However, clocks continued ticking. Roosters crowed. The sun appeared on schedule time. And Willoughby's funeral was marked by dignified simplicity.
Except that he hugely regretted his friend Willoughby, Cottswold Ommony cared for none of these things. He sat near the electric fan in a corner of the club smoking room, aware that he was being discussed, but also quite sure that he did not mind it. He had been discussed, on and off, ever since he came to India. He looked quite unlike Hypatia, whatever Willoughby may have thought of his character.
"Willoughby overrated him," said somebody. "You can't tell me Ommony or any other man is such a mixture of marvels as Willoughby made out. Besides, he's a bachelor. Socrates wasn't."
"Oh, Ommony's human. But—well—you know what he's done in that forest. It was raw, red wilderness when he was sent there. Now you can stand on a rock and see ninety miles of trees whichever way you care to look. Besides, dogs love him. Did you see that great dog of his outside? You can't fool that kind of dog, you know. They say he knows the tigers personally, and can talk the jungle-bat; there was only one other man who ever learned that language, and he committed suicide!"
"All the same—he's not the only man who's done good work—and I've heard stories. Do any of you remember Terry—Jack Terry, the M.D., who married Ommony's young sister? One of those delightful madmen who are really so sane that the rest of us can't understand 'em. Had weird theories about obstetrics. Nearly got foul of his profession by preaching that music was an absolute necessity at child-birth. Wanted the government to train symphony orchestras to play the Overture to Leonori while the birth takes place. Perfectly mad; but a corking good surgeon. Always dead broke, from handing out his pay to beggars —broke, that is, until he met Marmaduke. Remember Marmaduke?"
"Dead too, isn't he? Wasn't he the American who endowed a mission somewhere in the Hills?"
"Yes, at Tilgaun. Marmaduke was another—ab-so-lutely mad—and as gentle as sunrise. Quiet man, who swore like a trooper at the mention of religion. Made his money in Chicago, slaughtering hogs—or so I heard. Wrote a book on astrology, that only ran to one edition. I sold my copy for ten times what I paid for it. I tell you, Marmaduke was madder than Gandhi. They say he left America to keep the elders of the church he belonged to from having him locked up in an asylum. The mission he founded at Tilgaun caused no end of a stir at the time. Surely you remember that? There were letters to the Times, and an archbishop raised a shindy in the House of Lords. Marmaduke's theory was that, as he couldn't understand Christianity, it was safe to premise that people whose religion was a mixture of degraded Buddhism and devil-worship couldn't understand it either. So he founded a Buddhist mission, to teach 'em their own religion. No, he wasn't a Buddhist. I don't know what his religion was. I only know he was a decent fellow, fabulously rich, and ab-so-lutely mad. He persuaded Jack Terry to chuck the service and become the mission medico—teach hygiene to men from Spiti and Bhutan—like teaching drought to the Atlantic! Jack Terry married Ommony's sister about a week before leaving for Tilgaun, and none of us ever saw them alive again."
"Now I remember. There was a nine days' scandal, or a mystery, or something."
"You bet there was! Terry and his wife vanished. Marmaduke was carpeted, but couldn't or wouldn't explain, and he died before they could make things hot for him. Then they gave Ommony long leave and sent him up to Tilgaun to investigate—that was—by gad! that was twenty years ago—Good lord! how time flies. Ommony discovered nothing; or, if he did discover anything, he said nothing—he's a great hand at doing that, by all accounts. But it leaked out that Marmaduke had appointed Ommony a trustee under his will. There was another trustee—a red-headed American woman—at least I heard she's red-headed; maybe, she isn't —named Hannah Sanburn, who has been running the mission ever since. She was not much more than a girl at the time, I remember. And the third trustee was a Tibetan. Nobody had ever heard of him, and I've never met a man who saw him; but I'm told he's a Ringding Gelong Lama; and I've also heard that Ommony has never seen him. The whole thing's a mystery."
"It doesn't seem particularly discreditable to Ommony. What are you hinting at?"
"Nothing. Only Ommony has influence. You've noticed, I dare say, he always gets what he goes after. If you asked me, there's an even chance he may 'get' Jenkins, if he cares to."
"That's notorious. Whoever goes after Ommony's scalp gets left at the post. What's the secret?"
"I don't know. Nobody seems to. There's Marmaduke's money, of course. Ommony handles some of it. I don't suggest fraud, or any rot like that; but money's strange stuff; control of it gives a man power. Ommony's influence is out of all proportion to his job. And I've heard—mind you, I don't know how true it is—that he's hand-and-glove with every political fugitive from the North who has sneaked down South to let the clouds roll by during the last twenty years. They even said Ommony was on the inside of the Moplah business. You know the Moplahs didn't burn his bungalow, they say he simply asked them not to—can you beat that—and it's a fact that he stayed in his forest all through that rebellion."
Ommony was restless over in his corner. His obstinate jaw was only half-concealed by a close-clipped, graying beard, and there was grim humor on his lips. Having done more than any living man to pull the sting out of the Moplah rebellion, hints to the contrary hardly amused him. He was angry—obviously angry. However, one man claimed casual acquaintance and dropped into the next chair.
"Expecting to stay long in Delhi?"
"I don't know. I hope not."
"Care to sell me that wolf-hound?"
Ommony's reserve broke down; he had to talk to somebody:
"That dog? Sell her? She's the sum total of twenty-years' effort. She's all I've done."
The inquisitor leaned back, partly to hide his own face, partly to see Ommony's in a more distinct light; he suspected sunstroke, or the after-effects of malaria. But Ommony, having emerged from his reserve, continued:
"I don't suppose I'm different from anybody else—at least not from any other reasonably decent fellow—made a lot of mistakes, of course—done a lot of things I wish I hadn't—been a bally ass on suitable occasion but I've worked—damned hard. India has had all the best of me and—damn her!—I haven't grudged it. Don't regret it, either. I'd do it again. But there's nothing to show for it all—"
"Except a forest. They tell me—"
"A forest, half-grown, that corrupt politicians will play ducks and drakes with; a couple of thousand villagers who are now being taught by those same politicians that every thing they've learned from me is no good; a ruined constitution—and that dog. That's all I can show for twenty years' work—and like some others, I've had my heart in it. I think I know how a missionary feels when his flock walks out on him. I'm a failure—we're all failures. The world is going to pieces under our hands. What I have taught that dog is all I can really claim by way of accomplishment."
That particular inquisitor lost enthusiasm. He did not like madmen. He withdrew and considered Ommony in a corner, behind a newspaper, sotto voce. Another not so casual acquaintance dropped into the vacant chair, and was greeted with a nod.
"You've been absent so long you ought to see things with a fresh eye, Ommony. D'you think India's breaking up?"
"I've thought so for twenty years."
"How long before we have to clear out?"
"The sooner the better."
"For us?"
"I mean for India!"
"I should have thought you would be the last man to say that. You've done your bit. They tell me you've changed a desert into a splendid forest. D'you want to see it all cut down, the lumber wasted and—"
Ommony pulled out his watch and tapped his finger on the