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Updated: May 14, 2025
No man knew from Cumner's speech who was to be Dakoon, yet every man in Mandakan said in the quiet of his home that night: "To-morrow Pango Dooni will be Dakoon. We will be as the stubble of the field before him. But Pango Dooni is a strong man."
And Pango Dooni sat on the ground near them and pondered, and no man broke his meditation. When the two hours were gone, they mounted again and rode on through the dark villages towards Mandakan. It was just at the close of the hour before dawn that the squad of troopers who rode a dozen rods before the columns, heard a cry from the dark ahead. "Halt-in the name of the Dakoon!"
Pango Dooni should be Dakoon! Pango Dooni came forward and said: "If as ye say I have saved ye, then will ye do after my desire, if it be right. I am too long at variance with this Palace to sit comfortably here. Sometime, out of my bitter memories, I should smite ye.
Before two minutes had passed one had ridden back to the orderly, who reported to the Colonel that the Dakoon had commanded the shooting of five men of the tribe of the outlaw hill-chief, Pango Dooni, against the rear wall of the Palace, where the Dakoon might look from his window and see the deed. The Colonel sat up eagerly in his chair, then brought his knuckles down smartly on the table.
A look of satisfaction came into Pango Dooni's face. "Speak with the man alone," said he, and he drew back. Cumner's Son drew a little to one side with the man, who spoke quickly and low in English. "I have spoken the truth," said he. "I am Cushnan Di" he drew himself up "and once I had a city of my own and five thousand men, but a plague and then a war came, and the Dakoon entered upon my city.
The commander, who had not turned in, on coming on deck and hearing the case, promised poor Pango that he should be protected; and to do so effectually, at once entered him on the ship's books.
At the Residency another thousand men encamped, with a hundred hillsmen and eighty English, under the command of Tang-a-Dahit and McDermot. By the Fountain of the Sweet Waters, which is over against the Tomb where the Dakoon should sleep, another thousand men were patrolled, with a hundred hillsmen, commanded by a kinsman of Pango Dooni.
It went abroad through the city that Pango Dooni and Cumner paid great homage to the dead Dakoon, and the dread of the hillsmen grew less.
Cumner, the Governor, and McDermot heard the cry of the hillsmen, too, and took heart. Boonda Broke tried to divide his force, so that half of them should face the hillsmen, and half the Residency; but there was not time enough; and his men fought as they were attacked, those in front against Pango Dooni, those behind against Cumner.
For long they rode silently, and in that time Cumner's Son found new thoughts; and these thoughts made him love the brown hillsman as he had never loved any save his own father. "When there is peace in Mandakan," said he at last, "when Boonda Broke is snapped in two like a pencil, when Pango Dooni sits as Dakoon in the Palace of Mandakan "
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