"And lest they feel that they have been imposed upon—that they are beggars sent to beg in behalf of beggars—let us pay them royally! Lo, there sits one of these men beside the Gray Mahatma. I invite you, royal women, to provide him with the wherewithal for that campaign to which we have appointed him and his friend!"
She herself set the example by throwing a purse at me—a leather wallet stuffed full of English banknotes, and the others had all evidently come prepared, for the room rained money for about two minutes! Purses fell on the Mahatma and on me in such profusion that surely Midas never felt more opulent—although the Mahatma took no notice of them even when one hit him in the face.
There were all kinds of purses, stuffed with all kinds of money, but mostly paper money; some, however, had gold in them, for I heard the gold jingle, and the darned things hurt you when they landed like a rock on some part of your defenseless anatomy. Take them on the whole, those women made straight shooting, but not even curiosity was strong enough to make me pick up one purse and count its contents.
I rose and bowed acknowledgment without intending to commit myself, and without touching any of the purses, which would have been instantly interpreted as signifying acceptance. But I sat down again pretty promptly, for I had no sooner got to my feet than the woman in black got up too, and throwing aside the embroidered sari disclosed none other than Athelstan King looking sore-eyed from lack of sleep and rather weak from all he had gone through, but humorously determined, nevertheless.
Yasmini laughed aloud. Evidently she was in the secret. But nobody else had known, as the flutter of excitement proved. I think most of the women were rather deliciously scandalized, although some of them were so imbued with ancient prejudices that they drew their own veils all the closer and seemed to be trying to hide behind one another. In fact, any one interested in discovering which were the progressives and which the reactionaries in that assembly could have made a good guess in that minute, although it might not have done him much good unless he had a good memory for the colors and patterns of saris. A woman veiled in the Indian fashion is not easy to identify.
But before they could make up their minds whether to resent or applaud the trick that King had played on them with Yasmini's obvious collaboration, King was well under way with a speech that held them spellbound. It would have held any audience spellbound by its sheer, stark manliness. It was straighter from the shoulder than Yasmini's eloquence, and left absolutely nothing to imagination. Blunt, honest downrightness, that was the key of it, and it took away the breath of all those women used to the devious necessities of purdah politics.
"My friend and I refuse," he said, and paused to let them understand that thoroughly. "We refuse to accept your money."
Yasmini, who prided herself on her instantly ready wit, was too astonished to retort or to try to stop him. It was clear at a glance that she and King had had some sort of conference while the Mahatma and I were locked up together, and she had evidently expected King to fall in line and accept the trust imposed on him. Even now she seemed to think that he might be coming at concession in his own way, for her face had a look of expectancy. But King had nothing in his bag of surprises except disillusion.
"You see," he went on, "we can no longer be compelled. We might be killed, but that would bring prompt punishment. Maharajah Jihanbihar has already started inquiries about us, by telegraph, which, as you know, goes swiftly. We or else our slayers will have to be produced alive presently. So we refuse to accept orders or money from any one. But as for the Mahatma—we accord him our protection. There is only one power we recognize as able to impose death penalties. We repudiate all usurpation of that power. If the Mahatma thinks it will be safer in the United States, my friend and I will see that he gets there, at our expense.
"It was in my mind," he went on, "to drive a hard bargain with the Mahatma. I was going to offer him protection in return for knowledge. But it is not fair to drive bargains with a man so closely beset as he is. Therefore I offer him protection without terms."