One Maid's Mischief
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If he had seen her now, as she sank back in her chair, and the pleasant dimples and puckers came into her face, he would have understood much better how it was that the doctor had persuaded her to leave her maiden state to come and share his lot.
For as the doctor turned redder in the face and then purple, she smiled and shook a little round white finger at him.
“A guilty conscience needs no accuser,” she said. “I never accused you, sir, of flirting with Helen Perowne; but as soon as I mentioned her name you began to defend yourself.”
“I don’t care,” cried the doctor, “I confess I have said complimentary and pleasant things to all the ladies of the station, both old and young; not that they think anything of it, for I’m only the doctor; while as to Helen Perowne, last time her father asked me to see and prescribe for her, and she began to make eyes at me, and put forth her blandishments – ”
“Oh, you confess that, sir?”
“Confess it?” cried the doctor, stoutly. “Why she does that to every man she sees! I believe if her father took her to Madame Tussaud’s – You remember my taking you to Madame Tussaud’s, my dear?”
“Oh, yes, I remember,” said Mrs Bolter.
“Well, I honestly believe that if she were taken there she’d begin making eyes at the wax figures.”
“Indeed!” said Mrs Bolter, stiffly. “And so she began to make eyes at you!”
“That she did, the jade,” said the doctor, chuckling, “and – and – ha, ha, ha – ho, ho, ho! don’t – ha, ha, ha! – say a word about it, my dear – there was nothing the matter with her but young girl’s whimsical fancies; and she made me so cross with her fads and languishing airs, and then by making such a dead set at me, that I – ha, ha, ha – ho, ho, ho – ”
“Bolter,” exclaimed Mrs B, “if you confess to me that you kissed her I’ll have a divorce – I’ll go straight back to England?”
“Kiss her? Not I! – ho, ho, ho! – I gave her such a dose; and I kept her extremely poorly for about a week. She – she hates me like she does physic. Oh, dear me!”
The doctor wiped his eyes, burst into another fit of laughing, and then, after another wipe at his eyes, his face smoothed down and he grew composed.
“Then it’s a pity you don’t give her another dose of medicine,” said his lady, “and prevent her doing so much mischief as she is doing here.”
“But really, my dear, you have no right to accuse me of being extra polite to Helen Perowne.”
“I did not, and I was not about to accuse you of being extra polite to Helen Perowne —extra polite, as you call it, sir; but I was about to connect her name with that of other gentlemen, and not with that of my husband.”
“Oh! come, that’s a comfort,” said the doctor. “What is it then about Helen Perowne?”
“I don’t like the way in which she is going on,” said Mrs Doctor, “and I am quite sure that no good will come of it. I don’t think there is any real harm in the girl.”
“Harm? No, I don’t think there is,” said Dr Bolter. “She’s very handsome, and she has been spoiled by flattery.”
“Administered by foolish men like someone we know,” said the lady.
“H’m! yes – well, perhaps so; but really she is too bad. The fellows seem to run mad after her.”
“Did you see her talking to the Rajah last night?”
“Yes, I saw her; and then poor Hilton began to singe his wings in the candle, and next week she will have somebody else. I know what I’d do if I had to prescribe for her.”
“And what might that be, sir?”
“I’d prescribe a husband, such a one as Harley – a firm, strong-minded, middle-aged man, who would keep a tight hand at the rein and bring her to her senses. I daresay she’d make a man a good wife, after all.”
“Perhaps so,” said Mrs Doctor, pursing up her lips; “but meantime, as you are not called upon to prescribe, what is to be done?”
“To be done? Why, nothing.”
“Oh! but something must be done, Bolter. You ought to speak to Mr Perowne.”
“And be called an idiot for my pains. No, thank you, my dear. In all such delicate matters as these a lady’s hand – I should say, tongue – is the instrument to set matters right. Now, I should say the proper thing would be for a quiet, sensible, clever, middle-aged lady – may I speak of you as a middle-aged lady, my dear – ”
“Don’t be stupid, Henry. I’m forty-four, as you well know, and I never pretended to be younger.”
“No, of course not. You fired forty years at me in a platoon when I proposed, like the dear, sensible old darling you are.”
“Tut! Hush! Silence, sir! No more of that, please.”
“All right, my dear. Well, as I was saying, suppose you have a quiet talk to the girl yourself.”
Mrs Bolter knitted her brows and looked very thoughtful.
“I don’t know,” she said. “It might do good, or it might not. I will think about it.”
“And about my going away for three days, my dear.”
“Oh, one moment, Henry,” said Mrs Doctor. “There was something else I wished to ascertain.”
“What, another something else?” groaned the doctor.
“Yes, another something else, sir. You promised me, that if you could not quite check that terrible habit of yours of talking about Ophir and King Solomon, that you would modify it.”
“Yes, my dear,” said the doctor, giving his ear a rub, and accompanying it by a submissive look.
“I heard you last night exciting the ridicule of all the gentlemen by your pertinacious declarations regarding that mythical idea.”
“Don’t say ridicule, my dear.”
“But I do say ridicule, Henry, and I object to having my husband laughed at by ignorant people – he being a very clever man. So be careful in the future. Now you may go.”
“For three days, my dear?”
“Yes; and pray take care of yourself.”
“I will, my darling,” he cried, in delight; and he was about to embrace the lady warmly, when a step was heard in the veranda, and a voice exclaiming:
“May I come in?”
Volume One – Chapter Twenty Three.
A Little Cloud
“Yes; come in Mr Harley,” and the tall, stern-looking Resident entered the room with the free at-home-ness of people living out at a station where circumstances force the Europeans into the closet intimacy.
“Is anything the matter?” exclaimed the doctor’s wife, as she saw his anxious face.
“Well, not yet,” he said; “but I must confess to being a little nervous about something that has happened. Don’t go away, Bolter.”
“Only going to make a few preparations for a run out. Back directly.”
“No, no,” said the Resident; “you would oblige me by staying. I think, Bolter, you will have to give up all thought of going out at present.”
“Then something is the matter!” said the doctor.
“Oh, it isn’t doctor’s work – at present,” said the Resident, smiling. “The fact is, the Rajah has been hanging about Perowne’s place a good deal lately.”
“Yes, we had observed it,” said Mrs Bolter, severely.
“And the foolish fellow seems to think he has had a little encouragement from Miss Perowne.”
Mrs Doctor nodded and tightened her lips as the Resident went on:
“The result is, that he has been to Perowne’s this morning and proposed in due form for her hand.”
“Why, the scoundrel has got about a dozen wives,” cried the doctor.
“Yes, and of course Perowne tried to smooth him down and to soften the disappointment; but he has gone away furious. I have just come from Perowne’s, and I called to put you on your guard.”
“Think there’s any danger?” said the doctor, sharply.
“Can’t say. You know what these people are if they do not have their own way.”
“Yes,” said the doctor, thoughtfully. “They can be crafty and cruel enough I know; and they don’t love us any better than they did ten years ago, when I was all through the old troubles.”
“Of course,” said the Resident, “if there should be any threatening of trouble you will come across to the island till it is over. I would not show that we are at all uneasy, doctor; only be upon one’s guard.”
“Yes,” said Mrs Doctor, who had been listening attentively, “that will be best. There may be no trouble over the matter, Mr Harley, and I think we should, as you say, be doing wrong by seeming to be alarmed.”
“Then my expedition is quashed for the present,” said the doctor, dolefully.
“It can wait, I am sure,” said his lady, quietly; and her lord resigned himself to his fate as the Resident repeated his advice about not spreading the alarm and exciting the natives by whom they were surrounded, and then left them to go to the fort on the Residency island – a picturesque little clump of rocky earth that divided the river into two parts. On mounting upon the bamboo landing-stage the first person he encountered was Captain Hilton.
Knowing as he did that the young officer had been very attentive to Helen Perowne of late, he hesitated for a few moments, naturally feeling a repugnance to speak upon such matters to one whom other men would have considered a rival; but after a little thought he laughed to himself.
“I am a fatalist,” he muttered, “and I am not afraid. Here, Hilton,” he said, aloud, “I want to speak to you. Ah, there’s Chumbley, too. Don’t take any particular notice,” he continued, as he noted that several of the natives were about. “Have a cigar?”
He drew out his case as he spoke, and Lieutenant Chumbley coming sauntering up in his cool, idle way, the case was offered to him, and the three gentlemen went slowly along the well-kept military path towards the little mess-room.
“Anything wrong?” said Captain Hilton, eagerly; and as he spoke the Resident saw his eyes turn in the direction of Mr Perowne’s house on the east bank of the river.
“Not at present; but the fact is, I am afraid Mr Perowne has seriously affronted the Rajah this morning, and I think it would be as well to be upon our guard.”
“Got any more of these cigars, Harley?” said Chumbley, quietly. “I like ’em.”
“For Heaven’s sake do hold your tongue, Chumbley!” cried the captain. “I never did see a fellow so cool and indifferent.”
“Why not?” replied Chumbley, in his slow drawl. “There’s nothing wrong, only that the Rajah has been to Perowne’s this morning to propose for the fair Helen, and he has come away with a flea in his ear.”
“What?” cried Captain Hilton.
“How did you know?” exclaimed the Resident, turning upon Chumbley, sharply.
“Guessed it – knew it would come from what I saw last night. That’s it, isn’t it?”
“Yes, that is it,” replied the Resident, frowning slightly.
“The insolence – the consummate ignorant audacity!” cried the captain, his face flushing with anger. “The dog! I’ll horsewhip him till he begs for mercy!”
“You will do nothing of the kind, Hilton,” said the Resident quietly.
“But it is insufferable,” cried Hilton. “An ignorant, brown-skinned savage to pretend to place himself on a level with gentlemen, and then to dare to propose for an English lady’s hand!”
“Don’t be excited, Hilton,” said the Resident, looking fixedly in the young officer’s handsome, angry countenance. “You forget that the Rajah may look down upon us as his inferiors. He is a prince in his own right, and rules over a very large extent of country here.”
“Oh, yes, I know all that,” cried Hilton, angrily; “but of course Perowne sent him about his business?”
“Yes, and that is why I have come to you. There may be nothing more heard of the matter; but I think it is quite possible that the Rajah may have taken such dire offence that he will force all his people to join in his quarrel, and the result be a serious trouble.”
“I hope not,” drawled Chumbley. “I hate fighting.”
“Pooh!” ejaculated Hilton. “If the scoundrel gives us any of his insolence, we’ll send him handcuffed to Singapore!”
“I should be greatly obliged, Hilton,” said the Resident stiffly, “if you would modify your tone a little. For my part, I am not surprised at the Rajah’s conduct, and I think that it would be better to let our behaviour towards him be conciliating.”
“What! to a fellow like that?” cried the captain.
“To a man like that,” said the Resident, gravely. “If he behaves badly we are strong enough to resent it; but if, on the other hand, he cools down and acts as a gentleman would under the circumstances, it is our duty to meet him in the most friendly spirit we can.”
“I don’t think so,” cried Hilton, hotly, “and if the scoundrel comes to me I shall treat him as he deserves.”
“Captain Hilton,” said the Resident, and his voice was now very grave and stern, “I must ask you to bear in mind that we occupy a very delicate position here – I as her Majesty’s representative; and you, with your handful of troops, as my supporters. We are few, living in the midst of many, and we hold our own here, please to recollect, by prestige.”
“Of course – yes, I know that,” said Hilton.
“That prestige we shall lose if we let our judgment be biased by personal feeling. Kindly set self on one side, as I am striving to do, and help me to the best of your ability by your manly, unselfish advice.”
Hilton frowned as the Resident went on; but the next instant he had held out his hand, which the other grasped.
“I am afraid I am very hot-headed, Mr Harley,” he exclaimed. “There, it is all over, and I’ll help you to the best of my power. Now then, what’s to be done?”
“First accept my thanks,” cried the Resident. “I knew that I could count upon you, Hilton.”
“I’ll do my best, Harley.”
“Then stroll quietly back to the barracks, and in a matter-of-fact way see that all is in such order that you could bring up your men at a moment’s notice.”
“Reinforcements?” suggested Captain Hilton.
“I did think of asking for them,” said the Resident, “but on second thoughts it seems hardly necessary. I would do everything without exciting suspicion, and as if you were only inspecting the fort. Now go.”
“Right,” said the captain; and he walked away, saying to himself:
“He’s a good fellow, Harley, that he is, and he does not bear a bit of malice against me for cutting him out. Poor fellow! he must have felt it bitterly. Hang it all! I could not have borne it. The very fact of this fellow proposing for Helen nearly drove me wild. I think if I were to lose her I should die.”
Chumbley was about to follow Hilton, but the Resident laid a hand upon his shoulder.
“Of course I can count upon your discretion, Chumbley?” he said.
“Oh, yes, I suppose so,” said the young man, “so long as you don’t want anything done in a hurry. Nature seems to forbid a man to be scurried in this climate; but I say, Mr Harley, don’t let’s have a row if you can help it, I’m a soldier, but if there is anything I do abhor, it is fighting. I hate blood. The very idea of having to make our lads use their bayonets gives me a cold chill all down the back.”
“Depend upon it we will not have a quarrel with the natives if we can help it, Chumbley. If diplomacy can keep it off, there shall be none;” and nodding his head in a friendly manner to the young officer, he strolled away.
“But diplomacy won’t keep it off, my dear sir,” said Chumbley. “If Mother Nature turns loose such a girl as Helen Perowne, to play fast and loose with men like Murad, a row must come.
“Let me see,” he said, after a pause, “what shall I do with myself to-day? Best way to avoid scrapes is to keep up friendly relations with the natives.
“Oh, what a worry this love-making is! We all go in for it at some time or another, but hang me if I think it pays.
“Little Helen quite hates me now, since I’ve broken the string and will not be cajoled into coming back. By Jove! what a wise little girl little Stuart is. One might get up a flirtation there without any heart-breaking. No: won’t do, she’s too sweet, and wise, and sensible. Hang it all, can’t a fellow talk sensibly to a pretty girl without thinking he’s flirting! I like little Stuart. You can talk to her about anything, and she never giggles and blushes, and looks silly. She’s an uncommonly nice young girl, and twenty years hence, when beautiful Helen has grown old, and yellow, and scraggy, Stuart will be a pleasant, soft, amiable little woman, like Mrs Bolter. There’s a woman for you! ’Pon my word I believe she likes me; she talks to me just as if I were a big son.
“Well, now, what’s to be done? I’ll go and see if Hilton wants me, and if he doesn’t I shall have a few hours ashore.
“By the way, I wonder who’ll marry little Stuart?” he said, as he went slowly on with his hands behind him, his broad chest thrown out, and a bluff, manly bearing about him that would have made an onlooker think that he would not make a bad match for the lady himself.
“I shan’t,” he added, after a pause. “Hilton’s a precious idiot not to go for her himself, instead of wasting his time upon a woman who will throw him over. As for me, I’m beginning to think I am not a lady’s man. I’m too big, and clumsy, and stupid. They tolerate me when they don’t laugh at me. Bah! what does it matter? Sport’s my line – and dogs.”
Volume One – Chapter Twenty Four.
The Pains of a Princess
Captain Hilton saw no reason for detaining his subaltern, only bade him be ready to return to the island at the slightest sign of danger, which Chumbley promised to do; and he was about to walk down to the landing-stage, when, happening to gaze across the swift river towards Mr Perowne’s beautiful garden, which sloped down to the water’s edge, with as good a semblance of a lawn as could be obtained in that part of the world, he caught sight of a couple of figures in white, walking slowly up and down in the shade of the trees.
He was too far distant to make out their faces, but he had no doubt that the two were Helen and Grey Stuart.
“Now, I would not mind laying a whole shilling that Master Hilton has his binocular focussed exactly upon one of your faces, and is watching every turn of expression. If you smile he thinks it is with thoughts of him; and take it altogether, the poor fellow imagines you are always dreaming of him, when you are wondering what is worn now in Paris or London, and whether any of the new fashions will reach you by the next steamer.
“Yes, that’s Helen – fair Helen,” he said, leaning upon a rail, and gazing across the water. “Chumbley, old fellow, I’m beginning to think you are not such a fool as I used to imagine you to be. It was a good brave stroke to get away from the toils of that syren; for there’s no mistake about it, old man, you were just like a big fly in the pretty spider’s web.
“By George! she is a very lovely girl though! She seems to fascinate everyone she comes near. Thank goodness, she only got me by one leg, and I broke out, I hope, without much damaging the net. Certainly she soon seemed to repair it. I wish I were a good prophet,” he went on, lighting a cigarette. “I should like to be able to say what is to take place here, who’ll marry whom, and who’ll remain single. Hullo! what’s coming now?”
The splash of oars roused him from his reverie, and turning towards the landing-stage, he made out a dragon-boat, or naga, as the larger row-galleys used by the Malay nobles are called, rapidly approaching the little isle.
It was propelled by a dozen rowers, all dressed uniformly in yellow silk bajus or jackets, their coarse black hair being topped by a natty little cap similar to that worn by a cavalry soldier in undress, and they kept stroke with wonderful accuracy as they forced the boat along.
A large shed-like awning of bamboo and palm leaves covered the latter part of the vessel; and Chumbley forgot his customary inertia, and scanned the boat eagerly, to see if it contained armed men. To his surprise, however, he saw that the whole space beneath the broad awning was filled with women, whose brightly-coloured silken sarongs were hung from their heads after the manner of veils; and though the rowers each wore his kris, the hilt was covered, and it was evidently a friendly visit.
“I don’t know though,” thought Chumbley. “Perhaps it is a ruse, and instead of women, those are smart youths, well armed, ready to give our fellows a dig with the kris, and take the place by surprise.
“No,” he said, after a few moments’ pause, for there was no mistaking the object of the visit, the Malays being a particularly religious people, and great sticklers for form and ceremony, to which they adhere with scrupulous exactness, so that any one pretty well versed in their customs would know at a glance at their dress whether their object was friendly or the reverse.
“Why, it must be the Inche Maida,” muttered Chumbley, giving the native name to a princess residing some distance higher up the stream. “I ought to have been in full fig. I suppose I must go and receive her as I am.”
He threw away his cigarette, turned out the guard, sent a messenger up to the Residency with the news of the Princess’s arrival, bidding the man leave word at the officers’ quarters as he passed, and then walked down to the landing-stage, just as the dragon-boat, with its carved and gilded prow, was run abreast.
Chumbley courteously raised his muslin-covered pith helmet, tucked it beneath his arm, and helped the Princess to step ashore.
She was a remarkably handsome woman of about thirty, with features of the Malay type, but softened into a nearer approach to beauty than is common amongst the women of this nation, whose prominent lips and dilated nostrils are not compensated by the rich long black hair, and large lustrous dark eyes.
In the case of the Princess there was almost a European cast of feature, and she possessed an imposing yet graceful carriage, which with her picturesque costume and flower-decked hair, made her far from unattractive, in spite of her warm brown skin.
She accepted Chumbley’s assistance with a smile that checked the thought in his mind that she was a fine-looking woman; for that smile revealed a set of remarkably even teeth, but they were filed to a particular pattern and stained black.
Chumbley removed his eyes at once from this disfigurement, and let them rest on the magnificent knot of jetty hair, in which were stuck, in company with large gold pins, clusters of a white and odorous jasmine.
He could not help noting, too, the gracefully-worn scarf of gossamer texture, passing from her right shoulder beneath her left arm, and secured by a richly-chased gold brooch of native workmanship. This she removed to set the scarf at liberty, so as to throw over her head to screen it from the sun.
Accustomed to command, she made no scruple in exposing her face to the gaze of men; but as the women who formed her train alighted, each raised her hands to a level with her temples, and spread the silken sarong she wore over her head, so that it formed an elongated slit, covering every portion of the face but the eyes, and following the Princess in this uncomfortable guise, they took their places ashore.
“I have come to see the Resident,” said the Princess, looking very fixedly at Chumbley, and speaking in excellent English. “Will you take me to his presence?”
Chumbley bowed, and he forgot his slow drawl as he said that he would be happy to lead her to the Residency; but felt rather disconcerted as the visitor exclaimed, in a very pointed way:
“I have not seen you before. Are you the lieutenant?”
“I have not had the pleasure of meeting you either,” he replied, rather liking the visitor’s dignified way as he recovered himself; “but I have heard Mr and Miss Perowne talk of the Inche Maida.”
“What did they say about me?” she said, sharply.
“That you were a noble lady, and quite a princess.”
“Ah!” she replied, looking at him fixedly. “How big and strong you are.”
Chumbley stared and tried to find something suitable to reply, but nothing came, and the situation seemed to him so comical that he smiled, and then, as the Princess smiled too, he laughed outright.
“Forgive my laughing,” he said, good-humouredly. “I can’t help being big; and I suppose I am strong.”
“There is the Resident!” said the lady then; and she drew her hand from Chumbley’s arm. “Ah! and the captain.”
For just then Harley stepped out from the Residency veranda to meet his visitors; and Hilton, who had found time to put on the regimental scarlet and buckle on his sword, came up to make the reception more imposing.
The Princess shook hands in the European fashion, and accepted the Resident’s arm, smiling and bowing as if excusing herself to Hilton. Then, declining to enter the house, she took a seat in the broad veranda amongst the Resident’s flowers, while her women grouped themselves behind her, letting fall the sarongs they held over their faces now that, with the exception of a single sentry, none of the common soldiers were about to gaze upon their charms.