The Story of Sonny Sahib by Sara Jeannette Duncan (short story to read .txt) 📕

heard her to the end without a word or a change of expression. When she had finished, 'My soldiers were not there,' he said thoughtfully, and with a shade of regret, which was not, I fear, at the thought of any good they might have done. Then he seemed to reflect, while Tooni stood before him with her hands joined together at the finger-tips and her head bowed.

'Then, without permission, you brought this child of outcasts into my State,' said he at last. 'That was an offence.'

Tooni struck her forehead with her hand.

'Your Highness is my father and my mother!' she sobbed, 'I could not leave it to the jackals.'

'You are a wretched Mussulman, the daughter of cow-killers, and you may have known no better--'

'Your Highness!' remarked Sonny Sahib, with respectful indignation, 'Adam had two sons, one was buried and one was burned--'

'Choop!' said the Maharajah crossly. You might almost guess that 'Choop' meant 'Be quiet!'

'But it was an offence,' he continued.

'Protector of the poor, I meant no harm.'

'That is true talk. And you shall receive no harm. But you must leave the boy with me. I want him to play games with my son, to amuse my son. For thirty days my son has asked this of me, and ten days ago his mother died--so he must have it.'

Tooni salaamed humbly. 'If the boy finds favour in Your Highness's eyes it is very good,' she said simply, and turned to go.

'Stop,' said the Maharajah. 'I will do justice in this matter. I desire the boy, but I have brought his price. Where is it, Moti-ji?'

The little Maharajah laughed with delight, and drew from behind him a jingling bag.

'It is one hundred and fifty rupees,' said the Maharajah. 'Give it to the woman, Moti.' And the child held it out to her.

Tooni looked at the bag, and then at Sonny Sahib, salaamed and hesitated. It was a provision for the rest of her life, as lives go in Rajputana.

'Is it not enough!' asked the Maharajah irritably, while the little prince's face fell.

'Your Highness,' stammered Tooni, 'it is great riches--may roses be to your mouth! But I have a desire--rather than the money--'

'What is your desire?' cried the little prince. 'Say it. In a breath my father will allow it. I want the gold-faced one to come and play.'

The Maharajah nodded, and this time Tooni lay down at the feet of the little prince.

'It is,' said she, 'that--I am a widow and old--that I also may live in the farthest corner within the courtyard walls, with the boy.'

The Maharajah slipped the bag quickly into the pocket of his blue and yellow coat.

'It is a strange preference,' he said, 'but the Mussulmans have no minds. It may be.'

Tooni kissed his feet, and Sonny Sahib nodded approval at him. Somehow, Sonny Sahib never could be taught good Rajput manners.

'The boy is well grown,' said the Maharajah, turning upon his heel. 'What is his name?'

'Protector of the poor,' answered Tooni, quivering with delight, 'his name is Sonny Sahib.'

Perhaps nobody has told you why the English are called Sahibs in India. It is because they rule there.

The Maharajah's face went all into a pucker of angry wrinkles, and his eyes shone like little coals.

'What talk is that?' he said angrily. 'His great-grandfather was a monkey! There is only one master here. Pig's daughter, his name is Sunni!'

Tooni did not dare to say a word, and even the little prince was silent.

'Look you,' said the old man to Sonny Sahib. 'Follow my son, the Maharajah, into the courtyard, and there do his pleasure. Do you understand? FOLLOW him!'


CHAPTER V

'Sunni,' said Moti, as the two boys rode through the gates of the courtyard a year later, 'a man of your race has come here, and my father has permitted him to remain. My father has given him the old empty jail to live in, behind the monkey temple. They say many curious things are in his house. Let us ride past it.'

In his whole life Sunni had never heard such an interesting piece of news before--even Tooni's, about the Maharajah's horseman, was nothing to this. 'Why is he come?' he asked, putting his little red Arab into a trot.

'To bring your gods to the Rajputs.'

'I have no gods,' declared Sunni. 'Kali is so ugly--I have no heart for her. Ganesh makes me laugh, with his elephant's head; and Tooni says that Allah is not my God.'

'Tooni says,' Sunni went on reflectively, 'that my God is in her little black book. But I have never seen him.'

Perhaps this Englishman will show him to you,' suggested Moti.

'But His Highness, your father, will he allow strange gods to be brought to the people?'

'No,' said Moti, 'the people will not look at them. Every one has been warned. But the stranger is to remain, that he may teach me English. I do not wish to learn English--or anything. It is always so hot when the pundit comes. But my father wishes it.'

A pundit is a wise old man who generally has a long white beard, and thinks nothing in the world is so enjoyable as Sanskrit or Arabic. Sunni, too, found it hot when the pundit came. But an English pundit--

'Moti-ji,' said Sunni, laying his arm around the little prince's neck as they rode together, 'do you love me?'

Moti caught Sunni's hand as it dropped over his shoulder. 'You know that in my heart there is only my father's face and yours, Sahib's son,' he said.

'Will you do one thing, then, for love of me?' asked Sunni eagerly. 'Will you ask of the Maharajah, your father, that I also may learn English from the stranger?'

'No,' said Moti mischievously, 'because it is already spoken, Sunni-ji. I said that I would not learn unless you also were compelled to learn, so that the time should not be lost between us. Now let us gallop very fast past the jail, lest the Englishman should think we wish to see him. He is to be brought to me to-morrow at sundown.'

The Englishman at that moment was unpacking his books and his bottles, and thinking about how he could best begin the work he had come to Lalpore to do. He was a medical missionary, and as they had every variety of disease in Lalpore, and the population was entirely heathen, we may think it likely that he had too much on his mind to run to the window to see such very young royalty ride by.

'Sunni-ji,' said Moti that afternoon in the garden, 'I am very tired of talking of this Englishman.'

'I could talk of him for nine moons,' said Sunni; and then something occurred which changed the subject as completely as even the little prince could desire. This was a garden for the pleasure of the ladies of the court; they never came out in it, but their apartments looked down upon it, and a very high wall screened it from the rest of the world. The Maharajah and Moti and Sunni were the only people who might ever walk there. As the boys turned at the end of a path directly under the gratings, they heard a soft voice say 'Moti!'

'That is Matiya,' said the little prince. 'I do not like Matiya. What is it, Matiya?'

'It is not Matiya,' said the voice quickly, 'it is Tarra. Here is a gift from the heart of Tarra, little parrot, a gift for you, and a gift for the Sahib's son; also a sweet cake, but the cake is for Moti.'

'I am sure it was Matiya,' said Moti, running to pick the packet out of the rose-bush it had fallen into; 'but Matiya was never kind before.'

The packet held a necklace and an armlet. The necklace was of little pearls and big amethysts strung upon fine wire, three rows of pearls, and then an amethyst, and was very lovely. The armlet was of gold, with small rubies and turquoises set in a pattern. The boys looked at them more or less indifferently. They had seen so many jewels.

'Matiya--if you think it was Matiya--makes pretty gifts,' said Sunni, 'and the Maharajah will keep your necklace for you for ever in an iron box. But this armlet will get broken just as the other two armlets that were given to me have got broken. I cannot wear armlets and play polo, and I would rather play polo.'

'That is because you were clumsy,' Moti answered. Moti was peevish that afternoon. The Maharajah had refused him a gun, and he particularly wanted a gun, not to shoot anything, but to frighten the crows with and perhaps the coolie-folk. To console himself Moti had eaten twice as many sweetmeats as were good for him, and was in a bad temper accordingly.

'Now they are certainly of Tarra, these jewels,' exclaimed Sunni, 'I remember that necklace upon her neck, for every time Tarra has kissed me, that fifth stone which has been broken in the cutting has scratched my face.'

'In one word,' said Moti imperiously, 'it was the voice of Matiya. And this perplexes me, for Matiya, hating my mother, hates me also, I think.'

'Why did she hate your mother?' asked Sunni.

'How stupid you are to-day! You have heard the story two hundred times! Because she thought that she should have been chosen to be queen instead of my mother. It is true that she was more beautiful, but my mother was a pundita. And she was not chosen. She is only second in the palace. And she has no children, while my mother was the mother of a king.'

'No,' said Sunni, 'I never heard that before, Moti.'

'But I say you have! Two hundred times! And look, O thoughtless one, you have gone between me and the sun, so that even now your shadow falls upon my sugar-cake--my cake stuffed with almonds, which is the kind I most love, and therefore I cannot eat it. There,' cried Moti, contemptuously, 'take it yourself and eat it--you have no caste to break.'

For a minute Sunni was as angry as possible. Then he reflected that it was silly to be angry with a person who was not very well.

'Listen, Moti,' he said, 'that was indeed a fault. I should have walked to the north. But I will not eat your cake--let us give it to the red and gold fishes in the fountain.'

'Some of it,' said Moti, appeased, 'and some to my new little monkey--my talking monkey.'

The fishes darted up for the crumbs greedily, but the monkey was not as grateful for her share as she ought to have been. She took it, smelt it, wiped it vigorously on the ground, smelt it again, and chattered angrily at the boys; then she went nimbly hand over hand to the very top of the banyan-tree she lived in; and then she deliberately broke