It was actually a relief to the overtaxed bride, when they had sped across the Continent "via Brindisi," to settle down on the big P. & O. steamer, that throbbed and smelt, and was so strange, yet proved a paradise of rest and peace compared with London. There were not so many passengers—it was early in the season—but everyone was interested in young Mrs. Crayfield; they were all very kind and friendly. Her deck-chair was always surrounded; her singing was a great success; and though Santa-Sahib was tiresome in forbidding her to dance or take part in theatricals on board ship, she had an extremely pleasant voyage.
They landed at Bombay, and oh! the rainbow-coloured crowds, the splendour, the white, shining buildings, the spicy, intoxicating warmth. It was all entrancing to Stella, oddly familiar and yet so novel. How quaint the contradictions of "The Queen of Cities," such a mixture of dignity and squalor! The best hotel was barrack-like, comfortless, not over-clean; insects dotted the walls; there were flies in myriads; doubtful food; yet at that period it was the only possible refuge for European travellers coming and going.
Santa-Sahib grumbled and scolded; but Stella said what on earth did comfort and food and cleanliness matter? Were they not in India? To her, all the sights and sounds, the merciless sun, the dust and the clamour, even the smells, were thrilling. Robert's head servant was there to meet them, an elderly, important-looking native; his name was Sher Singh, and he had secured an ayah for the memsahib, a good class Mohammedan woman who knew her work and understood a little English. Stella appreciated her quiet movements, her deft attentions, and was not overawed by "Champa" as she had been by the grand maid in London. The ayah's attitude towards the Sahib entertained her; it was full of such humble and modest reverence. She would warn her mistress of the Sahib's approach as though for the coming of an emperor; turn aside bashfully when he entered the room, and draw her wrapper over her face. But Sher Singh! To Stella there was something vaguely sinister about the bombastic figure that held a weird, elusive reflection of his master's bearing and outline. The man seemed to watch her furtively, and though he anticipated her wishes, obeyed her least sign, she felt that beneath his diligent, obsequious care there lay a smouldering resentment.
"I'm sure Sher Singh is jealous of me," she told her husband; "he looks on me as an interloper. It's only natural, I suppose, after his long service with you as a bachelor, but it makes me uncomfortable."
"Nonsense!" he said sharply. "Sher Singh is an invaluable servant. Whatever you do, don't quarrel with him. It's all your fancy—you don't understand natives."
"Some day I shall. I mean to!"
"Well, don't begin by misunderstanding Sher Singh. I couldn't do without him."
There was a note of finality in his voice. It sounded to Stella almost as though he would prefer to part with her than with Sher Singh! She determined to banish the little rasp from her mind; after all, what did it matter? It should not interfere with her enjoyment—Sher Singh was only a servant.
They stayed long enough in Bombay to dine at the Yacht Club; to visit the caves of Elephanta, so old, so mysterious; to spend a day with an English merchant prince, a friend of Colonel Crayfield's, in his palace on Malabar Hill. And then came the journey up-country: days and nights in the train, passing from tropical temperature to chilly dawns, first rushing through scenery grand and austere, Doré-like in its peaks and valleys, wondrous in the crimson sunset; afterwards vast yellow plains, relieved by patches of cultivation, villages, groves—mightily monotonous. Except for the time when she slept, and when they alighted at echoing stations for unpalatable meals, Stella did not cease to gaze from the windows of their compartment. The crowds on the platforms of big junctions and wayside halting-places were fascinating; the family groups, the varied clothing, the half-naked sellers of fruit and sweetmeats, the pushing, the shouting, the flurry.
It was midnight when they reached Rassih. The branch line had but lately been completed, and the railway station was little more than a short strip of unfinished platform. The station-master, a fat babu, received the travellers with elaborate civility; and, outside, a curious conveyance awaited them—like a broad, low dog-cart, hooded, drawn by a pair of white bullocks, all horns and humps and pendulous dewlaps. Stella never forgot her first transit through the slumbering city; the little caves of shops, some dimly illumined; the occasional glimpses of figures squatting muffled and shapeless, or stretched on rude bedsteads. From upper storeys floated snatches of sleepy song and the faint twang of stringed instruments. Pariah dogs nosed and snarled in the gutters. Beneath the general somnolence lay a ceaseless, subdued undercurrent of sound that seemed to mingle with stale odours of spice and rancid oil; above it all the slate-blue sky pressed low, deeply clear, besprinkled with stars.