CHAPTER THE NINTH
A Fakir
Ahmed had enlisted in the Guides with two very definite purposes--theone closely connected with the other. The first was, to achievesomething that would establish a claim on the sahibs; the second, toeffect the release of Rahmut Khan, or at least to shorten hisimprisonment. Since the possibility of the second depended on the first,he bent his whole energies, from the moment he donned the khaki, to themastery of his duties. The circumstances of his admission to the corpswere such that many eyes were watching him. Some of the men werecurious; others, Sherdil's friends, were jealous that he should justifythem; the British officers were interested, not merely in observing theresult of the experiment of enlisting one much below the average age,but in the boy himself. There was in him a nameless something thatattracted them, and all of them, from Lumsden downwards, kept a specialeye upon his progress.
He showed himself quick at drill, and at exercise with the sword andlance. Assad had reported quite accurately about the goose-step; butAhmed, so far from feeling any indignity in standing on one foot, foundit amusing to watch the lines of men lifting and setting down their feetlike automata at the word of the officers, and gravely balancingthemselves like herons at a pond. He had nothing to learn in "stables"save some small matters of routine, and in three months passed as athoroughly efficient sowar. Furthermore, he was on good terms with hiscomrades. Sherdil treated him as a show pupil, and one day took anopportunity of asking Lumsden Sahib whether his praise of Ahmed had notbeen well deserved.
"Do you want us to make him a risaldar at once?" said Lumsden, with alaugh.
"The heaven-born knows that I, Sherdil, am not yet a naik," said the manreadily. Lumsden owed a great part of his influence with the men to thefreedom he permitted in his intercourse with them. His attitude towardsthem was that of one brave man to another; it made for mutual respect;yet no man forgot that the commander was a hazur or presumed on his_bonhomie_.
Ahmed was one of the escort that accompanied Lumsden and Sir JohnLawrence to their interview with Dost Muhammed, the Amir of Kabul, atthe entrance to the Khaibar Pass on the first day of the New Year. Hewondered whether Jan Larrens would recognize him, but the great man wastoo preoccupied to notice a trooper. When it became known that inpursuance of the agreement made at that meeting Lumsden was to go beforelong on a mission to Kandahar, Ahmed hoped that he would be chosen amongthe escort on that occasion. Proximity day after day to the Britishofficers would provide him with many opportunities of picking up theirlanguage. But before the time came for the mission to start he hadreason to change his mind.
One evening, as he was passing alone through the Pathan lines of theinfantry, he heard through the kusskuss matting which formed the doorwayof one of the huts, and which had been blown aside for a second by agust of wind, a voice that sounded strangely familiar. It was not thevoice of any of his comrades, and for a moment he could not remember towhom it belonged. Not greatly concerned, he was passing on when herecalled it in a flash; it was certainly very much like the voice ofMinghal, ex-chief of Mandan, and his father's enemy. He paused; if thespeaker was indeed Minghal, what had brought him to Hoti-Mardan? Ahmedwondered whether the defeated chief had heard of his enlistment in theGuides, and had come on his own or Dilasah's behalf to do him amischief. It occurred to him that he might be mistaken; but it was aswell to make sure.
The hut was one of a row, beneath the parapet of the wall, built of mud,and eight or ten feet apart. At first Ahmed thought of creeping up tothe doorway and pushing aside the matting gently so as to get a view ofthe occupants. There was some risk in this, however; he might be seen bythose inside the hut, or by some one passing outside, and then hispurpose would be defeated. So he crept round to the back, trying to finda crack in the wall of the flimsily-built hut, such as were often causedby the shrinking of the mud under the sun's heat. But in this he wasdisappointed. The hut, being close against the wall of the fort, hadbeen defended from the sun's rays. Nothing daunted, he proceeded withhis knife to cut a hole, very gently, as his tribesmen were wont to dowhen stealing horses. He was so dexterous in this that he soon scratchedaway the dried mud until he had made a hole a little larger than hiseye. Then, as he expected, he came upon the straw network with which themud was held together. So far his movements had been almost soundless,but there was a considerable risk of being heard if he cut the strawwhich alone stood between him and the occupants of the hut. Every nowand then a gust of wind came, whistling as it swept between the hut andthe wall. Taking advantage of this slight noise, he inserted the pointof his knife and gently severed the straw until he was able to seepretty clearly the interior of the hut, lit as it was by a smallsaucer-lamp.
The occupants appeared to be three in number. Two of them were Panjabis,whom, being infantrymen, he knew but slightly. In the third he did notrecognize, as he expected to do, the figure of Minghal Khan. It was afakir, with long matted grey hair and a straggling beard. Cold as theweather was, the fakir was almost entirely unclothed; his body wassmeared with ashes.
And then Ahmed blessed the caution which had prevented him from creepingup to the doorway of matting in front. Just behind it, so much in shadowthat Ahmed had not at first perceived him, stood a fourth man, whopeeped through now and again, as if to see that nobody approachedwithout warning. At the same time he lent an ear to the conversationgoing on among his comrades, who were seated, cross-legged, on thefloor. There was something suspicious in the attitude of the man onguard. Ahmed had once or twice lately noticed a certain restlessnessamong some of the Musalman members of the corps. He felt quite sure thatthe men were after no good, and removing his eye from the aperture, heturned his ear towards it The meeting was evidently a secret one, and itseemed to him important to know what was going on. The strangeresemblance of the voice of one of the men to that of his enemy Minghalstill disturbed him, and, as was perhaps natural in the circumstances,he still had a suspicion that he was himself the subject of theirdiscussion; but as he listened, he soon found that they were talkingabout matters far more weighty than the latest recruit of the Guides.
"The Feringhis are attacking our religion," were the first words heheard. "Is it not a time when all good Musalmans should lay aside theirlittle personal quarrels and join hands against the common foe?"
It was evidently the fakir who was speaking, and Ahmed was again struckby the likeness of his voice to Minghal's.
"The time is at hand when all the Feringhis shall be smitten," the voicecontinued. "Why have the infidels enlisted so many followers of Islam intheir army? Why are they making this new cartridge? To turn the sons ofthe Prophet from the true faith."
"Bah!" said one of the group. "The Feringhis' religion has nought to dowith the eating of pigs. They are men of the Book. They eat pigs, it istrue; but that concerns not their religion."
"Foolish one, dost thou not see? This cartridge is smeared with the fatof pigs, and when a true believer bites off the top, as the need is,does he not lose his caste and become a pariah? Will his father speak tohim? Will his brother eat with him? Nay, he loses father, brother, allhis kin; and then the Feringhi comes and says, 'Dog, thou art outcast.Embrace my religion, or thou art friendless in this world as well asdamned in the next.'"
"That may be so, O holy one," said the second man; "but what does itconcern us? We have not the new cartridge of which you speak. Our sahibsare honourable; they would do nothing in despite of our religion;Lumsden Sahib told me when I became a Guide that he would not permit anyman to interfere with that."
"Hai! Remember the saying, 'What is the goat, what is its flavour?' Thegoat can never become a camel, nor can its milk ever taste like thebuffalo's. Your sahibs are kafirs; they hold not the faith; they butbide the time, and then assuredly you will be defiled."
"But didst thou not say that nothing can be done without the help of theaccursed Hindus? I for one will not join hands with the dogs."
"Nay, nay, in this matter Islam and Shiva are at one. The Hindu bytasting the fat o
f the sacred cow, the Musalman by tasting the fat ofthe loathed swine, become alike defiled. The Feringhis are powerful.They are in the saddle. If the Hindus will aid us in tearing them out ofthe saddle, shall we despise their help? Have you not a saying,'Buffalo! though we are not of one mountain, we belong to one thicket'?We Musalmans have our horns in the thicket; shall not Hindus help todisentangle them? When the Feringhis are smitten and sent to perdition,then will be the time for us true believers to deal fitly with the Hindudogs. Will it not be then as it was in the days of the great Shah Nadir?Once more the Afghans, men of your race and faithful sons of theProphet, will pour into the plains and set up a new and gloriouskingdom. Who reigns now in Delhi? Bahadur Shah, toothless, feeble-kneed,a puppet in the hands of the Feringhis, doing nought from sunrise tosunset but invent foolish verses. We will change that; we will restorehim to his dignities, or set up another in his room. As in the old days,every soldier in our host shall become a zamindar. There will be nogoose-step to learn; no useless drill; none of the humiliation ofobeying the commands of the white-faced dogs."
Though the fakir spoke in low tones, there was an intensity in hisutterance that had its effect upon the listeners. This news of thefat-smeared cartridge troubled them in spite of themselves. They hadheard nothing of it before; as a matter of fact, it had not yet beenissued from the factory at Dam-dam; and but for the insolence of aLascar, probably no suspicion of it would have arisen. The Lascar askeda Hindu one day for a drink of water from his brass lotah, which theHindu indignantly refused, since he could not himself use the vesselagain without losing caste. Upon this the Lascar retorted that he wouldsoon have no caste to lose, since he would have to bite a cartridgesmeared with the fat of pigs and cows. The news spread like wild-firethrough the native army; and the terrible fear that the introduction ofthe new cartridge was a cunning device to make them pariahs, acting onsuperstitious minds which had other causes of disaffection, wrought thesepoys to a dangerous state of unrest.
But the fakir, besides appealing to his hearers' religious feelings,appealed also to their cupidity. He knew his men well. Like many of theGuides, they were by nature and training robbers. The prospect ofunlimited plunder fired their imagination, and they received his lastspeech with a grunt of approval. He was quick to seize his advantage.
"Listen, brothers," he said in a mysterious whisper which Ahmed couldbarely catch. "'Tis nigh a hundred years since the Feringhi Clive, thatson of perdition, defeated the host of Siraj-uddaula at Plassey. A holyman foretold that when the evil dominion of the Feringhis had enduredfor a hundred years, it should fade and vanish as a dream. The time isat hand, my brothers. Have I not lately received the sign from the handsof the Maulavi himself, the saint who now goes to and fro to stir thehearts of the faithful? Behold!"
Ahmed turned his eye quickly to the hole, and saw the fakir produce fromhis loin-cloth a chapati--a flat cake of unleavened bread--which hehanded with a solemn gesture to one of the Guides. The man took it asthough it were a sacred object.
"That is the sign chosen by the holy Maulavi Ahmed Ullah of Faizabad.Pass it to your comrades, brother, such of them as are true. I myselfmay no longer stay: I have far to go. Work in silence and discreetly,but with no loss of time. The hour is at hand; no man knoweth when theMaulavi may give the word. The train is laid from Meerut to Calcutta.The prize--wealth in this world and bliss in the world to come--is forhim who leads, not for him who follows, in the blessed work. I willrecord your names, so that the Maulavi may have you in remembrance."
Ahmed had been so intently watching, that, being unable to hear and seeat the same time, he lost part of this address. When he put his earagain to the hole, he could not catch the whispered words. With hisknife he slightly enlarged the opening, and was straining his ears whenhe heard a light footfall behind him. Before he could turn, an arm wasflung round his neck, a hand was pressed over his mouth, and in spite ofhis struggles to free himself he was held there until his captor, joinedby others, securely gagged and trussed him. The man nearest him in thehut had heard the scratching of his knife, and crept out; his companionshad followed him; and Ahmed was a prisoner.
While one of the men was scouting to make sure that nobody approached,the others dragged their captive round the hut and in at the doorway. Ashe entered, the fakir rose to his feet, and a glare of triumph lit hiseyes.
"A spy!" he cried in a whisper. "Allah protects the faithful."
"Shall it be a knife, holy one?" asked one of the men.
"Nay, nay," said another, "a knife means blood on the floor. And howcould we carry him from the lines? Within a little the gun will signalfor 'lights out,' and the gates will be closed. We could not carry adead man without being seen by the sentry. 'Tis easier to carry a manalive than dead."
"But we cannot keep him here," said the third. "'Tis Ahmed, the childwho puts his elders to shame at man's work, and licks the boots of thesahibs. Search will be made for him; the braggart Sherdil, who shareshis hut, will raise a cry when he is missed. This is evil work: he willbetray us."
"Listen to me," said the fakir. "When the gun fires I go. But I willremain without, at the foot of the wall. When the night is far spent, doyou lift him and throw him over the wall. Then will I take him and casthim into the river, and none will know."
"But the sentry!" said one of the men.
"Bah! has he eyes all round? The night is dark; none will see. Brothers,he is a kafir; he is a Feringhi who has come among you to learn yoursecrets and betray you. He shall die. So may all perish that stand inthe way of the faithful."
And then Ahmed knew that the fakir was in very truth his enemy, Minghal.The voice, the glance of hate, the knowledge that he was anEnglishman--all proved that his first suspicion was just. At the fakir'swords one of the men spat upon him; then he was cast to the floor behinda charpoy that lay on one side of the entrance. Another charpoy was onthe opposite side. It was near this that the conspirators had beensquatting. The charpoy behind which he had been flung concealed him fromthe view of any one who should enter the doorway, and one of the men nowplaced the little lamp on the floor near the end of the charpoy, so thata shadow was cast on the place where Ahmed lay.
His hands and feet being tied, and his mouth gagged, the men felt freeto listen to the fakir as he told them their prisoner's history. Ahmedfelt that that history would soon come to an end. Even if a friendshould enter the hut, he was so well concealed that he might escapeobservation. He had no means of giving an alarm; he saw no way ofescape: and when the lights were out and the fort was in darkness, itwould be no difficult matter for the men to do as the fakir hadsuggested. And should the sound of his fall from the wall attract thenotice of a sentry, and bring any one to the spot, he knew that Minghalwould certainly dispatch him even though he should himself be seized. Aknife-thrust would take but the fraction of a second; and Minghal wassuch an adept in cunning that he might make good his escape.
And so he lay helpless while his captors planned how they would lowerhim over the wall by a rope, so that no sound of falling should catchthe sentry's ear. They agreed that they ran a risk; but there wasgreater risk in any other course. To dispose of him was imperative, orthey themselves were doomed. The safest time would be two hours after"lights out," when the sentries had been changed; it would not be manyminutes before the signal gun was fired.
Ahmed tried again and again to think of some way of escaping theimpending doom. If only he could attract the attention of some of hisfriends in the corps, all might be well. He longed that Sherdil, orDilawur, or Rasul, all good friends of his, might be brought by somelucky chance into the hut. There was a possibility that he might thenraise himself above the charpoy and be seen. With all his heart he hopedthat the men would not extinguish the lamp before the signal was given,and he felt that if no help should come while it still burned he waslost indeed.
With the thought of the imminent extinction of the light a wild chancesuggested itself. On the charpoy, close to his feet, was a small bundleof straw which had a
pparently been used as a pillow. It was almostopposite to the lamp. Drawing up his feet slightly, he gently pushed thebundle to the edge of the charpoy. He was careful to move it slowly, forstraw crackles, and he expected that the slight rustle he could not helpmaking would be heard by the men. But if they heard the sound at all,they probably attributed it merely to his uneasy movements. He pushedthe bundle inch by inch until it came to a position where in a fewmoments it must fall over the edge of the charpoy to the floor. Would itfall on the lamp? If it did, would it extinguish the flame? If it didnot extinguish the flame, would it catch light quickly enough to preventthe men from quenching the flame? To all these questions was addedanother: Would the signal gun be fired before anything could be done?
Ahmed saw that the men were so near to the lamp that even if the bundlecaught fire they could stamp out the flames before they made such aglare as would raise an alarm. By some means this must be prevented. Thevery signal he had dreaded lent him aid. The gun was fired. The fakirrose to go. In another moment the lamp would be put out. Ahmed gave thelittle bundle the last tilt necessary to cause it to overbalance, andnext instant he drew his feet up, stuck them under the charpoy, and,suddenly shooting them out, kicked it directly upon the three men, whowere still squatting on the floor, looking towards the fakir as theybade him farewell. The three or four seconds thus gained achieved hisobject. The straw was ignited, a huge flame shot up in an instant to theroof. This, as in all Indian huts, was low. Being made of thatch itcaught fire readily. The hut was ablaze.
For the moment the conspirators were thrown so completely off theirbalance that they knew not how to act. But it soon dawned on them thatthe fire must bring the whole camp down on them; already there werecries from without. The discovery of Ahmed bound, dead or alive, wouldbe fatal to them. They could not get rid of him. Safety lay in flightalone. Barely five seconds after the sudden outbreak of flame theydashed out of the hut, rushed among the men who were flocking up, and inthe confusion made for the gate and disappeared.
But the fakir was not with them. On the point of departing when thestraw caught fire, he too had been dazed for a moment by the suddenglare, and took a step forward to flee. But then he turned, whipped outhis knife, and ran to where Ahmed lay. Ahmed saw him coming, saw theknife in his hand, knew his fell purpose. Quick as thought he wriggledagainst the wall and drew up his knees. Minghal came swiftly towardshim, intent only on his murderous design. Suddenly out shot theprisoner's bound feet; they caught the stooping fakir square on theknees. He reeled back against the loose matting of the doorway, andstumbled against one of the crowd whom the fire had summoned.
The man hurled him aside. He fell and was trampled by the feet ofothers. There were cries all around; some were shouting for water,others were beating at the burning roof with their swords; no one paidheed to the man on the ground. Bruised with kicks he wriggled throughthe press until he came near the gate; then, in full sight of thesentry, he raised his hands and piously besought the aid of Allah tosave the dwellings of the faithful.
Meanwhile the British officers had run up to the scene of theconflagration. First of them was Lieutenant Hawes, the adjutant. The menfell back from him as he pushed his way towards the blazing hut.
"Where are the men?" he cried. "Is any one inside?"
"That we know not, sahib," replied a Gurkha.
"We cannot see through the smoke, sahib," added a tall Afridi; "we arebeating out the flames."
"Idiots!" cried the lieutenant. "Out of the way!"
He rushed through the entrance. The hut was so full of smoke that for amoment he could see nothing. Then he caught sight of a figure againstthe wall: a trooper with his arms crossed on his face to defend it fromthe shreds of burning thatch that were falling. His legs were drawn upto avoid the flames from a charpoy already half consumed. Thinking hewas unconscious, Lieutenant Hawes seized him by the feet and hauled himby main force into the open air.
"Who is it?" asked Lumsden, standing there with Dr. Bellew.
The prostrate trooper moved his arms.
"Ahmed!" cried the adjutant. "You had no business in the hut. Get up!"
Ahmed wriggled, but could neither stand nor speak.
"Let me see," said the doctor, stooping. "Why, God bless me, he isgagged and tied up!"
He slit the cords and removed the gag, and Ahmed got up on his feet. Hewas half suffocated, and his eyes were red, and watering with the smoke.
"There's some devilry here," cried Lumsden. "Bellew, take him to myquarters. Hawes, see that nobody leaves the fort. Some of you men putout the fire and then go quietly to your beds."
The gates were by this time shut. When Lieutenant Hawes asked the sentrywhether he had noticed any suspicious characters leaving the fort, hereplied--
"No, sahib. The last to go before I shut the gate was a holy fakir, whobesought Allah that we might be saved from the fire."