"Why, Sherdil, thy beard has grown since those days. I remember thee well. Come in, and say why thou ridest in garments of so strange a make."

Sherdil rode in, eyed curiously by the crowd of men and boys whom the brief conversation had drawn to the spot. He was a magnificent specimen of a Pathan, tall, handsome of feature, well made, and his horse was a match for him. Dismounting, he led his horse by the bridle and went to pay his respects to the chief.

Sherdil had left the village nearly eight years before, when he was a youth of seventeen. He had been the wildest and most unruly boy of the tribe, always in mischief, showing no respect for his elders--one day he had called a holy sayad "old scaldhead," and laughed when his father thrashed him for it. He had been incorrigibly lazy at school: not all the mullah's thwackings drove into his thick head the sc.r.a.ps from the Koran which formed the greater part of his lessons, and he was always very rebellious at having to fast from sunrise to sunset in Ramzan, the ninth month. But in tent-pegging and racing and sword-play he beat all boys of his age, and indeed many of the men; and when he insisted on joining them in their expeditions, which happened at the age of sixteen, he excelled them all as a highway robber and a horse-thief.

When he was seventeen he ran away, and nothing had since been heard of him. His mother grieved, for he was her firstborn; but his father, having three more sons, was not greatly distressed, for the boy had always been a trouble to him. And now he had come back, grown out of knowledge, with a fine black beard and the look of a seasoned warrior.

His father, a.s.sad, as in duty bound, made a great feast in honour of the returned prodigal. He invited a great number of his neighbours, and regaled them with the flesh of sheep and goats and--this was a great luxury--fowls, and beautifully light chapatis baked by his wife Fatima herself, and luscious sweetmeats made of honey and ghi; but the only drink was water. And having been well fed, Sherdil related the story of his life since he had left s.h.a.gpur--a good riddance, as most of the folk thought.

It was a stirring tale, of wild doings on the borders, among men who kept the pa.s.ses into the hills and lived amid inaccessible rocks, whence they swept down upon unsuspecting travellers and merchants in the plains, and even pushed their forays across the frontiers among the sahib-log. His audience uttered many an exclamation of wonderment and admiration as he recounted his exploits, and you may be sure he did not minimize them. The men about him were robbers and brigands and murderers themselves, but their deeds faded into insignificance beside the bold and desperate adventures of Sherdil. Ahmed, who was among the company, listened with all his frame thrilling. He had a faint recollection of Sherdil as a big fellow who, rough as he was, had treated him with a certain kindness, and had shown him first how to snare a rabbit. And he felt a good deal of envy of this fine stalwart fellow who had seen and done so much.

One story of Sherdil's made the company hilarious. The chief to whom he for a time attached himself--one Dilawur, a native of Jahangia, a village on the Cabul river--heard one day that a wealthy Hindu shopkeeper was to be married. He instantly determined to profit by the bridegroom's happiness. With his men, among whom Sherdil was one, he lay in wait on the bank of the Indus at a place which the Hindu must pa.s.s on his way to the bride's house. When the expectant bridegroom came in sight, all bedizened with wristlets and chains and jewels, the brigands, armed with pistol, sword and dagger, fell upon the party, seized the luckless man, dragged him to the river bank, and thrust him into an inflated cow-hide. Then Sherdil mounted upon this monstrous bladder, and paddled it across the river. When the rest were across, the Hindu was carried away into the hills, and Dilawur's scribe--for he could not write himself--penned a letter to his sorrowing friends, informing them that their relative was well and happy, and would be restored to them fat and jolly for the little sum of two hundred rupees.

"Wah! wah!" said the company in chorus. "And what next, O lion of the hills?"

And Sherdil, whose name means "lion-hearted," chuckled and said--

"Why, did ye ever know a Hindu who would pay a price without bargaining?

And the richer they are, the more they haggle. 'Two hundred rupees? No, no: we cannot afford that. The sickness fell on our goats last winter; we are very poor; our friend is very dear to us, but he will be too dear if we pay that price. We will give a hundred rupees, when we are sure our friend has lost no flesh.' But Dilawur Khan has not the patience of a camel. When he got their foolish answer he sent me with another letter, saying that if the two hundred rupees were not in his hands within seven days, he would strike off their dear relative's head and send it them as an offering of peace; only having been at the expense of feeding him with good fattening food all that time, he would require two thousand rupees as recompense."

"Wah! wah!" shouted the delighted hearers, to whose sense of justice this appealed no less than to their sense of humour; "and what was the answer?"

"Why, the answer was two hundred rupees, full tale, and a present of goats beside. And the Hindu--whom fear and the delay of his marriage had most marvellously thinned--was restored to his home, with good wishes for a long life and many sons--for our sons to pluck likewise."

And in the midst of the laughter this story evoked, one of the guests asked a question--

"But why, O Sherdil, hast thou given up the dress of thy forefathers--the chogah, and the blue trousers drawn in at the ankles, and the sandals? Why dost thou wear this strange garb, like the dust of the plain or corn of the fields in colour?"

"Eha, that is a strange story too," said Sherdil, and he drew himself up. "I am a servant of the sahib-log."

"Hai! hai!" gasped the company in astonishment. "A servant of the sahib-log! the accursed Feringhis! sayest thou, O Sherdil?"

"'Tis true. My coat is the colour of corn, say you? yes, but it is the colour of the lion also. Is not my name Sherdil? A great sahib, his name Lumsden, heard of me; he knows everything; no man who does brave deeds escapes him. Having heard of my great daring in the hills, he sent one to me who had served him long and was as brave as myself, and begged me, if it were not too much trouble, to go and see him. And then he spoke fairly to me: the sahibs are just and speak true; he told me that he had learnt somewhat of my doings, and asked whether it would suit my honour to join a company of warriors like myself--Afridis and Gurkhas, Sikhs and Hazaras, Waziris and even Kafirs, many bloods but one spirit. And before I made my answer he showed me them at their sports, and verily, brothers, never did I see such skill among so many men. I saw them throw the spear at a mark, and doing nazabaze, which is, to fix a stake of a span length in the ground and take it up on the spear's point when pa.s.sing at a full gallop; and, for another sport, putting an orange on the top of a bamboo three spans high, and slicing it through with the sword as they ride by at full speed. 'By my beard!' I thought, 'these are fit mates for me;' and I asked the sahib whether I might try the nazabaze myself. And he allowed me, and when I caught up the stake on my spear point he smote his hands together and said words in his tongue to Hodson Sahib that stood by him, and then he offered me good wages to be one of his men--Guides, they call them. And I agreed, and therefore it is, my friends, that I wear this garb, which being of the colour of earth cannot be seen from afar so clearly as our own garments."

a.s.sad, for the first time in his life proud of this son of his, swelled with gratification.

"Well did I name thee Sherdil, my son," he said. "But tell us, what dost thou do for the pay these Feringhis--curst unbelievers--give thee?

a.s.suredly it is easy work, or thou wouldst not do it."

Sherdil laughed.

"You ask what we do, my father--we of Lumsden Sahib's Guides. We do what we are bid to do--is not that strange? It is strange to me myself, I own; for I never did what you bade me, father. But with the sahibs--well, that is a different matter. They say, Do this! and we do it, with a cheerful countenance. Canst thou see Sherdil handling a pick-axe? Say we have no water, and the sahib wishes a well to be sunk.

We of the Guides do it, and I, Sherdil, am the most diligent among them.

Say we need bricks to make a wall; the sahib bids us mould the clay and burn it, and lo! the bricks are made. Say the sahib desires to go a-hunting--and a mighty hunter he is, by Allah!--he bids us go into the jungle as beaters, and gives us rounds of ammunition for ourselves. And if we do well in our tasks, he gives us goats and rice, and after the feast we sing songs and make merry."

"But this is not work fit for warriors of the hills," said a.s.sad, looking a little blank. "Dost never fight and steal?"

"To steal is forbidden," replied Sherdil; "it is against the sahibs'

law. But fight!--do we not fight, my father! Didst never hear how we fought at Multan, with Fatteh Khan? And how we took the fort of Goringhar, Rasul Khan being our leader? Lo! I have many tales to tell; they will last the days of my leave. Yes, we fight, when we get the chance. Why, only four days ago we spied a troop of fifty or more hill-men away there in the hills, and we chased them for two days and nights, but they would never stand to take a shot at us, so much are we feared."

Inquiry soon discovered that Sherdil had been among the troops which had kept Rahmut Khan on the run, and loud was his laughter when he learnt that it was his own chief whom they had been chasing. He became serious, however, when he heard of what had befallen the village during the chief's absence, and cursed Minghal Khan with the true vigour of a Pathan. And on being told that no plans had yet been formed for the punishment of the offender, he vowed by the beard of the Prophet that some way should be found before his leave was expired.

Next day he sought an interview with the chief, and had not been in conversation with him more than half-an-hour before Rahmut called his council together and asked their opinion of an enterprise Sherdil had suggested. It won their hearty admiration. One of Minghal's sources of revenue consisted of a tribute levied on traders pa.s.sing to and from Central Asia. Their route lay within a few miles of his village, and, indeed, sometimes they made use of a change-house in it. They usually travelled in bodies of considerable size, and sufficiently well armed to offer a good defence against marauders. But they found it profitable to placate the princ.i.p.al chiefs through whose territories they pa.s.sed by paying a tribute varying with the importance of the chiefs; and the chiefs on their side recognized that their interests were better served by the regular income thus derived than by forays which might or might not be successful, and which would ultimately have the effect of scaring away the trade caravans altogether.

Sherdil had suggested that advantage of this fact might be taken to practise a trick on Minghal. He proposed that a small party of Rahmut's men should be equipped as traders, and thus gain admittance to Minghal's village. Then, at night, they might find some means of seizing his tower, and while the village was in confusion Rahmut could attack it with the main body of his men.

The old chief himself, true to his character, was at first reluctant to fall in with this cunning scheme. He pointed out that Minghal's attack on his own tower had failed, and foresaw many possibilities of failure in the proposed adventure. He would have preferred to wait until he could have gathered a sufficient reinforcement to enable him to make a direct attack in force on his enemy. But Sherdil laughed away his doubts; the burden of his reasoning was that against a wily enemy like Minghal, wiles must be employed. And as for the matter of the tower, and a possible failure there, that was not worth considering.

"Minghal had no Sherdil and no Ahmed," he said, with a magnificent gesture. "I, Sherdil, have learnt somewhat from the sahibs, and has not Ahmed the blood of sahibs in his veins? We are more than a match for Minghal, believe me."

Rahmut frowned, and threw an anxious glance at Ahmed when this reference was made to his English birth. This admiration of the sahibs was little to his liking; but he discreetly said nothing of what was pa.s.sing in his mind, and the general opinion being favourable to the scheme, he gave his a.s.sent to it. Then he threw himself keenly enough into the preparations suggested by Sherdil. He declared that if the stratagem was to be attempted, it must be done thoroughly. Any carelessness would invite discovery, and discovery would mean death to those engaged in it.

Sherdil undertook the arrangements. The first step was to select the members of the pretended trading party. Five well-tried warriors were chosen from among those who had accompanied the chief on his recent expedition. Having been absent from the village during Minghal's attack, they were not likely to be recognized by his men when they entered his village. And Sherdil himself begged that Ahmed might be allowed to join the party. To this the chief at first objected. The enterprise was fraught with great danger; Minghal would like nothing better than to get the chief's heir into his hands; and Ahmed, having taken so prominent a part in the defence of the tower, would certainly be recognized. But Sherdil had conceived a great admiration for the part Ahmed had played in resisting Minghal's raid, especially for his exploit in blowing up the powder. He a.s.sured Rahmut Khan that the lad could easily be sufficiently disguised; Ahmed himself pleaded very hard to be allowed to join the expedition; and the old chief at last, bethinking himself that, if successful, it might serve as an additional bond between Ahmed and the villagers and strengthen his consideration with them, gave his consent.

"Go, my son, and G.o.d go with thee," he said, laying his hands fondly on the boy's head. "But come back to me, for I am well stricken in years, and I would fain go to the grave happy, knowing that thou wilt be lord of s.h.a.gpur, and not Dilasah."

CHAPTER THE FIFTH

Reprisals

At sunset of the day on which Sherdil's plan was adopted, the little party of seven set off from s.h.a.gpur in the opposite direction from Minghal's village. Their goal was a small town on the frontier, many miles away, where in the bazar they might obtain the articles necessary to their proper equipment as traders. Sherdil, who had doffed his khaki uniform and a.s.sumed the native dress of his village, thought it best to start at night so as to evade any spies whom Minghal might have placed in the neighbourhood.

The journey was to have a great importance in the life of Ahmed, son of Rahmut Khan. He rode close beside Sherdil all the way, and when they halted at roadside serais for rest and refreshment, those two ate together and squatted or lay side by side. The things of which Sherdil had spoken at his father's feast had fired Ahmed's imagination. Though the impressions of his early childhood had become dim, and the people among whom he had then lived were mere shadows, he remembered that he was of English birth, and Sherdil's words had stirred within him a desire to know more about his own people. In the first days of his life at s.h.a.gpur he had sometimes thought of running away, but he soon found this to be impossible, and of late the desire had quite left him. The old chief, he knew, had saved his life on that terrible day when his real father was killed. That was a tie between them which could not easily be broken. And he had now become so thoroughly imbued with Pathan ideas and customs that he never thought of any other destiny than that of Rahmut Khan's successor. But his contact with a man who was actually in the service of the sahibs had roused within him a curiosity to see the people to whom he rightly belonged, and he plied Sherdil with questions about them.

Further, Sherdil's references to great fights in which the corps of Guides had been engaged appealed strongly to his spirit of adventure, and he pressed the man to tell him more.

"What was that fight at Multan of which you spoke?" he asked, as they took their siesta in the hot hours of the next day.

"Ah! the fight of Fatteh Khan," replied Sherdil. "'Tis a brave tale, and I will tell it thee. 'Twas seven years and more ago. We were in the trenches before Multan. Lumsden Sahib was absent; there were only three sahib officers with us. One day a kasid galloped into our camp with news that a party of the enemy's horse, some twenty strong, had driven off a herd of camels from their grazing near the camp of General Whish. Fatteh Khan was our risaldar, and he called to us to mount and follow him to punish those marauders. We galloped off, no more than seventy, the kasid going before to show the way. And lo! when we had ridden three miles, and came to the place he had spoken of, we discovered, not twenty, but the whole host of the enemy's cavalry, full twelve hundred men. They had been sent, as we learnt, to cut off a convoy of treasure which was said to be on the way to our general's camp; but they failed in this, and were now wending back to their own city.

"Did Fatteh Khan bid us halt and return? That is not Fatteh Khan. Wah!

he cried to us to ride like the wind, and the enemy, seeing us, halted, not knowing what this strange thing might be. And straight through them we rode, with sword and lance, and when we had come out on the other side we wheeled about and clove through them again. Wah! they were like a flock of sheep, witless, huddling together, springing this way and that without any sense. Again we rode into them, though our arms were weary and our horses much spent. And then that great host, crying on Allah to preserve them, broke apart and fled for their lives, and we pursued them up to the very walls of their city. That is one of the deeds of Fatteh Khan with Lumsden Sahib's Guides, of whom I am not the least."

With other stories like this Sherdil beguiled the hours of rest, and Ahmed became more and more eager to do something in emulation of the Guides. Perhaps this expedition on which he was soon to be engaged would provide him with an opportunity; he vowed that if it came he would not let it slip.

Four days later the party of seven was returning. But it presented a very different appearance now. The men had changed their costume so as to appear like peaceable traders. They wore white turbans and long coats girt about with a sash. All weapons save long talwars slung at their belts--for even traders must be prepared to make some defence of their wares--had disappeared. They had two camels, loaded with bales which might very well contain cloth. The youngest of the party, who, when he left s.h.a.gpur, was a smooth-cheeked youth with a ruddy duskiness of complexion, was now a shade or two darker in hue, and bore a thin black moustache on his upper lip.

These transformations had been effected within a day's march of Minghal's village. The party made their slow way between hill and plain, so timing themselves that they came to the gate a little before sunset.

To the customary demand of the gate-keeper that they should say who they were and what their business, Sherdil replied--

"We are traders from Rawal Pindi to Cabul, but a small party, as you see, and we dare not encamp for the night in the open, lest some accursed sons of perdition fall upon us and rob us. All the world knows of Minghal Khan's benevolence to strangers, and we beg a refuge for the night, O gate-keeper."

"And what do ye offer in return for this favour?" asked the gate-keeper.

"'Tis unworthy of your chief's ill.u.s.triousness, we fear," said Sherdil humbly, "but such as it is we make it with grateful hearts. 'Tis indeed a quant.i.ty of cloth, of good weaving, and such as the Amir of Cabul approves; therefore, unworthy as it is, we yet hope it may find favour in the eyes of Minghal Khan."