The Elephant God, Gordon Casserly [best books to read all time txt] 📗

halt at noon, the long line wound up a confusing jumble of ravines and passes. When night fell a plateau covered with tall deodar trees had been reached, and here the elephants rested.

Daybreak on the third morning found Badshah leading the line through a still more bewildering maze of narrow defiles and a forest with such dense foliage that, when the sun was high in the heavens, its rays scarcely lightened the gloom between the tree-trunks. Dermot wondered how Badshah found his way, for there was no sign of a track, but the elephant moved on steadily and with an air of assured purpose.

At one place he plunged into a deep narrow ravine filled with tangled undergrowth that constantly threatened to tear Dermot from his seat. Indeed, only the continual employment of the latter's kukri, with which he hacked at the throttling creepers and clutching thorny branches, saved him.

Darker and gloomier grew the way. The sides of the nullah closed in until there was scarcely room for the animals to pass, and then Dermot found Badshah had entered a natural tunnel in the mountain side. The interior was as black as midnight, and the soldier had to lie flat on the elephant's skull to save his own head.

Suddenly a blinding light made him close his eyes, as Badshah burst out of the darkness of the tunnel into the dazzling glare of the sunshine.

When his rider looked again he found that they were in an almost circular valley completely ringed in by precipitous walls of rock rising straight and sheer for a couple of thousand feet. Above these cliffs towered giant mountain peaks covered with snow and ice.

At the end of the valley farthest from them was a small lake. Near the mouth of the tunnel the earth was clothed with long grass and flowering bushes and dotted with low trees. But elsewhere the ground was dazzlingly white, as though the snow lay deep upon it. Badshah halted among the trees, and the old elephants passed him and went on in the direction of the lake. Dermot noticed that they seemed to have suddenly grown feebler and more decrepit.

He looked down at the white ground. To his surprise he found that from here to the lake the valley was floored with huge skulls, skeletons, scattered bones, and tusks. It was the elephants' Golgotha. He had penetrated to a spot which perhaps no other human being had ever seen—the death-place of the mammoths, the mysterious retreat to which the elephants of the Terai came to die.

He looked instinctively towards the aged animals, which alone had gone forward among the bones. And, as he gazed, one of them stumbled, recovered its footing, staggered on a few paces, then stopped and slowly sank to the ground. It laid its head down and stretched out its limbs. Tremors shook the huge body; then it lay still as though asleep. A second old elephant, and a third, stood for a moment, then slowly subsided. Another and another did the same; until finally all of them lay stretched out motionless—lifeless, dark spots on the white floor that was composed of bones of countless generations of their kind.

There was a strange impressiveness about the solemn passing of these great beasts. It affected the human spectator almost painfully. The hush of this fatal valley, the long line of elephants watching the death of their kindred, the pathos of the end of the stately animals which in obedience to some mysterious impulse, had struggled through many difficulties only to lie down here silently, uncomplainingly, and give up their lives, all stirred Dermot strangely. And when the thought of the incalculable wealth that lay in the vast quantity of ivory stored in this great charnel-house flashed through his mind, he felt that it would be a shameful desecration, inviting the wrath of the gods, to remove even one tusk of it.

He was not left long to gaze and wonder at the weird scene. To his relief Badshah suddenly turned and passed through the trees again towards the tunnelled entrance, and the hundreds of other elephants followed him in file. In a few minutes Dermot found himself plunged into darkness once more, and the Valley of Death had disappeared.

When they had passed through the tunnel, the elephants slipped and stumbled down the rock-encumbered ravines, for elephants are far less sure-footed in descent than when ascending. But they travelled at a much faster pace, being no longer hampered by the presence of the old and decrepit beasts. It seemed to take only a comparatively short time to reach the valley between the two mountain ranges. And here they stopped to feed and rest.

When morning came, Dermot found that the big assembly of elephants was breaking up into separate herds of which it was composed. The greater number of these moved off to the east and north, evidently purposing to remain for a time in Bhutan, where the young grass was springing up in the valleys as the lower snows melted. Only three herds intended to return to India with Badshah, of which the largest, consisting of about a hundred members, seemed to be the one to which he particularly belonged.

During the descent from the mountains into the Terai, Dermot wondered what would happen with Badshah when they reached the forest. Would the elephant persist in remaining with the herd or would it return with him to the peelkhana?

Night had fallen before they had got clear of the foothills, so that when they arrived in the jungle once more they halted to rest not far from the mountains. When Dermot awoke next morning he found that he and Badshah were alone, all the others having disappeared, and the animal was standing patiently awaiting orders. He seemed to recognise that his brief hour of authority had passed, and had become once more his usual docile and well-disciplined self. At the word of command he sank to his knees to allow his master to mount; and then, at the touch of his rider's foot, turned his head towards home and started off obediently.

As they approached the peelkhana a cry was raised, and the elephant attendants rushed from their huts to stare in awe-struck silence at animal and man. Ramnath approached with marked reverence, salaaming deeply at every step.

When Dermot dismounted it was hard for him to bid farewell to Badshah. He felt, too, that he could no longer make the elephant submit to the ignominy of fetters. So he bade Ramnath not shackle nor bind him again. Then he patted the huge beast affectionately and pointed to the empty stall in the peelkhana; and Badshah, seeming to understand and appreciate his being left unfettered, touched his white friend caressingly with his trunk and walked obediently to his brick standing in the stable. The watching mahouts and coolies nodded and whispered to each other at this, but Ramnath appeared to regard the relations between his elephant and the sahib as perfectly natural.

Dermot shouldered his rifle and started off on the long and weary climb to Ranga Duar. When he reached the parade ground he found the men of the detachment falling out after their morning drill. His subaltern, Parker, who was talking to the Indian officers of the Double Company, saw him and came to meet him.

"Hullo, Major; I'm glad to see you back again," he said, saluting. "I hardly expected to, after the extraordinary stories I've heard from the mahouts."

"Really? What were they?" asked his senior officer, leading the way to his bungalow.

"Well, the simplest was that Badshah had gone mad and bolted with you into the jungle," replied the subaltern. "Another tale was that he knelt down and worshipped you, and then asked you to go off with him on some mysterious mission."

Dermot had resolved to say as little as possible about his experiences. Europeans would not credit his story, and he had no desire to be regarded as a phenomenal liar. Natives would believe it, for nothing is too marvellous for them; but he had no wish that any one should know of the existence of the Death Place, lest ivory-hunters should seek to penetrate to it.

"Nonsense. Badshah wasn't mad," he replied. "It was just as I guessed when you first told me of these fits of his—merely the jungle calling him."

"Yes, sir. But the weirdest tale of all was that you were seen leading an army of elephants, just like a Hindu god, to invade Bhutan."

"Where did you hear that?" asked Dermot in surprise.

"Oh, the yarn came from the mahouts, who heard it from some of the forest guards, who said they'd been told it by Bhuttias from the hills. You know how natives spread stories. Wasn't it a silly tale?" And Parker laughed at the thought of it.

"Yes, rather absurd," agreed the Major, forcing a smile. "Yes, natives are really—Hello! who's done this?"

They had reached the garden of his bungalow. The little wooden gate-posts at the entrance were smeared with red paint and hung with withered wreaths of marigolds.

When a Hindu gets the idea into his head that a certain stone or tree or place is the abode of a god or godling or is otherwise holy, his first impulse is to procure marigolds and red paint and make a votive offering of them by making wreaths of the one and daubing everything in the vicinity with the other.

"By Jove, Major, I expect that some of the Hindus in the bazaar have heard these yarns about you and mean to do poojah (worship) to you," said Parker with a laugh. "I told you they regard Badshah as a very holy animal. I suppose some of his sacredness has overflowed on to you."

Dermot realised that there was probably some truth in the suggestion. He was annoyed, as he had no desire to be looked on by the natives as the possessor of supernatural powers.

"I must see that my boy has the posts cleaned," he said. "When you get to the Mess, Parker, please tell them I'll be up to breakfast as soon as I've had a tub and a shave."

Two hours later Dermot showed Parker the position of the defile on the map and explained his notes and sketches of it; for it was important that his subordinate should know of it in the event of any mishap occurring to himself. But before he acquainted Army Headquarters in India with his discovery, he went to the pass again on Badshah to examine and survey it thoroughly. When this was done and he had despatched his sketches and report to Simla, he felt free to carry out a project that interested him. This was to seek out the herd of wild elephants with which Badshah seemed most closely associated and try to discover the secret of his connection with them.

Somewhat to his surprise he experienced no difficulty in finding them; as, when he set out from the peelkhana in search of them, Badshah seemed to know what he wanted and carried him straight to them. For each day the animal appeared to understand his man's inmost thoughts more and more, and to need no visible expression of them.

When they reached the herd, the elephants received Badshah without any demonstration of greeting, unlike the previous occasion. They showed no objection to Dermot's presence among them. The little animal with the blotched trunk recognised him at once and came to him, and the other calves soon followed its example and made friends with him. The big elephants betrayed no fear, and allowed him to stroll on foot among them freely.

This excursion was merely the first of many that Dermot made with the herd, with which he often roamed far and wide through the forest. And sometimes, without his knowing it, he was seen by some native passing through the jungle, who hurriedly climbed a tree or hid in the undergrowth to avoid meeting the elephants. From concealment the awed watcher gazed in astonishment at the white