Danger at Dahlkari Read online

As we drew closer to the jungle, I could see huge gray boulders near the edge that looked for all the world like herds of gigantic elephants. As the caravan moved slowly on, the steel-gray sky gradually turned to yellow as the sun began to set. When we finally struck camp, the sky was a darkening yellow-orange, deep golden streamers on the horizon. The tents were pitched. Fires were started. Horses and camels were herded together in a makeshift rope corral. We were camped in a large clearing, the enormous gray boulders looming up on three sides, the jungle forming a fourth. The protective boulders afforded a sense of security missing on the open sands, and everyone seemed far more relaxed that they had been the night before. I was more relaxed, too, my fears quite forgotten.

  “More curry,” Sally said, strolling over to join me in front of our tent. “What wouldn’t I give for a nice slab of beef and some Yorkshire pudding.”

  “I thought you adored the native dishes,” I teased.

  “I do,” she retorted, “I do indeed. They’re quite interesting, but seven days a week? I’m beginning to hate curry, Miss Lauren. I might as well confess it.”

  There was a mournful note in her voice, and I had to smile. Sally was a delightful creature, not quite as tall as I and exceedingly well endowed, a fact her gold and brown sprigged yellow cotton dress did nothing to hide. Her full, rounded bosom strained against the low-cut bodice, and the snug fit emphasized her slender waistline. The full skirt cascaded over flaring cotton petticoats. With her saucy brown eyes and long tarnished gold curls, Sally was indeed a fetching sight, a bit too bold, a bit too earthy to be a suitable companion for Miss Lauren Gray of the Hampton Academy for Select Young Ladies.

  “I suppose we’ll get proper English food at Dahlkari?” she said.

  “I should think so.”

  “No more of those dreadful chapati, I hope, and I must admit I’ve had enough rice to last me a lifetime. Have you seen Ahmed around?” she inquired abruptly.

  “Not recently. Not since we stopped, in fact.”

  “I’ve been looking for him. Can’t find him anywhere.”

  “I wonder where he could have gone?”

  “I don’t know,” she replied wearily. “I wandered a bit behind the boulders, and—Miss Lauren, I saw the strangest thing. There was a gigantic hole, way over there, behind the largest group of rocks.”

  “A hole?”

  “It—it looked freshly dug. I thought it most unusual.”

  “Why would anyone want to dig a large hole?”

  “I don’t know. It wasn’t all that deep, really, not more than four or five feet, but it was very wide. An elephant could easily curl up in it. Strange—”

  Sally shook her head, a slight frown creasing her brow. All around us there were sounds of camp. Small fires crackled. Pots jangled as the evening meal was prepared, exotic odors wafting through the air. Two bearers were feeding the animals, and in front of his tent Yasmin Singh was giving orders to his servants. The five strangers wandered around the camp separately, more friendly than they had been before. I saw one of them chatting with the men who carried my palanquin, another talking to a servant cooking rice in a bubbling pot. The sky was an ashy gray now, and on the horizon streaks of dark crimson-orange glowed fiercely, gradually fading. Twilight was beginning to fall, a slight blue haze thickening in the air, and the intense heat was, thankfully, over.

  “Why were you looking for Ahmed?” I asked.

  “I wanted him to show me those ruins in the jungle. There’s a crumbling old temple, he said, all covered with vines and adorned with the most unusual carvings. There used to be a city there, hundreds of years ago, but the temple’s all that’s left now.”

  “Ahmed told me about it. It sounds fascinating.”

  “I had my heart set on seein’ it,” she said, peeved. “Now why would he disappear like that, the rascal? Truth to tell, Miss Lauren, Ahmed’s been acting a bit—well, cheeky of late. Like he can take liberties just because I’m friendly.”

  “I expect you’d best watch yourself,” I told her. “Ahmed isn’t like the others. He—he’s not English. The natives have very definite ideas about women, about—”

  “Don’t I know it,” Sally interrupted. “He’d like to ravish me and toss me into a harem or seraglio or whatever they call ’em in India. It’s quite exciting, of course, but, all the same, there’s something a bit frightening about it. He does look a dream with those glorious dark eyes and that enchanting grin, but—” She paused, searching for words.

  “Ahmed isn’t quite the uncomplicated youth he appears to be,” I supplied.

  “You got that impression, too, then?”

  I nodded. “He makes me a bit uncomfortable.”

  “That’s it. That’s it exactly. Oh, he’s a marvel with words, a regular poet, said my hair was like liquid gold, my eyes like dark topaz, my body like—well, uh, he is poetic, but I have the feeling something savage is lurking just beneath the surface, ready to spring. It’s most disconcerting.”

  Sally reached up to brush a lock of gold hair from her temple, a troubled look in her eyes. The horizon was a blaze of crimson now, the ashy gray sky turning darker. The blue haze of twilight grew thicker. A camel squealed. Horses neighed. Tents flapped as a slight breeze swept through the camp. One of the bearers had begun to play a flute. For some reason I was restless, and I could sense that Sally was, too. She sighed and looked at the green wall of jungle, trees festooned with garlands of vines and exotic plants. The birds and monkeys had grown silent.

  “I did so want to see that temple,” she said. “Ahmed said it was used for human sacrifice—Miss Lauren, let’s go find it! It’s just a short distance from camp, Ahmed said so. We could get there and back before it gets really dark.”

  “I—I’m not sure we should, Sally.”

  “Why not? You’re not afraid, are you?”

  “Well, I thought I heard a leopard last night, and—”

  “I’ll take my pistol,” Sally informed me.

  “Pistol?”

  She nodded and scurried away, her yellow skirt fluttering over rustling petticoats. I wasn’t really alarmed at the prospect of taking off into the jungle. None of the wild creatures would bother us, I knew, unless we bothered them first, but I wasn’t greatly taken with the idea of encountering a cobra or some other poisonous viper. Still, Sally and I were both wearing high kid boots, mine white, hers brown, and she would have her pistol. I wondered where on earth she had gotten it.

  “Corporal Hendricks gave it to me,” she said, returning a moment later. “He said if I was fool enough to go traipsing off with a band of heathens I’d best have some protection. Isn’t it lovely?” she inquired, brandishing it in front of me. It was long and black and looked perfectly villainous.

  “Do—do you know how to use it?” I asked.

  “I haven’t the foggiest notion, but I’m sure it’s simple enough. This is the safety catch. You just push it back and aim the barrel and pull the trigger. It can’t be difficult.”

  “You’ve had it ever since we left Delhi?”

  “I kept it hidden under the cushions of my palanquin,” she said, “just in case we ran into some of those dreadful Thugs or something. Do let’s go while there’s still enough light, Miss Lauren. I’m quite eager to find that temple.”

  Our tent was nearest the jungle, pitched rather apart from the rest of the camp for propriety’s sake, and no one seemed to notice as Sally and I moved across the narrow stretch of clearing and on into the natural tunnels formed by tree trunks and vines. The jungle wasn’t really all that dense here, not nearly as dense as some of the stretches the whole caravan had passed through earlier on. There was a pathway of sorts between trees, and Sally moved ahead with great confidence, looking a bit ridiculous with petticoats billowing and the pistol clutched in her hand.

  “I’m not at all sure we should be doing this,” I told her.

  “Where’s your sense of adventure?” Sally asked. “Just think, Miss Lauren, you could be sitting in some prim
parlor, doing embroidery. This is more like it! Here we are, in the middle of the jungle. Who’d of thought it three months ago?”

  “Certainly not I. I had no idea what I was going to do after graduation. I rather imagined I’d be a governess.”

  “I can just see that,” Sally replied, most disrespectfully. “You’ve far too much spirit to be in charge of a passel of snooty brats. You never did fit in with those other la de dah girls, you know.”

  “I know. I feel rather guilty about it.”

  “Always arguing with the teachers, always breaking rules, sneaking up to the attic to visit with me, telling me all the things you’d been reading and thinking about.”

  “I—don’t think I could have endured it without you, Sally,” I confessed.

  “And vice versa. They would have loved to have sacked me, but I was a treasure and they knew it. Besides, the orphanage placed me, and their board of directors were very important people who would have been most displeased. The academy knew which side their bread was buttered on.”

  “That’s for sure. That’s the only reason I wasn’t expelled. Letters of complaint to my guardian were all they dared. Sally, are—are you sure we’re going in the right direction? I—I’d hate to get lost. We really should have told someone what we were going to do.”

  “Ahmed said it was just a short ways from the campsite, due north. We’re moving north, aren’t we?”

  “I’ve no idea.”

  “You’re supposed to be able to tell by looking at lichen and things,” she said chattily, “but I don’t see any lichen. If we keep walking we’re bound to run into it.”

  Deeper and deeper into the jungle we moved, trees arching overhead and trailing thick vines studded with pink and white blossoms. For a while we had been able to hear sounds of camp, but now there was no sound but that of kid boots moving over damp, spongy earth. No other sound. It was puzzling. Why weren’t the monkeys scolding us from branches? Why weren’t the birds calling? It … it was almost as though they’d been frightened away, I thought, apprehension beginning to mount inside. Thin rays of pale yellow light streamed down through the treetops like wavering, mote-filled columns. How long would the light last? This was indeed foolish. I should never have let Sally talk me into it, I knew, but I was too stubborn to let her see my apprehension. She despised vapid, nervous females almost as much as I did.

  “—tiger,” she said.

  “What’s that?” She had been chattering all the while, and I hadn’t heard a word she was saying.

  “I said I hope we don’t run into a tiger.”

  “This isn’t tiger country,” I told her.

  “That’s a relief. Is—is that a cobra, Miss Lauren?”

  “It’s only a vine, Sally.”

  “Goodness, it gave me quite a start. I—I would have thought we’d have run into the ruins by now,” she said. “I’d say we’ve come at least half a mile.”

  “At least,” I agreed.

  “I—I wonder what’s happened to the monkeys?”

  Sally was beginning to feel it, too, then, A curious atmosphere hung over the jungle, something I couldn’t place. Ordinarily it would have been noisy and almost friendly with the green parakeets and white cockatoos flitting through sunlight and shadow, the small, boisterous gray monkeys swinging and jabbering overhead, but now there was a strange, expectant hush that was most unnerving. Shadows deepened all around us as the wavering columns of yellow light grew thinner, paler, everything green and black and ominous. I had the feeling that someone else had been here just recently, had passed this way only moments before.

  “Maybe we’d better go back,” I suggested.

  “Not till we’ve seen the ruins,” Sally said stubbornly. “They can’t be far now. Come on, Miss Lauren. I—I’ve got my gun. There’s no need to be nervous—”

  She seemed to be trying to convince herself of that as well. Squaring her shoulders, she moved on down the twisting pathway, ducking to avoid the overhanging branches, pushing flowering vines aside, and I followed close on her heels, trying to convince myself that there was no reason for my apprehension. Still, it was patently absurd for two English girls in summer frocks and kid boots to be trouping through the jungle like intrepid explorers, pistol or no. Most improbable. What on earth had possessed me to be so foolhardy? I had always been impetuous, yes, but this was carrying it altogether too far.

  “Sally, this is insane. We’re turning back right now, and I want no argument—”

  “Look,” she said quietly.

  She stopped, holding back a vine, and I hurried up to stand beside her. Ahead there was a small clearing in the jungle, completely surrounded by trees and not much larger than an average sized room. It was flooded with sunlight, yellow-orange now, the light deepening, streaming over the ruins. I was stunned, horrified by what I saw, and Sally was, too. She stepped into the clearing and I followed her, but neither of us had any desire to move closer to the hideous thing on the other side. Sally reached for my hand and held it tightly, both of us staring at the crumbling ruins of the temple and the grotesque goddess that perched there.

  There were two broken columns on either side of a flat platform, rock pink-gray and weathered, streaked with rusty stains, and Kali perched obscenely on the platform on one foot, the other leg raised, four arms waving, hands clutching vile objects, tongue thrust out and hair like coiling serpents. The idol was black, some kind of marble, I thought. It was the most frightening thing I had ever seen. The deep orange rays of light wavered, and the idol cast long black shadows over the ground of the clearing, shadows that seemed to move and dance. I noticed the dark, ancient stains on the platform in front of the centuries-old idol and remembered what Sally had said about human sacrifice. I wouldn’t have been at all surprised to have seen a pile of skulls and shattered bones.

  “Kali,” I whispered.

  “It—it fairly gives me the shivers,” Sally said. “It seems—almost alive, like it was looking at us, daring us to come closer. She’s the one the Thugs worship, the one who tells ’em to do their foul deeds.”

  “It’s—only a statue,” I told her.

  A sudden wind swept through the jungle. Leaves rustled violently and tree limbs groaned, vines swinging. Sally gripped my hand tighter as the shadows seemed to dance like dark demons. Kali seemed to dance, too, arms waving viciously, the raised foot ready to stamp and crush, the long tongue thrust out lewdly as rays of dark orange light spilled over her like liquid fire. My blood seemed to run cold. There was a moment of sheer, stark horror, and then the wind ceased and the shadows grew still. The silence returned, even more ominous now.

  It was then that I felt it. Someone had been here.

  “Miss Lauren—”

  “You—you feel it, too?”

  Sally nodded. “There was someone here—just recently.”

  The air in the clearing was filled with vibrations, as though retaining the impressions of those who had just left. It was like a room that had been vacated only moments before. At first I had thought I was imagining it, but Sally had the same feeling. She was still gripping my hand, so tightly that my fingers felt crushed. Her cheeks were pale, her soft pink lips parted, and her eyes were dark and troubled, a deep crease between her brows. Sally was the most levelheaded person I had ever known, absolutely fearless, but she was deeply shaken now.

  “Th—there,” she said. “On the ground. Look—”

  I followed her gaze and saw the pick axe half-hidden in the grass only a few feet in front of us. The blade glistened brightly, razor-sharp, recently polished, and the long handle was carved with bizarre, intricate designs. I knew what it was immediately, for I had read about their axes. The Thugs used them to break up the bodies of their victims to make burial simpler, used them to puncture stomachs so that gases wouldn’t cause the corpses to swell in the ground and give away the secret burial places. I shuddered, and for a moment I thought I was going to faint. Sally gripped my hand even tighter, staring at the ax
with sheer horror.

  “They were here,” she said. “One—one of them must have dropped it. It—it must have slipped out of his sash while he was leaving.”

  “You know what it is?”

  “I know,” she said grimly.

  “Sally, we—we must get back at once. We must warn—”

  “I imagine it’s too late,” she told me. “That hole I saw—I know what it was for. They—they select the site in advance, and they have men in their bands whose duty is to prepare the—the grave so that it will be ready. They—they generally infiltrate the caravans they plan to attack, Miss Lauren, and—”

  “Those five men who joined us—”

  Sally nodded again, and both of us looked at the obscene black idol of the goddess of death and destruction. It seemed to mock us. I remembered all the things I had read about the Thuggee, almost overcome with horror now as I thought about the caravan and what might be happening to it at this very moment. Yasmin Singh, Ahmed, the bearers … all of them brutally murdered, yellow scarfs slung around their throats, mercilessly tightened. Dark waves seemed to rise and swell inside my head, and I could feel my knees grow weak.

  “It may not be too late,” Sally said, suddenly calm, her voice hard and determined. “Perhaps we can get back in time, warn them—it’s the element of surprise that enables the Thugs to move so effectively. The men are armed, and if they’re prepared, expecting an attack—”

  “You’re right,” I said. “We—we must hurry.”

  We left the clearing without a moment’s hesitation, rushing back toward the caravan over the twisting, turning pathway, limbs and vines pushed out of the way, thorns tearing at our skirts. It was darker now, the last rays of sunlight almost gone, the jungle a mass of black and green-black shadow, rustling leaves, slithery noises, ominous, frightening. A bird called out in shrill alarm, a nerve-shattering sound that caused my heart to leap. I stumbled over a root, almost falling. Sally seized my arm. We had to hurry. We had to warn them. There were tears in my eyes as we raced through the jungle, panting now, both of us, and then Sally stopped abruptly.