A flood of yellow sunshine on yellow sand, and a horse at the gallop. A horse guided by an English boy, in blue spectacles, sitting squarely enough, but somewhat stiffly, in his saddle, as if too independent to give himself away even to the joyous swing of the handsome little beast beneath him. A big boy undoubtedly; but a boy for all his size, and despite the fact that he was an Assistant Commissioner of the third grade. In other words, one appointed to administer justice to the ignorant heathen--those ignorant heathen who seemed to have such odd ideas of life, and to require such immediate regeneration--at the hands of English boys. In front, across the foreground, the glaring white high road for which he was steering; to the left centre a gnarled, knotted old jhand tree hung with coloured threads and patches, proclaiming it to be still sacred to some effete modern form of serpent-worship--one of those mysterious Indian cults of which no one, not even the disciples themselves, know anything. Young Jones, or Smith--what matters the name when a character has but to figure before the footlights of a single scene?--noticed these threads and patches with the quick but incomprehensive eye of superiority. A not uncommon feeling of contemptuous interest came over him, which prolonged itself even when the cause changed into a wonder why the brute he was riding would not keep its head at the proper angle. Then darkness, and silence! Smith-Jones's horse had put its foot into a rat-hole and given him a bad fall, about as bad a fall as could well have been, short of those curious plunges over the edge of one world into the next. He lay white and still on the yellow sand, neither in time nor eternity, for a long while. How long matters no more than his name, for this is the story of Smith-Jones, and it is through his eyes and his thoughts that it must be seen and told; therefore until he began to gain consciousness the scene remained, as it were, a blank, despite the fact that there were other actors on the stage. Most people when coming to themselves (to use a popular, but confusing phrase) meet first of all with a sound of slow, storm-spent breakers rolling in on some unknown shore. Is it the one they are leaving, or the one to which they seek return? Who knows--for the vague wonder is stilled by a whispering hush! growing louder and louder as if both worlds were waiting, finger on lip, for a decision. Then, as a rule, comes a kindly, familiar voice or touch to settle the question in favour of this earth; perhaps some day it may come to summon us to another. Again, who knows? Smith-Jones, however, felt something so distinctly unfamiliar that he opened his eyes in a fright, relieved to find himself in that unmistakable flood of sunshine which does not exist out of India. Briefly he felt, or thought he felt, a kiss upon his lips. Now Smith-Jones, like most well-trained, unemotional English boys, had a strong dislike to kisses. He lumped them, with many other things, under the generic term bosh, and confined himself to reserved pecks at the foreheads of his mother, his sisters, his aunts, and an occasional, a very occasional, cousin. Even when they had all stood round in tears while Robin the gardener hoisted the brand-new cabin-trunk on to the fly, which from the large white placards on the luggage was evidently destined to carry Smith-Jones part of the way to Bombay, he had only got as far as a kiss on the cheek, despite a choke in his throat, and a distinct inclination to cry. And now? It was startling in the extreme! Lying on his back, a prey to somewhat alarmed surprise, he became aware through his nose of a pleasant scent, and through his eyes, of the pendant mistletoe-like twigs of the jhand tree. Mistletoe,--yes, that might account for the kiss; but what about the perfume of roses? There it was again, in company with an old peacock's feather fan which looked as if it were half through a severe moulting. Some one was fanning him, positively fanning him! for the feathers swooped again and again just above his face in composed curves suggestive of leisure and perpetual motion. He tried to find out more by turning his head--an effort which made him realise that he had been within an ace of breaking his neck, and sobered him to acquiescence for a time. Not for long, however, seeing that the boy was a pertinacious boy. So, at the expense of a fearful rick, he discovered a hand and arm belonging to the fan--at least if it was a hand and arm after all, and not merely a withered brown branch. Smith-Jones's blue eyes came to the conclusion that it was at any rate the skeleton of a hand and arm, and what is more a curiously graceful skeleton. Then, being still confused out of speech, he tried to arrest the arm by catching hold of it; but either he had not yet recovered a just estimate of distance, or it eluded his grasp, for the even monotony of the curve continued. And, on the whole, it was pleasant enough to lie on one's back in the yellow sand and be fanned sleepily, gracefully. An enjoyment, however, which could not be allowed long continuance when there was a horse to be caught, a camp to be reached, a judgment to be written; the whole burden of a world, in short, on Smith-Jones's young shoulders. "I could get up now, if you would remove that fan," he said at last, weakly surprised at his own difficulty in stringing two words together in a foreign tongue. "There is no hurry, Huzoor," came in immediate reply. "The Protector of the Poor being so very young, there is naturally plenty of time for all things ere he has to leave life; yea, plenty of time." What a remarkable voice! Soft as the cooing of the doves in the jhand tree, and no louder; the far-away echo of a voice, toneless, yet mellow. But then the whole experience was remarkable, and he lay trying to piece common-sense into it with his brain still muddled by the jar which had so nearly sent him to still more novel environments, until his hatred of bosh made him sit up suddenly, unsteadily, one hand supporting himself, the other averting the sweep of the fan. There was no doubt as to the place; yonder was the white road, there the responsible hole, the wallow in the sand where his horse had rolled, the jhand tree gay in its shreds and patches. But what was that to one side of him? Some one, either half-fledged girl or shrunken old woman, seated in one of those flat baskets which packmen use for carrying their burdens. It was, in effect, a pack-basket, since cords attached it to one end of a banghy, or yoke, which was resting against a net-full of small earthern pots fastened to the other extremity of the pliant lever. The sight of a human being in a pack-basket was unusual, but Smith-Jones during the last six months (that is to say, during his service in India) had seen so many strange things that he set it down as yet another eccentricity of an eccentric people. The occupant of the basket, however, disturbed him more; he even thought (with a certain sense of shame, which would have been wanting had he been older, or younger) of fairy godmothers--as if such banalities could be considered by Smith-Jones, Assistant Commissioner of the third grade! And yet he was not without excuse. Mr. Rider Haggard has described what "She" became when the fire scorched the charm out of a face and form which, but for magic, would have mouldered and been remoulded to fresh beauty centuries and centuries before. The figure in the pack-basket was as shrunken, as shrivelled, as any "She." Extreme old age had driven womanhood away; it had stolen every curve, every contour, every colour; and yet, possibly because the slow furnace of natural life is kinder than its artificial fires, there was nothing unlovely in the wizened face or form. On the contrary, Smith-Jones, despite the memory of that fancied kiss still haunting his brain, looked at her without a shudder. She was dressed in a way which even his ignorance of the gala costumes of respectable females told him was unusual. A very full red silk petticoat bordered with gay colours was half tucked into the basket, half displayed over the edge in coquettish quillings and frillings of the bright embroidery. A loose sacque of the same stuff, many times too large for the bones it covered, lay in wrinkles on arms and bust with here and there a glint of tarnished tinsel, while a veil of like material, faded to a purplish tint, its heavy gold thread tracings torn, frayed, or wanting, hid all but the tiny hand and arm swaying the fan, and a shrunken, waxen face whence a pair of bright black eyes looked at him wisely. "The Presence would do well to repose once more," came the worn-out voice. "He is not to die this time. He has broken nought save his blue spectacles, and that is well. Spectacles are not for the young; and, as this slave said but now, my Lord is in possession of such great youth that he can afford to rest till Dittu returns from pursuing the Presence's horse, which, conceiving that the Protector had no immediate need of its services, hath retired, after the manner of beasts, to gorge in a gram field. But I, being Dittu's relation, can affirm that he will of a surety return ere long; therefore rest is within reach, and if the Presence will lie down again I will keep the fly-people from settling on the Presence's face." To tell the truth, the effort to rise had made Smith-Jones feel decidedly queer, so without more ado he lay back on the pillow which the strange watcher had evidently improvised from the coarse outside veil she had worn over her finery. He guessed this by the lingering smell of roses which clung to the fabric. "You might tell me how I came to fall off, and who you are," said he after a pause, a little fretfully, for he was unused to inaction, and impatient at things he did not understand. "Huzoor! rat-holes are very simple things. Or perhaps it was a snake-hole. If my Lord had gone a pace farther from the tree, he would not have been on sacred ground, and then the serpent might not have revenged himself." Smith-Jones gave a little wriggle. "What bosh!" he muttered; adding aloud, as if to change the subject, "And who are you, mother?" "If my Lord dislikes old wives' tales," came the cooing voice, "he will not care for mine. He is so young. If the Presence's great-grandfather--" "What do you know about my great-grandfather?" he interrupted hotly. "Nothing, except that the Protector of the Poor must have had one. That is all. Nevertheless, if the Presence's great-grandfather (Heaven cool his grave!) had been in Jodhnagar when he was young he might have heard GulÂbi[28] sing. I am GulÂbi, Huzoor." The peacock's feather fan, with its scent of dead roses, swung backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards, in that even rhythmical sweep which only those accustomed to the task from childhood can maintain for long without break or flaw. It was particularly soothing. "I was singer to the great MÂharÂni at the Pearl Palace," went on the voice, "I had to sing her to sleep whilst I fanned her as I am fanning the Pillar of Justice even now, I used to sing also before the Court in the evening, sitting in the screened room where only the great and the favoured had sight of my mistress. Sometimes the Presence's people came from over the sea; I have seen them. They came in those days for gold and jewels. Sometimes also for love; not for justice, as my Lord comes now. Nor did they wear blue spectacles; but then they were young, and I, who am so old now, I was young also." The melancholy cadence of her words was quite lost on Smith-Jones, who was fast recovering himself, and beginning once more to take a rational view of life, and an interest in the situation, as a situation. Among other things he was a student of folk-lore, and the chance of acquiring information from this old woman, something that might even be construed into a sun-myth, was exceedingly tempting. "You must know a lot of old songs, mother," he said in superior tones. "Sing me one while we are waiting for Dittu. Or if you can't sing it, you know, just say it; I only want the words." Was it a faint chuckle he heard, as he lay prone on his back, or only a louder gurgle of those ceaseless doves in the jhand tree? The old lady's voice, imperturbably toneless, arrested his wonder. "Why should I not sing, Huzoor, seeing I am of a family of bards? We sing both of the old and the new order. My father and my father's father sang of them before me; yet I have no son to sing them after me. So the songs I sing die with me. When I am dead no one will hear them any more." All the more reason why he should hear them now, thought Smith-Jones, feeling surreptitiously in his pocket for a note-book. "The Presence need not trouble himself. He must close his eyes or I shall forget my song. My singing is for sleep and dreams, and this song has been waiting to be sung so long that it is well-nigh forgotten already. Listen and dream, Huzoor!" She began in the usual low chant, varied by occasional sudden turns modulating the tone into a higher or a lower key in accordance with the spirit of the story. From a musical point of view there was nothing remarkable in the performance, save the absolute want of vibration in the worn-out voice, whose even softness became all the more remarkable when contrasted by the passion in the words. Yet Smith-Jones felt at once that he was listening to a past mistress in her art. The art which in old times represented history, literature, and the drama, and made the desire for, or possession of, a really good bard a just cause for battle, murder, or sudden death among rival Courts. He could not, of course, recollect the exact words used, but, in telling me the tale years after, he declared that his memory clung close to the original, and that her song swept on untrammelled by more rhyme or rhythm than what seemed to come to it spontaneously through the chant. She sang, in fact, as the native bards sing, with every now and again an interlude of refrain or exclamation serving as a pause during which the singer grasps a fresh idea, a new measure. And this, according to Smith-Jones, was the song that she sang. Listen, Pillar of Justice! Listen. Roses smell sweet, but they are silent when the sun kisses them. I sing of a rose who sang, yet rose-like was silent of kisses. Heart of my heart? why should I sing of a kiss which never came, of the kiss owed to the rose, not by the dead but the living! For what is a dead man's kiss to lips that are like the rose? He was so fair and young, he came from far over the seas. Was it jewels or gold he was seeking? No matter! 'twas love that he found. His hair was golder than gold, his eyes, full of laughter, were blue--blue as the sapphires he sought whilst love was seeking for him. Yea, the black sought for love in the blue. Oh, cold were his eyes! cold as the snows in the north when the rose began singing Hai, golden sun! Hai, cold blue skies! Hai! Hai! Hai! Right to the inner court of marbles and jewels, 'mid peacocks' fans waving and tinkling sutaras, he came when the stars came and talked to my mistress--talked of love and of jewels, the one for the sake of the other. For the Rani grew old, and such women are easily flattered. But Singing-Rose smiled as she sang. Though naught but a singing slave, men sought her for love and for kisses, who sought not her mistress. And one, a snake of a man, sought both without shame; he was high in the Court and a noble, the Rani's known lover. Hai, the snake! Hai, venomous thing, Hai! Hai! But what is a snake to a rose when the gold sun may kiss her? So she sang sweeter and sweeter till blue eyes grew kinder. "What is your price for a song, Singing-Rose?" he asked softly. "Gold from a snake, but a kiss from the sun," I sang bravely; giving no heed to her frown, for speech was not mine, save by singing; night after night singing on, whilst they whispered of love and of jewels. "I owe her a gift of a surety," he said the last night to my mistress. "Give her gold," she replied with a sneer. "What more would you give to a slave?" Hai! Gold, nothing but gold! She sought for love! Listen! listen! Oh, the ways of love are bold, The coins were wrapped in a paper; it had a voice of its own. "To-night, when the gong chimes one, the seeker will find a kiss, in the twelve-doored marble summer-house bowered in roses." Alone in the garden I read it. I saw not the snake hid in the bushes with unwinking, venomous eyes. "This to my mistress," he laughed, "and to-night, when the clock chimes one, he dies; for the Rani sought love, and he gave her but words. What are words in exchange for the jewels she gave as a bride? The jewels he steals from the Queen when he leaves us to-morrow." Lies, lies! nothing but lies from the snake! Lies! lies! Heart of my heart! what are words and tears to a snake? And the sun far, far from the rose; too far for a warning. Listen! the rose has thorns to protect her blossoms; a woman has guiles and smiles to protect her lover. "What matters a kiss at one?" said I. "Take yours at eleven, in the twelve-doored marble summer-house bowered in roses." Hai! the greed and lust in his look. But the Rose saw his lying soul; she knew he would take his kiss, and betray her when it was over. She knew that with venomous snakes there is no safety but death. One and eleven when figured on paper show little of change. A stroke, a scratch of a thorn! No need for more than a scratch, ere the paper was lost by the maiden and found by her mistress. Lost by the guile of one woman, found in the path of another. Oh, heart! waiting 'mid the flowers, One--two--three--four--five--six--seven--eight--nine--ten--eleven! The clasp of a snake is cold, but the clasp of death is colder; and coldest of all, the warm clinging clasp of a rose, holding him tighter and tighter when the knife flashed out of the dark. "Let me go," he shrieked in his terror, but the thorns of the rose held fast, the warm blood staining her bosom as she waited for death in her turn. Then lights and an uproar, and, lo! instead of the stranger the Rani's own lover was dead. Dead! who grieves when a snake is dead? Yet was there crying and shouting, and noise bringing warning to all, reaching the moon in the heavens, the sun in its rising,--hastening its flight from the east, to its home in the arms of the west. Is not that the course of the sun? Leaving the cast with a smile; leaving the rose and the nightingale? Yea! 'tis the course of the sun. Hai, for the Rose, the Singing-Rose! Yet who kills his own pleasure? Who kills the bulbul in the rose? No! they cut its wings, they prison it, they bid it sing; sing with a blood-stained heart when the sun shines on other roses. So it sang, waiting always for the kiss which never came. Pillar of Justice, from the land of the western sun, say! did the Rose deserve the kiss which never came? Hath she not waited long enough for the promised kiss? The song ceased as abruptly as it began, and Smith-Jones, distinctly disappointed at its want of historical value, thanked the old lady politely. It appeared to him confused and bewildering; nevertheless part of it might be twisted into some semblance of a myth. The sun was frequently mentioned, and the chiming of the hours pointed conclusively to the swallowing up of darkness by light, and vice-versÂ. And--by Jove, that must be Dittu returning with the horse! It was; Dittu, the horse, a bundle of green wheat, and a very broad grin--all of which common objects relieved Smith-Jones, who, to say sooth, felt out of his element lying on his back and being fanned by an old mummy. In his more collected mood it struck him as undignified. He blushed a little, rose hastily, and prepared to mount his horse and depart at once. With this intention, proceeding to rummage in his pockets for a rupee, which with a courteously intended grunt he tendered to the old woman. She might have been a graven image for all the notice she took of him or his coin. The hand holding the fan rested on her lap, her eyes were half-closed. "The Presence wastes time. He had better give the bucksheesh to me," remarked Dittu, grinning again. "The old mother is nigh stone-deaf and blind. She sits so all day, never saying a word save her prayers. She is a real pious one. Hai, Hai, what misfortune! The stirrup of the Protector of the Poor is broken. God send the iron may be lying in the sand where the base-born beast fell!" Smith-Jones's puzzled, perturbed look, as he watched Dittu on his knees searching for the missing stirrup-iron, may have been due to anxiety lest he should have to walk six miles into camp. On the other hand, he may have been wondering if the fall had seriously injured his brain; anyhow there was an unusual air of doubt about him when Dittu's grin and the iron came out of the sand together with the remark that, if the Presence would sit down and wait a while, he, Dittu, had some string with which a splice of the broken strap could be made in a minute or two. Meanwhile, as the Presence no longer required the pillow, he would e'en cover up the old mother again with the veil he had taken from her. It was more decent like; and she was a decent old creature, despite the fancy she had to wear those gay garments of her youth. So the white veil was wound about the faded finery, leaving nothing visible but the waxen face with its half-closed eyes. "What are you carrying her about for?" asked Smith-Jones jerkily. "She is so old, Huzoor, and we, her belongings, thought she might like to end her long life peacefully in holy Ganges. So as I had the dead ancestors of the village to carry (they are in those little pots on the other side of the yoke, Huzoor) we just put her to make a balance in the basket." Smith-Jones's blue eyes (they really were fine eyes now the spectacles were away) grew big with surprise. "You mean that those little pots contain your dead ancestors?" "Their ashes, Huzoor; the ashes of the village for the year. Some one always takes them at pilgrimage-time, and as I was strong I brought the old lady too. She doesn't seem able to die up there amongst us all, and she will have to be brought along some time. She is mostly bones, as it is, no heavier than the ashes yonder." He nodded his head at the net-full of pots and went on twining the thread. Smith-Jones's face grew more and more troubled. He had read in books of old people being brought thus to end their days devoutly in the sacred stream, and it had seemed to him an interesting and curious habit. That was all. It seemed different now. "The Presence is surprised at the ways of the dust-like ones," continued Dittu cheerfully; "but old GulÂbi is accustomed to being carried about in a basket. When she was quite a girl--a long time ago, before the gracious and beneficent rule of the Presences came to put an end to all wrongdoing--she had both her feet cut off for something she did. I have heard my grandmother say she was a gay one; but it must have been so long ago that we may forget it in her present decency." "Both her feet cut off!" "Huzoor, the feet of young people lead them into mischief. She was a singer, and she got into trouble, so I have heard old folk say. If the Presence will cause forgiveness to be awarded to the speaker, it may be said that the trouble was an Englishman. One of the no-account wanderers who used to come before the Great Company BahÂdur threw the mantle of protection over the poor. I know not the story rightly; perhaps even old GulÂbi hath forgotten it, seeing it was so long ago. The Rani she served was jealous, and would have killed the Singing-Rose (so they called the old mother) but for her art. That they could not spare. What tyrant kills the bulbul in his garden? So they cut her feet off to keep her in the paths of virtue. It is an excellent plan for those who walk lightly. See! the stirrup is ready for the foot of the Presence and will support him safely on his road." Smith-Jones stood irresolute before the mummylike figure in the basket. "Did she ever tell you the story herself?" he asked at length. Dittu's tongue clucked emphatic denial from the roof of his mouth. "Huzoor, she became decent before my day. Besides, grandmother said even when she was young GulÂbi held her tongue on that score. Only if folk pitied her for crawling like a frog she would smile, saying some things were worth more than feet, and she expected her deserts some day. Hai! Hai! a bold saying for carnal sinners, but holy Ganges will choke the wickedness from her for ever." "Then you will take her--to--to HurdwÂr--and--and leave her there." Smith-Jones had a difficulty with this euphemism for the strange and barbarous custom he had read about in books. He seemed to see the old creature seated in her flat basket in the stream, a prey to exposure and cold. "It would scarcely be worth while her coming back," suggested Dittu humbly. "My grannie (she is over there, Huzoor," nodding his head towards the earthern pots) "was the last person who knew her ere she ceased singing. Now she is gone, wherefore should GulÂbi wait longer? She hath waited over long as it is. To-night, when the moon rises, we will travel onwards to her rest. I must get back to the village by harvest-time." Smith-Jones gave Dittu the rupee. He rode into camp sedately; he wrote his judgment still more sedately; then he ate his dinner and sat down sedately to read, one book after another--the Asiatic Antiquary, a sermon by his father on the relative guilt of the heathen--which in its day had fluttered the fold of Muddleton-on-the-Fens by its laxity--Herbert Spencer's Sociology, finally The Whole Duty of Man, which had been presented to him by a maiden aunt. And outside, beyond the thin film of canvas separating him from the calm Indian night, stretched a flood of moonshine; the tent-ropes glittering like silver cords against the dark leafage of the banyan-tree, the white road shining like a straight broad path to heaven--or elsewhere. Sitting beside the reading lamp he could see past the furled chicks of the door, right away to east and west: west to Rajputana and the Pearl Palace; east to holy Ganges and the golden gates of the great Rest-House. Chink-a-chink-a-chink came the brass jingles of a banghy, making Smith-Jones lay down The Whole Duty of Man restlessly, and move towards the door. Along that broad white shining path from west to east came a strange sight,--an old mummy of a woman wrapped in a shroud-like veil and balanced by the ashes of the village. Swaying, bobbing, dancing, mummy and ashes alike, as the pliant bamboo lever on Dittu's shoulder made the jingles chink and the eyes on the worn peacock's plume at either end look as if they were alive. Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle, bob, bob, bob, came Dittu and his burden. Hurri Gunga! Hurri Gunga! Hurri Gunga![29] Just a little guttural grunting, like a pig's, to keep the shuffle and the bob together. Smith-Jones stood staring into the moonlight, the picture of irresolution. The shadow of the banyan-tree lay right across the road in a solid mass of darkness, as if a great gulf were fixed between the light westward and the light eastward. Here, in this No Man's Land, Dittu set down his banghy, propped the lever into position with his packman's stick, and made sideways for an interlude of tobacco among the camp-followers at the watchfires across the road. Smith-Jones and the banghy were alone. He could scarcely see it in the darkness, though a wayward gleam of moonlight glittered on the brass jingles and lit up the peacock's eyes. For all that he saw it clearly in his mind. He saw the net of earthern pots, the figure in the shroud,--nay, he saw more! He saw through the grave clothes to the faded finery within, and through that again to something which had not faded despite the long, long years. To something which was waiting still for its reward. And then a strange thing happened. Smith-Jones forgot everything he had been taught. He forgot his father's sermon, he forgot sociology, folklore, and the whole duty of man. He forgot the sun-myth and the great fight between darkness and dawn which never ceases. He even forgot himself, as he stepped into the shadowy gulf, stooped, and paid another man's debt of honour with a kiss. He told me the tale years after, when we were sitting over our toddy round a camp fire. It was a moonlight night, and the shadow of a great banyan-tree lay like a gulf across a white road; perhaps that awoke the memory. He was then a married man, with a charming wife and a growing family, but never, he assured me, had he forgotten, nor could he ever forget, that kiss! He declared that for one short second the whole world was at his feet, the wilderness a blossoming rose, the perfumes of which lingered-- Here he took off his spectacles, for though he had given up wearing blue ones years before, his kind eyes had become a little dim, perhaps with the sympathy they bestowed on all sorts and conditions of men; he took off his spectacles, I say, and wiped them furtively. |