Read Ebook: Strangers at Lisconnel by Barlow Jane

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Ebook has 641 lines and 80092 words, and 13 pages

'Ap-pah! What will my father say when he comes home?' exclaimed Vallee.

'Ah, there will be a breaking of pots then, no doubt,' replied the old man.--'Where was the beast found?' he added.

'Suriyan found him standing in the river helpless this afternoon, and drove him home on three legs,' replied Vallee.

'Perhaps he cut himself on the sharp rocks in the river,' suggested a bystander.

'No, no!' said the old man. 'The cut was made by a knife; and we would not have to go far to find the owner of the knife,' he added, muttering.

'You are right enough, father,' whispered the other, who had overheard the old man's remark. 'We know very well who did this, and the p?s?ri will know too! There will be trouble when he comes home.--Ah, here he comes!'

As he spoke, a man emerged from the jungle and entered the village, and seeing the crowd, walked hastily towards it. It was R?man Ummiyan, the village priest. He was a tall, spare man, clad in a single yellow garment. Several strings of sacred beads encircled his neck; and his forehead, breast, and shoulders were smeared with consecrated ashes. His face indicated a man of strong passions. His keen, close-set eyes; deeply lined forehead; thin, sensitive nostrils; hard, straight mouth, and other strongly marked features, showed him to be of an irritable, quarrelsome disposition. As he advanced, the little crowd round the wounded buffalo opened and made way for him.

'What is this? What is the matter with it?' he exclaimed as he glanced at the animal.

'See! father,' replied Vallee, pointing to the wound. 'Suriyan found it at the river, and has just driven it here.'

For a moment the p?s?ri bent and looked at the wound; then he burst into a furious rage. Striking the end of his stick heavily on the ground, he exclaimed passionately: 'It is Iyan El?van who has done this!'

The p?s?ri and the man he spoke of were fellow-villagers and deadly enemies. The feud between them had arisen from a quarrel about a field which both men claimed. On going to law, the p?s?ri had won the case, and the other consequently hated him with a deep and deadly hatred. Iyan El?van was a man of a cruel, malignant, cunning nature, and never lost an opportunity of injuring or harassing his enemy. The quarrel was now some years old, but his hatred was just as bitter as ever. Many a time had the p?s?ri had cause to regret having incurred his neighbour's ill-will. He was not equal to him in audacity and cunning, and was also a much poorer man. He had brought many actions against his enemy; but the latter's keener brain and longer purse had almost always enabled him to get the better of his adversary. The object of each man was to drive the other out of the village; but the interests of both of them in the village were too great to permit either to leave, so they lived on within a stone's-throw of one another, deadly enemies, always on the watch to injure each other in every possible way.

'Ah, ah!' shouted the p?s?ri, gesticulating furiously with his stick. 'I will have vengeance for it! I swear by P?liya I will not rest till I have repaid him with interest, though it cost me my last rupee!--How long,' he continued, turning fiercely to the villagers, who stood round silent but sympathising--'how long are we to bear with this man? He is a wild beast, as cruel and dangerous as the fiercest brute in these jungles. He will stand at nothing to gratify his hate. He has robbed me and slandered me, and brought false cases against me; and now, see the brutal way he has injured this poor brute of mine! He will try to murder me next. But I will have vengeance; I will complain to the headman!'

'Ah!' exclaimed the p?s?ri passionately, 'he will bribe the headman as usual, no doubt. But I will outbid him! The m?dliya shall have my last ricepot ere I be balked of my vengeance!' So saying, he strode into his house, muttering curses and threats.

Vallee, after a short time, followed him in. 'The rice is ready, father,' she said. 'Shall I serve it?'

'No!' replied her father sternly. 'I will neither eat nor drink till I have seen to this matter. I shall go at once to M?nk?lam and see the m?dliya.'

'You're a fool, child!' returned the p?s?ri sharply. 'Who but he could have done it?'

Her father interrupted her with an angry exclamation. 'Did I not order you never to speak to him? Have you dared to listen to the brother of my bitterest enemy?' and he raised his hand threateningly. 'Now listen, daughter! If you ever speak to Valan or listen to him or have aught to do with him again, I will beat you as I would a dog; I swear to you I will.--Now, hearken to my words and obey!' And with a threatening look and a suggestive shake of his stick, the p?s?ri stalked out. After another look in silence at the wounded buffalo, he left the village and strode off in the direction of M?nk?lam, leaving Vallee crouching in a corner of the hut with her hands over her face and sobbing aloud.

Valan El?van, of whom they had been speaking, was the younger brother of the p?s?ri's enemy, and was Vallee's lover. He was a man of a very different nature from his brother, being open-hearted, generous, and good-natured. Nevertheless, the p?s?ri hated him almost as much as he did his brother. The understanding between Valan and Vallee had only recently been come to. For a long time, Valan had watched and admired the graceful maiden; but owing to the bad feeling between the two families, had not ventured to speak to her. One day, however, seeing her in difficulties with a troublesome cow she was trying to milk, he went to her assistance. She thanked him shyly, but with such evident pleasure at his attention, that he was emboldened to speak to her again, when he met her one day going to a neighbouring village. After that, they frequently found occasion to meet alone, and gradually their acquaintance grew to intimacy, and finally ripened to love. Unfortunately, her father discovered accidentally what was going on, and sternly forbade Vallee ever to speak to her lover again. Since then, she had only had one opportunity of seeing Valan. This fresh outrage on the part of Iyan El?van, she knew but too well, finally extinguished all chance of her father ever accepting Valan as her lover; so, crouching in the dark hut, she gave vent to her grief.

On catching sight of each other, the two men stopped and looked at one another. The p?s?ri's face worked with passion, his eyes glittered, and the veins stood out on his forehead. The other had a mocking, evil smile on his face, which seemed to irritate his enemy beyond endurance. Suddenly the p?s?ri grasped his heavy iron-shod stick and made two steps forward. In an instant Iyan swung round his jungle-knife and stood on the defensive, while his sneering smile gave place to a look of concentrated hate. For a few moments they stood glaring at each other, and then the p?s?ri slowly stepped to one side and motioned to the other to pass on, which he did, keeping an eye on his foe, however, and passing out of reach of him. As soon as he had gone by, the p?s?ri resumed his journey, his rencontre with his enemy having added fresh fuel to the fire of evil passions blazing in his heart. Iyan watched him till he had gone some distance, and then, after a few moments' hesitation, turned and followed, keeping him in sight, but remaining a long way behind.

A walk of a mile further brought the p?s?ri to the village of M?nk?lam, with Iyan following in the distance. It was rather a large village, consisting of about a score of huts, scattered about a wide open spot in the jungle, with a tank on one side, and rice-fields stretching beyond it. On the outskirts of the village was a house larger and more pretentious than any of the others, and boasting a dense plantain grove, growing close to the hut, and a few cocoa-nut palms. This was the residence of the m?dliya, or headman of the district. On entering the inclosure through the rude stile or gap in the fence, the p?s?ri paused for a moment, for the place seemed deserted, no one being in sight. He heard, however, the sound of voices inside the hut, so, stepping forward, with a loud unceremonious 'Salaam, m?dliya!' he entered the hut. Seeing his enemy enter the headman's house, Iyan came cautiously forward, but paused irresolutely at the gate. A glance round showed him that the people of the house were all indoors, so, sneaking into the inclosure, he crept stealthily through the grove of plantain trees till he got close to the door of the hut, when he crouched down under the eaves. From his hiding-place he could hear all that was said in the hut.

'What do you want?' he heard a wheezy, unpleasant voice say, and he knew it was the headman who spoke. The tone in which the question was asked was harsh and unfriendly, and an ugly smile passed over the listener's face as he noted it.

'I am come to lodge a complaint against Iyan El?van,' replied the p?s?ri shortly.

'I thought so,' wheezed the headman. 'You are as quarrelsome as a wanderoo he-monkey. Do you think I have nothing to do but to listen to your fools' quarrels?'

'You will listen readily enough,' retorted the p?s?ri angrily, 'when Iyan El?van comes with his hands full of rupees!'

'What!' exclaimed the headman, wheezing and choking with wrath, 'do you charge me, the m?dliya of M?nk?lam, with receiving bribes?'

'Ay, I do,' replied the p?s?ri sternly. 'All the villages know it. Many a time have I brought just complaints to you, and you would not hear them. When Iyan threw a dead dog into my well; when he set fire to my straw stack; and when, by manthiram' , 'he caused my cattle to fall ill, why did you not inquire into the complaints I made--why? but because your granary was bursting with the rice that Iyan gave you as hush-money!'

'Get out of my house!' screamed the headman huskily--'get out, I say!'

'I'll have justice,' shouted the p?s?ri fiercely. 'I am a poor man, and cannot bribe you; but I swear by P?liya-deva that I will have justice. I will make you both suffer for this. You shall pay for that buffalo that Iyan has lamed to the last hair on his tail. It shall be an evil day for you that you refused me justice. Look to yourself, m?dliya; look to yourself, I say!'

'Leave my house, you madman!' exclaimed the headman in a voice scarcely articulate with rage.

A moment later, Iyan, from his hiding-place, saw his enemy burst out of the house almost beside himself with rage, his eyes ablaze, his lips drawn back in a grin of fury, and his whole frame trembling with excitement. He watched him stride across the inclosure and make for the path leading to Pandiy?n, swinging his arms and gesticulating like one demented. Just as the p?s?ri disappeared, a little boy came out of the hut, and Iyan heard him uttering exclamations of excitement and astonishment. He could also hear the voice of the headman inside wheezing out threats and curses. Presently, the little boy went out at the gate and disappeared in the village, and Iyan rose to leave his hiding-place. As he did so, he saw lying in the path a knife, which he at once knew must have been dropped by the p?s?ri as he rushed out of the hut. Picking it up, Iyan crept back into his hiding-place, and crouching down, examined it long and earnestly, feeling its edge, and making motions with it in the air. Suddenly, an idea seemed to strike him. He looked up hastily and around with a scared, startled air, and then felt the edge of the knife again with his thumb slowly while he gazed earnestly in the direction of the door of the hut. Presently, an evil, cruel smile curled his lips and sent a baleful gleam into his little eyes. Muttering to himself, 'Yes; I'll do it; the suspicion is sure to fall on him!' he rose slowly, glanced round again, to assure himself that no one was watching him, and then, with a rapid, silent step, entered the hut.

Meanwhile, the p?s?ri was hurrying along in the direction of his village, cursing and raving. The injury done him by his enemy, and the refusal of the headman to give him justice, had angered him to the verge of madness. As he strode furiously along swinging his heavy stick, and grasping at the air with his other hand, as if he was in imagination tearing his enemy to pieces, he was quite oblivious of all surroundings, and only conscious of his wrongs and desire for vengeance. Blind with rage, he hurried on, heedless of where he was going.

Suddenly, just as he was about to give up in despair the attempt to find his way, a brilliant light appeared in the jungle ahead of him. Uttering an ejaculation of surprise, pleasure, and relief, the p?s?ri pressed towards it. A few moments later he was standing, with open eyes and startled expression, gazing at a scene such as he had never before looked on. Before him stretched a long narrow bazaar of houses, shops, and sheds, huddled irregularly together. Close behind them, and overhanging them, rose the jungle like a wall of ebony, densely dark. Above, stretched a sky of inky blackness, starless and cloudless. The whole bazaar was ablaze with light from numerous fires, torches, and lamps. It was crowded with people, men, women, and children, all apparently busily engaged in buying and selling and other occupations. But they were people such as the p?s?ri had never before seen--black, lean, ungainly, with thin evil faces, and long black hair flowing wildly over their necks and shoulders. He noticed, too, that their feet and hands resembled more the claws of wild beasts than human appendages. But the strangest thing of all was that, though the bazaar appeared to his eyes to be full of bustle and noise, and all the people to be talking, wrangling, singing, and laughing, he could not hear a sound! Could he have shut his eyes, he might have fancied himself alone in the jungle again.

The bazaar seemed to lengthen before him as he went. He walked on and on, but it seemed to have no end. He turned aside into several by-lanes, but they only led into others. He looked in vain for any gap between the huts by which he could escape into the jungle. As he went, he passed through crowds of demon-folk. They took no notice of him, but he felt they were all watching him with their gleaming red eyes. To the p?s?ri, everything around him seemed to be alive. The boughs of the trees waved above him threateningly like weird skinny hands and arms; hideous faces peered out at him from all sorts of strange, unlikely places. Even the rice mortars and pots lying about, and the articles being hawked about or lying exposed on the stalls, seemed to assume grotesquely human faces and figures and to watch him stealthily. Numbers of strange, vicious-looking cattle, and gaunt, evil-faced dogs wandered about, and the p?s?ri noticed them leering at him and each other with a human sort of expression which showed him what they were. Rows of fowls of queer shape were perched on the roofs of the huts, and watched him as he passed with heads knowingly on one side.

Many a strange sight did the p?s?ri see as he walked along. The shops were full of curious and extraordinary things such as he had never seen exposed for sale. He passed at one place a party of pis?sis engaged in beating drums of strange shape with drumsticks of bones. Soon after, he came to a part of the bazaar where a furious quarrel appeared to be raging. In a dark corner he caught sight of a large party of she-pis?sis, who appeared to be engaged in some horrible rite. More than once he thought he saw the mock-animals wandering about the bazaar talking to the keepers of the shops and to each other. It seemed to the p?s?ri that he had been walking for hours, yet the bazaar appeared to be as interminable as ever. He walked on as in a dream, for, in spite of the apparent bustle and excitement around him, he could hear nothing. Stupefied by his fearful position, he walked on mechanically, having now lost the sense of fear, and feeling only a sort of vague wonder.

And now a raging thirst seized on the p?s?ri. He had been on foot all day in the sun, and all the afternoon his mouth had been hot and bitter with curses. He had drunk nothing for many hours. As he walked along, the craving for water grew stronger and stronger, till he could bear it no longer. He realised vaguely the peril he ran in accepting anything from the hand of a pis?si, nevertheless he stopped and looked about, in the hope of finding something to drink. Near at hand was a small shop presided over by a hideous old she-pis?si. Undeterred by the horrible aspect of the red-eyed, wrinkled, old hag, the p?s?ri approached her with the intention of asking for a drink of water. As he did so, he felt conscious that all the pis?sis had suddenly stood still and were watching him. The she-pis?si's shop contained some strange things. On one side lay a huge rock python cut into lengths, each of which was wriggling about as if full of life. On the other side lay a young crocodile apparently dead; but as the p?s?ri approached, it turned its head and looked slily at him with its cold yellow eye. Over the old hag's head hung a crate full of live snakes, that writhed about and thrust their heads through the withes. Strings of dead bats, and baskets full of loathsome reptiles and creeping creatures, filled the shop. In front of her stood a hollow gourd full of water.

'Mother! I am thirsty,' said the p?s?ri as he pointed to the water. But though he said the words, he did not hear his own voice. The old hag looked fixedly at him for a moment, and then raising the gourd, gave it to him. He raised it to his lips, and drank long and eagerly. As he put the empty vessel down, he felt everything reel and swim about him. Gazing wildly round, he grasped at the air two or three times for some support, and then fell to the ground motionless and senseless.

AN EVERY-DAY OCCURRENCE.

There are in all our lives episodes which we should be glad to forget; of which we are so much ashamed, that we scarcely dare to think of them, and when we do, find ourselves hurriedly muttering the words we imagine we ought to have said, or making audible apologies for our conduct to the air; and yet these are not always episodes which necessarily involve a tangible sense of wrong done either to ourselves or to others. Some such episode in a commonplace life, such as must have fallen to the lot of many men, we would here reveal.

Once upon a time--to commence in an orthodox fashion--a man and a maid lived and loved. On the woman's part the affection was as pure and generous as ever filled the breast of a maiden; on the man's, as warm as his nature permitted. His love did not absorb his whole soul, it rather permeated his mind and coloured his being. Like most men of his not uncommon stamp, his affection once given, was given for ever. His was not a jubilant nature, nor did his feelings lie near the surface, and his manner was undemonstrative. The girl was clear-sighted enough to see that what love there was, was pure and true, and she made up for its scarcity with the overflowings of her sympathetic nature. She idealised rather than condoned. She gave in such measure that she could not perceive how little she was receiving in return; or if she noticed it, her consciousness of its worth seemed to her a full equivalent. He was an artist; and circumstances forced the lovers to wait, and at the same time kept them apart. A couple of days once a month, and a week now and again, was the limit of the time they could spend together. This, of course, prevented them getting that intimate knowledge of each other's personality which both recognised as an essential adjunct to the happiness of married life, though they did their best to obviate it by long letters, giving full details of daily events and of the society in which they moved. The remedy was an imperfect one. Strive as they might, the sketches were crude, and the letters had a tendency to become stereotyped. We only mention these details to show that they tried to be perfectly honest with each other.

While the girl's life, in her quiet country home, was one that held little variety in it, it was a part of the man's stock-in-trade to mix with society and to observe closely. Whether he liked it or not, he was compelled to make friends to such an extent as to afford him an opportunity of gauging character. Unfortunately for the purposes of my study, he had no sympathy with pessimism or pessimists. He loved the good and the beautiful for their own sakes, and in his art loved to dwell on the bright side of human nature, a side which the writer has found so much easier to meet with than the more sombre colouring we are constantly told is the predominating one in life. Like most artists, he was somewhat susceptible, but his susceptibility was on the surface; the inward depths of his soul had never been stirred save by the gentle girl who held his heart, and she was such as to inspire a constant and growing affection rather than a demonstrative passion.

At one of the many houses at which he was a welcome guest, the lover found a young girl bright, sensuous, beautiful. Unwittingly, he compared her with the one whose heart he held, and the comparison was unsatisfactory to him; do what he would, the honesty of his nature compelled him to allow that this beautiful girl was the superior in a number of ways to her to whom he had pledged his life. He was caught in the Circe's chains of golden hair, and fancied--almost hoped--yet feared lest, like bonds of cobwebs in the fairy tale, the toils were too strong for him to break. He could see, too, that the girl regarded him with a feeling so warm, that a chance spark would rouse it into a flame of love; and this gave her an interest as dangerous as it was fascinating. His fancy swerved. Day after day he strove with himself, and by efforts, too violent to be wise, he kept away from the siren till his inflamed fancy forced him back to her side.

To the maiden in the country he was partially honest. In his letters he faithfully told her of his visits, and as far as he could, recorded his opinions of the girl who had captivated his fancy. Too keen an artist to be blind to her faults, he dwelt on them in his frequent letters at unnecessary length. When the lovers met, the girl questioned him closely about her rival, but only from the interest she felt in all his friends known and unknown, for her love for him was too pure and strong to admit of jealousy, and he, with what honesty he could, answered her questions unreservedly.

Little by little he began to examine himself. Which girl did he really love? Should he not be doing a wrong to both by not deciding? The examination was dangerous, because it was not thorough. The premises were true, but incomplete. Yet we should wrong him if we implied that he for a moment thought seriously about breaking off his engagement. Even had he wished, his almost mistaken feelings of honour would have forbidden it. This constant surface introspection--a kind of examination which, had not the subject been himself, he would have despised and avoided--could have but one result--an obliquity of mental vision. He had a horror of being untrue--untrue to himself as untrue to his lass, and yet he dreaded causing pain to a bosom so tender and innocent. When he sat down to write the periodical letters to the girl to whom he was engaged, he found his phrases becoming more and more general and guarded. He took pains not to let her know what he felt must wound her, and the letters grew as unnatural as they had been the reverse; they were descriptive of the man rather than the reflex of his personality.

The country girl was quick of perception. The letters were more full of endearing terms than ever; they were longer and told more of his life; yet between the lines she could see that they were by one whose heart was not at rest, and that a sense of duty and not of pleasure prompted the ample details. Their very regularity was painful: it seemed as if the writer was anxious to act up to the letter of his understanding. She knew that the letters were often written when he was tired out. Why did he not put off writing, and taking advantage of her love, let her exercise her trust in him? Eagerly she scanned the pages to find the name of her rival, and having found it, would thoughtfully weigh every word of description, of blame or praise.

When he had been with her last, he had told her that his ensuing absence must perforce be longer than usual, and this she thought would be the best time for her purpose.

'Dear Frank,' she wrote at the end of a pitiful little letter, 'I am going to ask you not to come here next week. This will surprise you, for in all my other letters I have told you that what I most look forward to in life is your visits. But I have been thinking, dear, that it will be best for us to part for ever. I often ask myself if we love one another as much as we did, and I am afraid we do not. A loveless married life would be too dreadful to live through, and I dare not risk it. It is better that the parting should come through me. Do not fancy that I am reproaching you; I cannot, for to me you are above reproach, above blame. All I feel is that our affection is colder, so we had better part. God bless you, Frank; I can never tell you how deeply I have loved you.--ELSIE.'

Frank was almost stunned by the receipt of this letter. He read it and re-read it till every word seemed burnt into his brain. That the girl's love for him was less, he did not believe; he could read undiminished affection in the vague phraseology, in the studied carefulness to take equal blame on herself. That she should be jealous, was out of the question; long years of experience had taught him that this was totally foreign to her trustful nature. There was but one conclusion to come to. She had given him up because she thought his happiness involved. Yet she wished him to be free; might it not be ungracious to refuse to accept her gift?

Free! There was a terrible fascination in the sound. Be the bondage ever so pleasant, be it even preferable to liberty itself, the idea of freedom is irresistibly alluring. If the same bondage will be chosen again, there is a delight in the consciousness that it will be your own untrammelled choice. Frank was aware of a wild exultation when he realised the fact that he was once more a free agent. In the first flush of liberty, poor Elsie's image faded out of sight, and that of the siren took its place. Now, without wrong, he might follow his inclinations. He determined to write to Elsie, but knew not what to say, and put it off till the morrow.

There could be no harm in going to the house of his fascinator; it was pleasant to think that he might now speak, think, look, without any mental reservations; there would be no longer any need to watch his actions, or to force back the words which would tell her that she exercised a deadly power over him. The girl received him with a winning smile, yet, when he touched her hand, he did not feel his brain throb or his blood rush madly through his veins as he had expected. He bore his part through the evening quietly, and owned that it was a pleasant one; still, the flavour was not what he had expected. He called to mind that when he was abroad for the first time, he had been served with a peculiar dish, which he remembered, and often longed for when unattainable. After several years, he had visited the same caf? and ordered the same dish. The same cook prepared it, and the same waiter served it, but the taste was not the same; expectation had heightened the flavour, and the real was inferior to the ideal.

So it was with Frank. Before, when the siren had seemed unattainable, he had luxuriated in her beauty, admired her grace and genius, and revelled in her wit; now, when he felt he might call these his own, his eye began to detect deficiencies. The girl noted his critical attitude, and chafed at the calmness of his keen, watchful glance. Where was the open admiration she used to read in his eyes? Piqued at his indifference, she grew silent and irritable; and when he bade her farewell, both were conscious that an ideal had been shattered.

He buttoned his overcoat, and prepared for a long walk to the lonely chambers where he lived the usual careless, comfortless life of a bachelor whose purse is limited. All the way home he submitted himself to a deep and critical examination. He felt as if he was sitting by the ashes of a failing fire which he had no means of replenishing; the night was coming, and he must sit in the cold. If passion died out, where was he to look for the sympathy, the respect, the true friendliness which alone can supply its place in married life? Then he thought of Elsie. He had made a mistake, but a very common mistake. He had thought that the excitement of his interest, the enchaining of his fancy, and the enthralment of his senses, was love, and lo! it was only passion. He analysed his feelings more deeply yet, and getting below the surface-currents which are stirred by the winds, saw that the quiet waters beneath had kept unswervingly on their course.

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