On the Face of the Waters: A Tale of the Mutiny

by Flora Annie Webster Steel

And Kate, as she sat watching the red flush of sunset grow to the dome, remembered his look at her with a half-angry pang. Why should she be in this man's way always? So the day died away in soft silence, and there on the housetop it seemed incredible that so much hung in the balance, and that down in the streets the crowds must be drifting to and fro restlessly. At least she supposed so. Yet, monotonous as ever, there was the evening cry of the muezzin and the persistent thrumming of toms-toms and saringis which evening brings to a native city. It rose louder than usual from a roof hard by, where, so Tara told her, a princess of the blood royal lived; a great friend of Abool-Bukr's. The remembrance of little Sonny's hands all red with blood, and the cruel face smiling over an apology, made her shiver, and wonder as she often did with a desperate craving what the child's fate had been. Why had she let the old ayah take him? Why was he not here, safe; making life bearable? As she sat, the tears falling quietly over her cheeks, Tara came and looked at her curiously. "The mem should not cry," she said consolingly. "The Huzoor will save her somehow."

For an instant Kate felt as if she would rather he did not. Then on the distance and the darkening air came a familiar sound: the evening bugle from the Ridge with its cheerful invitation:

"Come-and-set-a-picket-boys! come-and-keep-a-watch."

So someone else was within hail, ready to help! The knowledge brought her a vast consolation, and for the first time in that environment she slept through the night without wakening in deadly dreamy fear at the least sound.

Even the uproarious devilry of Prince Abool in the alley below did not rouse her, when about midnight he broke loose from the feverish detaining hold which Newâsi had kept on him by every art of her power during the day, lest the master returning should find the Prince in mischief. But now he lurched away with a party of young bloods who had come to fetch him, swearing that he must celebrate the victory properly. But for a moment's weakness, fostered by a foolish, fearful woman, he might have led the cavalry. He wept maudlin tears over the thought, swearing he would yet show his mettle. He would not leave one hell-doomed alive; and, suiting the action to the word, he began incontinently to search for fugitives in some open cowyards close by, till the strapping dairymaids, roused from slumber, declared in revenge that they had seen a man slip down the culvert of the big drain. Five minutes afterward Prince Abool, half-choked, half-drowned, was dragged from the sewer by his comrades, protesting feebly that he must have killed an infidel; else why did the blood smell so horribly?

But after that the city sank into the soundlessness, the stillness, of the hour before dawn, save for a recurring call of the watch bugles on wall and Ridge and the twinkling lights which burned all night in camp and court. For those two had challenged each other, and the fight was to the bitter end. What else could it be with a death-pledge between them? The townspeople might sleep uncertain which side they would espouse, but between the Men and the Murderers the issue was clear.

And it remained so, even though the month-of-miracle lingered, and no assault came on the morrow, or the day after, or the day after that. So that the old King himself set his back to the wall and for once spoke as a King should. "If the army will not fight without pay, punish it," he said to the Commander-in-chief. But it was only a flash in the pan, and he retired once more to the latticed marble balcony and set the sign-manual to a general fiat that "those who would be satisfied with a trifle might be paid something." Whereat Mahboob Ali shook his head, for there was not even a trifle in the privy purse.

As for the city people, their ears and tongues grew longer during those three days, when the sepoys, returning from the sorties and skirmishes, brought back tales of glorious victory, stupendous slaughter. Her man had killed fifteen Huzoors himself, and there were not five hundred left on the Ridge, said Futteh-deen's wife to Pera-Khân's as they gossiped at the wall; and a good job too. When they were gone there would be an end of these sword cuts and bullet wounds. Not a wink of sleep had she had for nights, yawned Zainub, what with thirsts and poultices! And on the steps of the mosque, too, the learned lingered to discuss the newspapers. So Bukht Khân with fifty thousand men was on his way to swear allegiance, and the Shah of Persia had sacked Lahore, where Jan Larnce himself had been caught trying to escape on an elephant and identified by wounds on his back. And the London correspondent of the Authentic News was no doubt right in saying the Queen was dumfoundered, while the St. Petersburg one was clearly correct in asserting that the Czar was about to put on his crown at last. Why not, since his vow was at an end with the passing of India from British supremacy?

So the dream went on; the little brocaded bags kept coming in; the stupendous slaughter continued. Yet every night the Widow's Cruse of a Ridge echoed to the picket bugles, and the court and the camp twinkled at each other till dawn.

A sort of vexed despairing patience came to Jim Douglas, and more than once he apologized to Kate for his moodiness, like a patient who apologizes to his nurse when unfavorable symptoms set in. He gave her what news he could glean, which was not much, for Tiddu had gone south for another consignment of grain. But on the morning of the 12th he turned up with a face clearer than it had been; and a friendlier look in his eyes.