The Story of Sonny Sahib | Page 4

cannot go on thus,
but all that is in your hand to do you have done. It is necessary now
only to be very watchful. And it will be to dress the mistress, and to
make everything ready for a journey. Two hours later all the sahib-folk
go from this place in boats, by the river, to Allahabad. I will send an
ox-cart to take the mistress and the baby and you to the bathing ghat.'
'Jeldi karo!' he added, which meant 'Quickly do!'--a thing people say a
great many times a day in India.
The ayah looked at him stupidly. She was terribly frightened; she had
never been so frightened before. Her eyes wandered from the doctor's
face to the ruined south wall of the hut, where the sun of July, when it
happens to shine on the plains of India, was beating fiercely upon the
mud floor. That ruin had happened only an hour ago, with a terrible
noise just outside, such a near and terrible noise that she, Tooni, had
scrambled under the bed the mistress was lying on, and had hidden
there until the doctor-sahib came and pulled her forth by the foot, and
called her a poor sort of person. Then Tooni had lain down at the
doctor-sahib's feet, and tried to place one of them upon her head, and
said that indeed she was not a worthless one, but that she was very old

and she feared the guns; so many of the sahibs had died from the guns!
She, Tooni, did not wish to die from a gun, and would the Presence, in
the great mercy of his heart, tell her whether there would be any more
shooting? There would be no more shooting, the Presence had said; and
then he had given her a bottle and directions, and the news about going
down the river in a boat. Tooni's mind did not even record the
directions, but it managed to retain the words about going away in a
boat, and as she stood twisting the bottle round and round in the folds
of her ragged red petticoat it made a desperate effort to extract their
meaning.
'There will be no more shooting,' said the doctor again, 'and there is a
man outside with a goat. He will give you two pounds of milk for the
baby for five rupees.'
'Rupia! I have not even one!' said the ayah, looking toward the bed; 'the
captain-sahib has not come these thirty days as he promised. The
colonel-sahib has sent the food. The memsahib is for three days without
a pice.'
'I'll pay,' said the doctor shortly, and turned hurriedly to go. Other huts
were crying out for him; he could hear the voice of some of them
through their mud partitions. As he passed out he caught a glimpse of
himself in a little square looking-glass that hung on a nail on the wall,
and it made him start nervously and then smile grimly. He saw the face
of a man who had not slept three hours in as many days and nights--a
haggard, unshaven face, drawn as much with the pain of others as with
its own weariness. His hair stood up in long tufts, his eyes had black
circles under them. He wore neither coat nor waistcoat, and his
regimental trousers were tied round the waist by a bit of rope. On the
sleeve of his collarless shirt were three dark dry splashes; he noticed
them as he raised his arm to put on his pith helmet. The words did not
reach his lips, but his heart cried out within him for a boy of the 32nd.
The ayah caught up her brass cooking-pot and followed him. Since the
doctor-sahib was to pay, the doctor-sahib would arrange that good
measure should be given in the matter of the milk. And upon second
thought the doctor-sahib decided that precautions were necessary. He

told the man with the goat, therefore, that when the ayah received two
pounds of milk she would pay him the five rupees. As he put the
money into Tooni's hand she stayed him gently.
'We are to go without, beyond the walls, to the ghat?' she asked in her
own tongue.
'Yes,' said the doctor, 'in two hours. I have spoken.'
'Hazur![1] the Nana Sahib--'
[1] 'Honoured one.'
'The Nana Sahib has written it. Bus!'[1] the doctor replied impatiently.
Put the memsahib into her clothes. Pack everything there is, and hasten.
Do you understand, foolish one?'
[1] 'Enough.'
'Very good said the ayah submissively, and watched the doctor out of
sight. Then she insisted--holding the rupees, she could insist-- that the
goat-keeper should bring his goat into the hut to milk it; there was more
safety, Tooni thought, in the hut. While