THE MAHARAJAH
It was noon the next day when Captain Irwin stepped out of the Colonel’s bungalow and turned towards home. The interview with his superior officer appeared to have been serious and far from pleasant for him, for he was very pale. Red spots were burning on his cheeks, and his deep-set eyes flashed darkly, as though with suppressed wrath. A few minutes later the Colonel’s horse was led to the door, and a company of lancers under the command of a sergeant rode into the courtyard.
The commander came out in full uniform, and, placing himself at the head of the company, galloped towards the Maharajah’s palace.
The cavalry drew up before the palace gates, and Colonel Baird shouted out in a loud commanding voice to the servants lounging at the door that he wished to speak to the Maharajah.
A few minutes passed, and a gorgeously attired palace official made his appearance with the answer that His Highness could not receive at present; the Colonel would be informed as soon as the audience could be granted.
The commander leapt from the saddle, and with jingling spurs walked firmly into the palace, trailing his sword noisily over the marble floor.
“Tell the Prince I desire to see him at once,” he called out in a threatening voice to the palace officials and servants who followed him in evident embarrassment. It was evident that no one dare disobey such a peremptory command. All gates flew open before the Englishman, and he had hardly to wait a minute in the anteroom before the Prince consented to receive him. On a small high-raised terrace of the ground floor the Maharajah sat at luncheon. He purposely did not change his easy attitude when the English resident approached, and the glaring look which his dark eyes cast at the incomer was obviously intended to intimidate.
With his helmet on his head and his hand resting on his sword the Colonel stood straight before the Prince.
“I desire to have a few words with you, Maharajah!”
“And I have instructed my servants to inform you that I am not at your service. You see I am at luncheon!”
“That, in your case, is no reason for refusing to receive the representative of His Britannic Majesty. The message you sent me was an insult, which, if repeated, will have to be punished.”
In a transport of rage the Prince sprang up from his chair. He hurled an abusive epithet into the Colonel’s face, and his right hand sought the dagger in his belt. The attendant, who was about to serve up to his master a ruddy lobster on a silver dish, recoiled in alarm. But the Colonel, without moving an inch from his place, placed the silver hunting whistle that hung from his shoulder to his mouth. Two shrill calls, and at once the trotting of horses and the rattle of arms was audible. The high, blue-striped turbans of the cavalry and the pennons of their lances made their appearance under the terrace.
“Call my bodyguard!” cried the Prince, with a voice hoarse with rage.
But in a voice of icy calm the Colonel retorted, “If you summon your bodyguard, Maharajah, you are a dead man. That would be rebellion; and with rebels we make short shrift.”
The Prince pressed his lips together; the rage he had with the greatest difficulty suppressed caused his body to quiver as in a paroxysm of fever, but he had to realise that he was here the weaker, and without a word more he fell back again into his chair.
The Colonel stepped to the balcony of the terrace.
“Sergeant Thomson!” he called down into the park.
Heavy steps were heard on the marble stairs, and the man summoned, followed by two soldiers, stood at attention before his superior officer.
“Sergeant, do you know the gentleman sitting at that table?”
“Yes, sir! It is His Highness the Maharajah.”
“If I gave you orders to arrest this gentleman and bring him to camp, would you hesitate to obey?”
The sergeant regarded his superior officer as if the doubt of his loyal military obedience astonished him. He at once gave the two soldiers who were with him a nod and advanced a step further towards the Prince, as though at once to carry out the order.
“Stop, sergeant!” cried the Colonel. “I hope that His Highness will not let matters go as far as that. You are perhaps ready now, Maharajah, to receive me?”
The Indian silently pointed to the golden chair at the other end of the table. At a sign from the Colonel the sergeant and the two soldiers withdrew.
“I have a very serious question to put to you, Maharajah.”
“Speak!”
“Last evening, during Captain Irwin’s absence, several rascals entered his house with the intention of committing an act of violence on the person of the Captain’s wife. What do you know about the matter, Maharajah?”
“I do not understand, Colonel. What should I know?”
“Perhaps you would be well advised to try and remember. Do you mean to tell me that you now hear of this business for the first time?”
“Certainly! I have not heard a word about it until now.”
“And you have not been told that one of the assailants who was killed on the spot was one of your servants?”
“No. I have a great many servants, and I am not responsible for their actions, if they are not done by my orders.”
“But this is exactly what I believe to have been the case. You will hardly expect me to believe that one of your servants would have dared to make such an attack on his own initiative. Unfortunately, the other villains have escaped, but one of them left behind him a sabre belonging to a man in your bodyguard.”
It was evident that the Maharajah had a hard struggle to keep his composure. Endeavouring to conceal his rage behind a supercilious smile, he answered—
“It is beneath my dignity, Colonel, to answer you.”
“There can be no question of dignity justifying you in a refusal to answer the British resident, when he demands it. You are dealing not with an ordinary British officer, but with the representative of His Majesty the Emperor of India. It is your duty to answer, as it is mine to question you. A refusal might have the most serious consequences for Your Highness; for the Government Commissioners that would be despatched from Calcutta to Chanidigot on my report might be but little impressed by your dignity.”
The Indian set his teeth and a wild passionate hate flashed from his eyes, but, at the same time, he probably reflected that he would not have been the first of the Indian princes to be deprived of the last remnant of sham sovereignty for a paltry indiscretion.
“If you consider it necessary to make a report to Calcutta, I cannot prevent your doing so; but I should think that the Viceroy would hesitate before giving offence to a faithful ally of England, and at the very moment when he has to ask him to despatch his contingent of auxiliary forces.”
“Since you refer to this matter—whom have you appointed to command your force?”
“My cousin, Tasatat Maharajah.”
“And when will he start?”
“In about four weeks, I hope.”
The officer shook his head.
“That would be much longer than we can allow. Your force is to join my detachment, and I am starting at latest in a fortnight from now.”
“You are asking what is impossible. At present we have not a sufficient number of horses, and I do not know where to procure two thousand camels in such a short time; and I have not nearly enough ammunition for the infantry.”
“The requisite ammunition can be provided by the arsenal at Mooltan and debited to your account, Highness. As for the horses and camels, you will, no doubt, be able to furnish them in time, if you take the trouble. I repeat that in a fortnight all must be ready. Do not forget that the punctual execution of these orders is in a way an earnest of your fidelity and zeal. Every unwarranted delay and all equivocation on your part will be fatal to you.”
The emphasis with which these words were spoken showed how seriously they were meant, and the Maharajah, whose yellow skin had for a moment become darker, silently inclined his head.
Colonel Baird rose from his seat.
“As to the affair touching Mrs. Irwin, I demand that a thorough investigation shall be immediately set on foot, and require that it shall be conducted with unsparing rigour, without any underhand tricks and quibbles. The insult that has been offered by some of your subjects to an officer of His Majesty and a British lady is so heinous that not only the criminals themselves, but also the instigators of the crime, must be delivered up to suffer their well-merited punishment. I allow you twenty-four hours. If I do not receive a satisfactory report from you before the expiry of this time, I shall myself conduct the inquiry. You may rest assured that the information required will then be obtained within the shortest space of time.”
He made a military bow and descended the steps of the terrace, this time taking the shortest way. The cavalry dashed off amid a jingling of swords and accoutrements. The Maharajah followed their departure with lowering, flashing eyes. He then ordered his servant to fetch his body physician, Mohammed Bhawon. And when, a few minutes later, the lean, shrivelled little man, with his wrinkled brown face and penetrating black eyes, dressed entirely in white muslin, was ushered into his presence, he beckoned to him graciously, inviting him to be seated by him on the gold-embroidered cushion.
A second imperious wave of the hand dismissed the attendant. Placing his arm confidentially round the neck of the physician, the Maharajah talked long and intimately to him in carefully hushed tones—but in a friendly and coaxing manner, as one talks to someone from whom one demands something out of the way, his eyes flashing the while with passionate rage and deadly hate.