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

els routine c. once WORK, or put on Ms
calling clothes ard called on the ladies OF
the station; wandering how long they
would know aiii if they knew of poor little
Bisesa a. t:I' a.An ala the city was
still, came the walk Ender the evil smell
ing boorka, the patroi through Jitha
Megji's bustee, the quick turn into Amir
Maths gully between the sleeping cattle
and the dead walls. and then, last of all,
Bisesa, and the deep, even breathing of the
old woman who slept outside the door OF
the bare little room that Durga Charan
allotted to his sisters daughter. Who OF
what Durga Charan was Trejago never in
quired; and why in the world ne was not
| discovered and knitted never occurred to
him till his madness was ever, and Bisesa.
But this comes later.
Bisesa was an endless delight 10 Trejago.
She was as ignorant as bird and her dis
torted versions of the rumors from the out
side world that had reached aer in her
room amused Trejago almost az much as
| her lisping attempts to pronounce his
name, Christopher" The first syllable
was always more than she coule manage,
and she made funny little gestures with
her roseleaf hands, as one throwing the
| y,
! jago, asked him, exactly as an English
woman would do, if he were sure he loved
her. Trejago swore that he loved her more
than any one else in the world. Which
was true.
After a month of this folly the exigen-
cies of his other life compelled Trejago to
be especially attentive to lady of his &C
quaintance. You may take il for fact
81, Is IL l.;
ticed and discussed by mans own race
but by some hundred and fifty natives as
well. Trejago had to walk with this lady
and talk to her at the band stand, and
once or twice to drive with her, never for
an instant dreaming that this would affect
his dearer out-of-the-way life. But the
news flew in the usual mysterious fash
ion from mouth to mouth, till Bisesas
duenna heard of it and told Bisesa The
child was so troubled that she did the
household work evilly, and was beaten by
Durga Charan's wife in consequence.
A week later Bisesa taxed Trejago with
the Irritation. She understood no grada-
tions and spoke openly. Trejago laughed
and Bisesa stamped her little feet-httle
feet, light as marigold flowers, that could
lie in the palm of a mans one hand.
Much that is written about oriental
passion and impulsiveness" is exaggerated
and compiled at second hand, but a little
of it is true; and when an Englishman
finds that little it is quite as startling as
any passion in his own proper life. Bsesa
ragged and stormed, and finally threatened
to kill herself if Trejago did not at once
drop the alien Memsahib who had come
between them. Trejago tried to explain,
and to show her that she did not under
stand these things from a western stand
point. Bisesa drew herself up and said
simply:
81 do not. know only this-it is not
good that | should have made you dearer
than my own heart to me, Sahib. You are
an Englishman. l am only black grip
she was fairer than bar gold in the mint
land the widow of black man."
Then she sobbed and said: but on my
soul and my mothers soul, l love you.
There shall no harm come to you, what
ever happens to me-"
Trejago argued with the child, and tried
to soothe her, but she seemed quite unrea-
sonably disturbed. Nothing would satisfy
her save that all relations between them
should end He was to go away at once.
And he went. As he dropped out at the
window she kissed his forehead twice, !
and he walked home wondering
A week and then three weeks passed |
without a sign from Bisesa. Treiago, |
thinking that the rupture had lasted quite |
long enough, went down to Amir Mathis /
gully for the fifth time in the three weeks, /
hoping that his rap at the sill of the shift /
ing grating would be answered. He was
not disappointed.
There was young moon, and one stream |
Of light fell down into Amir Mathis gully |
and struck the grating which was drawn
away as he knocked From the black dark
Bisesa held out her arms into the moon
light. Both hands had been cut off at the
wrists, and the stumps were nearly healed.
Then, as Bisesa bowed her head between
her arms and sobbed, some one in the room
grunted like wild beast, and something
sword or spear-thrust at
Trejago in his boorka. The stroke missed
his body, but cut into one of the muscles
of the groin, and he limped slightly from
the wound for the rest of his days.
The grating went into it's place. There
was no sign whatever from inside the
but ;he moonlight strip on
the nigh wall and :he blackness of Amir
Maths gully behind.
The next thing Trejago remembers, after
raging and shouting like a mailman be-
tween those pitiless walls, is That he found
himself near the river as the dawn was
breaking, threw away his boorka and went
home bareheaded.
What the tragedy was-whether Bisesa
had in a fit of causeless despair told
Z - L.
covered and she tortured to tell; whether
Durga Charan knew his name and what
became of Bisesa-Trejago does not know
to this day Something horrible had hap
pened, and the thought of what il must
have been comes upon Trejagoin the night
now and again, and keeps him company
till the morning. Onespecial feature of the
case Is that he does not know where lies
the front of Durga Charan's house 1t
may open on to a court yard common to
two or more houses, or it may lie behind
any one of the gates of Jitha Megli's bus
tee. Treiago cannot tell. He cannot get
little Bisesa-back again He
has lost her in the city where each mans I
house is as guarded and as unknowable as
.he grave; and the grating that opens into
Amir Mathis gully has been walled up.
but 1reJago pays his calls regularly, and
S reckond very decent sort of man.
There is nothing peculiar about him ex- I
,ept slight stiffness, caused by a riding
strain, in the right leg.-Rudyard kipling.
Tea Plantations of the HimaIayas.
The lower hills of the Himalayas are GOV.
red with tea plantations. The plants look {
lot unlike well trimmed lockwood hedges,
md they rise in terraces up the sides of ;
he hills Here and there you may see a