“Indeed! I think he would be surprised to hear that; and you will find that you are mistaken. You have made a very good business out of this situation. Your time is up, and you clear out to-morrow.”
Mahomed, the bearer, and his following arrived, and a grand transformation scene ensued. Some old women in the compound and stabling had to be carried out bodily, shrieking vociferously, with their beds and cooking things and other luggage—the collection of years of thieving—like so many magpies’ nests. Fuzzil himself had also to be assisted off the premises, being extremely drunk, his turban askew, and uttering wild cries of vengeance, with spluttering, foaming mouth. And then the new régime came into working order. The house underwent a consolidated spring cleaning; sun and air were admitted to dusty old locked-up rooms—rooms that offered many surprises in the shape of their contents; a mixture of the properties of East and West—old howdahs and silver horse-trappings, rusty swords and spears, images of saints, holy water stands, crucifixes, pictures, tulwars, bonnets, betel-nut boxes, hookahs, armour. It was, in fact, a combination of a native “tosha-khana,” or wardrobe room—an oratory and a pawnbroker’s shop.
Dust, and dirt, and cobwebs were swept out, as well as goats, and kids, and poultry. House linen, glass, and crockery, and carpets were replaced—money and the telegraph wires can do great things—walls were white-washed, windows cleaned, jungle cut down. Thus was order and energy infused into every department. The “Pela Kothi,” though shabby, was neat and cheerful. The meals were good, and served by snowy-clad servants; flowers and fruit were actually to be seen on the table. There was a daily post, books, magazines, and a steady hill pony to carry Major Jervis. But he preferred to hobble on his son’s arm a hundred times up and down the terrace, talking of old times, and noting each turn with a bean. He was a different man already, roused at any rate for the moment from his stupor; he took an interest in the news of the day, in the garden, and, above all, in his pensioners, the lepers.
The young reformer, who had been the means of all these changes, had worked hard, worked ceaselessly from morning till night. He felt that incessant occupation was his only refuge; he dared not give himself time to think. He walked over the hills of an afternoon, when his day’s work was done, walked until he was so completely worn out that he was safe to sleep like a log, and, above all, safe from what he most dreaded—dreams.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
THE VOICE IN THE CONDEMNED CANTONMENT.
The condemned cantonment had an extraordinary fascination for Mark Jervis, and he frequently made a considerable detour, in order to return home by the path that led through this beautiful but melancholy spot. The world had abandoned it for a good reason—he had abandoned the world for a good reason, they had something in common in their isolation. He was familiar with the barracks, the mess-house, the ruinous bungalows, their wild tangled gardens, where flower and tree fought desperately against extinction by savage cousins and distant wild relations. Apple and rose trees still managed to hold their own, but heliotrope and geraniums had long succumbed. The churchyard was his constant haunt, he knew the names and short histories on the grave-stones, head-stones, crosses, and not a few immense square tombs, such as appear to be peculiar to old Indian cemeteries. It was as if a small house, or mortuary chapel, had been reared over the departed, and the more sincerely mourned, the larger loomed these great dark weather-stained erections! There was a big and stately edifice dedicated to the memory of Constance Herbert, aged nineteen. What had poor Constance done to deserve to be weighted down with so many tons of masonry? The inscription was effaced. There was another sarcophagus, erected over the remains of a man who was killed by a fall from a precipice; and a tomb, the size of an ordinary gate lodge, was raised to the memory of an infant aged eighteen months.
One evening Mark descended the hill after a long and very erratic tramp; it was the hour of sunset; he stood for a few moments a captive to the influence of his surroundings—the bluish hills, the amethyst-tinted distance, the quiet smokeless bungalows, nestling among their flower-choked verandahs, the soft yellow light flooding the entire valley, the uncanny silence, a silence befitting this forsaken spot.
He sat down on the grass-grown chabootra (or band-stand), drew out and lit a cheroot. It was Sunday, and he instinctively glanced over at the roofless church. What had been the last service held between its walls? A service for the burial of the dead, no doubt—the long-forgotten dead, who were buried in its precincts. As he sat there alone in the midst of dumb witnesses of the past, his mind travelled back over his whole life, and he steadily reviewed its most memorable incidents one by one; the most noteworthy of all had befallen him in these very mountains. His thoughts dwelt on his uncle, then on Honor Gordon. What was she doing just now? Perhaps she was sitting in church, listening attentively to one of Mr. Paul’s brief and excellent sermons. Had her thoughts, or prayers, ever strayed to him? Was it true what Miss Paske had said about woman’s thoughts? Could he honestly tell his own heart that he hoped Honor Gordon had forgotten him? Would he prefer to be what the Bible terms “a dead man, out of mind?”
The sun had drawn away his bright warm cloak foot by foot, the grey pall of a short Indian twilight was rapidly spreading over the valley. Shadows advanced stealthily and momentarily, the woods were inscrutable, and the first cry of the jackal rose through the sharp hill air.
Jervis had risen already to depart, when his attention was arrested by an unexpected sound—no jackal this, it was a voice, a human voice—coming from the direction of the church or churchyard. He almost held his breath to listen, and this is what he heard, in what had been once a full rich contralto. Every syllable was distinctly audible, and there was a slight almost imperceptible pause between each word—