CHAPTER IV
AS ESTHER TO AHASUERUS
“Mon ami,
Bon ami,
Je fais mes compliments,
Houp-la-la!
Tr-la-la-la-la!
Je m’enfiche de vos dents!”
OMMONY stepped back into his house humming, and if not devoid of care, inclined to laugh at it. Great-hearted men, forever diving into gloom as the price of greatness, rise and soar the higher for it. Problems lie buried in earth; their hearts are of the empyrean. Ommony again could see his forest enduring for centuries, ripening, reseeding, fulfilling its destiny, as he proposed to fulfill his.
He was more than courteous to Strange; he charmed him. Gone was the feeling of being at the mercy of this invading Visigoth; unnatural restraint went with it, and he made it his business to soften the fall of the tyrant by giving him good entertainment to remember.
If he did have qualms, they had vanished. The means he meant to use were such as Strange provided him. Nor had he any thought of personal gain. At the end of that first day he might have entered the millionaire’s employment almost on his own terms; for it was part of Strange’s pride that he could pick men, and he began to see the unusual characteristics of his host.
Of all the men in India who can weave tales from the entrails of events Cottswold Ommony stands first. His gift is to see below the surface, and interpret; and he sees so much more than camera or microscope, that what he says has a sound of half-humorous prophecy.
All rich men crave amusement, and enjoy the truth if it is handed to them on such terms as let them laugh at it, that being the old court jesters’ secret. And there on the fringe of that forest all the world’s news seemed to come, for Ommony to turn over and subject to scrutiny.
It was not for Strange to know that Ommony stands high in the counsels of the ablest secret service in the world; or that men near the throne send him sealed communications, to be returned with his marginal comment. His duty and pleasure are trees, and they, like his natural gifts, are a nation’s, to be drawn on in emergency.
So Strange learned things that are only guessed at by the politicians, and the days began to pass superbly—the best, almost the only true vacation Strange had had in all his life. He and Ommony, and Jeff Ramsden with the least decrepit of the horses straining under him, explored the forest in all directions, Ommony diverting attention from the trees by telling of ancient races that had once owned cities there.
Whenever Strange became greedy for a stand of timber, it always seemed that they came to an ancient ruin, or the traces of a road, immediately. There Ommony would dismount, to give Jeff’s horse a chance, and would turn imagination loose among such facts as he had garnered, speculating on the ways and manners of nations dead centuries ago.
Strange had about decided to endow a new museum in the West when, on the fifth morning, as Jeff was starting for the stable to take pity on his horse before the day’s work, he stopped in the garden face to face with a fat Bengali babu.
“Chullunder Ghose!” he exclaimed. “You were fired for good and all. What are you doing here?”
The babu was resplendent in new cotton clothing and a silk turban of rainbow hue that would have shamed a peacock, but he sat down in the dust and fanned himself with a palm-leaf. The action was apparently impromptu and induced by the heat; but he seemed aware that in that position a bed of flowers no brighter than his turban screened him effectually from the house.
“You were fired,” Jeff repeated.
“Yes. In moment of wrath deprived of pittance for support of wife and numerous dependents. Said brutality was highly desperate for brutalee. Am in new employment therefore.”
“Oh.”
“Yes indeed.”
“Who’s the unfortunate employer? Mr. Ommony?”
“No sahib, no such luck; yet better luck. This babu is much blessed.”
“Who are you robbing?”
“Immaculate and gorgeous creature, such as queens should envy and the wives of viceroys should imitate, has availed heaven-born self of this babu’s confidential services.”
“What’s her name? Satanita? Jezebel?”
“Ah! All glorious name, if only for a while! How fleeting are life’s pseudonyms for spiritual facts! Sahib, pray desist! I said confidential services!”
“You see my boot?” demanded Ramsden.
“Sahib, yes—emphatically; but desist! I must see Mr. Ommony. Instructions are”
“He’s on the veranda.”
“Yes, and three dogs. Krishna! Here is one of them! Sahib, call the brute off!”
Diana came and sniffed at the babu, only restraining open enmity on Jeff’s account. Chullunder Ghose shrugged himself into the smallest space possible, covering his bare legs with folds of clothing. His toes twitched in his sandals.
“I am fearful! Yow! What evil incarnated into thee?” he demanded, scowling at the dog.
Jeff scratched his chin. Past experience of the babu warned him; however, the house and the problems were Ommony’s.
“Fetch your master, Di!” he ordered; and Di went off at a bound.
“Oh excellent!” exclaimed the babu. “Sahib, the embodiment of homage—thus!”
He blew into his right hand and made a gesture as if throwing the result at Jeff, who grinned at him.
“Ah! Smiles! This babu makes salaam of much appreciation!”
He bowed to the dust.
“What has Di found?” demanded Ommony, appearing down the path. “Snake? Leopard tracks?” he hazarded. “Oh. No, I can’t employ a babu. Sorry. You may get food from the servants and sleep one night in the go-down, if that’s convenient.”
“Am overwhelmed by courtesy! Sahib, graciously consent to listen to me! Lend me your ear.”
“I’m listening.”
“Sahib, this babu is not Mark Anthony! Publicity, the breath of all things temporal, is very well for politicians, but for me, unopulent and pitiable babu that I am”
“All right. Come up to the veranda.”
“And spill beans! Sahib, I can say no in seven languages. Will one suffice?”
Ommony glanced sidewise, but Jeff had already taken the hint; he strolled to the veranda to keep Strange occupied.
“None can hear now,” said Ommony.
He suspected this man might be of the secret service, that employs the unlikeliest individuals. But there was no signal. The babu, having ascertained by peering around the flower-bed on hands and knees that they actually could not be overheard, made ready to enjoy himself. Eyes, gesture, attitude betokened mystery.
“Mellidrum Isstrange” he whispered.
“What of him?”
“Is here?”
“What of that?”
“She is there!” said the babu, gesturing, thumb over shoulder.
Ommony looked startled, and corrected that too late to spoil the babu’s exquisite satisfaction. However, he made an effort to seem ignorant.
“Who is she?”
“Most gracious of feminines! Amazing woman! Oh! Ah! Wonderful! This enraptured babu brings compliments of Memsahib Zelmira Poulakis to Ommony sahib, who is therefore enviable.”
OMMONY turned his back for a moment to consider. The East can read thought fairly accurately if allowed to watch the thinker’s eyes and face, and it seldom pays to betray concern.
“Is she at the station?” he demanded, turning again suddenly. He had not quite mastered irritation; Zelmira’s move appeared ill-considered, and she a shallow-minded female after all.
The babu almost chuckled, but refrained from prudence. Ommony’s toe was too near, and the dog was just behind him.
“Self am strategist.”
“I asked, where is she?”
“Not so. The sahib asked, is she at the station? She arrived at a station, let us hope. This babu, not having seen his goddess since Sissoo Junction at hour of midnight, train being belated, can only surmise her ladyship’s present whereabouts. Will hazard guess subject to modification by feminine caprice.”
“Where is she?” Ommony demanded sternly.
“This babu, having changed trains at Sissoo Junction, hazards guess her ladyship may now be at Chota Pegu—in direction as thumb points—across forest—guestess of three-gun raja of same ilk.”
Ommony’s face resumed its normal cheerfulness. He had fought the Raja of Chota Pegu to a conclusion long ago, over grazing rights and forest boundary, as victor using his influence afterwards to increase the royal revenue by getting an anachronistic tribute payable by the raja to the central government abolished. In consequence the raja had added an elephant to three that had formed the tripod of royal dignity, and the two men were now as close to being friends as fox might be with badger—mutually tolerant, at least.
“Am intimate in counsels of Raja of Chota Pegu,” said the babu. His air was less of pride than of possession. Ommony instantly suspected blackmail.
“How did Madame Poulakis come by your services?” he demanded.
“Fortunately!” said the babu. “Self was as Yankees say up against it, perambulating Delhi in vain search of occupation for support of wife and numerous dependents. Was shabbiness personified, approaching hotels by back way only, much ashamed. Like Romeo beholding vision of radiant loveliness on hotel upper-floor balcony by moonlight—tourist presumably—too well-dressed in view of income-tax for wife of British officer—sought means of approach to offer services as guide, same being gainful, generally. Was spurned forth from hotel back-entrance by officious Punjabi dipty-steward with soul for sale. Returned and purchased same for one rupee eight anna's, thus obtaining access to upper-landing, whence to glorious creature’s balcony was one step. Climbed over and sat down in deep shadow of potted palm-tree, to meditate.”
“You mean to listen?”
“Same thing, sahib. Recent arrival addressed as Charley, picturesquely indignant at unknown personage named Mellidrum Isstrange, held forth, she protesting with much amusement. In vino veritas; in anger indiscretion, which is better. This babu ascertained much that otherwise finding lodgement among thorns or stones, as in Christian parable, might have been unreproductive. Summoning courage to approach expensive suite of rooms by door in corridor, knocked and offered to tell fortunes. Sahib—glorious sahib—fell, as Yankees have it. Secret of successful fortune-telling is to tell what customer intensely desires to hear. Was omniscient in that respect.”
“I suppose you told her she would marry Mr. Meldrum Strange,” said Ommony, grinning.
“Nay, sahib. I said he will have unmerited but enviable destiny to marry her, thus disarming indignation of Charley sahib and encouraging her ladyship in one breath, wisdom being two-faced, looking both ways.”
“And she engaged you as guide?”
“Nay, sahib; as philosopher and friend, same drawing more emolument. Who can treat friend with parsimony, or philosopher with mistrust? Being deep in confidence of Raja of Chota Pegu, knowing your honor’s reputation—and aware by meditative process aforesaid of your honor’s intention to save this forest from hoppers of Western industry—natural gift for strategy overwhelmed this babu with agenda, naturally. No sleep that night. Self made reservations on morning train. Self sent cryptically worded telegram to Raja of Chota Pegu, giving also letter to sahiba, same flattering him deeply and explaining nothing. Now am here, awaiting your honor’s good will and coagitation.”
“What’s your plan?”
“Not having one, can’t say. Put cat and dog in bag and agitate same. Fight ensues. Pour chemicals together. There is combination. Place parties to problem at strategic intervals. Game begins. It plays itself, with subventitious assistance from all and sundry. Desire, thou seed of Karma, what amusement thou providest for the gods!”
“Where’s Mr. Charley Mears now?” Ommony demanded.
“Escort to her loveliness. Amazing individual! He likes; he loves her not; whereas this babu loves her, and exceedingly dislikes her restlessness, most discommoding to person of portly configuration. Krishna! You should see them dance together in station waiting-room when trains are late! She carries phonograph as baggage.”
“Any message for me?”
“As aforesaid, sahib—compliments.”
“Nothing else?”
“Sahib, compliments are all-embracing. Charley sahib, having sung your honor’s praises, sahiba sits and waits.”
“Um-m-m! Was there nothing about a promise?”
“Much! Am promised old-age competency if affair of heart succeeds.”
Ommony’s face clouded. Long familiarity had made him alert to the Indian trick of obliging the questioner, by strictly defining what he wants to know, to admit the questioned into confidence. Thereafter follows blackmail, subtle or crude as the case may be, but as inevitable as the day that follows night.
“This is unsatisfactory to me,” said Ommony.
Chullunder Ghose, too wise a strategist to fool himself, conceded a reverse.
“There were words this babu did not understand. Incomprehension being cause of mystification of principals—choosing, therefore, discretion as better part of”
“Out with it! You don’t have to understand a message to deliver it.”
“Sahiba said: ‘Say this: I will be as Esther with Ahasuerus!’ ”
“Good!” remarked Ommony, and grinned again. He had a baffling kind of grin. “Get your gossip over with the servants,” he added sarcastically. “They’ll be curious to know all about this.”
“Sahib, in propria persona am dumb discretion, absolutely!”
“Well: if they learn anything I shall know who has told them. Barring that, make yourself at home.”
“Sahib, after light refreshment would prefer to rejoin Fountain of Astonishment at Chota Pegu”
Ommony’s laugh cut the argument short.
“There’s too much at stake for your personal preferences and mine to have any weight at all, babu. Stay here, and confer with me on my return. You understand me?”
“Sadly!”
“Disobey—and deal with me!”
“Sahib, with what reluctance would I do the first! To deal with your honor is a privilege.”
“A privilege that hurts at times!” said Ommony. “All right, stay here and entertain yourself.”
Without pausing to consider what the babu might regard as entertainment, he returned to the veranda.
“Sorry. Urgent business on the other side of the forest. Can you and Jeff amuse yourselves?” he asked Strange. And Strange, with a second tiger to his bag in mind, made departure easy.
SO OMMONY set off on his lean gray pony at a canter, with the staghound careering in advance and the inevitable jungli, rag in teeth to keep the flies out, racing like a black fantom on foot behind. It was part of the honor of those naked forest-men never to let out of sight the one white man who understood them, and whom in part—at times—they thought they understood too.
The forest is long and wide, but Chota Pegu lies on a promontory as it were, projecting far into an ocean of trees. From Ommony’s bungalow to the raja’s palace is hardly forty miles, although by train, including the wait at Sissoo Junction, the journey would take a day and a night. So it was only a little after one that afternoon when the sweating pony steadied to a walk between low houses built from the débris of ancient cities, Diana flopped panting in the shade of a high wall, the jungli followed suit, and Ommony dismounting, hammered with the butt of his riding-whip on a gate so old that the iron studs had rusted themselves loose and shook as the struck wood quivered.
There was a long pause. Then a bell rang, as it does in temples to announce the presence and the service—one clear note and over-tones ascending all the way to heaven. A voice, in which a million years of melancholy seemed to find expression, gave an order, and the flower of the raja’s bodyguard—four men in crimson and yellow uniform—opened the gate with dignity.
Followed interchange of royal courtesy. Ommony, official tyrant and accommodating friend, stood while the army of four presented arms and a bare-legged man with a bugle blew a fanfare, cracked, but creditable since he did his best. Ommony’s right hand went to his helmet-rim in the clean, curt fashion of the West, and then came the rigorously conventional question and reply between him and the turbaned officer, as to health, the crops, the city’s peace, and the probable date of the next monsoon.
It would be ascertained whether his Highness was at home and could give audience. Ommony was offered an ancient stool in the shade of a much more ancient tree, while half the army went to find out what all already knew. Compliments were presented—more salutes; Ommony mounted the indignant gray, who had earned a respite, and rode behind the army up a long drive between old sar-trees, preceded in defiance of all convention by Diana. But the jungli remained in the street; as the descendant of a race that once ruled half the earth, such trumpery was not for him. He was afraid of it. Perhaps the racial memory had made him wise, as it makes wolves wise, with instinct.
Then the palace door, wide open; but ceremony to be gone through first. A great umbrella trimmed with glass was raised over Ommony’s head while he dismounted. Two menials removed his riding-boots and gave him embroidered slippers in their place—a great concession, for custom demands bare feet across the threshold. Shabby, but important men in turbans bowed and walked backwards before him, as the pony was led away and Ommony, leaving Diana at the door, entered into the cool gloom of the palace.
Very little, but too much modern vandalism had crept into that back number of the world’s volumes of changing manners. Except for some Tottenham Court Road furniture ridiculously set between antiquities, the place was as it had been for three centuries, low-ceilinged, stately, down-at-heel, and quiet—with the quietness that the noise of a phonograph emphasised. The thing was playing “Alexander’s Ragtime Band,” and the racket emerged between curtains at a passage-end.
On the right was the door of the durbar-hall, and Ommony was led through that into a room about thirty feet by twenty, lined with teak and polished. There was no furniture; visitors are expected to stand in the presence; but at one end on a red-carpeted low dais, was a gilt and red-silk covered chair of the Napoleonic period, that served for throne. Over that was a tasselled, square umbrella of native embroidery, hung from the ceiling by a wire.
There was a pause then of at least five minutes, for sake of the conventions, Ommony waiting bolt upright in the midst directly in front of the throne, wiping the back of his neck with a handkerchief, because there was no punkah, and through the windows, that gave on to a deep veranda, very little air came in.
Then pageantry awoke. A bell rang, and through a door on the right of the throne came the raja and his whole official family. The raja, without seeming to notice Ommony, took his seat, bowed to by all five radiantly dressed attendants. Two of them took position one on either hand, each armed with a jewelled fan, with which they disturbed the sultry atmosphere; but the other three were evidently of inferior rank and did not set foot on the dais. They stood in line on Ommony’s right hand.
The men with fans whispered to the raja, as if informing him who Ommony might be. He appeared interested, and at last looked up, meeting Ommony’s gaze directly. Ommony bowed low, and the raja nodded.
He was a lean-looking, whimsically-featured man in a yellowish silk suit adorned with a minor British Order (procured through Ommony’s influence). His fingers were covered with valuable rings, but his appearance was not otherwise effeminate. He looked like one who practised more or less asceticism for the profit there might be in it, and cynicism for his own amusement—both practices diluted with a liberal amount of intellectual sensuousness.
“I hope you are well. I am pleased to see you,” he said solemnly in the language of the land, and the whole court of five beamed appreciation of his tact and condescension.
Ommony replied, and for about five minutes there was rigorously regular exchange of question and answer, without one hint of human feeling or a word said that could by any possibility be construed into importance. Then:
“I am glad to have seen you,” said the rajah, and walked out, followed by the court, leaving Ommony standing; whereat he resumed the mopping with his handkerchief. He was used to the business—knew what would happen next. Some minutes later the raja, with the jewels off and a much less ornate suit on, pushed his turbaned head through the door Ommony had entered by.
“Come on, Ommony, old boy!” he called in English. “Are you so fond of ceremonial that you’ll stand there forever? Let’s sit under the punkah in the next room.”
They shook hands in the doorway, and Ommony submitted to be patted on the back.
“Opportune as ever! Always in the nick of time! I’ve a surprize for you!”
The phonograph tune now was “Everybody’s Doing It;” however, Ommony made ready for astonishment. There was a sound of four feet slipping on a polished teak floor; but the wise man, like the adder in the Bible, stops his ears to sounds it isn’t time to hear yet. They went into a room in which comfortable couches and a shuttered twilight set the key-note, with lots of French novels scattered about, and some pictures on the walls that would have hardly passed the U. S. censorship.
They sat down vis-à-vis, and the raja lit a cigaret, waving it airily.
“Ha-ha! Ornmony, old boy, you were never more surprized in all your life than you’re going to be! Downy old dodger! You’re not the only man who can produce the unexpected! What do you think I’ve got here?”
“A new elephant,” suggested Ornmony.
“Pooh! Think again. Everybody’s scandalized. My chamberlain is wondering whether I intend to abdicate! Now guess.”
“A motor-car.”
The raja’s face clouded a moment.
“Not yet. Well, I’ll tell you, for you’ll never guess. A European lady of most exquisite breeding, looks, and attainments! She is teaching me to dance the two-step, and there will jolly well be a revolution in Chota Pegu if I don’t look out! And by jove, Ommony old boy, you know, if I could afford to I jolly well would abdicate. This business of being a petty raja is no fun for a man of any intellect. I would like to live in Europe. Paris appeals to me.”
Ommony assumed an air of sympathy. He knew Chota Pegu’s hold on ancientry, but understood as well that moth-lure of the City of Bright Lights. Chota Pegu’s raja was as obviously fooled as any moon-struck college freshman; but even the freshman survives the experience generally, and India has survived the worst her weakness can do to her. There would be reaction at the proper time.
“Paris is a great place,” he answered guardedly.
“It is, Ommony, it is! Paris is the mother-city of intellectuals. Hah! They understand there the inanity of hypocritical convention! They see through things—live through them, Ommony! The land of Voltaire, Pascal, Rousseau—and delightful women!”
“Is your guest, then, a Parisienne?” asked Ommony.
“By birth, no. She is Greek—true offspring of a race that won at Marathon, and molded the thinking of Rome and all Europe! She knows Paris inside out. We have been speaking of it. She is charming—exquisite! But come and see.”
Gesturing for silence, he tip-toed to a corner, where an ancient, mirrored cabinet stood built into a recess in the solid wall. Searching for a key, he unlocked the central mirror, revealing a deep cupboard, whose back was nothing but the pierced carving of a wall of the room beyond. The entire room was visible, including a phonograph, with its back to a stand of ancient weapons, and Charley Mears winding it. The raja pulled Ommony forward by the coat, and signed to him to peer through.
“Hs-s-sh!” he whispered.
MADAME ZELMIRA POULAKIS was sitting almost facing the aperture, turning over the pages of a guide-book on her lap, and talking over her shoulder.
“No, Charley, no more dancing, it’s too hot. Come and help with this. I can’t find Chota Pegu in the book; if we can’t find something about it we’ll be at the mercy of our own resources, and the fewer they are the more they’ll confuse us. Come on. Come and help me.”
Nobody had too much praised her. Ommony conceded that at first glance. The mystery remained that she was willing to devote herself to the pursuit of Meldrum Strange; but the whole world is full of the unexplainable. If she was thirty, she did not look it. If her past was wrapped in coils of Levantine intrigue, no symptom of it showed. If she was unchaste, Ommoney was unobservant. Mischief sparkled all over her, as brightly as the diamonds on her left hand, but amused, not venomous. If eyes are windows of the soul, as some one says, her merry one looked at the universe through azure panes and liked it all.
The raja closed the cabinet again.
“Did you ever see such eyes, or lips—such hair, or such complexion?” he asked. “Is she not all curves, and suppleness, and lightness? Did you see her ankles? And her wrists? Is her voice not perfect—like the waters laughing at you? And she has money, I imagine; her diamonds surpass mine. Isn’t she wonderful?”
Ommony agreed. It was policy; but besides, there was no use in denying the obvious. But he began to dread the next few days, as sure as that he stood there that the management of a forest and a few score men would be as child’s play compared to partnership in an intrigue with Zelmira Poulakis.
“Ommony, old boy, I’m going to ask a favor of you,” said the raja, button-holing him. “She will introduce me into Parisian society. Can I go there? Can I afford it? Can a capital sum be raised?”
“Your Highness’ subjects are already taxed to about the limit,” Ommony answered warily. Something was coming and he did not care to nip sprouting information in the bud.
“Yes, confound it! They’re not fit to have a raja; they can’t pay for one! I’ve said that frequently. But I have forest-rights, you know. It’s all very well for you to claim control of the forest, and you’ve conserved it beautifully; but the timber revenue from all this section will have to revert to me when it’s time to cut down trees. The shroffs[1] won’t lend on it; they say there’s no knowing when Government will cut, or to what extent my right will be disputed. Now, don’t you think, if you advised it, Government would buy my rights for money down?”
“How much?”
“My rights are worth a lot—lakhs and lakhs of rupees,” said the raja. “I would be reasonable on a basis of money down.”
All governments are capable of anything. Ommony, as an individual, is not to be judged by that standard. But he was no such fool as to answer outright, and so set the raja dickering with shroffs again. He tickled hope, that springs eternal in a raja’s breast as with the rest of us.
“I’ll ask,” he said noncommittally.
“Will you? What a splendid fellow you are! How I wish all Englishmen were like you! Now let me do you a favor and introduce you to the most wonderful woman in the world.”
“One minute first. How is it you are entertaining her?” asked Ommony, and the raja’s face took on that supercilious smile with which the opportunist apes omniscience.
“I have ways and means, old boy, that you don’t dream of. Chota Pegu is older than the British Raj by quite a few centuries, you know. Connections everywhere. Wheels within wheels. You English will never understand how we obtain our ends. Ha-ha! No use asking her, you old fox! She doesn’t know either! She was ‘in maiden meditation fancy free’, as the Psalmist or Shakespeare or somebody says, and a little bird whispered to her. Ha-ha! I knew she was coming to visit me before she thought of it!”
Whereat Ommony looked puzzled, concealing his satisfaction at being in no way connected in the raja’s mind with Zelmira’s visit.
“But isn’t it awfully inconvenient?” he asked. And now he was simply curious.
The raja’s domestic worries were not even indirectly a concern of his. It was only by hearsay that he knew the raja had two wives and quite a nice stable of dancing women; but it is always fun to speculate on how a man contrives to keep the peace in such complicated circumstances.
“I do as I please!” the raja answered after a moment; and in the set lips and studied air of nonchalance was written a whole volume of strife-behind-curtains. But that, again, was no affair of Ommony’s; he was merely glad to know of it; since, to quote a favorite proverb of Chota Pegu, all straws serve the birds at nesting time.
“I’m agog to meet madame,” he said, with an air of playfulness that overlay real dread lest Zelmira should openly confess him an accomplice.
But not she! Her poise was perfect, and she had evidently tutored Charley Mears, whose natural instinct would have been to wear his pleasure on his face at meeting Ommony again. Zelmira glanced at the raja, as if to deduce from his her own proper attitude toward this bearded, stocky-shouldered individual. She did not shake hands—did not attempt to shine in conversation—hardly indeed looked at Ommony; it was only little by little, as an hour went by, that he knew he was being summed up and analyzed from under drooped eyelashes. He confessed to himself that the girl was adorable, and there was an added charm of deep artfulness without any evident malice, that meant more to him than cupid lips or dark, delightful brows.
And that while, with the raja playing half-intoxicated host, they talked of all inanity, like new neighbors at some one’s tea-party. A spy, or an intruder might have guessed them all bored, except the raja. Not the slightest hint was dropped until the raja left the room, and Zelmira’s face became instantly wreathed in smiles. She was about to say something to the point, but Ommony checked her.
“Look annoyed!” he ordered. “You wish the raja was here! You don’t think much of me!”
She registered, and Charley followed suit. Ommony, with forest-trained ears alert, was aware of the cabinet in the wall behind him being opened, and could almost feel the raja’s eyes making holes in the nape of his neck.
“Let me show you my dog,” he suggested, as if he could not think of any other way of entertaining; and, as if even that would be better than a dreary conversation with him, Zelmira jumped up with alacrity. Even so, she played safe.
“What fun! Perhaps the raja will come too. Hadn’t we better wait for him?”
Ommony raised his voice a trifle, and capped the safety.
“No,” he said, “he’s looking up information for me about his claims in regard to the forest. It’ll take him fifteen minutes.”
With that hint for the man behind the spy-hole he led the way out, and they walked three abreast down the long drive, Zelmira in the midst.
“Don’t talk yet,” said Ommony. “People’s backs give more away than they imagine.”
Two hundred yards from the gate in the wall, still in sight from the palace windows, Ommony set fingers to his teeth and whistled shrilly.
“Now watch! The wall’s too high for her, but she’ll try it first.”
Three disappointed, almost piteous barks announced that the whistle had been heard.
“Three shots at it,” he said. “Now watch again. There’s a jungli out there. He’ll stand against the wall. She’ll back across the street and take a running jump, using his shoulders for spring-board. Watch that space between the two trees.”
He whistled again. There was a pause, and then the hound’s paw just appeared above the level of the wall, missed hold, and disappeared as suddenly. A yelp, half-angry now, another pause—then head and shoulders—a yelp of triumph—and the enormous dog came leaping, thrusting her nose into Ommony’s hand and wriggling satisfaction.
“Now,” said Ommony, “we can talk while we fool with Diana. That looks innocent enough.”
- ↑ Money-lenders.