LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

of the morning, Tarvin heard the dry click of a voice he understood. It was the sound made by bringing up the cartridge of a repeating rifle. Mechanically he slipped from the saddle, and was on the other side of the horse as the rifle spoke, and a puff of blue smoke drifted up and hung motionless above the camel.

      'I might have known she'd get in her work early,' he muttered, peering over his horse's withers. 'I can't drop him at this distance with a revolver. What's the fool waiting for?'

      Then he perceived that, with characteristic native inaptitude, the man had contrived to jam his lever, and was beating it furiously on the forepart of the saddle. He remounted hastily, and galloped up, revolver in hand, to cover the blanched visage of Juggut Singh.

      'You! Why, Juggut, old man, this isn't kind of you.'

      'It was an order,' said Juggut, quivering with apprehension. 'It was no fault of mine. I--I do not understand these things.'

      'I should smile. Let me show you.' He took the rifle from the trembling hand. 'The cartridge is jammed, my friend; it don't shoot as well that way. It only needs a little knack--so! You ought to learn it, Juggut.' He jerked the empty shell over his shoulder.

      'What will you do to me?' cried the eunuch. 'She would have killed me if I had not come.'

      'Don't you believe it, Juggut. She's a Jumbo at theory, but weak in practice. Go on ahead, please.'

      They started back toward the city, Juggut leading the way on his camel, looking back apprehensively every minute. Tarvin smiled at him dryly but reassuringly, balancing on his hip the captured rifle. He observed that it was a very good rifle if properly used.

      At the entrance to Sitabhai's wing of the palace, Juggut Singh dismounted and slunk into the courtyard, the livid image of fear and shame. Tarvin clattered after him, and as the eunuch was about to disappear through a door, called him back.

      'You have forgotten your gun, Juggut,' he said. 'Don't be afraid of it.' Juggut was putting up a doubtful hand to take it from him. 'It won't hurt anybody this trip. Take yourself back to the lady, and tell her you are returned, with thanks.'

      No sound came to his ear from behind the green shutters as he rode away, leaving Juggut staring after him. Nothing fell upon him from out of the arch, and the apes were tied securely. Sitabhai's next move was evidently yet to be played.

      His own next move he had already reckoned with. It was a case for bolting.

      He rode to the mosque outside the city, routed out his old friend in dove-coloured satin, and made him send this message:--

      'MRS. MUTRIE, DENVER.--Necklace is yours. Get throat ready and lay that track into Topaz. --TARVIN.'

      Then he turned his horse's head toward Kate. He buttoned his coat tightly across his chest, and patted the resting-place of the Naulahka fondly, as he strode up the path to the missionary's verandah, when he had tethered Fibby outside. His high good humour with himself and the world spoke through his eyes as he greeted Mrs. Estes at the door.

      'You have been hearing something pleasant,' she said. 'Won't you come in?'

      'Well, either the pleasantest, or next to the pleasantest; I'm not sure which,' he answered with a smile, as he followed her into the familiar sitting-room. 'I'd like to tell you all about it, Mrs. Estes. I feel almightily like telling somebody. But it isn't a healthy story for this neighbourhood.' He glanced about him: 'I'd hire the town crier and a few musical instruments and advertise it, if I had my way; and we'd all have a little Fourth of July celebration and a bonfire, and I'd read the Declaration of Independence over the natives with a relish. But it won't do. There is a story I'd like to tell you, though,' he added, with a sudden thought. 'You know why I come here so much, don't you, Mrs. Estes--I mean outside of your kindness to me, and my liking you all so much, and our always having such good times together? You know, don't you?'

      Mrs. Estes smiled. 'I suppose I do,' she said.

      'Well; that's right! That's right. I thought you did. Then I hope you're my friend!'

      'If you mean that I wish you well, I do. But you can understand that I feel responsible for Miss Sheriff. I have sometimes thought I ought to let her mother know.'

      'Oh, her mother knows! She's full of it You might say she liked it. The trouble isn't there, you know, Mrs. Estes.'

      'No. She's a singular girl; very strong, very sweet. I've grown to love her dearly. She has wonderful courage. But I should like it better for her if she would give it up, and all that goes with it. She would be better married,' she said meditatively.

      Tarvin gazed at her admiringly. 'How wise you are, Mrs. Estes! How wise you are!' he murmured. 'If I've told her that once I've told her a dozen times. Don't you think, also, that it would be better if she were married at once--right away, without too much loss of time?'

      His companion looked at him to see if he was in earnest. Tarvin was sometimes a little perplexing to her. 'I think if you are clever you will leave it to the course of events,' she replied, after a moment. 'I have watched her work here, hoping that she might succeed where every one else has failed.. But I know in my heart that she won't. There's too much against her. She's working against thousands of years of traditions, and training, and habits of life. Sooner or later they are certain to defeat her; and then, whatever her courage, she must give in. I've thought sometimes lately that she might have trouble very soon. There's a good deal of dissatisfaction at the hospital. Lucien hears some stories that make me anxious.'

      'Anxious! I should say so. That's the worst of it. It isn't only that she won't come to me, Mrs. Estes--that you can understand--but she is running her head meanwhile into all sorts of impossible dangers. I haven't time to wait until she sees that point. I haven't time to wait until she sees any point at all but that this present moment, now and here, would be a good moment in which to marry Nicholas Tarvin. I've got to get out of Rhatore. That's the long and the short of it, Mrs. Estes. Don't ask me why. It's necessary. And I must take Kate with me. Help me if you love her.'

      To this appeal Mrs. Estes made the handsomest response in her power, by saying that she would go up and tell her that he wished to see her. This seemed to take some time and Tarvin waited patiently, with a smile on his lips. He did not doubt that Kate would yield. In the glow of another success it was not possible to him to suppose that she would not come around now. Had he not the Naulahka? She went with it; she was indissolubly connected with it. Yet he was willing to impress into his service all the help he could get, and he was glad to believe that Mrs. Estes was talking to her.

      It was an added prophecy of success when he found from a copy of a recent issue of the Topaz Telegram, which he picked up while he waited, that the 'Lingering Lode' had justified his expectations. The people he had left in charge had struck a true fissure vein, and were taking out $500 a week. He crushed the paper into his pocket, restraining an inclination to dance; it was perhaps safest, on reflection, to postpone that exercise until he had seen Kate. The little congratulatory whistle that he struck up instead, he had to sober a moment later into a smile as Kate opened the door and came in to him. There could be no two ways about it with her now. His smile, do what he would, almost said as much.

      A single glance at her face showed him, however, that the affair struck her less simply. He forgave her; she could not know the source of his inner certitude. He even took time to like the grey house-dress, trimmed with black velvet, that she was wearing in place of the white which had become habitual to her.

      'I'm glad you've dropped white for a moment,' he said, as he rose to shake hands with her. 'It's a sign. It represents a general abandonment and desertion of this blessed country; and that's just the mood I want to find you in. I want you to drop it, chuck it, throw it up.' He held her brown little hand in the swarthy fist he pushed out from his own white sleeve, and looked down into her eyes attentively.

      'What?'

      'India--the whole business. I want you to come with me.' He spoke gently.

      She looked up, and he saw in the quivering lines about her mouth signs of the contest on this theme she had passed through before

Скачать книгу