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IN KALI'S COUNTRY

In Kali's Country

Tales from Sunny India
By
EMILY T. SHEETS

Illustrations from drawings by
ELMA McNEAL CHILDS

New York Chicago Toronto
Fleming H. Revell Company
London and Edinburgh

Copyright, 1910, by
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY

New York: 158 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 80 Wabash Avenue
Toronto: 25 Richmond Street, W.
London: 21 Paternoster Square
Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street

This book is dedicated to
My Mother
Jane Churchill Thompson
and
My Father
William H. Thompson, Jr.

Contents

Illustrations

Glossary

I
Kalighat

"The five years will be up to-morrow. When the sun rises next upon the festival of Kali I shall have completed my vow."

Scarcely had the holy man been able to say his prayers or repeat his sacred texts the whole day long, for there had been constantly before his mind the knowledge that this was the last day of his self-imposed sacrifices and that the next day he would be free from all restraints to do—what? Over and over had the thought repeated itself in the man's mind until now, unconsciously, he had given utterance to it and the stout, sleek priest of Kali who chanced to be standing beside his shelter, looked down upon him in surprise.

"What vow, most holy one?" he courteously inquired. "For many years thou hast sat here at the ghat, the most honoured and revered of all the holy men this side the temple of our Goddess Kali. Was this thy vow—to sit thus in ashes?"

The fakir started at the priest's voice, for his own remarks had been unconscious, and, looking up at his interrogator, he seemed slowly to comprehend that he had spoken aloud and that the priest had heard his words.

"Yes, Priest of Kali," he said, dropping his eyes and poking the little fire before him with his sacred tongs.

"Perhaps you of the holy priesthood can answer a question for me," he added slowly after a moment, without looking up.

The fat, half-naked priest, not loath to take advantage of any opportunity to do nothing, especially when at the same time he was being religious by talking with a holy man, dropped lazily to the pavement beside the fakir's rude shelter of a bit of thatch on four poles and, waving for a hookah from the rest-house across the narrow street, settled himself to listen in comfort.

But before the holy man propounded his question, for a few minutes he seemed to have forgotten about it. His keen, dark eyes, after turning thoughtfully from one side to the other of the small paved square in front of him, looked across the sluggish brown stream at the foot of the steps to the opposite bank where a few people were bathing in the water, and beyond to where were crowded close together the small mud houses of the native section of a great Indian city. While he gazed thus, the young priest took several puffs at the long pipe, leering lazily the while at two pretty girls who had come from the street into the square and, pausing before the fakir, timidly had placed a few pice on the dirty cloth spread out before him, but, seeing the leer of the priest, hastened to pull their saris over their faces and pass hurriedly down the steps to the sacred Ganges.

The holy man had not noticed the girls, nor did he seem to see the rest of the crowd of people who walked back and forth through the little square, having come to throw flowers upon the river or to bathe in its waters or, having bathed, to lie down and rest in Indian fashion in the roofed verandas charitably provided by rich and merit-seeking Hindus. He did not seem to see any of them, although so many of them brought their offerings of fruit and pice to him that his begging cloth was almost overflowing. Nor did he notice the presence of an American tourist who had stepped into the square and who, with a Murray under one arm and an umbrella under the other, was endeavouring to keep an immense sola, topi, from falling over on his nose while he took a picture of the "freak"; for how else could a globe-trotting American classify a man who, naked all but for a small loin cloth, sat cross-legged upon a deer's skin, his long hair, matted with filth into ropes, wound in a scraggy knot upon his head and his body smeared with ashes from the small fire that burned before him, the marks of white upon his forehead, intelligible only to the Hindu, making his bearded face almost frightful.

Nor did the fakir heed the naked children who trotted across the pavement at the heels of their mothers, going to perform the sacred rites at the river and to secure their children from all harm by a dip in its holy waters. The old woman, too, who, scarcely able to hobble along, had placed a little brass bowl of the dirty, foul water beside him (for the piece of water near Kali's temple is only a slip of the Ganges itself and is, therefore, particularly filthy) received not her usual blessing in return and sank down near by to wait until the holy man should notice her.

"Yes, Priest of Kali," the holy one turned from his gazing, "I have a question that waits an answer. Listen to my story. I was once a wealthy man, trained in all the learning of Brahminism. I did only what our religion allowed; I did all that it required, in sacrifices to the gods, in presents to their priests, and even in pilgrimages. But I was wretched within. I had no peace." As he spoke he laid his hand upon his heart and his eyes were heavy. "On the day of the great feast five years ago, on this very spot, after having made my offering to Jaganauth and to Haunamon and the other gods there," and he indicated with his dirty hand a little stone building at his left which contained a shrine to the legless, armless, hideous god, Jaganauth, and to the red, shapeless figure known as Haunamon, "I came to this spot to present my offering to the old man who had sat here ever since I could remember. But he was not here. He was gone. They told me that they had found him that morning lying dead on the steps there with his feet in the Ganges and that already his body had been burnt in the burning-ghat near by. 'What a reward!' I thought, 'to have died by the side of Mother Gunga. Surely he must have found peace.'

"'Can I not find peace by following his example?' The thought came to me suddenly as I stood here gazing upon his empty shelter and his neglected fire. I determined at least to try, for, at any cost, I must find peace! In my zeal and eagerness at once I stripped off my clothing and smeared myself with ashes from the fire which the holy man had kindled but the day before. Leaving my clothes on the ground underneath this little roof near the heap of ashes, as a sign that the dead man's place had been taken, to warn off other possible devotees from the spot, immediately I passed down the little street there between the stalls where are sold the articles needed in the worship of your goddess. At one I bought the little lamp; at another, garlands; at another, oil and a brass bowl; and at the street there I turned aside to buy, with my last annas, a black kid as a sacrifice for Kali.

"Through the narrow passage between the houses that surround the temple of Kali I went in haste, drawing the bleating kid behind me by a rope. When I reached the little paved courtyard before that small but most sacred shrine where dwells the goddess herself I gave the animal over to the priest. Then I watched eagerly as he put the little creature's neck between the posts so that he could not get away, and, with but one blow of the knife, severed the head from the body, letting the blood pour forth. I hastened to catch the precious blood in my brass bowl. I daubed it upon my forehead. I touched the sacred slaughter posts with it. I gladly stepped where it had flowed upon the pavement and reddened my feet in the sacred flood. Then, as the priest carried the carcass away and other sacrificers thronged in, I took my bowl and, mounting the steps of the holy place where no unclean foot has ever trod, I saw the door of the shrine open and before me stood the Goddess Kali in her black majesty, with human skulls for a necklace and human arms for a girdle, her protruding tongue thirsting for blood. I poured my offering of blood upon her and with prayers and presentation of flowers and incense, I invoked her blessing upon me and declared to her a vow that for five years I would sit at the ghat day and night; that I would follow all the customs of the holy men:—wear no clothes but ashes, eat no food but fruit, drink no water but that of the sacred Ganges, and pray without ceasing; and that every anna that I received as alms I would give to her.

"Now, Priest of this most revered goddess, all this have I done. I have never left this spot since returning from offering my vow to her five years ago; I did not even go home to tell my family, who after several days traced me here; but I was so changed that they did not recognize me. Now they mourn me as dead. Here I have sat for five years upon this skin. See my legs, how withered they are! See my body; there is not a clean spot on it! See, I have drunk nothing but this water," and he held up the jar of muddy liquid which the old woman had set down at his side. "I eat nothing but fruit; I think of nothing but my beads and my sacred book; I give every pice to your temple. I have kept my vow. But I am not satisfied. I have not found peace. What shall I do? Priest of Kali! What can I do to find peace?"

The sad heart of the holy man was in his eyes as he looked at the priest and his voice was pleading. "If thou dost know, tell me!"

The priest, who had been dulled by his bestiality so that he was not able to comprehend the soul-longings of the man before him, had already become weary of the fakir's earnestness and importunity. Lazily he pulled himself to his feet, after a last long suck at the pipe. "Come and be a priest of Kali," was his only answer as he turned down the lane towards the temple of his goddess, with lustful eyes fixed upon a pretty woman, who, attracted by the unusual animation of the holy man, had been standing near by until the priest arose.

The fakir, worn out by the eagerness with which he had spoken and the unappreciativeness of his listener, turned wearily to his holy book and his prayers. He knew the priesthood of Kali; in his five years at the Kalighat he had heard and seen strange things which as a Hindu he could not condemn, but which he knew would not bring peace to him, even as a priest of Kali, for in his young manhood he had tried them and had not been at rest. "I was, indeed, foolish to have talked to the priest at all," he murmured.

"Pardon me, holy one," a voice interrupted his thoughts, the voice of a young man who had been standing for some time with an open book in his hand, not reading, but listening to the words of the fakir. "I heard thy conversation. Hast thou ever tried the pursuit of wisdom? Study, learn, become the wisest of men and surely thou wilt become the most happy. I am a follower of that way."

The holy man, turning, looked fixedly for some time at the young man. "Son, what means the sad look in your eyes? Are you yourself happy? Tell me truly!"

The young man's intelligent but undeniably sad face was turned full towards the fakir. For a few moments he seemed to hesitate to reply. At last he said, "No, holy man, I have not found peace yet. I have not found happiness yet, but I am only a student. I am seeking. I study and read at all times—but even while I read my heart is not at rest, I must confess." He turned as he finished speaking and with bowed head, unmindful of the noise and confusion of the square about him, went down the lane.

The fakir sighed. "Peace is not found in that way, poor youth! For I have tried it. I was a Hindu scholar of note before I became this," and he gazed at his dirty hands and body with evident loathing.

The old woman, who had waited all this time for her blessing, said timidly, holding out her hand towards him, "Holy man, most holy man! Give me thy blessing, for my son is ill. Tell me how he can be healed, my only son."

Mechanically the holy man muttered a blessing, and taking a pinch of ashes from the fire before him, with a mumbled prayer, dropped them into her hand. "Put these upon his tongue. Bathe his head in the holy Gunga water and forget not to offer a kid to Kali."

"But I cannot offer a kid. I have no money! I have no money! My son will die! My son will die!" sobbed the woman.

The holy man looked at her fixedly for a full minute, realizing her grief and her need. Then with a quick glance about him he leaned forward. He swept up the pile of coins on the offering cloth before him and thrusting them into the woman's hands whispered: "Go and buy! Go and buy!"

The woman went quickly, wiping her eyes with her sari.

The fakir's face became radiant. "Surely that sweet feeling was peace! Blessed peace! Is this the end of my quest? Has my soul at last found rest?"

As suddenly his face darkened. "Yet, yet—I should have given that money to the goddess. I promised in my vow that every anna, above the cost of my fruit and of the wood for my fire, should be given to her."

He bowed his head upon his hands.

"I have broken my vow—on the last day of the five years I have broken my vow! I am unholy! I am unholy!"

After a few minutes he raised his bowed head and seemed to be thinking aloud. "Peace could not have come in cheating the gods. That strange feeling when I gave to the woman to relieve her sorrow could not have been peace—but it was sweet, very sweet!" He paused with a half smile which soon, however, was overcast, for all the joy went out of his face again as he said, "It must be that I have not denied myself enough, have not made enough sacrifices. And I have been unholy! Surely there is peace for the truly holy. I will try again.—I will swear another vow. Take me to Kali!" He called the last sentence loudly, but ere the people in the square understood his wish, he remembered that he had no money, no offering to take; even he, a "holy man," could not go to Kali's temple to make a vow without an offering. He must wait until the people should fill his empty begging cloth.

"After all, it is best thus," he thought. It would have been useless for him to have gone to the temple without having planned what new form of self-torture he must add to his present life, in his search for peace. "I must plan my vow," he said.

In the meantime the sun had set and the people were leaving the ghat. Involuntarily the fakir pulled a cotton sheet around him and started to add a stick to his fire, for it was beginning to get chilly. But suddenly he stopped, dropped the stick from his hand and threw the cloth from his shoulders, proclaiming in a loud voice: "For the next five years I will have no fire at night, nor will I put more clothing about my body; but I will have a fire by day when the sun is hot. Moreover I will eat but once a day and but once a day will I drink water, no matter how parching the heat. And—and—I will hold my arms above my head all the night! Surely," his voice sank, "surely these sacrifices will bring me peace. Surely—they—will—bring—me—peace. To-morrow will be the day to begin my new vow, but," he paused, "perchance I can gain my desire sooner if I begin now. Now, to-night, I will begin to keep my vow."

In haste the holy man beat out his fire with the sacred tongs; he threw his cotton sheet towards a beggar shivering on a step near by; and with his eyes turned towards the waters of the sacred Ganges, just visible in the dim twilight, he raised his arms high above his head.

II
Shama Sahai

A little company of pilgrims were trudging along the hot, dusty road. Where a large tree offered a resting place, there for a few minutes, squatting in the shade, the little company would stop while the mother, taking her naked baby from her hip, astride of which he had been carried during the journey, would let him stand beside her, and the father would take a fresh chew of pan, spitting out the red juice upon the roadside. But the young girl of the party would sit apparently unwearied, with bright, eager eyes fixed upon the road and with caressing fingers fondling the bracelets which adorned her arms.

It was an unusual thing for Shama Sahai to be clad in a gay sari, to have necklaces of beads about her neck, a glass-set stud in her nose, pretty, brass rings in her ears, bracelets upon her arms, metal circlets upon her fingers, large anklets upon her feet, and rings even on her toes. But most unusual was it for her to be leaving her village home of mud huts and with her parents-in-law and baby brother to be taking a journey; for from early childhood Shama Sahai had been but a despised and neglected widow in the home of her dead Hindu husband. She knew that they were going to some place afar off to worship the god Krishna and that some special blessing was coming to them for making this journey. She knew that her father and mother and she herself had worked hard in the fields that they might earn the money needed to pay the visit to the sacred city. She knew, too, that a large portion of this money had been spent upon her own adornment. So she felt very proud and very happy, but most of all very eager to reach the wonderful place to which they were going. Shama Sahai was young and strong, accustomed for many of her sixteen years to the heat of the noonday sun in the fields. To make greater haste she would offer to carry the baby and settling more comfortably the bundle which she carried upon her head, she would take the baby astride upon her hip and start off at an energetic pace.

For several days they journeyed thus, at night sleeping by the roadside, each wrapped in an extra covering which Shama carried in the bundle on her head during the day. Often they met other pilgrims, or sacred fakirs who, each with a pair of tongs in his hand, would be measuring their length along the road with naked, ash-smeared bodies, seeking by such self-torture to win rest for their souls. Sometimes they would meet ox-carts loaded with produce for the city market; at other times, bands of coolies carrying sugar-cane or bundles of fuel cakes upon their heads. It was all of interest to Shama Sahai, who, pulling her sari down over her face, would peep out between its folds and eagerly watch every passer-by. Sometimes, however, she would be frightened as a "chug-chug" would sound upon the air and a great motor car would whiz by and all she could see would be a cloud of dust whirling along before her.

On the long journey before they could reach Kamadabad Shama was afraid that her pretty finery would be spoilt, because her sari soon began to get wrinkled and one of the stones in her prettiest finger ring fell out. Therefore, every evening, when just at sundown they stopped in front of a little wayside temple, the names of whose gods she did not know, and lost an hour of travelling before dark while they put flowers upon the necks of the idols, poured a little oil upon their bodies, and lighted tiny lamps before them, she begrudged the time. She was not interested either in the terrible din, the beating upon gongs and the ringing of bells with which the Hindu priests awakened their gods for worship. Her thoughts were of Kamadabad and the wonders that awaited her there.

At last on a bright morning they reached the city with its narrow, black streets lined with dirty-white, plastered houses and tiny shops. As the streets were full of people crowding this way and that, Shama Sahai kept as close to her parents as she could. At once the little company hurried to the great temple which was by far the most wonderful building that Shama had ever seen. It was enclosed by high walls and above the gate was a tower tapering upward many stories, on each story of which stood figures of gods, many of whom the girl knew and feared, but others whom she had never seen before. Passing under this tower they entered a court and from there went under another tower to another court and on until, entering a covered building in the centre, they found the god, a great black figure, reeking with oil and garlanded with flowers. All around were young girls, no older than Shama herself, who, with faces shamelessly uncovered, stood there alone, without their parents. Priests, almost naked, were going through ceremonies before the idol. So dark and weird did it all seem and so many strange looking people were passing back and forth that Shama Sahai was half frightened.

After the little company had presented its offerings to the gods and the father had spoken aside to a big fat priest who kept looking at Shama Sahai, the mother announced that they must bathe in the sacred pool. So they returned to the outer court of the temple where was a tank about two hundred feet square containing foul and slimy, but none the less exceedingly sacred, water. Into this tank they stepped and with prayers and the reciting of charms bathed with the throng of worshippers. Carefully they washed out their mouths with the filthy water and then drank of it. During all this time the fat priest kept close to them and it seemed to Shama that his eyes were always upon her. His were not attractive eyes nor was his face pleasing and the girl was thoroughly frightened when, after the cleansing ceremony, he bade them good-bye with a caressing hand upon her shoulder while a bestial smile distorted his face.

That night Shama Sahai was not happy although she had reached the place where she had so longed to be. The memory of the priest's face haunted her and she could not keep from thinking of those girls in the temple. Towards morning her mother was taken ill. And the groans of the woman kept her awake. She stole out upon the door-step, but the sounds of the city were so strange that, little country girl that she was, she drew back and preferred to lie down again beside her moaning mother.

The mother was no better in the morning. Then the man of whom they rented the lodging suggested that Shama Sahai should go up to the house of a white memsahib who could make people well and ask for help. The memsahib could do wonderful things, the man said, and without doubt would cure the sick woman. Although very timid, Shama could not refuse to go for her mother's sake. So, taking her baby brother on her hip and guided by the landlord's child, she took her way along the narrow streets until she came to a high brick wall with a large open gateway. Within she saw a number of people standing before a long, low building. The boy, her guide, having pointed to that building and by so doing having done his whole duty, set himself to the pleasant task of chasing some chickens which were running at large in the compound. Shama Sahai had to approach the building alone. As she came nearer the little knot of people, she noticed that every one of them looked ill and almost every one carried a little bottle in his hand. Through the open door of the building she could see a white memsahib in a blue striped dress, sitting at a little table, writing slips of paper and handing them out to the sick people. Occasionally the lady would touch one of the patients and he would run out his tongue. It was all very queer but interesting to Shama and even the baby watched quietly. When Shama's turn came to enter, she was so embarrassed that she could hardly speak, but, encouraged by the memsahib's speaking kindly to her in her own tongue, she finally stammered out a brief but none too lucid account of her mother's illness. But the lady seemed to understand. After writing in a book and speaking to a native woman who stood behind a sort of table near by, with more kind words she put a small bottle of medicine into the girl's hands. Assured that her mother would soon be well and with orders to come the next day and report the condition of the patient, Shama Sahai went home very much pleased.

But the mother did not get well at once and for several days the girl paid a daily visit to the dispensary, each time losing a little of her timidity and each time being more attracted by the white lady who was so kind to her and called her by name and who, one day when there had been but a few patients and Shama Sahai had lingered behind, had told her beautiful stories about a new god that was not an ugly black image.

However, after a while the mother did get so much better that she could go to the temple again and Shama Sahai's visits to the dispensary ceased. She hoped that they would soon go home. By this time so frightened had the girl become in the great city that she was almost as anxious to leave Kamadabad as she had been to reach there.

One night as she lay, apparently asleep, in her corner of the room near the outside door, she heard her father and mother talking as they came up on the door-step. She opened her eyes and listened.

"We'll go home to-morrow. I made final arrangements with the priest to-day. My, but he's a hard one to drive a bargain with! We will settle the money part in the morning so that we can get a good start before night," said her father.

Shama Sahai gave a sigh of relief at the prospects of an early start for home and was about to close her eyes so that she might sleep and be rested for the journey, when she heard her mother say: "Where are we to leave her?"

"The priest said to take her to the inner court of the red temple with the offerings. He will perform the necessary ceremonies in a short time and we can leave her there," answered the man. "I wanted it done to-day so that we could get off on the road in the cool of the morning, but he would not have it so."

"Have you bought our food yet? We won't need so much rice without Shama, you know," said the mother.

"I haven't forgotten that when that's just what we are getting rid of her for, you may be sure. Yes, I bought it this afternoon. We'll miss the girl in carrying the load, I suppose, but you can carry it and the baby too just as well as not. How much better it is to get rid of a widow in this way and have one less to feed than to have the cursed creature always around in the way. We'll not go hungry now. A good business we've done here at Kamadabad, old woman, although you did waste a lot of time and money by being sick, for of course we had to pay extra for the longer stay. That old rupee-snatcher of a landlord wouldn't give in an anna because you had been sick. He said that he really ought to have charged more, for when people are sick they lie down longer and so wear out his floor more quickly. You were a fine one, you were, to get sick!" the man snarled.

"Yes, but you wouldn't have been here at all or have thought of bringing the girl, if I hadn't suggested it," snapped the old woman in her turn.

Shama Sahai lay perfectly quiet as the couple, still mumbling unkind remarks at each other, came in and lay down on the floor. She scarcely breathed for fear that they should find out that she was awake. But when she knew that they were asleep, she crept out-of-doors and darting around a corner sank down upon some steps. She knew from what she had overheard that her parents-in-law were planning to go home in the morning without her and that the priest was to have her. As she remembered the evil, swollen face of the man who had watched her that first day at the temple, she shuddered and, drawing her sari more closely about her, crept farther back into the doorway.

Only one thought would come—she must run away where the priest could not get her and she must go at once. Peeping out from the doorway, she looked up and down the street. No one was astir; only a quiet form here and there on the little porches could be seen in the dim light of the street lamps. She would go to the white memsahib. The memsahib and the new god would surely save her.

Like a spirit the girl took her flight through the streets, the lightness of her footfall awaking not the most restless of the sleepers.

When she reached the familiar compound, she did not hesitate, but, running up to the veranda, shook the sleeping chokidar.

"Where is the memsahib? Quick, tell me, quick!"

The watchman, ashamed at having been caught asleep and thinking it nothing strange that a girl should call the doctor in the night, hastened to show Shama Sahai the stairs leading to the roof of the bungalow.

"You'll find her up there. She always sleeps on the roof in the hot weather."

The girl was soon beside the doctor's cot and with frightened sobs was telling her story. "I've come to you and you must save me," were her final words.

Events happen quickly sometimes, especially when an energetic woman is helping them along. As the earliest morning train pulled out from Kamadabad for Mattera, a native Christian woman with a Hindu girl, disguised in the slightly different garb of a Christian, was on board, and the white doctor-memsahib was taking her chota hazri with fear in her heart.

What would be the fate of the poor young girl who had fled to her for refuge? That was the question which was troubling the doctor that morning. Although she was used to witnessing crises in people's lives with real, professional calm, this morning her outward calmness was assumed, for this was a case which her degree of M. D. had, perhaps, not qualified her to handle.

Throughout the long day the doctor waited expecting searchers for the girl, but no one came to make any inquiries of her. As she was leaving her compound gate towards evening for her daily exercise, she met a man and a woman, the latter carrying on her hip a baby whom the doctor recognized. The man was saying in Hindustani to the woman:

"The priest stole her. I know he stole her! Well, it's much the same after all, I suppose, for we're rid of her anyway. Of course he pretended he had not seen her and was angry because I had not brought her. Well, well; it's hard to deal with the priests."

"Whoever has her, may bad luck go with her!" exclaimed the woman.

But the woman's malediction did not bring fear to the doctor who, stopping short in her walk, could scarcely restrain a shout of joy. For this man and woman were Shama Sahai's parents-in-law going home without her, believing that the priest had stolen the girl. Instead of going on to the river for her usual evening constitutional, the doctor-memsahib hastened to the station where she caught the last afternoon train for Mattera that she might tell Shama Sahai that she was safe.

III
Old Sarah

"Here comes Old Sarah!" A shrill voice shouted the news through the open door into the mud house where the small boy's mother squatted at work, with one long, rounded stone crushing the curry seeds upon another large, flat stone that stood on the mud floor. At the call the mother dropped the long stone from her hand and, springing to her feet, hastily followed her naked boy out upon the street of the village. Old Sarah was a new friend who recently had come often to the village, telling the people stories and singing songs to them. But she never had come oftener than twice a week and she had been there only the day before. So the woman wondered what could have brought her back so soon.

The boy, meantime, had been running up and down the short street, clapping his hands and shouting, "Old Sarah has come! Old Sarah has come!" as Old Sarah herself had taught him to do at her arrival so that the people might know at once that she had come and she might not have to wait for an audience.

"Where is she?" called the mother after the running child, for she had looked up and down the road and failed to see the old woman.

"Why, there she is!" said the boy coming up. "Don't you see her sitting there by the road?"

"That's not Old Sarah! I never saw her sitting by the road like that."

"Yes it is! Yes it is!" and the boy danced off in the direction of the sitting figure, kicking up the dust with his bare feet in his eagerness to reach the side of the old lady who always had some sweet for him hidden away in her bag. His mother followed after him and several other people, also, who had come from their homes at his familiar call.

"Why, it is Old Sarah, sure enough! What can be the matter with her?" exclaimed the woman to a neighbour as they approached.

The exclamation was not unnatural, for the usually active old lady who, unwearied, had come trudging into their village week after week, after a walk of five miles, now sat all bent over on the ground with her sari-covered head bowed upon her arms.

The noise of the little crowd as it drew near aroused the old woman, who, letting the sari slide back from a head well sprinkled with gray, raised to them a face white and drawn. The people were astounded, for never in their acquaintance had she shown them aught but a face full of life and joy. Now she looked weak and haggard.

"I am sick," she said, answering the unasked question which she saw in their faces. "You are my good friends; so I came to you for help."

"Oh, let me help her!" cried one.

"Bring her to my house!" called another.

"I will care for her myself," said the child's mother as several women stepped up to raise the old woman to her feet.

They had helped her along some little way and the children were following close behind or crowding ahead to tell the rest of the villagers, when the head man met them.

Looking at the old woman, he said sharply, "What is the matter with her?"

The crowd stopped, out of respect to the head man, and each looked at the other, not knowing what to say. Then the old woman herself looked up. With a feeble attempt at the usual gay salaam with which she always greeted the chief, she answered his question.

"It is the cholera," she said.

"The cholera!" frightened voices screamed.

The hands that had so tenderly been guiding the woman's feeble steps were suddenly withdrawn. The women fled from her, dragging their children with them while the larger youngsters ran down the street, crying, "Old Sarah has the cholera! Old Sarah has the cholera!"

The cry was passed on from one person to another for miles along the road, for never are the roads of India, except in the hottest part of the day, without a throng of travellers.

The old woman, who, thus suddenly left unsupported, had fallen in a limp heap in the middle of the road, lay there for some time until the sun became unendurable and made its rays felt even in her acute suffering. She raised her head. Not a person was in sight. The little village was deserted. It consisted only of a few palm-leaf huts on each side of the street, shaded by cocoanut trees, and could be taken in at a glance. Old Sarah's head fell upon her hands. What could she do? If she stayed in the road her suffering would be more intense; although she expected to die now that her friends had deserted her, still she wanted to die with as little torture as possible.

About six feet away from her was the open door of a tiny hut. The shade within looked very inviting. Summoning all the strength she had, Old Sarah crawled upon her hands and knees, slowly, painfully, to the door and dropped at full length on the hard mud floor. It was cool there but, oh, how lonely! No one to care for her! no one to supply her wants! no one to be with her when she should die! and no one to give her body Christian burial before the pariah dogs should tear it to pieces! She heard a noise at the door. With a flash of joy in her heart to think that some one had returned to help her, painfully turning her head, she saw—only the sacred bull of the village sticking an inquiring nose into the door. Perhaps there might be something within that he might feed upon, for he, according to Hindu custom, was privileged to help himself to whatever he could find anywhere. With disappointed heart, Old Sarah let her head roll back and closed her eyes, although the thought passed through her mind that the bull might enter the house and trample upon her in his search for food in the tiny room; but if he should, it would bring her only a quick release from her pain. Then the pain and suffering became so great that she could not even think. The bull, however, evidently seeing nothing to please his appetite within the hut, turned away from the door and went on down the street, nosing along the front of every house until he reached the last one where a woman in her haste to flee from the cholera had overturned a basket of pea-pods and left them in a heap on the mud floor of the porch before the house—a fine meal for a hungry bull.

The minutes flew by and became hours; only the moaning from the house near the middle of the street disturbed the hot hush of the midday.

A cat crept into the hut and sniffed at the woman's feet; a dog peered in at the dark object on the floor; but no human being came near.

When the sun was no more than an hour from setting, there sounded the rumble of wheels. A wooden ox-cart, driven by a scantily-clad, very dark native, and drawn by a pair of the gray, humped bullocks of the district, entered the street at the head of the village. The bullocks were brought to a halt at once and a woman's head appeared from under the rounded straw covering of the cart.

"Where is she? Do you see her?" she asked the man.

"There is no one in sight," he replied. "But, hark, I hear a moan!"

"She must be in that house there," he added after listening a moment, pointing as he spoke with a thin, black finger to the house into which Old Sarah had crawled.

He drove his bullocks on down the narrow street until he pulled up in front of the hut. Then the young woman, for it was a young Tamil woman in the cart, with beautiful face and straight, lithe figure, leapt to the ground and ran into the house, her pretty red sari fluttering behind her. The man in the cart sat still, watching the open door, the eternal sadness of the Hindu in his face.

The woman was gone for some time but, finally, looked out of the door. "I have done all I can for her. She is very bad. I think we had better take her to the hospital in the city, for there they may be able to save her life. Get the cart ready," she called.

As she disappeared again, the man got down slowly from the front of the cart and, having got in at the back, arranged some blankets so as to make it as comfortable as possible for the sick woman. Then he went into the house with another blanket in his arms. And in a few minutes the two came out again, carrying Old Sarah in the blanket between them, and they laid her as carefully as they could in the cart.

All this was not done in silence, for all of the time the young woman kept talking, sometimes addressing the sufferer, sometimes the driver, and sometimes herself. "Poor old woman!" she said. "To think that the cowards all ran away and left her like this after the kindness she had shown them. She has walked those five miles, really ten, there and back, day after day, to tell them about her new religion and to help them; for she never came that she did not help the women in their work, or bring the children some sweets, or teach the people something new. Dear old soul! And after all the love you have given them, just in your hour of need they all forsook you! Just wait until I get a chance and I'll tell them what I think about such actions; indeed, what every decent person would think! They pretended to be so fond of her too; she really thought they loved her as much as if she had been their mother. That's the way with these black heathen!"

"Why didn't she come to you?" asked the man as they got the old woman settled with her head on the young woman's lap and he had climbed up in front to prod the bullocks to a start.

"Poor old soul, I never gave her any reason to think that I believed her preachings although she has come faithfully every week to visit me. I liked to tease her and hear her funny answers. I liked to ask her hard questions about her new religion. She would pucker her face all up and think and think until she had answered every one. Alas, I never let her know that her religion touched my heart and that I believe in Jesus Christ! I never even let her know that I loved her. Of course she would not come to me for help. But I do love her. She was so funny and so full of life and odd sayings that I just had to tease her, that was all. Now, now I fear it is too late to tell her!" she ended with a sob.

"I don't believe she will live, do you?" she asked the servant a moment later as he had turned around to look at the old woman and they both were gazing down upon her face, drawn and haggard, with lips parted in a moan.

"I fear not," said the man. "Have you given her from the bottle?"

"Yes, the very medicine she brought me a month ago when the cholera threatened our village." She pulled a bottle from the bosom of her sari. "I'll give her another dose now; surely if one dose is good, two will be better."

She tipped the bottle to the old woman's lips who mechanically swallowed a very little. It seemed to revive her for she opened her eyes and murmured: "Who is this? Where am I?"

The other, bending over her, answered, "This is Jessa. Don't you know Jessa? I've come to take care of you. You will be all right soon."

"Jessa! Who is Jessa?" the weak voice asked while the big eyes stared up at the girl, unseeing.

"Don't you know Jessa, the girl at Bindy, the chief's daughter whom you go to teach every week?"

"Yes, but she wouldn't come to help me. She doesn't love me and she makes fun of my God."

"Sarah, dear Old Sarah!" the young woman raised the old woman's head from her lap and, gazing into her eyes, seemed to draw her back to sight. "Sarah, it is Jessa and she loves you, and—and—Sarah," the girl added softly, "she loves your God."

A brightness as of renewed life suffused the face of the old woman. "God be thanked!" she tried to shout, but the shout fell away into a murmur and the hands, which she had tried to clap as was her custom when overjoyed, fell back at her sides. But although she became again unconscious, the smile of joy remained upon her face and lighted up the thin, dark features surrounded by the straggling gray locks and made her face beautiful, as beautiful for the moment as the face, young and perfect of feature, that bent over her.

"She is dying!" said the man. Stopping his bullocks as he spoke he slid from his seat and began to fumble under the blankets.

"What are you doing, Nado?" called the girl.

"Here is a shrine. I will pray for the life of the old woman and offer a handful of rice to the god."

"Nado," a slim brown hand was laid on his big black one and prevented him from opening the rice bag, "Nado, she is a Christian. I, too, am a Christian now. We cannot pray for her life at a heathen shrine. Sit in your place, Nado, and I will pray to our God."

The man did not get up into his place but stood and with wide, interested eyes watched the girl as, laying the old woman's head gently back in her lap, she freed her hands and clasping them to heaven, raised her eyes and prayed. The words were the words of the young girl herself but the gestures were copied from Old Sarah as she had prayed many, many times in the girl's presence. One, not impressed by the solemnity of the moment, would have laughed at the grotesque motions of her hands and head as she prayed.

"Oh, most great God, most great of all the gods," said the girl. "Let Old Sarah live. She is a good woman. Never has she harmed any one. Her whole life has been given to helping others. Save Old Sarah's life, I pray. I will bring Thee an offering of the best I have, if Thou wilt spare her life and let her live. Take the awful pain away from her. Let her sleep and let her rest and do, oh God, let her live. I will bring Thee cocoanuts and sweets, rice and a young kid, if Thou wilt spare her life. For Jesus Christ's sake. Amen!"

The girl, unconscious of the absurd way that she had mixed the ideas of her old heathenism with the words and thoughts of the new religion she had learned from the old woman, unclasped her hands and with a smile looked down upon the face in her lap. Already it seemed to her that her prayer was being answered, for the sick woman's breath seemed to come more easily and the moaning had ceased. As the girl was absorbed in watching the effect of her prayer, the man took a handful of rice from the bag, without attracting attention, and slipped to the side of the road where under a tree stood a wayside shrine. Pouring out the rice before the ugly image and bowing three times in front of it, he hurriedly muttered some unintelligible words and climbed back into the wagon. There was a gleam of satisfaction on his face as he started the bullocks again, for he had done what he could to save the life of the old woman whom he, as a respected servant in the family of the chief, had seen often about their home but to whose preaching he had never had time to listen.

To the city and then through the city to the hospital was a long ride in the lumbering ox-cart but it was not a particularly hard ride to any of the three, for native Indians prefer hard seats and hard beds to springs and cushions. And already the old woman was resting so quietly that the girl thought her prayer had been answered and the man felt that his offering had been accepted.

At the hospital a nurse took charge of the sick woman but she would not let the girl enter. So the latter quietly placed a kiss upon the old woman's forehead and turned away, confident that in a short time she would see Old Sarah again in her own village, for she had prayed.

As it was night and the oxen were tired, the girl could not return to her village at once. Besides there was one thing more that she must do in the city. Therefore they turned aside to the marketplace where the farmers slept under their carts. There they made themselves comfortable for the night, after the driver had cooked them a little meal at a fire of twigs and dung-cakes. The girl kept in the cart with her sari drawn up over her face, for such was her custom in the big city. But later, when she was rolled up in the blankets, she felt very secure with Nado asleep under the pole of the cart and the bullocks chewing their cuds beside him.

When morning came, when the bullocks had been yoked up again and all things were ready for the start, she said:

"Nado, we must tell Old Sarah's mistress. I don't know where she is but we must find her. She lives in a big house and takes care of a lot of little orphan children, for Sarah has often told me about them and her."

It was strange, but in only a few minutes they had found the place where the little orphan children lived, for the natives seemed to know the compound well. And a few minutes later Jessa stood before a sweet-faced English woman, but so embarrassed by the memsahib's presence that she scarcely dared raise her eyes. Only thoughts of Old Sarah and her love for this white lady gave her courage.

"Memsahib," she said in a timid voice, "Old Sarah is very ill with the cholera. We have taken her to the hospital."

"Old Sarah ill with cholera!" the English woman exclaimed in amazement. "She has been gone since day before yesterday. She never was gone so long alone before and we have been worried; but I did not dream of cholera! She is in the hospital?"

"Yes, Memsahib. But I think she will get well," the girl added hastily as she saw the lady's anxiety. "I am sure she will get well, for I—I—prayed," she faltered.

"And I gave an offering to the gods," said the man servant in a pleased tone to himself, for he was listening interestedly, having followed the girl to the door.

"Get my topi, boy, and order the gari quickly," the memsahib called to her bearer. "I must go to Old Sarah at once. Where did you find her, child?"

So while the memsahib waited for her topi and the gari, Jessa told her the story of how Old Sarah had gone to the village to her friends for help but how they had fled from her and left her to die; how one of the frightened people had come to the village of which her father was head man and had told them; and how she herself, because she loved Old Sarah on account of the loving teaching she had received from her, how she had taken her servant and cart and gone to save the old woman's life. She told the lady, too, of the condition in which she had found Old Sarah, of the journey to the city, and of the reception at the hospital. As she finished telling her story, she repeated her assurance that the old woman would live because she, Jessa, had prayed to God.

The memsahib praised the girl for her bravery and thanked her for her kindness to Old Sarah who was very dear to the English lady's heart. And as the gari came up just then she urged them to remain until her return from the hospital, but the girl felt that she must hurry back, since she knew that Old Sarah would be all right now. So they said good-bye and Jessa, having climbed into the cart, was trundled away by the faithful bullocks and the still more faithful Nado, whose gentle prodding of the bullocks was essential to their progress.

Meantime the memsahib had entered her gari and was being driven as fast as the ponies could take her to the hospital. There she was met by a nurse who said that she knew nothing of the case that the lady spoke of. Another nurse was called who knew nothing of such a woman as Old Sarah. The lady, however, would not be turned aside; the records must be searched. And searched they were. The nurses discovered that a cholera case had been brought in late the evening before, that the woman had died towards morning, and that already her body had been for some time in the hospital morgue.

"You must get her out at once," said the lady, "for she is not dead."

The nurses who had been uninterested until that moment then looked at the English lady in mild amazement, for how could a person who had been in the dead-house for several hours be still alive? But the lady was well known to them by reputation and they yielded to her wishes. At her demand they called the head nurse who, because she, too, knew much about this lady, revoked all hospital rules and permitted her to enter the morgue with them.

There lay Old Sarah's form, covered with a sheet, upon the floor with other corpses. The familiar gray hair drew the memsahib's eyes at once. She pulled back the sheet and felt for the heart.

"We'll work over her. I do not think she is dead."

With incredulity not only in their hearts but written plainly upon their faces, the nurses had the body removed to an empty room. And then, because the little memsahib was a woman of such mighty spirit, they fell to work.

Old Sarah was not dead, although she had been for several hours numbered among the dead. Gradually circulation was restored. When the signs of life became unmistakable the nurses worked zealously to make up for the awful wrong that had almost been done. In a big, busy hospital, especially during times of stress, things sometimes are done in a hurry and mistakes are sometimes made.

The memsahib did not leave for several hours. When the dear old eyes opened at last, they looked around in wonder until they rested upon the memsahib's face. Then a glad light shone from them and an eager voice whispered: "Oh, Memsahib, is this heaven?"

"No, Sarah, this is not heaven. You are still on earth with me, thank God!"

"I didn't think it looked exactly like heaven," the old woman added a little later as she looked around at the bare walls, "but with Jesus and you, Memsahib, it would be heaven in any kind of place.

"I thought I was dead," she kept murmuring, evidently unable to get the idea out of her head.

"No, Sarah," the memsahib finally assured her, "you are very much alive and just to convince you I will scold you a little. Why, oh, why, Sarah, did you not come to me when you were taken ill?"

"Memsahib, Old Sarah knew she had the cholera and she could not expose the memsahib and the dear, little orphan children to it; so she just took her burial clothes and went away, thinking that her friends at Yenna, for whom she had travelled so many, many miles in her old age to tell them about Jesus, would take her in. But they ran away and left Old Sarah to die all alone."

"Were you not sorry then that you had not told me?" urged her mistress.

"No, Memsahib, not even then, for it was better that Old Sarah should die all alone than that the memsahib and the dear, orphan children should die too."

"You precious old woman!" The memsahib, sinking on her knees by the bed with her arms around the thin, brown shoulders, implanted a kiss upon the gray hair. "That is more than a white person would have done!" she said under her breath.

And as the English woman looked upon Old Sarah's happy face and remembered the happy, trustful face of the young girl who had saved this life and declared that the old woman would live because of prayer, the memsahib realized that no hearts in the world were whiter before God than those of these brown people who loved Him well enough to be willing to lay down their lives for others. In beauty of form and feature these brown people often surpass the white races and she felt that with the love of the true God in their hearts they might surpass the white races, also, in the beauty of their lives and of their love.

IV
A Son of the Law

On an afternoon in the early days of the British occupancy of India, Blackmore-Sahib sat alone at the big desk in his study, in his hand a report which had just reached him from one of his districts. At his elbow the tea tray was untouched, although at this hour of the afternoon he was usually stretched out in a rattan chair in the living-room with the punkah swinging over him, the latest magazine, three months old at that, in his hand, and the tea tray already replaced on the small table beside his chair by the cigar service holding cigarettes all neatly rolled ready for his match. It was not because the report was urgent that he had forsaken his accustomed ease to prove it up; nor was it that he was particularly interested in the task, for apparently he was forcing himself to go over the lines of type and up and down the columns of figures. As his pencil reached the bottom of a column it would almost drop from his listless fingers until, with a start, he would begin upon the next row as if in great haste.

The bearer, entering the room noiselessly, saw the untouched tea tray standing just as he had left it a half hour before and looked anxiously at his master's face. But without disturbing his master he removed it and turned to the side table where stood the tobacco service. Not a cigarette was rolled! He clumsily attempted to prepare some but none of his efforts were really successful. However, he put several bulky ones in a saucer and placed them near his master's hand. Still in silence but with many backward glances at the man bending over the slowly-moving pencil, the boy left the room.

As the boy closed the door, the man dropped the pencil upon the desk, put his hand to his head for a second, and then arose. He walked to the door into the living-room and seemed to listen for an instant; then he went back to the desk.

The servant, evidently having heard his master's step, entered with fresh tea and toast.

"Is she better?"

As the boy set the tray down he replied hesitatingly, "No, Sahib, she is still groaning."

"You fool, don't you suppose I can hear that? She has groaned incessantly since last night."

"What can I do?" The man asked the question of himself as he turned half around towards the veranda door.

"Won't the Sahib have some tea?" suggested the boy timidly, for like every native-born this man feared his stalwart English master.

Blackmore-Sahib held out his hand without turning back from the door. "Yes, I will take a cup. Perhaps it will steady me a bit."

"Poor little Nona!" he sighed as he took the cup.

He gulped down the tea hurriedly and reached for a cigarette. But as his eyes fell on the clumsy ones in the saucer, they filled with tears and he walked quickly out upon the veranda without taking one.

Up and down he paced unheeding the streaks of sunshine which found their way in through the vines and fell upon his unprotected head.

"Poor Nona! Poor little girl!" he groaned. How skillfully she had always rolled his cigarettes, just to his taste! how daintily she had served his cup of tea! and how quietly she had sat every afternoon beside him, never disturbing his nap or reading! "Poor little Nona!" he sighed, for she might never sit beside him again. He could hear her groans now from the bedroom at the other side of the great living-room. Pitiable, heart-breaking little groans they were! He could not trust himself even to go to the door and look in upon her.

And yet he did not really love her. Nona had made Blackmore-Sahib's life very comfortable for the last ten years and he could not bear to think that she was suffering and probably would die. He did not want to lose his little Indian wife and her affectionate care for him, though of course she was his "wife" only according to the customs of many white men in dark lands. As he paced up and down he remembered how, when he had been sent by the government to this city in the heart of India away from every European association, he had rebelled until, seeing a pair of black eyes peeping from the doorway of a certain mud house, he had become very much interested in that section of the city although it belonged to a low caste of Hindus. He remembered how for several evenings he had taken his evening walk in that locality and furtively watched that house door in which he again saw framed for a second a beautiful Indian face and a slender, lithe Indian figure in a red sari. After a few more visits he had several conversations with the men of the neighbourhood and had learned that the man who lived in that house was, as they all were, of low caste and desperately poor. Finally he had met the man himself whom he heard loudly lamenting because he could not afford to marry off his beautiful daughters. "Why, a wedding costs many rupees nowadays!" he had heard him say.

So the sahib by a little courteous inquiry had learned that the man had three unmarried daughters. By further courteous and diplomatic conversation he had conveyed to the father the idea that if he, the sahib, could have his choice of the three girls he would pay a dowry for one of them. After several evenings of discussion and bargaining the old man slowly and cautiously had consented, but the matter of giving the sahib his choice had been a trifle difficult even among the low caste. But, finally, having bidden the sahib stand at the other corner of the street where he could see without being particularly noticeable, on the evening the bargain was sealed, the old man had called his daughters one at a time to the door of the house on some trifling pretext. It had been only a glimpse, but as the third girl disappeared from the doorway, Blackmore-Sahib had been satisfied. On the very next evening, having promised to pay a sufficient number of rupees to marry off both of the other daughters, the Englishman had had the satisfaction of seeing a little draped figure enter a covered ekka and be driven away towards his bungalow.

He could remember, even after ten years, how the ekka had driven up to his door and how he, having reached the door before her arrival, would not pay the promised money until the girl's veil had been lifted and he had seen for himself that no trickery had been played upon him and that this was the one of his choice. She had been very young, very timid, and very beautiful. He remembered that, cross, burly chap though he was, he had delighted to tease her out of her shyness and teach her the little ways by which she could make him happy and his bungalow a home. She had been an ignorant native girl, as the majority of Indian girls are, but she had soon learned to love him and she had always been beautiful to look upon.

They had not been married. That was not necessary in those days in the East. He had given her a good home and in doing that he had done his whole duty. Yet he had never mentioned her in his letters to England, for "they would not understand." Indeed, he had half expected until the last two years to go back to England and marry a fine girl whom he had known in boyhood. But when the time had drawn near he had decided to stay here as he was;—for what would become of Nona? He could not keep her, too, for even he did not think that way of living right. He sometimes longed for the green meadows and the hawthorne bush and the skylark, nevertheless he remained in India, for he could not take Nona and he could not leave her.

But now it seemed as if Nona were going to leave him. If she should die, he would be free to go to England to marry his childhood friend, for a recent letter from his brother had told him that Elizabeth was still unmarried and mistress of her own estate. But now, of a sudden, he did not want to go; he did not want to marry. Indeed, he did not want anything but to stay here with Nona. He wanted Nona! She must not die! He needed her.

"Sahib!" A soft voice arrested his step and Nona's ayah besought him: "Sahib, she is no better. May I get the memsahib? I think she can help her."

"What memsahib?" he asked, his voice gruff with emotion.

"The missionary memsahib, master. Please let me get her."

"A missionary! Would a missionary come to my house?" he asked in scorn.

Blackmore-Sahib had seen the missionary lady often, for she was one of the very few Europeans in the city, but he never had spoken to her. He knew missionary principles and he felt that he and Nona in her eyes were worse than the Hindus "in their blindness." He had always avoided a missionary's path; now he would not ask for help! Even if he should humble his pride and do so, he felt that no Christian would come to him, for were not he and Nona without the law?

"No, she would not come," he said emphatically.

"Yes, master, she will come. I know she will come. See how ill my mistress is! Hear her moans!" and the faithful ayah wrung her hands in grief. "Oh, let me go to get her."

"Is she a doctor?" he asked. "Does she give medicine?" he went on, trying to make the native woman understand.

"No, she is not a doctor, but she gives medicines," the woman replied enigmatically.

There was no doctor within reach. If this woman could help Nona, had he any right to let his pride keep him from at least asking for her help? Blackmore-Sahib reasoned it out slowly. Although he was sure that she would not come, he must do all that he could to help the sick woman and so he must ask the missionary to come.

"Go!" he said finally to the ayah and as she sped down the road he continued his pacing and his thoughts. His thoughts turned strangely, after the interruption, to his boyhood home and his boyhood days when even a lie, a wrong word, or an unkind deed had hurt him almost as much as his mother. But his mother had died when he was only a lad and after that had come school and then India and—Nona.

The change from the rigid morality of a well-trained boy living under the eye of a law-abiding people, to the moral thoughtlessness and neglect of a man far away from the reign of aught but the law of the conqueror among an inferior people; the change from the conventional obedience to the social customs of a Christian land, to the unconventional disregard of all Christian customs in a heathen land, had come so gradually that Blackmore-Sahib had never before realized how different he was in moral integrity from what he had been in that boyhood home and how different he must be in reality from what his mother had imagined that he would be in her fond dreams about the future. Had India by her enervating climate, by the ease with which she gratifies the sensual side of man's nature, and by the intellectual loneliness in which she makes her foreign rulers live—had India by these means warped his moral sense? Or had his good life in Christian England been a foolish fanaticism and was his life here the true living of a free soul?

Blackmore-Sahib was startled at the presence of such questionings in a mind which heretofore had accepted his conduct and life unquestioned. But at that moment there stole upon him the memory of a sweet white face, drawn with pain and the sound of a low but earnest voice saying, "My boy, I am going away—to leave you alone. Be strong and brave and good." These memories as they mingled in his mind and ears with the picture of a beautiful, dark face full of suffering into which he had looked that very morning and the sound of sharp moans still coming through the half-closed bungalow door, worked strange havoc within him.

Although his thoughts had carried him far, only a few moments had actually passed when, hearing quick steps beyond the compound wall, he came to a halt and saw an English woman hurry in at the gate, followed by the panting ayah.

"Good-afternoon, Mr. Blackmore," spoke a pleasant English voice. "I am not a physician, but I'll do the best I can."

Blackmore-Sahib followed clumsily, as a man does in a house of illness, after the energetic little figure that went straight to Nona's room. There the missionary spent much time examining her patient and it was with anxious eyes that she finally looked at the man as he sat near the door.

"It is a serious case. I have seen just one like it before," she said. "But since it is impossible to get a real physician I will do the best I can. Will you kindly send me a couple more servants and order several tubs of hot water got ready? Then, please, go away for a gallop and do not come back for several hours. I don't believe you know much about sickness and a good ride will brace you up, for you will have to watch with her to-night, I think." The last was said with a smile as she started quickly and quietly about her preparations.

At the end of two hours he met her at the bedroom door.

"She is more comfortable, but it will be a hard fight. I shall stay here to-night. I don't dare trust the case to any one else yet."

In the morning, when at five o'clock he was wakened from a fitful sleep by a rap at his door, the same voice said, "She is resting now. Will you come and watch her while I go home for a short time? I cannot leave her alone with the servants, for they are either too tired or too stupid to obey instructions this morning."

About seven she returned and all day long, sometimes by turns, sometimes together, they watched and waited, doing all they could to help Nature bring back peace to the poor suffering body.

About the middle of the morning he asked her how she had gained her medical skill. Then she told him of her life in India and how she had found that by helping the sick she could most easily reach the hearts of the people. She told of spending one furlough in a hospital at home for training. Seeing that the conversation did not annoy the patient and that it seemed to interest the man, she went on telling about her work and the joys and sorrows that she had experienced as a missionary. Not one word of preaching! She simply told of her life as if talking to an old friend. There was not a sign that she had recognized anything unusual in this household or seen anything to condemn. He began to wonder if she knew and yet he felt that she did know. She talked about England and the home she had hoped to go to the next year; but no one had been found to take her place and she could not go until there was some one to work for her people. He was surprised at the light in her eyes when she said: "I'll not leave them without some one to care for them even if I have to put off my home-going all my life."

She talked of Christ so freely and of her own religious beliefs so naturally that he felt that her speech grew out of her life and he did not resent the personal religious element in her conversation which he had always avoided and resented in others.

But while she was talking in low tones or listening to him as he, in turn, told of his home in England, she kept a keen eye on her patient. About eight o'clock at night a change came. The moaning stopped; the restless brown hands grew still; the breath came regularly; and Nona slept a quiet, restful sleep. The memsahib, on her knees beside the bed, looked up at the big, burly, white man standing on the other side of the narrow couch. "She will get well," she said simply. "And now—now"—she stammered with difficulty, "you will marry her, won't you?"

As the astonished man gazed into her wistful, earnest face a slow resolve grew in his own. The coming of this strong, wholesome woman into his life, the revival of the memories of his boyhood, the face of his mother, never entirely forgotten, and now clear and vivid before his very eyes, and, more even than all these, the dawning consciousness of the Presence in which his life had been lived and was now being judged cleared away all his ethical confusion, revealed to him the evil of his past life and begat in him a great desire for cleansing and a high purpose to make amends for the past.

And so when the missionary memsahib said to him, "You will marry her, won't you?" his astonishment slowly gave way to a sense of high moral purpose. After a silence which revealed the struggle within, he replied in a firm voice, "I will! and may God bless you."

With these words the man dropped upon his knees on the other side of the bed and his head rested for a moment on the pillow very close to the beautiful brown face there. Then, without asking permission, the missionary prayed a simple prayer of thanksgiving for the life of the woman and a request for a blessing upon her English brother and herself that they might shape their lives after the character of Christ and live according to Christian laws.

Then the missionary slipped quietly out of the room, for the danger was over and the servants could take as good care of their mistress as could she. But she promised the anxious ayah as she went away that she would come in from time to time for a few days to see that all went well.

Two weeks from that day an Englishman stood with a Hindu woman by his side in a missionary's parlour and there a quiet wedding ceremony was performed. To the bride it meant nothing, but to the bridegroom it meant an entire change in his life and heart.

Several years later an English gentleman bore unflinchingly the embarrassment—and worse—of introducing an Indian wife to his English family at home. Tenderly he sheltered her from all annoyances and apparently with pride he took her from place to place in the homeland. Only one person, a missionary from India, home on a long-delayed furlough, guessed that the journey was one prolonged torture to the man who, from a high sense of duty to a woman who could not even comprehend it, was making her all amends in his power for a wrong which, also, she did not comprehend.

"I don't understand why he married a native," one of the Englishman's relatives remarked to a friend. "Otherwise he is a perfect Christian gentleman and an honour to the family."

The missionary, who chanced to overhear the remark, in her mind erased the "otherwise."

V
Mundra

"Mundra!" a harsh voice screamed from the door of the mud house. "Mundra, child of the devil, come here. Where are you, spending all your life in laziness and I working hard to put rice into the mouth of a god-cursed creature like you!"

There would have been no need for more than the first call, if the old woman had simply wanted the child to come to her, for at the first sound of the voice the little thing had started up from the dirt of the road where she had been lying and, gathering the sari, in which she had been wrapped, up around her hips and waist, had moved hastily towards the speaker. But the woman seemed to be giving vent to her own ill nature in an evidently customary and certainly vivid way.

"You vile object of the gods' wrath! To be sleeping when every decent creature is at work!

"Bring water," the old woman commanded fiercely and with a thrust of her foot sent the child, who had reached the door by that time, reeling in the direction of a large brass water pot which stood in a corner of the mud porch.

Evidently too wise and too tired for words, the little creature, recovering her balance, quietly but not without great difficulty, lifted the big, brass jar and, putting it upon her head, started off down the village street.

The small, dark, thin figure walked very straight because of the jar on the head, not from any sense of pride, for what had Mundra to be proud of? Not a single ornament so dear to the hearts of India's women did the child wear; her sari was but a dirty cloth; and her head was shaven. Little girls of her own age with clinking anklets and glistening jewels drew away their gay garments from any possible contact with hers as she came near and stepped to one side of the street with their water jars. The men who came towards her along the road carefully turned away so as to avoid her shadow as she passed them. And no one addressed her except as a small boy now and then pointed a finger at her and called out the same words which the men muttered to themselves as she passed them—"Cursed of the gods."

As she paused to rest for a moment under the shade of the great peepul tree which protects the emblems most sacred to the Hindu villager, even the priest, who tended the various small shrines beneath the great tree, muttered a curse and moved quickly to the other side of the gnarled trunk where a coolie, clad only in soiled white loin cloth and dirty pink turban, was winding a garland of marigolds about one of the sacred stones. The worshipper's attention, attracted by the sudden movement of the priest, was drawn to Mundra and he in turn, muttering, paused in his acts of worship until the contaminating presence should be withdrawn.

When the child reached the well, she had to wait at a distance until all the others there had filled their vessels and gone. Then she filled her own and, without assistance, although it took a dreadful struggle, raised it to the necessary position on her head.

But the child was so accustomed to all this treatment and so tired that she scarcely noticed how the people acted. Her body ached all over, from hard work and blows, even to her very heart, which really ached hardest of all. Just one short year before Mundra had been one of the happy, bejewelled girls of this very town and everybody had smiled at her and passers-by had called her "Blest of the gods." But now how different! Her father had been of the weaver caste and when she had been about ten years old, no native ever knows his exact age, she had been married to a man in the same caste. And at that time, less than one year before, she had gone to her husband's home a welcomed bride, the very home to which she was now returning in disgrace, and her mother-in-law had been pleased with her and greeted her with kind words, the very same woman who but a few moments before had kicked her away with curses.

At the time of Mundra's wedding the people had been anxious because rain had not come and the crops were dying. Therefore, with grain still at famine prices from the year before, conditions had been bad in the district where she lived. So it had not been a surprise when, soon after the wedding, among these ill-fed natives had come the ever-expected and ever-dreaded cholera. In the early days of the scourge Mundra's father and mother had died. At first their death had meant little to the child for she was no longer a part of their household. But soon death did take one whose going meant at once more to her, almost more, than the loss of her own life. One morning her husband, a strong man of about thirty, was stricken. By nightfall another body had been placed upon the funeral pyre and Mundra was a widow.

Mundra, and she alone, had caused the death of her husband; so thought every one in the village and so thought the child herself, brought up in Hinduism. Now she realized the death of her parents, for had they been alive she would have been sent back to them at once. But since they were dead she had to be kept as a despised member of the household of her mother-in-law, practically a slave there, with all the hardships and abuse usually attendant upon the lot of such an one. Her hair had been cut off; her pretty jewelry had been taken from her; her coloured saris had been sold to a neighbour; and in place of all these belongings she had been given a few yards of white cotton to wrap about her and part of a ragged blanket for a bed. But Mundra could have stood all this hard treatment, hard as it had been, and even gladly would have slept on the mud porch with the cattle or in the street with the dogs, if only every one had not hated her and shunned her as foul and unclean, if only some one had loved her, if only some one had even spoken kindly to her sometimes or smiled upon her.

"Late as usual, you foul creature of the dust! If you have touched that water with your unclean hands, may the next drop which you take into your accursed mouth choke you! To your work there at once, you abomination in the sight of all that's holy! May the moon blast you! May the sun smite you! May your food poison you! And may the gods damn you, you devil-bought murderer of men!"

This was the greeting the child received as she staggered upon the porch and almost fell as she set the brass jar in the corner. But not one moment's rest was there for her.

"To your work, I say!" shrieked the woman again, pointing a brown, bony finger towards the grinding-stones in the opposite corner of the porch where sat a strong young girl, about sixteen years of age, with her hand already upon the handle of the stones waiting for Mundra to help her. This girl was well dressed, an honoured daughter-in-law in the family, who must do a share of the household work, as all Indian women, except the rich, must, but who was well fed, strong, and able to work.

Mundra sank down on the floor beside the mill and, placing her small hand on the handle above the other's big one, threw all the strength she could muster into her thin arm to make the one great stone revolve upon the other beneath and crush to flour the grain which by handfuls with her free hand the older girl was pouring into the opening at the top of the stone.

Meanwhile the mother-in-law had lighted a fire in the tiny mud stove beside them, the home-made mud stove, found even in the kitchens of the rich, a small, hollow, semicircular mound of mud about eight inches high, upon which a kettle could be set and within which a fire could be lighted and replenished through the opening in front. Upon this stove, instead of a kettle, the woman had put a large, flat, iron griddle, upon which, after having patted and rolled out some flour, she threw a flat cake, about eight inches in diameter. This cake she turned with a pair of long, iron tongs. After it had browned a little, she thrust it over the coals in the fire to let it puff out and when it was just right to suit her Indian taste, with the iron tongs she tossed it, the hot chapati, the common bread of India, into a basket by her side. This process she had repeated until her basket was nearly full.

The old woman was not so busily engaged with this task, however, as to be unable to give her attention to other things. When Mundra's tired hand relaxed its hold upon the handle of the grinding-stones and the strength in her little body gave out, with one swing of the arm, down upon the child's bare back came the hot tongs.

"To work, you accursed creature!" screamed the mother-in-law.

A sharp cry of agony followed the blow, but Mundra, although her body was quivering with pain, resumed her work. For a few minutes she managed to keep up the straining movement of the arm. Then, in spite of all her gathered will, her fingers slipped again. Down came the hot tongs a second time upon the tender, though dark, skin and Mundra fell in a faint beside the mill.

When the child regained consciousness she was still lying beside the mill. She could hear the family within eating their evening meal of chapatis, rice, and curry. She could hear their talk of the coming rain, of the tiger that had been seen in the jungle near the river, of the preparations for the festival of Ram, and of the offerings of rice and flowers which must be taken to the god before the day of the great procession. Dimly she heard it all. No one mentioned her or seemed to have noticed her lying there in the corner of the porch. She hoped that they had not; if they would only forget her and torture her no more for a little while she would be so glad!

The smell of the fresh chapatis, however, made her long for food, for as a widow she had had no meal since morning and could have nothing more until the next day. The pain in her back almost made her cry out at times, but she restrained herself and lay still, unheeded, in the corner behind the mill, until darkness came and the lump of clay in the little shrine across the street under the red flag had been propitiated by offerings of rice and chapatis, and the people of the household had rolled themselves in their blankets and gone to sleep.

Then Mundra dragged herself to the edge of the porch and looked about. All was dark except a tiny spot in front of the shrine opposite, which was still lighted by a small wick burning in a shallow dish of oil. The priest had not yet come for the offering.

All was quiet.

An old blue rag, the remnants of a sari, lay on the floor near her. Mundra picked it up quickly. As quickly and silently she slipped across the street, and—unholy act! worthy of one "cursed of the gods"!—she emptied the dish of rice which stood there before the idol into the piece of blue cloth; then laying the chapatis upon the rice, hurriedly tied the whole into a bundle. For a moment she stood looking up and down the street. In both directions all was still quiet and dark. But she did not hesitate long. Towards the river, where the jungle lay, the tiger might be; down towards the well, where the village street joined the public highroad, there might be—the child did not know what, except that somewhere in that direction lay the great city.

She turned towards the highroad. Creeping along, half walking, half crawling, she reached the well. There beside it she tore off her own dirty white covering, and, having changed the rice from the blue cloth into a piece of the white, she wrapped the ragged blue sari around her and drew it up over her shaven head.

Having, with the shrewdness of the native, placed her old clothes on the brink of the well, Mundra, now no longer in the garb of a widow, turned down the main road towards the great city. She knew not what might await her there, but, childlike, she had faith to believe that even unknown people would not treat a beggar more cruelly than she, a widow, had been treated by her own.

VI
Of the Tribe of Haunamon

The great bungalow, set far back in the grassy compound and shaded by mango trees, looked peaceful and sleepy in the afternoon sunlight. The very roses in the carefully rounded beds in the centre of the lawn before the house were nodding as if resting in the shade after the blaze of an Indian noonday sun. The only human creature in sight, a dhersy, sitting cross-legged on the little side porch, was asleep over his sewing. Between the rows of potted ferns and palms along the front veranda appeared glimpses of white as if the occupants of the bungalow might be taking their siestas on the open rattan couches in preference to the warmer curtained beds within, one of which could be seen through an open bedroom door. A mongoose, tied to a post of the veranda, had, for a moment, ceased to fret at his bondage and gone to sleep. Even several lizards half-way across the gravel path from one grassy hunting ground to another had stopped as if too exhausted to pursue the never-ending chase. Only the shadows moved, little by little lengthening out, creeping towards the compound wall, as the never-sleeping sun continued his ceaseless journeying towards the west.

Still one hundred and twenty by the thermometer which on the wall behind the sleeping dhersy caught the direct rays of the sun! At three o'clock of an afternoon in India after a morning's combat with the heat how could Nature do aught but sleep in whatever shade she could find for her weary head? But even in sleepy, dreamy India there are the exceptions that prove the rules. Suddenly a wail arose upon the sleepy air and a most terrified cry broke up all quiet and repose.

The dhersy, startled from his stolen slumber, looking up guiltily, quickly began to turn the wheel of the hand-sewing machine beside him. The mongoose tugged at his cord. And a frightened woman started up from her couch on the front veranda, as a little white figure with flying feet and topiless curly head came running from behind the bungalow with the usual cry of childhood's terror:

"Mother! Mother! Oh, mother!"

Even the ayah, who was trying to keep up with the child but having a hard time to run in her long, tightly-drawn sari, looked frightened. An ugly chattering, sounding from behind the house, kept up for some moments as the mother, having gathered the child up in her arms, sat down again with her, soothing and quieting her as only a mother can, while the ayah dropped panting on the floor beside them.

"There, dear, what is the matter? Tell mother quickly."

"Oh, mother! The monkeys! The monkeys!" sobbed the child.

"There, there, dear, don't cry. You are here with mother now and the monkeys cannot hurt you. Tell mother what happened."

However, before the little girl could calm herself enough to tell the story, the ayah began it for her.

"Baby woke early from her nap to-day, Memsahib, and would not go to sleep again and so I dressed her and brought her down for her bread and milk. She ate it like the good little girl that she is and so I gave her a piece of cake. I had just turned to put the plate back in the cupboard, when I heard a scrambling noise behind me and there was a monkey. He grabbed the cake from baby's hand and ran up a tree, chattering. He was a great, big fellow, the biggest one I ever saw. He looked very fierce and chattered terribly. Of course baby was frightened most to death and she ran at once for you." The ayah looked fearfully over her shoulder. "I'm afraid to go back there again myself."

"Hush, ayah!" whispered the mother over the child's head. "Don't frighten her any more. And you were giving her cake, too, when I have told you that she must not have any for a few days now as she really hasn't been feeling very well."

"Oh, mother!" interrupted the child, who had got the better of her sobs. "The monkey looked so ugly and grabbed the cake right out of my hand just as I was going to take a bite. His paw almost touched my face. Will he come again?"

"No, dear," replied the mother as she hugged the little girl close in her arms. "Father comes home to-night. We will tell him and he will send the monkeys away. Something has got to be done, for we cannot have the naughty monkeys stealing our baby's food right out of her mouth," she added playfully.

"Look, dear," she said in a moment to the child whose fright was soon over. "See how your curls are mussed! And, dearie," she looked at the little girl very reproachfully, "you ran all the way around in the sun without your topi. Go into the house now and let ayah fix your hair and wash your face. Then you can come out again and we will watch for father together, for he will surely come soon. Won't it be nice to have father home again?" And she kissed the child as she set her down on the floor. "A week isn't very long, but it seems a month since he went away this time."