Читать книгу A Desert Bride - Hume Nisbet - Страница 6
ОглавлениеINTRODUCING JACK BANGLES AND RONALD MACIVOR.
The extraordinary adventures of my two heroes might cause some people to doubt their authenticity, were it not already well known that the chronicler is a man of the strictest veracity.
One of my heroes was, alas! a very common youth, that is, he had no sort of correct bringing up at all, but picked most of his education from about the streets, which not being edifying, gained for him the title of a bad boy unmistakably, and what was worse, he never had any aspirations to become better, in spite of all that the chaplain and some of the benevolent ladies of the mission tried to do for him.
Benares was the city where, like Topsy, he "growed." Benares, that beautiful and holy city on the river Ganges, where the pilgrims came to wash away their many sins. Perhaps the pilgrims left a number of their sins, along with their loose hairs, on the banks of this sacred river, and which may partly account for this foolish young fellow picking up so much that was objectionable to respectable and orderly people.
His name was Jack; now, I fancy that Jack is the most appropriate name for a reckless and untrained young man. At least, all the bad boys are generally known as Jack, while the staid and good ones are called John.
Jack Bangles was the name he went by, although he had been christened John Adolphus D'Arcy, and his surname was Norman and ancient like the family his scapegrace father belonged to; however, the soldiers of Benares had dropped the Adolphus D'Arcy, and given him Bangles as a friendly nickname, as they are generally so fond of doing with their favourites, so as Bangles we must know him through this story.
His father, at one time a captain in the army, had deserted his wife and company very early in Jack's career, leaving mother and son destitute in this holy city; and as for that mother, there is not much to say about her, for she was a very ordinary if hard-working and honest little woman. She had been a pretty but fifth-rate actress before her marriage, but her beauty had soon faded in India, while she was forced to utilise her poor abilities at concerts and music-halls, in order to keep herself and little Jack from starvation; painting her face up and decorating herself with the cheap ornaments of the East, and with all the other stage devices, only making at the best of times starvation wages, so that they had both to go to bed very often hungry, until Jack grew big enough to cater for himself, after which things didn't go so badly with them.
Ronald MacIvor was the name of my other hero, the son of an English officer who had been about a twelvemonth located in the land, and who, a fine frank fellow himself, trusted his son out of sight without any conditions, satisfied that he had the blood of the MacIvors in his veins, and that this lofty strain was quite sufficient to help his boy in the only path which a perfect knight and gentleman can possibly walk.
The two boys had met by accident one day. Ronald MacIvor, passing aimlessly along the streets on this hot day, had seen Jack Bangles trying to defend himself against a crowd of cowardly Eurasians; and Ronald, like his father, being a creature of impulse and chivalry, without much consideration for caste, rushed to the rescue, helped to scatter the assailants, and only then turned to examine the side which he had taken, to find himself being thanked by a fearfully tanned and tatterdemalion boy of his own age, yet who appeared more like a stage prince in disguise than a bona fide pariah beggar of Benares.
A boy of about thirteen, slender and straight as a dart, with limbs beautifully proportioned, and complexion, although almost as dark as a native's with the fierce sunshine beating so constantly upon it, yet showing unmistakably European; for there can be no mistaking the sickly olive of the native for the sun-tan on the skin of a brunette Englishman. Jack Bangles looked English to the back-bone in spite of his rags, and, what was more, he looked like what the pure-bred aristocrat of long descent is supposed to appear.
Classical and strongly-marked features, flashing brown eyes, with the whites as they should be, snow-white teeth behind those ripe-red lips—the gnawing of old bones and dry crusts had polished those ivories as no dentifrice could have done—small shell-like ears, small yet strong and well-shaped hands, and finely arched and pointed feet. With his wavy and tangled shock of dark hair and general pose of grace, resolution, fearlessness and innate strength, Ronald MacIvor did not take long to sum up this ragged prince, or decide about offering him his friendship.
"You are a mem-sahib boy, are you not—a mother's darling, ain't you?" observed this youthful cynic a little scornfully, as he looked over the other's neat clothes, while he contrasted his own rags, with the feeling that gratitude might exist, but friendship never, with such inequality.
"I have no mother," replied Ronald, a little sadly.
"But you own a father, don't you?"
"Yes."
"Then he'd never allow you to take up with the likes of me."
"Yes, he would; you come and see him."
"Hum! I'll tell you what I am game to do. You've got a father, and I have a mother; come and see my old woman first, and if you can stand her into the bargain, I'll go with you and see what sort your dad is, then perhaps we can be friends after that, for you can fight—almost as well as I can myself."
Jack took his finely-dressed new-made friend into the hovel where his mother spent her days, and introduced her to the boy, who did not seem in the least degree affected either by her appearance or her surroundings.
Mrs Bangles was, at this hour of the morning, a withered, shrivelled, yellow-visaged little scarecrow, with hollow eyes, who passed most of the time smoking cheroots until the moment when the mysteries of the toilet began. Then she would retire from sight to an inner apartment, and after a couple or so of hours' seclusion, she would emerge round-faced, clear-complexioned and almost beautiful, with her golden tresses and flashing eyes. That, however, was only, of course, when she had an engagement to sing. When Ronald first saw her, she was at her smoking and withered stage, so that he saw nothing to alter his determination to be the sworn friend of her handsome son, for the hovel, although poorly furnished, was clean and tidy. Jack, who was watching him jealously, grew softened at the utter unconscious of this rich boy, and said,—
"You're a good sort, Ronald, and if your father lets us, I'll be your friend."
The boys then went out together to interview the captain, who, when he had examined Jack, saw nothing to prevent the compact; he might be a bad boy certainly, but he was not a cringing one, and as for his clothes, that evil could easily be remedied.
So Jack Bangles and Ronald MacIvor became chums, or rather Ronald the rich boy became the dutiful henchman and follower of the more dominant Jack, whom privations and scorn had made older than his years.
No greater contrast could be imagined than these two friends; for while Jack was dark and finely built, Ronald was thick-set, large-boned and fair as a Norseman, with fearless blue eyes, golden hair and ruddy skin. He had spent most of his young days in the Highlands before coming to India, and therefore had to depend altogether upon the native knowledge of the other, so that, before the first day of the league was over, Jack Bangles had taken the post of leader quite naturally and easily; and as he had now a suit of Ronald's clothes on, he looked the character to perfection, while Ronald did not at all object to be patronised, or play the subordinate part. He had a vast amount of generous affection in his disposition, with an utter unconsciousness of dignity, and although he would have quarrelled instantly, and fought as well, if he had seen anything low or mean about his companion, yet, not seeing this, he was content to follow where the other led.
As for Jack, well, he was a boy who was getting his chance for the first time in his life; who had been regarded by most of the people who knew him as a hopeless case, who might by-and-by make a fairly good soldier when he was old enough to enlist, but who at present could not be too much kicked and hunted about.
But there was nothing mean or cruel about him for all that; he hated liars, and would have abhorred himself if, to save his hide, he could have stooped to tell a lie. Animals were safe also at his hands, for, indeed, hitherto they had been his only friends; and, with all his ignorance of books, he had a singularly imaginative mind, well stored with native legends, and a sturdy idea that the time would yet come when, by a lucky stroke, he would conquer all their misfortunes, and raise his poor mother, whom he loved in a fierce sort of way, from her present position of poverty and neglect.
These were some of the vague ideas which filled the mind of this dark-eyed boy in his serious moments, but which were not quite so common, perhaps, as the moods that made him the terror of Benares.
