The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1890-11-07
BEYOND THE PALE.


A man should, whatever happens, keeI
10 his own caste, race and breed. Let the
white go to the white and the black to the
black. Then, whatever trouble falls is in
the ordinary course of things neither
sudden, alien nor unexpected
This is the story of a man who willfully
stepped beyond the safe limits of decent
every day society, and paid for it heavily
He knew too much in the first instance,
and he saw too much in the second. He
took too deep an interest in native life, but
he VIII never do so again.
Deep away in the heart of the city, be-
hind Jitha Megji's bustee, lies Amir Mathis
| gully, which ends in dead wall pierced
! by one grated window. At the head of the
| gully is big cowbyre, and the walls on
| either side Of the gully are without win
| dows. Neither Suchet Singh nor Gaur
| Chand approve of their women folk look
| ing into the world. If DUrga Charan had
been of their opinion he would have been
a happier man today, and little Bisesa
would have been able to knead her own
| bread. Her room looked out through the
| grated window into the narrow, dark
| gully, where the sun never came and where
the buffaloes wallowed in the blue slime
She was a widow, about IS years old, and
she prayed the gods day and night to send
her lover, for she did not approve of liv-
ing alone.
One day the man-Trejago his name was
came into Amir Mathis gully on an aim
less wandering, and after he had passed
the buffaloes stumbled over big heap of
cattle food
Then he saw that the gully ended in a
trap, and heard little laugh from behind
the grated window. 1t was a pretty little
laugh, and Trejago, knowing that, for all
practical purposes, the old Arabian Nights
are good guides, went forward TO the win
dow and whispered that verse of 1.-The
Love Song of Har Dyal'' which begins:
Can man stand upright in the face Of the
naked sun; or lover in the presence Of his be-
loved'
If my feet fail me, o heart of my heart, am to
blame being blinded by the glimpse of your
beauty
There came the faint tchinks of a wom-
ans bracelets from behind the grating, and
little voice went on with the song at the
fifth verse:
Alas! alas can the moon tell the Lotus of her
love when the gate of heaven is shut and the
clouds gather for the rains?
They have taken my beloved, and driven her
with the pack horses to the north.
There are iron chains on the feet that were set
on my heart
Call to the bowmen to make ready
The voice stopped suddenly, and Trejago
walked out of Amir Mathis gully wonder
ing who in the world could have capped
1.-The Love Song of Har Dyal" so neatly
Next morning as he was driving to Office
an old woman threw packet into his dog
cart. In the packet was the half of a
broken glass bangle, one flower of the blood
red dhak. pinch of bhusa or cattle food
and eleven cardamoms. That packet was
letter-not clumsy, compromising letter,
but an innocent, unlntelligible lovers
epistle.
Treiago knew far too much about these
things, as | have said. No English man
should be able to translate object letters
But Treiago spread all the trtles on the
lid of his Office box and began to puzzle
them out
a broken glass bangle stands for Hin
doc widow all India over; because, when
her husband dies, a woman's bracelets are
broken on her wrists. Trejago saw the
meaning of the little bit of the glass The |
flower of the dhak means adversely de /
sire" come" write" or danger" ac- |
cording TO the other things with it, One |
cardamon means jealousy" but when |
any article is duplicated in an object letter |
it loses its symbolic meaning and stands /
merely for one of a number indicating |
time, or, if incense, curds, or if saffron be |
sent also, place. The message ran then: /
"A widow-dhak flower and bhusa-st ii 1
O'Clock" The pinch of bhusa enlightened 4
Treiago. He saw-this kind of letter 4
leaves much TO instructive knowledge |
that the bhusa referred to the big heap of |
cattle food over which he had fallen in |
Amir Maths gully, and that the message /
must come from the person behind the |
grating, she being widow. SO the mes
sage ran then, "a widow, in the gully in /
which is the heap of bhusa, desires you to
come at II o'clock"
Trejago threw all the rubbish into the /
fireplace and laughed. He knew that the /
men in the east do not make love under
windows at II in the forenoon. nor do \
women fix appointments a week in adj /
vance So he went that very night at IL |
into Amir Maths gully clad in boorka.
which cloakS a man as well as a woman
Directly the gongS in the city made the
hour the little voice behind the grating
took up The Love Song of Har Dyal" at
the verse where the Panthan girl calls
upon Har Dyal to return. The song is
really pretty in the vernacular. In English
you miss the wall of it. 1t runs something
like this:
Alone upon the housetops 10 the north
turn and watch the lightning in the SKY;
The giam0r Of thy footsteps IN the north,
Come back 70 me, beloved or dIe.
Below my feet the stin hazar is laid.
Tar, far below the weary camelS lie
The c2melS and the csptves of thy raid;
Come back 10 me, beloved, or ! die!
Sly fathers wife is old and harsh with years,
And drudge Of all my fathers house ami
My bread is sorrow and my drink is tears;
Come hack 10 me, beloved, or die
As the song stopped Trejago stepped up
under the grating and whispered: i am
here"
BIsesa was good to look upon.
That night was the beginning OF many
strange things, and OF double life so wild
chat TreJago today sometimes wonders il
Il were not all a dream BiSeSa or her old
h2ndmaiden, who had thrown the object
'etter, had detached the heavy grating from
he brick work OF the wall: 80 that the
window slid inside, leaving only square
II raw masonry into which al active man
nig ht climb.
In the daytime Trejago drove through