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THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB

■PJ (If JUKI IPIfl U^IIV^--

"■^T^^i^ V~

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

VERNON'S AUNT.

With many Illustrations. 12mo. Cloth, $1.25.

" Atniising from beginning to end, and the experiences inci-
dent to the travifling of & niai Jen lady all alone in the Orient are
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A DAUGHTER OF TO-DAY.

A Novel. 12nio. Cloth, 11.50.
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A SOCIAL DEPARTURE:

How Ortiiouocia and I Went Round the
World by Ourselves. With 111 Illustrations
by F. II. TowNSEND. 12mo. Paper, 75 cents;

cloth, $1.75.
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Advertiser.

AN AMERICAN GIRL IN LONDON.

With 80 Illustrations by F. H. Townsend.
12mo. Paper, 75 cents ; cloth, $1.50.
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THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A
MEMSAHIB.

With 37 Illustrations by F. II. Townsend.

12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
"It is like traveling without leaving one's armchair to read
it Miss Duncan has the descriptive and narrative gift m large
measure, and she brings vividly before us the street scenes, the
interiors, the bewilderingly queer natives, the gayetiee of the
English colony."— Philadelphia Telegraph.

■54

D. APPLETON & CO., Publishers, 72 Fifth Ave.

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H'>,0l^;5;^.

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//< Indian garb.

«T

THE

STORY OF SONNY SAHIB

MRS. EVERARD COTES

(SARA JEANNETTE DUNCAN)

AUTHOR OF A SOCIAL DEPARTURE, AN AMERICAN GIRL IN LONDON,

A DAUGHTER OF TO-DAY, VERNON's AUNT, ETC.

NEW YORK
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY

1895

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J)5025

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

In Indian garb ....

Sonny goes to court

Before the Maharajah .

In princely favour.

A package is thrown to Moti

Doctor Roberts's enemy

Sonny's hand trembled as he took it

An early-morning adventure

" Pris'ner, sir ! " .

" And this is the baby ? "

FACINa
PAQU

Frontispiece

24
85
43
47
65
81
91
98
111

^•^

CHAPTER I.

''Ayah," the doctor-sahib said in the
vernacular, standing beside the bed, "the fever
of the mistress is like fire. Without doubt it
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 Alla-
habad. I will send an ox-cart to take the mis-
tress and the baby and you to the bathing ghat."

'' Jeldl Tcaro!'' 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 fright-

2 THE STORY OF SOJsinY SATIIB.

ened before. Her eyes wandered from the doc-
tor'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 ihe Pres-
ence, in the great mercy of his heart, tell her
whether there would be any more shooHng?
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

T ,. ■ /'-"TT •T.»_,r, I f

T»Tn> f7r~~rr. ^rrv^-y.'n'^"' crv

•^WFVM1^>)II>

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. g

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 twist-
ing 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."

'^Uwpia! I have not even one!" said the
ayah, looking toward the bed; "the captain-
sahib has not come these thirty days as he prom-
ised. 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.

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THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

He saw the face of a man who had not slept three
hours in as many days and nights— a haggard, un-
shaven 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 regi-
mental 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.

I MfJfV* 1^P'".f> V\ UJ^WPl"

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 5

" 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 ! "^ the Nana Sahib "

"The Nana Sahib has written it. Bus!^^\
the doctor replied impatiently. "Put the mem-
sahib into her clothes. Pack everything there is,
and hasten. Do you understand, foolish one ? "

" 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 he milked it Tooni
sat upon the ground, hugging her knees, and
thought.

The memsahib had said nothing all this time,
had known nothing. For two days the mem-
sahib had been, as Tooni would have said, with-

* " Honourecl one."

f " Enough."

THE STORY OF SONNY SAUIB.

out SGDse— had lain on the bed in the corner
quietly staring at the wall, where the looking-
glass hung, making no sign except when she
heard the Nana Sahib's guns. Then she sat up
straight, and laughed very prettily and sweetly.
It was the salute, she thought in her fever ; the
Viceroy was coming ; there would be all sorts of
gay doings in the station. When the shell ex-
ploded that tore up the wall of the hut, she
asked Tooni for her new blue silk with the
flounces, the one that had been just sent out from
England, and her kid slippers with the rosettes.
Tooni, wiping away her helpless tears with the
edge of her head covering, had said, '''' JSfci^ mem-
sahih, nd!'' and stroked the hot hand that
pointed, and then the mistress had forgotten
again. As to the little pink baby, three days old,
it blinked and throve and slept as if it had been
born in its father's house to luxury and rejoicing.
Tooni questioned the goat-keeper ; but he had
seen three sahibs killed that morning, and was
stupid with fear. He did not even know of the

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB. 7

Nana Sahib's order that the English were to be
allowed to go away in boats ; and this was re-
markable, because he lived in. the bazar outside,
and in the bazar people ^.enerally know what is
going to happen long before the sahibs who live
in the tall white houses do. Tooni had only her
own reflections.

There w^ould be no more shooting, and the
Nana Sahib would let them all go away in boats ;
that was good /chaber — good news. Tooni won-
dered, as she put the baby's clothes together in
one bundle, and her own few possessions together
in another, whether it was to be believed. The
Nana Sahib so hated the English ; had not the
guns spoken of his hate these twenty-one days ?
Inside the walls many had died, but outside the
walls might not all die? The doctor had said
that the Nana Sahib had written it ; but why
should the Nana Sahib write the truth ? The
Great Lord Sahib, the Viceroy, had sent no sol-
diers to compel him. Nevertheless, Tooni packed
what there was to pack, and soothed the baby

'^'»5«^»^riHrw"'"'«^r^™r-T""Tr»Tn'7'iiw'?TiiiBiiww3.ra^

8 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

with a little goat's milk and water, and dressed
her mistress as well as she was able, according to
the doctor's directions. Then she went out to
where old Abdul, the table- waiter, her husband,
crouched under a wall, and told him all that she
knew and feared. But Abdul, having heard no
guns for nearly an hour and a half, was inclined
to be very brave, and said that without doubt
they should all get safely to Allahabad ; and
there, when the memsahib was better, they would
find the captain-sahib again, and he would give
them many rupees hacksheesJi for being faithful
to her.

**The memsaliib will never be better," said
Tooni, sorrowfully; "her rice is finished in the
earth. The memsahib will die."

She agreed to go to the ghat, though, and
went back into the hut to wait for the ox- cart
while Abdul cooked a meal on the powder-black-
ened ground with the last of the millet, and gave
thanks to Allah.

There was no room for Tooni to ride when

■JftS

■■■w

g<5a

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 9

they started. She walked alongside carrying the
baby and its little bundle of clothes. There was
nothing else to carry, and that was fortunate, for
the cart in which the memsahib lay was too full
of sick and wounded to hold anything more. In
Toonf s pocket a little black book swung to and
fro ; it was the memsahib's book ; and in the be-
ginning of the firing, before the fever came, Tooni
had seen the memsahib reading it long and often.
They had not been killed in consequence, Tooni
thought ; there must be a protecting charm in the
little black book ; so she slipped it into her
pocket. They left the looking-glass behind.

The ox-cart passed out creaking, in its turn,
beyond the earthworks of the English encamp-
ment into the city, where the mutinous natives
stood in sullen curious groups to watch the train
go by. A hundred yards through the narrow
streets, choked with the smell of gunpowder and
populous with vultures, and Abdul heard a quick
voice in his ear. When he turned, none were
speaking, but he recognised in the crowd the

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

lowerins; indifferent face of a sepoy he knew —
one of the Nana Sahib's servants. Saying noth-
ing, he fell back for Tooni and laid his hand
upon her arm. And when the cart creaked out
of the town into the crowded, dusty road that led
down to the ghat, neither Abdul nor Tooni were
in the riotous crowd that pressed along with it.
They had taken refuge in the outer bazar, and
Sonny Sahib, sound asleep and well hidden, had
taken refuge with them.

As to Sonny Sahib's mother, she was neither
shot in the boats with the soldiers that believed
the written word of the Nana Sahib, nor stabbed
with the women and children who went back to
the palace afterwards. She died quietly in the
ox-cart before it reached the ghat, and the pity of
it was that Sonny Sahib's father, the captain,
himself in hospital four hundred miles from
Cawnpore, never knew^.

There is a marble angel in Cawnpore now,
standing in a very quiet garden, and shut off even
from the trees and the flowers by an enclosing

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

new —
notli-
1 hand
ed out
lat led
li were
dtli it.
LP, and
;n, had

neither
elieved
tabbed
jack to
in the
pity of
aptain,
from

wall. The angel looks always down, down, and
such an awful, pitiful sorrow stands there with
her that nobody cares to try to touch it with
words. People only come and look and go silent-
ly away, wondering what time can have for the
healing of such a wound as this. There is an in-
scription —

" Sacred to the perpetual Memory of a

GREAT company OF CHRISTIAN PEOPLE, CHIEFLY

Women and Children, who near this spot
were cruelly murdered by the followers of

THE REBEL NInA DhUNDU PaNT OF BiTHUR, AND
CAST, THE DYING WITH THE DEAD, INTO THE WELL
BELOW, ON THE 15tH DAY OF JuLY MDCCCLYII."

And afterwards Sonny Sahib's father believed
that all he could learn while he lived about the
fate of his wife and his little son was written
there. But he never knew.

e now,
)ff even
closing

CHAPTER II.

TooNi and Abdul heard the terrible news of
Cawnpore six months later. They had gone back
to their own country, and it was far from Cawn-
pore — hundreds and hundreds of miles across a
white sandy desert, grown with prickles and stud-
ded with rocks— high up in the north of Rajpu-
tana. In the State of Chita and the town of Rub-
bulgurh there was no fighting, because there were
no sahibs. The English had not yet come to
teach the Maharajah how to govern his estate and
spend his revenues. That is to say, there was no
justice to speak of, and a great deal of cholera,
and by no means three meals a day for everybody,
or even two. But nobody was discontented with
troubles that came from the gods and the Mahara-
jah, and talk of greased cartridges would not have
been understood. Thinking of this, Abdul often

p^>1

IJiWipP ■■! ,iP'il|l IP

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

-■.-^•^j

■>'M

said to Tooni, his wife, " The service of the sahib
is good and profitable, but in old age peace is bet-
ter, even though we are compelled to pay many
rupees to the tax-gatherers of the Maharajah."
Tooni always agreed, and when the khaber came
that all the memsahibs and the children had been
killed by the sepoys, she agreed weeping. They
were always so kind and gentle, the memsahibs,
and the little ones, the hahalok — the hahalok !
Surely the sepoyu had become like the tiger-folk.
Then she picked up Sonny Sahib and held him
tighter than he liked. She had crooned with pa-
tient smiles over many of the hahalok in her day,
but from beginning to end, never a baba like this.
So strong he was, he could make old Abdul cry
out, pulling at his beard, so sweet-tempered and
healthy that he would sleep just where he was
put down, like other babies of Rubbulgurh.
Tooni grieved deeply that she could not give him
a bottle, and a coral, and a perambulator, and
often wondered that he consented to thrive with-
out these things, but the fact remains that he did.

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

He even allowed himself to be oiled all over occa-
sionally for the good of his health, which was for-
bearing in a British baby. And always when Ab-
dul shook his finger at him and said —

•' Gorah pah howdah, hathi pah jeen I
Jeldi bag-gia, Warren Has/een / " *

he laughed and crowed as if he quite understood
the joke.

Tooni had no children of her own, and won-
dered how long it would be before she and Abdul
must go again to Cawnpore to find the baby's
father. There need be no hurry, Tooni thought, as
Sonny Sahib played with the big silver hoops in
her ears, and tried to kick himself over her
shoulder. Abdul calculated the number of rupees
that would be a suitable reward for taking care of
a baby for six months, found it considerable, and
said they ought to start at once. Then other news
came — gathering terror from mouth to mouth as

* " Howdahs on horses, on elephants /een /
He ran away quickly, did Wan-en Has^fen /"
" Jeen " means " saddles," but nobody could make that rhyme 1
Popular incident of an English retreat in Hastings' time.

••-y

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

it crossed Rajputana— and Abdul told his wife one
evening, after she had put Sonny Sahib to sleep
with a hymn to Isralil, that a million of English
soldiers had come upon Cawnpore, and in their
hundredfold revenge had left neither Mussulman
nor Hindoo alive in the city — also that the Great
Lord Sahib had ordered the head of every Tidla
admi^ every black man, to be taken to build a
bridge across the Ganges with, so that hereafter
his people might leave Cawnpore by another way.
Then Abdul also became of the opinion that there
need be no haste in going.

Sonny Sahib grew out of the arms and necks
of his long embroidered night dresses and day
dresses almost immediately, and then there was
a difficulty, which Tooni surmounted by cutting
the waists off entirely and gathering the skirts
round the baby's neck with a drawing string, mak-
ing holes in the sides for his arms to come
through. Tooni bought him herself a little blue
and gold Mussulman cap in the bazar. The cap-
tain-sahib would be angry, but then the captain-

• f,w-^-tr*n-9-^iv^iftr}^jfrtwfj j

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

sahib was very far away, killed perhaps, and
Tooni thought the blue and gold cap wonderfully
becoming to Sonny Sahib. All day long he
played and crept in this under the sacred peepul-
tree in the middle of the village among brown-
skinned babies who wore no clothes at all — only a
string of beads round their fat little waists — and
who sometimes sat down in silence and made a
solemn effort to comprehend him.

In quite a short time — ^in Kubbulgurh, where
there is no winter, two years is a very little while —
Sonny Sahib grew too big for even this adaptation
of his garments ; and then Tooni took him to
Sheik Uddin, the village tailor, and gave Sheik
Uddin long and careful directions about making
clothes for him. The old man listened to her for
an hour, and waggled his beard, and said that he
quite understood ; it should be as she wished.
But Sheik Uddin had never seen any English
people, and did not understand at all. He ac-
cepted Tooni's theories, but he measured and cut
according to his own. Sheik Uddin could not

T^y ■»LJi. u^ -wiT|p

N| «piBII.L|UI VVI

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

afford to suffer in his reputation for the foolish
notions of a woman. So he made Sonny Sahib a
pair of narrow striped calico trousers, and a long
tight-fitting little coat with large bunches of pink
roses on it, in what was the perfectly correct fash-
ion for Mahomedan little boys of Rubbulgurh and
Rajputana generally. Tooni paid Sheik Uddin
tenpence, and admired her purchase very much.
She dressed Sonny Sahib in it doubtfully, how-
ever, with misgivings as to what his father would
say. Certainly it was good cloth, of a pretty
colour, and well made, but even to Tooni, Sonny
Sahib looked queer. Abdul had no opinion, ex-
cept about the price. He grumbled at that, but
then he had grumbled steadily for two years, yet
whenever Tooni proposed that they should go
and find the captain- sahib, had said no, it was
far, and he was an old man. Tooni should go
when he was dead.

Besides, Abdul liked to hear the little fellow
call him "Bap," which meant "Father," and to
feel his old brown finger clasped by small pink

■;•(. : v".

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

and white ones, as he and Sonny Sahib toddled
into the bazar together. He liked to hear Sonny
Sahib's laugh, too ; it was quite a different laugh
from any other boy's in Rubbulgurh, and it came
oftener. He was a merry little fellow, blue-eyed,
with very yellow wavy hair, exactly, Tooni often
thought, like his mother's.

CHAPTER III.

It was a grief to Tooni, wlio could not under-
stand it ; but Sonny Sahib perversely refused to
talk in his own tongue. She did all she could to
help him. When he was a year old she cut an
almond in two, and gave half to Sonny Sahib and
half to the green parrot that swung all day in a
cage in the door of the hut and had a fine gift of
conversation ; if anything would make the baby
talk properly that would. Later on she taught
him all the English words she remembered her-
self, which were three, "bruss"' and *'wass'"
and **isstockin'," her limited but useful vocab-
ulary as lady's maid. He learned them very
well, but he continued to know only three, and
he did not use them very often, which Tooni
found strange. Tooni thought the baba should
have inherited his mother's language with his

. ■\1J>'. HiitL .

THE STORY OP SC'TNY SAHIB.

blue eyes and his white skin. Meanwhile, Sonny
Sahib, playing every morning and evening under
the peepul-tree, learned to talk in the tongue of
the little brown boys who played there too.

When Sonny Sahib was four he could drive
the big black hairy buffaloes home from the vil-
lage outskirts to be milked. Abdul walked be-
side him, but Sonny Sahib did all the shouting
and the beating with a bit of stick, which the
buffaloes must have privately smiled at when
they felt it on their muddy flanks, that is, if a
buffalo ever smiles, which one cannot help think-
ing doubtful. Sonny Sahib liked buffalo milk,
and had it every day for his dinner with chupat-
ties, and sometimes, for a treat, a bit of roast kid.
Chupatties are like pancakes with everything that
is nice left out of them, and were very popular in
Rubbulgurh. Sonny Sahib thought nothing in
the world could be better, except the roast kid.
On days of festival Abdul always gave him a pice
to buy sweetmeats with, and he drove a hard bar-
gain with either Wahid Khan or Sheik Luteef,

■«^-WP"V",'FT?"«'«WI|P' ,WV^^'*T'WJ

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

wlio were rival dealers. Sonny Sahib always got
more of the sticky brown balls of sugar and but-
ter and cocoanut for his pice than any of the
other boys. Wahid Khan and Sheik Luteef both
thought it brought them luck to sell to him.
But afterwards Sonny Sahib invariably divided
his purchase with whoever happened to be his
bosom friend at the time — the daughter of Ram
Dass, the blacksmith, or the son of Chundaputty,
the beater of brass— in which he differed alto-
gether from the other boys, and which made it
fair perhaps.

At six Sonny Sahib began to find the other
boys unsatisfactory in a number of ways. He
was tired of making patterns in the dust with
marigolds for one thing. He wanted to pretend.
It was his birthright to pretend, in a large active
way, and he couldn't carry it out. The other
boys didn't care about making believe soldiers,
and running and hiding and shouting and beating
Sonny Sahib's tom-tom, which made a splendid
drum. They liked beating the tom-tom, but they

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

always wanted to sit round in a ring and listen to
it, which Sonny Sahib thought very poor kind of
fun indeed. They wouldn't even pretend to be
elephants, or horses, or buffaloes. Sonny Sahib
had to represent them all himself ; and it is no
wonder that with a whole menagerie, as it were,
upon his shoulders, he grew a little tired some-
times. Also he was the only boy in Rubbulgurh
who cared to climb a tree that had no fruit on it,
or would venture beyond the lower branches even
for mangoes or tamarinds. And one day when he
found a weaver-bird's nest in a bush with three
white eggs in it, a splendid nest, stock-full of the
fire-flies that light the little hen at night, he
showed it privately first to Hurry Ghose, and
then to Sumpsi Din, and lastly to Budhoo, the
sweeper's son ; and not one of them could he coax
to carry off a single egg in company with him.
Sonny Sahib recognised the force of public opin-
ion, and left the weaver-bird to her house-keeping
in peace, but he felt privately injured by it.
Certainly the other boys could tell wonderful

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

stories — stories of princesses and fairies and de-
mons— Sumpsi Din's were the best— that made
Sonny Sahib's blue eyes widen in the dark, when
they all sat together on a charpoy by the door of
the hut, and the stars glimmered through the
tamarind- trees. A charpoy is a bed, and every-
body in Rubbulgurh puts one outside, for socia-
bility, in the evening. Not much of a bed, only
four short rickety legs held together with knotted
string, but it answers very well.

Sonny Sahib didn't seem to know any stories
— he could only tell the old one about the fighting
Abdul saw over and over again — but it was the
single thing they could do better than he did.
On the whole he began to prefer the society of
Abdul's black and white goats, which bore a
strong resemblance to Abdul himself, by the
way, and had more of the spirit of adventure.
It was the goat, for example, that taught Sonny
Sahib to walk on the extreme edge of the house-
top and not tumble over. In time they be-
came great friends, Sonny Sahib and the goat,

F*^ ' -w^^TTi f'*r t

24 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

and always, when it was not too hot, they slept
together.

Then two things happened. First, Abdul
died, and Sonny Sahib became acquainted with
grief, both according to his own nature and ac-
cording to the law of Mahomed. Then, after he
and Tooni had mourned sincerely with very little
to eat for nine days, there clattered one day a
horseman through the village at such a pace that
everybody ran out to see. And he was worth
seeing, that horseman, in a blue turban as big as
a little tub, a yellow coat, red trousers with gold
lace on them, and long boots that stuck out far
on either side ; and an embroidered saddle and a
tasselled bridle, and a pink-nosed white charger
that stepped and pranced in the bazar so that
Ram Dass himself had to get out of the way.
It ought to be said that the horseman's clothes
did not fit him very well, that his saddle girth
was helped out by a bit of rope, and that his
charger was rather tender on his near fore-foot ;
but these are not things that would be noticed in

■ •■! i -1 1— ! (— 1 — » — I l-n TT — -1—1

Sonny goes to court.

■ ■IIIWI I

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 25

Rubbulgurh, being lost in the general splendour
of his appearance.

Sonny Sahib ran after the horseman with all
the other boys, until, to everybody's astonish-
ment, he stopped with tremendous prancings at
Tooni's mud doorstep, where she sat to watch him
go by. Then Sonny Sahib slipped away. He
was afraid— he did not know of what. He ran
half a mile beyond the village, and helped
Sumpsi Din keep the parrots out of his father's
millet crop all day long. Nor did he say a word
to Sumpsi Din about it, for fear he should be
persuaded to go back again. Instead, he let
Sumpsi Din sleep for long hours at a time face-
downwards on his arm in the sun, which was
what Sumpsi Din liked best in the world, while
he. Sonny Sahib, clapped his hands a hundred
times at the little green thieves, abusing them
roundly, and wondering always at the back of his
head why so splendid a horseman should have
stopped at his particular doorstep.

Tooni was frightened too— so frightened that

26 THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

she could think of nothing to do but stand per-
fectly still, shading her eyes and putting back
her wisps of gi'ey hair. The rabble of the vil-
lage and all the j)ariah dogs gathered round,
and Wahid Khan, the sweetmeat seller, and two
goats and other respectable persons ; and Ram
Singh, the messenger, said to Tooni :

*' Salaam, worthy one ! "

Tooni's hand went to her forehead.

*' Salaam, your honour!" said she. At the
same moment she reflected that since the Maha-
rajah's horseman thought it worth while to be
polite he probably wanted something, which
might or might not be reassuring— so much de-
pended on what it was.

"I look for Tooni, Abdul's widow," said he
pompously, "and a child of the white dogs, who
lives with her. "

Tooni trembled.

"I am that poor creature, your honour," said
she ; and the leanest pariah helped himself to
a kid-shank ready for boiling just inside the

Mi'tTCt^iiMaiuiv III

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 27

hut, nobody paying the slightest attention to
him.

"I come from the palace with a command to
you from the Maharajah. His Highness wishes
the white puppy to be brought to him at once."

"There!" exclaimed Wahid Khan mourn-
fully, while Tooni stared. *'I always feared
the little Sahib would come to a bad end. The
gods have given him no morals ! What did I
find him doing yesterday ! Blowing an egg —
a pigeon's egg\ Now, an egg is a sacred thing,
Abdul's widow — a very sacred thing ! "

*'But what is it — " Tooni faltered, taking no
notice of Wahid Khan — "what is it that His
Highness desires with the child ? "

"How should I know that, Abdul's widow?
Certainly I do not know it," and Ram Singh
put his foot into his stirrup.

Tooni bethought her then of expedients.

"Is there anything that you do not know,

noble one? It is said in the village that the

Maharajah's secrets are all in your keeping.
3

-^ I jip-j'w-iw-i 'iii» I ■ ipiipf^j iif>iaiiM'ii'ii9"!i"rMV — ■Lwp^ffigjpi jiiiyiiyii^ii^Bim'

28 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

But perhaps this was too important even for
your ears." Then she added respectfully: *'I
am an old woman, but I am glad to have lived
to see your honour's beard. Such a beard as
that is not seen every day ! " It was outrageous
of Tooni, but you must make excuses for her.
Consider the circumstances.

Ram Singh stroked it complacently.

"It is said to be a fine beard," he admitted;
"already it is as long as my grandfather's. And
the gossip that I am in the confidence of the
Maharajah has some truth in it, worthy Tooni.
This much I can say, that no harm will come to
the boy."

"But of course your honour did not hear for
what purpose he is to be brought." Tooni looked
at him admiringly— it was shocking, such make-
believe. "How tall are the Rajputs! I have
never seen an Englishman, even in Calcutta, as
tall as your honour."

"And I have heard that the English are pro-
digiously tall men. But I can tell you, Abdul's

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB. 29

widow, much more important matters than that
reach my ears. When His Highness smothered
his grand-aunt— but that is a foolish tale, and
not to be repeated ; do you understand ? The
word I bring has been spoken," and Ram Singh
looked round upon the crowd with a grand air.
*'Now where is the house of Wahid Khan, seller
of sweetmeats, for he owes my father money ? "

But Wahid Khan, whose memory had served
him in time, had disappeared, and by a curious
coincidence none of his acquaintances appeared
to be present, thougli the second leanest pariah,
^who owed Wahid Khan a lame leg, looked as if
he could mention his address with pleasure.

In the evening, when the pipal-trees threw
long shadows and the "cons' dust" stood in the
afterglow all along the broad road to the jungle.
Sonny Sahib came back very hungry, hoping the
horseman would be gone, and heard Tooni's won-
derful news. Before she gave him water or oil,
or even a chupatty, Tooni tcld him, holding his
hand in hers.

30 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

" The Maharajah has sent for you, O noonday
lute; where have you been in the sun? The
Maharajah has sent for you, lotus-eyed one, and
I, though I am grown too old for journeys, must
go also to the palace of the Maharajah ! Oh, it is
very far, and I know not what he desires, the
Maharajah ! My heart is split in two, little Sa-
hib ! This khaber is the cat's moon to me. I
will never sleep again ! "

Then for some reason the fear went out of
Sonny Sahib. " Am I not going with you, Tooni-
ji f " said he, which was his w^ay of saying " dear
Tooni." "There is no cause for fear. And will
it not be very beautiful, the palace of the Maha-
rajah % Sumpsi Din says that it is built of gold
and silver. And now I should like six chupat-
ties, and some milk and some fried brinjal, like
yesterday's, only more, Tooni-y/."

'■W?W»l'W«!i!» ",*-*•"''■ VH",«l<»wjii"»B»'ii',V.WP»»5flf^^^^l!Wi.*'"'

i|f

CHAPTER IV.

The palace of the Maharajah at Lalpore was
not exactly built of gold and silver ; but if it had
been, Sonny Sahib could hardly have thought it
a finer place. It had a wall all rourd it, even on
the side where the river ran, and inside the wall
were courts and gardens with fountains and roses
in them, divided by other walls, and pillared
verandahs, where little green lizards ran about in
the sun, and a great many stables, where the
Maharajah's horses pawed and champed to be let
out and ridden. The palace itself was a whole
story higher than the stables, and consisted of a
wilderness of little halls with grated windows.
It smelt rather too strong of attar of roses in
there— the Maharajah was fond of attar of roses
—but the decorations on the whitewashed walls,
in red and yellow, were very wonderful indeed.

*!!»,y»"'^{<"»»l'^Vii*'W«irii' '■

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

The courtyards and the verandahs were full of
people, soldiers, syces, merchants with their
packs, sweetmeat sellers, barbers ; only the gar-
dens were empty. Sonny Sahib thought that if
he lived in the palace he would stay always in the
gardens, watching the red- spotted fish in the
fountains, and gathering the roses ; but the peo-
ple who did live there seemed to prefer smoking
long bubbling pipes in company, or disputing
over their bargains, or sleeping by the hour in
the shade of the courtyard walls. There were no
women anywhere ; but if Sonny Sahib had pos-
sessed the ears or the eyes of the country, he
might have heard many swishings and patterings
and whisperings behind curtained doors, and
have seen many fingers on the curtains' edge and
eyes at the barred windows as he went by.

This was the palace, and the palace w^as the
crown of Lalpore, which was built on the top of a
hill, and could lock itself in behind walls ten
feet thick all round, if an enemy came that
way.

*» "^TTf' "."r.'^^yww-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

The Maharajah was to receive them in one of
the pillared verandahs, one that looked out over
the river, where there was a single great ivory-
chair, with a red satin cushion, and a large piece
of carpet in front of it, and nothing else. It was
the only chair in the palace, probably the only
chair in all the Maharajah's State of Chita, and
as Sonny Sahib had never seen a chair before he
found it very interesting. He and Tooni in-
spected it from a respectful distance, and then
withdrew to the very farthest corner of the ver-
andah to wait for the Maharajah. A long time
they waited, and yet Tooni would not sit down.
What might not the Maharajah do if he came
and found them disrespectfully seated in his
audience hall ! Patiently she stood, first on one
foot and then on the other, with her lips all puck-
ered up and her eyes on the floor, thinking of
things that would be polite enough to say to a
Maharajah. They were so troublesome to think
of, that she could not attend to what Sonny Sa-
hib said at all, even when he asked her for the

34 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

sixth tim how you made a peacock with blue

glass eyes, like the one on each arm of His High-

ness's chair. Sonny Sahib grew quite tired of

watching the mud-turtle that was paddling about

in a pool of the shallow river among the yellow j

sands down below, and of counting the camels

that were wading across it, carrying their packs

and their masters ; and yet the Maharajah did not

come.

*' Tooni," he said presently, '' without doubt I
must sit down," and down he sat plumply, with
his back against the wall, and his two small
legs, in their very best striped cotton trousers,
stretched out in front of him.

As a matter of fact the Maharajah was asleep,
and had forgotten all about Sonny Sahib in the
hall of audience. It was Moti* who reminded
him, whispering in his ear until he awoke. Moti
was the little Maharajah, and that was his pet
name. Moti was privileged to remind his father
of things.

* A pearl.

«>

THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB.

J.)

So Mod and the Maharajah went down to the
audience hall together, and there they found
Sonny Sahib asleep too, which was not wonderful,
considering that the Maharajah had kept him
waiting two hours and a quarter. Perhaps this
occurred to His Highness, and prevented him
from being angry. At all events, as Sonny Sahib
scrambled to his feet in response to a terrified tug
from Tooni, he did not look very angry.

Sonny Sahib saw a little lean old man, with
soft sunken black eyes, and a face like a withered
potato. He wore a crimson velvet smoking-cap
upon his head, and was buttoned up to the chin
in a long tight coat of blue and yellow brocade.
Above the collar and below the sleeves of the coat
showed the neck and cuffs of an English linen
shirt, which were crumpled and not particularly
clean. The cuffs were so big that the Mahara-
jah's thin little brown fingers were almost lost in
them. The blue and yellow brocaded coat was
buttoned up with emeralds, but the Maharajah
shuffled along in a pair of old carpet slippers,

36 THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB.

which to Sonny Sahib were the most remarkable
features of his attire. So much occupied, indeed,
was Sonny Sahib in looking at the Maharajah's
slippers, that he quite forgot to make his salaam.
As for Tooni, she was lying flat at their High-
nesses' feet, talking indistinctly into the marble
floor.

The little Highness was much pleasanter to
look at than his father. He had large dark eyes
and soft light- brown cheeks, and he was all
dressed in pink satin, with a little jewelled cap,
and his long black hair tied up in a hard knot at
the back of his neck. The little Highness looked
at Sonny Sahib curiously, and then tugged at his
father's sleeve.

"Let him come with me now, immediately,"
said the little Maharajah ; "he has a face of
gold."

The Maharajah sat down, not in his chair — he
did not greatly like sitting in his chair — but on
the carpet.

" Whence do you come % " said he to Tooni.

■

THE STORY OF SOxXNY SAHIB. 37

"Protector of the poor, from Rubbulgurh."
"Where your Highness sent to for us,"

added Sonny Sahib. " Tooni, why do you pinch

me?"

His Highness looked disconcerted for a mo-
ment. As a matter of fact he had known all
that Tooni or Sonny Sahib could tell him about
themselves for three years, but he considered it
more dignified to appear as if he knew nothing.

"This is a child of the mlechas, '\ 8ai6. the
Maharajah, which was not a very polite way of
saying that he was English.

"Protector of the poor, yes."

"Account to me for him. How old is he?"

"Seven years, great King."

" And two months, Tooni-ji. Your Highness,
may I sit down ? "

"As old as the Folly."*

"He came of the Folly, Hazur. His mother
died by the sepoys in Cawnpore, his father —

* Native term for the Mutiny.

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

also," said Tooni, for she feared to be blamed
for not having found Sonny Sahib's father. As
she told the story once again to the Maharajah,
adding many things that Sonny Sahib had never
heard before, he became so much interested that
he stood on one foot for five minutes at a time,
and quite forgot to ask His Highness again if he
might sit down.

The Maharajah heard her to the end without
a word or a change of expression. When she had
finished, " My soldiers were not there," he said
thoughtfully, and with a shade of regret, which
was not, I fear, at the thought of any good they
might have done. Then he seemed to reflect,
while Tooni stood before him with her hands
joined together at the finger-tips, and her head
bowed.

"Then, without permission, you brought this
child of outcasts into my State," said he at last.
" That was an offence."

Tooni struck her forehead with her hand.

*'Your Highness is my father and my moth-

• i"**i^ « I ■■■

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 39

er 1 " she sobbed, '' I could not leave it to the
jackals."

" You are a wretched Mussulman, the daugh-
ter of cow-killers, and you may have known no
better "

"Your Highness!" remarked Sonny Sahib,
with respectful indignation, "Adam had two
sons, one was buried and one was burned "

"Choop ! " said the Maharajah crossly. You
might almost guess that " Choop " meant " Be
quiet ! "

" But it was an offence," he continued.

" Protector of the poor, I meant no harm."

" That is true talk. And you shall receive no
harm. But you must leave the boy with me. I
want him to play games with my son, to amuse
my son. For thirty days my son has asked this
of me, and ten days ago his mother died— so he
must have it."

Tooni salaamed humbly. "If the boy finds
favour in Your Highnesses eyes it is very good,"
she said simply, and turned to go.

-■'■■"" - - --

40 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

**Stop," said the Maharajah. "I will do
justice in this matter. I desire the boy, but I
have brought his price. Where is it, Moti.;^ f "

The little Maharajah laughed with delight,
and drew from behind him a jingling bag.

"It is one hundred and fifty rupees," said
the Maharajah. *'Give it to the woman, Moti."
And the child held it out to her.

Tooni looked at the bag, and then at Sonny
Sahib, salaamed and hesitated. It was a pro-
vision for the rest of her life, as lives go in Raj-
putana.

"Is it not enough % " asked the Maharajah
irritably, while the little prince's face fell.

"Your Highness," stammered Tooni, "it is
great riches — may roses be to your mouth I But
I have a desire — rather than the money "

" What is your desire ? " cried the little prince.
"Say it. In a breath my father wiU allow it. I
want the gold-faced one to come and play."

The Maharajah nodded, and this time Tooni
lay down at the feet of the little prince.

/ \

'I ip» ■iui^|»in.i.i«»,«w,f»w>riip h^j iiiF*L"i"-"v"i'j"'"i|w»B«w w^pww f,tr iM\<"

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

**It is," said she, "that— I am a widow and
old — that I also may live in the farthest corner
within the court- yard walls, with the boy."

The Maharajah slipped the bag quickly into
the pocket of his blue and yellow coat.

** It is a strange preference," he said, *'but the
Mussulmans have no minds. It may be."

Tooni kissed his feet, and Sonny Sahib nodded
approval at him. Somehow, Sonny Sahib never
could be taught good Rajput manners.

"The boy is w^ell grown," said the Maharajah,
turning upon his heel. "What is his name?"

" Protector of the poor," answered Tooni, quiv-
ering with delight, "his name is Sonny Sahib."

Perhaps nobody has told you why the English
are called Sahibs in India. It is because they rule
there.

The Maharajah's face went all into a pucker
of angry wrinkles, and his eyes shone like lit-
tle coals.

" What talk is that ? " he said angrily. " His
great-grandfather was a monkey I There is only

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

one master here. Pig's daughter, his name is

Sunni ! "

Tooni did not dare to say a word, and even

the little prince was silent.

"Look you," said the old man to Sonny Sahib.
" Follow my son, the Maharajah, into the court-
yard, and there do his pleasure. Do you under-
stand? Follow him!"

ib.
It-
er-

In princely favour.

-" — ■*■ -_ -M -

-T'TWByrirT- i, i) i|.iHi i^ivfi^ii

•'

CHAPTER V.

"SuNNi," said Moti, as the two boys rode
through the gates of the courtyard a year later,
"a man of your race has come here, and my
father has permitted him to remain. My father
has given him the old empty jail to live in, behind
the monkey temple. They say many curious
things are in his house. Let us ride past it."

In his whole life Sunni had never heard such
an interesting piece of news before— even Tooni's,
about the Maharajah's horseman, was nothing to
this. "Why is he come?" he asked, putting his
little red Arab into a trot.

"To bring your gods to the Rajputs."

I "I have no gods," declared Sunni. "Kali is

so ugly— I have no heart for her. Ganesh makes

me laugh, with his elephant's head; and Tooni

says that Allah is not my God."
4 48

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

"Tooni says," Sunni went on reflectively,
" that my God is in her Uttle black book. But I
have never seen him."

"Perhaps this Englishman will show him to
you," suggested Moti.

" But His Highness, your father, will he allow
strange gods to be brought to the people ? "

"No," said Moti, "the people will not look at
them. Every one has been warned. But the
stranger is to remain, that he may teach me Eng-
lish. I do not wish to learn English— or anything.
It is always so hot when the pundit comes. But
my father wishes it."

A pundit is a wise old man who generally
has a long white beard, and thinks nothing in
the world is so enjoyable as Sanskrit or Arabic.
Sunni, too, found it hot when the pundit came.
But an English pundit

"Moti-/i," said Sunni, laying his arm around
the little prince's neck as they rode together, "do
you love me ? "

Moti caught Sunni's hand as it dropped over

li*f»W"PP«!»t|f lipilf "'i»* W *H ««'ii!l'"^)IM;'W'l'«lW"'"' WHWLWW' I

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

his shoulder. " You know that in my heart there
is only my father's face and yours, Sahib's son,"
he said.

" Will you do one thing, then, for love of me ? "
asked Sunni eagerly. "Will you ask of the
Maharajah, your father, that I also may learn
English from the stranger?"

"No," said Moti mischievously, "because it
is already spoken, Sunni-y/. I said that I would
not learn unless you also were compelled to learn,
so that the time should not be lost between us.
Now let us gallop very fast past the jail, lest the
Englishman should think we wish to see him.
He is to be brought to me to-morrow at sun-
down."

The Englishman at that moment was unpack-
ing his books and his bottles, and thinking about
how he could best begin the work he had come to
Lalpore to do. He was a medical missionary, and
as they had every variety of disease in Lalpore, and
the population was entirely heathen, we may
think it likely that he had too much on his mind

46 THE STORY OP SONNY SAIIIB.

to run to the window to see such very young roy-
alty ride by.

"Sunni-//," said Moti that afternoon in the
garden, "I am very tired of talking of this Eng-
lishman."

"I could talk of him for nine moons," said
Sunni ; and then something occurred which
changed the subject as completely as even the
little prince could desiie. This was a garden for
the pleasure of the ladies of the court ; they never
came out in it, but their apartments looked down
upon it, and a very high wall screened it from the
rest of the world. The Maharajah and Moti and
Sunni were the only people who might ever walk
there. As the boys turned at the end of a path
directly under the gratings, they heard a soft
voice say *'Moti!"

*'That is Matiya,"said the little prince. "I
do not like Matiya. What is it, Matiya?"

" It is not Matiya," said the voice quickly, "it
is Tarra. Here is a gift from the heart of Tarra,
little parrot, a gift for you, and a gift for the

•«Nl''

•*(r.

A packaye ia ihivwa to Moti.

THE STORY OP SONNY SAIllB.

Sahib's son ; also a sweet cake, but the cake is for
Moti."

"I am sure it was Matiya," said Moti, run-
ning to pick the packet out of the rose-bush it
had fallen into; "but Matiya was never kind
before."

The packet held a necklace and an armlet.
The necklace was of little pearls and big ame-
thysts strung upon fine wire, three rows of pearls,
and then an amethyst, and was very lovely. The
armlet was of gold, with small rubies and tor-
quoises set in a pattern. The boys looked at them
more or less indifferently. They had seen so many
jewels.

"Matiya— if you think it was Matiya— makes
pretty gifts," said Sunni, "and the Maharajah
will keep your necklace for you for ever in an iron
box. But this armlet will get broken just as the
other two armlets that were given to me have got
broken. I cannot wear armlets and play polo,
and I would rather play polo."

"That is because you were clumsy," Moti an-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB.

swered. Moti was peevish that afternoon. The
Maharajah had refused him a gun, and he partic-
ularly wanted a gun, not to shoot anything, but to
frighten the crows with and perhaps the coolie-
folk. To console himself Moti had eaten twice as
many sweetmeats as were good for him, and was in
a bad temper accordingly.

*'Now they are certainly of Tarra, these
jewels," exclaimed Sunni, "I remember that neck-
lace upon her neck, for every time Tarra has
kissed me, that fifth stone which has been broken
in the cutting has scratched my face."

*'In one word," said Moti imperiously, "it
was the voice of Matiya. And this perplexes
me, for Matiya, hating my mother, hates me also,
I think."

"Why did she hate your mother?" asked
Sunni.

"How stupid you are to-day! You have
heard the story two hundred times! Because
she thought that she should have been chosen
to be queen instead of my mother. It is true

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB. 49

that she was more beautifi \ but my mother
was a pundita. And she was not chosen. She
is only second in the palace. And she has no
children, while my mother was the mother of a
king."

**No," said Sunni, "I never heard that before,
Moti."

*'But I say you have ! Two hundred times !
And look, O thoughtless one, you have gone be-
tween me and the sun, so that even now your
shadow falls upon my sugar-cake— my cake stuffed
with almonds, which is the kind I most love, and
therefore I cannot eat it. There," cried Moti, con-
temptuously, *'take it yourself and eat it— you
have no caste to break."

For a minute Sunni was as angry as possible.
Then he reflected that it was silly to be angry
with a person who was not very well.

"Listen, Moti," he said, "that was indeed a
fault. I should have walked to the north. But I
will not eat your cake — let us give it to the red
and gold fishes in the fountain."

■ '^v^

50 TUE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

"Some of it," said Moti, appeased, "and
some to my new little monkey— my talking
monkey."

The fishes darted up for the crumbs greedily,
but the monkey was not as grateful for her share
as she ought to have been. She took it, smelt it,
wiped it vigorously on the ground, smelt it again,
and chattered angrily at the boys ; then she went
nimbly hand over hand to the very top of the ban-
yan-tree she lived in ; and then she deliberately
broke it into little pieces and pelted the givers
with them.

" She is not hungry to-day," said Moti. " Let
US take out the falcons."

Next morning the Maharajah was very much
annoyed by the intelligence that all the little red-
spotted fishes were floating flabby and flat and
dead among the lily pads of the fountain— there
were few things except Moti that the Maharajah
loved better than his little red-spotted fishes. He
wanted very particularly to know why they should k

have died in this unanimous and apparently pre-

'■m

-1-- -'-71

THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB. 51

concerted way. The gods had probably killed
them by lightning, but the Maharajah wanted to
know. So he sent for the Englishman, who did
not mind touching a dead thing, and the English-
man told him that the little red-spotted fishes had
undoubtedly been poisoned. Moti was listening
when the doctor said this.

'*It could not have been the cake," said
Moti.

But when all was looked into, including one of
the little fishes. Dr. Roberts found that it un-
doubtedly had been the cake. Scraps of it were
still lying about the banyan-tree to help him to
this conclusion, and the monkey chattered as if
she could give evidence, too, if anybody would
listen. But she gave evidence enough in not eat-
ing it. Everybody, that is, everybody in Rajpu-
tana, knows that you can never poison a monkey.
The little prince maintained that the voice he heard
was the voice of Matiya, yet every one recognized
I ? • the jewels to be Tarra's. There was nothing else

to go upon, and the Maharajah decided that it was

52 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

impossible to tell which of the two had wickedly-
tried to poison his eldest son. He arranged,
however, that they should both disappear — he
could not possibly risk a mistake in the matter.
And I wish that had been the greatest of the Ma-
harajah's injustices. When the truth came out,
later, that it was undoubtedly Matiya, the Maha-
rajah said that he had always been a good deal of
that opinion, and built a beautiful domed white
marble tomb, partly in memory of Tarra and
partly, I fear, to commemorate his own sagacity,
which may seem, under the circumstances, a little
odd.

The really curious thing was, however, that
out of it all came honour and glory for Sunni.
For what, asked the Maharajah, had prevented
the poisoning of his son ? What but the shadow
of Sunni, which fell upon the cake, so that Moti
could not eat it ! Therefore, without doubt, Sun-
ni had saved the life of a king ; and he could
ask nothing that should not be granted to him ;
he should stand always near the throne. Sunni

-^P^WP)II4OT'JUWWRN)>

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 53

felt very proud and important, he did not know
exactly why ; but he could not think of any-
thing he wanted, except to learn his own lan-
guage from the Englishman.

"Oh, foolish bargainer!" cried Moti, **when
you know that has been given already ! "

CHAPTER VI.

Dr. Roberts, who lived, by the Maharajah's
kind permission, in the jail behind the monkey
temple, soon found himself in rather an awkward
dilemma. Not in regard to the monkeys. They
were certainly troublesome. They stole his bis-
cuits, and made holes in his roof, and tore up
the reports he wrote for the S. P. C. K. in Eng-
land. Dr. Roborts made allowance for the mon-
keys, however. He had come to take away their
sacred character, and nobody could expect them
to like it. If you had asked Dr. Roberts what
his difficulty was he would have shown you
Sonny Sahib. The discovery was so wonderful
that he had made. He had found a yellow-
haired, blue-eyed English boy in a walled palace
of Rajputana, five hundred miles from any one of
his race. The boy was happy, healthy, and well

'■-M

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 55

content. That mucli the Maharajah had pointed
out to him ; that much he could see for himself.
Beyond that the Maharajah had discouraged Dr.
Koberts' interest. The boy's name was Sunni, he
had no other name, he had come '' under the pro-
tection" of the Maharajah when he was very
young ; and that wu, all His Highness could be
induced to say. Any more pointed inquiries he
was entirely unable to understand. There seemed
to be no one else who knew. Tooni could have
told him, but Tooni was under orders that she did
not dare to disobey. In the bazar two or three
conflicting stories, equally wonderful, were told of
Sunni ; but none that Dr. Roberts could believe.
In the end he found out about Sunni from Sunni
himself, who had never forgotten one word of
what Tooni told the Maharajah. Sunni men-
tioned also, with considerable pride, that he had
known three English words for a long time—
*' wass " and " hruss " and ** isstocJdn.''^

Then Dr. Roberts, with his heart full of the
awful grief of the Mutiny, and thinking how

T-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

gladly this waif and stray would be received by
somebody, hurried to the Maharajah, and begged
that the boy might be given back to his own
people, that he, Dr. Roberts, might take him
back to his own people at his personal risk and
expense ; that inquiries might at least be set on
foot to find his relatives.

*'Yes," said the Maharajah, "but not yet,
ee-Wobbis. The boy will be well here for a year,
and you shall teach him. At the end of that
time we will speak again of this matter."

Dr. Roberts was not satisfied. He asked the
Maharajah at all events to allow Sunni to live
with him in his empty jail, but Ilis Highness re-
fused absolutely.

"And look you, ee-Wobbis," said he, "I have
promised the ^Viceroy in Calcutta that you shall
be safe in my country, and you shall be safe,
though I never asked you to come here. But if
any khaber goes to Calcutta about this boy, and
if there is the least confusion regarding him, your
mouth shall be stopped, and you shall not talk

THE STORY OF SONNY SADIB. 57

any more to my people. For my part, I do not
like your medicines, and you have not yet cured
Proteb Singh of his short leg ; he goes as lame as
ever ! "

This was Dr. Roberts' difficulty ; his mouth
would be stopped. He did not doubt the Maha-
rajah. If he wrote to Calcutta that a Bajput
prince still held a hostage from the Mutiny, and
made a disturbance, there would be an end to
the work he had begun under the shadow of the
palace wall. And the work was prospering so
well ! Tlie people were listening now, Dr.
Roberts thought, and certainly he had been able
to relieve a great deal of their physical misery.
Would he be justified in writing to Calcutta?
Dr. Roberts thought about it very long and very
seriously. In the end he believed that he would
not be justified, at least until the year was over
of which the Maharajah spoke. Then if His
Highness did not keep his promise, Dr. Roberts
would see about it.

So the year went by ; the months when the

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

sun blazed straight across the sky overhead, and
everybody slept at noonday — the months when a
gray sheet of rain hung from the clouds for days
together, and the months when all the Maha-
rajah's dominions were full of splendid yellow
lights and pleasant winds — when the teak wood
trees dropped their big dusty leaves, and the
nights were sharply cold, and Rajputana pre-
tended that it was winter. Dr. Roberts and
Sunni were very well then, but Moti shrivelled
up and coughed the day through, and the Ma-
harajah, when he went out to drive, wrapped
himself up in cashmere shawls, head and ears
and all.

The boys learnt as much English as could pos-
sibly be expected of them ; Sunni learnt more,
because Dr. Roberts made it a point that he
should. Besides, he became a great friend of Dr.
Roberts, who began by begging that Sunni might
be allowed to ride with him, then to drive with
him, and finally to spend two or three days at a
time with him. Sunni had more to learn than

TOE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 59

Moti had. He had a good many things to forget,
too, which gave him almost as much trouble.

The Maharajah found it as difficult as ever to
like ee-Wobbis's medicines, but he considered
them excellent for Moti's cough, and only com-
plained that his son should be given so little of
them. The royal treasury would pay for a whole
bottle — why should the little prince get only a
spoonful ? Nevertheless Dr. Roberts stood well
in the estimation of the Maharajah, who arranged
that a great many things should be done as the
missionary suggested. In one case the Maha-
rajah had the palace well, the oldest palace well,
cleaned out — a thing that nobody had ever
thought of before ; and he was surprised to find
what was at the bottom of it. Dr. Roberts ad-
vised putting down a few drains too, and making
a road from the city of the Maharajah to the
great highways that led to the Viceroy's India.
The Maharajah laid the drains, and said he
would think about the road. Then Dr. Roberts
suggested that a hospital would be a good thing,

•^r

60 THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

and the Maharajah said he would think about
that too.

Sunni was growing fast ; he was too tall and
thin for nine years old. Dr. Roberts took anx-
ious care of him, thinking of the unknown grand-
father and grandmother in England, and how he
could best tell them of this boy of theirs, who
read Urdu better than English, and wore em-
broidered slippers turned squarely up at the toes,
and asked such strange . questions about his
father's God. But when he taxed the Maha-
rajah with his promise, Ilis Highness simply re-
peated, in somewhat more amiable terms, his
answer of the year before. And the work was
now prospering more than ever. When once he
had got the hospital. Dr. Roberts made up his
mind that he would take definite measures ; but
he would get the hospital first.

CHAPTER VII.

I SUPPOSE it was about that time that Suiji
Rao began to consider whether it was after all for
the best interests of the State that ee-Wobbis
should remain in it. Surji Rao was first Minister
to the Maharajah, and a very important person.
He had charge of the Treasury, and it was his
business to produce every day one hundred fresh
rupees to put into it. This was his duty, and
whether the harvests had been good and the cat-
tle many, or whether the locusts and the drought
had made the people poor, Surji Rao did his
duty. If ever he should fail, there hung a large
and heavy shoe upon the wall of the Maharajah's
apartment, which daily suggested personal chas-
tisement and a possible loss of dignity to Surji
Rao.

Dr. Roberts was making serious demands

. LI

THE STORY OP SONNY SAEIB.

upon the Treasury, and proposed to make others
more serious still. Worse than that, he was sup-
planting Surji Rao in the confidence and affection
of the Maharajah. Worse still, he was making a
pundit of that outcast boy, who had been already
too much favoured in the palace, so that he
might very well grow up to be Minister of the
Treasury instead of Rasso, son of Surji Rao— a
thing unendurable. Surji Rao was the fattest
man in the State, so fat that it was said he sat
down only twice a day ; but he lay awake on
sultry nights for so many weeks reflecting upon
this, that he grew obviously, almost ostenta-
tiously, thin. To this he added such an ex-
tremely dolorous expression of countenance that
it was impossible for the Maharajah, out of sheer
curiosity, to refrain from asking him what was
the matter.

" My father and my mother ! I grow poor
with thinking that the feet of strangers are in
the palace of the King, and what may come
of it."

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

The Maharajah laughed and put his arm
about the shoulders of Surji Rao.

*'I will give you a tub of melted butter to
grow fat upon again, and two days to eat it,
though indeed with less on your bones you were
a better Rajput. What should come of it, Surji
Rao ? "

Thp Minister sheathed the anger that leapt
up behind his eyes in a smile. Then he answered
gravely —

*' What should come of it but more strangers?
Is it not desired to make a road for their guns
and their horses? And talk and treaties, and
tying of the hand and binding of the foot, until
at last that great Jan Larrens * himself will ride
up to the gate of the city and refuse to go away
until Your Highness sends a bag of gold mohurs
to the British Raj, as he has done before."

"I do not think I will make the road," said
the Maharajah reflectively.

* John Lawrence, aftervrards Lord Laurence and Viceroy of
India.

e4 THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

" King, you are the wisest of men, rnd there-
fore your own best counsellor. It is well decided.
But the Rajputs are all sons of one father, and
even now there is grief among the chief of them
that outcasts should be dwelling in the King's
favour."

"I will not make the road," said the Mahara-
jah. ''Enough!"

Surji Rao thought it was not quite enough,
however, and took various means to obtain more,
means that would never be thought of anywhere
but in countries where the sun beats upon the
plots of Ministers and ferments fanaticism in the
heads of the people. He talked to the Rajput
r'liets, and persuaded them — they were not difficult
to persuade — that Dr. Roberts was an regent and a
spy of the English Government at Calcutta, that
his medicines were a sham. When it was neces-
sary, Surji Rao said that the medicines were a
slow form of poison, but generally he said they
were a sham. He persuaded as many of the chiefs
as dared, to remonstrate with the Maharajah, and

Doctor Robcrttis enemy.

J J^I'VV'W lllMli

TEE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB. (35

to follow his example of going about looking as if
they were upon the brink of some terrible disaster.
Surji Rao's wife was a clever woman, and she ar-
ranged such a feeling in the Maharajah's zenana,
that one day as Dr. Roberts passed along a corridor
to His Ilighness's apartment, a curtain opened
swiftly, and some one in the dark behind spat at
him. Amongst them they managed to make His
Highness extremely uncomfortable. But the old
man continued to decline obstinately to send the
missionary back.

Then it became obvious to Surji Rao that Dr.
Roberts must be disposed of otherwise. He went
about that in the same elaborate and ingenious
way. His arrangements required time, but there
is always plenty of time in Rajputana. He be-
came friendly with Dr. Roberts, and encouraged
the hospital. He did not wish in any way to be
complicat(?d v/ith his arrangements. Nobody else
became friendly. Surji Rao took care of that.
And at last one mijrning a report went like wild-
fire about the palace and the city that the mis-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAUIB.

sionary had killed a sacred bull, set free in honour
of Krishna at the birth of a son to Maun Rao, the
chief of the Maharajah's generals. Certainly the
bull was found slaughtered behind the monkey
temple, and certainly Dr. Roberts had beefsteak
for breakfast that day. Such a clamour rang
through the palace about it that the Maharajah
sent for the missionary, partly to inquire into the
matter, and partly with a view to protect him.

It was very unsatisfactory — the missionary did
not know how the bull came to be killed behlrd
his house, and, in spite of all the Maharajah's
hints, would not invent a story to account for it.
The Maharajah could have accounted for it fifty
times over, if it had happened to him. Besides,
Dr. Roberts freely admitted having breakfasted
upon beefsteak, and didn't know where it had
come from ! He rode home through an angry
crowd, and nobody at all came for medicines that
day.

Two days later the Rajput general's baby died
—could anything else have been expected ? The

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 67

general went straight to the Maharajah to ask for
vengeance, but His Highness, knowing why the
chief had come, sent word that he was ill — he
would see Maun Rao to-morrow. To-morrow he
had not recovered, nor even the day after ; but in
the meantime he had been well enough to send
word to Dr. Roberts that if he wished to go away
he should have two camels and an escort. Dr.
Roberts sent to ask whether Sunni might go with
him, but to this the Maharajah replied by an abso-
lute "No."

So the missionary stayed.

It was Surji Rao who brought the final word
to the Maharajah.

"My father and my mother! " he said, "it is
no longer possible to hold the people back. It is
cried abroad that this English hakkim * has given
the people powder of pig's feet. Even now they
have set upon his house. And to-day is the fes-
tival of Krishna. My heart is bursting with
grief. "

* Doctor.

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

*'If Maun Rao strikes, I can do nothing," said
the Maharajah weakly. '' He thinks the English-
man killed hia son. But look you, send Sunni to
me. lie saved mine. And I tell you," said the
Maharajah, looking at Surji Rao fiercely with his
sunken black eyes, " not so much of his blood
shall be shed as would stain a moth's wing."

But Maun Rao struck, and the people being
told that the missionary was dead, went home
hoiking that Krishna had nothing more against
them ; they had done what they could.

As to Sunni he told his grief to Tooni because
it comforted him, and went into mourning for nine
days in defiance of public opinion, because he
owed it to the memory of a countryman. Ho be-
gan, too, to take long restless rambles beyond the
gates, and once he asked Tooni if she knew the
road to Calcutta.

"It is fifty thousand miles," said Tooni, who
had an imagination ; ''and the woods are full of
tigers."

CHAPTER YIII.

The gates of Lalpore were shut, and all about
her walls the yellow sandy plains stretched silent
and empty. There did not seem to be so much as
a pariah dog outside. Some pipal- trees looked
over the walls, and a couple of very antiquated
cannon looked through them, but nothing stirred.
It made a splendid picture at broad noon, the
blue sky and the old red-stone city on her little
hill, holding up her minarets and the white marble
bubbles of her temples, and then the yellow sand
drifting up; but one could not look at it long.
Colonel Starr, from the door of his tent, half a
mile away, had looked at it pretty steadily for
two hours, so steadily that his eyes, red and
smarting with the dust of a two hundred mile
ride, watered copiously, and made him several de-
grees more uncomfortable than he had been be-
fore.

70 THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

I doubt whether any idea of the beauty of Lal-
pore had a place in the Colonel's mind, it was so
full of other considerations. He thought more,
probably, of the thickness of its walls than of
their colour, and speculated longer upon the
position of the arsenal than upon the curves of the
temples. Because, in the Colonel's opinion, it had
come to look very like lighting. In the opinion
of little Lieutenant Pink the fighting should have
been over and done with yesterday, and the 17th
Midlanders should be "bagging" the Maharajah's
artillery by now. Little Lieutenant Pink was
spoiling for the fray. So were the men, most of
them. They wanted a change of diet. Thomas
Jones, sergeant, entirely expressed the sentiments
of his company when he said that somebody ort to
pay up for this blessed march, they 'adn't wore the
skins off their 'eels fer two 'undred mile to admire
the bloomin' scenery. Besides, for Thomas
Jones's part he was tired of living on this yere
bloomin' tinned rock, he wanted a bit of fresh
roast kid and a Lalpore curry.

:3lvv

THE STORY OF SONNY SAUIB. 71

Colonel Starr had been sent to "arrange," if
possible, and to light if necessary. Perhaps we
need not inquire into the arrangements the
Grovernment had commissioned Colonel Starr to
make. They were arrangements of a kind fre-
quently submitted to the princes of independent
States in India wlien they are troublesome, and
their result is that a great many native States are
governed by English political residents, while a
great many native princes attend parties at
Government House in Calcutta. Tlie Maharajah
of Chita had been very troublesome indeed.
Twice in the year his people had raided peaceful
villages under British protection, and now he had
killed a missionary. It was quite time to
*' arrange " the Maharajah of Chita, and Colonel
Starr, with two guns and three hundred troops,
had been sent to do it.

His Highness, however, seemed indisposed to
further his social prospects in Calcutta and the
good of his State. For the twenty- four hours
they had been in camp under his walls the Maha-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB.

rajah had taken no more notice of Colonel Starr
and his three hundred Midlanders than if they
represented so many jungle bushes. To all
Colonel Starr's messages, diplomatic, argumenta-
tive, threatening, there had come the same un-
satisfactory response— the Maharajah of Chita
had no word to say to the British Raj. And
still the gates were shut, and still only the pipal-
trees looked over the wall, and only the cannon
looked through.

By the time evening came Colonel Starr was at
the end of his patience. He was not, unfor-
tunately, simultaneously at the end of his inves-
tigations. He did not yet know the position or
the contents of the arsenal, the defensibility of
the walls, the water supply, or the number of
men under arms in that silent, impassive red city
on the hill. The reports of the peasantry had
been contradictory, and this ordinary means of
ascertaining these things had failed him, while he
very particularly required to know them, his force
being small. The Government had assured Colo-

'^miniyv'^r^^Ffmm'^r'WWli w»ijipt^"w^^^

THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB. 73

nel Starr that the Maharajah of Chita would be
easy to arrange ; that he was a tractable person,
and that half the usual number of troops would
be ample, which made Ilis Highness's conduct, if
anything, more annoying. And Colonel Starr's
commissariat, even in respect to " tinned rock,'*
had not been supplied with the expectation of be-
sieging Lalpore. The attack would be uncertain,
and the Colonel hesitated the more because his
instructions had been not to take the place if he
could avoid it. So the commanding officer paced
his tent, and composed fresh messages to the
Maharajah, while Lieutenant Pink wondered in
noble disgust whether the expedition was going
to end in moonshine after all, and Thomas Jones,
sergeant, remarked hourly to his fellow-privates,
*' The 17th 'aint come two 'undred miles for this
kind of a joke. The bioomin' Maharajer 'uU
think we've got a funk on."

But neither Colonel Starr nor Thomas Jones
was acquainted with the reason of the remarkable
attitude of Lalpore.

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THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

A week before, when the news reached him
that the Viceroy was sending three hundred men
and two guns to remonstrate with him for his
treatment of Dr. Roberts, the Maharajah smiled,
thinking of the bravery of his Chitans, the
strength of his fortifications, the depth of hla
walls, and the wheat stored in his city granaries.
No one had ever taken Lalpore since the Chitans
took it — in all Rajputana there were none so
cunning and so br^^ve as the Chitans. As to
bravery, greater than Rajput bravery simply did
not exist. The Maharajah held a council, and
they all sported with the idea of English soldiers
coming to Lalpore. Maun Rao begged to go out
and meet them to avenge the insult.

"Maharajah," said he, "the Chitans are suffi-
cient against the world ; why should we speak of
four hundred monkeys' grandsons ? If the sky
fell, our heads would be pillars to protect you ! "

And after a long discussion the Maharajah
agreed to Maun Rao's proposal. The English
could come only one way. A day's march from

t^'^^^"1^'»lf.')W^' " ■, t ^' J-^' '".f '

THE STORY OP SONNY SAIIIB.

Lalpore they would be compelled to ford a
stream. There the Maharajah's army would meet
them, ready, as Maun Rao said in the council, to
play at ball with their outcast heads. There was
a feast afterwards, and everybody had twice as
much opium as usual. In the midst of the rev-
elry they made a great calculation of resources.
The Maharajah smOed again as he thought of the
temerity of the English in connection with the ten
thousand rounds of ammunition that had just
come to him on camel back through Afghanistan
from Russia— it was a lucky and timely purchase.
Surji Rao, Minister of the Treasury, when this
was mentioned, did not smile. Surji Rao had
bought the cartridges at a very large discount,
which did not appear in the bill, and he knew
that not even Chitan valour could make more
than one in ten of them go off. Therefore, when
the Maharajah congratulated Surji Rao upon his
foresight in urging the replenishment of the
arsenal at this particular t.'me, Surji Rao found it
very difficult to congratulate himself.

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

It all came out the day before the one fixed
for the expedition. His Highness, being in great
spirits, had ordered a shooting competition, and
the men were served from the new stores supplied
to the State of Chita by Petroif Gortschakin of
St. Petersburg. The Maharajah drove out to the
ranges to look on, and all his Ministers with
him. All, that is, except the Minister of the
Treasury, who begged to be excused ; he was so
very unwell.

Some of the men knel*- and clicked and re-
loaded half a dozen times before they could fire ;
some were luckier, and fired the first time or the
third without reloading. They glanced suspi-
ciously at one another and hesitated, while there
grew a shining heap of unexploded cartridges, a
foot hig^^, under the Maharajah's very nose. His
Highness looked on stupefied for ten minutes,
then burst into blazing wrath. Maun Rao rode
madly about examining, inquiring, threatening.
"Our cartridges are filled with powdered
charcoal," he cried, smiting one of them between

if'WWui" W'lWWMIffW^

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

two stones to prove his words. There was an un-
expected noise, and the noble General jumped
into the air, bereft of the largest half of his curled
moustache. That one was not. Then they all
went furiously back to the palace. The only
other incident of that day which it is worth our
while to chronicle is connected with Surji Rao
and the big shoe. The big shoe was administered
to Surji Rao by a man of low caste, in presence of
the entire court and as many of the people of
Lalpore as chose to come and look on. It was
very thoroughly administered, and afterwards
Surji Rao was put formally outside the city
gates and told that the king desired never to look
upon his black face again. Which was rubbing
it in rather unfairly, as His Highness's own com-
plexion was precisely the same shade. With
great promptitude Surji Rao took the road to
meet the English and sell his information, but
this possibility occurred to the Maharajah soon
enough to send men after him to frustrate it.
*' There shall be at least enough sound car-

tinMuqiw.ii jupii|fifiji|ipiiji|i,iiiH> Mi|iii.i|||^..i;)fif jiipnvfinip^qpmnxr

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

tridges in his bargain for that," said His High-
ness grimly.

The Chitan spirit did not flourish quite so
vain-gloriously at the council that night, and
there was no more talk about the sky falling
upon dauntless Chitan heads. The sky had
fallen, and the effect was rather quenching than
otherwise. The previous stores were counted
over, and it w^as found that the men could not be
served with three rounds apiece out of them.
When this was announced, nobody thought of
doubting the wisdom of the Maharajah's decision
to shut up the gates of the city, and trust to the
improbability of the English venturing to attack
him in such small numbers, not knowing his re-
sources. So that very night, lest any word
should go abroad of the strait of the warriors of
Chita, the gates were shut. But all the city
knew. Moti knew. Sanni knew.

Two days later, Moti and Sunni heard the
English bugles half a mile away. They were
playing " Weel may the keel row I " the regi-

■«W^Wt>»"».'"

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 79

mental marcli-past, as Colonel Starr's Midlanders
did the last half mile to their camping-ground.
The boys were in the courtyard among the horses,
and Sunni dropped the new silver bit he was
looking at, held up his head, and listened. He
was the same yellow-haired, blue-eyed Sunni,
considerably tanned by the fierce winds of Raj-
putana ; but there came a brightness over his face
as he listened, that had not been there since he
was a very little boy.

*'How beautiful the music is!" said he to
Moti.

Moti put his fingers in his ears.

" It is horrible," he cried. '* It screams and it
rushes. How can they be able to make it? I
shall tell my father to have it stopped."

Presently the bugles stopped of themselves,
and Moti forgot about them, but the brightness
did not go out of Sunni's face, and all day long
he went about humming the air of ^' Weel may
the keel row," with such variations as might be
expected. He grew very thoughtful toward even-

!f I

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

ing, but his eyes shone brighter than any sap-
phires in the Maharajah's iron boxes. As to an
old Mahomedan woman from Rubbulgurh who
cooked her chupatties alone and somewhat de-
spised, she heard the march-past too, and was
troubled all day long with the foolish idea that
the captain-sahib would presently come in to tea,
and would ask her, Tooni, where the memsahib
was.

Sonny^s hand trembled as he took it.

lp^lHMBj|Pi|Bll^ iM %^yni\v V f^ «<a

CHAPTER IX.

m ■.3''

Irt

SuNNi had his own room in the palace, a little
square place with a high white wall and a table
and chair in it, which Dr. Roberts had given him.
The table held his books, his pen and ink and
paper. There was a charpoy in one corner, and
under the charpoy a locked box. There were no
windows, and the narrow door opened into a pas-
sage that ran abruptly into a wall, a few feet
farther on. So nobody saw Sunni when he car-
ried his chirar/, his little chimneyless, smoking
tin lamp, into his room, and set it in a niche on
the wall, took off his shoes, and threw himself
down on his charpoy at eleven o'clock that night.
For a long time he had been listening to the bul-
buls, the nightingales, in the garden, and think-
ing of this moment. Now it had come, and Sunni
quivered and throbbed all over with excitement.

THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB.

He lay very still, though, on the watch for foot-
steps, whispers, breathings in the passage. Four
years in the palace had taught Sunni what these
things meant. He lay still for more than two
hours.

At last, very quietly, Sunni lifted himself up
by his elbows, put first one leg, and then the other,
out of the charpoy, and got up. More quietly
still he drew the locked box from under the bed,
took a key from his pocket, and opened it. The
key squeaked in the wood, and Sunni paused
again for a long time, listening. Then in the
smoky, uncertain light of the chirag flaring in the
niche, he took from the box three gold bangles,
two broken armlets, enamelled in red and blue,
and a necklace of pearls with green enamelled
pendants. Last, he drew out a little sword with
rubies set in the hilt. For an instant Sunni hesi-
tated ; the ornaments were nothing, but the sword
was his chief possession and his pride. It would
be so easy to carry away ! He looked at it lov-
ingly for a minute, and laid it with the rest. All

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 83

these things were his very own, but something
told him that he must not take tliem away. Then
he took the long coarse white turban cloth from
his head, and wrapped everything skilfully in it.
Nothing jangled, and when the parcel was made
up it was flat and even. Then Sunni, with his
English pen, printed

M '^Mi-

upon one side of it, which in English letters would
have been spelled "Maharajah ka wasti," and
which meant simply, "For the Mahaajah."
Upon the other he wrote in the large round hand
that Dr. Roberts had taught him.

To your Honner, the Maharajah of Chita,
Sunni will take your Honner in his hart to Ms
oun country^ hut the gifs are too heavier

Sunni had certainly learned politeness at last
among the Rajputs. Then lie put the parcel back
into the box, softly locked it, and laid the key on
the cover.

fl 1'!

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

Still nobody came his way. Sunni took an-
other turban cloth from its nail in the wall, a
finely-woven turban cloth, with blue and gold
stripes, nine yards long, for festivals. He twisted
it carelessly round his neck, and blew out the chi-
rag. Then he slipped softly into the passage, and
from that into the close, dark, high walled corri-
dors that led into the outer courts. He stepped
quickly, but carefully ; the corridors were full of
sleeping servants. Twice he passed a sentinel.
The first was stupid with opium, and did not
notice him. Mar Singh, the second, was very wide
awake.

" Where go you, Sunui-Ji f " he asked, inquisi-
tively.

*'I go to speak with Tooni about a matter
which troubles me so that I cannot sleep," an-
swered Sunni; *'and afterwards I return to the
little south balcony that overlooks the river ; it
will be cooler there if the vvind blows."

As Sunni went on, the thoughts of the sentinel
became immediately fixed upon the necessity of

■ ji^i»ut«t Mld>w^*«))*' vvm-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

being awake when the sahib's son should pass in
again — the sahib's son had the ear of the Mahara-
jah.

The ayah's hut was in the very farthest corner
of the courtyard she had begged for, somewhat
apart from the others. It was quite dark inside
when Sunni pushed open the door, but the old
woman, slumbering light, started up from her
charpoy with a little cry.

" Choop/ " said he in a low. quick tone ; and
Tooni, recognising his voice, was instantly silent.

Sunni made his way to the side of the bed, and
took one of her hands.

"Listen, Tooni," said he, in the same tone, "I
am come for what is mine. Give it to me."

** Sonny Sahib ! " quavered the old woman
hoarsely, " what have I to give you ? Dil Jcushi,*
I have nothing."

"What from fear you have never given up,
nor burnt, nor thrown away," said Sunni, firmly ;

* Heart's delight.

86 THE STORY OF SONNY SAUIB.

"what you said false words to ee-Wobbis
about, when you told him it had been stolen
from you. My little black book, with my God
in it."

'^ Hazur ! I have it not."

"Give it to me," said Sunni.

The old woman raised herself in the bed. " A
sahib's promise is written in gold," said she;
"promise that the Maharajah tihall never know."

"He shall never know," said Sunni.

Tooni felt her way to the side of the hut ;
then her hand fumbled along the top of the wall ;
it seemed to Sunni for an interminable time. At
a certain place she parted the thatch and put her
hand into it with a little rustling that Sunni
thought might be heard in the very heart of the
palace. Then she drew out a small, tight sewn,
oilskin bag, that had taken the shape of the book
inside it, groped across the hut again, and gave it
to Sunni. The boy's hand trembled as he took it,
and without a word he slipped into the darkness
outside.

> W^P'^'^'f"? jV-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

Then he stopped short and went back. *' Great
thanks to you, Tooni-j>7," he said softly into the
darkness of the hut. "When I find my own
country I will come back and take yoa there too.
And while I am gone Moti will love you, Tooni-Ji.
Peace be to you ! "

Mar Singh was still awake when Sunni re-
entered the palace. The wind had come, he said.
Sleep would rest upon the eyelids of Sunni-yz in
the south balcony.

It was a curious little place, the south balcony,
really not a balcony at all, but a round-pillared
pavilion with a roof that jutted out above the city
wall. It hung over a garden, too, rather a
cramped garden, the wall and the river came so
close, and one that had been left a good deal to
take care of itself. Some fine pipal-trees grew in
it though, one of them towered within three feet of
the balcony,, while the lower branches overspread
the city wall. All day long the green parrakeets
flashed in and out of the pipal-trees, screaming
and chattering, while the river wound blue among

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

the yellow sands outside the wall ; but to-night
the only sound in them was the whispering of the
leaves as the south wind passed, and both the
river and the sands lay silver gray in the stai light.
Sunni, lying full length upon the balcony, listened
with all his might. From the courtyard, away
round to the right where the stables were, came a
pony's neigh, and Sunni, as he heard it once —
twice — thrice — felt his eyes fill with tears. It
was the voice of his pony, of his ^^ DJiooplal,^^
his "red sunlight," and he would never ride
Dhooplal again. The south breeze brought no
other sound, the palace stretched on either side
of him dark and still, a sweet heavy fragrance
from a frangipanni-tree in the garden floated
up, and that was all. Sunni looked across the
river, and saw that a group of palms on the
other side was beginning to stand distinctly
against the sky. Then he remembered that he
must make haste.

The first thing he did was to unwind his long
turban from his neck, and cut it in two. Two-

t';!

• ywimiw.','*- '>»''»'•" 'i:fr"!^">fp

THE STORY OF SONNY SAIIIB.

thirds he twisted round his waist, the other he
made fast to one of the little red stone pillars of
the balcony. It himg straight and black down
into the shadows of the pipal-tree. Then, very
gradually and cautiously, Sunr.^* slipped over the
balcony's edge and let himself down, down, till
he reached a branch thick enough to cling to.
The turban was none too long, the branches at the
top w^ere so slender. Just as he grasped a thick
one, clutching it with both arras and legs, and
swaying desjoerately in the dark, he felt a rush of
wings across his face, and a great white owl flew
out hooting in her panic. The boy almost missed
his catch with fear, and the Maharajah, wakeful
in his apartments, lost another good hour's sleep
through hearing the owl's cry. It was the worst
of omens, the Maharajah believed, and sometimes
he believed it with less reason.

As quickly as he dared, Sunni let himself
down branch by branch till he reached the level
of the wall. Presently he stood upon it in the
subsiding rustle of the leaves, breathless and

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

trembling. He seemed to have disturbed every
living thing within a hundred yards. A score of
bats flew up from the wall crevices, a flying fox
struck him on the shoulder, at his feet something
black and slender twisted away into a darker
place. Sunni stood absolutely still, gradually
letting go his hold upon the pipal twigs. Pres-
ently everything was as it had been before, ex-
cept for the little dark motionless figure on the
wall ; and the south wind was bringing across the
long, shrill, mournful howls of the jackals that
plundered the refuse of the British camp half a
mile away.

Then Sunni laid down flat on the top of the
wall, and began to work himself with his hands
and feet towards the nearest embrasure. An
old cannon stood in this, and threatened with
its wide black mouth any foe that should be
foolish enough to think of attacking the fort
from the river. This venerable piece of ammuni-
tion had not been fired for ten years, and would
burst to a certainty if it were fired now ; but as

It;

'*.,

every

core of

ng fox
letliirg

darker
duaWy

Pres-
e, ex-
»n the
3s the

that
alt SL

' the
inds

An
vith

be
fort
mi-
ald

An early-morning adventure.

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. 91

nobody had ever dreamed of attacking Lalpore
from the river that didn't particularly matter.
When Sunni reached it, he crouched down in its
shadow — the greyness behind the palms was
growing paler — and took the rest of his turban
cloth from his waist. Then he took off his coat,
and began to unwind a rope from his body— a
rope made up of all sorts of ends, thick and thin,
long and short, and pieced out with leather
thongs. Sunni was considerably more comfort-
able when he had divested himself of it. He tied
the rope and the turban cloth together, and fas-
tened the rope end to the old gun's wheel. He
looked over for a second — no longer — ^but it was
too dark to tell how far down the face of the
thirty-foot wall his ragged contrivance hung. It
was too dark as well to see whether the water
rippled against the wall or not ; but Sunni knew
that the river was low. As a matter of fact he
had only about five feet to drop, and he went
very comfortably into a thick bed of wet sand.

Nor was anything known of his going in Lalpore
7

!!?;';

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

until daybreak, when one of the palace sweepers
found the end of a blue and gold turban flapping
about the south balcony ; and Moti, who often
went early to tell his dreams to Sunni, brought
the Maharajah a parcel.

epers
pping
often
mglit

CHAPTER X.

"What's this?" said Colonel Starr, looking
up from his camp table, -vhere he was writing a
final message for translation to the Maharajah.
The sun was on the point of rising, the air was
crisp, and the sky was splendid. Lalpore, on her
buttressed slope, sat as proud and as silent as
ever ; but something like a blue ribbon floated
from the south wall over the river.

" What's this « " said Colonel Starr, with the
deepest possible astonishment.

" Pris'ner, sir," answered Thomas Jones, sa-
luting.

''What?'' said the Colonel. "IS'onsensel
Where did you get him ? "

*'Beg pardon, sir. Peters were on duty, sir,
at the second outpost, sir. It were about two
hours ago as far as I could judge, sir, not 'avin'

94 THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

the time by me. Peters seed prisoner a-comin'
strite fer the camp across the sands from the
river, sir. Peters sings out * Oo goes ? ' ICand
there been no notiss took, pints, sir."

*' Yes," interposed Sunni, composedly, in his
best English, '*he did. But he did not fire.
And that was well, for he might have hit me. I
am not broken."

"Go on, Jones," said the Colonel. *'This is
very queer."

" Pris'ner were about ten yards off, sir, *an, as
*e says, Peters might 'a hit 'im," said Sergeant
Jones, with solemn humour, "but afore he'd
made up 'is mind to fire, 'e'd come so close Peters
saw 'ow small he was, an' therefore didn't, sir."

"Quite right," remarked Sunni. "Peters
might have killed me."

The Colonel nodded. He was looking with
absorbed interest into Sunni's eyes. He came
out of his instant of abstraction with a start,
while Jones went on with respectful volubility.

"Beggin' pardon, sir, Peters says as 'ow 'e

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

were all struck of a heap, sir, at 'earin' the young
'un call out in English, sir, an' bein' so light com-
plected fer a native, sir, an' even lighter in that
light, Peters didn't rightly know wot 'e might be
firin' at, sir. Peters do be a bit superstitious."

" Peters took him then, I suppose ? " The
Colonel smiled ironically.

**Beggin' your pardon, sir, it was rather 'im as
took Peters. 'Ee walked strite up to 'im, an'

* Ware is the burra * sahib \ ' says 'e. Peters
sends 'im into the guard tent to me as 'e passed
on his beat, and pris'ner says ' You ain't the
burra sahib,' says he. Then I says to pris'ner,

* You hito t an' give an account of yerself , ' says
I. Says 'e quite 'aughty like, ' I'll account fer
myself to the burra sahib,' an' wouldn't take no
chaff. But 'e bitoes, an' curls 'isself up in the
sand, an' goes sound asleep in no time— an' 'ere 'e
is, sir."

" Also," corrected Sunni, " he gave me some

* Principal.

f Sit down on the ground.

^ ■■..,.,

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

coffee. He is a good man. Are you the burra
sahib?" he asked the Colonel.

But Colonel Starr was not in a mood to answer
questions regarding his dignity. He looked at
the queer slender figure before him, in its torn
coat of embroidered silk, and its narrow, shape-
less, dirty cotton trousers ; and especially he
looked at the boy's hair and eyes — his wavy yel-
low hair and his blue eyes.

"You are not a Rajput, you are an English
boy," he said finally, with amazed conviction.

At another time the Colonel would have been
wild with excitement at such a discovery, but for
the moment his mind was full of graver things.
In an hour he meant to attack Lalpore. He dis-
missed his kindling enthusiasm, and added
simply, "How came you here?"

"I came by a rope from the palace to the
pipal-tree, and thence to the south wall, and
thence to the river bed. It was not hard. Know-
ing the shallows of the river, I arrived quite
easily by wading."

".riW,aWHr"P"4>l<'^ U>

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

"You come from the fort? Are there any-
other English there ? " The Colonel's voice was
quick and eager.

"Not even one! Ee-Wobbis was there, but

he is killed."

"Ah!" said Colonel Starr. "When was he
killed ? "

"In the evening on tho tenth day of the
month. I do not properly know for why. It
was not the Maharajah," added Sunni quickly ;
"it was Maun Rao. Ee-Wobbis was my country-
man, and I hate Maun Rao."

The orderly came for the final message
that was to be sent to the Maharajah. Colonel
Starr told him it would be ready in half an
hour.

"Have they given you any breakfast?" he
asked.

"No, thank you — not yet," answered Sunni
politely.

The Colonel wrote an order, and gave it to
Thomas Jones. " Be smart," he added.

U '"'

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

Until Thomas Jones returned with some
bread and bacon and a bowl of milk, and until
Sunni had eaten the bread and drunk the milk,
the Colonel looked at the boy as seldom as he
could, and said only two words. ''No bacon T'
he asked.

Sunni flushed. "If it is excusable," said he,
"I do not eat of the pig."

At which Colonel Starr's face expressed curi-
osity, amusement, and interest all at once ; but
he kept silence until Sunni had finished.
"Now," said he pleasantly, "listen, my small
prisoner. I am sure you have a great deal to tell
me about yourself. Very good, I will hear it. I
should like to hear it. But not now — there is no
time. Since you have taken the trouble to escape
from this place, you do not want to go back
again, I suppose ? "

" I want to go to my own country — with you,"
said Sunni. " I can march."

The Colonel smiled. It was the smile of a
brave man, and kindly. His men knew it as well

ntil
iJk,
he

'^I-'ria'nei; *?>/"'

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

as they knew his sterner looks. Sunni thought
it a beautiful smile.

"You shall go," he said, "but we are not
quite ready to start yet. Perhaps in a few days,
perhaps in a few weeks, we shall be. A good
deal depends on what you can tell me."

Sunni looked straight into the Colonel's eyes,
a little puzzled.

" How do they get water in Lalpore ? " asked
the Colonel, to begin with.

" There are four wells," said Sunni, " and two
of them have no bottom."

" H'm ! And what is that white building with
the round roof that we see from here?"

"That is the mosque of Larulla," said Sunni,
"but it is no longer of consequence ; there is so
little Mussulmans in Lalpore. The soldiers hang
their guns there now,"

" Ah ! And has the Maharajah many soldiers,
and have they good guns— new guns ? "

Sunni looked into the Colonel's face with eager
pleasure to reply ; but there he saw something

100

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

that made him suddenly close his lips. He had
not lived ten years among the Rajputs without
learning to read faces, and in Colonel Starr's he
saw that all this talk the Colonel desired about
Lalpore was not for Lalpore's good. The boy
thought for a minute, and tightened his lips, while
a little firm line came on each side of his mouth.
He only opened them to say, *' Burra sahib, I can-
not tell you that."

"But you must tell me," said Colonel Starr
firmly.

"No," returned Sunni, "not that, nor any
more informations about the fort."

The Colonel's face grew stern. He was not
accustomed to disobedience. "Come," he said;
"out with it, boy. I have no time to waste."
His tone was so serious that Sunni felt a little
nervous thrill run all over him.

"No," said he.

The Colonel tried another way: "Come, my
little chap," said he gently, "you are English, are
you not ? "

"TiF'w (■jvFiiixwuwi ii,i.ijwi|i|i|iiPim^|Br'

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

101

Starr

Sunni nodded.

*'Then you must serve the English Queen.
She has sent me here to punish the Maharajah for
killing the padre-sahib. You must help me."

*'The Maharajah did not kill ee-Wobbis,"
cried Sunni excitedly. "I have already once
said that. The Maharajah he liJce ee-Wobbis. I
am English, but the Maharajah is my father and
my mother. I cannot speak against the Mahara-
jah, burra sahib."

There came a light into the Colonel's eyes
which was not kindled by anger. He found him-
self liking this slip of a ragged urchin with fair
hair, who defied him — liking him tremendously.
But the crisis was grave ; he could not sacrifice
his men to a child's scruple ; he could not let him-
self be defied. He took out his watch, and made
his face hard.

"Then," said he coldly, "you are either the
Maharajah's deserter or his spy. If you have
deserted, I am disposed to send you back to him,
since you are of no use to us. K you are his spy.

102

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

it is my duty to have you shot. I will give you
five minutes to save your skin in."

"But— but you are my countryman^ burra
sahib I " There was a sob in his voice.

The only possible answer to that was a hug, so
it went unanswered. Colonel Starr set himself to
think of his Midlanders.

Sunni lifted his blue eyes entreatingly to the
Colonel's face, but he had turned it away. He
was watching a little brown lizard sunning itself
outside the tent door, and wondering how long he
could keep his disciplinary expression. You could
hear nothing in the tent but the ticking of the
watch. Sunni looked down at the lizard too, and
so the minutes passed.

Three of them passed. Colonel Starr found
himself hoping even more that the boy should
stand firm than that he should speak. Colonel
Starr began to say softly within himself, " I am a
brute." The fifth minute was up. "Will you
speak % " asked the Colonel.

"Burra sahib, no," said Sunni.

■i«ii»v?'-«'|ijvjsw»i"i^iw" ♦."■»<< www

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

103

ive you

<, buna

hug, so
nself to

y to the
ly. He
ig itself
long he
)u could
of the
00, and

found

should

Colonel

* I am a

ill you

*'i

At that instant Lieutenant Pink galloped up to
the door of the tent.

" They've come to their senses at last, sir. Six
mounted men have just left the north gate, signal-
ling for a parley."

The Colonel jumped to his feet and gave
half a dozen orders without stopping. The last
one was to Sunni. *' Stay here," he said ;
*'you shall soon go back to your own coun-
try."

The Chitan horsemen had ridden out to an-
nounce the coming of the Maharajah, so that the
English officer might meet him half-way. They
gave the message gravely, and rode slowly back.
Half an hour later there arose a great shouting
and blowing of trumpets inside the walls, the
royal gate was flung open, and the Maharajah
appeared, swaying in a blaze of silk and jewels
upon an enormous elephant with a painted trunk
and trappings fringed in gold and silver. Trum-
peters and the crimson flag of Chita went before
him ; Maun Rao and the other generals rode be-

104

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

hind him ; at his side sat his bard, his poet lau-
reate, with glowing eyes, speaking constantly into
his royal ear the glorious annals of his house.
Colonel Starr and his little suite met this wonder-
ful cavalcac^e a quarter of a mile from the city,
and the Maharajah and the Colonel dismounted.
Whereupon the magnificent Rajput, in his dia-
mond aigrettes and his silken swathings, and the
broad-shouldered British officer, in his Queen's
red coat, solemnly kissed each other. They ex-
changed other politenesses, spoke of the health
of the Viceroy and of his "good friend" the
Maharajah, and His Highness arranged a durbar
to be held in his hall of audience at two that
afternoon, when he would hear the desires of the
British Raj.

Strangely enough, it occurred to nobody to
wonder why the Maharajah had so suddenly
changed his mind. To nobody, that is, except
Sonny Sahib. He guessed the reason, and sitting
all morning in a corner of the Colonel's tent, as
he had been told, he thought about it very seri-

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

105

ously. Once or twice he had to swallow a lump
in his throat to help him to think. The Maha-
rajah's reason was that he supposed that Sonny-
Sahib had told the English about Lalpore's am-
munition ; and that, under the circumstances,
was enough to bring lumps into anybody's
thi'oat.

The Colonel was very busy, and took no notice
of him, except to say that he should have some
dinner. He heard talk of the Maharajah's visit
and of the durbar, and he revolved that too.
When the time came, Sunni had concluded that
he also must go to the durbar. He said so
to Colonel Starr.

"Nonsense!" said the Colonel. **And yet,"
he added reflectively, ** it might be useful to have
you there. I daresay you will be safe enough.
You are not afraid 1"

Sunni said he was not afraid. So they all
went, and the Maharajah, rising from his ivory
chair, received them with much state and cere-
mony. He frowned when he saw Sunni, but said

106

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

nothing. His Highness felt that he was not in a
position to resent anything, and thought bitterly
of Petroff Gortschakin.

The durbar i)roceeded.- Formally, and accord-
ing to strict precedence, each man spoke. With
great amiability Colonel Starr presented the de-
mands of the English Government ; with greater
amiability the Maharajah and his officers repelled
them. But Colonel Starr was firm, and he had
the unanswerable argument of three hundred
well-armed men and two nine-pounders, which
Maun Rao would have to meet with Petroff
Gortschakin's cartridges. After duly and sadly
reflecting upon this, the Maharajah concluded
that he would give up ee-Wobbis's murderers —
one of them at any rate — and let himself be ar-
ranged, at all events for the present. Afterwards
he would say to Maun Rao that it was only for
the present. He summoned all his politeness to
his aid, and said in the end that such was his ad-
miration for the English Lord Sahib in Calcutta,
such his friendship and respect, that he would

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

107

welcome any ooe who came to Lalpore in his
name.

*' Accompanied by a small force," added Colo-
nel Starr in the vernacular, and the Maharajah
also added, while Maun Rao behind him ground
his teeth, *' Accompanied by a small force."

"One word more," said the Maharajah, "and
the durbar is ended. The opium pledge will ap-
pear, and we will drink it with you. From the
palm of your hand I will drink, and from the
palm of my hand you shall drin> ; but the lips
of the boy who comes with you shall not taste
it. The Rajputs do not drink opium with their
betrayers."

Sunni heard and his face grew crimson.

" Maharajah ! " he shouted, " I did not tell ; I
did not tell."

The Maharajah shrugged his shoulders con-
temptuously.

" He is not of our blood ; why should he have

kept silence?" said the old man.

"But he did keep silence," said the Colonel,
8

n !i

108

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

looking straight into- the Chitan's sunken eyes.
*' I asked him about your men and your ammu-
nition. I commanded him, I threatened him. I
give you my word of honour as a soldier that he
would say nothing."

The English in India are always believed. A
cry went up from the other Chitans. Moti clap-
ped his hands together, Maun Rao caught the
boy up and kissed him.

** Then," said the Maharajah slowly, ** I love
you still, Sunni, and you shall drink the opium
with the rest. Your son," he added to Colonel
Starr, **will bring praise to his father."

The Colonel smiled. *'I have no children,"
said he. "I wish he were indeed my son."

" If he "is not your son," asked the Maharajah
cunningly, "why did you bring him to the
durbar ? "

'* Because he wished to come "

**To say that I did not tell," said Sunni.

"Call the woman," ordered His Highness

She was in the crowd in the courtyard, wait-

.?Bf ',''^»"'^

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

109

ing to see her old master pass again. She came

in bent and shaking, with her head-covering over

her face. She threw herself at Colonel Starr's

feet, and kissed them.

"Cap tan Sahib!" she quavered, "Captan

Sahib I Mirhani do I " *

There was absolute silence in the audience

hall. A parrakeet flashed through it screaming.

The shadows were creeping east over the marble
floor ; a little sun flamed out on the hilt of Maun
Rao's sword. The Colonel stooped over the old
woman and raised her up. His face whitened as
he looked at her.

**It's Tooni!" he said, hoarsely. And then,
in a changed voice, unconscious of the time and
place, "Tooni, what happened to the memsahib ! "
he asked.

The ayah burst into an incoherent torrent of
words and tears. The memsahib was very, very
ill, she said. There were not five breaths left in

Give mercy.

i^T.'i- . ■r<;7 VI.-.-

110

THE STORY OP SONNY SAHIB.

her body. The memsahib had gone in the jart —
and the chota baba * — the Sonny Sahib — had al-
ways had ffood milk — and she had taken none of
the memsahib's ornaments, only her little black
book with the charm in it

"That is true talk," interposed Sunni,
"Tooni's words are all true. Here is the little
black book."

Colonel Starr had the face of a man in a
dream, half conscious and trying to wake up.
His lips worked as he took the oilskin bag from
Sunni, and he looked at it helplessly. Little
Lieutenant Pink took it gently from him, slit it
down the side with a pocket-knife, and put back
into the Colonel's hand the small leather bound
book. On the back of it was printed, in tar-
nished gold letters, " Common Prayer."

It was a very little book, but the Colonel was
obliged to hold it with both hands. Even then
they trembled so that he could hardly turn to the

* The little baby.

' "TWI^^ i^l« '-Jin «V^J.WPia«4i^in*l

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB. m

fly-leaf. His eyes filled as lie read there,
"Evelyn Starr from John Starr, December 5th,
1855," and remembered when he had written that.
Still the shadows crept eastward, the mynas chat-
tered in the garden, the scent of the roses came
across warm in the sun. The Kajputs looked at
him curiously, but nc» one spoke.

The Colonel's eyes were fixed upon Sunni's
face. He made one or two efforts to speak that
did not succeed. Then "And this is the baby,"
he said.

"-Hazur, ha!''* replied Tooni, ''Sonny
^ I SaJiib hai ! "

The Colonel looked at Sunni an instant longer,
and the boy smiled into his face. " Yes," said
he assuredly, with a deep breath, "it is Sonny
Sahib."

*' The woman saw your honour this morning,
and the khaber was brought to me then," re-
marked the Maharajah complacently.

* " Your Honour, ves. It is Sonnv Sahib."

.'=«

112

THE STORY OF SONNY SAHIB.

It was three weeks, after all, before the Maha-
rajah of Chita was satisfactorily arranged. For
three weeks Thomas Jones indulged in roast kid
and curry every day from Lalpore, and Lieu-
tenant Pink, having no more warlike way of
amusing himself, made sanguinary water-colour
sketches of the city to send home to the Misses
Pink in England. The day came at last when
Colonel Starr and Sonny Sahib went to pay their
final respects to the Maharajah. With his hand
upon his son's shoulder the Colonel turned once
more after the last courtesy had been exchanged.

"Your Highness will remember," said the
English soldier for the pleasure of saying it,
"he did not tell."

THE END.

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author of "A Nymph of the West," etc.

" We confess to a great liking for the tale Mr. Seely tells . . . There are pecks of
trouble ere the devoted lovers secure the tying of their love knot, and Mr. Seely de-
scribes them all with a Texan flavor that is refreshing."— A^. Y. Times.

New York : D. APPLETON & CO., 72 Fifth Avenue.

il »™,llf JW«>»I,I

D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS.

OUND THE RED LAMP, By A. Con an Doyle,

author of " The White Company," " The Adventures of Sher-
lock Holmes," "The Refugees," etc. i2mo. Cloth, $1,50.

The " Red Lamp," the trademark, as it were, of the English country practitioner's
office, is the central point of these dramatic stories of professional life. 'I'here are no
secrets for the snrgeon, and, a surgeon himself as well as a novelist, the author has
made a most artistic use of the motives and springs of action revealed to him in a field
of which he is the master.

" A volume of bright, clever sketches, . . . an array of facts and fancies of medical
life, and contains some of the gifted author's best work." — London Daily News.

FLASH OF SUMMER. By Mrs. W. K. Clif-
ford, author of " Love Letters of a Worldly Woman," " Aunt
Anne," etc. i2mo. Cloth, $1.50.

" The story is well written and interesting, the style is limpid and pure as fresh
water, and is so artistically done that it is only a second thought tliat notices ic." — San
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HE LILAC SUNBONNET. A Lm^e Story. By
S. R. Crockett, author of "The Stickit Minister," "The
Raiders," etc. i2mo. Cloth, $1.50.

" A love story pure and simple, one of the old-fashioned, wholesome, sunshiny kind,
with a pure-minded, sourd-hcarted hero, and a heroine who is merely a good and beauti-
ful woman ; and if any other love story half so sweet has been written this year it has
escaped us." — New York Times.

J\/TAELCHO. By the Hon. Emily Lawless, author
-^^ of "Crania," " Hurrish," etc. i2mo. Cloth, $1.50.

"A paradox of literarj' genius. It is not a history, and yet has more of the stuff
of history in it, more of the true national character and fate, than any histoucl mono-
graph we know. It is not a novel, and yet fascinates us more than any novel." —
London Spectator.

^HE LA AW OF THE SUN. Vistas Mexicanas.

■^ By Christian Reid, author of " The Land of the Sky," " A

Comedy of Elopement," etc. Illustrated. i2mo. Cloth, .*r. 75.

In this picturesque travel romance the author of " The Land of the ?ky "
takes her characters from New Orleans to fascinating Mexican cities like
Guanajuato, Zacatecas, Aguas Calientes, Guadalajara, and f f course the C iiy
of iMexico. What they see and what they do are desciibcd in a viv?ci(Ji:s
style which renders the book most valuable to those who wish an inte .-btir.j^
Mexican travel-book unencumbered with details, while the story as a story
sustains the high reputation of this talented author.

New York : D. APPLETON & CO., 72 Fifth Avenue.

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HE THREE MUSKETEERS. By Alexandre
Dumas. An Edition de luxe (limited to 750 copies), with 250
Illustrations by Maurice Leloir. In two volumes. Royal 8vo.
Buckram, with specially designed cover. $i2.co.

By arrangement with the French
publishers, Messrs. D. Appleton
& Company have secured the
American rights for this, the
finest editi;m of Dumas's im-
mortal romance which has
been published. The illus-
trations are carefully printed
from tlie original blocks, and
this edition therefore has an
unapproachable distinction
in point of pictorial quality.

.."<^S"*3lH?S^

The translation has been scrupu-
lously revised, and every effort has
been made to present a perfect edition
of Dumas's masterpiece.

•' Such a book lends itself to the draughtsman's art, and both requires
and rewards decoration. But it must be decoration of the best ; and it has
waited long. At length, however — I have it before me now — an edition has
been prepared which should satisfy both the lovers of black and white and
the lovers of picturesque fiction. ... It is scarcely too much to say that
were Alexandre Dumas alive to-day, to see this latest form of his greatest
work — first published exactly fifty years ago — he who loved the sumptuous
w ith an almost tropical fervor, and buUt a grand theater for the production
of his own dramas, would weep tears of joy over his offspring." — Stanlry
J. Weyman, in The Book Buyer.

New York : D. APPLETON & CO.. 72 Fifth Avenue.

St)

EXANDRE

i), with 250

Royal 8vo.

the French
D. Appleton
e secured the
for this, the
Dumas's im-
! which has

The illus-
fuUy printed
I blocks, and
efore has an

distinction
}rial quality.

loth requires

; and it has

1 edition has

d white and

to say that

his greatest

; sumptuous

e production

"— Stanlry

cnue.