_ PHASE IV. DUST OF THE ACTUAL
CHAPTER X
"In you I most discern, in your brave spirit,
Erect and certain, flashing deeds of light,
A pure jet from the fountain of all Being;
A scripture clearer than all else to read."
--J.C. SQUIRE.
Roy returned to an empty bungalow.
On inquiry, he learnt that the Major Sahib had gone over to see the Colonel Sahib; and Wazir Khan--Desmond's bearer--abused, in lurid terms, the bastard son of a pig who had dared to assault the first Sahib in creation.
Roy, sitting down at his table, pushed aside a half-written page of his novel, and his pen raced over the paper in a headlong letter to Jeffers:--an outlet, merely, for his pent-up sensations; and a salve to his conscience. He had neglected Jeffers lately, as well as his novel. He had been demoralised, utterly, these last few weeks: and to-day, by way of crowning demoralisation, he felt by no means certain what the end would be--for himself; still less, for India.
The damaged Major Sahib--untroubled by animosity--appeared only just in time to change for Mess; his cheek unbecomingly plastered, his hand in a sling.
"Beastly nuisance;
Hukm hai,"[35] he explained in response to Roy's glance of inquiry. "Collins says it's a bit inflamed. I've been confabbing with Paul over the deferred wedding. But, of course, there's no chance of things settling down, unless we declare martial law. The police are played out; and as for the impression we made this morning--the D.C.'s just telephoned in for a hundred British troops and armoured cars to picket and patrol bungalows in Lahore. Seems he's received an authentic report that the city people are planning to rush civil lines, loot the bungalows, and assault our women--damn them. So, by way of precaution, he has very wisely asked for troops.--Are they off--those two?"
"To-morrow night," said Roy, feeling so horribly constrained that the influx of Barnard and Meredith was, for once, almost a relief.
Then there was Mess; fresh speculations, fresh tales, and a certain amount of chaff over Desmond having 'stopped a brick'; Barnard, in satirical vein, regretting to report a bloody encounter: one casualty: enemy sprinkled with buckshot, retired according to plan.
Before the meal was over, Roy fancied he detected a change in Lance; his talk and laughter seemed a trifle strained; his lips set, now and then, as if he were in pain.
Later on he came up and remarked casually: "I'm not feeling very bright. I think I'll turn in. Perhaps the sun touched me up a bit." Clearly Roy's face betrayed him; for Lance added in an imperative undertone: "
Don't look at me like that. I'm going to slip off quietly--not to worry Paul."
"Well, I'm going to slip off too," Roy retorted with decision. "I feel used up; and my beast of a bruise hurts like blazes."
"Drive me home, then," said Lance; and his changed tone, no less than the surprising request, told Roy he would be glad of his company.
They said little during the drive; Roy, because he felt vaguely anxious, and knew it would annoy Lance if he betrayed concern, or inquired after symptoms. It seemed a shame to worry the poor fellow in this state; but silence had now become impossible.
"Are you for bed, old man?" he asked when they got in.
"Rather not. I just felt a bit queer. Wanted to get away from them all and be quiet."
His normal manner eased Roy's anxiety a little. Without more ado, they settled into long veranda chairs and called for 'pegs.' The night was utterly still. A red distorted moon hung just above the tree-tops. Yelling and spitting crowds seemed to belong to another world.
Lance leaned back in the shadow, the tip of his cigar glowing like a fierce planet. Roy sat forward, tense and purposeful: hating what he had to say; yet goaded by the knowledge that he could have no peace of mind till it was said.
He was silent a few moments, pulling at his cigar: then, "Look here, Lance," he said. "I've got a question to ask. You won't like it. I don't either. But the truth is ... I'm bothered to know what is ... or has been ... between you and...."
"Drop it, Roy." There was pain and impatience in Desmond's tone. "I'm not going to talk about
that."
Flat opposition gave Roy precisely the spur he needed.
"I'm afraid
I've got to, though." The statement was placable but decisive. "I can't go on this way. It's getting on my nerves----"
"Devil take your nerves," said Lance politely. Then--with an obvious effort--"Has she--said anything?"
"No."
"Then why the hell can't you let be!"
"I
shall let be--altogether, if this goes on;--this infernal awkwardness between us; and the things she says--the way she looks ... almost as if she cares."
"Well, I give you my oath--she doesn't. I suppose I ought to know?"
"That depends how things were before I came up. She's twice let your name slip out, unawares. And at Anarkalli she was extraordinarily upset. And to-day--about your hand. Then, riding home, I met Mrs Ranyard. And she started talking ... hinting at a private engagement----"
"Mrs Ranyard deserves to have her tongue removed. She'd tell any lie about another woman."
"Quito so. But is it a lie? It fits in too neatly with--the other things----"
Lance gave him a sidelong look. Their faces were just visible in the moonlight.
"Jealous--are you?"--His tone was almost tender.--"You damned lucky devil--you've no cause to be."
That natural inference startlingly revealed to Roy that jealousy had little or nothing to do with his trouble; and so great was the relief of open speech between them, that instinctively he told truth.
"N-no. I'm bothered about
you."
"Good God!" Desmond's abrupt laugh had no mirth in it. "
Me? "
"Yes--naturally. If it amounted to ... an engagement, and I charged in and upset everything ... I can't forgive myself ... or her----"
At that Desmond sat forward, obstructive no longer. "If you're going so badly off the rails, you must have it straight. And ... confound you!... it hurts----"
"I can see that. And it's more or less my doing----"
"On the contrary ... it was primarily
my doing ... as you justly pointed out to me a week or two ago."
Roy groaned. The irony of the situation stung like a whip-lash. "
Did it amount to an engagement?" he persisted.
"There or thereabouts." Lance paused and took a long pull at his cigar. "
But--it was quite between ourselves--in fact, conditional on ... the headway I could manage to make. She--cared, in a way. Not--as I do. That was one hitch. The other was Oh 'Ell's antipathy to soldiers, as husbands for her precious family. She--Rose--knew there would be ructions; a downright tussle, in fact. Well--she'll go almost any length to avoid ructions; specially with her mother. I don't blame her. The woman's a caution. So--she shirked facing the music ... till she felt quite sure of herself...."
"
Till she felt sure of herself, there should have been
no engagement," Roy decreed, amazed at his own rising anger. "Unfair on you."
Desmond's smile was the ghost of its normal self. "You always were a bit of a purist, Roy! Besides--it was my doing again. I pressed the point. And I think ... she liked me ... loving her. She really seemed to be coming my way--till
you turned up----" He clenched his hand and leaned back again, drawing a deep breath. "I'm forcing myself to tell you all this--since you've asked for it--because I won't have you blaming
her----"
Roy said nothing. Remembering how, throughout, the initiative had been hers, how hard he had striven against being ensnared, he did blame her, a good deal more than he could very well admit to this friend, whose single-hearted devotion made his own mere mingling of infatuation and passion seem artificial as gaslight in the blaze of dawn.--But knowing so much, he must know all.
"How long--was it on?"
"Oh, about three weeks before you came.
I was on a long while. Before Christmas."
"Since when has it been--off?"
Lance hesitated. "Well--things became shaky after Kapurthala. That day--the wedding, you remember?--I spoke rather straight ... about you. I saw you were getting keen. And I didn't want you to come a cropper----"
"Why the devil didn't you tell me the
truth?"
Lance set his lips. "Of course I wanted to. But--it was difficult. She said--not any one. Made a point of it. Not even Paul. And I was keen for her to feel quite free; no slur on her--if things fell through. So--as I couldn't warn you, I spoke to her. Perhaps I was a fool. Women are queer. You can never be sure ... and it seemed to have quite the wrong effect. Then I saw she was really losing her head over you---- Natural enough. So I simply stood by. If she really wanted
you--not me, that was another affair. And it's plain ... she did."
"But when--did she
make it plain?" Roy insisted, feeling more and more as if the ground were giving way under his feet.
"Just before the Gym. That ... was why...." He looked full at Roy now. His eyes darkened with pain. "I felt like murdering you that day, Roy. Afterwards ... well--one managed to carry on somehow. One always can--at a pinch ...
you know."
"My God! It's the bitterest, ironical tangle!" Roy burst out with a smothered vehemence that told its own tale. "You
ought to have insisted about me, Lance. I wouldn't for fifty worlds...."
"Of course you wouldn't. Don't fret, old man. And don't blame
her."
"Blame or no, I can't pretend it doesn't alter things ... spoil things, badly...."
He broke off, startled by the change in Desmond. His face was drawn. He was shivering violently.
"Lance--
what is it? Fever? Have you been feeling bad?"
Desmond set his lips to steady them. "On and off--at Mess. Touch of the sun, perhaps. I'll get to bed and souse myself with quinine."
But he was so obviously ill that Roy paid no heed. "Well, I'm going to send for Collins instanter."
"Don't make an ass of yourself, Roy," Lance flashed out: but his hands were shaking: his lips were shaking. He was no longer in command of affairs....
While the message sped on its way, Roy got him to bed somehow; eased things a little with hot bottles and brandy; nameless terrors knocking at his heart....
In less than no time Collins appeared, with the Colonel; and their faces told Roy that his terror was only too well founded....
Within an hour he knew the worst--acute blood-poisoning from the
lathi wound.
"Any hope----?" he asked the genial doctor, while Paul Desmond knelt by the bed speaking to his brother in low tones.
"Too early to give an opinion," was the cautious answer. But the caution and the man's whole manner told Roy the incredible, unbearable truth.
Something inside him seemed to snap. In that moment of bewildered agony, he felt like a murderer....
* * * * *
Looking back afterwards, Roy marvelled how he had lived through the waking nightmare of those two days--while the doctor did all that was humanly possible, and Lance pitted all the clean strength of his manhood against the swift deadly progress of the poison in his veins. It was simply a question of hours; of fighting the devil to the last on principle, rather than from any likelihood of victory. With heart and hope broken, superhumanly they struggled on.
For Roy, the world outside that dim whitewashed bedroom ceased to exist. The loss of his mother had been anguish unalloyed; but he had not
seen her go....
Now, he saw--and heard, which was worse than all.
For Lance, towards the end, was constantly delirious; and, in delirium, he raved of Rose--always of Rose. He, the soul of reserve, poured out incontinently his passion, his worship, his fury of jealousy--till Roy grew almost to hate the sound of her name.
Worse--he was constrained to tell the Colonel the meaning of it all: to see anger flash through the haunting pain in his eyes.
Only twice, during the final struggle, the real Lance emerged; and on the second occasion they happened to be alone. Their eyes met in the old intimate understanding. Lance flung out his undamaged hand, and grasped Roy's with all the force still left him.
"Don't fret your heart out, Roy ... if I can't pull through," he said in his normal voice. "Carry on. And--
don't blame Rose. It'll hurt her--a bit. Don't hurt her more--because of me. And--look here, stand by Paul for a time. He'll need you."
Roy's "Trust me, dear old man," applied, mentally, to the last. Even at that supreme moment he was dimly thankful it came last.
Then the Colonel returned; and they could say no more; nor could Roy find it in his heart to grudge him a moment of that brief blessed interlude of real contact with the man they loved....
There could be no question of going to Lahore station on Sunday evening. He was ill himself, though he did not know it; and his soul was centred on Lance--the gallant spirit inwoven with almost every act and thought and inspiration of his life. By comparison, Rose was nothing to him; less than nothing; a mushroom growth--sudden and violent--with no deep roots; only fibres.
So he sent her, by an orderly, a few hurried lines of explanation and farewell.
"MY DEAR,--
"I'm sorry, but I can't come to-night. We are all in dreadful
grief. Lance down with acute blood-poisoning. Collins evidently
fears the worst. I can't write of it. I do trust you get up safely.
I'll write again, when it's possible.
"Yours,
ROY."
Yes, he was still hers--so far. More than that he could not honestly add. Beyond this awful hour he could not look. It was as if one stood on the edge of a precipice, and the next step would be a drop into black darkness....
* * * * *
By Monday night it was over. After forty-eight hours of fever and struggle and pain, Lance Desmond lay at rest--serene and noble in death, as he had been in life. And Roy--having achieved one long, slow climb out of the depths--was flung back again, deeper than ever....
It was near midnight when the end came. Utterly weary and broken, he had sunk into Lance's chair, leaning forward, his face hidden, his frame shaken all through with hard dry sobs that would not be stilled.
Through the fog of his misery, he felt the Colonel's hand on his shoulder; heard the familiar voice, deep and kindly: "My dear Roy, get to bed. We can't have you on the sick-list. There's work to do; a great gap to be filled--somehow. I'll stay--with him."
At that, he pulled himself together and stood up. "I'll do my best, Colonel," was all he could say. The face he had so rarely seen perturbed was haggard with grief. They looked straight at one another; and the thought flashed on Roy, 'I must tell him.' Not easy; but it had to be done.
"There's something, sir," he began, "I feel you ought to know. By rights, it--it should have been
me. That brute with the
lathi was right on me; and he--Lance--dashed in between ... rode him off--and got the knock intended for me. It--it haunts me."
Paul Desmond was silent a moment. Pain and exaltation contended strangely in his tired eyes. Then: "I--don't wonder," he said slowly. "It--was like him. Thank you for telling me. It will be--some small comfort ... to all of them. Now--try and get a little sleep."
Roy shook his head. "Impossible.--Good-night, Colonel. It's a relief to feel you know. For God's sake, let me do any mortal thing I can for any of you."
There was another moment of silence, of palpable hesitation; then once again Paul Desmond put his hand on Roy's shoulder.
"Look here, Roy," he said. "Drop calling me Colonel. You two--were like brothers. And--as Thea's included, why should I be out of it. Let me--be 'Paul.'"
It was hard to do. It was inimitably done. It gave Roy the very lift he needed in that hour when he felt as if they must almost hate him, and never wish to set eyes on him again.
"I--I shall be proud," he said; and, turning away to hide his emotion, went back to the bed that drew him like a magnet.
There he knelt a long while, in a torment of mute, passionate protest against the power of so trivial an injury to rob the world of so much gallantry and charm. Resignation was far from him. With all the vehemence that was in him, he raged against his loss....
* * * * *
Next morning, they awoke, as from a prolonged and terrible dream, to find Lahore practically isolated; all wires down, but one; the
hartal continuing in defiance of orders and exhortations; more stations demolished; more trains derailed and looted; all available British troops recalled from the Hills. But for five sets of wireless plant, urgently asked for, isolation would have been complete.
By the fourteenth, the position was desperate. Civil authority flatly defied; the police--lacking reserves--fairly played out; the temperature chart of rebellion at its highest point. The inference was plain.
Organised revolt is amenable only to the ultimate argument of force. Nothing, now, would serve but strong action, and the compelling power of Martial Law.
Happily for India, the men who had striven their utmost to avoid both did not falter in that critical hour.
At Amritsar strong action had already been taken; and the sobering effect of it spread, in widening circles, bringing relief to thousands of both races; not least to men whose nerve and resource had been strained almost to the limit of endurance.
In Lahore, notices of Martial Law were issued. The suspended life of the city tentatively revived. Law-abiding men of all ranks breathed more freely; and for the moment it seemed the worst was over....
Roy, having slept off a measure of his utter fatigue, took up the dead weight of life again, with the old sick sensation, of three years ago, that nothing mattered in earth or heaven. But then, there had been Lance to uphold and cheer him. Now there was only the hard unfailing mercy of work to be pulled through somehow.
There was also Rose--and the problem of letting her know that he knew. And--their marriage? All that seemed to have suffered shipwreck with the rest of him. He was still too dazed and blinded with grief to see an inch ahead. He only knew he could not bear to see her, who had made Lance suffer so, till the first anguish had been dulled a little--on the surface at least.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 35: It is an order.] _