Читать книгу: «The Three Sapphires», страница 5

Chapter VI

Swinton drove back to get Lord Victor. When his two elephants were ready, Finnerty, with the Banjara marching at his side, took the road that, halfway to Darpore City, forked off into a wide stretch of dusty plain that was cut here and there by small streams and backwaters; these latter places growing a heavy rush grass that made good cover for both the tiger and his prey – swamp deer and pig.

Swinton and Lord Victor were at the fork in the road, the latter attired in a wondrous Bond Street outfit. "Awfully good of you, old chap," he bubbled. "Devilish quick work, I call it; I'll feel like cabling the governor in the morning if I bag that man-killer."

"If I had Burra Moti under me, I'd think that we as good as had the tiger padded," the major declared; "but I don't know anything about my mount to-day. I don't know whether he'll stand a charge or bolt. Keep your feet under those iron straps; they're the stirrups, Lord Victor."

"Right-o."

They went down off the hill, with its big rhododendron trees, and out onto the wide plain, directed by the Banjara. In an hour they came to a small stream fringed by green rushes; along this for half a mile, and the Banjara pointed with his bamboo to a heavy, oval clump of grass, saying: "The outcast of the jungle is in that cover, sahib."

"Now this is the plan," Finnerty outlined to Swinton. "Stripes is evidently pretty well fed, and hasn't been shot at, so he's cheeky. He won't leave that grass in this hot sun unless he has to – that's tiger in general – but this cuss may have some variations. He's quite aware that we're here. Hark back on this road that we've come by till you reach that old, dry river bed, and go down that till you come to a nala that runs out of this big patch of grass. I'll wait till you're posted there, then I'll beat in slowly through the grass from this side, not making much fuss so that Stripes won't think I'm driving him. When he breaks cover from the other end he'll make for that nala. Don't shoot till you're sure of your shot; just behind the shoulder, if possible, but raking forward – that's the spot."

"Sahib," and the Banjara pointed with his bamboo to where a small bird was circling and darting with angry cries above the canes.

"Yes, that's where he is," Finnerty declared; "that's a bulbul – pugnacious little cuss – trying to drive Stripes away."

Finnerty waited until he was quite sure Swinton and his companion would be in position; then at a command his mahout prodded the elephant with a hooked spear, crying: "Dut-dut, king of all elephants, dut-dut!"

With a fretful squeak of objection the elephant, curling his trunk between his tusks for its safety, forged ponderously ahead. Like a streamer from the topmast of a yacht the bulbul, weaving back and forth, showed Finnerty the tiger was on the move. The major did not hurry him, knowing that if pressed too close he might break back, thinking he was being driven into a trap.

The Banjara, anxious to see the finish of the beast that had slain his cow, worked his way along the grass patch, watching the bulbul and Finnerty's howdah, which just showed above the canes. As the tiger stealthily slipped away from the advancing elephant other jungle dwellers in the kagar grass moved forward to escape from the killer. Knowledge of this movement of game came scenting the wind that smote on the Banjara hound's nostrils. He was a hunting dog; his very living depended on it. He saw a honey badger slip from the reeds and disappear in a hole in a bank; he caught a glimpse of a mouse deer; and all the time his master was shaping his course and timing it by the bulbul. Where there were so many small dwellers of the jungle afoot there surely would be some eating, so the hound slipped into the cane and drifted ahead of the tiger.

The wind that had been blowing across the grass now took a slant and came riffling the feathered tops of the heavy cane from the opposite point, carrying a taint of the Gilfain party.

The tiger, who had been slowly working his way in that direction, stopping every few feet to look back over his shoulder, threw up his head and read the warning message – the sahib scent that was so different from that of the coconut-oiled natives.

The sun, slanting in between the reeds, threw shadow streaks of gold and brown and black. The tiger knew what that meant – that with his synthetic-striped skin he was all but invisible at ten paces. He circled to the left, and when he had found a thick tangle of cane that promised cover, burrowed into it like a jungle pig. With his head flat to his forepaws, hiding his white ruff – so like the chin whisker of an old man – he easily might be passed without discovery.

The bulbul eyed this performance thoughtfully; a tiger lying down for a sleep was something not to waste time over. With a little tweak of triumph he settled for an instant on the bare arm of a leafless, leper-marked dalbergia tree; then, catching sight of something he disliked even more than a tiger, and still in a warlike mood, he continued on with the dog.

When Gilfain's mahout pointed with his goad to the bulbul's squawking approach, the Englishman cocked both barrels of his Paradox and waited.

The dog gradually worked up to the edge of the cane, and lay down just within its cover, ready for a sudden spring on any small animal that might come ahead of the tiger.

"There is the tiger, just within the tall grass. He has seen us and will not come out," the mahout advised.

"What shall we do, captain?" Lord Victor asked. "Go in and beat him out?"

"No; he'll break back or take to the side for it. If we wait till Finnerty beats up, the tiger will make a dash across to that other big stretch of heavy grass on our right. There's a game path between the two, and he'll stick to that."

"But I can't hit him on the gallop – not in a vital spot."

"If you get a chance at him before he breaks cover let go; if you don't bowl him over I'll take a pot shot."

Suddenly Lord Victor, quivering with excitement, his heart beating a tattoo that drowned something Swinton whispered, drew a bead on a patch of rufous fur that showed between the quivering reeds.

Back in the canes sounded a squealing trumpet note from Finnerty's elephant. With his keen scent he had discovered the tiger. Their elephant answered the call, and Lord Victor, fearing the animal his gun covered would break back, pulled the trigger. Unfortunately, and by chance, his aim was good.

A howl of canine agony followed the report, and the Banjara's dog pitched headfirst out of the cover, sat up on his haunches, looked at them in a stupid, dazed way, then raised his head and howled from the pain of a red-dripping wound in his shoulder.

Pandemonium broke loose. Down in the cane there was the coughing roar of a charging tiger; the squeal of a frightened elephant; the bark of a gun; and out to one side the harsh voice of the Banjara calling, the growing cadence of his tones suggesting he was approaching with alacrity.

Lord Victor, a presentiment of ribald retribution because of his too excellent marksmanship flashing through his mind, sprang to his feet just as the elephant, excited by all these wondrous noises, commenced a ponderous buck; that is to say, an attempt to bolt. At the first stride a huge foot went into the soft, black cotton soil, and the young nobleman, thrown off his balance, dove headfirst out of the howdah. The soft muck saved him from a broken neck; it also nearly smothered him. Eyes, nose, mouth full – it was squirted in large quantities down his spine.

Swinton started to swear, angered by the mess Lord Victor had made of things; but when that young man pulled himself like a mud turtle out of the ooze and stood up, the reproach trailed off into a spasm of choking laughter. But the Banjara arriving on the scene checked this hilarity; indeed it was probably Gilfain's grotesque appearance that saved his life.

Finnerty, too, hove hugely onto the scene, a little rivulet of blood streaming from his elephant's trunk. "Were there two tigers?" he called as he emerged from the cane.

His circling eye fell upon the black-mucked nobleman. "Gad, man, what's happened?" he queried, clapping a hand to his mouth to smother his laughter. Then he saw the dog and its owner, and hastily dropping from the howdah pushed over beside Lord Victor, saying: "Get back on your elephant."

"Look, huzoor!" And the Banjara spread his big palm in a denunciatory way toward the dying dog. "I, having had my buffalo slain by a tiger that I had befriended, and bringing the word to the sahib that he might obtain a cherished skin, now have this accursed trial thrust upon me. Why should the young of the sahibs go forth to do a man's work, huzoor?"

"It was an accident," the major replied. "Come to the bungalow to-night and you will be given the price of two dogs."

"Better make it the price of five dogs, major," Swinton called.

"I'll pay for a whole pack of hounds; I'll stock a kennel for him. I was too devilish quick on the trigger." Lord Victor emptied the black muck from his ears.

The Banjara, not understanding English, looked suspiciously at Finnerty, who hedged: "The sahib says you will be given the price of three dogs."

"Sahib, how shall we fix the price of Banda, that is a Banjara? Such are not sold. I have dogs that are just dogs, and if I had known that this sahib was young in the ways of the hunt I would have brought them for his practice. And was there a kill of tiger, or did the sahib also shoot somebody's dog?"

"Be careful!" Finnerty took a step toward the ironical one, who backed up. Then the major said in a mollifying way: "We'll kill the tiger to-morrow."

Muttering "Kul, kul– it is always to-morrow for a difficult work," the herdsman took under his arm his wounded dog and strode angrily away.

"Too devilish bad! He's fond of that cur," Lord Victor said mournfully.

"I had a corking good chance at Stripes," Finnerty offered, "but I muddled it when my elephant almost stepped on the smooth old cuss, who was lying doggo; he got up with a roar of astonishment and took a swipe at the beast's trunk. I was holding the ten-bore, loaded with shot to fire across the cane should Stripes try to break back, and, rattled by his sudden charge, I blazed away, peppering him with bird shot. So, you see, Gilfain, we're all liable to blunder in this game. We'll go back now and take up the hunt to-morrow."

As they went back Mahadua put his hand on Finnerty's foot and asked: "Did you see the spectacles on Pundit Bagh?"

Finnerty nodded, for he had seen the black rings when the tiger lifted his head.

"And did sahib put down the ball gun and take up the one that is for birds and shoot over Pundit's head because he, too, thinks that it is the spirit of a man?"

"It is not good to offend the gods, Mahadua, if one is to live with them, so we will save the killing of the pundit for the young sahib who soon goes back to Inglistan, where the anger of the gods cannot follow him," Finnerty answered solemnly.

In the other howdah, Lord Victor, in whose mind rankled the dog's shooting, brought up in extenuation this same matter of Finnerty's confessed blunder, for he had not caught the chivalry of the major's lie. "I didn't miss like the major, anyway," he began.

"No, you didn't – unfortunately." Swinton was holding a cheroot to a lighted match.

"Really, captain, I wasn't so bad. Fancy an old hunter like him getting fuzzled and banging at a tiger with bird shot."

Swinton shot a furtive look at the thin, long-nosed face that was still piebald with patches of caked lava; then he turned his eyes away and gazed out over the plain with its coloured grass and wild indigo scrub. A pair of swooping jheel birds cut across, piping shrilly: "Did you do it, did you do it!"

"That'll be a corking fine yarn for the club when I get back," Lord Victor added.

"And will you tell them about the dog you shot?"

"Rather! I didn't miss, and the major did."

Swinton turned his brown eyes on the cheerful egoist. "Gilfain, you're young, therefore not hopeless."

"I say, old chap, what's the sequel to that moralising?"

"That probably before you get out of India you'll understand just how good a sportsman Major Finnerty is."

Their elephant had been traversing a well-worn path along the bottom of a hollow, and where it left the nala to reach the plain they suddenly came upon the Banjara's encampment. It was a tiny village of dark-coloured tents; to one side of this was a herd of buffalo that had come in from the plain to be milked. They could see the herdsman sitting moodily on his black blanket, and beside him lay the dead dog.

The young Englishman viewed not without alarm the women who wore belts beneath which were stuck old-fashioned pistols and knives. This was the Banjara custom, but the guilty man feared it was a special course of punishment for him.

Finnerty's elephant had overtaken them, and now again the major had to explain that the dog would be paid for three times over, and the tiger would be surely shot on the morrow.

At this promise, a ponderous woman who had the airs of a gipsy queen pointed to the slayer of the dog and said: "Tomorrow the sahib will hunt again!"

The youngsters whooped with joy, catching the satire.

Finnerty ordered the march resumed.

At a turn, Mahadua pointed to some little red-and-white flags that fluttered above a square plinth of clay upon which was the crude painting of a vermilion tiger, saying: "That is the shrine of Pundit Bagh, and if the sahib wishes to slay him, it being necessary in the law of the jungle, it might avert evil if sacrifice were made at the shrine."

"An offering of sweetmeats and silver?"

"No, huzoor. If a goat is purchased by the sahib and a bottle of arrack, Mahadua will take the goat to the shrine, pour the wine on his head till he has bowed three times to the god, and cut his throat so that the blood falls upon the shrine to appease the god. Also I will hang up a foot of the goat."

"What becomes of the goat?" the major asked.

"We will make kabobs of the flesh in the little village yonder, and hold a feast to-night."

Finnerty remained silent, and the Ahnd, to secure a feast, fell back upon tangible arguments. "Sahib, if the villagers are full with feasting and happy because of a little arrack warm in their stomachs, they will not go forth in the early morning with conch horns and axes to beat upon trees to drive Pundit Bagh up into the hills so he may not be slain."

"All right, Mahadua, I'll furnish the goat."

PART TWO

Chapter VII

They had come to where the open plain gave way to patches of jungle and rolling land clad with oak and rhododendron.

The other elephant came alongside, and Finnerty suggested: "We might walk back to my bungalow from here on the chance of getting some game for the pot. There's quail, grey and painted pheasants, green pigeon, and perhaps a peacock – I heard one call up in the jungle. I've got shells loaded with number six for my 10-bore."

"Good!" Swinton answered. "I'm cramped sitting here."

"I'm game," Lord Victor agreed.

Finnerty sent the elephants on, keeping Mahadua, the shikari.

A hot sun was shooting rapidly down close to the horizon, glaring like a flaming dirigible. A nightjar was swooping through the air like a swallow, uttering his weird evening call, "Chyeece, chyeece, chyeece!" as they went through a fringe of dwarf bamboos and up into the shadow of the trees.

Here Finnerty checked, saying: "I'm afraid I'll have to keep in the lead." He lifted a foot, showing a boot made of soft sambar skin with a cotton sole. "Every creature in the jungle is on the qui vive, and for stalking on foot one has to wear these silent creepers."

They had not travelled far along the narrow jungle path that had been worn smooth by the bare feet of natives crossing from village to village when Finnerty stood rigid and beckoned gently with a forefinger; and when they had reached his side they could hear the jabber of monkeys scolding angrily far up the path. Between them and the jungle discord was a large monkey sitting on the limb of a tree, with his face turned away and his long tail hanging down.

Finnerty put a finger to his lips, and, slipping forward with the soft stealthiness of a leopard, undetected by the monkey, who was intent on his companions' squabble, gave the tail a pull. The startled and enraged lungur whisked about and thrust his black face, with its fringe of silver-grey whiskers, forward pugnaciously, pouring out a volley of simian oaths. Seeing a sahib, he stopped with a gasping cry of fright and raced up the tree to take a diving flight to another.

"No end of a funny caper!" Lord Victor laughed.

"No use of keeping quiet now," the major declared; "those noisy devils have stirred up everything. If I were following up a tiger I'd know they had spotted him."

"Behold, sahib!" And Mahadua pointed to the trunk of the rhododendron.

When Finnerty had closely examined some marks about the height of his head in the tree, he said: "Even if our friend Pundit Bagh hasn't an evil spirit, he has a sense of humour; he's sharpened his claws here, and not long ago, either."

"Really? Oh, I say, old top, you're spoofing. No end of a good draw, though." And Lord Victor chuckled.

"I'm in earnest," Finnerty declared crisply. "A rhododendron has a bark like rough sandpaper – it's a favourite whetstone for the cat tribe; and this was a big tiger, as you can judge by the height of the marks."

"There are no pugs on the path, sahib," Mahadua advised, after a search.

"We'll keep close together for a bit," Finnerty advised, starting on.

At Finnerty's elbow the shikari whispered: "Tell the sahibs to talk, so that we come not in a startling way upon the Pundit, that he may escape in peace."

The major conveyed this message to his companions.

For a hundred yards they walked through a jungle that was now silent save for their voices and the slip of their feet on the smooth earth. From a tangle of raspberry bushes ahead a king crow rose in excited flight.

"That's a bird that always gets in a rage when tiger is about," Finnerty explained; "so keep your eye open – the jungle's thick here."

The major had taken a knife from his pocket, and he now ran its sharp blade around two 10-bore shells, just between the wads which separated the powder from the shot, saying, as he slipped first the shot half and next the powder half into his gun: "That is now practically a ball cartridge, for the shot packet will carry like a bullet for a good many yards. I don't think we'll see him, though. Ah! Mistaken!"

A magnificent striped creature slipped without noise from some thick undergrowth twenty yards ahead, and now stood across the path, his huge head turned so that the questioning yellow eyes were full upon them.

"Pundit Bagh – see his spectacles, sahib!" Mahadua gasped.

The curious black oval markings added to the sinister malignity of the unblinking eyes.

"Don't move, you chaps; he's only bluffing. If you weaken he'll charge," Finnerty cautioned.

"I will speak to Pundit Bagh," Mahadua said, stepping a pace forward. "Kudawand, Protector of the Village, go in peace. Did not the sahib this day give you back your life? Did not the sahib put down the rifle and take up the bird gun and shoot in the air over your head? Go in peace, Kudawand, lest the sahib now smite thee with the ball gun."

"Have you a box of matches, Swinton?" the major asked, a quick thought coming to him that probably the tiger, in his migrations to the hills, had learned to dread the fire line of the burning grass.

Something of this scheme registered in Swinton's brain, for he answered: "I've got a newspaper, too."

"Give the paper and matches to Mahadua." Then to the servant he added: "Roll the paper like a torch and light it."

The tiger watched this performance with interest. There is no dweller of the jungle but is a victim of curiosity – the unusual will always arrest their attention; and the tiger's attitude assured Finnerty that he really had no fixed purpose; it would take very little to make him either attack or retreat. If it had not been for the Banjara's buffalo, killed out of pure deviltry, and the mauled native, Finnerty would have had no hesitation in thinking the tiger would turn from the path if they kept steadily advancing.

When Mahadua struck a match on the box, its snapping hiss and flare of light caused an uneasy shift of the spectacled eyes. When the paper showed its larger flame, the look of distrust and suspicion increased; the bristled lips twisted in a nervous snarl; the powerful tail that had been swinging in complacent threatening from side to side now stilled and dropped.

"Move on!" Finnerty commanded, stepping slowly forward, the 10-bore held waist-high, both fingers on the triggers.

Mahadua, holding the burning paper straight in front of him, kept pace with his master, Swinton and Lord Victor following close.

The sinister ominousness of this performance, its silent aggression, wakened in the tiger's wary mind the dominant thought of his lifetime – caution, suspicion of a trap. It was a supreme test of unheated courage between two magnificent creatures, each of his own species – the gigantic man and the regal tiger; and the physical advantage was with the beast. Step by step, slow-measured, Finnerty and the shikari pressed forward. The Pundit now swung his lithe body with sinuous grace till he stood aggressively straight in the path, his head lowered so that a little furrow showed between his shoulder blades and the red-green eyes slanted evilly upward through the spectacles.

Finnerty read the sign. If the tiger crouched flat to earth, ready for a spring, it would be well to halt and try still further his courage by calmly waiting his attack. The big tail had ceased its rhythmic swing, but did not stiffen in ferocity; it curved downward. Even that beat of the pulse of events Finnerty gauged.

At ten yards Lord Victor had ceased to breathe; he wanted to scream under the cracking strain. He felt a hand on his arm – it was Swinton's. The paper torch palpitated in the native's trembling hand; but he faltered not, though the vicious eyes were ever on him and the fire. Nine yards, eight yards – all a hell of silent, nervous strain. Seven yards – the tiger turned in a slow, voluptuous glide, his ominous eyes still on the torchbearer, and slipped through the bushes to the jungle beyond.

Finnerty quickened his pace to a fast walk, saying: "Put the light out – save the paper."

Presently Mahadua touched Finnerty's elbow and held up a hand. Listening, the major heard the "miouw" of a peacock – not the usual, droning note, but a sharp, angry screech. Immediately the alarmed belling of a sambar came from the direction in which the peacock had called, followed by a short, muffled roar from the tiger.

"Missed him!" Finnerty commented. He turned to his companions. "Our shooting has been spoiled; we'll just push on to my bungalow."