CHAPTER II
A DINNER À DEUX

 
Ho! A flowing bowl and a merry lass,
And a fig for monk or friar!
And the clean white light
Of a sword in fight,
And gold to my heart's desire.
 

The Buccaneer.

Eight o'clock! There was just time to dress and reach Hawkshawe's house, unless Jackson wanted to be late for dinner. He was unromantic enough to have an extremely good appetite, and a man must dine even if he is going to make the old East new. He got through his dressing as quickly as possible, and found his pony waiting for him under the portico that protected the front door of the house. Ah-Geelong followed close at his heels with an enormous hand lantern, which threw a blaze of light many yards around them. Peregrine protested.

"There is a bright moon, Ah-Geelong; you surely do not want a lamp! You might as well bring an umbrella!"

"Plentee snakee, master," and the Chinaman pointed generally all around him with a long knotted bamboo staff. The argument was unanswerable. Out of deference, therefore, to the cobra the lantern was permitted to assist the moonlight, and the procession moved off. Peregrine determined that, snake or no snake, he would come back without the lantern, and as he rode took little mental bearings, in order to guide himself home again. On arrival, he sent back the pony with his groom, and Ah-Geelong disappeared into the servants' quarters with his cosmos burner. Hawkshawe came forward with cordial greeting, and it might have been fancy, but as they entered the drawing-room Peregrine thought he saw the curtain that guarded the entrance to a side door falling swiftly, and the flicker of a silken tamein as it vanished from sight.

"Take that long chair," said Hawkshawe, "and have a sherry and bitters; it will give you a fillip up!"

Jackson did not want the fillip up, but he took the sherry and bitters. He did not do so, however, in his host's scientific way. Hawkshawe first sprinkled the bitters in, and holding the glass before him bent it on one side, slowly turning it until there was a streak of burnt sienna winding round the inside; then he poured in the sherry and drank sip by sip with deep satisfaction. "It's the only way to get the true flavour of the bitters," he remarked. This was, of course, utter nonsense; but Hawkshawe fully believed it, and said the words so positively that his listener bowed to his superior knowledge and also believed. When Hawkshawe had absorbed some of the flavour of the bitters, he asked, "How have you been amusing yourself since I left you-office files?"

"No, a lot came in, but I have reserved them for later on. I've been writing letters. The mail goes out to-morrow, and I took the opportunity to write home."

"Of course you did. I never write home now. The fact is I haven't seen Old England for many a long year now, and one loses touch. Besides, I never was a good hand at writing letters, and I don't suppose anything I have to say would be particularly interesting."

"I should have thought it was quite the other way, Hawkshawe."

As Jackson spoke dinner was announced, and they moved to the dining-room. It was dinner à deux, and for a few moments the conversation was general, Hawkshawe asking about friends at the capital, most of whom Jackson had met, notwithstanding his short stay there; but in this respect the East is a very small place. Finally Hawkshawe got on to the subject of his work, and gave a most interesting account of the robber gangs, or dacoits, that infested the district, concluding by expressing his firm belief that the chief malefactor was a well-known priest, who to all appearance had abandoned the world, but who, Hawkshawe was convinced, although he had apparently nothing to support his statement, acted as a fence, and was at the bottom of all the mischief.

"And you really think," inquired Jackson, "that this man is a sort of head centre? It seems improbable, if what I have read and heard of the Buddhist priesthood is true; but I suppose there are exceptions."

Hawkshawe slowly raised his glass to the light and watched the little beads in the Ayala. "Nothing is improbable in this country, as you will find after a few years' experience," he answered, half in mockery and half in earnest. "For instance, I believe it is really true that the bad characters of the adjoining district of Myobin were all driven here by the mosquitoes. They grow a special kind in Myobin-big gray ones about half an inch long, and striped like a tiger. They were more effective than the police; the dacoit couldn't stand them and came here, worse luck!"

"The obvious course, then, would be to import some of your tiger-striped friends," laughed Jackson.

Hawkshawe sighed. "We have done that, but it was of no use; there is something in the air here which does not agree with that particular brand of insect life. But, joking apart, the dacoits are a very serious evil here, and I have made little or no headway against them. Now and then I score a success, but I put down all my failures to the priest Bah Hmoay-old Father Fragrance."

"I suppose there is no way of clearing the fragrant old gentleman out?"

"None; but if one could be devised, you would end all our troubles and earn Smalley's undying gratitude as well. But Bah Hmoay is a power in the land in more ways than one, as you will find before many weeks, or rather days, have passed."

"Why Smalley's gratitude in particular?"

"Because two of a trade never agree, I fancy. I don't mean by this that Smalley is a dacoit in disguise, but that they are both bigoted representatives of religion, and each believes the other to be the fiend himself. By the way, the mention of Smalley reminds me that I have explained your little mistake of this morning to the reverend Habakkuk, and he is quite prepared to smoke the pipe of peace with you; and this is well, as he is the only doctor within a hundred miles, and no one knows what may happen. Of course, he will bother you a good deal; but I should think you would know how to meet him when he opens fire on the mission side."

"It was very good of you to explain. I think also that I know what Smalley wants, and I must say I don't see why Government should help the mission on purely religious grounds-and he won't take help on any other. As an educationalist, Smalley should of course be helped, and the same argument would apply to the pagoda schools, over which I suppose Bah Hmoay presides. I don't think we should bring in religion into grants in aid, and it doesn't seem as if Christianity suits the Eastern. What do you think?"

"Don't know; all that's beyond me. I do know, however, that the native Christian is generally a d-d scoundrel. Try these cigars-they are specially made, and you must be patriotic and adopt your new country properly. If you won't face them, there are some Havanas-made of cabbage leaves probably."

"Thanks," said Jackson, "but I am afraid I am not yet blooded sufficiently for a Burman cheroot. I shall move up to the height by easy stages, and, if you will permit me, will stick to the Havanas, which I am sure you libel."

"They are better for the nerves, at any rate," replied Hawkshawe, and Jackson noted how the flaring, sputtering vesta he lighted trembled in the policeman's hand as he held it to the cheroot. For the true enjoyment of tobacco there must be silence and repose. Although Jackson was utterly unable to attack a yard of poison, such as Hawkshawe was smoking, he knew how to enjoy a cigar, and the Havana was very good. The little incident of the curtain and the silken robe came into his mind again, and he caught himself getting curious about it. Hawkshawe was smoking nervously with quick, short puffs; he continually took the cheroot out of his mouth and rolled it between his fingers, apparently to make the rank leaf draw easier, and assisted his tobacco with short nips of old brandy-a thing which was not good to see. Jackson made no attempt to speak, and they smoked without a word being exchanged until the silence was apparently too much for the policeman, and he suddenly asked, "I suppose you like your new house?"

"Very much indeed. You were right in saying that Drage did himself well. It is very nearly perfect."

"Do you know what became of his impedimenta?"

Jackson understood the question, and flushed with anger. He controlled himself, however, and answered shortly: "No; those are matters about which I am not in the least concerned, nor do I think any one else should be."

"Don't you?" said Hawkshawe-his potations had evidently loosened his tongue-"don't you? Well, it will force itself on you some day. You shy at it now. We all did-I did-Thomson, Perkins, Drage did-and yet you see we are as we are. We have found that the cycle of Cathay is better than the fifty years of Europe."

"And you call yourselves rulers of men! Why should you go down to the level of the brute if you happen to live near him?"

"Don't know, my dear fellow, except that one gets to like, or like the brute after a time. Why, man," and Hawkshawe rose and began to pace the room, "what have we got to live for in this infernal country? You rot here-rot, I say-and your mind and your body both go to ooze and slime. Books! One can't read in this climate. The blue mould covers them up, as it has covered me, and as it will cover you and many a better man yet, and you will be as I am." Hawkshawe filled his glass and drank to the dregs. It seemed as if he were toasting the success of his hideous prophecy. "And you will be as I am!" The words hit Jackson like a life sentence. He looked at the man before him, at the promise in the high aquiline features and still, clear eyes, and then he saw the little crowsfeet round the eyelids, the puffy cheeks and trembling hands, and shuddered. No! It would never come to that with him. But a dread rose in his heart. What, after all, if he was wrong in his thoughts of his strength? Hawkshawe looked to him with a strange light in his eyes. "Come," he said, "let me show you what it is like."

It was evident that Hawkshawe was determined, with a half-drunken persistence, to continue a subject that was more than unpleasant to his guest, and there was only one course open to Jackson, and that was to get away as quietly as possible. "I don't think I will venture," he replied, "and, at the risk of offending you, I must ask you to excuse me for to-night. One always has a lot to do on first coming to a place, and I am no exception to the rule. No, not any more, thank you, to-night; but I will have another of those cheroots, if I may."

"I suppose if wilful will, then wilful must, but you are losing a new experience," said Hawkshawe, as he accompanied his guest to the door. He there found that Peregrine was going to walk home. "Let me order my trap for you, or a pony, if you prefer to ride?" he asked.

"No, thanks, Hawkshawe; there is a bright moon, and I know my way perfectly. I go to plan the suppression of Bah Hmoay. Goodnight!"

The hard gravel crunched under his firm footsteps as he walked down the drive. Hawkshawe stood looking after him. "He knows his way, he says. I wish I knew mine. Mr. Peregrine Jackson strikes me as rather a cold-blooded prig. I never could stand that sort of fellow-no," and, as if to keep his heart up, he sang:

 
"Pass the bowl, the merry, merry bowl,
Let it brim with good red wine.
I have pledged my soul
To the merry, merry bowl,
And the ruby light of wine."
 

He trolled out the verse in a rich baritone as he walked upstairs and entered his drawing-room. Taking up a book, he flung himself into the same long chair he had so hospitably pressed on Jackson earlier in the evening. He glanced over the leaves for a few moments; but the effort to read was beyond him, and putting down the volume he stared moodily into space. He had done this for years. Every evening, except when he was on active service-and he was keen enough then-he had drunk more than was good for him, and sat drearily through an hour or so before going to sleep. Ordinarily he did not think at all on such occasions; but somehow Jackson's attitude had impressed itself on him, and he was feeling nervous and depressed. There was that also which brought a hot flush of shame to his forehead, for he had lied to his guest when he had expressed his inability to bring Bah Hmoay, the dacoit priest, to justice. It would all come out some day, and then he, Hawkshawe, would be cast adrift on the river of shame. "D-n!" he hissed between his teeth, and buried his hot face between his hands.

The curtain before a door that led to an inner room was lifted, and a figure entered the room. It was that of a woman dressed in the national costume of Burma, which is so adapted to conceal as well as reveal the figure. Taller than ordinary, she had a face and form of imperial beauty, and as she stood there, looking at the bowed head before her, it was possible to understand Hawkshawe when he said that for himself he had chosen the cycle of Cathay. She crossed the room with light steps, and, laying her hand on his shoulder, asked in Burmese, "What is the matter? Are you ill?"

Jackson had touched a lost chord in Hawkshawe's memory, and the murmurs of the white past were sighing in his ears. He raised his head wearily, and drooped it again. "No, Ma Mie, not ill in body but sick at heart."

She looked at him, and, untutored savage as she was, she understood, and, stooping suddenly, kissed him with a fierce little pressure. "Hawkshawe," she said, "I have news for you-good news. Look up, my husband!"