In the Guardianship of God

by Flora Annie Webster Steel

"Huzoor!" came a familiar voice, "the first bugle has gone. The Huzoor will find his uniform--a corporal's, with three good-conduct stripes--is ready. The absence of a rifle is to be regretted; but that shall be amended if the Huzoor will lend a gracious ear to the plan of his slave. In the meantime a gifting of the Huzoor's feet for the putting on of stockings might be ordered."

George Afford thrust out a foot mechanically, and sate on the edge of the string bed staring stupidly at the three good-conduct stripes on the tunic, which was neatly folded beside him.

"It is quite simple," went on the deferential voice. "The Huzoor is going to march with the colours, but he will be twelve hours behind them; that is all. He will get the fighting, and by-and-by, when the killing comes and men are wanted, the Colonel-sahib may give a place; but, in any case, there will always be the fighting. For the rest, I, the Huzoor's slave, will manage; and as there will, of necessity, be no canteen, there can be no tyranny. Besides, since there is not a cowrie in the master's jacket, what else is he to do?"

The last argument was unanswerable. George Afford thrust out his other foot to be shod for this new path, and stared harder than ever at the good-conduct stripes.

That night, despite the fatigues of a first day in camp, Peroo trudged back along the hard white road to meet some one whom he expected; for this was the first step, and he had, perforce, been obliged to leave his charge to his own devices for twelve hours amid the distractions of the bazaar. Still, without a cowrie in his pocket--Peroo had carefully extracted the few annas he had found in one--a man was more or less helpless, even for evil.

Despite this fact, there was a lilt in the lagging step which, just as Peroo had begun to give up hope of playing Providence, came slowly down the road. It belonged to George Afford, in the gentlemanly stage of drink. He had had a chequered life, he said almost tearfully, but there were some things a man of honour could not do. He could not break his promise to an inferior--a superior was another matter. In that case he paid for it honestly. But he had promised Peroo--his inferior--to come. So here he was; and that was an end of it.

It seemed more than once during the next few hours as if the end had, indeed, come. But somehow Peroo's deferential hand and voice extricated those tired uncertain feet, the weary sodden brain, from ditches and despair; still it was a very sorry figure which Peroo's own hasty footsteps left behind, safely quartered for the day in a shady bit of jungle, while he ran on to overtake the rear-guard if he could. The start, however, had been too much for his lameness, and he was a full hour late at his work; which, of course, necessitated his putting in an excuse. He chose drunkenness, as being nearest the truth, was fined a day's wages, and paid it cheerfully, thinking with more certainty of the sleeping figure he had left in the jungles.

The afternoon sun was slanting through the trees before it stirred, and George Afford woke from the sleep of fatigue superadded to his usual sedative. He felt strangely refreshed, and lay on his back staring at the little squirrels yawning after their midday snooze in the branches above him. And then he laughed suddenly, sate up and looked about him half confusedly. Not a trace of humanity was to be seen; nothing but the squirrels, a few green pigeons, and down in the mirror-like pool behind the trees--a pool edged by the percolating moisture from the water with faint spikes of sprouting grass--a couple of egrets were fishing lazily. Beyond lay a bare sandy plain, backed by faint blue hills--the hills where fighting was to be had. Close at hand were those three good-conduct stripes.

That night Peroo had not nearly so far to go back along the broad white road; yet the step which came echoing down it, if steadier, lagged more. Nor was Peroo's task much easier, for George Afford--in the abject depression which comes to the tippler from total abstinence--sate down in the dust more than once, and swore he would not go another step without a dram. Still, about an hour after dawn, he was once more dozing in a shady retreat with a pot of water and some dough cakes beside him, while Peroo, in luck, was getting a lift to the third camping-ground.

But even at the second, where the sleeping figure remained, the country was wilder, almost touching the "skirts of the hills," and so, when George Afford roused himself--as the animals rouse themselves to meet the coming cool of evening--a ravine deer was standing within easy shot, looking at him with head thrown back and wide, startled nostrils, scenting the unknown.