The cry was almost incessant, but the eye could see little, for the moon was young, the night dark.

"_Hara! Hari! Hari! Hara!_"

Hour after hour it came, that cry on the dread Creator, the dread Destroyer. Monotonous, patient, almost indifferent, yet absolutely insistent.

The golden-shod feet of the pilgrims, after whose souls the missionaries yearned, were on the golden stair also, and their golden gates would open at the 'Cradle of the G.o.ds'; must open, hidden though the goal was by mist when it was day, by darkness when it was night.

What matter if it was hidden? For the gold-shod feet might falter and fall ere that goal was reached; but the hidden spring of cleansing at the Pool of Immortality was theirs. It would rise at dawn; rise as it did always, every year.

"_Hara! Hari! Hari! Hara!_"

What matter Birth or Death, if the finding of that lost paradise of purity was certain.

Out on the bridge, whence the cry came oftenest, there was no doubt regarding this certainty; but as each weary pair of feet stumbled on the first stones of the town, it stumbled into an atmosphere in which nothing seemed sure, save that there was change; that Eshwara was not what it had been.

To begin with, it held soldiers. Wherefore? And why had dead women been sent back to it by Mother Ganges to curse the men whose love had killed them?

But what wonder, when the very logs, the fishes, were stolen from the river nowadays; and from the people also. Then what of this strange new light? The light which fed on men's brains!--that came and went at pleasure--that was quite small at first, when but seven or eight men had been sacrificed, but which, only an hour or so agone, had showed in a huge ray, feeling here and there through the darkness for G.o.d knows what, then settling on it, making it impossible to hide aught, prying into the very Holiest of Holies! Had it not shot into Mother Kali's very temple, and shown the worshippers that two of her mighty arms were stuck on with sealing wax! What G.o.d would stand that! And how could the very G.o.ds themselves work miracles if everybody could see how they were done?

They had already refused to work them for pious _jogi_ Gorakh-nath.

What wonder? The G.o.ds did not like laughter, especially the laughter of _M'llechas_.[10]

Therefore, who was to tell if the spring would even rise in the Pool?

So those who were wise would make certain of at least a modic.u.m of salvation, and go straight to the bathing-steps; since the river, anyhow, must be there.

This suggestion of a cautious hedge was diligently spread by the bathing-_ghat_ priests among the new arrivals; who listened patiently.

But so they did also to the other priests whose business it was to scorn the possibility of failure, and to deny the displeasure of the G.o.ds. To say that _jogi_ Gorakh-nath had been found out by the _Huzoors_ in one of his usual tricks; that was all. So that people who wanted the genuine article, and a real, good, old crusted miracle, had better come as usual to the Pool.

The weary-footed, anxious-eyed climbers of the golden stairs listened patiently, silently, even when the antagonists began, in vehement quarrel, to bandy threats, and hint at worse portents to come. To their experience, their hope, it seemed impossible even to dream their pilgrimage in vain. The dawn would show, anyhow. So hour by hour, minute by minute, the tide of pilgrims set citywards till it brimmed over with faith and hope. And these are dangerous things when charity depends on them, and there are antagonistic claims to every alms. So Eshwara was restless.

Over in the gaol, also, by which the golden-shod feet pa.s.sed so closely with their heart-stirring cry, it seemed as if Vincent Dering's thrumming, following as it did on the heels of Eugene Smith's success with the search light, had set what Dr. Dillon called his Hosts of the Devil in commotion. Indeed, that thrumming was still going on when George Dillon had gone raging over to conjure the experimenter, with oaths, to turn off his confounded bull's-eye at once, or the prisoners would go out of their judgment with thinking of the number who would have to die that night in order to keep up the supply of brain power!--just too, as he had been congratulating himself that the cholera scare was over. Seventy-two hours, and not a case! It was too bad!

Eugene, whom he found on the roof of his house playing with coils, batteries, acc.u.mulators, had suggested eagerly that if there was real trouble, he might end it by turning his light bang on to the gaol, and so reducing it to a paralysis of sheer terror. Dr. Dillon, however, had sworn violently that he would not have the poor wretches frightened unnecessarily, especially when that triumphant cry of those who were free to defy the devil by seeking sanctification before death reminded them that _they_ could not--that they must die defiled, helpless, hopeless! That fear was, he said, in a way dignified, worthy of consideration. And he did not antic.i.p.ate trouble unless there was treachery inside or out, though perhaps he might, as a precaution, ask Dering for an extra guard. But when the latter happened to come in, as Mrs. Smith's escort home, while the doctor was still there, Dr. Dillon apparently changed his mind. Anyhow, he pooh-poohed Captain Dering's offer to send one, saying, the more you could keep a gaol to yourself the better--or for the matter of that anything else! So, with a curt good-night to Mrs. Smith, he went back to his work, leaving Vincent to remark, carelessly, that Dillon seemed in a bad temper. At which Muriel smiled. There was something in the air, she said, conducive to bad temper. She, herself, felt she must soon have quarrelled with the doctor's a.s.sumption of knowing better than anyone else; so it was as well he had not stopped to dinner. Her quarrelsomeness did not, however, extend to Vincent, who did; indeed, she made herself so tenderly charming and unconsciously friendly towards him that he began to accuse himself of having been too irresponsive of late. The fact of being in love did not preclude friendship for someone else, if, indeed, he was really in love with Laila Bonaventura? In one way he knew himself to be so; but the idea of treating this love of his on conventional lines was still repugnant to him; the thought of her, as his wife, barely attractive.

So, after a time spent pleasantly enough for those two, Eugene Smith went off to his coils, and acc.u.mulators, and batteries, half-sulky, half-bored, and wholly ill-used at having to switch off, when he had at least half an hour's electricity all ready stored for use.

He was grumbling over this fact when Vincent called good-night to him before starting to drive back; and he answered that but for fools, who were afraid of going to their proper place, he might have given Dering electric light on the road.

"No, thanks!" cried Vincent, gaily, "there's enough electricity in the air to-night without that. I believe your machine has leaked, Smith! I feel as if I should give out sparks if anyone touched me!"

As he drove across the bridge Eshwara looked as if it were doing that, too. There were lights everywhere, twinkling, little, restless lights.

The very spit, usually dark with the darkness of primitive life after sundown, was alive with them; for the pilgrims were camping there, as elsewhere. Nor were all the fisher folk abed as usual, for that, surely, was one of them paddling up stream on a dug-out,--just under the last span of the bridge. He saw the man distinctly, not five yards from him in the flash of the lamps as he drove past overhead, and wondered what the mischief the fellow was doing at that time of night, going up stream.

Something to be ashamed of, no doubt, else why should he have sent the dug-out beyond the circle of light with a swift stroke?

Truly Father Ninian was right; Eshwara was not normal. Its pulse beat irregularly, and things were going on which should not be going on--

A sudden shame made him glance at the shadowed pile of the palace looming above the shadowed town. It was all dark, save for one row of restless, twinkling lights. Those were the little latticed windows of Laila's sitting-room, that was fit for any king's favourite. He had seen it already, might see it again at twelve, if she was in one of her reckless moods when she would risk anything for his sake.

Truly! there were things going on!--

But this was between themselves; this could hurt no one. By and by, of course, he would insist on a commonplace engagement, and a wedding.

Yes! a commonplace wedding. He had, despite his vague repugnance to her origin, made up his mind to that. No one but an utter cad could take what he was taking, and then shake his bridle rein and ride away. But for the present, it was the most absolutely perfect bit of romance in his whole life. He could not, would not give it up. Laila was right!

This was the essence. As a rule, people mixed love, diluted it, were vaguely ashamed of its absorbing influence. But when you came to a.n.a.lyze even the diluted feeling, its virtue lay in this irrational content, this desire for nothing better than this best of pleasures--this paradise of a woman's or a man's love.

He laughed, suddenly, at the memory of Laila's quick grasp of his meaning when Muriel had overheard his remark about the time. Such quickness, in the latter, would have made him revolt from it; but with Laila it was different. A pa.s.sionate grat.i.tude to the girl to whom fear, remorse, the very possibility of change seemed unknown, rose up and claimed him. Dear little girl! She was so absolutely single-minded in her love for him. How could anyone expect him to forego the luxury of such love yet awhile?

In thinking Laila single-minded, Vincent thought the truth, so far as he was concerned. If love, pa.s.sionate as Juliet's, and far more innocent in one way, far more _ruse_ in another, ever existed, hers was that love. Nevertheless, its very integrity made her curiously cunning in regard to anything which threatened to disturb that idyll in the garden. So, at that very moment, when Vincent looked up at her windows a.s.serting her absolute lack of pretence and single-mindedness, she was pitting her wits against old Akbar Khan in a manner worthy of her grandmother, Anari Begum; since Akbar, far more than her guardian, was to be feared. The latter, honest man, went to his bed, beyond the chapel, at ten of the clock precisely; but Akbar, who from ancient habit was given to prowling about at night, and napping in odd corners, had many chances of discovery. During the last few days, however, when she, for her own purposes, had let him talk, he had become so garrulous regarding his past that she had recognized in him an unscrupulous confidant, with whom, in face of the possibility of requiring one, it was wise to remain on terms.

So, as she lounged on the sofa, she listened to his endless talk with tolerance.

"Nay!" she interrupted at last. "If, as thou sayest she will, she brings me more dresses and jewels, she may call me Begum, and hint at my being one, really, a thousand times over! Why not? Begum and Princess are the same, and my great-grandmother in Italy was that.

Pidar Narayan told me so to-day."

The memory of the old man's voice, when, with new-found courage, she had questioned him concerning those old days, made her eyes soft. Yes!

he would, he _must_ understand. So, by and by, when Vincent and she were tired of playing Romeo and Juliet (the story of the star-crossed lovers had been her only reading since Vincent had taken to quoting so much from it) they would make Pidar Narayan play Friar Laurence, and marry them on the sly. That would be so much more amusing than a regular wedding. He could not refuse, since he had once loved as she loved. You could hear that in his voice; after how many years?--fifty or sixty! And the Princess had, of course, loved also in exactly the same way. Laila felt sure of it. That curious, inexpressible feeling had come to her also. Laila, trying to formulate that feeling, slipping her heel idly in and out of her dainty little bronze shoe as she lounged, suddenly remembered Vincent's song to the tambourine, and laughed. That was it!

"Golden feet upon a golden stair."

That expressed it exactly. Two pair of feet going side by side up a golden stair, to golden gates. So contented. Ah, G.o.d! how content!

Seeking something, claiming something, yet still content. That feeling came, sometimes, when you were saying your prayers. A sort of yearning _for_, a sort of satisfaction _in_, something that was not you; so, surely if it came _then_, there could be no harm in it.

Harm! The very sisters allowed that you must love the man you were going to marry. And she and Vincent would be married by and by and live happily, for that was better than having a "_statue of pure gold_"

erected to you! In the meantime, secrecy, so long as Vincent wished to play Romeo and Juliet, was her cue; therefore, the more she could blind old Akbar, the more he could be turned on a wrong track, the better.

Especially when the turning was so delightfully ridiculous!

She managed, however, not to laugh her childish love of mischief into Mumtaza Mahal's very face when, after much shrinking into white sheets held up as screens, and quick cuddlings into corners at the faintest suspicion of a possible peep, that good lady, in her very, very best pink satin continuations, was ushered in through the dark deserted pa.s.sages of the palace, to Laila's boudoir. For, despite the amus.e.m.e.nt, the girl's heart was beating fast with determination to climb her golden stairs without interruption. So she allowed herself to be _kow-towed_ to, and called Begum-_sahiba_ and she accepted the new dress and jewels without protest. Eagerly, in fact, since they were far more gorgeous than the first, and caught her taste better. The former, indeed, had been Roshan Khan's own choice, dictated by his acquired knowledge of the sort of things _mem-sahibs_ admired; these latter were her grandmother's, purely, entirely oriental. The difference was great.

Put briefly, _this_ was the costume in which Anari Begum had flouted the Nawab, the _other_ that in which she had caught Bun-avatar's fancy.

Laila took up one of the heavy, gorgeous, glittering garments. It smelt strongly of musk, attar of roses, and jasmin, and she snuffed at it with a smile. That was ever so much better than the dull lavender water, which was the only scent her guardian said a lady could use.

Vincent would like that; he, like she did, loved strong scents. If only the stupid old frumpish thing would go away in time, she would put on that dress at once, and so give him pleasure. That was all her thought.

As she sat, with a happy smile, her face half-buried in a tiny, three-cornered corselet of scarlet net embroidered in seed pearls, Mumtaza and Akbar Khan winked at each other; and Laila's sharp eyes, catching this, brimmed over with laughter. She felt glad the rest of her face was hidden, until she was grave enough to reply graciously to the hints, the suggestions; for Mumtaza had been bound over by oaths not to go too fast, and she obeyed her instructions.

Even so, Akbar Khan, listening with folded hands in a mantis-like att.i.tude, his angles all crushed together into humility, wondered if he was standing on his head or his heels, as he heard Laila admit, gravely, that she was certainly, in a way, the head of the family, in that she possessed its land; but that, of course, Roshan was really the heir. That it had given her great gratification to see how thoroughly he had adopted English ways. That, of course, it would be impossible for him to marry an uneducated cow of a girl. Here, for a moment, she had relapsed to sincerity in order to remark that it must be impossible to love a person you had not seen, and that for her part, she knew in an instant if she was going to like or dislike people. If the latter, she tried never to see them, really, again. Then, remembering her part, she had resumed it hastily by saying that no doubt she would see more of her cousin,--who, by the way, was very nice-looking,--in the future, as he was quite in society.

Old Mumtaza had hard work at this juncture to prevent herself from cracking all her finger-joints over the girl's head for luck, and wishing her a numerous offspring; while Akbar gave a gasp that was not all pleasure. He felt that he was being rushed, that the crisis might come before he was ready for it. At this rate, Pidar Narayan would have no chance of dying. At this rate, Roshan Khan's castle in the air must topple over from sheer lack of foundation to such a lofty structure.

As he trotted back beside Mumtaza's curtained _dhooli_ to that little parasite of a house against the palace wall, where he knew Roshan was waiting for the upshot of the interview, his one consolation was that bow-strings were out of fashion!

In truth, there was no more restless man in Eshwara that night than Roshan Khan. The desire for this paradise had grown overwhelming, and as he listened to his grandmother, while Akbar pointed each triumphant appeal of the old lady's with a helpless "_Gereeb-pun-was_," his face grew pale with emotion; until, at the mention of his good looks and Laila's desire to see him, he turned fiercely to the go-between, and bade him fix a time; the sooner the better!

Akbar felt inclined to tell the truth then. To admit that he had never breathed a word of Roshan's pretensions to the Miss-_sahiba_ and that, so far, the negotiations only existed in his own imaginings. But the look on Roshan's face--he had seen it often in his youth in connection with women, and sacks, and bow-strings--reduced him to protestations.

He would do his best, he said, but with Pidar Narayan it would be difficult to manage.

Roshan strode about the little courtyard like a wild beast in a cage, biting his mustache, and thinking. Then he turned to the old phrase-monger.