Beeroo awoke long before sunrise. He drank some milk, stole into his tent, and crept out again with a stout canvas haversack in his hands. Into this sack, which contained other things besides, he stuffed some broken meat and bread made of Indian corn, and slung is over his shoulders. Then grasping his staff, he gave a last look around him, and plunged into the jungle. Sagoo would have followed, but Beeroo ordered him back, and the hound with drooping tail and wistful eyes watched the figure of his master until it was lost in the gloom of the trees. Beeroo walked on tirelessly, and by midday was far in the hills. He could go from sunrise to sunset at that long trotting pace of his, rest a little, eat a little, and then keep on till the sun rose again. He was now high up in the hills. The sal trees had given place to the screw-pine, silk-cotton and mango were replaced by holm-oak and walnut. In the tangle of the low bushes the dog-rose and wild jasmine bloomed, and the short green of the grass was spangled with the wood violet, the amaranth, and the pimpernel. Far below the Jumna hummed down to the plains in a white lashing flood, and the voice of the distant river reached him, soft and dreamy, through the murmur of the pines. As he glanced into the deep of the valleys, a blue pheasant rose with its whistling call, and with widespread wings sailed slowly down into the mist below. The sunlight caught the splendour of his plumage, and he dropped like a jewel into the pearl grey of the vapour that clung to the mountain-side. Beeroo looked at the bird for a moment, and then lifting his gaze, fixed it on a white spot on the summit of the forest-covered hill to his left. He made out a cone-like dome, surmounting a square building, built like an eagle's nest at the edge of the precipice which fell sheer for a thousand feet to the silver ribbon of the river. It was the mandar, or temple of Mohonagh, and so clear was the air, that it seemed as if Beeroo had only to stretch out his staff to touch the white spot before him. He knew better than that, however, and knew too that the sun must rise again before he could rest himself beneath the walls of the temple, and look on the treasure of the shagul.
"Ram, ram, Mohonagh!" he cried, saluting the far-off shrine in mockery, and then continued his way. When he had gone thus for another hour or so, he came upon the traces of a recent encampment. There was a heap of stale fodder, one or two earthenware pots were lying about, and the remains of a fire still smouldered under the lee of a walnut tree. Hard by, on the opposite side of the track, a huge rock rose abruptly, and from its scarred side a bubbling spring plashed musically into a natural basin, and, overflowing this, ran across the path in a small stream, past the tree and over the precipice, where it lost itself in a spray in which a quivering rainbow hung. Here Beeroo halted, and having broken his fast and slaked his thirst, proceeded to totally alter his personal appearance. This he did by the simple process of removing his turban of Turkey red and his warm vest, the only covering he had for the upper portion of his body. After this he let down his long straight hair, which he wore coiled in a knot, to fall freely over his shoulders. Then he smeared himself all over, head and all, with ashes from the fire; and when this was done he stood up a grisly phantom in which no one would have recognised the Sansi tracker. He hid his sandals and the wearing apparel he had removed in a secure place in a cleft in the rocks, and marking the spot carefully, went on--no longer Beeroo the Sansi, a man of no caste, but a holy mendicant. In his left hand he held one of the earthen vessels he had found under the walnut, in his right, his bamboo staff, and the knapsack hung over his shoulders. When he had gone thus for about a mile he heard the melancholy "Aosh! Aosh!" of cattle-drivers in the hills and the tinkling of bells. Turning a bluff he came face to face with a small caravan of bullocks, returning from the interior, laden with walnuts, dried apricots, and wool. Each bullock had a bundle of merchandise slung on either side, and the frontlet of the leading animal was adorned with strings of blue beads and shells. The caravan-drivers walked, and as they urged their beasts along, repeated at intervals their call, which to European ears would sound more like a sigh of despair than a cry of encouragement. Beeroo stood by the side of the road, and, stretching out his ash-covered hands, held out the vessel for alms. Each man as he passed dropped a little into it for luck, one a brown copper, another some dried fruit, a third a handful of parched grain, and Beeroo received these offerings in a grave silence as became his holy calling. He stayed thus until the caravan was out of sight; then he collected the few coins and tossed the rest of the contents of the vessel on to the roadside. He was satisfied that his disguise was complete, and that he could face the priests of the temple at Mohonagh without fear of discovery, for the carriers were Bunjarees, members of a tribe allied to his own, whose lynx-eyes would have discovered a Sansi in a moment unless his disguise was perfect.
"Thoba!" laughed Beeroo to himself as he pressed on. "Had the Bunjarees only known who I was, I had heard the whisper of their sticks through the air, and my back might have been sore; but the blessing of Mohonagh is upon me," he chuckled.
Beeroo rested that evening in a cave. He rose at midnight, however, and travelling without a check was by morning ascending the winding road that led to the shrine. He was not alone here, for there were a number of pilgrims toiling up the ascent, halting now and again to take breath, as they wearily climbed the narrow track set in between the red and brown rocks, and overhung by wild apricot and holm-oak. Among the pilgrims were those who, in expiation of their sins, wriggled up the height on their faces like snakes, others who laid themselves flat at every third step, others again who crawled up painfully on their blistered hands and knees; there were women going to thank the god for the blessing of children, bearded Dogras of the hills, ash-covered and ochre-robed mendicants, and a fat mahajun, or money-lender, who had won a lawsuit and ruined a village. All these were hurrying towards the shrine, and their hands were full.
Under the arch of the gateway stood Prem Sagar, the high priest of Mohonagh, and flung grain towards a countless number of pigeons that fluttered and cooed around him. "They are the eyes and ears of the temple," he said to himself as he gazed upon them; "they warn the shrine of danger, they bring the news of the world beyond the hills, they are surer than the telegraph of the Sahibs, for they tell no secrets. Perchance," and he looked down on the specks slowly nearing the gate, "amongst that crowd of fools is Beeroo the Sansi; if so the god will welcome him, and there will be another miracle. Purun Chand!" and he called out to a subordinate priest who approached him reverently, "Purun Chand, awaken the god."
Purun Chand placed a conch-horn to his lips, and blew a long deep-toned call. Its dismal notes were caught up in the hills and echoed from valley to valley, until they died away, moaning in the deeps of the forest. As the call rang out dolefully, the pilgrims ascending the road fell on their knees, and with one voice cast up a wailing cry, "Ai, ai, Mohonagh!" And Beeroo the Sansi, the man of no caste, whose very presence so near the temple was an abomination, shouted the loudest of all.
Half an hour later, Prem Sagar, the high priest, naked to the waist, with his brahminical cord hanging over his left shoulder and a red and white trident painted on his forehead, stood on the stone steps leading up to the shrine, and watched with keen eyes the pilgrims as they came within the temple walls. The devotees took no notice of him, except some of the women who prostrated themselves, while he bowed his head gravely in answer, but said nothing. His lips were muttering prayers in a sing-song tone, but his eyes were tirelessly watching the groups as they came up in files. At last Beeroo appeared, and on his coming to the steps, slightly dragging his left foot, a quick light shone in the high priest's eyes.
"Soh! It is the holy man!" his thoughts ran on. "Gobind Ram did well to warn me of his limp. There too are the five marks of the leopard's claws, running down the inside of the calf." As Beeroo approached the priest, he imitated the action of a woman before him, and prostrated himself. Prem Sagar pretended not to see him; but raised his voice to a loud chant, and repeated the mystic words Om, mane padme, om![[2]] There was a time when these words caused the heavens to thunder as at the sacred name of Jehovah; but now the limpid blue of the sky was undisturbed, as the priest called out to the jewel in the lotus, the symbol of the Universal God.
"Om, mane padme, om!" repeated Beeroo, and passed into the shrine. He found himself in a room about twenty feet square, the walls and floor blackened by age and by the smoke from the cressets which burned day and night in little niches in the walls. Overhead the vault of the dome was in inky darkness, and in front of him, three-headed and four-armed, painted a bright red, was the grinning idol of Mohonagh. At the feet of the god were the offerings of the pilgrims, and on each side of the idol stood an attendant priest holding a censer, which he swung to and fro, and the fumes from which, heavy with the odour of the wild jasmine and the champac, curled slowly up to the blackened dome. But it was not on the idol, nor on the priests, nor on the worshippers, that Beeroo's eyes were fixed. They were bent to the right of the idol, where the trunk of the Shagul Tree rose from the flooring of the temple like the body of a huge snake, and, escaping outside through a cutting in the wall, spread out into branches and leaves. In fact the temple was built around the tree, and even through the gloom, Beeroo could see that the part of the tree within the temple walls was covered with coins and gems. The coins, old and blackened with smoke, looked like scales on the snake-like trunk of the Shagul Tree: the gold and silver of the jewels were dimmed of their brightness; but through the murky scented atmosphere the Sansi saw the dusky burning red of the ruby, the green glow of the emerald, the orange flame within the opal, and the countless lights in the diamond; and all these came and went like stars twinkling through the veil of a dark night. The Sansi almost gasped, such riches as these were beyond his dreams; they truly meant lakhs of rupees. A single one of the gems would buy him a village and lands; if he could get the whole! His brain almost reeled at the thought, and it was with an effort that he steadied himself, and laying his offering at the feet of the god, backed slowly out of the temple.