Leonie of the Jungle Part 28

The bay caught the side of the pony's bleeding mouth, causing the wretched animal to rear from pain and twist sideways into a bullock cart.

In its usual leisurely way the bullock swung itself also sideways, and almost under the bay's feet, causing him to lose a precious second, for which Cuxson made up by a ruthless use of his spurs, whilst before Leonie's eyes, quite close, through the trees, appeared the funnels and masts of the river craft.

"Oh!" she said involuntarily, having retained no impression during her motor drives of the road to Kidderpore; as the Devil tore with her across the old polo ground and the old Ellenborough course, straight to the crowded Strand Road.

And then she sighed a little sigh of relief, for the bay heaved alongside and a hand stretched for her bridle.

Side by side they clattered across the Strand towards the Prinseps Ghat, standing just as ostracised and white as the Marble Arch.

Would the two horses crash headlong into the columns, or would the Devil yield in time to the strong hand pulling on the bit?

Neither.

Terrified by the shouts of the populace, and the shrill whistling from the river, he raced along so close to the left side of the monument that Cuxson's boot scratched against the stone.

But as they crashed across the Strand and the sharp incline on the other side of the railway lines appeared, Cuxson, knowing that the moment had arrived, dropped his reins, and gripping the bay with his knees, leant over towards Leonie as she dropped her reins, and loosening her grip on the pommel, prepared to break her neck or her back or both as she slipped from the saddle.

Then she felt an arm round her waist.

She knew intuitively her rescuer's intention, _but_----!

Would a man's left arm be strong enough to lift her across her horse's hind-quarters at the terrific speed they were going, combined with her weight?

Would he be able to hold her until his horse slackened speed, or would they both overbalance and hurtle to the ground together? Would there be time to stop the horse, or would they all be hurled into the water?

The questions had hardly flashed through her mind when she felt herself lifted and swung.

For one petrifying moment the bay, pulled savagely until blood stained the bit, reared with its double weight within a yard of the steep incline, then, yanked cruelly by its master, swung sideways and came down; just as the Devil, striving at the last moment to check his wild career, hesitated for one half-second, then, pushed by his own terrific impetus, slid over the incline, and turning a complete somersault backwards, crashed into the water.

Leonie's scarlet mouth trembled, and her yellow-green eyes gleamed as the man she loved pressed both her hands in his against his coat, until the high relief of the b.u.t.ton was marked upon her skin, even through her glove.

"You," she said, so softly that the one note sounded like the chime of a temple bell.

"You!" he said, giving her arms a little savage wrench, then letting her go as the sound of approaching hoofs heralded the arrival of the first of the hunt to be in at the averted death.

A score or more of natives in their vivid colours, which seem so atune with all that has to do with love, mattered not at all; but Leonie turned and pointed casually to the Devil, enjoying his matutinal bath, as the boy flung himself from the discredited polo pony on which he had done his best.

He seized both her hands and held them very tightly, then catching sight of Cuxson, let them go suddenly.

"Of course!" he said, "of course you would--you lucky beggar!" Then added triumphantly, "But anyway, _I_ told her so!"

CHAPTER XXIX

"A merry heart doeth good like a medicine!"--_The Bible_.

Guy Dean, the cheery optimistic lad who wors.h.i.+pped openly at Leonie's beautiful feet, and who was seeing the world at the behest of his wealthy old father, had been as good as his word.

Bursting with excitement, he hurled himself into his racing-car one Sunday morning, about a fortnight after Leonie's hasty ride riverwards, and pa.s.sed like a whirlwind through the fairly empty streets of Calcutta and the suburb of Ballygunge to the Jodhpur Club.

She was waiting for breakfast under the trees with some friends, discussing the four-some they had just finished, and watching the arrival of various cars which were parked, with some difficulty, with the others which had arrived earlier.

"Sounds all right," said Cuxson, as he looked with disfavour upon the club's breakfast _piece de resistance_, namely fatty sausages and mashed of all things. "I am beginning to feel quite thrilled. Let's see, it will take us about a day to get to Tiger's Point by launch from Kulna, and there we find monkeys, adjutant birds, spotted deer, and tigers all ready."

"Don't rot!" said young Dean. "I've bribed the finest _s.h.i.+kari_ in the whole of Bengal to stage-manage the whole thing; he did seem rather contemptuous over the _chotar s.h.i.+kar_, as he called it, I must say, until I began to juggle with backsheesch, and then he bucked up considerably and said he would do his very best to provide sport for the mems. The programme includes a ruined temple but not a tiger, 'cause he says it would be too risky a job at such short notice; also, and the real reason _I_ should say, there hasn't been a tiger seen, anyway killed, since one was wounded and caught near that same Hindu temple umpteen years ago."

Leonie wrinkled her forehead at the last sentence, and looking up caught Jan Cuxson's eyes upon her.

"That sounds _so_ familiar," she said perplexedly, "I----"

"The tiger at the Zoo which we knew all those years ago was trapped near a ruined Hindu temple in the Sunderbunds, Lady Hickle," he said quietly, watching the curious dilation of the pupils in the greenish eyes as he spoke.

"The very one!" broke in young Dean, as he suspiciously eyed a proffered curry.

"How did you come to think of the stunt?"

"I ran up against a perfectly top-hole native prince at polo last month. Amongst other things we started talking elephant and _bagh_--tiger, you know," laughed the lad, who always seemed to be on the point of bursting with high infectious spirits. "No, take it away, I will _not_ eat a cold _chupattie_ of the consistency of a bicycle tyre--as I was saying, we talked tiger, and somehow or other he suggested a few days' pursuit, through the Sunderbunds, of the spotted deer, muntjak or sambur----"

"Neither."

"Well, they're _spotted_."

"Dogs, perhaps."

Ignoring the execrable repartee, the boy turned completely round to Leonie.

"By the way, Lady Hickle, if you ever go to Benares, don't forget to get off _en route_ and visit the tomb of what's-its-name, it's quite near--oh! I forget--but it's on one of this fellow's father's estates.

They don't let many people go and see it--afraid, I expect, of paper bags but if you _do_ go you'll find an elephant or two hanging about to take you to the place in state. He's, the native prince, got some of the finest elephants in the whole of this mosquito-ridden land--makes a hobby of them."

"What happened to the original tiger?"

"Noah pushed him into the ark."

The lad grinned, and offered his cigarette to Leonie, who shook her head.

"Oh! stop fooling, Dean. Did a sahib manage to trap the brute, or what?"

"Yes! and sent it across to Blighty and shoved it into the Zoo.

They're frightfully sick about that tiger being in a cage; they wouldn't have minded a sahib killing it for the good of mankind it seems, but putting it behind bars is an insult to some G.o.d, or something like that. Are you any good as a gun, dear lady?"

Leonie smiled at the tardiness of such an important question.

"Fair," she said, refusing an unkempt pot of marmalade as she turned to Cuxson. "I used to pa.s.s most of my holidays with the Wetherbournes, you know them, don't you? They were awfully keen on sports, and had a rifle-range, but I could beat them any day with a revolver."