THE PASS OF PERIL

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22612, 28 December 1936, Page 15

THE PASS OF PERIL

By EDMUND BARCLAY Author of "Karonn," etc.

CHAPTER XV.—(Continued) "You have been very good to me, Miss Deeming," said Ruth shyly, who now that the emotional crisis had passed, was shrinking back into the protection of her innate reserve, "Somehow, you've enabled me to see things more closely and to understand Michael much better than ever I did before; why have you done this for me?" Mvra's eves were now the colour of the seas on a cold northern dawn. "That's just what I'm asking myself," she said, as she turned and walked away, "Guess L must be tin* world's prize, fool. Good-night, Miss Conyers," and there was something in her tone which forbade Ruth's following. l\vo days later after a day in the air and a day in the saddle, two tired girls rode into the fort at Walizanee, whero a much startled Deeming met them. The journey down to India by horses to the Pass, and then motor ear and train to Quetfa, had taken Myra weeks. But by private plane secretly chartered. by the American Trade Commissioner, who had not the faintest idea what lie was doing, the return trip had been accomplished in twentyfour hours, to a point well oxer the Walizaneo border, leaving but a day's ride to the Fort. Myra's elaborately casual introduction of Ruth, with the explanation that the English girl had come to Wali/.anee on the hopes of meeting Captain Garvie, was a rude shock to the American, who however, was too old a campaigner to give himself away, and lie welcomed the girl with rough politeness. After Ruth had retired for the night, father and daughter had a long conference, which left them both distinctly uneasy. If Garvie were still up in the hills, they could look for trouble. Their uneasiness was not allayed by the fact that Ali Khan, fierce to the point of smouldering taciturnity, had not even troubled to unpack the £IO,OOO in English gold and Bank of England notes which Deeming had given him, but had seized the money and had ridden olf into the hills again, red lights glinting in bis eyes which made Deeming realise that a border war was closer upon him than he could wish.

The well still gushed its liquid wealth, but as the long days dragged wearily one into the other, the eyes of the three white people at Wali/.anee were more often lifted to the hills, than not, and they were curiously silent. Even Chunder Lai, when he at last staggered from his eharpoy, but a tortured ghost of himself, with .stubbed cheek and folds of flesh hanging loosely upon him —even he had little to say. and even he spent his days, watching the hills.

CHAPTER XVI It was a hot cloudy day when the first mutterings of the gathering storm were heard at Walizanee. The morning had come upon them ominously quiet. Mvra after spending a restless night tossing and turning wearily on her eharpoy had welcomed the slanting .sunbeams as they struck through her window and mounted slowly up the wall. She watched them la/.ilv, thinking those iong, slow thoughts which come when the soul is poised between wakefulness and sleep; thoughts half-dream, haltreal, but wholly about Michael and the girl who slept in the next mud-walled low-raftered room. She heard far in the distance, and muffled by the intervening walls the low pounding of galloping hoofs, and she raised herself on her elbow, her cheeks flushed and her eyes shining. Michael I . . . Surely it was Michael. No . . . the horse was leaving, not approaching. Besides, it was not for her to greet liini. That was the prerogative of violet eyes, and she slowly sank back on her pillow again, idly watching the slowly mounting sunbeans. With a start she suddenly realised that the sunbeams were much higher 11p tho wall than they should be, which meant that Ali Khan's well-drilled servants were much later than they should lie with the tray of morning coffee. She jumped from her bed, wrapped a thick dressing-grown around her, opened her door and walking out into the gloomy sunless corridor, listened intently for a while. Not a sound! No subdued murmur from the servant's quarter, no expected savour from tho cooking pots, not even the barking of a dog was heard. She heard her father's shouting in the distance, and she smiled slightly as she recognised several colourful and characteristic curses. She went back to lior room, hastily dressed herself in ridingkit, and buckled a "thirty-eight" Colt in a holster worn low down on the thigh, in the Western manner, and then, without disturbing Ruth, ran out into the courtyard, to find it absolutely deserted, even the few scraggy fowls which used to scratch about the gate being gone. She looked tip on to the watch-tower, and there saw her father, who had climbed up to the parapet, and who was gazing down steadily into the valley whore the oil well gushed its liquid riches. She whistled to him, and with an answering wave of the arm, he turned and came down to her. "I don't know what's going on around here," he grumbled, when they met. "Every durn soul in the whole outfit is down in the valley holding a Presidential Congress or something. Maybe they're all going on strike, and aiming to stick up the Walizanee Oil Corporation for more pay. I wish that guy Ali Khan was back. I'm feeling a bit worried. Must be getting old, 1 guess." "You'll feel a lot better after breakfast, pop," she laughed. "Mas Chunder Lai joined the strikers?" Even as she spoke, the Bengali, looking a little more like his usual self strutted from the cook-house, bearing the welcome copper tray in his hand upon which rested the steaming coffeepot and a plate of what ho called "grilled-bread." "Bo so good as to precipitate this food into your alimentary canal, while T take the matutinal coffee to the Mem-sahib Conyers. Then after the prolapse of the usual period Cliotahazri will be served," babbled the Bengali. "How do ruffled eggs appeal to the Mem-sahib Deeming," lie continued benevolently. "1 ruffle the eggs most cleverly, with quantum enough of the pepper and salt." "No scrambled eggs for me, Chunder,'' laughed the girl. "You're too heavy on the scramble part of it. 1 think I'll have my eggs boiled." "It shall be as the mem-sahib designates," was the grave rejoinder. "Do you like your eggs boiled one verse or two verses?" "Bug-house," muttered Deeming to himself, "just plain plump loony." Seeing that some sort of an explanation was required, Chunder obligingly gave it. "For the timing of the immersion of the eggs in the agitated water, 1 sing to myself that well known hymn, 'Onward Christian Sailors.' One verse for the egg boiled soft, two verses for the egg boiled stiff."

"See hero. Chunder," impatiently interrupted Deeming, in between sips of his coffee, "what's happening here? "Why is this fort deserted? Where are all Ali Khan's men? What's the big idea at the back of the pow-wow down in the valley?'* "Jove by Jove, Sahib, but those are questions I can answer with the most magnificent accuracy. Am I not a brainy man? A man galloped in from the hills, gave a message to the headman. who indeed was very much excited to receive the aforesaid message." "Message, pop. message," said Myra, as with twitching lips she placed a re-

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A STORY OF THRILLING ADVENTURE AND A GREAT LOVE

straining hand upon her father's arm, thus preventing the .Bengali from receiving half a cup of hot coffee in his fat face. Deeming breathed heavily, hut said nothing. The look in his eye, however, was enough to render the baboo nervous, and exceedingly particular in the choice of his words. "What the communication was, Sahib, L am not permitted to formulate, for the totally adequate reason that 1 have not been reformed on that point," said Chunder. "But all the Pathans here are in the extremity of stimulated agitation, the question being, in the words of Hamlet, 'to he, or vice-versa.' Shall they wait hero, or shall they all ride, walk, or perambulate themselves to meet the victorious Sultan, A 1 i Khan."

"When is Ali Khan due back? Do you know?" asked the American, holding bis cup out for more coffee. "That 1 cannot informulate you, Sahib. To-day or to-morrow, and if not sooner than that, then ]>erhaps most certainly, later. If I may offer a suggestion, Sahib, I would not if I were you, seek to place any obstacles in their going, for they are most assuredly in that state of temper, when for two needles, they would bite the hand that rocks the cradle." "H'lit! We'll see about that. After you've taken coffee to that English mem-sahib, rustle up some chota Jiazri just as quick as you can rustle it, Chunder." "Jove by Jove, but that's 0 and K by this brainy man. Sahib f rustle up some brekker like one thing if not two thing. So long, buddy, I'll be seeing you more or loss," and with a benevolent smile at M.vra, he waddled off.

"Say, Myra, is that guy getting fresh, or is he just battv?" asked Deeming, his gaze on the retreating baboo.

".lust battv pop," laughed the girl, "although, of course, he can be quite cute enough at times. He's helped us out of one or two tight places."

Deeming thoughtfully rolled a cigar between his lips. "I'll be glad when Ali Khan gets back," he muttered. "Guess I'll have to make him hold Jiis horses for quite a while yet. We don't want ativ fighting going on around here until we've cleaned up a pile. After that, we can sell out and let some other guy hold the baby. I'll have to increase Ali Khan's subsidy, that's all. Nothing like gold for keeping a crook quiet.'' And that is whero Deeming made his great mistake. A Western "crook" is almost always motivated by mercenary motives, ail Eastern crook, seldom. "That English girl being up around hero is a bit of a complication, Myra. Whv the heck did you want to bring her:-"

"What else could I do, pop? She's very great friends with that Colonel man, and 1 didn't want him to know that we weren't welcoming strangers."

"L wasn't thinking so much about that side of things, Myra. You say Captain Garvie is still up here somewhere:-' Well, why did you bring her up here?" So then, her father's shrewd eye had missed nothing. She felt the colour burning her cheeks, but she faced her father's steady ga/.e bravely. "Forget it, pop," she said. "He's got no time for me, and never will have." She saw the expression of pain coming into her father's eyes, and hastened to dispel it. "it's got nothing to do with you, and what's happened up here. It would have been the same if we had met anywhere. I'm not his sort, that's all." .V faint clamour, and a steady beating of gongs interrupted their conversation. much to Myra's relief, and the two of them ran to the gateway, from where they were able to see that practically tho whole, able-bodied population of tho village were heading madly for the hills, men, women and children. "So that's that," said Deeming. "There'll be no work done at the well to-day. Gee, I'll be glad when Ali Khan gets back." After chota hazri, Myra and Ruth talked vaguely upon non-essential topics for a while. Since that night at Quetta, Michael's name bail not been mentioned between them, and as the thoughts of both were practically filled with just that one person, there was a constraint between tliein which did not permit of comfortable conversation.

The heat down in the lower room became almost insufferable, and the two of them strolled up on to the walls in a vain search for a cooling breeze. There they found Chunder Lai, esconsed in a high corner by the watch-tower. There was a strange immobility about tho man which aroused curious little doubts in Myra's mind.

It was not his usual immobility, the negative quietude of a fat and lazy man, but the dynamic tenseness of a keen and watchful spirit. Perhaps it was only a trick of sunlight, but his jaw-bones seemed to bo much leaner, and his face seen in profile was almost intelligent, the eyes literally alive with vitality. She spoke to liini, but so immersed was he in his own . thoughts that she had to speak twice before he answered her.

"Pardon your pardon, Mem-Sahib," he said, turning his faco fully toward her. so that she wondered how she could have been misled. Why, of course, here was the oily smile, the double chin, the stupid eyes, and the drooping mouth of the rascal who would do anybody's dirty work were ho paid for it.

"Pardon your pardon, Mem-sahib," he said, "but I come up here for the cooling zephyrs to fan my fevered brow, ft is mostly very beastly hot, isn't it? Of course, being a very brainy man, I know that it is not so much the heat, but the humility," and taking a filthy rag from his sleeve, he wiped the "humility," from his dripping face. A stentorian shout from Deeming, below in the courtyard, brought Chunder to his feet with a grunt. "I come sahib." he quavered, "I come. Jove, by Jove, there is no peace at all for the wicked, and precious little for Chunder Lai Esquire. Pardon your pardon, Mom-sahib if i leave you now, but it is not good to get on tho wrong side of things with Sahib Deeming, who upon the slightest of slight provocations places his heavy footfiiled boot upon a certain curvilinear portion of mv anatomy which was not made for the placing of boots thereon." And so he waddled off.

The two girls smilingly watched liitn. •'How do you got 011 with your native servants, Miss Conyers?" asked Mvra. •'They are rather a problem, aren't they: - Hut you seem fortunate in C'lmnder Lai. He appears to be very good-natured, and that's something." "Yes, Miss Conyers, a little goodnature goes a long way in this world, doesn't it?" 'Ms that meant as a reproach," began the Knglish girl, and then her eyes widened, and she seized Myra's arm, pointing to a horseman who came riding up the hill toward them. Dust caked with sweat covered both the mount and its rider, and the horse drew its breath in great shuddering sobs which were plainly audible to the girls on the wall. A grev-faced figure rocked and swayed in the saddle. The horse carried two riders, but the second lay limp and senseless across the crupper, hold there by straps. Within twenty yards of the gate, the horse staggered to its knees, made a terrific struggle to rise again, and then slowly rolled over, dead, pitching both its riders heavily to the ground. Even as the two girls, stunned with astonishment, were trying to grasp the meaning of it., a fat figure waddled through the gate toward the recumbent figure, it was Chunder Lai. "Jove, by Jove," he shouted, "but it is Captain Garvie." t (To be continued daily) I