Argosy and Railroad Man's Magazine — page 69: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

2 ““JEHANNUM” SMITH. sawmi indicated. ‘“ But marshter, please. Sitting by my alone is a ghostly labor. For bhooth I got sacred amulet; but in presence of this Mahadeo fellow I am verree fearful man. Becoming riled, monkeys he can make.” ““ Ho, ken he? Well, me boy, there’s a time when I has a argument with this ere. same Mahadeo; an’ I sloshes ’im in the belly with a coconut; an’ a million 0’ priests comes yawpin’ for to cut out me gizzard; an’ I metagrobolizes ’em by battalions. But I ain’t no monkey yet.” And with that the amazing man leaped like a vast ape to a perfectly impossible branch and was lost in the heavy shadows of its foliage. What wild adventure of his past lay behind that incident of the coconut, Poonoosawmi never knew; but he sat and waited in contentment, for his faith in his master was infinite. He saw him drop springily from a lower limb and melt into the darkness in the direction of the women’s quarters. The staggering thing about the whole pro- ceeding was the sublime carelessness of the man. On that exalted soul such trivialities as preconceived plant or disguise had never impinged their troublesome presence. There he stood, a white man in a sacrosanct enclo- sure restricted to a fanatical creed where even governments did not venture to interfere. : But paltry considerations suth as these never troubled that soaring spirit. If the thought came to him at all, it was immedi- ately counterbalanced by the supreme con- viction that whatever untoward thing might happen, something equally unexpected and astonishing would immediately happen to offset it. He ambled on therefore in the dark till he came to the women’s lines, a long, low barrack, removed quite a way from the rest of the temple buildings, just a series of single rooms, “hardly more than cells, with a door in front and a grated window in the back. The doors opened out on a long veranda with a floor of stamped earth in which those unfortunate creatures who had been dedicated to the temple service -cooked and ate and lived, and did every- thing, in fact, except sleep. 411 From most of the windows the wretched light from open chirag lamps threw flicker- ing shafts which lined the barrack with a series of dim gun-ports. With amazing directness Smith strolled along the rain-gutter and peeped into each window till he was satisfied that he had found the boudoir of the beauty whose fame had reached all the four corners of the land. None too softly he called her name. In an instant the woman was. alert. Intrigue is the life blood of the women of the Orient; and for most of them, penned up as they are, it is their only relaxation. Smith spoke a low bazaar Hindustani with the fluency of a coolie. After twenty minutes’ conversation with the girl her only anxiety was the hazard of escape. “All that is necessary, O nautchni, is a thick pole wherewith to pry off the bars of thy prison,” said Smith simply; and there- upon he shoved his hands comfortably into his pockets and strolled off with the fixed idea of finding a pole somewhere about the grounds in the dark. There was no slinking, no crouching be- hind trees. Somewhere against the walls, Smith knew, there would be a lean-to or a shed containing garden tools; and he began a leisurely exploration with the directness of a man going about his legitimate business. Fortunately the far walls were, of course, deserted. Quite fortunately again the di- lapidated outline of a lean-to bulked pres- ently ahead. Smith found himself treading in a sand path, and he strode forward with eagerness. Then three figures drifted silently out of the dimness in front. of him. They were dressed in a single robe of dingy muslin which encircled the waist with certain prescribed folds and draped the loose-flowing end over the shoulders. It was their only garment. Even in the dark they were instantly recognizable as priests of Mahadeo. They stopped in surprise at the crunching of boots on the sand. “ Kaun hai? Who is there?” one of them called. _ Smith stared in their direction. Slowly his head lowered like a bull’s, and he swelled with indignation at their interruption. Then: Conmiclooolks.conn