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The Hermit Doctor of Gaya: A Love Story of Modern India

I. A. R. Wylie

died out of him. "They're not, Anne--heaven forbid. Because you and I are to live together all our lives--because we care for each other, our personalities don't cease to exist. We have both our secrets--our very thoughts are secret. We can't help it. I'll wager you don't tell me everything you think about me. Do you?" She got up slowly. She went and stood by the light, her head averted. She was very truthful. She recognized the truth of what he had said. She could not have told him then what she thought. "I daresay--you're right. It was silly of me." But an immense desire possessed her--a primitive desire beyond her control and based on she knew not what knowledge--the desire to hurt him. "By the way, Sigrid Fersen was married this afternoon," she said. He did not answer for a moment. She heard him re-light his pipe. The stem was evidently choked, for it drew badly and noisily. "Well, that was to be expected," he said. "My word--I am tired--just dog-tired." She kept her eyes averted. She was stifled by an emotion that was half shame, half anger. Presently the shame predominated. She turned to him, a word of reluctant kindness ready on her lips. His head had fallen back among the cushions. His outstretched hand still held the pipe, which had gone out again. She saw the great muscles of his bare neck--of the half-exposed chest. His eyes were closed and he breathed deeply and smoothly like a child. The pipe slipped from his hand and fell on the mat with a dull little thud. She crept nearer and picked it up, her lips drawn together in ungovernable disgust. *CHAPTER V* *CRISIS* The Comptons had rushed into debt with their eyes open and their teeth clenched. More than one piece of valuable Sevres had vanished from their collection and its place been filled by a judicious rearrangement of the remaining gods. Colonel Armstrong never met the Captain without dropping a hint as to the inexpediency of opposing oneself to the feelings of a touch-and-go community like Gaya. The Comptons persisted recklessly on their course. Archie Compton, no military genius, was a fine soldier, prepared to fight to the last cartridge and go down with his superior officer, colours flying. His superior officer in this particular affair was one Mary, his wife, and the last cartridge was about to be fired at her command. It could not be said that she faced this last encounter with perfect equanimity. Throughout the day she had felt her heart beat loudly and heavily. At the approach of the fatal hour, woman-like, she had arrayed herself in her very best, her courage trickling back to her in the measure that she discovered herself still presentable. The look of awed admiration which her husband threw her from time to time gave her strength to meet the advance-guards of the enemy forces. Were they enemy forces or was it a capitulation? At any rate Gaya had not turned its back, and that was something to be thankful for. Mrs. Bosanquet, with George in tow, was the first to arrive--probably an intentional move on the part of that good-natured and loyal soul. She kissed Mary on both cheeks and squeezed her hand. "_Morituri te salutant_," she whispered. "My dear, you have done things wonderfully. I had hardly recognized the place. What are you giving them to drink?" "Champagne--the very best," Mary Compton replied grimly. "Twenty rupees a bottle, and unlimited supplies. I've borrowed a cook from the Prevets at Lucknow. He's supposed to be a wonder. We may pull it off." "We may," Mrs. Bosanquet agreed. "Gaya isn't an ass. It would be a dull station without Sigrid, and it knows it. Unless anything unlucky happens they'll give in gracefully--especially after dinner. But why on earth did these two go and get married like that? It adds a kind of scandal----" Mrs. Compton sighed. "That man wanted it. He was finding the half and half situation too trying. They both wished it to be quiet--Sigrid especially. I think she thought we'd rather be out of it----" "I don't wonder----" Mrs. Bosanquet began and checked herself. She was in the unfortunate position of doing something whole-heartedly of which she equally whole-heartedly disapproved. A fresh influx of guests sent her adrift. Everybody who had a right to be considered in the first flight had been invited and had accepted. They came in with more formality than was usual with them. It was as though they recognized that the occasion was in the nature of ceremony--a kind of symbolic festival. If they swallowed Mrs. Compton's dinner it was only to be understood that they swallowed the Barclays with it. Mrs. Compton's manner, if not her actual invitation, had made that clear. Mrs. Compton heaved a sigh of relief when Colonel Armstrong and his washed-out-looking wife made their appearance. He paid her a little old-fashioned compliment, and she understood from his manner that he had reached toleration, if not approval. Mrs. Boucicault swept both out of her path. She was radiant. Even the painted cheeks and reckless display of jewellery could not detract from the wonder of her vitality, her irrepressible joy of life. It was as though all the winds of heaven had blown in with her. "I passed the Barclays as I came along," she said. "Mr. Barclay has such wonderful horses. He told me he has the finest polo ponies in India just eating their heads off. Won't it be splendid if we win the cup? Do look at Tristram, Mary! Doesn't he look odd in uniform? Anne, of course, loves it. She would, wouldn't she? She made that dress of hers. It's not economy. She has a sort of idea that it's wicked to be beautiful. And Anne is so good." She gave a little malicious laugh. "I don't know how she came to be my daughter." She rambled on erratically, but Mary Compton heard her only as a vague murmur. That moment of which she had been so painfully conscious for the last week had come. She drew her breath sharply between her teeth. She had seen Sigrid--Sigrid and her husband. The little groups went on talking, but there had been a general, involuntary movement. It was not hostile. They turned towards her as they had always done, scarcely knowing that they did so, drawn by the magnetism stronger than either good-breeding or dislike. And tonight it was not easy to turn away. There was something new about her--something more arresting than either beauty or even the vivid life which had made her powerful amongst them. They could not have defined it. She was not radiant, not triumphant, not challenging. The gold hair was smoothed down on either side of the small, erect head. Her face was colourless, the mouth composed, unsmiling. The eyes were wide open and intensely bright. There was a touch of gold on the white, full-skirted dress--on the slippers, on the small, perfect feet. She was a study of a burning pallor--a white flame. Barclay came behind her. He looked proportionately dark and very handsome. The cut of his evening clothes proclaimed Bond Street. He wore a red silk button in the lapel of his coat--an order given him by King Leopold in recognition of short but effective service in the unhappy Congo. He glanced about him with a sombre distrust. Gaya hesitated. Even a gathering of well-bred English men and women can be swept by an invisible wave of panic, and Gaya was panic-stricken, torn between a headstrong admiration and an instinctive, inherent dislike. Moreover, it was not easy to take the initiative, and the most seasoned among them wavered. But before Sigrid and her companion could reach their hostess Tristram had left his wife's side and gone to meet her. "I wish my bracelet-sister all happiness," he said in a low tone. He held her hand for an instant and then turned to Barclay and greeted him frankly as though nothing had ever passed between them. But Barclay's hand hung at his side. He bowed with an exaggeration that was a veiled sneer. But the ice had been broken, if not dispersed. Others came forward, murmuring incoherencies which, they thanked heaven, no one could wait to disentangle. They tried earnestly, and they believed successfully, to include Barclay in their welcome, and they would have been surprised to learn that the most any of them accomplished was a sightless nod in his direction. Perhaps, at the bottom, they were of opinion that their resignation to his presence was enough. But it all looked well enough from a distance, and there was colour in Mrs. Compton's cheeks as she kissed Sigrid. "We've won," she whispered. "You've won, dear." She gave Barclay her hand with a little vacant smile. "You've got to take your wife in, Mr. Barclay," she said. "You two are the guests of the evening, and must lead the way. I'm sure we're all ready." Then another little rush of misery and panic swamped her. She had gone over the points of precedence very carefully. It had seemed to her best and most courageous to take the bull by the horns, to drive the nail home with all her strength. The Barclays were not to slip in--they were to be the people of the evening. Gaya had got to accept them whole-heartedly and with its eyes open. Now she realized the horribleness of theories when applied to human beings. She saw that she had made a blunder and had set one person at least an almost intolerable task. Sigrid laid her hand on her husband's arm. The entrance to the dining-room was immediately opposite her--half a dozen yards away, Gaya between. It was like running the gauntlet. An almost imperceptible spasm passed over the dead-white face. For an instant Mary Compton thought she faltered. Then the two incongruous figures made their way slowly across the room. But Mrs. Compton had seen that scarcely perceptible change. She forgot her guests. She stood there, lost in misery and helpless speculation. For what was this intolerable price paid? Was this the splendour of living for which a woman might sell herself? What silence could be worth such galling humiliation? If Sigrid had committed a crime, surely it was not in this way she would have chosen to escape? Then Mrs. Compton, finding herself on the verge of tears, became exasperated and seized the arm of the man nearest her. "Please--please take me in," she said imperatively. He obeyed, perhaps aware of the nearness of disaster, and thereby the order and decorum of the evening went to the winds. Gaya, however, itself ill at ease, accepted the situation, and followed haphazard, the two forsaken and ill-assorted partners joining forces in good-natured resignation. Only Compton himself lingered. He had excused himself to Mrs. Bosanquet, who had fallen to his lot, and whose understanding of the situation was probably more poignant than his own. As a rule, he knew what his wife let him know and saw what she pointed out to him, but not much else. He had not the vaguest idea why she had, as he expressed it, "stampeded," but he did realize, as a painstaking host, that one guest had been forgotten--and that guest a personage who would be unlikely to accept the oversight gracefully. Compton set himself to wait, therefore, with as much patience as he could muster. It was not till ten minutes later that Rasaldu made his appearance. Unpunctuality was with him a fetish. On this occasion his ordinary habit had been exaggerated by circumstances which he explained elaborately as he smoothed his sleek black hair before a glass. "Only got back this afternoon--marvellous fine shooting--two tigers and a cheetah. I got the tigers myself--magnificent specimens. The biggest