Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) (159 page)

‘A powerful bad thing is a ayah. Don’t you niver have any thruck wid wan. Thin he began sootherin’ her, an’ all the orf’cers an’ orf’cers’ ladies left, an’ they put out the lights. To explain the theory av the flight, as they say at Muskthry, you must understand that afther this
Sweethearts’
nonsinse was ended, there was another little bit av a play called
Couples
— some kind av couple or another. The gurl was actin’ in this, but not the man. I suspicioned he’d go to the station wid the gurl’s kit at the end av the first piece. ‘Twas the kit that flusthered me, for I knew for a Capt’n to go trapesing about the impire wid the Lord knew what av a
truso
on his arrum was nefarious, an’ wud be worse than easin’ the flag, so far as the talk aftherwards wint.’

‘‘Old on, Mulvaney. Wot’s
truso
?’ said Ortheris.

‘You’re an oncivilised man, me son. Whin a gurl’s married, all her kit an’ ‘coutrements are
truso
, which manes weddin’-portion. An’ ‘tis the same whin she’s runnin’ away, even wid the biggest blackguard on the Arrmy List.

‘So I made my plan av campaign. The Colonel’s house was a good two miles away. “Dennis,” sez I to my colour-sargint, “av you love me lend me your kyart, for me heart is bruk an’ me feet is sore wid trampin’ to and from this foolishness at the Gaff.” An’ Dennis lent ut, wid a rampin’, stampin’ red stallion in the shafts. Whin they was all settled down to their
Sweethearts
for the first scene, which was a long wan, I slips outside and into the kyart. Mother av Hivin! but I made that horse walk, an’ we came into the Colonel’s compound as the divil wint through Athlone — in standin’ leps. There was no one there excipt the servints, an’ I wint round to the back an’ found the girl’s ayah.

‘“Ye black brazen Jezebel,” sez I, “sellin’ your masther’s honour for five rupees — pack up all the Miss Sahib’s kit an’ look slippy!
Capt’n Sahib’s
order,” sez I. “Going to the station we are,” I sez, an’ wid that I laid my finger to my nose an’ looked the schamin’ sinner I was.

‘“Bote acchy,”
says she; so I knew she was in the business, an’ I piled up all the sweet talk I’d iver learnt in the bazars on to this she-bullock, an’ prayed av her to put all the quick she knew into the thing. While she packed, I stud outside an’ sweated, for I was wanted for to shif the second scene. I tell you, a young gurl’s e-vasion manes as much baggage as a rig’mint on the line av march! “Saints help Dennis’s springs,” thinks I, as I bundled the stuff into the thrap, “for I’ll have no mercy!”

‘“I’m comin’ too,” says the ayah.

‘“No, you don’t,” sez I, “later —
pechy!
You
baito
where you are. I’ll
pechy
come an’ bring you
sart
, along with me, you maraudin’”-niver mind fwhat I called her.

‘Thin I wint for the Gaff, an’ by the special ordher av Providence, for I was doin’ a good work you will ondersthand, Dennis’s springs hild toight. “Now, whin the Capt’n goes for that kit,” thinks I, “he’ll be throubled.” At the end av
Sweethearts
off the Capt’n runs in his kyart to the Colonel’s house, an’ I sits down on the steps and laughs. Wanst an’ again I slipped in to see how the little piece was goin’, an’ whin ut was near endin’ I stepped out all among the carr’ges an’ sings out very softly, “Jungi!” Wid that a carr’ge began to move, an’ I waved to the dhriver.
“Hitherao!”
sez I, an’ he
hitheraoed
till I judged he was at proper distance, an’ thin I tuk him, fair an’ square betune the eyes, all I knew for good or bad, an’ he dhropped wid a guggle like the canteen beer-engine whin ut’s runnin’ low. Thin I ran to the kyart an’ tuk out all the kit an’ piled it into the carr’ge, the sweat runnin’ down my face in dhrops. “Go home,” sez I, to the
sais;
“you’ll find a man close here. Very sick he is. Take him away, an’ av you iver say wan wurrd about fwhat you’ve
dekkoed
, I’ll
marrow
you till your own wife won’t
sumjao
who you are!” Thin I heard the stampin’ av feet at the ind av the play, an’ I ran in to let down the curtain. Whin they all came out the gurl thried to hide herself behind wan av the pillars, an’ sez “Jungi” in a voice that wouldn’t ha’ scared a hare. I run over to Jungi’s carr’ge an’ tuk up the lousy old horse-blanket on the box, wrapped my head an’ the rest av me in ut, an’ dhrove up to where she was.

‘“Miss Sahib,” sez I; “going to the station?
Captain Sahib’s
order!” an’ widout a sign she jumped in all among her own kit.

‘I laid to an’ dhruv like steam to the Colonel’s house before the
Colonel was there, an’ she screamed an’ I thought she was goin’ off.
Out comes the ayah, saying all sorts av things about the Capt’n havin’
come for the kit an’ gone to the station.

‘“Take out the luggage, you divil,” sez I, “or I’ll murther you!”

‘The lights av the thraps people comin’ from the Gaff was showin’ across the parade ground, an’, by this an’ that, the way thim two women worked at the bundles an’ thrunks was a caution! I was dyin’ to help, but, seein’ I didn’t want to be known, I sat wid the blanket roun’ me an’ coughed an’ thanked the Saints there was no moon that night.

‘Whin all was in the house again, I niver asked for
bukshish
but dhruv tremenjus in the opp’site way from the other carr’ge an’ put out my lights. Presintly, I saw a naygur man wallowin’ in the road. I slipped down before I got to him, for I suspicioned Providence was wid me all through that night. ‘Twas Jungi, his nose smashed in flat, all dumb sick as you please. Dennis’s man must have tilted him out av the thrap. Whin he came to, “Hutt!” sez I, but he began to howl.

‘“You black lump av dirt,” I sez, “is this the way you dhrive your
gharri?
That
tikka
has been
owin’
an’
fere-owin’
all over the bloomin’ country this whole bloomin’ night, an’ you as
mut-walla
as Davey’s sow. Get up, you hog!” sez I, louder, for I heard the wheels av a thrap in the dark; “get up an’ light your lamps, or you’ll be run into!” This was on the road to the Railway Station.

‘“Fwhat the divil’s this?” sez the Capt’n’s voice in the dhark, an’
I could judge he was in a lather av rage.

‘“
Gharri
dhriver here, dhrunk, Sorr,” sez I; “I’ve found his
gharri
sthrayin’ about cantonmints, an’ now I’ve found him.”

‘“Oh!” sez the Capt’n; “fwhat’s his name?” I stooped down an’ pretended to listen.

‘“He sez his name’s Jungi, Sorr,” sez I.

‘“Hould my harse,” sez the Capt’n to his man, an’ wid that he gets down wid the whip an’ lays into Jungi, just mad wid rage an’ swearin’ like the scutt he was.

‘I thought, afther a while, he wud kill the man, so I sez: — ”Stop, Sorr, or you’ll, murdher him!” That dhrew all his fire on me, an’ he cursed me into Blazes, an’ out again. I stud to attenshin an’ saluted: — “Sorr,” sez I, “av ivry man in this wurruld had his rights, I’m thinkin’ that more than wan wud be beaten to a jelly for this night’s work — that niver came off at all, Sorr, as you see?” “Now,” thinks I to myself, “Terence Mulvaney, you’ve cut your own throat, for he’ll sthrike, an’ you’ll knock him down for the good av his sowl an’ your own iverlastin’ dishgrace!”

‘But the Capt’n niver said a single wurrd. He choked where he stud, an’ thin he went into his thrap widout sayin’ good-night, an’ I wint back to barricks.’

‘And then?’ said Ortheris and I together.

‘That was all,’ said Mulvaney; ‘niver another word did I hear av the whole thing. All I know was that there was no e-vasion, an’ that was fwhat I wanted. Now, I put ut to you, Sorr, is ten days’ C. B. a fit an’ a proper tratement for a man who has behaved as me?’

‘Well, any’ow,’ said Ortheris,’tweren’t this ‘ere Colonel’s daughter, an’ you
was
blazin’ copped when you tried to wash in the Fort Ditch.’

‘That,’ said Mulvaney, finishing the champagne, ‘is a shuparfluous an’ impert’nint observation.’

OF THOSE CALLED

[Footnote: 1895]

We were wallowing through the China Seas in a dense fog, the horn blowing every two minutes for the benefit of the fishery craft that crowded the waterways. From the bridge the fo’c’sle was invisible; from the hand-wheel at the stern the captain’s cabin. The fog held possession of everything — the pearly white fog. Once or twice when it tried to lift, we saw a glimpse of the oily sea, the flitting vision of a junk’s sail spread in the vain hope of catching the breeze, or the buoys of a line of nets. Somewhere close to us lay the land, but it might have been the Kurile Islands for aught we knew. Very early in the morning there passed us, not a cable’s-length away, but as unseen as the spirits of the dead, a steamer of the same line as ours. She howled melodiously in answer to our bellowing, and passed on.

‘Suppose she had hit us,’ said a man from Saigon. ‘Then we should have gone down,’ answered the chief officer sweetly. ‘Beastly thing to go down in a fog,’ said a young gentleman who was travelling for pleasure. ‘Chokes a man both ways, y’ know.’ We were comfortably gathered in the smoking-room, the weather being too cold to venture on the deck. Conversation naturally turned upon accidents of fog, the horn tooting significantly in the pauses between the tales. I heard of the wreck of the
Eric
, the cutting down of the
Strathnairn
within half a mile of harbour, and the carrying away of the bow plates of the
Sigismund
outside Sandy Hook.

‘It is astonishing,’ said the man from Saigon, ‘how many true stories are put down as sea yarns. It makes a man almost shrink from telling an anecdote.’

‘Oh, please don’t shrink on our account,’ said the smoking-room with one voice.

‘It’s not my own story,’ said the man from Saigon. ‘A fellow on a Massageries boat told it me. He had been third officer of a sort on a Geordie tramp — one of those lumbering, dish-bottomed coal-barges where the machinery is tied up with a string and the plates are rivetted with putty. The way he told his tale was this. The tramp had been creeping along some sea or other with a chart ten years old and the haziest sort of chronometers when she got into a fog — just such a fog as we have now.’

Here the smoking-room turned round as one man, and looked through the windows.

‘In the man’s own words, “just when the fog was thickest, the engines broke down. They had been doing this for some weeks, and we were too weary to care. I went forward of the bridge, and leaned over the side, wondering where I should ever get something that I could call a ship, and whether the old hulk would fall to pieces as she lay. The fog was as thick as any London one, but as white as steam. While they were tinkering at the engines below, I heard a voice in the fog about twenty yards from the ship’s side, calling out, ‘Can you climb on board if we throw you a rope?’ That startled me, because I fancied we were going to be run down the next minute by a ship engaged in rescuing a man overboard. I shouted for the engine-room whistle; and it whistled about five minutes, but never the sound of a ship could we hear. The ship’s boy came forward with some biscuit for me. As he put it into my hand, I heard the voice in the fog, crying out about throwing us a rope. This time it was the boy that yelled, ‘Ship on us!’ and off went the whistle again, while the men in the engine-room — it generally took the ship’s crew to repair the
Hespa’s
engines — tumbled upon deck to know what we were doing. I told them about the hail, and we listened in the smother of the fog for the sound of a screw. We listened for ten minutes, then we blew the whistle for another ten. Then the crew began to call the ship’s boy a fool, meaning that the third mate was no better. When they were going down below, I heard the hail the third time, so did the ship’s boy. ‘There you are,’ I said, ‘it is not twenty yards from us.’ The engineer sings out, ‘I heard it too! Are you all asleep?’ Then the crew began to swear at the engineer; and what with discussion, argument, and a little swearing, — for there is not much discipline on board a tramp, — we raised such a row that our skipper came aft to enquire. I, the engineer, and the ship’s boy stuck to our tale. ‘Voices or no voices,’ said the captain, ‘you’d better patch the old engines up, and see if you’ve got enough steam to whistle with. I’ve a notion that we’ve got into rather too crowded ways.’

‘“The engineer stayed on deck while the men went down below. The skipper hadn’t got back to the chart-room before I saw thirty feet of bowsprit hanging over the break of the fo’c’sle. Thirty feet of bowsprit, sir, doesn’t belong to anything that sails the seas except a sailing-ship or a man-of-war. I speculated quite a long time, with my hands on the bulwarks, as to whether our friend was soft wood or steel plated. It would not have made much difference to us, anyway; but I felt there was more honour in being rammed, you know. Then I knew all about it. It was a ram. We opened out. I am not exaggerating — we opened out, sir, like a cardboard box. The other ship cut us two-thirds through, a little behind the break of the fo’c’sle. Our decks split up lengthways. The mizzen-mast bounded out of its place, and we heeled over. Then the other ship blew a fog-horn. I remember thinking, as I took water from the port bulwark, that this was rather ostentatious after she had done all the mischief. After that, I was a mile and a half under sea, trying to go to sleep as hard as I could. Some one caught hold of my hair, and waked me up. I was hanging to what was left of one of our boats under the lee of a large English ironclad. There were two men with me; the three of us began to yell. A man on the ship sings out, ‘Can you climb on board if we throw you a rope?’ They weren’t going to let down a fine new man-of-war’s boat to pick up three half-drowned rats. We accepted the invitation. We climbed — I, the engineer, and the ship’s boy. About half an hour later the fog cleared entirely; except for the half of the boat away in the offing, there was neither stick nor string on the sea to show that the
Hespa
had been cut down.”