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Kudrat Sharif smiled with frank affection on the boy, as he drew his right hand away, to touch his forehead in the Indian salaam. The gesture showed both grace and dignity as Dickson Sahib had said. "I am exalted to carry back to my stockades the story of the manner of your work, Son-of-Power," he began. "My name is Sanford Hantee," Skag deprecated gently.
And now Skag heard of the coming of the messenger with the strange elephant; and the black edging began to run about Deenah's tale, as he revealed the ugly possibilities in his own mind that the Monster Kabuli had his part in this sending: ". . . Now Hantee Sahib must learn," Deenah finished, "that not within four hours' journey from Hurda; nay, not within six hours' journey from Hurda, is there any native prince with the dignity of one elephant."
The ayah's voice finished in the tones of ceremony; and she moved smoothly from the room, unconscious that she had not been dismissed. The following evening, after the police commissioner had gone down, the ayah brought report concerning the stranger. His name was Sanford Hantee Sahib. He was an American Sahib. He did not consort with any of his own people, nor with Europeans.
There was a keen squeal from ahead, answered by a fiery hissing intake of Chakkra's breath: "That, Sahib, is the murderous mahout using his steel hook. . . . Yes, it was by necessity, the Deputy Sahib said. Certainly it was by necessity!" The fling of a white arm again. Sanford Hantee was standing. "Carlin!" he called. The answer came back to him in some mystery of imperishable vibration.
Much in his silence afterward, and in the great still joy that had come to him, Sanford Hantee chose to reflect upon the mystery of pain he had known on the lonely out-journey the spiritless incapacity to cope with life the loss even of his mastercraft with animals. He would look toward Carlin in such moments and then look away, or possibly look within.
Sanford Hantee of the Natural Research Department, after much opportunity to wrestle with the subtle and gritty and hard-testing demon of delay, came at last to Hurda again, and stepped out of the coach with a throb in his chest and a knot in his throat which only the best and bravest soldiers have brought in from the field.
His name was Sanford Hantee, but you will hear that only occasionally, for the boys of the back streets called him Skag, which "got" him somewhere at once. That was in Chicago. He was eleven years old, when he wandered quite alone to Lincoln Park Zoo, and the madness took him. A silent madness. It flooded over him like a river.
Mitha Baba rocked on her feet a moment, calling a curious low call a question, softly spoken. At once there was the sound of rapid movement in front. Then Mitha Baba literally whirled plunging away at incredible speed almost exactly in the opposite direction from the one she had been facing. Doctor Carlin Deal Hantee tried to remember Skag tried to remember her own name.
"And you say there was no sign from the tiger, but that Hantee Sahib knew when the instant was past?" the famous marksman repeated curiously. Carlin nodded. "But how did he know?" "Ask him," she said. "Huh," he muttered. "I might as well enquire of the Dane beastie." Fever Birds Carlin had been listless for a day or two. This was several weeks after her forty-two hours on Mitha Baba.
N.B. The Sahib is to enquire of his servant Bhanah what is the native meaning of "walk softly." He will find Bhanah entirely trustworthy in all matters of information. Skag looked up and the old cook spoke: "I, who am speaking to Sanford Hantee Sahib, am Bhanah entered into covenant before the gods that I am his servant to serve him with my strength, so long as I endure to live.
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