BY WORD OF MOUTH.
Not though you die to-night, O Sweet, and wail, A spectre at my door, Shall mortal Fear make Love immortal fail-- I shall but love you more, Who from Death's house returning, give me still One moment's comfort in my matchless ill.
Shadow Houses.
This tale may be explained by those who know how souls are made, andwhere the bounds of the Possible are put down. I have lived long enoughin this country to know that it is best to know nothing, and can onlywrite the story as it happened.
Dumoise was our Civil Surgeon at Meridki, and we called him "Dormouse,"because he was a round little, sleepy little man. He was a goodDoctor and never quarrelled with any one, not even with our DeputyCommissioner, who had the manners of a bargee and the tact of a horse.He married a girl as round and as sleepy-looking as himself. She wasa Miss Hillardyce, daughter of "Squash" Hillardyce of the Berars, whomarried his Chief's daughter by mistake. But that is another story.
A honeymoon in India is seldom more than a week long; but there isnothing to hinder a couple from extending it over two or three years.This is a delightful country for married folk who are wrapped up in oneanother. They can live absolutely alone and without interruption--justas the Dormice did. These two little people retired from the world aftertheir marriage, and were very happy. They were forced, of course,to give occasional dinners, but they made no friends hereby, and theStation went its own way and forgot them; only saying, occasionally,that Dormouse was the best of good fellows, though dull. A Civil Surgeonwho never quarrels is a rarity, appreciated as such.
Few people can afford to play Robinson Crusoe anywhere--least of allin India, where we are few in the land, and very much dependent on eachother's kind offices. Dumoise was wrong in shutting himself from theworld for a year, and he discovered his mistake when an epidemic oftyphoid broke out in the Station in the heart of the cold weather, andhis wife went down. He was a shy little man, and five days were wastedbefore he realized that Mrs. Dumoise was burning with something worsethan simple fever, and three days more passed before he ventured to callon Mrs. Shute, the Engineer's wife, and timidly speak about his trouble.Nearly every household in India knows that Doctors are very helplessin typhoid. The battle must be fought out between Death and the Nurses,minute by minute and degree by degree. Mrs. Shute almost boxed Dumoise'sears for what she called his "criminal delay," and went off at once tolook after the poor girl. We had seven cases of typhoid in the Stationthat winter and, as the average of death is about one in every fivecases, we felt certain that we should have to lose somebody. But all didtheir best. The women sat up nursing the women, and the men turnedto and tended the bachelors who were down, and we wrestled with thosetyphoid cases for fifty-six days, and brought them through the Valley ofthe Shadow in triumph. But, just when we thought all was over, and weregoing to give a dance to celebrate the victory, little Mrs. Dumoisegot a relapse and died in a week and the Station went to the funeral.Dumoise broke down utterly at the brink of the grave, and had to betaken away.
After the death, Dumoise crept into his own house and refused to becomforted. He did his duties perfectly, but we all felt that he shouldgo on leave, and the other men of his own Service told him so. Dumoisewas very thankful for the suggestion--he was thankful for anything inthose days--and went to Chini on a walking-tour. Chini is some twentymarches from Simla, in the heart of the Hills, and the scenery is goodif you are in trouble. You pass through big, still deodar-forests, andunder big, still cliffs, and over big, still grass-downs swelling likea woman's breasts; and the wind across the grass, and the rain among thedeodars says:--"Hush--hush--hush." So little Dumoise was packed off toChini, to wear down his grief with a full-plate camera, and a rifle. Hetook also a useless bearer, because the man had been his wife's favoriteservant. He was idle and a thief, but Dumoise trusted everything to him.
On his way back from Chini, Dumoise turned aside to Bagi, through theForest Reserve which is on the spur of Mount Huttoo. Some men who havetravelled more than a little say that the march from Kotegarh to Bagi isone of the finest in creation. It runs through dark wet forest, and endssuddenly in bleak, nipped hill-side and black rocks. Bagi dak-bungalowis open to all the winds and is bitterly cold. Few people go to Bagi.Perhaps that was the reason why Dumoise went there. He halted at sevenin the evening, and his bearer went down the hill-side to the villageto engage coolies for the next day's march. The sun had set, and thenight-winds were beginning to croon among the rocks. Dumoise leaned onthe railing of the verandah, waiting for his bearer to return. The mancame back almost immediately after he had disappeared, and at such arate that Dumoise fancied he must have crossed a bear. He was running ashard as he could up the face of the hill.
But there was no bear to account for his terror. He raced to theverandah and fell down, the blood spurting from his nose and his faceiron-gray. Then he gurgled:--"I have seen the Memsahib! I have seen theMemsahib!"
"Where?" said Dumoise.
"Down there, walking on the road to the village. She was in a bluedress, and she lifted the veil of her bonnet and said:--'Ram Dass, givemy salaams to the Sahib, and tell him that I shall meet him next monthat Nuddea.' Then I ran away, because I was afraid."
What Dumoise said or did I do not know. Ram Dass declares that he saidnothing, but walked up and down the verandah all the cold night, waitingfor the Memsahib to come up the hill and stretching out his arms intothe dark like a madman. But no Memsahib came, and, next day, he went onto Simla cross-questioning the bearer every hour.
Ram Dass could only say that he had met Mrs. Dumoise and that she hadlifted up her veil and given him the message which he had faithfullyrepeated to Dumoise. To this statement Ram Dass adhered. He did not knowwhere Nuddea was, had no friends at Nuddea, and would most certainlynever go to Nuddea; even though his pay were doubled.
Nuddea is in Bengal, and has nothing whatever to do with a doctorserving in the Punjab. It must be more than twelve hundred miles fromMeridki.
Dumoise went through Simla without halting, and returned to Meridkithere to take over charge from the man who had been officiating for himduring his tour. There were some Dispensary accounts to be explained,and some recent orders of the Surgeon-General to be noted, and,altogether, the taking-over was a full day's work. In the evening,Dumoise told his locum tenens, who was an old friend of his bachelordays, what had happened at Bagi; and the man said that Ram Dass might aswell have chosen Tuticorin while he was about it.
At that moment a telegraph-peon came in with a telegram from Simla,ordering Dumoise not to take over charge at Meridki, but to go at onceto Nuddea on special duty. There was a nasty outbreak of cholera atNuddea, and the Bengal Government, being shorthanded, as usual, hadborrowed a Surgeon from the Punjab.
Dumoise threw the telegram across the table and said:--"Well?"
The other Doctor said nothing. It was all that he could say.
Then he remembered that Dumoise had passed through Simla on his wayfrom Bagi; and thus might, possibly, have heard the first news of theimpending transfer.
He tried to put the question, and the implied suspicion into words, butDumoise stopped him with:--"If I had desired THAT, I should never havecome back from Chini. I was shooting there. I wish to live, for I havethings to do.... but I shall not be sorry."
The other man bowed his head, and helped, in the twilight, to pack upDumoise's just opened trunks. Ram Dass entered with the lamps.
"Where is the Sahib going?" he asked.
"To Nuddea," said Dumoise, softly.
Ram Dass clawed Dumoise's knees and boots and begged him not to go. RamDass wept and howled till he was turned out of the room. Then he wrappedup all his belongings and came back to ask for a character. He was notgoing to Nuddea to see his Sahib die, and, perhaps to die himself.
So Dumoise gave the man his wages and went down to Nuddea alone; theother Doctor bidding him good-bye as one under sentence of death.
E
leven days later, he had joined his Memsahib; and the Bengal Governmenthad to borrow a fresh Doctor to cope with that epidemic at Nuddea. Thefirst importation lay dead in Chooadanga Dak-Bungalow.