Driftwood Spars | Page 4

be a
warrior--yea, though he had to die in his first skirmish and ere his beard
were grown. Then the woman wept and wearied my father until it

seemed better to him that she should die and, being at peace, bring
peace. No quiet would he have at Mekran Kot from my mother and his
father, the Jam Saheb, while the woman lived, nor would she herself
allow him quiet at Kot Ghazi. And was she not growing old and skinny
moreover? And so he sent my brother to Mekran Kot--and the woman
died, without scandal. So my brother dwelt thenceforward in Mekran
Kot, knowing many things, for he had passed a great imtahan[10] at
Bombay and won a sertifcut[11] thereby, whereof the Jam Saheb was
very pleased, for the son of the Vizier had also gone to a madresseh and
won a sertifcut, and it was time the pride of the Vizier and his son were
abated.
[7] School. [8] Mohammedan High School. [9] Clerk. [10]
Examination. [11] Certificate.
"Now the son of the Vizier, Mahmud Shahbaz, was Ibrahim--and a
mean mangy pariah cur this Ibrahim Mahmud was, having been
educated, and he hated my brother bitterly by reason of the sertifcut and
on account of a matter concerning a dancing-girl, one of those beautiful
fat Mekranis, and, by reason of his hatred and envy and jealousy, my
mother made common cause with him, she also desiring my brother's
death, in that her husband loved this child of another woman, an alien,
his first love, better than he loved hers. But I bore him no ill-will,
Huzoor. I loved him and admired his deeds.
"Many attempts they made, but though my mother was clever and
Ibrahim Mahmud and his father the Vizier were unscrupulous, my
brother was in the protection of the Prophet. Moreover he was much
away from Mekran Kot, being, like our father, a great traveller and
soon irked by whatever place he might be in. And, one time, he
returned home, having been to Germany on secret service (a thing he
often did before he became a Sahib) and to France and Africa on a little
matter of rifles for Afghanistan and the Border, and spoke to us of that
very Somaliland to which this very pultan, the 99th Baluch Light
Infantry, went in 1908 (was it?), and how the English were losing
prestige there and would have to send troops or receive boondah[12]
and the blackened face from him they called the Mad Mullah. And yet

another time he returned from India bringing a Somali boy, a
black-faced youth, but a good Mussulman, whom, some time before, he
had known and saved from death in Africa, and now had most strangely
encountered again. And this Somali lad--who was not a hubshi, a
Woolly One, not a Sidi[13] slave--saved my brother's life in his turn. I
said he was not a slave--but in a sense he was, for he asked nothing
better than to sit in the shadow of my brother throughout his life; for he
loved my brother as the Huzoors' dogs love their masters, yea--he
would rather have had blows from my brother than gold from another.
He it was who saved Mir Jan Rah-bin-Ras el-Isan from the terrible
death prepared for him by Ibrahim Mahmud. It was during this visit to
Mekran Kot that Mahmud Shahbaz, the Vizier, announced that he was
about to send his learned son, the dog Ibrahim, to Englistan to become
English-made first-class Pleader--what they called--'Barishtar-at-Lar'
is it not, Sahib?"
[12] An insulting and contemptuous gesture. [13] A class of negroes,
much employed as sailors and boatmen, and called Seedeeboys.
"That's it, Mir Saheb," replied I, sitting alert with chattering teeth and
shivering ague-stricken body. "Barrister-at Law.... Sit as close to me as
you can, for warmth.... Hark! Is that a signal?" as a long high wavering
note rose from the dry river-bed before us and wailed lugubriously
upon the night, rising and falling in mournful cadence.
"'Twas a genuine jackal-cry, Huzoor. One can always tell the imitation
if jackals have sung one's lullaby from birth--though most Pathans can
deceive white ears in the matter.... Well, this made things no pleasanter,
for Ibrahim crowed like the dung-hill cock he was, and boasted loudly.
Also my mother urged him to do a deed ere he left Mekran Kot for so
long a sojourn in Belait.[14] And to her incitements and his own
inclination and desires was added that which made revenge and my
brother's death the chiefest things in all the world to Ibrahim Mahmud,
and it happened thus.... But do I weary the Sahib with my babble?"
[14] Europe.
"Nay--nay--far from it, Mir Saheb," replied I. "The sentry of talk

challenges the approaching skirmishers of sleep. The thong of narrative
drives off