"Higher Courts."

New Zealand Illustrated Magazine, Volume 1, Issue 8, 1 May 1900, Page 602

"Higher Courts."

By Guy H. Scholefield

Illustrated by E. B. Vauglian

Never the lotos closes, never the wild fowl \vake ; But a soul goes forth on the east wind that died for England's sake. r\UNGA KNEL was a place where a IS) gqnadron of Hussars served the Queen Empress. There was Montagu-Murray, a subaltern ; silly, simple, sincere and awfully superior. No one knew how superior he was. Montagu-Murray had a soul intact. That is to say, he had not begun to use it for the purposes of the world ; had not begun to sin with it ; in fact, did not know the world. And then his superiority, it simply weighed on him. Montagu-Murray's uncle was a member of the Simla ring, and Montagu-Murray knew that it was only a matter of time and many wide bullets for himself to become L.G. with two aides-de-camp and at least four letters. But then the world knows so little of a man's private affairs that he was not even suspected of this.

He was quiet and reserved. Meu said sulky; women, milk-and- watery, and he knew what they thought of him. But inwardly he felt on a higher level than their sarcasm, as the dear water stands above the sediment. As far as possible he lived outside the world, completely, he thought, outside of it; and his inward confidence inhis undoubted superiority, which must tell in the long run, made him proof against remarks. The colonel's daughters— the whole world in fact -.chuckled aloud at croquet parties, whether he pegged, or spooned, or played the best came that ever was. But he was proof.

He did not even ask them to marry him. He knew that at any moment he could soar higher than the whole station, and then he would be L.Gr. or Viceroy, airl the most sought man in India if be only liked to divulge himself. He would go up, step by step, as quickly as his successive superiorities could be reported to Her Majesty, and the letters patent signed. He would start at 0.8. or D.5.0., and jump and soar past everyone of his own age and generation until he sat as Viceroy, while the most fought man in India was a mere Brigadier-General. And his wife ? She would be a — he doubted if she would not be a princess of the blood. At any rate the Colonel's daughters would l'egret their folly.

In the thought of these things MontaguMurray lived ; in the certainty that, by sheer superiority, he would one day simply crush seniority and rank out of existence, he was

strong

Now, once and for all, why cannot every man prove himself ? The moment a remount has completed his education he leaves the depot, and may be this, that, or the other thing, according as he is able. Why then should a mere subaltern be shot at according to regulation for five years, and fevered at for three or four, before he may assert his right to live and be even a company officer ? The man who is convinced 1 of his superiority has a perfect right to say so, before the best tribunal he can face, but he descends to the level of his fellow man the moment consequences come to be dealt with. Even so Montagu-Murray.

The season was full of balls, Simla

Viceregal Lodge, L.G.s functions at Lahore and Peshawur, and quiet little station dances in the Hussars' Theatre. Montagu-Murray went to them all — lieutenants sometimes do. But oh, he was so superior ! He stood in the same set as the L.G., bored to death, and dying with the hiddenness of his superiority over the L.G. himself. But he bore up, confident that occasion only was required to give him his right place in the world. Then at the little station dances he thawed moderately, danced everything, pocketed the coldness of those who thought him cold, and appeared on parade next day as usual, Lieutenant Montagu-Murray, with only the prospects and pay of a cavalry subaltern, but the confidence of an heir-presumptive, going his way in silence, tolerated, but not liked. Then the war came on the Frontier. The tribes were out against the British. Leave was stopped, the regiments began to troop, the trains came up from Bengal and the N.W.P. all in one direction; commissariat trains, troop trains, baggage trains, artillery trains, transport trains, all in their gray monotony, All India throbbed ; even up at Dunga Khel the world was shaken ; and the Hussars were told to go away and fight. Montagu-Murray heard it all, saw the waves of commotion surging at the foot of the hills, and appeared on the special parades with his fellows. But something told him that he would not need to go away with the regiment. He had not fought a single fight in his troop yet, but he was sure he knew perfectly well how it was done, and it was not necessary for him to go forward and demonstrate his theory. He had not a Vicoria Cross— not actually— but mentally he had won it, he should say, thrice over, so that seemed to be sufficient. There would scarcely be an opening ou the staff with the Field Force that would suit his ability. Heaven told him that he would be required in higher places, and he was surprised indeed that he had not yet received a call to the Viceroy's Council.

These were among Montagu- Murray's thoughts — he had thought and spoken of the Viceroy's Council before— as he strolled down

from the parade ground and hid himsolf for reflection in a clump of deodars. There were many things he had to arrange. Next morning the regiment was to troop down to the railway terminus at Kalka, and although ho felt certain he would be called elsewhere, the time was drawing nigh, and he began to have

SILLY, SIiMTLK, SINCKUE, AND AWKULI.Y SUI'KKIOU. fears that the office of the heads of all things had forgotten him in the general bustle of getting the war under weigh. The oversight was particularly rash and unpardonable, ho thought, but perhaps • Just as he was about to excuse the bonds of all things, a small telegraph messenger tumbled down the hill, landing at \m feet,

and handed him an "urgent" envelope. Montagu-Murray took the envelope, nicked 11 the messenger offthe bottom left-hand corner, and cut it open with official neatness. The c wire read : You are called to the Viceroy's Council. — KOBETJTS. " Many things which, as a human being, ( Montagu -Murray might have questioned, simply didn't strike him. As a matter of ( fact he did not even decide that it was not i correct for the Commander-in-Chief to meddle _ with calls to the Council. The messenger hung about his spurs in wistful unmeaningness waiting for the favour of a reply. Montagu-Murray merely administered a superior jostle to remove the small vestment of officialdom out of the road, puffed out his chest, and turned towards the barracks. It was an afterthought that induced him to hastily recover his horse from the care of the sais, and ride at a furious pace up the hill to the telegraph station to wire his reply to Calcutta as follows : Appointment accepted. In Calcutta to-morrow. MONTAGTJ-MURRAT. But there was no excitement, nothing out of the regulation pace, as he trotted back to barracks to prepare. The station was all agog with excitement at the approaching departure of the regiments. Men bustled about in and out of the barracks; officers' wives appeared on the scene with melancholy countenances; native knansamahs and kitmatgars made their license and authority felt among the promiscuous bhistis and followers who had rolled up from strange corners for the march; loud-mouthed dealers paraded horses which certainly never were equalled for frontier service ; and every little social function was swept away into oblivion. The officers of the squadron were merry at the prospect, and more. Moutagu-Murray was one of many, and seemed for once to be inbued with the common instinct. It was not surprising, therefore, that nobody noticed that his traps were labelled "Calcutta" iustead of anything else.

» Hullo, Monty, old fellow ! " yelled Savile in the exuberance of his preparations, "what's this? Dak bungalow, shikar kit, chain mail, 'pon my word ! " At that moment the major appeared on the scene, cynically prepared to sneer at anything and everything emanating from young minds. " Humph ! " he snorted, with the air of one who has found the kitmatgar's chicken perched on his table-cloth. " Who the devil expects the Field Force tongas to carry all this?" (kicks Montagu-Murray's pile). " It's as plain as plain can be you fellows missed the Colonel's lecture on transport the other day. The first lesson of wild warfare, perhaps you'll remember, is to find material for your defences on the spot, and so adapt materials at hand to your purpose. Now, hang it all, Murray, we're not going to carry trenches and breastworks with us, that's dead certain ! "

" You don't understand, Major," explained Montagu-Murray ; "my traps are going to Calcutta." The major burst into a derisive laugh. "Well," well, in all my life I never saw such a set of fellows as you ! Here's a fresh sub. never been under tire yet making over his effects to his friends to escape the Court of Adjustment! You're altogether too deuced morbid, Murray! You won't believe that I've known an officer— yes, and a man who was something, too— come out of a campaign alive, and he didn't even have the honour of having scared the whole moss into funk of death. Perhaps you'll have a few healthier ideas when you've been shot at for a week or two. You'll place a smaller price on effects then." "I'm afraid it will be a few weeks yet before I'm under tire," meekly suggested Montagu-Murray, with admirably assumed disappointment. « Don't be too sure ! I'll lay you a wager you'll have a hundredweight of lead seething within a yard of you, and a few score of tulwars hacking at your head before you re a week older; and if you don't make an effort to get into something like form before then, well, I don't know what! Now the

Court of Adjustment, you know, is a regular shark at all times, and perhaps I will bo president, so hadn't you better stick your riding crop into one of those bales? "

The Major snorted at tho success of his sarcasm, as betokened by the silence of Montagu-Murry. Tho latter, mildly patient, fell back for consolation on the thought of his blood so blue, so blue, his inviolable right to display and use two square feet of Norman escutcheon and five brevier lines of motto

Of the many apt remarks ready on his tongue for retort, the one " that he was now a member of the Viceroy's Council, and the Major would he deed surprised to hoar from him in

Calcutta in a day or two," did not find utterance until, far down the corridor, the Major was roundly bantering the sur-geon-captain for enticing ladies into barracks. Next day, in " Out Station Items," (F.O. C) of The Civil and Military Gazette, appeared the following :

Dunga Khel. — I have it on the best authority that Lieutenant Montagu- Murray, of the 23rd (Queen's Ixidia) Hussars, now stationed here, has received and accepted a call to the Viceroy's Council. He left for Calcutta last evening. The appointment, I believe, was made in consequence of the position of affairs on the Frontier, whero several important Afghan tribes are said to bo involved, as Lieutenant Montagu-Murray has

practically conducted tho Afghan policy of tho Council for sovoi'al years. "Well, I'm d d !" blurted the Colonel, as lie road tho paragraph. His \vi fo interrupted that she was both surprised and horrifiod at

his statement, as she had never suspected that such was the case, and he really should have told her sooner. "I'm not in the least surprised," sho added, when, with suppressed indignation, fcho Colonel read the announcement aloud. " I always thought he seemed a superior boy. Poor boy, the girls almost frightened him

away from Lai Kothi altogether. He was really too bashful to be loose in the world ; but perhaps ho will find Calcutta and his now life more congenial. He never was ' intended for a soldier, and then it is so much easier to feel comfortable in a large town where one is never brought so much before everybody as here." "H'm!" granted the Colonel. "He's barely entitled to call himself lieutenant ; hasn't seen a bhisti die in cold blood. By Jove, though, it's just as well he's fairly out of this campaign ! I often think, you know, that blue blood and blue funk are natural neighbours. He would break if he got half a chance ; too deuced quiet and sentimental. But I don't believe a word of this paragraph !" At this stage the Colonel conceived that it was a breach of etiquette for MontaguMurray's promotion to have been conferi'ed and accepted entirely without his cognizance. A few moments' meditation served to magnify the impropriety, and at the conclusion the Colonel strode oil to barracks in lurid indignation to demand an explanation. Montagu-Murray had left the previous evening. A black dakwallah had taken his worldly effects to Kalka, and he had ridden off himself amid the profuse congratulations of his brother officers, and his own expressed l'egrets at missing the fun on the Frontier, to catch the Loop Mail going down to Calcutta. In the gloriously busy world of the Punjab things went on their way. * * * * # Two days later Montagu - Murray, in correct civilian kit, eyeglass, and the complete regalia of political life, called at the Militai'y Department and asked to see the Comniander-in-Chief. The cleric, doubting the boy's genuine importance, asked for a cai'd, and MontaguMurray had to confess that he was not able to oblige — he had omitted to bring his card case — but assured the impudent young rascal that he was a member of the Viceroy's * Council, and would have him thrashed out of the Department, and put to making pucca roads for the elite of Calcutta to drive over,

if he persisted in his impertinent dilatoriness. Montagu-Murray blushed pink at the same time. Another clerk was summoned — two grades higher— and he informed MontaguMurray in conciliatory accents that it was necessary he should hand in his card. Again, with dignity, Montagu- Murray pleaded his impotence in the matter, but introduced himself verbally, and hoped in his heart the clerk would not make the mistake of calling him Montgomery or Montmorency. He was ushered into an ante-room. The clerk summoned a senior clerk, two grades higher still, who produced a telegram addressed to the Commander-in-Chief, and asked him to recognise it as his letter of introduction. He read as follows : Appointment accepted. In Calcutta to-morrow. Montagu-Murray. An untidy jagged hole in the centre told of filing by the recipient, and an official scrawl in the corner completed the tale : Write for further particulars. — F.R. There was now no doubt, Montagu- Murray divined, that the Commander-in-Chief had his appointment on the order paper for the day. The clerks retired with one accord. Why, Montagu-Murray could not imagine. The day was hot, the sky was blue, and the punkahs creaked, but never a word was uttered. Surely the voice of heaven was whispering to them. Montagu-Murray waited alone with the telegram exactly an hour. At the sixtieth minute he concluded that the Commander-in-Chief had been called away, and rose to depart. A card tray stood in a corner of the room. He selected a neat little ivory, struck out the name of some big bouncing D. A. A G\, and wrot6 his own on the back. CLAUDE A. de G. MONTAGU-MURRAY, Viceroy's Council, Donga Khel.

Mentally raving at the postponement of his greatness, he picked up the telegram and left. He was met on the steps by the head clerk, who stood against a pillar, his hands behind his back, yawning his ennui and waiting for the night. "The Commander-in-Chief ! " he exclaimed in answer to Montagu- Murray's query; " oh, I must apologise ! Really thought you had left. Quite slipped my memory ! I am instructed to tell you that the Cotnmander-in-Chief is absent in the Mofussil. He much regrets being unable to meet you." " I am obliged for the information, sir, but I shall feel compelled to lodge a complaint concerning the conduct of officers of the Department, and only hope you will not be dismissed. And the Commander-in-Chiof will return " "Well, really it's impossible to say at present. His inspections may last any time, you know. Bnt, ah, — yes, perhaps it will be the safer method to drop you a line when he will be at your disposal." " Horribly annoying, to be sure ! And I left the regiment at an hour's notice ! " Clerk laughs uproariously at a man who walks up the drive just like other men. " Good morning." " Good morning, sir. You may depend upon hearing at the Commander-in-Chief's earliest convenience." Montagu - Murray (aside) : " The cad ! He's beginning to be afraid of losing his billet." Montagu-Murray was borne away on the wings of his anger. The city was crowded and busy unto the war, and as he passed along Sackville Street, with an eye to nothing in particular, it was none other than Chesney, of the 38th Dogras, who ran bolt into him, and for the sake of politeness declared that he was truly deed at the idea of meeting him there. " And I'm far worse deed to see you. How the deuce did you get away from the regiment ? An appointment too ? " " Yes, as I'm alive ! Congratulate me!"

"So I do, old follow. What luck, oh ? You and I together. I suppose you heard that I've been resurrected again at last ? " "Of course! Must toll, you know, must tell in the end ! " " Where do you happen to bo off to now ? " "Just came to see you, solo purpose." "Never! Do you know, my dear follow, your life's ruined ? You havo achieved your object too easily ; that is presuming you havo just come off tho train. No man ever lived to be any good as a colonel after becoming a captain to his taste, did he now?" — (Chosney, aside, " Well, now, that's not Monty's solemn old self at all, at all ! Blessed if ho's not a new man already ! ") — " Yes, and you really came to see me ? Where did you oxpect to come across me?" Chesnoy (asido) : "Stunner now! Guess ['11 need to keep an eye on my pickets for a few hours ! " (Aloud) : "At tho Council, I was afraid, Hope you haven't boon yet, and made any arrangements. Look here, old man, I was appointed to come and rescue you ! Will you believe it, you're wanted with the regiment? They are exactly Lieutenant Montagu-Murray short ! " "And yours exactly Lieutenant Chesnoy short, adjutant, etc. But' what if I can't possibly be spared from here! When a fellow's called to higher courts, you know, it's simply a matter of do, or bo done. I'm sadly afraid I'll havo to miss tho fun, Chesney." Chesney (aside) : " Superb white liar, are you not ? You can't hide your rcliof, though, not at all.") (Aloud): "Oh, that will be all right ! We havo arranged with the Commander-in-Chiot' to delay the appointment. Colonel wouldn't hear of your being away ; couldn't think of it ! Fact is, you must have missed oiu' wire at Kalka." " But how did you manage fco get off ? Hasn't yours left yet ? " " I expect it has. I got three days' special leave to hunt you up, with a codicil not to return without you. Of course you understand I can't wait for any negotiating. You'll find the way quite clear, no trouble at all, and the appointment will come later,"

" On your word, I won't mess matters to follow you ? " "On my word. You'll straighten them. Come on, there's no time to lose, the train leaves in less than half-an-hour | "

It was the work of a few momeuts to take tickets by the first train and get on board. For hours and hours the country dragged by, and Montagu-Murray talked more than he had ever talked before. At Umballa, where

the branch runs off to Kalka in the hills, a troop train stood ready to leave for Peshawar, and the two transferred to it. The whole atmosphere was soldiers. Wherever the train palled up by the wayside there were soldiers ; where a carriage rolled down to the line, or riders cantered round the corners, there were soldiers; where a kitmatgar disappeared in the bazaar to chant a warning of the flying speed of the train when there was •' fet " on the frontier, soldiers emerged in dozens. Montagu-Murray was a new man in a new element. The atmosphere of soldiers after nil did seem a congenial one, and he talked tactics and brush very freely with the officers of a native battalion going forward, until (Jhesney almost suspected that he had been studying his profession. ***** Then there was an interval, filled with frontier warfare and mistakes, sniping parties, convoys massacred, brilliant charges such as the schoolboy loves to dream of, and a mail tonga from the military base with letters ten days old from Dunga Khel. At last the Hussars got to beyond Tank, far away in the hills, and the tribes foregathered to meet them. There was a big light. The Dogras wavered ; the Lincolns had more than their hands full to keep their ground, aud the Queen's Indias were sent forward to clear their front and cover the retreat. Montagu-Murray felt sick at heart, as he had felt when for the tirst time lie bad lined out with the school for a match in the first fifteen. But it was only for a moment. Then he rose superior. The Hussars charged. The Colonel was wounded and unhorsed. The squadron was penned in close to a sangar under a singing cross fire, and the leaded garnets phitted and split on the stones. The position was serious, and the ranks fidgeted to move. The trumpeter blew "Rally," and the troopers formed in expectation. The trumpeter blew " Retire," and Montagu-Murray,

with his tivst public oath sinco ho was a o-entleman cadet, said : " Rotire bo danmod ! " * * * * * By and bye the doolie bearers camo along to pick up the wounded. Montagu-Murray lay on his back far beyond tho reach of doolies. Next morning Dunga Khel read the war news with a heavy heart. Many known figures would not be seen again at the Hussars' Theatre, from the colonel down to the subaltern, ami to judge from the paragraph which concluded the Commanding Ollicer's report of the brush, the subaltern would not be tho least missed. Dtuiga Khel marvelled and wept when it read as follows: Second Lieutenant, Claude A. do U. MontaguMurray behaved with conspicuous gallantry, dashing out and rescuing tho Colonel of his regiment when ho whs wounded and dismounted, and in danger of being taken prisoner, and afterwards leading tho brilliant charge of the Hussars which decided tho day, and in which he lost his life. " It was marvrllous ! " said the Colonel, a week or two later, when he was home again at Dunga Khel by the advice of the Medical Staff. " Five minutes before I. could swear he would funk ! lie was blue with whiteness, poor fellow ! But they are all the same lit lirst, and you can be pretty certain of blue blood turning game in a tight corner. I've seen so much of it in my time." The Colonel was very much upset at Montagu-Murray's death. He said as much ; and tho whole station was proud of the subaltern, although to this day there aro some uncharitable enough to say that he was burning to destroy remembrance of the call to the Council in something even better and more real. And it was destroyed as far as the outsido [ world was concerned. A Christian clerk at the Military Department saved the telegram from being filed, and the only persons who i know the story of the hoax aro Chosnoy and . his accomplices at Dunga Khel, some of whom are dead, and tho rest ashamed.