In the Permanent Way

by Flora Annie Webster Steel

"Lazybones!" retorted the giggler. "Thy mother-in-law will need her tongue. Thy water-pot is but half-full even now."

"Still, it is heavy enough for my arms," replied the sweet voice indifferently, yet sharply, "and the river is far." Then it added inconsequently: "But there are streams up in the hills that folk can guide to their doors. And the grass grows soft too. Here is nothing but stones; I hate them, they are so hard."

"And the big shepherd's mother is dead," put in another girl pertly; whereat the rest giggled louder than ever.

Was it Hussan or Husayn who, three days afterwards, appeared suddenly before the District-officer in camp with a nicely written petition on a regulation sheet of English-made paper, requesting that he might be put on as a swimming patrol on the river opposite Sitâna in place of one who was supposed to have been killed or drowned? There is no need to know. No need to know which it was who won the toss when Husayn came back with a smile to say that, so far, they were quits, and might begin a new game. Whichever it was, John Nicholson looked at the lean bronze thews and sinews approvingly, and then asked the one crucial question, "Can you?"

The man smiled, a quick, broad smile. "None better, Huzoor, on the Indus. There is one, over the water, who deems himself my match. God knows if he is."

John Nicholson, who had bent over his writing again, glanced up hastily. "So that is it. Here, Moonshee, write an order to the man at Khânpur to put this man on at once." He was back at his writing almost before the order was ended, and in the silence which followed under the white wings of the tent set wide to all the winds of heaven, the sound of two pens could be heard. One was the Englishman's, writing a report to headquarters saying that the increase of crime must be checked by reprisals, the other the native's, bidding the inspector put on the bearer as a Government swimmer.

"For signature, Huzoor," came a deferential voice, and the still-busy pen shifted itself to the shiny paper laid beside it, and the dark, keen, kindly eyes looked up once more for half a second. "Well, good luck to you! I hope you'll kill him, whoever he is."

"By the help of God, Huzoor, by the help of God!"

Which was it, Hussan or Husayn, who in the growing dusk walked up and down the shaly glacis below the long cluster of Sitâna, watching the opposite bank with the eyes of a lynx for each stone of vantage, each shallow whence a few yards' start might be gained? Which was it, Husayn or Hussan, who in the same dusk paced up and down the low bank on the other side watching in his turn, with untiring eyes, for the quicker curve of the current where a bold swimmer might by one swift venture drift down faster to the calmer water, and so have a second or two in which to regain breath ere the fight began? What matters it whether the panther was on the western bank and the leopard on the eastern? They were two wild beasts pacing up and down, up and down, with their feet upon the water's edge; up and down, up and down, even when the moon rose and their shadows showed more distinctly than they did themselves; for the oil upon their limbs caught the light keenly like the glistening shale and the glistening wet sand at their feet. Up and down, up and down, they paced, in the stillness and the peace, with only the noise of the rushing river, slumberously, monotonously, insistent; up and down, up and down till the cry of the muazzim at dawn came echoing over the water.

Prayer is more than sleep! Prayer is more than sleep!