Dariel: A Romance of Surrey

CHAPTER L

TWO OLD FRIENDS

The Svâns are a strange and peculiar race, declared indeed by the few outsiders who have ever seen them and come back, to be the most original of mankind. And Usi proved at least that much, by showing some rudiments of gratitude.

Although he had managed to tell his tale, with failure of words, and gasps for breath, and rolling of his eyes when the agony came back, poor Wolfsmeat was not fit for much, except to be laid in a soft and shady place, consoled with tobacco and cordials, and continually asked how he felt now. We soon understood what he wished to say, even without the interpreter, for he had picked up small pieces of divers tongues, by being so long among the mountain troops. More than once we feared that he would never bear up from the pains and privations he had undergone; but he said that he should be unworthy of the name of a Shamylid, or son of Shamyl, unless he could starve for a week, without showing immoderate signs of hunger. If the signs Usi had manifested, after only three days, were moderate, no wonder that the big wolf turned and fled from a countenance so expressive.

Strogue, and Cator, and myself, who might now be called the three leaders, sat late into that night, discussing the story of this patient sufferer. What chance had we of being in time, even if we could raise force enough to prevent the murder in cold blood appointed for next Monday? All the fighting men of this tribe of Ossets in the Upper Terek, and the Ardon valleys, would probably be mustered there to carry out the execution. Cator had often heard of the place so clearly described by the injured Svân, and he told us that these wild folk called it the "Valley of Retribution." From Usi's account, it was plain that Marva was making a tribal revenge of it. Her brother would be tried and condemned by the tribe, in expiation of the death of their former chief, Prince Rakhan. Him she had hated and scorned perhaps; for she was not of the sweet kind of women, who look at their wrongs with dewy eyes; but according to the Osset creed her duty was – blood for blood, and soul for soul. Strong in her own dominion now, she might drop all that, if she saw fit, and cry, "Bygones be bygones." Every man of the tribe (being in his heart most loyally afraid of her) would have joined all his cousins in lamenting, that the days were not as they had been; that nobody had the courage now to keep up good old customs; and yet, however right one's own mind was, what could one do, but as the others did? And then to sigh, and cast a glance at Heaven (that forbears to fall upon us) and light another pipe with some remorse, but plenty of sentiment to make it draw.

This was not for us to do, in a state of things beyond all understanding of any man not in the thick of them; and a thousandfold worse for him, if he is there. Nothing is more pleasing than to hear a man tell the story of some touch-and-go adventure he has been through. If he is an Englishman, he is sure to be self-ashamed about it, and describe himself as much more frightened than his slow system gave him time to be. But whoever he is, you may depend upon it that he will put into the narrative a lot of things which never occurred – till afterwards. And I am afraid that I shall do this, when I try to tell how we went on, though I mean to tell everything word for word, which ought to be the same as fact for fact.

But lo, at the very outstart, indignation cripples one! We know that it is sure to go too far, and to put things into darker colours than clear truth has cast into them. In dread of this, a truthful man draws back, and takes too weak a brush.

All of us were put upon that sense of wrong which stirs us up to think less of our own poor lives, and more of that great power which the Lord has planted in us (though He has not always worked it out), to show that we are something more than the brute creation round us. The sense of justice, and good will, and love to those of our own kind, and hate of all that wrong them. Even if Sûr Imar had not been the man he was, and Dariel's father, I would gladly have risked my life – if time were allowed me to know what I was about – rather than let such inhumanity triumph among human beings. Strogue and Cator were of the same mind, and the rest of the miners found that a little excitement would not be amiss. The worst of it was that they were inclined to underrate the enemy. To them it seemed sound argument that a dozen Englishmen could larrup, almost with their neckties, thirty or forty of such fellows as they were like to meet with. Even if there had been truth in that, and it would be most ungrateful on my part to disparage them, what would they do if they had to encounter perhaps a hundred men all well armed? Therefore we must increase our force, and that without loss of a minute. To call for Russian interference would be vain, for they had no brigade – even if they would have used it – that could be brought up in three days' time. We must act for ourselves; as the rule is laid down generally for poor Englishmen, because they are so few, yet always called upon to meet so many.

Strogue struck the proper note. Of savage people I knew nothing, save of Income-tax Commissioners, who charged us twice upon our land, – once for our crime in owning it, and once for the profit which they alone were able to make out of it. But the Captain said: "These men will fight. And they fight quite as bravely as we do, only with more passion in it. To beat them, we must have man for man, or something very near it. The only plan is to find your friend Stepan, and all the fellows he can bring. That poor beggar who is groaning in his sleep seems to know where to find him. He will not be able to walk for days; but he can tell us where to go."

We had searched in vain, as I may have said, for any sign of Stepan near Karthlos. That was one of the things which made us sure that treachery was at work; for if he had travelled with the heavy goods, straightway home, as his orders were, he ought to have been at Karthlos long ago, in spite of the terrible winter. But no one seemed to know where to find him, although a rumour was spread abroad that his master was returning. There was, however, every prospect now of discovering him and those other retainers who had been with the Chief in his exile, for Usi could not have been so long the forester or huntsman of that district without knowing where to find all the principal members of his adopted tribe. What could be finer justice than that a fiendish plot of fratricide should be discomfited chiefly through the brutality of its conceiver? If that tortured victim could but recover the use of his swollen limbs, we might push along towards the Lesghian valleys in time to rouse the tribe on the Saturday night. But to carry poor Usi was a sad, slow drag, and to go without him would be useless, even if humanity allowed it.

"Bear's grease!" was his perpetual moan; "Oh, that men valued the precious bear's grease! If the good Lord would send me only half a pound of bear's grease, I would leap like the Ibex, and dance like the Tûr."

Then, as if to show that Heaven itself had taken a turn in our favour, a most unusual thing came to pass, although at the time I was very far from being at all surprised at it. But those who knew the country said that such a thing scarcely ever happened, and all of our little company might live to be ninety, and keep eyes like twenty, without ever seeing such a thing again. However, I can answer for it, and was not at all disturbed by it.

We came, walking heavily yet tenderly, and like men who (if they were in England) would go to their chemist and ask him whether he had tried his "Celandine" on his own feet, – we came about the middle of that day – Friday it was and a critical time – to a corner where two torrents ran into one another's arms, with as much noise as two Frenchmen make. There were no trees, not a leaf to break the sun; everything was either hard or wet; and the light itself seemed to come in gurgles, as if it were almost giddy with the shining of the water, and the staring of the rocks. In the loose spread of it, below the rush of the two streams into one another, – both being buxom with snow on the melt, which affords them a thickness of suet, – there I saw a great sprawling thing – sprawling at least it appeared to be, and at the same time splashing. I happened to be foremost of the file, yet for the life of me, I could not make out what it was; till Cator spoke over my shoulder thus —

"Motherly she-bear, carrying her cub! Economical father wants to kill it – they always do at this time of year – mother takes a different view. She will land in a second. Aim behind the shoulder. The kid is fine eating. If you feel like missing, let me do it for you."

"Get away!" I answered; "I came first – what have you got to do with it?" I put up my rifle, but when she landed with wonderful care not to hurt a hair of the baby in her clumsy mouth, and then looked at it so proudly – though it was but an ugly little lump – and began to lick the holy trickle from its newly opened eyes, such a touch of nature went into my heart, that I would rather have shot myself almost. "Fire, you stupid!" keen Cator cried. And fire I did, but not at her. For paterfamilias came down raging, with his coat thrown back on his body, and his little eyes rolling, and his hairy chin poked out in fury at his wife's self-assertion. My bullet behind his open shoulder told him that there might be two opinions about paternal duty, and he rolled like a log into the swirling torrent, and was washed up on our side a hundred yards below. Then Usi, the Svân, in a glory of excitement rose from his litter, and told us what to do; and we cut him out the fat that lies along the kidney part, and he scrabbled it into his stringy legs, and fell back again, and smiled at them. In less than half an hour he could walk, and we had all we could do to keep up with him.

That night we slept in Kazbek village, which is on the great Russian road; and we laid our plans for the morrow. Cator was to make rush for the mine, which he could reach before nightfall, and implore Jack Nickols to spare us every son of a gun who could handle a rifle; while Strogue, and Usi, and myself, and others, made every hour of daylight tell for our race in quest of Stepan. We feared that those vile Ossets had a short cut across the western mountain, from their village to the "Valley of Retribution," which would bring them in front of any speed of ours; and unhappily so it proved indeed. And they must have carried Usi by that track, when they caught him spying in their valley; although they gave him small chance of knowing what was time, or where was road. For the mighty mass of Kazbek lay betwixt the Osset villages, and the vale which had been for ages hallowed to their horrible revenge.

At daybreak on Saturday we set forth, in the midst of a miserable drizzle, which would have made the way as hard to find as it was bad when found, except for the knowledge of the land which Usi showed. That son of Shamyl, as he loved to be called, was of infinite service to our cause. Very seldom did he care to speak, unless he was consulted; and the bronze cast of his rugged face beneath that hairy thicket showed no more life than the juniper scrub which we saw on the cheeks of the mountain. But the quick blue flash of his eyes, whenever we caught them unexpectedly, was like the point blank spark that comes, when the lightning is over one's own lawn. Let me not be in that man's black-books – was the first thought of even the boldest mind, as Strogue said more than once to me.

Presently this "Bear-slayer" showed us that he deserved the name of "Straight-pipe," which he had received from Shamyl. For while we were halting in a glen to feed, Gator's rifle stood against a rock. We grudged every moment, and were eating against time, when one of those great black eagles, which are the grandest of European birds, came soaring above us at a mighty height, searching the earth for lamb, or kid, or perhaps a nice babe fast asleep beneath a rock. With Cator's leave, Usi raised his gun, and he must have been as quick as light, for the crack of the rifle and the heavy flop of the dead bird on the track before us, were the first I knew of the matter, although I was standing within a few yards of him. "That's a grand shot; I couldn't have done that, although I am not a bad hand," said Strogue. But the Svân was not satisfied with his work. "I struck him too far behind," he said, "my own pipe would have done it better. I must get time to search for it among the ashes." But we could not spare him yet; for he alone could show us the men we wanted.

How it may be in the winter I know not, and perhaps no one would care to know much about it then, but to me, who was used to very reasonable weather (sometimes dull and sometimes fickle, but scarcely ever furious, and generally comprehensible), the style of this Caucasian sun, whether as he asked his way among a crowd of pinnacles, or whether as he mounted high, strong, and hot above them, or even when he meant to be compassionate and genial in looking back at his long day's work – all I can say is, that to a man of Surrey, who lives out of doors nearly all day long, and can tell you the time within half an hour, whether it be cloudy or whether it be clear, the climate was incongruous. At home, you could look up at the sky, and after making wise allowances for the way of the wind, and the manner of the clouds, and the inclination of the quicksilver, you could generally say something, which could be explained away when a little incorrect. But here the only wisdom was to shake your head, and say the developments are complicated, pressure variable and conflicting, local showers not improbable, thunder not impossible. As our Scientific Staff begins to waver, after predicting rain every day, in a drought of three months' duration.

That Saturday evening the sun went down (so far as we could get a straight look at him through such ins and outs), genial, bountiful, a great globe of good will, squandering gold upon a maiden world of snow, which it blushed to accept, and yet spread upon its breast.

"The weather at any rate is on our side," was my cheerful remark to Captain Strogue; "if we can only find those fellows, we shall be all right."

"Don't you be too sure," he said, "there may be a hurricane to-morrow."

Travelling eastward all that day, we had passed the foot of Karthlos long ago, under Usi's guidance; for to climb the steep would be waste of time, as there was no strength of men there now. Then we descended into another valley, and Usi blew upon a horn, and listened. We heard no reply, but he heard something, and led us, as the yellow light turned grey, into a hollow place with huts around it, and out rushed two enormous dogs, and behold they were Kuban and Orla!

CHAPTER LI

THE ROOT OF EVIL

The amazement of those dogs at sight of me was beyond anything I ever did behold. They had seen so much of the world by this time, including a good deal of England, that they had learned to doubt all the evidence which untravelled dogs wag tail to. They pulled up suddenly, and looked at one another, with the tawny curls of their ears in a tremble, and the hackles of their necks thrown back, and every hair to the tips of their tails quivering with incredulity. Then, like a fool, I pronounced their names, and the word that brings down the avalanche would have been a wiser utterance. They flung their great frames and golden crests in one shock of delight upon my breast, like a harvest-cart dashed against the rickyard post. Luckily I expected it, but even so was glad to be backed up by a rock, and there it was impossible for me to speak, all human emotion being swallowed up in dog.

However, they soon made amends for that, and the roar that rang from crag to crag brought every living being out. Foremost of these was our old friend Stepan, carrying a mighty gun, with Allai peeping through the loop of his elbow, and four or five more, who had been in our valley, staring at us over the packing-cases. I shouted to them with the old salute which they had taught me at St. Winifred's, and they made their salaams, and sang their welcome, while Stepan enfolded me in his capacious arms, and Allai hugged my knees and wept.

"Say nothing till we are inside," I whispered to Strogue, who could speak their language somehow. It was high time to be prudent now, as well as prompt and resolute, for it seemed as if the enemy had in every way outmanœuvred us; and now, if our project should become known, the case would indeed be hopeless. "Not a word to any of these people, until Stepan thinks fit to tell them."

But I need not have been so particular, for they are as true as steel to one another, and above all to their Chieftain. Stepan told them, even before he heard my story out; because swift runners must be sent that very night to other Kheusur villages, for every fighting man within reach to join the muster at the foot of Karthlos. And that muster, to be of any use, must not be later than noon of the morrow, which would be Sunday.

Then I told Stepan our side of the story, with Strogue to make it clear to him; and Usi, without whom we could have done nothing, recounted all that he had seen, but scarcely spoke of his own woes.

At this I wondered for the moment, but knew the reason afterwards. Stepan listened with arms folded, and his great grey head as still as a rock, while his eyes were harder and less expressive – as it chanced to occur to me – than the agate which had saved Usi's life. And I noticed that the wall on which he fixed them was not half so sound and solid, nor the room itself so neat and cheerful as the old stone ruin occupied by Sûr Imar's men in England. "Is that all?" he inquired at last; and Strogue replied, "Yes; and to me it seems enough." The Lesghian dipped his unshorn chin upon the wooded cataract of his breast, and nodded courteously, meaning clearly – "Sir, you have been through us, but not to any purpose among us." And I, as a young slip – in comparison with him, though old enough now to stand up for my growth – marvelled about dry roots, and trunks that are all bark, and so on.

"Hearken to me, and I will use few words," said the loyal Lesghian slowly, with Strogue explaining for my benefit; "I am getting old, and I have my daughters, for the Lord has granted me no son, and the babes whom my daughters have brought forth while I was far away, to dwell upon. I am growing old, and my strength is only in the standing combat now. I cannot leap down from a rock and alight with both feet together, and my arms like willows of steel twined round the enemy. It has been ordained that a man, as his years increase upon him, should increase also in bulk and weight, if permitted by fortune to feed well. All the men of our tribe feed well, because they are just and remain with their wives, who know how to cook the cattle of their neighbours. None of those would we ever take, if we could trust them to leave us ours. For not only are we righteous, but we endeavour to make strangers so, when their wickedness is not good for us.