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But his instincts were manly and true. "Then run speedily, little one," he whispered, "back to the village. There is danger here in the dark." Little Shikara tried to speak, and he swallowed painfully. A lump had come in his throat that at first would not let him talk. "Nay, Protector of the Poor!" he answered. "I I came alone. And I I am thy servant." Warwick's heart bounded.
It never even occurred to them that Little Shikara might be a born jungle creature, expatriated by the accident of birth one of that free, strange breed that can never find peace in the villages of men. "But remember the name we gave him," his mother would say. "Perhaps he is only living up to his name."
Thus in time, with Warwick's influence, his would be a great voice through all of India. For small as he was, and not yet grown, he was of the true breed. After the shouting was done, Warwick turned to Little Shikara to see how he thought upon all these things.
The days are almost too hot, but the nights are cool and delicious, and the mosquitoes are only noticeable for a brief period of sinful activity about sundown, after which the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest. At half-past ten this morning we set sail; that is to say, we hired nine extra coolies and a second shikara to tow, and advanced on Srinagar.
"There are none of the King's soldiers here," the brown village folk replied to him. "Either thou liest to us, or thine eyes lied to thee. And didst thou also see the chevron that told his rank?" "That was the way I knew him. It was the black bear, and he wore the pale chevron low on his throat." This was Little Shikara all over.
Little Shikara had an inborn understanding and love of the jungle; and except for such material dangers as that of Nahara, he was not afraid of it at all. He had no superstitions in regard to it. Perhaps he was too young. But the main thing that the laugh did was to set off, as a match sets off powder, a whole heartful of unexploded indignation in Shikara's breast.
Human hearts grow shaken and bloodless from such sights as this they had just seen, and only the heart of a jungle creature the heart of the eagle that the jungle gods, by some unheard-of fortune, had put in the breast of Little Shikara could prevail against them.
They watched with drawn faces the growing darkness. But there was one among them who was not yet a man grown; a boy so small that he could hover, unnoticed, in the very smallest of the terrible shadow-patches. He was Little Shikara, and he was shocked to the very depths of his worshipping heart.
Nay thou wilt be a herdsman, like thy father and perhaps gather many rupees." But Little Shikara did not want to think of rupees. Even now, as sleep came to him, his childish spirit had left the circle of thatch roofs, and had gone on tremulous expeditions into the jungle.
She had seen the last part of the drama in front of the village; and she was too frightened even to notice the curious imperturbability of her little son. But there was no orderly retreat after Little Shikara had heard the two reports of the rifle.
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