Benefit of Doubt/Chapter 9
CHAPTER IX.
“I will lead?”
Athelstan King recovered consciousness, but did not advertise the fact, not believing in advertisement, and having seen too many men betray their plans and their weakness at the instance of that uptodate disease. He does not believe that it pays, and his dread of advertisement is of such long standing and so ingrained that it controls him even in the twilight between near-death and recovery.
So he lay still and discovered that he was lying on his stomach between a dozen men and a ridge of rock. He could touch the rock with his right hand. The men sat in a row between him and a bonfire, whose light danced and fell, alternating with shadow on the rock beside him. His head ached and there was a singing in his ears, but he could hear the men talking, and could hear others jesting across other fires not far away. He knew that his wrists and ankles had been tied, for they smarted where the thongs had cut, but some one had loosed them and the blood was circulating freely.
Moving inch by inch he managed to turn his head and look under his left arm, but it took him a long time to recognize what he saw as anything but phantasy, because the blood was still surging behind his eyes. He had evidently had a bad blow on the head, and a cautious survey with his fingers discovered a bruise the size of half a mango—whereat he was content. Bruises that break outward hurt but are hardly ever serious.
The scene, as viewed between the hips of two men who squatted chin on knee, resembled a glimpse of Robin Hood and his merry men carousing in the open. There were even bows and arrows in evidence, but most of the men had modern rifles and bandoliers. All had peculiar swords of foreign make; and every single man had loot of some kind—when nothing else, then brass railway carriage handles or the buttons from an official's uniform. Headmen were haranguing groups in front of the fires, for a Moslem loves to be told what he wants to think and will listen in raptures to almost any one who will reel off the right sort of platitudes.
Obviously these were men returning, not from one raid, but from a series of them. They had the loot of Hindu villages as well as of railway trains. Over beyond the fires he could make out the shadowy shapes of cattle and sheep, and herded in a corner between two bonfires, with a guard beyond them, were unquestionable prisoners, mostly young Hindu women, like himself unbound, but unlike himself, watched closely.
Gradually King began to remember the incidents preceding the blow on the head that had stunned him. He judged that he must have been transported a considerable distance since then. He remembered the pinnacle rock and looked for it, but it was not there. Instead, his eye rested on another—a monolith twenty feet high from the ground, shaped like a huge recumbent tomb-stone, on which men were seated talking in the dark.
He could not hear words at first; could not recognize a single voice, for they were all pitched low; and he did not expect to be able to understand the language in any event; but he listened, trying by sheer force of will to overcome the singing in his ears.
Presently the men who squatted near him got up and crossed over to the far side, without even glancing at him. Taking advantage of the shadows King instantly started to crawl toward the monolith, and gained a point about twenty yards away from it, where a dozen dwarf trees cast impenetrable darkness. He lay there and listened again, beginning to imagine that a rather hard, not exactly nasal but roof-of-the-mouthy voice might be familiar. There were certain notes in it that struck chords of memory.
Then, to his surprize, he recognized words—Hindustanee, which meant that one race was talking to another, using the lingua franca. That drew attention to the predominant voice again, and he was more than ever sure he recognized it. Nevertheless, he could not catch more than a word or two here and there that were meaningless without the context. And he did not dare crawl nearer.
The men were not quarreling, but they were arguing. Some of them were shooting questions at the fellow with the Northern voice. That was it—Northerner! Mahommed Babar for a fortune! Knowing who the man was made it easier to hear what he said for some unfathomable reasons
“There are liars here as elsewhere evidently. You have listened to very many lies. You have only yourselves. No help from outside. Yes, it is true there is discontent. Yes, the North is full of violence. Yes, I have come from the North expressly to be with you. Very true, I would not do that unless I felt sure the cause I espouse would succeed. But I know more than you do. Listen! I tell:you you will only make these English obstinate by raiding out of your own territory—I know them. They are like those trees; they can be made to bend before the blast, but if they are uprooted they grow again, and they hardly ever break. By Allah, I say you must act wisely, brothers! Slay no more prisoners lest the British send an army corps!”
The speaker got up to pace restlessly to and fro, and King could see him clearly at last outlined against the crimson overglow of a row of fires a hundred yards beyond, It was Mahommed Babar—both hands behind him—chin down—staring at the rock before his feet.
Aping Napoleon?
“Who is that fellow we seized by the lookout rock and brought along with us? He is a Hillman like yourself. Who is he?”
“How should I know?” Mahommed Babar answered. “Men from the Hills are sure to come in ones and twos. The news of your looting will bring them like kites. But do kites help?”
“Every Moslem's sword is welcome to strike a blow with us for the Khalifate!” some one shouted, and for a minute or two they all chorused “There is no God but Allah and Mahommed is his prophet.” 'The whole bivouack voiced the sentiment.
“How many times must I tell you that between us and the Northern tribes lie not only leagues but armies!” said Mahommed Babar when the noise died down. “The men of the north have made you promises, but can not fulfil! Can each of you fight a hundred? No. Neither can they. You are as far apart as the mountain was from Mahommed, and neither can get to the other! You must manage this the way I tell you, or you will be overwhelmed.”
Aping George Washington?
The others talked on. Mahommed Babar with hands knitted behind him continued to pace to and fro until the mauve of morning glimmered over the tree-tops and the glow of the bonfires paled. Then, of course, most of the raiding party proceeded to fall asleep. But some one blew a horn that sounded like a bagpipe, and a dozen others took it up, running officiously among the dying fires to waken everybody. Probably they had been feasting through the night on the flesh of Hindu cows. None paused for breakfast. They were up and away, on foot all of them, before the first golden shaft of sunlight pierced between the trees; and nobody seemed to remember King. At all events nobody looked for him; and none took notice of him as he took to the trail with the rest.
It was difficult to think at all with his head almost splitting apart with pain, and he rewound his turban to make sure that the early sun did not creep under it and put the finishing touch. They were marching nearly due west, and a cursory study of one of Ommony's forest maps had not conveyed much information. He did not know where he was to begin with, so could hardly calculate what place they might be heading for.
He did not know whether to approach Mahommed Babar and tax him with disloyalty—perhaps dissuade him even yet—or to let him alone and wait on events. Chance and the law of averages always play into the hands of him who waits. He did not even know whether Mahommed Babar had seen him or not; nor if so, whether he had recognized him. That answer made on the monolith—“How should I know who he is?”—might have been honest in either of two ways—plain truth, or the effort of a careful man to save a friend's life.
He decided at last to look for Mahommed Babar and watch for an opportunity. But whether his head ached so badly that he could not watch as alertly as usual, or whether Mahommed Babar avoided him, he failed—even when they reached a Moplah village and filed up the one tree-shaded street.
It WAS a prosperous enough village of about two hundred huts, some in considerable compounds, all enclosed behind a fence of sticks, and all shaded by enormous trees, underneath which the inevitable poultry put on muscle fighting and chasing insects. Peaceful enough at the first glance, except that the little boys who came running out were noisy and pelted the prisoners, and the women peering through the high stake-fences shrilled like furies.
There was a mosque built mainly of mud and thatch at the upper end of the steep street, and some one was thumping a tom-tom near the door. King made straight for that, confidently in spite of the sickening pain in his head and the increasing curiosity of a dozen small boys, who detected his foreign appearance and were. inclined to be abusive on general principles. Just as the center of a cyclone is the safest place, so is a mosque in Moslem country, if you can pass for a Mahommedan. Every Moslem has right of refuge there—the right to pray and meditate and sleep.
Moreover, the mullah very often fancies himself as a physician, or at least as a vendor of cure-all charms, so King had a double claim on him, in addition to a knowledge of the Koran that would establish his credentials in any community where, as likely as not, the mullah himself knew no more than a hundred texts. Moreover, women having no soul worth mentioning in Moslem lands, the mosque, the coffee shop and the barber's are sure to be free from the sex, which gossips no more than men, and is no more curious, but is different. The gossip of men falls nine times out of ten on unbelieving ears. The curiosity of men is fairly easy to withstand. It was a woman, not a man, who saw through Peter by the courtyard fire, and though he had no objection to lying thirty times if need were, whether cock crew or otherwise, King was resolved to avoid the dangerous sex as much as possible.
Nevertheless, a priest is usually the next most dangerous.
The mullah greeted King with undisguised relief. He craved the night's news, was full of a private stock of rumors of his own, wanted to mix with the crowd and do what the Scots call “argle-bargle,” yet dared not for fear of losing dignity. Evidently there was some local phase of politics that upset the usual procedure and, temporarily at any rate, robbed the priest of his privileges.
“Ah! An Afghan!” he exclaimed at sight of King. “No? An Afridi, are you. Well, the same thing. Both are true-believers, and Islam is all one, or ought to be. The blessing of the Most High rest on you, my son.”
He was a learned-looking mullah, with the white turban supposed to imply that he was a doctor of Moslem law, but the crafty expression of his face added to a sort of vague indefiniteness provided excuse for reasonable doubt. If a small community lacks a really learned priest it must make the most of an ambitious one, and usually does.
He had a straggly beard through which he ran his fingers at frequent intervals, showing his fangs between rather simian lips, which could smile, nevertheless, extremely good naturedly. Clearly a man who could let well enough alone; who would rob Peter but would certainly pay Paul; who would fight underhandedly or any other way for his own interest, but would concede the other fellow's once his own was sure. In fact, not such a bad fellow, provided you did not poach in what he claimed were his preserves.
“It is good to meet a learned man among all these fools,” said King. “I sat at the feet of the learned Sidiki ben Suliman of Delhi, of blessed memory, who filled me with a void of loneliness because so few can talk as he did.”
The mullah's eyes changed swiftly as he went on guard. He was like a cat that wonders whether you mean to stroke or seize it. Plainly he was willing to admire King's learning, even if he should not comprehend much of it, for all India knows the name of the late Sidiki ben Suliman, and those who were taught by him are entitled to deep respect. But he was not going to be shown up before the villagers as an ignoramus, and if anything of that kind were on the cards he was going to denounce the new arrival out of hand.
“You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours,” his brown eyes said, and King understood him perfectly.
Now King really had sat at the feet of Sidiki ben Suliman. That had been part of his secret service training, and the great Sidiki had accepted him quite frankly as an Englishman in quest of knowledge, who would inevitably do more good than harm in a world that is all too empty of what are called true seekers.
“Naturally I know much less than your eminence,” said King, “and I have never had the inestimable privilege of being appointed mullah. But there are some things that the great Sidiki told me, which your honor might be pleased to hear; and I have been fortunate in acquiring some medical skill that might increase your honor's reputation.”
The mullah almost purred. He crossed one fat leg over the other and leaned back against a wooden upright of the portico, brushing a place on the floor with his hand as a hint to King to sit beside him.
“I perceive your honor is a man of great distinction,” he said warmly. “My servant shall bring a wet poultice for your head, which I regret to see is injured, and may Allah bless your honor with a swift recovery.”
They exchanged names, and the mullah rolled King's over in his mouth half-a-dozen times, liking the sonorous high sound of it.
“Sirdar Mahommed Akbar Khan! Your honor favors us. To what circumstance do we owe the good fortune of this visit?”
“I heard of what you Moplahs intend, and as a good Moslem I came to see for myself and possibly to do some good here,” King answered. “However, some of your outposts saw me first in the night-time and all but beat my brains out. Your men are alert and have keen eyes in the dark—good fighting men. There is no serious harm done. I shall recover. Many a harder blow than this has fallen to my lot in the Northern wars.”
The mullah's servant came and bandaged King's head rather skilfully, clipping the hair around the bruise and laying on a kind of cool leaf that reduced inflammation.
“Tell me what chance you think we have! You are a soldier. Tell me, can we drive the British away from here, seize their ships, and send an army to restore the Kahlifate in Stamboul?”
“All that is on the knees of God,” King answered piously, grateful for the Moslem habit that makes that kind of reply acceptable. “Let us talk first of the great Sidiki ben Suliman and the wise sayings that he taught.”
The mullah sent for food. He was delighted. Here was a man, not only of good breeding but of learning, not only of learning but of valor, not only of valor but of discrimination—a stranger most unquestionably versed in the law, who set the law first and politics after it—who was pious, wise, indisputably well disposed toward himself—one from whom he could learn priceless scraps of knowledge, to be retailed thriftily to the villagers afterwards, and one whom he dared trust to give impartial, sound advice.
“Surely,” he said. “If your honor pleases, tell me of the great Sidiki and his sayings, whose memory and whose wisdom may Allah forever bless. This is a stiff-necked people and I need such word as your honor brings for the better chastening of their pride. They are willing to slay the infidel and to circumcise the idolater, but they are backward in prayer and fasting, and in alms-giving less eager than these stones.”
So for an hour they talked, eating chupatties swallowed down with drafts of cows' milk (for the plundered Hindu cows were lowing for relief, and the villagers were not so unmindful of their mullah's needs as he chose to maintain.)
King's art—his whole art—consists in being all things to all men, as that arch-strategist the apostle Paul advised, so as he talked the mullah warmed to him, calling him “my son,” drinking in the absolutely simple proverbs that had fallen from the lips of Sidiki ben Suliman, deceased, wondering at his broad humanity, chuckling at his shrewdness, more and more patronizing him and, as he patronized, delivering himself bound and helpless into King's net.
King asked no questions. Whoever has watched a lawyer examine even a willing witness must know that direct interrogation is the surest way to get the facts confused. He was simply sympathetic; not so flattering as friendly; willing to be waited on and accorded deference, but much more pleased to render service if that could be done with dignity. He owned the key that opens all doors in the world, and the oil that prevents the telltale squeak of hinges.
“Your honor is acquainted in the North. Do you know Mahommed Babar?” the mullah demanded at last. The really important subject must come to the surface, as a cat knows when she camps near a mouse-hole. King was at least as cautious as a cat.
“Who is he? What of him?” he countered.
“He came and worked for Ommon-ee, who is mad but has been blessed by Allah with compensating gifts. He ran away from Ommon-ee and came to us; and my servants brought me word last night that he sets himself up as a leader.”
“What does he look like?” King asked, avoiding the direct question.
“I have not seen him. He advises one course, whereas I have all along insisted on the other. I say, raid and plunder. We have always done it—always. We have met defeat, because of dissention generally, ' but we have always kept the plunder, for our villages are inaccessible. Hindu women make good wives when their cursed superstitions have been whipped out of them. The Moplah nation has grown to be a million strong because Allah has blessed us with the daughters of our enemies. I say, Raid in the name of Allah! This Mahommed Babar from the North says otherwise. What does your honor think?”
“I think,” King answered.
“In Allah's name think quickly, then, for I need advice! It is not good that a stranger should upset my authority. If he has valuable counsel for us, that is well, but he should address it to me first. Then with my approval it can be passed on by the elders.”
“He lacks manners,” King agreed. “Your wisest course is to arrange for me to have private word with him. Meanwhile, if you think his advice is bad”
“It is the advice of an ape in the tree-tops!”
“—you may say there is another here from the North, whose advice may prove different.”
“Excellent! Excellent! And you will say nothing without my sanction?”
“I will discuss each syllable with you in advance!'
King entered the mosque and lay down in the cool, clean interior. The mullah departed, blessing him. He had let enough time go by to preserve his dignity and now, with a wonderful new ally in reserve, whom Allah must have sent for the express purpose of upholding traditional authority, he could afford to approach the raiders and highhandedly “demand to know.” Incidentally, of course, he would make a few inquiries as to the share of the loot that was due him, and would look the prisoners over—males first, of course, in the name of Allah, for likely converts. Females second, not quite so perfunctorily, in the name of prudence, since he had but two wives.
And because some of them wished to avoid the mullah, whose prayers were doubtless excellent but whose appetite for percentages was insatiable; and because it was the custom; and because there was nowhere else where men could talk at that time of day without being overheard by women (which is always inconvenient) gossiping parties of two and three, with an eye for the mullah as they made a circuit of the house, began dropping in to the mosque and squatting face to face on kaskas mats.
It was reasonable that King should lie there fast asleep against the wall. Even in the gloom every one could see that his head was bandaged. He might be dying. Who knew? In the name of the Prophet, Allah bless the man!
And having breathed the word of charity, they spoke of blood—of this and that raid on the railway line—of this and that woman dragged screaming from a Hindu home—of jewelry, cash, cattle—and the tale of butchered Hindu traders.
But lordly though the count was, and uninterrupted the series of detail victories, every little group opened presently on the subject of Mahommed Babar, until one group joined another and absorbed in a common subject they all formed one wide circle—outside which, in the shadow King lay presumably dead to the world. Not that he mattered. A Moslem—an obvious Northerner—a man with a broken head whom the mullah had been seen to feed on the portico—let him listen for all they cared.
Mahommed Babar had puzzled them. They recognized him for a good, grim fanatic, whose fiery impulse was to convert all India to Islam forcibly; but they did not understand his everlasting harping on the theme of caution—forbearance—discrimination.
What in the name of Allah had forbearance to do with rebellion? Why discriminate between troops and civilians? Troops could hit back. Civilians usually couldn't! Civilians had money. Troops had none. And by the time you had driven British troops to bay and butchered the last man there was usually not even any ammunition left. It was wiser, easier, more profitable and much less dangerous to kill civilians. Moreover, the soldiers never had women with them, and civilians always had.
The consensus of opinion was that Mahommed Babar was probably mad. Not that madness was necessarily against him. Most good leaders had a strain of divine frenzy that showed itself in unexpected ways. But it was a weird kind of madness that urged them to make common cause with Hindus! Mahommed Babar actually said, and swore to it in the name of the Most High, that in Delhi and such-like ancient places—even in Ahmedabad and Lucknow—Moslems and Hindus had fraternized and sunk old grievances in the hope of combining to clear India of foreigners from end to end. The man was obviously not a liar, but they did not believe a word of that. Some one had deceived him.
Why, the first thing they would do, if the British could be driven out of India, would be to—Allah! Think of it! How many Hindu virgins, and how many rupees in Hindu pockets would remain between the mountains and the sea? Oh Allah, Giver of all good, hasten that day!
Nevertheless, Mahommed Babar had impressed them. Their neck of the woods lacked leadership. Their own mullah was a greedy fellow, full of talk and plentifully bent on rapine, but not inclined to take the field himself—which, indeed, was no misfortune, since he would be quite sure to lead into disaster if obeyed, and if he were disobeyed there would be even less discipline than at present.
Mahommed Babar would make a splendid leader. Trained in war—widely traveled and full of experience—scornful of personal gain, and therefore unlikely to tithe them too heavily—brave, for had he not faced their headmen the previous night and stood up to them unarmed, insisting on his determination to be heard? Magnetic—for had he not appealed from the headmen to themselves, and successfully? They had actually threatened their headmen with violence unless they gave the Northerner a hearing, and one by one the headmen had seen the advantage of befriending him.
Followed much laughter. It was funny to remember with what haste the headmen had scrambled to make friends with Mahommed Babar after the first one had shown the way. Hah! With what jealousy they competed for recognition! How they had flattered, who but ten minutes before were mouthing hot threats! How they had striven and intrigued for the privilege of being host to him!
Even now all the headmen were crowded together uncomfortably into one small room rather than let one man have Mahommed Babar's private ear. Allah, what a stifling heat in there! What a mess of argument! If Mahommed Babar were indeed a leader he would drive those headmen forth and claim his privacy!
By Allah, that was a brilliant proposal! Who had thought of it?
They all had, since somebody said it was brilliant. Each nudged the other and insisted on having been the author of the praised remark.
Why—how was it brilliant? Hah! Any man with half an eye could understand that. Let there be a sign from heaven. Was not that the authorized, established, ancestral way of deciding knotty issues? If Mahommed Babar should up and drive those headmen forth, thus proving himself greater and braver and wiser than the headmen, then let him be accepted as their leader! If not, then no.
Let Allah, Lord of life, decide the issue. Then, if Mahommed Babar drove the headmen forth it would be the verdict of Allah and
The speaker was interrupted by the arrival of the headmen in more or less of a cluster, each doing his best to seem the most important without offering the others too much inducement to challenge him. For a while they all whispered and talked at once, unable to elect a spokesman, until at last the youngest of them seized the advantage, speaking very rapidly and loud to avoid interruption.
“We advise that you engage this man Mahommed Babar to be leader for the present,” he announced.
“We recommend it.”
“We have considered the proposal in council and we strongly advise it!”
“We will continue to be a council. He may do nothing without our approval. Subject to that we advise you to appoint him leader for the present.”
“We are unanimous.”
“We urge you to agree to this at once.”
The headmen were undoubtedly unanimous, but in nothing so much as preventing any one of their number from rising a little higher than the rest.
There came another man into the mosque. He was laughing and full of communicative malice.
“He drove them forth! I saw! I heard! From the street I saw and heard! He called them bellies full of wind and said he will appeal to less opinionative folk! He said he will offer himself as leader before us all, and we may leave or take him. If we take him he will lead. By Allah he will lead, said he. If we reject him he will go away and we may stew in our own juice! So he said, standing in the door-with legs apart, and they went away and held a council afterwards.”
“Good! Let him be leader!” said some one, and they shouted agreement.
“But he must change that part about doing no violence to civilians! We must be allowed to loot or kill unhindered!”
They agreed to that, too, unanimously.
“Let some one bring him and we will tell him so to his”
The speaker's jaw dropped. There was silence. In the door Mahommed Babar stood, with head bent a little forward and hands behind him. He appeared to meet the eyes of every man in the mosque before he spoke. Then—
“I told these headmen that I will be your leader,” he said quietly. “Does any one object?”
None did. At least none cared to voice his disapproval.
“Very well then,” he said after a full minute. “I will lead. Henceforth there will be no killing of unarmed civilians. But there will be a plan and a purpose, and no back talk. I will give my orders to the headmen, who will enforce them. By Allah, since you have named me leader, I will lead!”