CHAPTER XV
_The Lair_
Carlin appeared to get right again in a few days of quiet after herterrific experience on Mitha Baba. There were a few more wonderfulweeks for Skag and herself in the Malcolm M'Cord bungalow inHurda--weeks always remembered. Then Skag undertook a little adventureof his own that had to do with Tiger. He was away seven days in alland made no report of the thing he had done to his department. He cameback with a deeper quiet in his eyes and told no one but Carlin whatthe days had shown him. Skag never was at his best in trying to makewords work. He was slow to explain. He had been hurt two or threetimes in earlier days, trying to tell something of peculiar interest tohis work and finding incredulity and uncertain comment afterward. Thismade the animal trainer more wary than ever about talk.
But Carlin required few words. Carlin always understood. She didn'tpraise or fall into excesses of admiration, but she understood, and theolder one gets the dearer that becomes. Carlin didn't advise with Skagwhether she should speak of the matter. She merely decided that herold friend, Malcolm M'Cord, Hand-of-a-God, deserved to be told. Thesilent Scot knew much about animals and this was an affair that wouldstand high in his collection of musings and memories. M'Cord observed,in a Scotch that had suffered no thinning in thirty years of India,that if he hadn't known Hantee Sahib he would be forced to pass byCarlin's report as an invention, though a "fertile" one. It was M'Cordwho decided that Government should get at least a private account ofthe affair.
A remarkable tiger pair had operated for several years in the brokencliff country stretching away toward the valley of the Nerbudda beyondthe open jungle round Hurda. As mates they had pulled together soefficiently that the natives had started the interminable process ofmaking a tradition concerning them. These were superb youngindividuals and not man-eaters, for which reason Hand-of-a-God had notbeen called out to deliver the natives; also on this account Skag hadbeen interested from the beginning.
Their lair had never been found, but they had been seen together andsingly over a ranging ground that covered seventy miles and containedseveral dejected villages. Once, hard pressed for game, the male tigerhad entered a village grazing ground and made a quick kill--on therun--of one of the little sacred cows--a tan heifer much loved by thepeople. The point of comment was that the tiger had spared the boy; infact, the young herder had been unable to run so rapidly as his littledrove, which was lost in a dust cloud ahead of him. The tiger hadactually passed him by, entered the drove, knocked the heifer down andstood over it as the boy circled past.
There were no firearms in the village, so that the natives did notventure close in the falling darkness. It was evident next day,however, that the tiger had not fed on the spot of the kill. It wassupposed that the female had come to help him carry away the game.
Also, this was the same tiger pair that had leaped an eight-foot wallsurrounding another village, made their choice of a sizable bullock ina herd of ordinary cattle, and actually helped each other drag thecarcass over the wall and away--a daylight raid, this, witnessed fromthe shadows of several village huts.
So the stories went, but nothing monotonous about them. Often formonths at a time no villager would sight the tiger mates. It waspositively stated that there were no other mature tigers within thevicinity: that is, within the seventy-miles range. The pair had beenknown to bring up at least three litters; but the young had been drivenat the approach of maturity to outlying hunting grounds, as had beenall the weaker tigers of the vicinity.
Now the report came into Hurda that an English hunter had wounded thebig female. Another report followed that the Englishman had killed themale and wounded the female. The hunter himself did not appear inHurda; nor was a trophy hide recorded anywhere. Skag heard the twostories. Thinking over the affair, he called Nels for a stroll in theopen jungle toward the Monkey Glen.
To the American there was a pang about the hunter's story. He wasaltogether unsentimental, but wild animals had to do with his reasonfor being and there was his fixed partiality for tigers. Theuncertainty about the story troubled him. This was the time of yearfor kittens and it was seldom far from his mind that these parents werenot man-eaters. The stories of the hunter were indefinite. The thingworked upon Skag as he walked. The thought of finding the motherlesslair and bringing in a hamper of starving young occurred to him as asane performance, but not one to speak about. Also his servant,Bhanah, reported Nels superbly fit for travel and adventure.
The animal trainer rode the elephant, Nut Kut, into one of the villagesin the tiger-ranging grounds and left him in charge of the mahout,saying that he might be gone two or three days and that he was out fora ramble among the waste places of the valley. Skag took merely ahaversack, a canteen, light blanket and a hunting belt, carrying aknife and a six-shooter but no rifle. Nels actually lost his dignityin enthusiasm for the excursion, and they were miles away from avillage and hours deep in an apparently leisurely journey before hesubsided into that observant calm which was his notable characteristic.
This light travelling, with none other than the great hunting dog,brought him back a keen zest of appreciation and memories of early daysamong the circus animals, and his first adventures in India withCadman. Moreover, there was a fresh mystery that had to do with Carlinafter Skag's first supper fire afield. He had always resented the factthat it was straight out-and-out pain for him to be away from the placeshe had made in Hurda. Suffering of any kind to Skag was a sign ofweakness. He had dwelt long on the subject.
The mystery of that first night out had to do with the fact that Carlinseemed to be near. He had known something of this before, a flash atleast, but nothing like this. There wasn't the pain about separationhe had known aforetime. It was as if the miracle he had longed for hadcome--some awakening of life within himself that was quick to herpresence even at a distance and cognisant that absence was illusion.Carlin's uncle, the mystic of the Vindhas, had told him that there weremysteries of romance that had to do with separation as well as withtogether, and that real mates learn this mystery through the years.To-night Skag found to his wonder that the mystic had spoken the truth.
He cooked the supper joyously and shared it with Nels, talking to himoften and answering himself for the Dane. The camp was in the open andthe night was presently lustrous with stars. There was a sense ofwell-being, together with his fresh delight in the unfolding secret ofCarlin's nearness, that made him enjoy staying awake. Nels was wakefulalso--as if these moments were altogether too keen with life to wastein sleep.
"It's just a ramble, old man. We'll be about it early," Skag saidtoward the last. "We may find what we're after and we may not. In anycase we'll live on the way."
That was Skag's old picture of the Now; making the most of theever-moving point named the Present.
"And I'm expecting great things from you, my son--an altogether newbrand of self-control--if we find what we're out after. I don't mindtelling you that it's Tiger, Nels--tiger babies possibly--littleorphans just grown enough to be demons and just knowing enough not tobehave."
Nels woofed.
"Half-grown tiger cubs are apt to be a whole lot meaner than theirparents," Skag went on. "Wild--that's the word. They haven't senseenough to be careful or mind enough to be appealed to. I think that'ssomething of what I mean to say."
Skag was taking more pains to explain than he would to a man. Nelsdidn't get it--didn't even make a pretense. He knew what Tiger meant,but so far as he was concerned that subject had been dropped somemoments since. He had listened intently to the point in which Tigerceased to be the topic--sitting on his haunches. Then he dropped tohis front elbows, and as Skag's voice trailed away he rolled quietly tohis side, keeping himself courteously awake.
There was silence. Skag's eyes were far off among the blazing Indianstars.
"We'll manage 'em together," he added sleepily. The next day theywandered--rough desolate country in burning sunlight. It gave theimpression that the wh
ole surface crust of earth had been burned to awhite heat ages ago. Low hills with clifflike faces; shallow nullahsused only a month or two a year to carry the monsoon deluges to theNerbudda; the stones of the river bottoms bone-white--everywhere sparseand scrubby foliage with dust-covered leaves. There was no turf inthis stony world except the sand of the hollows and the wind eddiedmost of these spaces like water, quickly covering all tracks. It wastoward the end of the afternoon that Nels first intimated a scent.
Tiger of course--that was Nels' orders--but it wasn't fresh. Skag gavethe Dane word to do the best he could and followed leisurely. The bigfellow worked with painful care for more than an hour before he becamesure of himself; then his speed quickened, following a dry nullah atlast, for several miles. The dark was creeping in before they came toa deep fissure among the rocks where the empty waterway sunk into apool which was not yet dry. Skag and the Dane drank deep; then the manfilled his canteen, with the remark:
"We'll camp a little back, not to obstruct the water hole. All trailsend here. To-morrow morning we'll get fresh tiger scent if we're inluck. But I wonder what we're trailing?"
It was a fact of long establishment among the villages that only theone mated pair worked this section of the country. According to one ofthe stories of the English hunter, the male tiger had been killed andthe female wounded--in which case what was this? Certainly there wasnothing to indicate that the scent was left by a wounded tiger. Othersmight have doubted Nels' discrimination, but Skag scouted that in hisown mind. The Dane knew Tiger. It was as distinct and individual tohim from the other big cats as the voices of friends one from another.
Nels was said to have met Tiger in battle before he came to Skag, butit was no purpose of his present master to give him a chance now. Itwas established that several of the great Indian hunting dogs hadsurvived such meetings. Malcolm M'Cord declared that a veteran in thecheetah game would show himself master in any ordinary tiger affair.
They were tired and sun drained. Skag laid down his blankets in theearly dusk and there were hours of sleep before he was awakened by thedifferent activities at the water hole. Nels apparently had been awakefor some time, studying the separate noises in a moveless calm. Skagtouched his chest affectionately. A panther or some smaller cat hadjust made a kill among the rocks above the pool, yet Nels' hackles hadnot lifted in answer to the bawl of the stricken beast.
"Spotted deer possibly," Skag muttered. Then he added to the Dane:
"You're an all-right chap to camp with, son. You'd sit it out aloneuntil they brought the fracas to our doorstep rather than disturb afriend's sleep. That's what I call being a white man."
Skag always thought of Cadman as the unparallelled comrade for fieldwork. In fact, he had learned many of the little niceties of the openfrom the much-travelled American artist and writer--finishedperformances of comradeship, a regard for the unwritten things,reverence for those rights which never could be brought to the point ofwords, but which give delicacy and delectation to hours togetherbetween men. Skag never ceased to delight in the silence andself-control of the Dane. The dog rippled and thrilled with all thefundamental elements of friendship and fidelity, but his big bodyseemed able to contain them with a dignity that endeared him to the onewho understood. Bhanah's work in the training of this fellow wasnothing short of consummate art.
Breakfasting together, Skag refreshed Nels' mind with the work of theday--that it meant Tiger, that all lesser affairs might come and go.The big fellow was up and eager to be off, before Skag finishedstrapping his blanket roll. There was rather a memorable moment ofsentiency just there. Skag was on one knee as he glanced into Nels'face. His own powers were highly awake that minute, so that heactually sensed what was in the dog's mind--that they must go down tothe pool for a look before moving on. The thing was verified a momentlater when Nels led the way down into the dim ravine to the margin ofthe water.
Tiger tracks--full four feet on the soft black margin of the pool--ahuge beast, unmarked by any toe scar or eccentricity. Long body,heavy, a perfect thing of his kind. It was as if the tiger had stoodsome moments listening. Yet the natives declared that only the matedpair operated in this range and the hunter was said to have killed themale. If these were the tracks of the tigress she certainly was notbadly hurt. There wasn't the overpressure of a single pad to indicateher favouring a muscle anywhere. And this couldn't have been the trackof anything but a mature beast--the finished print of a perfectspecimen.
"That hunter didn't tell it all, Nels, or else he didn't do it all,"Skag remarked. "We started out to find a sick tigress and a hamper ofneglected babies. I'm not saying we won't find that much. The thingis, we may find more."
Nels was already five yards away across the pebbly hollow, waiting forSkag to follow along the ravine. Not a sign of a track that human eyecould detect after that--straight, dry, stony nullah bed, deeplyshadowed from the narrow walls and stretching ahead apparently formiles. At least it was cool work; the sun would not touch the floor ofthe fissure for hours yet. Nels never faltered. His pace graduallyquickened until Skag softly called. The Dane would remember forfifteen or twenty minutes, when Skag, again finding that he had to stepuncomfortably fast to keep up, would laughingly call a check. The manwas watching the walls and the coverts of broken rock, and Nels' speed,if left alone, altogether occupied his outer faculties.
It was eleven in the forenoon and Skag reckoned they must be close tothe Nerbudda when Nels halted--even bristled a bit, his broad blackmuzzle quivering and held aloft. Skag came up softly and stood close.He touched his finger to his tongue and drew a moist line under hisnostrils, trying to get the message that Nels was working with soobviously. Presently an almost noiseless chuckle came from the man,and he touched Nels' shoulder as if to say that he had it too. Thething had come unexpectedly--the faintest possible taint of a lair.
They would have passed it a hundred times if it had not been for thescent. The silence was absolute and the walls of the fissureapparently as unbroken as usual. No human eyes would have noted thewear of pads upon the stones, and one had to pass and look back to seethe cleft in the walls of the ravine, far above the high-water mark,which formed the door of significant meaning for the man. Nels hadn'tseen this much, but he couldn't miss now. He nosed the pebbles againand made an abrupt turn to the right. They climbed to the rocks nearthe entrance. The taint was unmistakable now--past doubt a bone pileof some kind in there--and Nels had followed Tiger to the door.
Skag sat down upon a stone a little below and mopped his forehead, witha smile at the Dane. For ten minutes he sat there. He thought of thefirst time he had ever entered a tiger cage as a mere boy, way back inthe Middle West of the States, travelling with the circus. A boredshow tiger in that cage, and he had blinked unconcernedly at the boy.Years of circus life had atrophied that tiger's organs of resentment.Miles and miles of the public stream had passed his cage with awe,speculating upon the great cat's ferocity. Skag had merely to learnafter that, the trick of it all--that one's perfect self-control notonly soothes but disarms most normal beasts. Skag had cultivated suchself-control in recent years to a degree that made him the astonishmentof many Hindu minds. India had shown him that the attainment of thissort of poise is a stage of the same mastery that the mystics are outafter--to gain complete command of the menagerie in one's own insides.Hundreds of times after that, night and day, in storm, in sultryweather, Skag had entered the cages of all kinds of animals in alltheir moods.
His first adventure in India came back, when with his friend Cadman hehad fallen into the pit trap and the grand young male tiger had tumbledafter them. Skag had prevailed upon the nervy Cadman to sit tight andnot to shoot, against all that the writer man knew; also he hadappeared to prevail upon the tiger to keep his side of the pit untilthey were rescued. And now Skag recalled the big tiger that had lainon the river margin near the Monkey Glen while he had told Carlin thathe had never really seen what a woman was like before. The
presence ofthe big sleepy cat down among the wet foliage had nerved him and calledout all his strength for that romantic crisis.
He thought of the moment under the poised head of the great serpent inthe place of fear in the grass jungle; and of the coming of Nut Kut,the incomparable black elephant, whom he had forced to listen in spiteof the red hell in the untamable eyes. Always between and in andround, his thoughts were of Carlin--her voice, her presence, thecurious art of her ministration and the utterly wise lure of her heart.Even now he couldn't quite be calm under the whip of memory of theafternoon of the cobra fight. The whole panorama might have been namedCarlin so far as Skag was concerned.
He didn't think of his own danger now. It wasn't that he ignored it;rather that he had entered upon a new dimension of his power. He hadno thought of failure. No thought came to him that Carlin would haveprevented his entering had she been near. This was different fromanything he had ever been called to do, but his power was different.The thing that engaged his mind was utterly clear from every angle. Hecouldn't have missed the novelty from the unusual stress of Nels'manner. The big Dane was actually burning with excitement. His eyeswere filled with firelight and back of the smoky burning was a dumbappeal turned to his chief. Hyenas alone had been able to break Nels'nerve for himself, but he was frightened now for the man. The big bonyjowl was steadily pressed like a knuckled hand against Skag's knee, thebody only half lifted from the dry stones and cramped with tension.
Skag's eyes were turned up toward the mouth of the lair and his lefthand fell to the Dane's head. The beast actually shook because hiseyes were covered a second.
"Of course you're to stay outside, Nels," he said softly as he rose.
The dog lowered his breast to the stones. It was like a blow tohim--the one thing he had feared most.
"Don't, Nels!" the man muttered. "You're to stand at the mouth of thelair and watch there. I need you there--outside, of course."
The dog followed him heavily up the slope past the high-water mark.Skag turned with a cheering whisper, shielding his eyes from the lightfor a moment before peering in. There was a sound like blown paperacross a marble floor and then another sound--low, soft, prolonged,like the hiss of escaping steam.
Skag shoved himself into the narrow, rocky aperture. He could seenothing for the moment. The taint was oppressive at the first breathof the still air. There were kittens--no doubt of that. He heardtheir scurrying; he felt their eyes and the sort of melting panic inthe place that would have utterly unstrung any but a perfectly keyedset of nerves.
It was a cave, the mouth higher than the floor. The way down wasjagged and precipitous. Skag, advancing softly, had to feel for eachstep and yet give no distracting attention to keep his footing, for thefull energy of his faculties was directed ahead.
The sound of blown paper was from the kittens--that was clear enough.Yet the hissing continued and this was the mystery of it all--thatthere appeared to be no movement besides. If this sound came from thetigress, at least, she had not stirred to meet him.
The hiss sunk to a low guttural grating. No cub had a cavernousprofundity of sound such as that. Still there was not the stir of amuscle, so far as his senses had detected.
Skag was puzzled. Big game before him, possibly nerved to spring, andyet the tensity was not like that. The man stood still, waiting forhis eyes to adjust to the darkness--waiting for the mystery to clear.Then to the right, like a little constellation suddenly prickingthrough the twilight, Skag saw a cluster of young stars. His heartwarmed--kittens hunched there in a bundle and watching him. Theirpricked ears presently shadowed somewhat from the blacker background;then he saw the little party suddenly swept and overturned, as if along thin arm had brushed them back out of reach of the intruder.
Now his eyes turned slightly to the left and began to get the rest--thegreat levelled creature upon the darkened floor. Skag kept hisimagination down until his optic nerves actually brought him thepicture. The long thin sweep was the mother's tail, yet she was notcrouched. Skag saw her sprawled paws extended toward him. She layupon her side.
Thus it was that he was rounded back to the original proposition. Hehad found the lair of the wounded tigress and her young. For fully twominutes Skag stood quiet before her, working softly--her hiss changingat slow intervals to the cavernous growl. The kittens were too youngto organise attack--the tigress was too maimed for resistance, eventhough at bay in lair with her kittens to defend.
Now the man saw the gleam of her eyes. She had followed his movementsand was holding him now, but half vacantly. The pity of it all touchedhim; the rest of the story cleared. Her tongue was like a blown bag,the blackness of it apparent even in the dark. She was dying ofthirst, the bullet wound in the shoulder turned up to him. The littleones were still active, for the tigress had fed them until her wholebody was drained. He saw how her breast had been torn by the thirstylittle ones--the open sores against the soft grey of her nether parts.Skag backed out. Nels pressed him--half lifted his great body insilent welcome.
"Oh, yes," Skag was saying, "we got the call, all right, my son. Fourlittle duds in there eating their mother alive, and she full of feverfrom a wound--no water for days. I'm just after the canteen, Nels."
Skag entered again. His movements were deliberate, but not stealthy.He spoke softly to the creature on the floor--his voice lower than theusual pitch, yet sinking often deeper still. The words were merenothings, but they carried the man's purpose of kindness--carried itsteadily, tirelessly. The great beast tried to rise as he steppedcloser. Skag waited, still talking. He had uncorked the canteen andheld it forward--his idea being not only that she would smell the waterbut become accustomed to the thing in his hand. Each time he pressed abit nearer she struggled to rise toward him--Skag standing just out ofreach, tirelessly working with his mind and voice. He keenlyregistered her pain and helplessness in his own consciousness and wasunwilling to prolong it, yet at the same time he had a very clearunderstanding of the patience required to bring help to her.
It was fully a quarter of an hour before he bent close, withoutstarting a convulsion of fear and revolt in the huge fevered body uponthe rocky floor. Skag poured a gurgle of water upon the swollentongue, watching the single baleful tortured eye that held his face.The water was not wasted, though not drunk, for it washed away some ofthe poison formed of the fever and the thirst. Skag poured again andfor a second the great holding eye was lost to him and the tongue moved.
Thus he worked, permitting her fear and rage to rouse no answer in kindfrom himself; talking to her softly, luring her out of fury into theenveloping madness of her own great need.
He waited a moment and her tongue stretched thickly to draw to itselfthe water on the rock; then he turned toward the cubs. They scurriedback deeper into the cave. He poured a gill or two of water into ahollow of the rock and returned to the mother. Presently as hemoistened her tongue again, one of the little ones crept forward andbegan to lap the puddle on the rock.
Skag smiled in the gloom. The others were presently beside the babyleader. A few moments later Skag interrupted his ministrations to themother to fill the hollow for the kittens again. All this with lessthan three pints of water--the work of a full half hour as he foundwhen he emerged to Nels and the light.
"It's only a beginning, old man. We've got to get more water. It'sfive hours' march back to the pool where we camped. I'm gambling thatwe're a lot nearer than that to the Nerbudda."
Nels' jubilation was stayed by the unfolding of fresh plans that werenot slow to dawn upon his eager mind. They hastened along the riverbed, continuing in the direction they had come. Skag was in a queerelation, dropping a sentence from time to time. Suddenly he halted.It had occurred to him to recall something his mind had merely notedduring the work in the cave. There was fresh meat there. He had notlooked close, but at least two partly devoured carcasses had lain inthe shadows.
"They were mighty thirsty, Nels," he muttered.
"The mother dying ofthirst, but the little ones were only sultry compared. Yes, they'reold enough to tear at fresh meat. They weren't so bad off and therewas plenty of meat there. Only thirsty," he added thoughtfully.
It was clear to his mind that the tigress had been helpless at leastthree days, possibly four. She could not have brought the game. Therewas one conclusive reason--that the meat was in an altogether too freshcondition to have been brought by the mother before she gave up. Skagwalked rapidly. They did not reach the Nerbudda, but sighted a villageback Horn the river bed after nearly two hours' walk.
They refilled the canteens and procured two water skins besides; also abroad deep gourd which Skag carried empty. The man's difficulty was toescape without assistance. A white man in his position was notsupposed to carry goatskin water bags over his shoulders. The boys ofthe village followed him after the elders had given up, and Skag haltedat last to explain that this was an affair that would interest themvery much--when a teller came back to tell the story; but that this wasthe doing part of the story and must be carried to its conclusion alone.
A little later in the nullah bed he fastened the canteen and the gourdto Nels' collar, but continued to pack the two skins himself--a ratherarduous journey in full Indian daylight with between forty and fiftypounds of water on his shoulders. It was four in the afternoon whenthey neared the mouth of the lair and Nels was drooping again.
"Buck up, old man!" Skag said. "I'll go in for a while with thethirsty ones. Then we'll make a camp and have some supper together."
Skag heard the hiss again as he entered the darkness, and the kittenswere not so still as before. Only a trifle less leisurely heapproached the mother. He knew that any strength that had come wouldonly feed her hostility so far; that a man was not to win theconfidence of a great mammal thing like this in a day. His firstimpulse was to silence the kittens with a gourd of water, but he couldnot bear to make the mother wait.
She raised her head against him as before, but the smell of the watercaught and altered her fury more swiftly this time. Skag saw the glarego out from the great eye as the tortured mouth was cooled; and now thehope grew within him that the tigress might actually be saved. Hetalked softly to her as he poured drop by drop upon her tongue from theside--the little ones pressing closer and closer. Even in theconvulsive trembling that took her body from time to time there was aninflowing rather than the ebb of strength.
Presently he left her long enough partly to fill the big gourd for thebabies. He had scarcely drawn back before the first was at the edge.Lapping was not enough for this infant. He wanted to cover himself;apparently to overturn the dish upon himself. The others helped tobalance the gourd for a moment or two, but the massed effort became toofurious and over it went among them. Skag laughed. Only a portion waswasted, for the kittens followed the little streams on the rock,tonguing them as they moved and filled. He tried them again, onlycovering the bottom of the gourd, but it was as swiftly overturned.Still the young had drunk enough presently and went to tearing at themeat in the deeper shadows.
Skag went back to the mother, still using the canteen for her.Alternately now he dropped the water upon the wound in her shoulder.There were hours of work here to soften the fever crust and establishdrainage. Some time afterward this work was stopped abruptly by thewarning of Nels at the door. Skag stood his canteen against a rock andhurried forth. Nels stood at the mouth of the lair, his head turned upthe river bed. His eyes did not alter from their look of fixity as theman emerged. The shoulder nearest Skag merely twitched a trifle, theleft paw lifting to the toes. Skag followed the Dane's eyes.
The great male himself stood stock-still in the centre of the riverbed, the carcass of a lamb having dropped from his mouth. So strange,so vast and still, the picture, that it seemed dreamlike; the great,round, sunny eyes unwinking--serious rather than savage--a dark-bandedthing of gold in the ruddy gold of late afternoon.
Skag was silent, the magic of the moment flowing into him. Nels hadnot moved. Skag had been forced to walk round him to find room tostand. They faced the big Bengali together for an instant, the man'shand dropping softly to the dog's shoulder.
"The king himself, son," Skag whispered raptly. "He's the loveliestthing in stripes. We'll have to look out for this fellow, Nels.There's no fear in him. We're on his premises and the missus is sickand needs quiet. He's apt to charge, and I can see his point of view.We'll back down, son, and not obstruct the gentleman's door."
They couldn't have been three seconds clambering down the rocks to thenullah bed, yet the male tiger was twenty feet nearer when they lookedup. Moreover, he had brought the lamb with him, and this time he keptit in his mouth as he watched.
"We mustn't let him see our dark side again, Nels," Skag muttered."See if we can't stare as straight as he does. God, what a picture!Yet I'm rather glad he's got that lamb. He must have brought it far.Carrying out her orders doubtless. Only a great male would do that.Oh, it's not that he cares for the babies, Nels. It's to please herthat he does it! And she's down and done, but running the lair!"
So Skag talked, hardly knowing what he said, keeping in touch with Nelswith his hand and holding the eyes of the royal beast that seemed to bemade of patience and poise and gilded beauty. Skag didn't step back,but presently to the side, away from the mouth of the lair. Thetiger's counter movement was not to lessen the distance between themthis time, but to drop to his haunches, still holding his game. Herocked a little on his hind feet, that ominous undulation whichportends the charge. Not more than ten seconds passed and no outwardchange was apparent, yet there was a relief of tension in Skag's voice.
"It's the little lamb that saved us that time, Nels. I think we'vepassed it--passed the crisis, my boy. We'll just stand by now andmeasure patience with him."
It was two minutes before Skag ventured a further movement to theright. The tiger made absolutely no counter this time. Skag now spoketo Nels:
"You're doing beautifully, son."
The dog had stood by like part of himself. The droop and the quiverthat he had known twice that day when the man disappeared into the lairhad given way in the real test to unbreakable nerve and defiant heart.Yet it was less the courage than his absolute obedience that enteredthe man with a charge of feeling that instant. A minute later Skagtook another ten steps to the right.
In the deeper shadows, less than an hour afterward, he struck a matchto the little supper fire a hundred yards up the slope from the mouthof the lair. Skag then loosened his hunting belt, dropping the weightfrom him to the blanket with a sigh of content. The hardware hadchafed him all day and had only been really forgotten in the stressesof action.
"I didn't pack that gun for tiger," he said softly. "Why, I would assoon have shot our good Arab, Kala Khan, or put a bullet between NutKut's eyes, as to stop that big fellow bringing young mutton home--toplease her! Won't Carlin love to hear that! Oh, yes, it's been a day,son, one more day! I've loved it minute by minute, and you'vebeen--well, I can't think in words, when it comes to that."
The big fellow drowsed in the firelight, his four paws stretched evenlytoward the man.
In the morning and afternoon of the next two days Skag brought water tothe tigress and bathed her shoulder long. On the third day he couldnot be sure that the male had left the lair until late afternoon, andwhen he finally ventured to the mouth and his eyes grew accustomed tothe darkness within he saw that the tigress was watching him from thedeeper shadows--not prone, but on three feet.
He filled the gourd and weighted it with stones; then backed out.
"We're starting for Hurda to-night, son," he said to Nels. "I've lefther a drink or two, and by the time she needs more, she'll be able toget to the river herself."
Carlin must have caught the reality of that moment of crisis fromSkag's telling--the moment when the male tiger might have charged butdidn't, because she succeeded in making Malcolm M'Cord see it, too.
"And you say there was no
sign from the tiger, but that Hantee Sahibknew when the instant was past?" the famous marksman repeated curiously.
Carlin nodded.
"But how did he know?"
"Ask him," she said.
"Huh," he muttered. "I might as well enquire of the Dane beastie."
CHAPTER XVI
_Fever Birds_
Carlin had been listless for a day or two. This was several weeksafter her forty-two hours on Mitha Baba. They were still living inMalcolm M'Cord's bungalow. Skag woke in the night, not with a dream,but rather with a memory. He was broad awake and recalled an incidentthat had entirely escaped his day-thoughts for a long time. It had todo with that hard-testing period, just after his meeting with Carlin,when he had journeyed to Poona to confer with the eldest brother,Roderick Deal, and had been forced to wait more than a month. In thatinterval he had learned about hyenas at first hand, through the plightof Beatrice Hichens and the children; also his servant Bhanah had cometo him, and the Great Dane, Nels; still it had been a vague stretch ofdays, in retrospect.
It was during the return-trip to Hurda that the thing happened whichheld him now as he lay broad awake. Toward twilight, as the trainhalted at one of the civil stations, a white-covered cot was liftedaboard. There was a kind of silence about that station. The mountainswere near on the left hand which was to the West. The white glare ofIndian day had softened into delicate rose. A haze of orange andbronze lay upon the lower slopes of the mountains, magically enrichingthe greens; and the blue against which the mountains were contoured,was pure and immense and still. It was difficult to remember the fretand pain and discolouration of a world bathed in so vast a peace. . . .
At first he thought that the body on the cot was in its shroud. Thehush about it and from the mountains touched him with a feeling that hehad not quite known before, the depth of it having to do with Carlin.Then he saw, back of the natives who had lifted the cot, yet not toonear, the figure of an Englishman of the Military--standing quietly by,as if casually ordering a platoon of soldiers in the duty of loadingthe train. Now Skag looked at the man's face. It had nothing to dowith the lax grace of the officer's figure. This was the face of a manwho could endure anything without a cry--a narrow face, tanned and abit hard possibly from years of self-repression--a silent man,doubtless loved for the _feeling_ around him, rather than because ofwhat he was accustomed to say or do--a face stricken now to the vergeof chaos--unchanging anguish of fear and loneliness and sorrowimprinted from within. A strange white glow, that had nothing to dowith the tan, shone forth from the skin--etheric disruption, subtlerthan the breakdown of mere cells. This man would put a bullet in hisbrain if pressed too far, but he would not cry out. Just now he wasclose to his limit.
Skag knew something of what passed in the English officer's heart,because he himself was learning what love means. Before his hour withCarlin in the afterglow, on their way back from the monkey glen, hewould never have dreamed that there was such feeling in the world; infact, he would have been unable to read the vivid story of it in theofficer's face. . . . So much in a second or two.
The cot had been partly lifted into the coach. The face now wasuncovered--the white wasted face of a lovely woman, a woman stillliving; an utterly delicate face, telling the story of one who hadnever met a rough impact from the world. It was as if there had alwaysbeen a strong hand between her and the grit and the grind ofworld-affairs--first her father's and then the lover's. In the greatsilence, the eyelids opened. It seemed that night and chill hadsuddenly come in. The lips moved. The most mournful and hopelessvoice spoke straight into Skag's eyes:
"Oh, won't you please stop those fever birds!"
Skag supposed it an isolated sentence of delirium. He didn'tunderstand. There was a drive of drama or tragedy back of it, but hismind did not give him details. He did not see the English officeragain. He did not know if he entered the train. One thing Skag knew:Deep under that narrow masculine face there was a capacity for feelingthat this officer's men never saw; that his closest associates neversaw. The American reverenced the secret. . . . Sometimes during thehushes of the night, when the train stopped for a moment, Skag lyingawake, heard the voice of the woman. There was a feeling from itutterly strange to him. It carried him out of himself, as if he sharedsomething of her delirium and something of the man's agony.
The next day was one of the hardest that Skag ever lived, for Carlinwas not at Hurda to meet him. She had gone with a strange elephantinto the country. That was the day of the chase on the great youngelephant Gunpat Rao, the day in which the story of the monster Kabuliunfolded. The face of the man at the mountain station and the sentenceof the woman were completely erased from his surface consciousness, asthe memory of an illness.
That was months away, and life had been very full in between. . . .
Carlin said she was just tired, when he went to her room in themorning. She looked at him long. It suddenly came to him vaguely,that she wasn't thinking; rather that her eyes were merely turned tohis face. A queer breathlessness came to him a little later, as herhead rolled to one side--such a sinking of weakness in the movement.It reminded him with a shock that she had never seemed quite tirelesssince that long ride on Mitha Baba's neck. But never before had herface turned away from him.
And now he saw a certain inimitable loveliness of her. There were nowords to describe the last--only that it was Spirit made of all thedusks and all the white fires. There was something little about herthat called an undreamed-of tenderness; and something superb andmysterious, so vast that he could be held in it like a toy in the hands.
Burning Indian day was walled and curtained and barred from the placewhere she lay. White of the walls, white of her face, white of thepallet--the rest a breathless, ungleaming shadow that held a heat notfrom the sun, as it seemed, but from the centre of the earth.
. . . Skag was away in timelessness and an unfamiliar space. Thisspace was not fixed to one dimension, but moved back and forth. AsBhanah came to him, he saw more than Bhanah animate upon thefeatures--like someone who had belonged always, whom he had known forages, whom Carlin had always known. So many things struck himdifferently now; as if they belonged not just to this crisis, but to acrisis of eons.
Yet externals in the main were so trifling. Carlin didn't eat; peopleseemed to take that as significant. Malcolm M'Cord came. MargaretAnnesley came. Horace Dickson's father came. Skag went to the bazaarsand back again. He went to the monkey glen. It was all a blur. Oncehe caught himself walking on the great Highway-of-all-India; and oncedeep in the jungle. He passed the civil surgeon of Hurda on his ownverandah; and someone said that the old "family doctor" was to comefrom Poona. . . . Now he was in Carlin's room and Carlin was lookingat him. He saw her face the moment he entered the room, and the factthat he had come in from the fierce daylight into the shadows did, notseem to blur his eyes, even for a second.
Her people in the room--Bhanah, the ayah, the civil surgeon, Ian Dealand someone else--but the line from her eyes to Skag was not crossed.The heart of the man leaped from what he saw--the transcendentunderstanding which needed no words; the look of all looks that meant_herself_--a little lingering smile on the lips, the endless lure ofher wise eyes.
But all that was whipped away as he came three steps nearer her couch.The wonder of it was not taken, but the old pain returned; rather, thepain had been there all the time, but he had forgotten for a space. Hesaw the ashen and frail face again and the inexpressible weariness ofher eyes, too tired to tell of it, too tired to stay! Then the face ofthe English officer appeared for his eyes--hovering back of the people,in a background of mountains. . . .
Carlin seemed listening. What she heard came out of a grey intolerablemonotony; but still her eyes held his. They seemed concentrated uponsome weakness of his nature--some dementia that had been before her foryears, that had confronted her in every highway of life, frightenedaway every opportunity and spoiled every day. Her hand lifted justslight
ly, the palm turned toward him:
"Oh, won't you please stop those fever birds?"
. . . Then one day Skag, standing in the darkened library, heardMargaret Annesley and one of her friends speaking together in theverandah.
"But does she really hear anything?" the friend asked.
"Oh, yes; though you never hear them unless you are ill with the fever."
"How strange and terrible, and is it a particular fever?"
"Jungle fever, dear. It comes to us sometimes of itself, but moreoften after a shock. . . . Carlin's night in the dark--"
Skag's arm lifted in a curve to cover his face as if from a blow. . . .Yet Margaret Annesley was not quite right; for he had learned to hearwhat Carlin heard:
From far away very faint, curiously thin tones came to him; alwaysrepeating one word, with an upward inflection, like a question. Everyrepetition sounded the fraction of a degree higher than the last, tillthey were far above the compass of any human voice:
"Fee-vur? fee-vur? fee-vur? fee-vur? -- -- --" and on and on.
When it began, quite low, he heard infinite patience in it; gradually,it grew full of fear; then it climbed into a veritable panic of terror.
When it stopped at last, on a long distracted "u-u-u-r-r-r-r?"--heheard the male bird's answer, sounding nearer, in deep tones of utterhopelessness, with a prolonged descending inflection:
"Bhoo-kha-a-a-r-r-r! bhoo-kha-a-a-r-r-r! bhoo-kha-a-a-r-r-r!"--theIndian word for fever, repeated only three times. Then the femalebegan again; so, day and night--night and day.
After he had once heard it, he could always hear it. So he learnedthat they never rest. Always, by listening, he could hear it at somepoint of its maddening scale--its insane assurance of the hopelessnessof jungle fever.
Skag faced the ultimatum. This was different. It had nothing to dowith his world of animal dangers. This was a slow devouring which hecould not touch nor stay. _Carlin was melting before his eyes_. . . .The brothers had come in, one by one, from over India. (MargaretAnnesley had attended to that.) Skag met them, moved quietly about,yet could not remember their faces one from another. He answered whenspoken to, but retained no registration as to whom he had spoken, orwhat had been said. Sometimes he was alone for a few moments withCarlin; and when her eyes were open he was appalled by the growingsense of distance in them. Then before she spoke, he would hear whatshe heard:
"Bhoo-kha-a-a-r-r-r! bhoo-kha-a-a-r-r-r! bhoo-kha-a-a-r-r-r!"
There were queer rifts of light in his mind, instants when he realisedthat all the hard moments of the past had prepared him for this. Hesaw clearly that he could not have endured, even to the present hour,without every experience life had shown him--especially without thedifficult ones. He lived again the great moments--all the Indianafterglows that were identified with Carlin--perfect lessons of mercyshe had taught him, through the very yearning of his own heart in herpresence to be worthy of days with her. Never useless words fromCarlin, but always the vivid meaning. He had been slow at first to seehow much more magic were their days together, because she paid for themwith a night-and-day readiness to go forth to the call of service toothers.
Yet through all, he was utterly, changelessly desolate. Not onlybitterness, but an icy bitterness, was upon all meaning and movement oflife. It was almost like a conspiracy that no part in ministration wasdemanded of him by those who were now in his house. The doctors talkedto Miss Annesley or to the servants; the brothers came and went withtheir fear and fidelity--but spoke to Skag of other things than theillness. Still, in his heart a concept slowly formed--that he hadsomething which Carlin needed now; that this something had to do,though it was different, with the power he used to change animals. Itseemed absurd even to think of this--with all these wise ones aroundhim, not perceiving it. They formed a barrier of their thoughts whichkept him from expression. He stood apart for hours as the days passed,thinking of his part; and yet the icy bitterness held him from action.
Sometimes his heart seemed dying; chill already upon it. Again heseemed filled with a strange vitality, other than his own. Thisphenomenon frightened him more than the first, so that he would hurryto look at Carlin lest the strength had come from her. He tried to_think_ the strength back to her; to think all his own besides; butthere was no drive to his mind-work because he did not have faith inhimself.
At length came the night when the fever birds ceased for Carlin. Outof a great soft depth of tone which no one but Skag had heard before(which he had thought no other would hear until there was a baby in herarms), her words came with unforgettable intensity:
"Oh, the jungle shadows! The jungle shadows!"
After that he did not know whether it was night or day, until he heardthe end of a sentence from the doctor from Poona:
". . . only four hours left to break the fever."
The room was in great still heat--heat of a burning night, a smotheringheat to the couch from a distant lamp--the fire of the day coming upfrom the ground like flashes of anger. . . .
A strange stillness was settling on everything; the silence before hadnot been so heavy. The old family doctor from Poona came into it; andMargaret Annesley stood by him near the bed.
"Carlin has not spoken for more than an hour," Skag heard her tell him.
It seemed long before he answered:
"She has passed too far down into the shadows. She will not speakagain."
The words came to Skag as if through limitless space; but the last onespenetrated deep and laid hold.
Margaret went out swiftly and the doctor followed. He looked a very,very old man--with his head bent, like that.
. . . She will not speak again!
The universe was falling into disruption.
It was all white where she lay. Only the heavy masses of her darkhair, spread on the pillows and across one shoulder, showed anycolour--shadowed gold, shadowed red.
. . . She will not speak again!
Seven tall men filed into the room before Skag's eyes, and ranged oneither side of her. These were her own brothers. Skag felt the vaguepang again, of being alien to them.
Roderick Deal, the eldest--the one with the inscrutable blackness ofeyes--leaned and kissed the white, white forehead; and a fold of thesplendid hair.
One figure had gone down at the lower end of the bed--long armsstretched over her feet--slender dark hands clenching and unclenching.The detail of it cut into Skag, like a spear of keen pain throughchaos. Returned away--it was intolerable.
. . . An arm fell about Skag's shoulders.
"Brother?" Roderick Deal's fathomless eyes drew Skag's and held themwhile he spoke: "We are leaving you to be alone with her--at the last!"
The arm gripped as he added:
"You are to know this--we will not fail you, now!" and he was gone.They were all gone.
Faint tones of the fever bird, ascending, came from far out. Othertones, descending, came from greater distances within. . . . She willnot speak again!
Bhanah touched his sleeve.
"My Master!" The man's nearness of spirit, as he spoke, vibrated intoSkag and roused him to something different, something clearer. "Amystic from the Vindha mountains has but just reached this place. Theyare very powerful, having great knowledge. This man is blood-kin toher. Give me permission and I will call him."
Skag looked into Bhanah's eyes, finding the ancient friendship there;then he said only one word:
"Hurry!"
Bhanah leaped away across the lawn and Skag turned to stand by Carlin'sside.
The silence seemed absolute now; the whiteness absolute. He rememberedthat she had gone down into shadows. He bent his head toward herbreast and looked down.
. . . Sense of time was gone--even the endlessness of it. Sense ofwhiteness was gone. His vision wakened, as he groped through deepeningshadows, on and on--till they turned to utter blackness. In that utterblackness appeared a thread of pure blue; he traced it back up till itentered Carlin's body. Ther
e, it was not blue any more, but a faintglow of high white light centred in her breast and shed--likemoonlight--through all her person.
The heart of his heart called to her. . . . There was no answer.
. . . He became aware that a tall slender man stood at his side; but itdid not disturb him. The man wore long straight robes of camel's hair.The sense of him was strength. At last he spoke:
"Son, why do you call to her? She cannot come back--of herself. Youcannot fetch her back."
"Why?" breathed Skag. "I ought to be able to."
"No," the man said kindly, "you are not able to--I am not able to--nocreated being is able to."
The man emphasised the word created.
"What can?" Skag asked.
"First you must learn not to depend on yourself; then you must knowsomething of the law."
The man was holding one hand out, above Carlin's head--quite still, butnot close, while he spoke. Skag felt his strength more than at first.
"Do you want her for yourself?" he asked.
Skag looked into his kind dark eyes--his own eyes speaking for him.
"Do you want her for her own sake--because she loves you? Is it thatyou have knowledge what will be best for her? Did you create her--didyou prepare her ultimate destiny, do you even know it?"
"I know that I am in it!"
Skag answered very low, but with conviction. His eyes were agonised;but the man bored into them, without relenting.
"Do you want her to come back from the margin of departure, for thesake of others--for the sake of her ministry to their need?"
The answer to this last question came up in Skag--waves on waves,rolling into engulfing billows.
"That answer may avail!" the man said conclusively. "If it isaccepted--if your love for her is perfect enough to forget itself--ifyou are able to make your mind altogether inactive--"
"Then how shall I work--if not with my mind?" Skag interrupted.
"First know that you yourself can do nothing." The man spoke withsoft, slow emphasis. "No created being has power to do that kind ofwork."
"What has?" Skag asked.
"A Power that we are not worthy to name," the man answered, withreverence. "If it accepts your reason why she should stay--if yourlove is found to be without tarnish of self--it will work herrestoration; not otherwise.
"Make yourself still. Give your mind to the apprehension of hernature--till your mind has come to be _as if it were not_. . . .Peace!"
The man dropped his head a moment, before he moved to stand at the foodof her bed. With his eyes on her face he leaned, laying his palms overher feet; then, seeming to float backward to the wall, he sankslowly--to sit as the Hindus do.
The sense of his strength seemed to fill the whole room. It was thelast outward thing Skag was aware of.
. . . It was as if Skag had passed through eons of ages trying to putaway all the tender yearning anguish of his love for Carlin. He cameto know her as a beneficent entity of high voltage--needed in more thanone place.
It must be that he should make it possible for her to serve here, morepotently than there--else she could not be held back. With all hisstrength, he would try.
"Son," the mystic's voice rang out, "now give yourself to your love forher--with your strength!"
Presently a warm glow flowed up into Skag's feet, filling his personand extending his physical sentiency into her body. That body wasutterly bound in a strange vise--very heavy; as if every particle ofevery part were separately frozen.
. . . It seemed to Skag as if he could not breathe.
"Breathe!" the mystic said, as he rose from the floor to stand on hisown feet.
That instant an impact of force from him struck Skag like a blow; andthe next moment his sense of strength had become like that of twentymen--it was hard to bear.
"Steady--slow!" It was a soft, but imperative order.
Gradually the warmth increased; not in degree, but in the rate of itsflow. At last it was a surge, so intense that Skag could feel his ownblood-pulse--a different kind of pulse.
The need of help was very great. There was a faintness--surely moreterrible than any death!
"Fear not!" the mystic called tenderly. "The Supreme Power cares forher--more than you can!"
As he heard these words, a great tide rose up into Skag, penetratinghis body and his mind and the uttermost deeps of his consciousness. Avast sweeping tide--it descended below all depths, it ascended aboveall heights, it compassed all reaches. It was ineffablelove--transcendent. It was for her! But it was for him--too! Nay--itwas for every living thing in this mortal condition and in all otherconditions!
. . . Carlin turned her head a little, lifted one hand a little andsighed deeply. Then she moved till she lay easily on one side, justmurmuring:
"I think I'll sleep."
Carlin had spoken again!
"Son" (the mystic spoke very softly, while he drew Skag to a largecouch in the same room), "it is finished. She is altogether safe now.You should be this far away; stretch yourself here and give yourself tosleep also--it will be best for her if you do.
"Be at perfect rest--there is no fear. (I will give Bhanahdirections.) Now--Peace be on thee; and on thy house, forever!"
His words permitted no answer. He went and smiled down on Carlin. Hetouched her forehead with his finger-tips--he even kissed her curlinghair.
"Child of my brother's love!" he said softly, as he turned away.
Then Skag also slept.
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