Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) (56 page)

‘She is killing our people,’ shouted a villager.

‘Maybe,’ said the woman, with a flashing smile; ‘but I know who will be lying here dead if you do not suffer her to pass. Are you Rajputs, or Bhils from the hills, hunters of fish, and diggers after grubs, that you run like cattle because a lying priest from nowhere troubles your heads of mud? Is she killing your people? How long can you keep that man alive with your charms and your mantras?’ she demanded, pointing to the stricken form on the stretcher. ‘Out — go out! Is this hospital your own village to defile? Have you paid one penny for the roof above you or the drugs in your bellies? Get hence before I spit upon you!’ She brushed them aside with a regal gesture.

‘It is best not to go in,’ said Dhunpat Rai in Kate’s, ear. ‘There is local holy man in the courtyard, and he is agitating their minds. Also, I myself feel much indisposed.’

‘But what does all this mean?’ demanded Kate again.

For the hospital was in the hands of a hurrying crowd, who were strapping up bedding and cooking-pots, lamps and linen, calling to one another up and down the staircases in subdued voices, and bringing the sick from the upper wards as ants bring eggs out of a broken hill, six or eight to each man — some holding bunches of marigold flowers in their hands, and pausing to mutter prayers at each step, others peering fearfully into the dispensary, and yet others drawing water from the well and pouring it out around the beds.

In the centre of the courtyard, as naked as the lunatic who had once lived there, sat an ash-smeared, long-haired, eagle-taloned, half-mad, wandering native priest, and waved above his head his buckhorn staff, sharp as a lance at one end, while he chanted in a loud monotonous voice some song that drove the men and women to work more quickly.

As Kate faced him, white with wrath, her eyes blazing, the song turned to a yelp of fierce hatred.

She dashed among the women swiftly — her own women, who she thought had grown to love her. But their relatives were about them, and Kate was thrust back by a bare-shouldered, loud-voiced dweller of the out-villages in the heart of the desert.

The man had no intention of doing her harm, but the woman of the desert slashed him across the face with her knife, and he withdrew howling.

‘Let me speak to them,’ said Kate, and the woman beside her quelled the clamour of the crowd with uplifted hands. Only the priest continued his song. Kate strode toward him, her little figure erect and quivering, crying in the vernacular, ‘Be silent, thou, or I will find means to close thy mouth!’

The man was hushed, and Kate, returning to her women, stood amongst them, and began to speak impassionedly.

‘Oh, my women, what have I done?’ she cried, still in the vernacular. ‘If there is any fault here, who should right it but your friend? Surely you can speak to me day or night.’ She threw out her arms. ‘Listen, my sisters! Have you gone mad, that you wish to go abroad now, half-cured, sick, or dying? You are free to go at any hour. Only, for your own sake, and for the sake of your children, do not go before I have cured you, if God so please. It is summer in the desert now, and many of you have come from many koss distant.’

‘She speaks truth! She speaks truth,’ said a voice in the crowd.

‘Ay, I do speak truth. And I have dealt fairly by ye. Surely it is upon your heads to tell me the cause of this flight, and not to run away like mice. My sisters, ye are weak and ill, and your friends do not know what is best for you. But I know.’

‘Arre! But what can we do?’ cried a feeble voice. ‘It is no fault of ours. I, at least, would fain die in peace, but the priest says —  — ’

Then the clamour broke out afresh. ‘There are charms written upon the plasters —  — ’

‘Why should we become Christians against our will? The wise woman that was sent away asks it.’

‘What are the meanings of the red marks on the plasters?’

‘Why should we have strange devil-marks stamped upon our bodies? And they burn, too, like the fires of hell.’

‘The priest came yesterday — that holy man yonder — and he said it had been revealed to him, sitting among the hills, that this devil’s plan was on foot to make us lose our religion —  — ’

‘And to send us out of the hospital with marks upon our bodies — ay, and all the babies we should bear in the hospital should have tails like camels, and ears like mules. The wise woman says so; the priest says so.’

‘Hush! hush!’ cried Kate, in the face of these various words. ‘What plasters? What child’s talk is this of plasters and devils? Not one child, but many have been born here, and all were comely. Ye know it! This is the word of the worthless woman, whom I sent away because she was torturing you.’

‘Nay, but the priest said —  — ’

‘What care I for the priest? Has he nursed you? Has he watched by you of nights? Has he sat by your bedside, and smoothed your pillow, and held your hand in pain? Has he taken your children from you and put them to sleep, when ye needed an hour’s rest?’

‘He is a holy man. He has worked miracles. We dare not face the anger of the gods.’

One woman, bolder than the rest, shouted, ‘Look at this’; and held before Kate’s face one of the prepared mustard-leaves lately ordered from Calcutta, which bore upon the back, in red ink, the maker’s name and trade-mark.

‘What is this devil’s thing?’ demanded the woman fiercely.

The woman of the desert caught her by the shoulder, and forced her to her knees.

‘Be still, woman without a nose!’she cried, her voice vibrating with passion. ‘She is not of thy clay, and thy touch would defile her. Remember thine own dunghill, and speak softly.’

Kate picked up the plaster, smiling.

‘And who says there is devil’s work in this?’ she demanded.

‘The holy man, the priest. Surely he should know!’

‘Nay, ye should know,’ said Kate patiently. She understood now, and could pity. ‘Ye have worn it. Did it work thee any harm, Pithira?’ She pointed directly toward her. ‘Thou hast thanked me not once but many times for giving thee relief through this charm. If it was the devil’s work, why did it not consume thee?’

‘Indeed it burnt very much indeed,’ responded the woman, with a nervous laugh.

Kate could not help laughing. ‘That is true. I cannot make my drugs pleasant. But ye know that they do good. What do these people, your friends — villagers, camel-drivers, goat-herds — know of English drugs? Are they so wise among their hills, or is the priest so wise, that they can judge for thee here, fifty miles away from them? Do not listen. Oh, do not listen! Tell them that ye will stay with me, and I will make you well. I can do no more. It was for that I came. I heard of your misery ten thousand miles away, and it burnt into my heart. Would I have come so far to work you harm? Go back to your beds, my sisters, and bid these foolish people depart.’

There was a murmur among the women, as if of assent and doubt. For a moment the decision swayed one way and the other.

Then the man whose face had been slashed shouted, ‘What is the use of talking? Let us take our wives and sisters away! We do not wish to have sons like devils. Give us your voice, O father!’ he cried to the priest.

The holy man drew himself up, and swept away Kate’s appeal with a torrent of abuse, imprecation, and threats of damnation; and the crowd began to slip past Kate by twos and threes, half carrying and half forcing their kinsfolk with them.

Kate called on the women by name, beseeching them to stay — reasoning, arguing, expostulating. But to no purpose. Many of them were in tears; but the answer from all was the same. They were sorry, but they were only poor women, and they feared the wrath of their husbands.

Minute after minute the wards were depopulated of their occupants, as the priest resumed his song, and began to dance frenziedly in the courtyard. The stream of colours broke out down the steps into the street, and Kate saw the last of her carefully swathed women borne out into the pitiless sun-glare — only the woman of the desert remaining by her side.

Kate looked on with stony eyes. Her hospital was empty.

XX

Our sister sayeth such and such,
And we must bow to her behests;
Our sister toileth overmuch,
Our little maid that hath no breasts.

A field untilled, a web unwove,
A bud withheld from sun or bee,
An alien in the courts of Love,
And priestess of his shrine is she.

We love her, but we laugh the while;
We laugh, but sobs are mixed with laughter;
Our sister hath no time to smile,
She knows not what must follow after.

Wind of the South, arise and blow,
From beds of spice thy locks shake free;
Breathe on her heart that she may know,
Breathe on her eyes that she may see.

Alas! we vex her with our mirth,
And maze her with most tender scorn,
Who stands beside the gates of Birth,
Herself a child — a child unborn!

Our sister sayeth such and such,
And we must bow to her behests;
Our sister toileth overmuch,
Our little maid that hath no breasts.

— From Libretto of Naulahka.

‘Has the miss sahib any orders?’ asked Dhunpat Rai, with Oriental calmness, as Kate turned toward the woman of the desert, staying herself against her massive shoulder.

Kate simply shook her head with closed lips.

‘It is very sad,’ said Dhunpat Rai thoughtfully, as though the matter were one in which he had no interest; ‘but it is on account of religious bigotry and intolerance which is prevalent mania in these parts. Once — twice before I have seen the same thing. About powders, sometimes; and once they said that the graduated glasses were holy vessels, and zinc ointment was cow-fat. But I have never seen all the hospital disembark simultaneously. I do not think they will come back; but my appointment is State appointment,’ he said, with a bland smile, ‘and so I shall draw my offeeshal income as before.’

Kate stared at him. ‘Do you mean that they will never come back?’ she asked falteringly.

‘Oh yes — in time — one or two; two or three of the men when they are hurt by tigers, or have ophthalmia; but the women — no. Their husbands will never allow. Ask that woman!’

Kate bent a piteous look of inquiry upon the woman of the desert, who, stooping down, took up a little sand, let it trickle through her fingers, brushed her palms together, and shook her head. Kate watched these movements despairingly.

‘You see it is all up — no good,’ said Dhunpat Rai, not unkindly, but unable to conceal a certain expression of satisfaction in a defeat which the wise had already predicted. ‘And now what will your honour do? Shall I lock up dispensary, or will you audit drug accounts now?’

Kate waved him off feebly. ‘No, no! Not now. I must think. I must have time. I will send you word. Come, dear one,’ she added in the vernacular to the woman of the desert, and hand in hand they went out from the hospital together.

The sturdy Rajput woman caught her up like a child when they were outside, and set her upon her horse, and tramped doggedly alongside, as they, set off together toward the house of the missionary.

‘And whither wilt thou go?’ asked Kate, in the woman’s own tongue.

‘I was the first of them all,’ answered the patient being at her side; ‘it is fitting therefore that I should be the last. Where thou guest I will go — and afterward what will fall will fall.’

Kate leaned down and took the woman’s hand in hers with a grateful pressure.

At the missionary’s gate she had to call up her courage not to break down. She had told Mrs. Estes so much of her hopes for the future, had dwelt so lovingly on all that she meant to teach these helpless creatures, had so constantly conferred with her about the help she had fancied herself to be daily bringing to them, that to own that her work had fallen to this ruin was unspeakably bitter. The thought of Tarvin she fought back. It went too deep.

But, fortunately, Mrs. Estes seemed not to be at home, and a messenger from the Queen Mother awaited Kate to demand her presence at the palace with the Maharaj Kunwar.

The woman of the desert laid a restraining hand on her arm, but Kate shook it off.

‘No, no, no! I must go. I must do something,’ she exclaimed almost fiercely, ‘since there is still some one who will let me. I must have work. It is my only refuge, kind one. Go you on to the palace.’

The woman yielded silently, and trudged on up the dusty road, while Kate sped into the house and to the room where the young Prince lay.

‘Lalji,’ she said, bending over him, ‘do you feel well enough to be lifted into the carriage and taken over to see your mother?’

‘I would rather see my father,’ responded the boy from the sofa, to which he had been transferred as a reward for the improvement he had made since yesterday. ‘I wish to speak to my father upon a most important thing.’

‘But your mother hasn’t seen you for so long, dear.’

‘Very well; I will go.’

‘Then I will tell them to get the carriage ready.’

Kate turned to leave the room.

‘No, please; I will have my own. Who is without there?’

‘Heaven-born, it is I,’ answered the deep voice of a trooper.

‘Achcha! Ride swiftly, and tell them to send down my barouche and escort. If it is not here in ten minutes, tell Saroop Singh that I will cut his pay and blacken his face before all my men. This day I go abroad again.’

‘May the mercy of God be upon the heavenborn for ten thousand years,’ responded the voice from without, as the trooper heaved himself into the saddle and clattered away.

By the time that the Prince was ready, a lumbering equipage, stuffed with many cushions, waited at the door. Kate and Mrs. Estes half-helped and half-carried the child into it, though he strove to stand on his feet in the verandah and acknowledge the salute of his escort as befitted a man.