The Advanced-Guard

by Sydney C. Grier

After this visit to Sheikhgarh there was another month of waiting. Major Keeling warned all his officers to be on the look-out for a fakir or dervish who might come with a message; but although several members of the fraternity presented themselves as usual in search of alms, and were given every opportunity to speak if they would, none of them had anything particular to say. The month had more than elapsed when one day a respectable elderly man, dressed like an attendant of some great family, and with a scribe’s inkhorn at his girdle, asked leave to present a petition to Kīlin Sahib. Applicants of this sort were always plentiful, owing to the breaking-up of the huge households maintained by all the native princes before the annexation; and it was Major Keeling’s policy to find employment for as many of them as possible, lest they should seek to obtain a precarious livelihood by going up and down among the ignorant peasantry and agitating against British rule. The man was admitted into the office, and Sir Dugald, who was sitting at a little distance, saw him put his hands together in a submissive attitude, and heard him begin to pour out a long rigmarole in low tones. But almost as Sir Dugald distinguished the words “dervish” and “Gamara,” Major Keeling rose from his chair.

“Come in here,” he said, opening the door of his private office. “Haigh, you come too. Now, Kutb-ud-Din, let us have your story.”

“The servant of my lord has little to tell him, but it is that which he is anxious to know. For when my lord’s servant was at Gamara disguised as a most holy dervish, so that he wore no clothes but a rough mantle, and painted his body blue, and left his hair and beard wild and long, he heard one day of a great sight that was to be seen in the square before the palace. And forasmuch as his religious meditation was interrupted by the passing to and fro and the loud speaking of those that hurried to see this sight, he asked them what it might be. And one told him one thing and one another, but all agreed that it was such a sight as would rejoice the heart of a holy man, and therefore my lord’s servant determined to go thither. And coming to the square, the people made way for him, so that he stood at last in a good place, and saw the Khan and a great company of soldiers and counsellors come out of the palace. And at the head of the Khan’s bodyguard he saw the Farangi, Firoz Sahib, of whose conversion all the city had been talking, so great were the festivities at his initiation——”

“Stop!” said Major Keeling hoarsely. “Are you certain it was Ferrers Sahib?”

“My lord’s servant will swear it, if my lord so wills. Has he not often beheld Firoz Sahib, both here and at Shah Nawaz? Moreover, his history was known to all in Gamara. It seemed to my lord’s servant that Firoz Sahib had been drinking bang, for his eyes were bright and his face flushed, and Mirza Fazl-ul-Hacq, the renegade, rode at his bridle-rein, as though to restrain him. And afterwards, when the people were slow to disperse, he ordered the soldiers to charge the crowd, and escaping from his friend the Mirza, rode down a Jew who stood in his way, so that all who saw him fled. But that was not until after——”

“After what? Go on,” said Major Keeling impatiently, as the man hesitated.

“Let my lord pardon his servant, if that which he has to say is not pleasing to his ears, for the dust under my lord’s feet can but tell what he saw. There was led out into the square, before the Khan and his court and army, another Farangi, wearing chains that would not suffer him to walk upright, and clothed in shameful rags; and a whisper went about among the people that it was the young sahib whom they called the Father of a Book.”

“And was it?” demanded Major Keeling.

“How can the servant of my lord say? It so chances that his eyes never rested upon the young sahib while he was among his own people. But this sahib was young and tall and lean, and white like a wall—yea, even his hair was white, yet reddish-white like that of the sahibs, not pure white like that of the people of this land——”

“White—in those few weeks!” breathed Sir Dugald.