Guns of the Gods | Page 8

set-back into at any rate a minor victory and
went in person to the kitchen for chupatties such as the servants ate.
Then, returning to the top of the steps he intimated that the
earth-defilers might draw near and receive largesse, contriving the
impression that it was by his sole favor the concession was obtained.

Two of them came promptly and waited at the foot of the steps,
smirking and changing attitudes to draw attention to their rags. Chamu
tossed the bread to them with expressions of disgust. If they had cared
to pretend they were holy men he would have been respectful, in degree
at least, but these were professionals so hardened that they dared ignore
the religious apology, which implies throughout the length and breadth
of India the right to beg from place to place. These were not even true
vagabonds, but rogues contented with one victim in one place as long
as benevolence should last.
"Where is the third one?" Tess demanded. "Where is Pinga?"
They professed not to know, but she had seen all three squatting
together close to the little gate five minutes before. She ordered Chamu
to go and find the missing man and he waddled off, grumbling. At the
end of five minutes he returned without him.
"One comes on horseback," he announced, "who gave the third beggar
money, so that he now waits outside."
"What for?"
"Who knows? Perhaps to keep watch."
"To watch for what?"
"Who knows?"
"Who is it on horseback? A caller? Some one coming for breakfast?
You'd better hurry."
The call at breakfast-time is one of the pleasantest informalities of life
in India. It might even be the commissioner. Tess ran to make one of
those swift changes of costume with which some women have the gift
of gracing every opportunity. Chamu waddled down the steps to await
with due formality, the individual, in no way resembling a British
commissioner, who was leisurely dismounting at the wide gate fifty
yards to the southward of that little one the beggars used.
He was a Rajput of Rajputs, thin-wristed, thin-ankled, lean,
astonishingly handsome in a high-bred Northern way, and possessed of
that air of utter self-assuredness devoid of arrogance which people
seem able to learn only by being born to it. His fine features were set
off by a turban of rose-pink silk, and the only fault discoverable as he
strode up the path between the shrubs was that his riding-boots seemed
too tight across the instep. There was not a vestige of hair on his face.
He was certainly less than twenty, perhaps seventeen years old, or even

younger. Ages are hard to guess in that land.
Tess was back on the veranda in time to receive him, with different
shoes and stockings, and another ribbon in her hair; few men would
have noticed the change at all, although agreeably conscious of the
daintiness. The Rajput seemed unable to look away from her but
ignoring Chamu, as he came up the steps, appraised her inch by inch
from the white shoes upward until as he reached the top their eyes met.
Chamu followed him fussily.
Tess could not remember ever having seen such eyes. They were
baffling by their quality of brilliance, unlike the usual slumbrous
Eastern orbs that puzzle chiefly by refusal to express emotion. The
Rajput bowed and said nothing, so Tess offered him a chair, which
Chamu drew up more fussily than ever.
"Have you had breakfast?" she asked, taking the conscious risk.
Strangers of alien race are not invariably good guests, however
good-looking, especially when one's husband is somewhere out of call.
She looked and felt nearly as young as this man, and had already
experienced overtures from more than one young prince who supposed
he was doing her an honor. Used to closely guarded women's quarters,
the East wastes little time on wooing when the barriers are passed or
down. But she felt irresistibly curious, and after all there was Chamu.
"Thanks, I took breakfast before dawn."
The Rajput accepted the proffered chair without acknowledging the
butler's existence. Tess passed him the big silver cigarette box.
"Then let me offer you a drink."
He declined both drink and cigarette and there was a minute's silence
during which she began to grow uncomfortable.
"I was riding after breakfast--up there on the hill where you see that
overhanging rock, when I caught sight of you here on the veranda. You,
too, were watching the dawn--beautiful! I love the dawn. So I thought I
would come and get to know you. People who love the same thing, you
know, are not exactly strangers."
Almost, if not quite for the first time Tess grew very grateful for
Chamu, who was still hovering at hand.
"If my husband had known, he