Book: The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition

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He had met at Suakin a young man, sitting on the edge of a
recently
abandoned redoubt about the size of a hat-box, sketching a clump
of
shell-torn bodies on the gravel plain.

'What are you for?' said Torpenhow. The greeting of the
correspondent
is that of the commercial traveller on the road.

'My own hand,' said the young man, without looking up. 'Have you
any
tobacco?'

Torpenhow waited till the sketch was finished, and when he had
looked
at it said, 'What's your business here?'

'Nothing; there was a row, so I came. I'm supposed to be doing
something
down at the painting-slips among the boats, or else I'm in charge of
the
condenser on one of the water-ships. I've forgotten which.'

'You've cheek enough to build a redoubt with,' said Torpenhow,
and took
stock of the new acquaintance. 'Do you always draw like that?'

The young man produced more sketches. 'Row on a Chinese
pig-boat,'

said he, sententiously, showing them one after another.--'Chief
mate
dirked by a comprador.--Junk ashore off Hakodate.--Somali
muleteer
being flogged.--Star-shelled bursting over camp at
Berbera.--Slave-dhow
being chased round Tajurrah Bah.--Soldier lying dead in the
moonlight
outside Suakin.--throat cut by Fuzzies.'

'H'm!' said Torpenhow, 'can't say I care for Verestchagin-and-water
myself, but there's no accounting for tastes. Doing anything now,
are
you?'

'No. I'm amusing myself here.'

Torpenhow looked at the sketches again, and nodded. 'Yes, you're
right
to take your first chance when you can get it.'

He rode away swiftly through the Gate of the Two War-Ships,
rattled
across the causeway into the town, and wired to his syndicate, 'Got
man
here, picture-work. Good and cheap. Shall I arrange? Will do
letterpress
with sketches.'

The man on the redoubt sat swinging his legs and murmuring, 'I
knew
the chance would come, sooner or later. By Gad, they'll have to
sweat for
it if I come through this business alive!'

In the evening Torpenhow was able to announce to his friend that
the
Central Southern Agency was willing to take him on trial, paying
expenses for three months. 'And, by the way, what's your name?'
said
Torpenhow.

'Heldar. Do they give me a free hand?'

'They've taken you on chance. You must justify the choice. You'd
better
stick to me. I'm going up-country with a column, and I'll do what I
can
for you. Give me some of your sketches taken here, and I'll send
'em
along.' To himself he said, 'That's the best bargain the Central
southern
has ever made; and they got me cheaply enough.'

So it came to pass that, after some purchase of horse-flesh and
arrangements financial and political, Dick was made free of the
New and
Honourable Fraternity of war correspondents, who all possess the
inalienable right of doing as much work as they can and getting as
much
for it as Providence and their owners shall please. To these things
are
added in time, if the brother be worthy, the power of glib speech
that
neither man nor woman can resist when a meal or a bed is in
question,
the eye of a horse-cope, the skill of a cook, the constitution of a
bullock,
the digestion of an ostrich, and an infinite adaptability to all
circumstances. But many die before they attain to this degree, and
the
past-masters in the craft appear for the most part in dress-clothes
when
they are in England, and thus their glory is hidden from the
multitude.

Dick followed Torpenhow wherever the latter's fancy chose to lead
him,
and between the two they managed to accomplish some work that
almost
satisfied themselves. It was not an easy life in any way, and under
its
influence the two were drawn ver closely together, for they ate
from the
same dish, they shared the same water-bottle, and, most binding tie
of all,
their mails went off together. It was Dick who managed to make
gloriously drunk a telegraph-clerk in a palm hut far beyond the
Second
Cataract, and, while the man lay in bliss on the floor, possessed
himself of
some laboriously acquired exclusive information, forwarded by a
confiding correspondent of an opposition syndicate, made a
careful
duplicate of the matter, and brought the result to Torpenhow, who
said
that all was fair in love or war correspondence, and built an
excellent
descriptive article from his rival's riotous waste of words. It was
Torpenhow who--but the tale of their adventures, together and
apart,
from Philae to the waste wilderness of Herawi and Muella, would
fill
many books. They had been penned into a square side by side, in
deadly
fear of being shot by over-excited soldiers; they had fought with
baggage-camels in the chill dawn; they had jogged along in silence
under
blinding sun on indefatigable little Egyptian horses; and they had
floundered on the shallows of the Nile when the whale-boat in
which they
had found a berth chose to hit a hidden rock and rip out half her
bottom-planks.

Now they were sitting on the sand-bank, and the whale-boats were
bringing up the remainder of the column.

'Yes,' said Torpenhow, as he put the last rude stitches into his
over-long-neglected gear, 'it has been a beautiful business.'

'The patch or the campaign?' said Dick. 'Don't think much of
either,
myself.'

'You want the Euryalus brought up above the Third Cataract, don't
you?
and eighty-one-ton guns at Jakdul? Now, I'm quite satisfied with
my
breeches.' He turned round gravely to exhibit himself, after the
manner
of a clown.

'It's very pretty. Specially the lettering on the sack. G.B.T.
Government
Bullock Train. That's a sack from India.'

'It's my initials,--Gilbert Belling Torpenhow. I stole the cloth on
purpose.

What the mischief are the camel-corps doing yonder?' Torpenhow
shaded his eyes and looked across the scrub-strewn gravel.

A bugle blew furiously, and the men on the bank hurried to their
arms
and accoutrements.

'"Pisan soldiery surprised while bathing,"' remarked Dick, calmly.

'D'you remember the picture? It's by Michael Angelo; all beginners
copy
it. That scrub's alive with enemy.'

The camel-corps on the bank yelled to the infantry to come to
them, and
a hoarse shouting down the river showed that the remainder of the
column had wind of the trouble and was hastening to take share in
it. As
swiftly as a reach of still water is crisped by the wind, the
rock-strewn
ridges and scrub-topped hills were troubled and alive with armed
men.

Mercifully, it occurred to these to stand far off for a time, to shout
and
gesticulate joyously. One man even delivered himself of a long
story. The
camel-corps did not fire. They were only too glad of a little
breathing-space, until some sort of square could be formed. The
men on
the sand-bank ran to their side; and the whale-boats, as they toiled
up
within shouting distance, were thrust into the nearest bank and
emptied
of all save the sick and a few men to guard them. The Arab orator
ceased
his outcries, and his friends howled.

'They look like the Mahdi's men,' said Torpenhow, elbowing
himself into
the crush of the square; 'but what thousands of 'em there are! The
tribes
hereabout aren't against us, I know.'

'Then the Mahdi's taken another town,' said Dick, 'and set all these
yelping devils free to show us up. Lend us your glass.'

'Our scouts should have told us of this. We've been trapped,' said a
subaltern. 'Aren't the camel guns ever going to begin? Hurry up,
you
men!'

There was no need of any order. The men flung themselves
panting
against the sides of the square, for they had good reason to know
that
whoso was left outside when the fighting began would very
probably die
in an extremely unpleasant fashion. The little
hundred-and-fifty-pound
camel-guns posted at one corner of the square opened the ball as
the
square moved forward by its right to get possession of a knoll of
rising
ground. All had fought in this manner many times before, and
there was
no novelty in the entertainment; always the same hot and stifling
formation, the smell of dust and leather, the same boltlike rush of
the
enemy, the same pressure on the weakest side, the few minutes of
hand-to-hand scuffle, and then the silence of the desert, broken
only by
the yells of those whom their handful of cavalry attempted to
purse. They
had become careless. The camel-guns spoke at intervals, and the
square
slouched forward amid the protesting of the camels. Then came
the
attack of three thousand men who had not learned from books that
it is
impossible for troops in close order to attack against
breech-loading fire.

A few dropping shots heralded their approach, and a few horsemen
led,
but the bulk of the force was naked humanity, mad with rage, and
armed
with the spear and the sword. The instinct of the desert, where
there is
always much war, told them that the right flank of the square was
the
weakest, for they swung clear of the front. The camel-guns shelled
them
as they passed and opened for an instant lanes through their midst,
most
like those quick-closing vistas in a Kentish hop-garden seen when
the
train races by at full speed; and the infantry fire, held till the
opportune
moment, dropped them in close-packing hundreds. No civilised
troops in
the world could have endured the hell through which they came,
the
living leaping high to avoid the dying who clutched at their heels,
the
wounded cursing and staggering forward, till they fell--a torrent
black as
the sliding water above a mill-dam--full on the right flank of the
square.

Then the line of the dusty troops and the faint blue desert sky
overhead
went out in rolling smoke, and the little stones on the heated
ground ant
the tinder-dry clumps of scrub became matters of surpassing
interest, for
men measured their agonised retreat and recovery by these things,
counting mechanically and hewing their way back to chosen
pebble and
branch. There was no semblance of any concerted fighting. For
aught the
men knew, the enemy might be attempting all four sides of the
square at
once. Their business was to destroy what lay in front of them, to
bayonet
in the back those who passed over them, and, dying, to drag down
the
slayer till he could be knocked on the head by some avenging
gun-butt.

Dick waited with Torpenhow and a young doctor till the stress
grew
unendurable. It was hopeless to attend to the wounded till the
attack was
repulsed, so the three moved forward gingerly towards the weakest
side
of the square. There was a rush from without, the short
hough-hough of
the stabbing spears, and a man on a horse, followed by thirty or
forty
others, dashed through, yelling and hacking. The right flank of the
square sucked in after them, and the other sides sent help. The
wounded,
who knew that they had but a few hours more to live, caught at the
enemy's feet and brought them down, or, staggering into a
discarded
rifle, fired blindly into the scuffle that raged in the centre of the
square.

Dick was conscious that somebody had cut him violently across
his
helmet, that he had fired his revolver into a black, foam-flecked
face
which forthwith ceased to bear any resemblance to a face, and that
Torpenhow had gone down under an Arab whom he had tried to
'collar
low,' and was turning over and over with his captive, feeling for
the
man's eyes. The doctor jabbed at a venture with a bayonet, and a
helmetless soldier fired over Dick's shoulder: the flying grains of
powder
stung his cheek. It was to Torpenhow that Dick turned by instinct.
The
representative of the Central Southern Syndicate had shaken
himself
clear of his enemy, and rose, wiping his thumb on his trousers. The
Arab,
both hands to his forehead, screamed aloud, then snatched up his
spear
and rushed at Torpenhow, who was panting under shelter of Dick's
revolver. Dick fired twice, and the man dropped limply. His
upturned
face lacked one eye. The musketry-fire redoubled, but cheers
mingled
with it. The rush had failed and the enemy were flying. If the heart
of the
square were shambles, the ground beyond was a butcher's shop.
Dick
thrust his way forward between the maddened men. The remnant
of the
enemy were retiring, as the few--the very few--English cavalry
rode
down the laggards.

Beyond the lines of the dead, a broad blood-stained Arab spear
cast aside
in the retreat lay across a stump of scrub, and beyond this again the
illimitable dark levels of the desert. The sun caught the steel and
turned
it into a red disc. Some one behind him was saying, 'Ah, get away,
you
brute!' Dick raised his revolver and pointed towards the desert. His
eye
was held by the red spash in the distance, and the clamour about
him
seemed to die down to a very far-away whisper, like the whisper of
a
level sea. There was the revolver and the red light. . . . and the
voice of
some one scaring something away, exactly as had fallen
somewhere
before,--a darkness that stung. He fired at random, and the bullet
went
out across the desert as he muttered, 'Spoilt my aim. There aren't
any
more cartridges. We shall have to run home.' He put his hand to his
head
and brought it away covered with blood.

'Old man, you're cut rather badly,' said Torpenhow. 'I owe you
something for this business. Thanks. Stand up! I say, you can't be
ill
here.'

Throughout the night, when the troops were encamped by the
whale-boats, a black figure danced in the strong moonlight on the
sand-bar and shouted that Khartoum the accursed one was
dead,--was
dead,--was dead,--that two steamers were rock-staked on the Nile
outside
the city, and that of all their crews there remained not one; and
Khartoum was dead,--was dead,--was dead!
But Torpenhow took no heed. He was watching Dick, who called
aloud to
the restless Nile for Maisie,--and again Maisie!
'Behold a phenomenon,' said Torpenhow, rearranging the blanket.
'Here
is a man, presumably human, who mentions the name of one
woman
only. And I've seen a good deal of delirium, too.--Dick, here's
some fizzy
drink.'

'Thank you, Maisie,' said Dick.

CHAPTER III

So he thinks he shall take to the sea again
For one more cruise with his buccaneers,
To singe the beard of the King of Spain,
And capture another Dean of Jaen
And sell him in Algiers.
A Dutch Picture. Longfellow

THE SOUDAN campaign and Dick's broken head had been some
months
ended and mended, and the Central Southern Syndicate had paid
Dick a
certain sum on account for work done, which work they were
careful to
assure him was not altogether up to their standard. Dick heaved the
letter into the Nile at Cairo, cashed the draft in the same town, and
bade
a warm farewell to Torpenhow at the station.

'I am going to lie up for a while and rest,' said Torpenhow. 'I don't
know
where I shall live in London, but if God brings us to meet, we shall
meet.

Are you starying here on the off-chance of another row? There will
be
none till the Southern Soudan is reoccupied by our troops. Mark
that.

Good-bye; bless you; come back when your money's spent; and
give me
your address.'

Dick loitered in Cairo, Alexandria, Ismailia, and Port
Said,--especially
Port Said. There is iniquity in many parts of the world, and vice in
all,
but the concentrated essence of all the iniquities and all the vices
in all
the continents finds itself at Port Said. And through the heart of
that
sand-bordered hell, where the mirage flickers day long above the
Bitter
Lake, move, if you will only wait, most of the men and women you
have
known in this life. Dick established himself in quarters more
riotous than
respectable. He spent his evenings on the quay, and boarded many
ships,
and saw very many friends,--gracious Englishwomen with whom
he had
talked not too wisely in the veranda of Shepherd's Hotel, hurrying
war
correspondents, skippers of the contract troop-ships employed in
the
campaign, army officers by the score, and others of less reputable
trades.

He had choice of all the races of the East and West for studies, and
the
advantage of seeing his subjects under the influence of strong
excitement,
at the gaming-tables, saloons, dancing-hells, and elsewhere. For
recreation there was the straight vista of the Canal, the blazing
sands,
the procession of shipping, and the white hospitals where the
English
soldiers lay. He strove to set down in black and white and colour
all that
Providence sent him, and when that supply was ended sought
about for
fresh material. It was a fascinating employment, but it ran away
with his
money, and he had drawn in advance the hundred and twenty
pounds to
which he was entitled yearly. 'Now I shall have to work and
starve!'

thought he, and was addressing himself to this new fate when a
mysterious telegram arrived from Torpenhow in England, which
said,
'Come back, quick; you have caught on. Come.'

A large smile overspread his face. 'So soon! that's a good hearing,'
said
he to himself. 'There will be an orgy to-night. I'll stand or fall by
my
luck. Faith, it's time it came!' He deposited half of his funds in the
hands
of his well-known friends Monsieur and Madame Binat, and
ordered
himself a Zanzibar dance of the finest. Monsieur Binat was
shaking with
drink, but Madame smiles sympathetically--
'Monsieur needs a chair, of course, and of course Monsieur will
sketch;
Monsieur amuses himself strangely.'

Binat raised a blue-white face from a cot in the inner room. 'I
understand,' he quavered. 'We all know Monsieur. Monsieur is an
artist,
as I have been.' Dick nodded. 'In the end,' said Binat, with gravity,
'Monsieur will descend alive into hell, as I have descended.' And
he
laughed.

'You must come to the dance, too,' said Dick; 'I shall want you.'

'For my face? I knew it would be so. For my face? My God! and for
my
degradation so tremendous! I will not. Take him away. He is a
devil. Or
at least do thou, Celeste, demand of him more.' The excellent
Binat began
to kick and scream.

'All things are for sale in Port Said,' said Madame. 'If my husband
comes
it will be so much more. Eh, 'how you call--'alf a sovereign.'

The money was paid, and the mad dance was held at night in a
walled
courtyard at the back of Madame Binat's house. The lady herself,
in
faded mauve silk always about to slide from her yellow shoulders,
played
the piano, and to the tin-pot music of a Western waltz the naked
Zanzibari girls danced furiously by the light of kerosene lamps.
Binat sat
upon a chair and stared with eyes that saw nothing, till the whirl of
the
dance and the clang of the rattling piano stole into the drink that
took the
place of blood in his veins, and his face glistened. Dick took him
by the
chin brutally and turned that face to the light. Madame Binat
looked
over her shoulder and smiled with many teeth. Dick leaned against
the
wall and sketched for an hour, till the kerosene lamps began to
smell, and
the girls threw themselves panting on the hard-beaten ground.
Then he
shut his book with a snap and moved away, Binat plucking feebly
at his
elbow. 'Show me,' he whimpered. 'I too was once an artist, even I!'
Dick
showed him the rough sketch. 'Am I that?' he screamed. 'Will you
take
that away with you and show all the world that it is I,--Binat?' He
moaned and wept.

'Monsieur has paid for all,' said Madame. 'To the pleasure of
seeing
Monsieur again.'

The courtyard gate shut, and Dick hurried up the sandy street to
the
nearest gambling-hell, where he was well known. 'If the luck
holds, it's
an omen; if I lose, I must stay here.' He placed his money
picturesquely
about the board, hardly daring to look at what he did. The luck
held.

Three turns of the wheel left him richer by twenty pounds, and he
went
down to the shipping to make friends with the captain of a decayed
cargo-steamer, who landed him in London with fewer pounds in
his
pocket than he cared to think about.

A thin gray fog hung over the city, and the streets were very cold;
for
summer was in England.

'It's a cheerful wilderness, and it hasn't the knack of altering much,'
Dick
thought, as he tramped from the Docks westward. 'Now, what must
I
do?'

The packed houses gave no answer. Dick looked down the long
lightless
streets and at the appalling rush of traffic. 'Oh, you rabbit-hutches!'
said
he, addressing a row of highly respectable semi-detached
residences. 'Do
you know what you've got to do later on? You have to supply me
with
men-servants and maid-servants,'--here he smacked his lips,--'and
the
peculiar treasure of kings. Meantime I'll clothes and boots, and
presently
I will return and trample on you.' He stepped forward
energetically; he
saw that one of his shoes was burst at the side. As he stooped to
make
investigations, a man jostled him into the gutter. 'All right,' he said.

'That's another nick in the score. I'll jostle you later on.'

Good clothes and boots are not cheap, and Dick left his last shop
with the
certainty that he would be respectably arrayed for a time, but with
only
fifty shillings in his pocket. He returned to streets by the Docks,
and
lodged himself in one room, where the sheets on the bed were
almost
audibly marked in case of theft, and where nobody seemed to go to
bed at
all. When his clothes arrived he sought the Central Southern
Syndicate
for Torpenhow's address, and got it, with the intimation that there
was
still some money waiting for him.

'How much?' said Dick, as one who habitually dealt in millions.

'Between thirty and forty pounds. If it would be any convenience to
you,
of course we could let you have it at once; but we usually settle
accounts
monthly.'

'If I show that I want anything now, I'm lost,' he said to himself.
'All I
need I'll take later on.' Then, aloud, 'It's hardly worth while; and I'm
going to the country for a month, too. Wait till I come back, and
I'll see
about it.'

'But we trust, Mr. Heldar, that you do not intend to sever your
connection with us?'

Dick's business in life was the study of faces, and he watched the
speaker
keenly. 'That man means something,' he said. 'I'll do no business
till I've
seen Torpenhow. There's a big deal coming.' So he departed,
making no
promises, to his one little room by the Docks. And that day was the
seventh of the month, and that month, he reckoned with awful
distinctness, had thirty-one days in it!
It is not easy for a man of catholic tastes and healthy appetites to
exist for
twenty-four days on fifty shillings. Nor is it cheering to begin the
experiment alone in all the loneliness of London. Dick paid seven
shillings
a week for his lodging, which left him rather less than a shilling a
day for
food and drink. Naturally, his first purchase was of the materials of
his
craft; he had been without them too long. Half a day's
investigations and
comparison brought him to the conclusion that sausages and
mashed
potatoes, twopence a plate, were the best food. Now, sausages
once or
twice a week for breakfast are not unpleasant. As lunch, even, with
mashed potatoes, they become monotonous. At dinner they are
impertinent. At the end of three days Dick loathed sausages, and,
going,
forth, pawned his watch to revel on sheep's head, which is not as
cheap
as it looks, owing to the bones and the gravy. Then he returned to
sausages and mashed potatoes. Then he confined himself entirely
to
mashed potatoes for a day, and was unhappy because of pain in his
inside. Then he pawned his waistcoat and his tie, and thought
regretfully
of money thrown away in times past. There are few things more
edifying
unto Art than the actual belly-pinch of hunger, and Dick in his few
walks
abroad,--he did not care for exercise; it raised desires that could
not be
satisfied--found himself dividing mankind into two classes,--those
who
looked as if they might give him something to eat, and those who
looked
otherwise. 'I never knew what I had to learn about the human face
before,' he thought; and, as a reward for his humility, Providence
caused
a cab-driver at a sausage-shop where Dick fed that night to leave
half
eaten a great chunk of bread. Dick took it,--would have fought all
the
world for its possession,--and it cheered him.

The month dragged through at last, and, nearly prancing with
impatience, he went to draw his money. Then he hastened to
Torpenhow's address and smelt the smell of cooking meats all
along the
corridors of the chambers. Torpenhow was on the top floor, and
Dick
burst into his room, to be received with a hug which nearly
cracked his
ribs, as Torpenhow dragged him tot he light and spoke of twenty
different things in the same breath.

'But you're looking tucked up,' he concluded.

'Got anything to eat?' said Dick, his eye roaming round the room.

'I shall be having breakfast in a minute. What do you say to
sausages?'

'No, anything but sausages! Torp, I've been starving on that
accursed
horse-flesh for thirty days and thirty nights.'

'Now, what lunacy has been your latest?'

Dick spoke of the last few weeks with unbridled speech. Then he
opened
his coat; there was no waistcoat below. 'I ran it fine, awfully fine,
but
I've just scraped through.'

'You haven't much sense, but you've got a backbone, anyhow. Eat,
and
talk afterwards.' Dick fell upon eggs and bacon and gorged till he
could
gorge no more. Torpenhow handed him a filled pipe, and he
smoked as
men smoke who for three weeks have been deprived of good
tobacco.

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