‘Bapri-bap,’4 muttered the grooms’ wives, ‘to cheat a child so! But we know what the bunnia-folk5 are, sisters.’
‘The press was an old press, and we were not strong men – my brother and I; nor could we fix the neck of the beam firmly in the shackle.’
‘Nay, indeed,’ said the gorgeously-clad wife of the Head Groom, joining the circle. ‘That is a strong man’s work. When I was a maid in my father’s house –’
‘Peace, woman,’ said the Head Groom. ‘Go on, boy.’
‘It is nothing,’ said Little Tobrah. ‘The big beam tore down the roof upon a day which is not in my memory, and with the roof fell much of the hinder wall, and both together upon our bullock, whose back was broken. Thus we had neither home, nor press, nor bullock – my brother, myself, and the sister who was blind. We went crying away from that place, hand-in-hand, across the fields; and our money was seven annas and six pie. There was a famine in the land. I do not know the name of the land. So, on a night when we were sleeping, my brother took the five annas that remained to us and ran away. I do not know whither he went. The curse of my father be upon him. But I and the sister begged food in the villages, and there was none to give. Only all men said – “Go to the Englishmen and they will give.” I did not know what the Englishmen were; but they said that they were white, living in tents. I went forward; but I cannot say whither I went, and there was no more food for myself or the sister. And upon a hot night, she weeping and calling for food, we came to a well, and I bade her sit upon the kerb, and thrust her in, for, in truth, she could not see; and it is better to die than to starve.’
‘Ai! Ahi!’ wailed the grooms’ wives in chorus; ‘he thrust her in, for it is better to die than to starve!’
‘I would have thrown myself in also, but that she was not dead and called to me from the bottom of the well, and I was afraid and ran. And one came out of the crops saying that I had killed her and defiled the well, and they took me before an Englishman, white and terrible, living in a tent, and me he sent here. But there were no witnesses, and it is better to die than to starve. She, furthermore, could not see with her eyes, and was but a little child.’
‘Was but a little child,’ echoed the Head Groom’s wife. ‘But who art thou, weak as a fowl and small as a day-old colt, what art thou?’
‘I who was empty am now full,’ said Little Tobrah, stretching himself upon the dust. ‘And I would sleep.’
The groom’s wife spread a cloth over him while Little Tobrah slept the sleep of the just.
Black Jack1
To the wake av Tim O’Hara
Came company,
All St Patrick’s Alley
Was there to see.
Robert Buchanan.2
As the Three Musketeers share their silver, tobacco, and liquor together, as they protect each other in barracks or camp, and as they rejoice together over the joy of one, so do they divide their sorrows. When Ortheris’s irrepressible tongue has brought him into cells for a season, or Learoyd has run amok through his kit and accoutrements, or Mulvaney has indulged in strong waters, and under their influence reproved his Commanding Officer, you can see the trouble in the faces of the untouched two. And the rest of the Regiment know that comment or jest is unsafe. Generally the three avoid Orderly-Room and the Corner Shop3 that follows, leaving both to the young bloods who have not sown their wild oats; but there are occasions –
For instance, Ortheris was sitting on the drawbridge of the main gate of Fort Amara, with his hands in his pockets and his pipe, bowl down, in his mouth. Learoyd was lying at full length on the turf of the glacis, kicking his heels in the air, and I came round the corner and asked for Mulvaney.
Ortheris spat into the Ditch and shook his head. ‘No good seein’ ’im now,’ said Ortheris; ‘’e’s a bloomin’ camel. Listen.’
I heard on the flags of the verandah opposite to the cells, which are close to the Guard-Room, a measured step that I could have identified out of the tramp of an army. There were twenty paces crescendo, a pause, and then twenty diminuendo.
‘That’s ’im,’ said Ortheris; ‘my Gawd, that’s ’im! All for a bloomin’ button you could see your face in an’ a bit o’ lip that a bloomin’ Hark-angel would ‘a’ guv back.’
Mulvaney was doing pack-drill – was compelled, that is to say, to walk up and down for certain hours in full marching order, with rifle, bayonet, ammunition, knapsack, and overcoat. And his offence was being dirty on parade! I nearly fell into the Fort Ditch with astonishment and wrath, for Mulvaney is the smartest man that ever mounted guard, and would as soon think of turning out uncleanly as of dispensing with his trousers.
‘Who was the Sergeant that checked him?’ I asked.
‘Mullins, o’ course,’ said Ortheris. ‘There ain’t no other man would whip ’im on the peg4 so. But Mullins ain’t a man. ‘E’s a dirty little pig-scraper, that’s wot ’e is.’
‘What did Mulvaney say? He’s not the make of man to take that quietly.’
‘Say! Bin better for ’im if ‘e’d shut ‘is mouth. Lord, ‘ow we laughed! “Sargint,” ’e sez, “ye say I’m dirty. Well,” sez ’e, “when your wife lets you blow your own nose for yourself, perhaps you’ll know wot dirt is. You’re himperfec’ly eddicated, Sargint,” sez ’e, an’ then we fell in. But after p’rade, ’e was up an’ Mullins was swearin’ ’imself black in the face at Ord’ly-Room that Mulvaney ’ad called ’im a swine an’ Lord knows wot all. You know Mullins. ‘E’ll ’ave ‘is ‘ead broke in one o’ these days. ‘E’s too big a bloomin’ liar for ord’nary consumption. “Three hours’ can an’ kit,” sez the Colonel; “not for bein’ dirty on p’rade, but for ‘avin’ said somethin’ to Mullins, tho’ I do not believe,” sez ’e, “you said wot ’e said you said.” An’ Mulvaney fell away sayin’ nothin’. You know ’e never speaks to the Colonel for fear o’ gettin’ ’imself fresh copped.’
Mullins, a very young and very much married Sergeant, whose manners were partly the result of innate depravity and partly of imperfectly digested Board School, came over the bridge, and most rudely asked Ortheris what he was doing.
‘Me?’ said Ortheris. ‘Ow! I’m waiting for my C’mission. Seed it comin’ along yit?’
Mullins turned purple and passed on. There was the sound of a gentle chuckle from the glacis where Learoyd lay.
‘’E expects to get his C’mission some day,’ explained Ortheris. ‘Gawd ‘elp the Mess that ’ave to put their ‘ands into the same kiddy5 as ’im! Wot time d’you make it, sir? Fower! Mulvaney’ll be out in ’arf an hour. You don’t want to buy a dorg, sir, do you? A pup you can trust – ‘arf Rampur by the Colonel’s grey’ound.’
‘Ortheris,’ I answered sternly, for I knew what was in his mind, ‘do you mean to say that –’
‘I didn’t mean to arx money o’ you, any’ow,’ said Ortheris. ‘I’d ‘a’ sold you the dorg good an’ cheap, but – but – I know Mulvaney’ll want somethin’ after we’ve walked ’im orf, an’ I ain’t got nothin’, nor ’e ’asn’t neither. I’d sooner sell you the dorg, sir. ‘Strewth I would!’
A shadow fell on the drawbridge, and Ortheris began to rise into the air, lifted by a huge hand upon his collar.
‘Onnything but t’ braass,’ said Learoyd quietly, as he held the Londoner over the Ditch. ‘Onnything but t’ braass, Orth’ris, ma son! Ah’ve got one rupee eight annas ma own.’ He showed two coins, and replaced Ortheris on the drawbridge rail.
‘Very good,’ I said; ‘where are you going to?’
‘Goin’ to walk ’im orf w’en ’e comes out – two miles or three or fower,’ said Ortheris.
The footsteps within ceased. I heard the dull thud of a knapsack falling on a bedstead, followed by the rattle of arms. Ten minutes later, Mulvaney, faultlessly dressed, his lips tight and his face as black as a thunderstorm, stalked into the sunshine on the drawbridge. Learoyd and Ortheris sprang from my side and closed in upon him, both leaning towards him as horses lean upon the pole. In an instant t
hey had disappeared down the sunken road to the cantonments, and I was left alone. Mulvaney had not seen fit to recognize me; so I knew that his trouble must be heavy upon him.
I climbed one of the bastions and watched the figures of the Three Musketeers grow smaller and smaller across the plain. They were walking as fast as they could put foot to the ground, and their heads were bowed. They fetched a great compass round the parade-ground, skirted the Cavalry lines, and vanished in the belt of trees that fringes the low land by the river.
I followed slowly, and sighted them – dusty, sweating, but still keeping up their long, swinging tramp – on the river bank. They crashed through the Forest Reserve, headed towards the Bridge of Boats, and presently established themselves on the bow of one of the pontoons. I rode cautiously till I saw three puffs of white smoke rise and die out in the clear evening air, and knew that peace had come again. At the bridge-head they waved me forward with gestures of welcome.
‘Tie up your ‘orse,’ shouted Ortheris, ‘an’ come on, sir. We’re all goin’ ’ome in this ‘ere bloomin’ boat.’
From the bridge-head to the Forest Officer’s bungalow is but a step. The mess-man was there, and would see that a man held my horse. Did the Sahib require aught else – a peg,6 or beer? Ritchie Sahib had left half-a-dozen bottles of the latter, but since the Sahib was a friend of Ritchie Sahib, and he, the mess-man, was a poor man –
I gave my order quietly, and returned to the bridge. Mulvaney had taken off his boots, and was dabbling his toes in the water; Learoyd was lying on his back on the pontoon; and Ortheris was pretending to row with a big bamboo.
‘I’m an ould fool,’ said Mulvaney reflectively, ‘dhraggin’ you two out here bekaze I was undher the Black Dog – sulkin’ like a child. Me that was sodgerin’ when Mullins, an’ be damned to him, was shquealin’ on a counterpin for five shillin’ a week – an’ that not paid! Bhoys, I’ve tuck you five miles out av natural pivarsity. Phew!’
‘Wot’s the odds as long as you’re ’appy?’ said Ortheris, applying himself afresh to the bamboo. ‘As well ‘ere as anywhere else.’
Learoyd held up a rupee and an eight-anna bit, and shook his head sorrowfully. ‘Five miles from t’ Canteen, all along o’ Mulvaaney’s blaasted pride.’
‘I know ut,’ said Mulvaney penitently. ‘Why will ye come wid me? An’ yet I wud be mortial sorry av ye did not – any time – though I am ould enough to know betther. But I will do penance. I will take a dhrink av wather.’
Ortheris squeaked shrilly. The butler of the Forest bungalow was standing near the railings with a basket, uncertain how to clamber down to the pontoon.
‘Might ‘a’ know’d you’d ‘a’ got liquor out o’ bloomin’ desert, sir,’ said Ortheris gracefully to me. Then to the mess-man: ‘Easy with them there bottles. They’re worth their weight in gold. Jock, ye long-armed beggar, get out o’ that an’ hike ’em down.’
Learoyd had the basket on the pontoon in an instant, and the Three Musketeers gathered round it with dry lips. They drank my health in due and ancient form, and thereafter tobacco tasted sweeter than ever. They absorbed all the beer, and disposed themselves in picturesque attitudes to admire the setting sun – no man speaking for a while.
Mulvaney’s head dropped upon his chest, and we thought that he was asleep.
‘What on earth did you come so far for?’ I whispered to Ortheris.
‘To walk ’im orf, o’ course. When ’e’s been checked we allus walks ’im orf. ’E ain’t fit to be spoke to those times – nor ’e ain’t fit to leave alone neither. So we takes ’im till ’e is.’
Mulvaney raised his head, and stared straight into the sunset. ‘I had my rifle,’ said he dreamily, ‘an’ I had my bay’nit, an’ Mullins came round the corner, an’ he looked in my face an’ grinned dishpiteful. “You can’t blow your own nose,” sez he. Now, I cannot tell fwhat Mullins’s expayrience may ha’ been, but, Mother av God, he was nearer to his death that minut’ than I have iver been to mine – and that’s less than the thicknuss av a hair!’
‘Yes,’ said Ortheris calmly, ‘you’d look fine with all your buttons took orf, an’ the Band in front o’ you, walkin’ roun’ slow time. We’re both front-rank men, me an’ Jock, when the Rig’ment’s in ’ollow square. Bloomin’ fine you’d look. “The Lord giveth an’ the Lord taketh awai, – Heasy with that there drop! – Blessed be the naime o’ the Lord.”’ He gulped in a quaint and suggestive fashion.
‘Mullins! What’s Mullins?’ said Learoyd slowly. ‘Ah’d taake a coom-p’ny o’ Mullinses – ma hand behind me. Sitha, Mulvaaney, don’t be a fool.’
‘You were not checked for fwhat you did not do, an’ made a mock av afther. ’Twas for less than that the Tyrone7 wud ha’ sent O’Hara to Hell, instid av lettin’ him go by his own choosin’, whin Rafferty shot him,’ retorted Mulvaney.
‘And who stopped the Tyrone from doing it?’ I asked.
‘This ould fool who’s sorry he did not shtick that pig Mullins.’ His head dropped again. When he raised it he shivered and put his hands on the shoulders of his two companions.
‘Ye’ve walked the Divil out av me, bhoys,’ said he.
Ortheris shot out the red-hot dottle of his pipe on the back of the hairy fist. ‘They say ‘Ell’s ‘otter than that,’ said he, as Mulvaney swore aloud. ‘You be warned so. Look yonder!’ – he pointed across the river to a ruined temple – ‘Me an’ you an’ ‘im’ – he indicated me by a jerk of his head – ‘was there one day when Hi made a bloomin’ show o’ myself. You an’ ’im stopped me doin’ such – an’ Hi was on’y wishful for to desert.8 You are makin’ a bigger bloomin’ show o’ yourself now.’
‘Don’t mind him, Mulvaney,’ I said; ‘Dinah Shadd won’t let you hang yourself yet awhile, and you don’t intend to try it either. Let’s hear about the Tyrone and O’Hara. Rafferty shot him for fooling with his wife. What happened before that?’
‘There’s no fool like an ould fool. Ye know ye can do anythin’ wid me whin I’m talkin’. Did I say I wud like to cut Mullins’s liver out? I deny the imputashin, for fear that Orth’ris here wud report me – Ah! You wud tip me into the river, wud you? Set quiet, little man. Anyways, Mullins is not worth the throuble av an extry p’rade, an’ I will trate him wid outrajis contimpt. The Tyrone an’ O’Hara! O’Hara an’ the Tyrone, begad! Ould days are hard to bring back into the mouth, but they’re always inside the head.’
Followed a long pause.
‘O’Hara was a Divil. Though I saved him, for the honour av the Rig’mint, from his death that time, I say it now. He was a Divil – a long, bould, black-haired Divil.’
‘Which way?’ asked Ortheris.
‘Wimmen.’
‘Then I know another.’
‘Not more than in reason, if you mane me, ye warped walkin’-shtick. I have been young, an’ for why shud I not have tuk what I cud? Did I iver, whin I was Corp’ril, use the rise av my rank – wan step an’ that taken away, more’s the sorrow an’ the fault av me! – to prosecute nefarious inthrigues, as O’Hara did? Did I, whin I was Corp’ril, lay my spite upon a man an’ make his life a dog’s life from day to day? Did I lie, as O’Hara lied, till the young wans in the Tyrone turned white wid the fear av the Judgment av God killin’ thim all in a lump, as ut killed the woman at Devizes?9 I did not! I have sinned my sins an’ I have made my confesshin, an’ Father Victor knows the worst av me. O’Hara was tuk, before he cud spake, on Rafferty’s door-stip, an’ no man knows the worst av him. But this much I know!
‘The Tyrone was recruited any fashion in the ould days. A draf’ from Connemara – a draf’ from Portsmouth – a draf’ from Kerry, an’ that was a blazin’ bad draf’ – here, there, and ivrywhere – but the large av thim was Irish – Black Irish. Now there are Irish an’ Irish. The good are good as the best, but the bad are wurrse than the wurrst. ’Tis this way. They clog together in pieces as fast as thieves, an’ no wan knows fwhat they will do till wan turns informer an’ the gang is bruk. But u
t begins agin, a day later, meetin’ in holes an’ corners an’ swearin’ bloody oaths an’ shtickin’ a man in the back an’ runnin’ away, an’ thin waiting for the blood-money on the reward papers – to see if ut’s worth enough. Those are the Black Irish, an’ ’tis they that bring dishgrace upon the name av Ireland, an’ thim I wud kill – as I nearly killed wan wanst.
‘But to reshume. My room – ‘twas before I was married – was wid twelve av the scum av the earth – the pickin’s av the gutther – mane men that wud neither laugh nor talk nor yet get dhrunk as a man shud. They thried some av their dog’s thricks on me, but I dhrew a line around my cot, an’ the man that thransgressed ut wint into hospital for three days good.
‘O’Hara had put his spite on the room – he was my Colour-Sargint – an’ nothing cud we do to plaze him. I was younger than I am now, an’ I tuk fwhat I got in the way av dhressing-down and punishmint-dhrill wid me tongue in me cheek. But it was diff’rint wid the others, an’ why I cannot say, excipt that some men are borrun mane an’ go to dhirty murther where a fist is more than enough. Afther a whoile, they changed their chune to me an’ was desp’rit frien’ly – all twelve av thim cursin’ O’Hara in chorus.
‘“Eyah!” sez I, “O’Hara’s a divil and I’m not for denyin’ ut, but is he the only man in the wurruld? Let him go. He’ll get tired av findin’ our kit foul an’ our ‘coutrements onproperly kep’.”