at her she gently laid her hand on his where it lay on the coverlet.
Then in a weak voice he said:
"Dearest, I mustn't love you, I mustn't. I'm bound in honour—bound to another woman and I must play the game. It's hard sometimes. But if I die I want you to know I loved you, only you."
Her heart seemed to stop suddenly, then beat again with redoubled force. Was he conscious? Was he speaking to her? Did he know what his words meant? She waited eagerly for him to continue; but his hand closed on hers in a weak grip and, shutting his eyes, he seemed to sleep. The girl sank on her knees beside the bed and stared at the pale face that in those few hours had grown so hollow and haggard. Did he really love her? The thought was joy—until the damning memory of his other words recurred to her and a sharp pain pierced her heart. There was another woman then—one who held his promise. Who was she? He could not be secretly married, surely; no, it must be that he was engaged to some other girl. But he loved her—her, Muriel. He wanted to say so, he had said so, though he strove to hold back, in honour bound. He would play the game—ah! that he would do at any cost to himself. For she knew his chivalrous nature. But he loved her—she was sure of it. Then the doubts came again—did he know what he was saying? Was it perhaps only delirium that spoke, the fever of his wounds? The girl suffered an agony worse than death as she knelt beside the bed, her forehead on his hand. And Noreen, entering softly an hour later, found her still crouched there, weeping bitterly but silently.
Shortly after sunrise Macdonald entered the house, wan and haggard, for he had not been to bed all night. Besides the hours that he had spent with his patients he had been busy in the Fort all night. He had to make an autopsy of the dead man, and, as the only officer available, investigate the crime, examine the witnesses and the prisoner who calmly confessed his guilt, and telegraph the news of the occurrences to Regimental, Divisional and Army Headquarters. He found Major Hunt sleeping peacefully; but Wargrave woke as he tiptoed into the room and looked up at him, at first not seeing the women. He was fully conscious and asked eagerly for an account of what had happened. Noreen and Muriel shuddered at the delight with which he heard of the murderer's capture; for they were too tender-hearted to understand his passionate desire to avenge the cruel slaying of one of his men. When he turned away from Macdonald and saw Muriel his eyes shone eagerly for a moment, then seemed to dull as memory returned to him. He begged Mrs. Dermot to forgive him for upsetting her domestic arrangements by his intrusion into the house.
Later in the morning Noreen was sitting alone with him, having sent Muriel to lie down for a couple of hours. She had not been to bed herself, but after a bath and a change of clothing had given her children their breakfast and bidden them make no noise, because their beloved "Fwankie" was lying ill in the house. Yet she could not forbear to smile when she saw the portentous gravity with which Eileen tiptoed out into the garden to tell Badshah the news and order him to be very quiet.
Now, looking fresh and bright, she sat beside Wargrave's bed. Since the doctor had left him he had lain thinking. He felt that Violet must be informed at once that he had been hurt but was in no danger, lest she might learn of the occurrence through another source and believe him to be worse than he really was. As he looked at Mrs. Dermot the desire to ask her instead of Macdonald if she would be the one to communicate with Mrs. Norton grew overwhelming, and he felt that he wanted to confide to her the whole story, sure that she would understand. And she could tell Muriel—for he had been quite conscious when he had spoken to the girl in the morning. It was only right that she should know the truth, but he shrank from telling it to her himself.
So he opened his heart to Noreen; and the understanding little woman listened sympathisingly and made no comment, and undertook to explain the situation to Muriel. So, an hour or two later, when Macdonald was again with the subaltern, she went to her friend's room and told her the whole story.
The girl's first feeling was anger at the thought of Frank making love to a married woman.
"Seems to me it's the married woman who made it to him, from what I can gather," said Noreen, a little annoyed with Muriel for her way of receiving the story. "He did not say so, but it was easy to guess the truth. Now, my dear, don't be absurd. Men are not angels; and if a pretty woman flings herself at the head of one of them it's hard for him to keep her at arm's length. And you've seen yourself in Darjeeling how some of them, the married ones especially, do chase them." Her eyes grew hard as she continued, "I remember how Kevin once was——." Then she stopped.
"But Frank! How could he? Oh, how could he? And he loved her," sobbed the girl.
"Don't be silly, Muriel. I tell you I don't believe he ever did. He loves you now."
"Oh, do you think he does? What am I to do?"
"Nothing. Merely go along as you've been doing. Just be friendly. And don't be hard on him. He's had a bad time. I've always felt that there was something troubling him. Now I know; and I'm not going to let him ruin himself and throw away his happiness for a woman who's not worth it. He's the nicest, cleanest-minded man I've known after Kevin and my brother. He saved my babies, and for that I'd do anything for him. I feel almost as if he were one of my children; and I'll stand by him if you won't."
"Oh, but I will, I will," cried the girl. "But how can I help him?"
"As I said, by acting as if nothing had happened and just keeping on being friends. It oughtn't to be hard. See how he's suffering and think how brave he's been. Remember, he loves you; and you do care for him, don't you? I've an idea that he hopes that this woman is tiring of him and may set him free. Of course he didn't say as much, but——." She nodded sagely. Her intuition had told her more of his feelings in a minute than Frank had dared to acknowledge to himself in many months. "Anything I can do to help to bring that about I will."
The days went by; and Wargrave, aided by his clean living, the devoted nursing that he received, and the cool, healthy mountain air, began to mend. Major Hunt had recovered and returned to duty, relieving the officer sent from Headquarters to command during his illness. Colonel Dermot had come back from Simla with Frank's appointment to the Political Department as his assistant in his pocket. The murdered man had long ago been laid to rest by his comrades; but his slayer still sat fettered in the one cell of the Fort awaiting the assembling of the General Court Martial for his trial, and seeing from his barred window the even routine of the life that had been his for three years still going on, but with no place in it for him.
The period of Wargrave's convalescence was a very happy time for him. Muriel had remained a whole month after the eventful night; for Mrs. Dermot declared that, with the care of her house and children, she had no time to nurse the subaltern, and the girl must stay to do it while he was in any danger. So she lingered in the station to do him willing service, wait on him, chat or read to him, give him her arm when he was first allowed to leave his room, and did it all with the bright, cheerful kindness of a friend, no more. She never alluded to his words to her; but her patient somehow guessed that she had not been angered by the revelation of the state of his feelings towards her. And from the tenderness of her manner to him, the unconscious jealousy that she displayed if anyone but she did any service for him, he began to half hope, half fear, that she cared a little for him in return. But even as he thought this he realised that he must not allow her to do so.
At last the time came when she had to return to her father down in the vast forest; and bravely as she said goodbye to everyone—and most of all to Frank—the tears blinded her as she sat on the back of the elephant that bore her away and saw the hills close in and shut from her gaze the little station that held her heart.
Wargrave, however, was not left to pine in loneliness after her departure. All day long, if they were allowed, the children stayed with him, Eileen smothering him with caresses at regular intervals. They told him their doings, confided their dearest secrets to him and demanded stories. And "Fwankie" racked his brains to recall the fairy tales of his own childhood to repeat to the golden-haired mites perched on his bed and gazing at him in awed fascination, the girl uttering little shrieks at all the harrowing details of the wicked deeds of Giant Blunderbore and the cruel deceit of the wolf that devoured Red Ridinghood.
But the subaltern, had a grimmer visitor one day. The orders came at last for Gul Mahommed to be sent to Calcutta to stand his trial without waiting for Wargrave's recovery, the latter's evidence being taken on commission. The prisoner begged that he might be allowed to see the wounded officer before he left; and, Frank having consented, he was brought to the subaltern's bedroom when he was marched out of the Fort on the first stage of his journey to the gallows.
It was a dramatic scene. The stalwart young Pathan in uniform with his wrists handcuffed stood with all the bold bearing of his race by the bedside of the man that he had tried to kill, while two powerful sepoys armed with drawn bayonets hemmed him in, their hands on his shoulders.
The prisoner looked for a moment at the pale face of the wounded man, then his bold eyes suffused with tears as he said:
"Huzoor! (The Presence!) I am sorry. Had I known that night it was Your Honour I would not have lifted my rifle against you. The Sahib has always been good to me, to all of us. My enemy I slew, as we of the Puktana must do to all who insult us. That deed I do not regret."
Wargrave looked up sorrowfully at the splendidly-built young fellow—barely twenty-one—who had only done as he had been taught to do from his cradle. Among Pathans blood only can wash away the stain of an insult. The officer felt no anger against him for his own injuries and regretted that false notions of honour had led him to kill a comrade and were now sending him to a shameful death.
"I am sorry, Gul Mahommed, very sorry," he said. "You were always a good soldier, and now you must die."
The Pathan drew himself up with all the haughty pride of his race.
"I do not fear death, Sahib. They will give me the noose. But my father can spare me. He has five other sons to fight for him. If only the Sahib would forgive——."
Wargrave, much moved, held out his hand to him. The prisoner touched it with his manacled ones, then raised his fingers to his forehead.
"For your kindness, Sahib, salaam!"
Then he turned and walked proudly out of the room and Wargrave heard the tramp of heavy feet on the rocky road outside as the prisoner was marched away on the long trail to the gallows. Two months later Gul Mahommed was hanged in the courtyard of Alipur jail in Calcutta before detachments of all the regiments garrisoning the city.
The subaltern had long chafed at the restraint of an invalid before Macdonald took him off the sick-list and he was free to wander again with Colonel Dermot in the forest and among the mountains. Before the hot weather ended Raymond came to spend three weeks with him and be initiated into the delights of sport in the great jungle.
When the long imprisonment of the rains came Wargrave began to suffer in health; for his wounds had sapped his strength more than he knew and Macdonald shook his head over him. Nor was he the only invalid; for little Brian grew pale and listless in the mists that enveloped the outpost constantly now, until finally the doctor decreed that his mother, much as she hated parting from her husband and her home, must take the children to Darjeeling. And he ordered the subaltern to go too. Frank did not repine, after Mrs. Dermot had casually intimated that Muriel Benson was arranging to join her at the railway station and accompany her on a long visit to Darjeeling.
It was Wargrave's first introduction to a hill-station; and everything was a delightful novelty to him, from the quaint little train that brought them up the seven thousand feet to their destination in the pretty town of villas, clubs and hotels in the mountains, to the glorious panorama of the Eternal Snows and Kinchinjunga's lofty crests that rise like fairyland into the sky at early dawn and under the brilliant Indian moon.
As Mrs. Dermot could not often leave her children it was Muriel, who knew Darjeeling well, who became his guide. Together every day they set out from their hotel, together they scaled the heights of Jalapahar or rode down to watch the polo on the flat hill-top of Lebong, a thousand feet below. Together they explored the fascinating bazaar and bought ghost-daggers and turquoises in the quaint little shops. Together they went on picnics down into the deep valleys on the way to Sikkhim. They played tennis, rinked or danced together at the Amusement Club; and the ladies at the tea-tables in the great lounge smiled significantly and whispered to each other as the good-looking fair man and the pretty, dark-haired girl came in together when the light was fading on the mountains. Frank forgot cares. He ceased to brood unhappily—for it had come to that—on Violet, who, as her rare letters told him, had spent the Hot Weather in the Bombay hill-station of Mahableshwar and was now enjoying life during the Rains in gay Poona. She seldom wrote, and then but scrappily; and it seemed to him certain that she was forgetting him. And he felt ashamed at the joy which filled him at the thought. Was he always destined to be only the friend of the girl he loved, the lover of the woman to whom he wished to be a friend?