LIKE AS A WOODCOCK.

Otago Witness, Issue 2284, 9 December 1897, Page 47

LIKE AS A WOODCOCK.

By Gut H. Scholefield.

• There was a general consensus of opinion that the matter should be put a stop to. It had gone too far to be longer a joke, and there were already several cases of nervous collapse among the English ladies at the station. They had, of course, to be reported at Lahore, and a wire had come back to put the station under cholera regulations. Which web done.

The men had a few viotims, too. But that was not official information. It Was told in camera. The regimental surgeon-captain gave them ■febrifuges, hypnotics, acd sf datives, and forgot to enter them on the health sheet. Such is human nature. So the military lives were free from ths epidemic.

It happened within the military line?, too. So said the native police. At least it had not been seen in the thoroughfares of the town by an upright and sober native. But it was believed to be somewhere in India else, in [the region of the Five Rivere. The native were thackfullfdr it, and yet they bad "bravery enough: Indeed on more than one .occasion thSy had'-arreated'a drunken sahib and put him M'clin& v Tlfe fact that he W3&: released befoijft^he "fairly regained responsibility was not broogiftrforth atf the moment,' so tkey were deemed"to~bß a satisfactory institution, which indeed they were. ' ' "* But this was nc ordinary case. Imdad AH, the head of police, was brave.-He bad held his beat with the greatest presence of mind against the Pathans on the Border ; he bad stu'ek to an abandoned gun long after the native artillery had fled, and he had dared the fight of Afghan might when the boldest hearts were wrung. Such a man bad Imdad AH been. Bat he had left the Piffars since then. He retired with 45 summers, three good-conduct badges, and an Afghani medal, to pass the autumn of his life on two rupees per week and a; bungalow. ,As head of police the Colonel one day waited on him to complain of the origin of the disturbing element in the civil lices.

Poor Imdad knew not what to say. He pleaded gout, cholera, bubonic plague, and elephantiasis ; he pointed to his young hopeful subordinatep. Let them go, he urged. They were ycung and burned for fame. JT& had paid his price to the war god. Tne native police heard his words and trembled. One by one they were taken to drop into barracks on business. JTet were they brave. " The Oclocel was inexorable. Imdad drew his rupees — eight per mensem — and he must carry out his duties to preserve the peace of the Punjab; if the spectre was seen in tha civil iines he must see to its arrest. Whereupon Imdad drew a sigh of partial relief ; it h&d-not been--seen in his province. Nevertheless, after rainy words the Colonel made to depart, and -Imdad. Baid he would do his b'3sfc; -•--*'•-" y la another place also the matter was discussed. - '

" Tell you what." said Perkiq?, GEt 2in of English awkwardness — "we can J fc have this humbugging any longer. We can't have the place upset like thip."

Now Perkins was not the admitted fountain of wisdom in the mess, and, moreover, he had suffered a-severe nervous shock himself, which had icopacitated him from night duty for a wetk. Nevertheless, when a man speaks with assurance he generally has something to say, and all eyes turned to Perkins for a further utterance. Perkins was r&turally shy, and after a short, awkward pause, which he accepted as an insult, he said in an offended tone : " When I say a thirg I mean it." This was a new phase in L^euietant Perkins — his eccentricities. A momentary silence was broken by a roar of laughter. And so, after much talk to the same «-f£fct, the mess retired to " doss," havirg thus disposed theoretically of the business, brief in hand. It happened that one of the few regular habits of Parkins was to go in the dusk tq, bathe in bis favourite pond near the village of the Jats. It was a pretty spot. The tall deodars waved their feathery top 3to a high puß paiamraiqs SMopuqs jjcus &qi pae 'pancue jo Xmsaq ex\i 03 padsij pau ire quivered in the steamy atmosphere like the ripples on the pond of Sir Jung Bahadur, laughing in their own affluence and the bsauty of their situation.

A few days after the above events, when the station was still under the spell of the spectre, the following telegram came up from liahore : " Be prepared for moonlight inspection 10.30." Now the Colonel's wife had her arrangements completed for a delightful dance at " Lai Kothi." And many of the officers said very many words which very few papers would publish; to which Perkins, after due deliberation, added a few.

So Perkins in the evening rode eff to the pond near the village of the Jats. It was dark when be arrived, but the Pnt.jab guide book Baid the moon would be up in a quarter of an hour. Impregnable was tired and hot, and Perkins turned him loose under the deodars to nibble the luxuriant, moist grass, which is infinitely more refreshing than stale *• bhoosa " ; and Perkins plunged into th*e pond. , Never had Perkins so eDjoyed his bath. It was as a plunge in the Holy GuDga to the plague-stricken pariah — as a soothing balm to the foot of him that is tired. And Perkins revelled in its delights.

Bat even as he revelled Impregnable suddenly sent forth a shrill, piercing neigh into the dark coldness of the night. The blood of Lieutenant Perkins ran cold. It was a cruel circumstance, this sudden appearance of a form and figure of white mounted on a steed of white, and moving slowly in a ghastly manner on the skyline. Impregnable snorted and stood stiff and erect, bis ears pricked and bis forefeet planted firmly in the ground. Peikins scrambled, trembling and blood-shivering, to the bank. He was a modest man, and his first thought was for his garments, wherein was a revolver. But the figure halted. Impregnable snorted. It moved again and approached. Impregnable could brook it no longer. With a final squeal he turned. Perkins, stark naked and almost as mad, climbed into his saddle, and in a moment Impregnable's hoofs were striking fire from the pebbles on the road to the station. Perkins felt that it .was a ride for life.

Straight in Impregnable's course was " La! Kotbi." Under ordinary circumstances he would have viewed its fast developing outline with dismay in his present garb, but he now welcomed in the fulness of his heart any sign of a friend in the Punjab.

Impregnable racketed, on in his own boisterous way, his nostrils distended, his head thrown madly in the air. There was nothing of the ordinary parade spirit in his Arab veins, nothing of the Frontier elan Peikins had seen in him as his prospective purchase. "He Was a jolly rough seat 1 " He was mad, stark-mad with fright, and all he remembered of his everyday life was to keep going as hard as his wind would allow.

And then Perkins ? Hia very heart felt like a successful jally. His stirrups were as ice to his feet,' bis scalp tingled, his eyes glared wildly, his hands refused to act. He knew not a whit of the world ; he was in ths I-.ferno.

Tha light 3of "Lai Kothi" had opened fi the trees and individualieed themselves from the lesser lights of the dry stones on tbe side of the track when Perkins gradually realised that he had passed a term at tbe cannon's mouth. A faint, 6ickly. hope — nay, hardly, a-boge,- a' transient thought— entered hiß mind that his life would perchance be -pTclonged if he couid only — no, there was nothing he conld do. Wi! h the recklessness of despair he glanced- over, .his shoulder *towar-d3' thVtantalisfcgf' sotffid of hoofs, synchronous with those of Impregnable, ratllirg, clapping, striking, sloshiDg behind, and ever drawing nearer. Never a white steed met his gr-z 3 , but a luminous ghostly centaur ; never a human nor a snperhuman rider, but a fieadish Gorgon. Serpents hissed abcu' the centaur's head ; fierce eyes gleamed from the sockets of tnt- Gjrgor.

Perkins's brain swirled, ansl be almost fell from his saddle. Again his blocd ran cold — again ihe cbld tingle coursed through his hair, and he gave up the ghost in despair to that behind. He sat tight, however, lest he should fall from his saddle and come to that death which he knew to be'his fu.te.

Then a long state of coma — deatb, torture, life, and hell pasfed before Perkins wilh never a wince on his face. They were as nothing. There was a warmth about the last, however, that thawed his frozen heart, and slowly, as he thawed, he felt again that he had an interest in life, if only to be in at the kill. A ray of light shone 1 over his shoulder, and he turned nnperturbed to view it.

♦ Ha 1 ha I Piffer. Ha ! ha 1 Piffer. Gallant boy I Good boy I "

It was no human tongue that thus gave voice to the horrors of the situation. Perkins was on a forlorn hope.

*' For God's sake don't — don't — oh-h-h I " H«*could find voice for no more. His own words told him"he was a fool. " Die lika an Englishman 1'" tbey said, and he tock to heart the rebuke.

The. voice penetrated Impregnable. With a terrified yell and a wild plunge he outdistanced the spectre in a few strides." The rotary action of Peikins's senses had brought him back to desperation through all the 'pangs of death, hope, destroyed, ■ laDguor, and sickness of heart. Some magic agent in this cycle set his relaxed hands in motion, and he tugged, brandished, flourished, and whirled his reins in a freczy. ! Soon his haz? eyes descried figures on the [ balcony of " Lai Kothi," then his ears caught the low sound of music —it was the "Nautch" wal!z. A few more moments of terror and he saw the puckawallahs on the balcony, and then the inspecting efneer calmly leaning over tbe railirjg with the Colonel at his elbow surveying him with a night-glass. Impregnable's instinct led him under the balcony — he was never actuated by anything else, even to Perkins's spur — and be was e;oing at his usual pace. Perkins forgot that he was bare. The flash of hope gave warmth to his framp, and to the whole assembly, as it en me to pear over at him, he lifted up Iris voice in a long, despairirg cry for help. Then he sank, -exhausted, in his saddle. A cruel and gleeful laugh responded to his appeal, for the onlookers saw^-what be would have given the world to know — that he was not pursued by man or beast.

There are several circumstances which do not require relating, but it happened, contrary to the general usage, that Imdad AH was on the trail with a posse of his young police, whose quaking fears he dispelled with fine stories of the regiment. And'near " Lai Kothi" they came upon Perkins, whose words tbey wou'd hear not, but took possession as of the ghost. . So in due course Perkins was handed over and taken to the Colonel as an offender Bgainst the 'Queen's peace in Indie, and charged with that offence. The reat of the story is short. Imdad won laurels ; Perkins was ostracised by a section at the station. Others bad seen the ghost since, and the " cases " still accumulated. At length the " ghost " was seen without simultaneously with Perkins partaking of tiffin within, and the officer who, clad in lawn, had ruu Perkins to earth had to surrender his /kudos.

For many days the ghost held bi3 license, until of a sudden the cholera ban was lifted and the station free. To this day neither Imdad nor the Colonel has seen the ghost, but few can say what was the lot of Perkinß in his ostracism.