Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 146 No. 4 — page 83: what you’re looking at

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

CASTE. “4 mail carrier,” Barlow said. And then to the monotonous pat-pat-pat of trotting feet the mail carrier emerged from the gray wall of night. “Here, you, what comes?” the captain queried, checking the gray. The postie stopped in terror at the Eng- lish voice. “Salaam, Bahadur Sahib; it is war.” “Thou art a tree owl,” and Barlow laughed. “A war does not spring up like a drift of driven dust. Is it some rajah’s elephants and carts with his harem going to a durbar?” “ Sahib, it is, as I have said, war. The big brass cannon that is called ‘ the humbler of cities,’ goes forth to speak its order, and with it are sepoys to feed it the food of destruction. Beyond that I know not, sahib, for I am a man of peace, being but a runner of the post.” Then he salaamed and sifted into the night gloom like a thrown handful of white sand, echoing back the clamp—clamp— clamp of his staff’s iron ring, which was a signal to all cobras to move from the path of him who ran, slip their chilled folds from the warm dust of the road. And on in front what had been sounds of mystery was now a turmoil of noises. The hissing screech, the wails, were the expos- tulations of tortured axles; the rumbling boom was unexplainable; but the jungle of the hillside was possessed of screaming devils. Black-faced, white-whiskered mon- keys, roused by the din, screamed cries of hate and alarm as they scurried in volplan- ing leaps from tree to tree. And peacocks, aaiieoed when they should have slept, called with their harsh voices from lofty A party of villagers hurried by, shifting _ their cheap turbans to hide faces as they “The one with the staff spoke of sol- diers.” He laughed and patted her shoulder. “Don’t fear, little lady,” he said. “An army doesn’t make war upon one, even if they are soldiers. It will be but a wedding party who now takes the wife to the village of her husband.” “Not at night; and a sahib who carries a woman upon his saddle will hear words of offense.” Though Barlow laughed he was troubled. What if the smoldering fire of sedition had flared up, and that even now men of Sind- hia’s were slipping on a night march toward some massing of rebels. The resonant, heavy moaning of massive wheels was like the rumble of a gun carriage. And, too, there was the drumming of many hoofs upon the road. Barlow’s ear told him it was the rhythmic beat of cavalry horses, not the erratic rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat of native ponies. With a pressure upon the rein he edged the gray from the white road to a fringe of bamboo and date palms, saying: “If you will wait here, Gulab, I'll see what this is all about.” He slipped from the saddle and lifted her gently to the ground, saying: “ Don’t move. Of a certainty it is nothing but the passing of some rajah. But, if by any chance I don’t return, wait until all is still, until all have gone, and then some well- disposed driver of a bullock cart will take you on your way.” Putting his hand in his pocket, and drawing it forth, he added: “ Here is the compeller of friendship—sil- ver; for a bribe even an enemy will be- come a friend.” But the Gulab with her slim fingers closed his hand over the rupees, and pressed the back of it against her lips, saying: “ If I die it is nothing. But stay here, sahib, they may be—” She stopped, and he asked: “ May be whom, Gulab?” ““Men who will harm thee.” But Barlow, lifting to the saddle, passed to the road, and Bootea crumpled down in a little desolate heap of misery, her fingers thrust within her bodice, ann with an 3 amulet for protectios: omic im