King--of the Khyber Rifles: A Romance of Adventure, Talbot Mundy [ebook smartphone TXT] 📗

heir to my whole nose, too, and a blessing!” laughed the Pathan, and the butt of the jest spat savagely. In the “Hills” there is only one explanation given as to how one lost his nose, and they all laughed like hyenas until the mullah Muhammad Anim came rolling and striding back.

By that time King had got busy with his lancet, but the mullah called him off and drove the crowd away to a distance; then he drove King into the cave in front of him, his mouth working as if he were biting bits of vengeance off for future use.

“Write thy letter, thou! Write thy letter! Here is paper. There is a pen--take it! Sit! Yonder is ink--ttutt--ttutt!--Write, now, write!”

King sat at a box and waited, as if to take dictation, but the mullah, tugging at his beard, grew furious.

“Write thine own letter! Invent thine own argument! Persuade her, or die in a new way! I will invent a new way for thee!”

So King began to write, in Urdu, for reasons of his own. He had spoken once or twice in Urdu to the mullah and had received no answer. At the end of ten minutes he handed up what he had written, and Muhammad Anim made as if to read it, trying to seem deliberate, and contriving to look irresolute. It was a fair guess that he hated to admit ignorance of the scholars' language.

“Are there any alterations you suggest?” King asked him.

“Nay, what care I what the words are? If she be not persuaded, the worse for thee!”

He held it out, and as he took it King contrived to tear it; he also contrived to seem ashamed of his own clumsiness.

“I will copy it out again,” he said.

The mullah swore at him, and conceiving that some extra show of authority was needful, growled out:

“Remember all I said. Set down she must surrender Khinjan Caves or I swear by Allah I will have thee tortured with fire and thorns--and her, too, when the time comes!”

Now he had said that, or something very like it, in the first letter. There was no doubt left that the Mullah was trying to hide ignorance, as men of that fanatic ambitious mold so often will at the expense of better judgment. If fanatics were all-wise, it would be a poor world for the rest.

“Very well,” King said quietly. And with great pretense of copying the other letter out on fresh paper he now wrote what he wished to say, taking so long about it (for he had to weigh each word), that the mullah strode up and down the cave swearing and kicking things over.

“Greeting,”' he wrote, “to the most beautiful and very wise Princess Yasmini, in her palace in the Caves in Khinjan, from her servant Kurram Khan the hakim, in the camp of the mullah Muhammad Anim, a night's march distant in the hills. “The mullah Muhammad Anim makes his stand and demands now surrender to himself of Khinjan Caves; and of all his ammunition. Further, he demands full control of you and of me and of all your men. He is ready to fight for his demands and already--as you must well know--he has considerable following in Khinjan Caves. He has at least as many men as you have, and he has four thousand more here. “He threatens as a preliminary to blockade Khinjan Caves, unless the answer to this prove favorable, letting none enter, but calling his own men out to join him. This would suit the Indian government, because while the 'Hills' fight among themselves they can not raid India, and while he blockades Khinjan Caves there will be time to move against him. “Knowing that he dares begin and can accomplish what he threatens, I am sorry; because I know it is said how many services you have rendered of old to the government I serve. We who serve one raj are One--one to remember--one to forget--one to help each other in good time. “I have not been idle. Some of Muhammad Anim's men are already mine. With them I can return to India, taking information with me that will serve my government. My men are eager to be off. “It may be that vengeance against me would seem sweeter to you than return to your former allegiance. In that case, Princess, you only need betray me to the mullah, and be sure my death would leave nothing to be desired by the spectators. At present he does not suspect me. “Be assured, however, that not to betray me to him is to leave me free to serve my government and well able to do so. “I invite you to return to India with me, bearing news that the mullah Muhammad Anim and his men are bottled in Khinjan Caves, and to plan with me to that end. “If you will, then write an answer to Muhammad Anim, not in Urdu, but in a language he can understand; seem to surrender to him. But to me send a verbal message, either by the bearer of this or by some trustier messenger. “India can profit yet by your service if you will. And in that case I pledge my word to direct the government's attention only to your good service in the matter. It is not yet too late to choose. It is not impertinent in me to urge you. “Nor can I say how gladly I would subscribe myself your grateful and loyal servant.”

The mullah pounced on the finished letter, pretended to read it, and watched him seal it up, smudging the hot wax with his own great gnarled thumb. Then he shouted for the Orakzai Pathan, who came striding in, all grins and swagger.

“There--take it! Make speed!” he ordered, and with his rifle at the “ready” and the letter tucked inside his shirt, the Pathan favored King with a farewell grin and obeyed.

“Get out!” the mullah snarled then immediately. “See to the sick. Tell them I sent thee. Bid them be grateful!”

King went. He recognized the almost madness that constituted the mullah's driving power. It is contagious, that madness, until it destroys itself. It had made several thousand men follow him and believe in him, but it had once given Yasmini a chance to fool him and defeat him, and now it gave King his chance. He let the mullah think himself obeyed implicitly.

He became the busiest man in all the “Hills.” While the mullah glowered over the camp from the cave mouth or fulminated from the Quran or fought with other mullahs with words for weapons and abuse for argument, he bandaged and lanced and poulticed and physicked until his head swam with weariness.

The sick swarmed so around him that he had to have a body-guard to keep them at bay; so he