Читать книгу Caravans By Night - Harry Hervey - Страница 13

Table of Contents

Dana awakened with a start. Involuntarily she sat up in bed, staring drowsily about the room. It was buried in dusk. The moonlight, floating through the casement, crusted the floor with a band of pearl. As full consciousness wiped the threads of sleep from her brain, she wondered what had caused her sudden awakening. No noise, for silence shut down like a lid, made more intense by the sighing of trees beyond the stone terrace. The sounds of a clock on the dressing-table seemed to stitch the hush.

For a moment she sat there, vaguely uneasy; then swung her feet over the side and slipped them into bedroom sandals. Moving quietly to the dressing-table, she looked at the clock. After one.... Her sandals lisped on the floor as she crept to the window.

Delhi lay asleep in the breathless night. Temple, tower, dome and minaret swam in the moonlight, and in the jungle stretch by the river jackals were laughing hysterically. With a little shiver she returned to the bed.

Strange to awaken like this, she thought. The new surroundings probably. She sighed and settled deeper in the bed.

... She was almost asleep when a shadow flitted across her vision. At first it seemed a part of the slumber that had nearly overcome her, and she lay there contemplating the window-casement where it had passed until it was borne to her, suddenly, and not without a shock, that she was fully awake and the shadow was not a shadow, but a very substantial human form that had stolen by on the stone terrace. The realization drew her muscles rigid, and she lay motionless, listening to the hammering of her heart.

A faint scraping noise came from Alan's room. What was it, a footfall? An oblong reservoir of darkness outlined the doorway. She could see nothing.... She must move, must call her brother. But her body was locked in a temporary paralysis, her tongue dry.

Again the sound. Unmistakable. Some one was walking stealthily. The crackle of paper.

Her fright increased, swelled, became so acute that she could no longer endure it.

"Alan!"

It was not a scream; a whisper. She found that she could move, and she sat up.

From the next room came a series of thuds; bare feet on the floor.

"Damn you—"

She leaped out of bed.

A ripping sound. A groan. Another thud, heavier this time.

Dana reached the communicating door in a few steps. A quick intake of breath. Her hands closed upon the door-frame, tightened convulsively. Dimness swam visibly before her. Through the dark mist she saw a figure dart out upon the stone terrace and disappear.

Beside the bed, stretched full length upon the floor, was a white form.

She screamed. The dimness dissolved and she rushed to the body.

"Alan! Alan!"

She grasped his shoulders, dizzy, cold with horror. Involuntarily she drew one hand away and saw a dark stain upon her fingers. It seemed to glare out and strike her eyes. She fought against a gathering weakness; forced herself to feel his heart. Beating. But that white face! And how could she lift him to the bed, how—

Footsteps rang from the hall. Came a knock at the door; a voice penetrated the panels.

Dana rose, found the light-switch and turned it. The flood of yellow gave warmth and strength to her—showed her a blue coil in the middle of the room. Dimly she realized it was a turban cloth—probably torn from the intruder's head. She did not touch it, but unlocked the door.

The Eurasian proprietor stood outside, in a dressing-gown. Behind him was a dark-skinned porter. A door opened further along the hall.

"My brother!" she gasped, motioning toward the white form.

The Eurasian spoke to the porter. They entered and placed the unconscious man upon the bed. Oblivious of the fact that she was clad only in a nightdress, Dana stood by, trying to collect her scattered faculties.

"If you will call a doctor," she said, "I'll attend to him now."

"Yes, madam. I'll have the boy fetch some water and smelling-salts from my wife's room. How did this happen?"

"I—I can't think—now," she returned dazedly. "Later...."

The Eurasian said something, but she did not remember what it was; remembered only that he and the porter went out. A moment after the door closed she heard voices in the hall.

"O Alan!" she pleaded, bending over her brother. "Can't you hear me?"

Several minutes passed before he showed any symptoms of reviving; then he mumbled a few unintelligible words, and the lids drew back from his eyes.

"Dana!"—weakly. "He—took it—"

"What, Alan, dear?"

"The scarf—confounded imitation." He closed his eyes; opened them an instant later. "I'll be all right,"—with a smile. "Nothing serious. Don't mention the scarf, or anything about it. Just say—thief...." The lids sank over his eyes. "Imitation," he muttered. And fainted again.

... The Eurasian returned shortly, with the porter at his heels. The latter carried a basin of water and several bottles.

"If you'll allow me to attend to him," offered the proprietor, "it will spare you much unpleasantness."

Dana nodded and sank into a chair, shivering.

Nearly an hour passed before the doctor arrived. Alan had regained consciousness, but fainted during the examination. Dana, standing beside the bed in her negligee, waited nervously to hear the decision.

"I don't think you have any cause to be uneasy," said the doctor, after what seemed an interminable time. "The wound isn't serious—only the muscles and tissues punctured—nothing internal. But I'm going to suggest, rather, insist, that he go to a hospital."

"By all means," agreed Dana, very close to tears. "I want everything possible done for him."

The doctor smiled sympathetically. "Be sure we'll do all we can," he assured her. "Now, if you'll have some one fetch a basin of water, boiled, I'll get at this dressing."

Close to dawn, after the doctor had departed and Alan was conscious, Dana went to her room to dress. At the doorway she paused—for the blue turban-cloth lay coiled upon the threshold where she had tossed it. Incidents of greater importance had crowded the remembrance of it from her brain. Now she stooped and picked it up, rather gingerly. Queer. For imitation pearls!

She lowered her eyes, suddenly, involuntarily—as though in obedience to a subconscious command.

On the spot where the turban-cloth had lain was a small scrap of paper.

Thus, having jested with a puppet at Indore and given a thread into the hands of Dana Charteris, Destiny, capricious as the winds, turned toward the officer of the empire upon whom a chalk-mark had previously been placed.