“Look at me!” he burst forth, springing upon his feet, his breast heaving under his blue pajamas.
“Pardon the question,” I answered. “Go on, you are doing bravely.”
He sank back into his chair with a commendable air of dignity.
“I had a little money of my own,” he continued, “and opened up an estate. It promised well, but I soon came to the end of my small capital. I thought I could go to Calcutta and Bombay and Simla, and cultivate my mind by travel and society, while the bushes were growing. Well it ended in the same old way. I got into the chitties’ hands—they are worse than Jews—at two per cent a month on a mortgage on my estate. Then I went back to it with a determination to pay up my debt, make my estate a success, and after that to see the world. I worked, sir, like a nigger, and for a time was able to meet my naked creditor, from month to month, hoping all the time against hope for a bumper crop.”
“I understand,” I said. “Your bumper crop did not come, and your chitty did. Where does she come in?” I nodded in the direction of the little sleeper.
He glanced uneasily in the same direction, and a tear gathered in his eye.
“I married on credit, sir, the daughter of an English army officer. It was infernal. But, sir, you would have done likewise. Live under the burning sun of India for four years, struggle against impossibilities and hope against hope, and then have a pair of great hazel eyes look lovingly into yours and a pair of red lips turned up to yours,—and tell me if you would not have closed your eyes to the future, and accepted this precious gift as though it were sent from above?”
The pale, shrunken face of the speaker glowed, and his faded eyes lit up with the light of love.
“We were happy for a time, and the little gal was born, but the bumper crop did not come. Then, sir, I sold farm tools and my horse, and sent the wife to a hill station for her health. I kept the little gal. I stayed to work, as none of my natives ever worked. It was a gay station to which she went. You know the rest,—she never came back. That ended the struggle. I would have shot myself but for the little one. I took her and we wandered here and there, doing odd jobs for a few months at a time. I drifted down to Singapore, hoping to better myself, but, sir, I am about used up. It’s hard—hard.”
He buried his head in his long, thin fingers, and sat perfectly still.