Khân Mahomed Lateef Khân, then, retreated growling to his tumbledown roof, and betook himself inconsequently to polishing up his sword. Half an hour afterwards, however, he suddenly bade old Fâtma bring him his company raiment with the medals and clasps of his dead sons sewn on it. Then he said a brief farewell to the child, left the women without a word, and went over to borrow the pink-nosed pony of the pleader's father, who, being the Government accountant, was of course discreetly at home.
"Why didst not make thy son take up the case without payment?" asked the old man wrathfully, as his neighbour held the stirrup for him to mount. "Then should I not have had to go in mine old age and strive for peace,--mark you, for peace!"
But as he rode off, the old sword clattered merrily about his old legs, and he smiled, thinking of the gift given when the light of his eyes lay sick in the mem's arms.
"The sword is for her and hers, according to my oath," he said to himself. "God knows it may be peace; I will do naught to hinder it; but with Marsden sahib--Allah Akbar! at least they do not worship stocks and stones like these pigs."
So behind the gathering cloud of witnesses, half hidden in the gathering dust, came the pink-nosed pony ready for peace or war. The odds, either for one or the other, flickered up and down a dozen times as village after village sent or held back its contingent. Finally it flared up conclusively with the advent of Râmu at the head of his particular villains, armed not only with sticks and stones, but with picks and shovels. Like a spark among tinder the suggestion flamed through the mass,--why waste time in words when, without a blow, except at solid earth, they could bring the floods into their own channel, since Afzul and his gang had declared in favour of the people? So said Râmu, and the peasants were only too ready to believe him, seeing that picks and shovels were more to their minds than blows. Thus, while the trio of aliens to whom that low curve of earthwork meant so much, were talking and laughing over their lunch, the dam was being assailed by a swarm of men eager for its destruction. Almost at the same time the Khân sahib, spurring the pink-nosed pony to the overseer's hut, found Afzul asleep, or pretending to sleep. Perhaps the hint of bribery was true; perhaps the Pathan thought a crisis was needed; at all events he was too crafty to show his hand to his stern old patron, and set off ostensibly to give the alarm at the house and summon his gang, who by a curious coincidence happened to be employed half a mile or so further up the river. Not till he saw his messenger reach the verandah did the Khân seek the scene of action. Picks and shovels indeed! Well! these ploughmen had a right to use such weapons, and he would stand by and see fair play.
How Afzul fulfilled his mission has already been told; also the result of John Raby's appeal for help to Philip Marsden. To say that the former could not believe his eyes, when, on first turning out of the garden, he caught sight of the crowd gathered on the dam, is but a feeble description of the absolutely incredulous wrath which overpowered him. He had been prepared for opposition, perhaps even for attack, when such attack was reasonable. But that these fools, these madmen, should propose to cut a channel with the full weight of a flood on the dam was inconceivable. As he ran back for his revolver, a savage joy at the danger to the workers themselves merged itself with rage at the possible ruin of his labour, and a fierce determination by words, warnings, and threats to avert the worst. They could not be such fools, such insensate idiots! As he passed the workmen's huts on his return, he shouted to Afzul, and getting no reply ran on with a curse at all traitors. He was alone against them all, but despite them all he would prevail. As he neared the crowd, bare-headed, revolver in hand, he felt a wild desire to fire without a word and kill some one, no matter whom. The suspicion, however, that this attack could not proceed from anything but revenge had grown upon him, and became conviction as he saw that the largest portion of his enemies were of the ruck; men who never did a hand's turn, and who even now stood by, applauding, while others plied spade and mattock. In the latter, in their stolid wisdom and experience, lay his best chance, and he slipped the revolver to his pocket instantly. "Stop, you fools!" he shouted, "stop! Peru! Gunga; where are your wits? The flood,--the flood is too strong." Then, recognising the old Khân, he appealed instinctively to him for support. "Stop them, Khân sahib! you are old and wise; tell them it is madness!"
As he spoke, reaching the growing gap, he leapt down into it and wrested a spade from the man nearest to him. It was yielded almost without resistance, but a murmur ran through the bystanders, and the workers dug faster.
"Jodha! Boota! Dhurma!" rose John's voice again, singling out the men he knew to be cultivators. "This is folly! tell them it is folly, Khân sahib!"
"I know not," answered the other moodily; "'tis shovel, not sword-work, and they have a right to the water--before God, sahib, they have a right to so much!"
"Before God, they will have more than they want," interrupted that eager tone; and something in its intelligent decision arrested one or two of the older workers. They looked round at the swirling waste of the river and hesitated.