Talbot Mundy

“ ART is individual, and knows no limits. Fools are they who sneer at new tools, and processes of giving form to idea. Ommony, an artist in his own way, paid suitable homage to Charley’s camera, because the thing of brass and glass and wood was the tool of a true enthusiast.
That forest and its outskirts are a thousand square miles. ”

“ Yet a man of one idea is like a horse in harness. You can use him. He can be a strong cog in the intricate machine. The punishing grind, that kills or makes a rebel of the fellow who can see both sides of anything, only spurs a fanatic to further effort He might use Ommony. ”

“ The dastari [1] is good.”
So they were now three who trod the jungle-lanes, and laughed until rocks that had known the laughter of four forgotten races re-echoed to the high, the middle and the bass—until the junglis brought word of a bear, hurt fighting, whom the flies were driving mad, and Jeff strode off to end that misery. (For Ommony is a prince of hosts, reserving to himself no more than right to judge emergency.)
The bear-skin lay pegged out, raw-side upward, in the sun the morning Strange came, and Charley told him how Jeff had to use four bullets and the butt. ”

“ For him. He won’t kill men while we have him under observation. This is the look-out rock.”
Ommony sent the staghound first up the well worn track that circled to the summit, to make sure there were no bears or leopards to misinterpret the intrusion. He went next, springing up quickly, leaving Strange to scramble slowly after him. He had talked all the tiger he chose to just then.
For about five minutes, panting on the summit, Strange took in the view of a forest like a raging sea arrested in mid-turmoil. ”

“ He may have been wondering why he, a man with an income in the millions, should have to hide himself in a forest. From hat to shoe-soles, rifles and all, the same two hundred dollar bill would have purchased the entire kit, down to the skin, of either himself or Ommony. ”

“ They say that once, when men of evil purpose locked him behind doors, he broke down a door with nothing but his hands, and smote them with the pieces of it. Yet he laughs, and his heart is as a woman’s, but not as a too inquisitive woman’s. ”

“ It was in his mind that no man drawing such small salary in the middle-age was of much account, or had much right to dispense the forest privileges. Feudalism, an ancient gas that ever crept along with money, and deluded men, caused him to regard his host as some one who had scant option in the matter. ”

“ Ommony’s eye followed the line of the jungli’s arm.
“That might be your|tiger,” he said quietly.
“Where? Show me!”
Strange clutched his rifle that he had leaned against a corner of the rock, and looked over Ommony’s shoulder, trying to get the line.
“You see a rock about a hundred yards from the base of this one—shaped roughly like an egg at this end. Carry your eye to the right from that. Now: d’you see a patch of brown leaves with light and shadow playing on them. Part’s lighter than the rest—more gold in it. You get that? That’s your tiger. He’s looking up at us. ”

“ Jeff laughed aloud.
“You’re right. Charley wrote such a glowing account of you that Strange is suspicious. You know, a multi-millionaire is a poor —— who thinks every one is trying to work him for something. Thirty per cent of what he thinks is true. Strange can’t escape even in India. ”

“ There are temples in it, not wholly ruinous but older than written history, and in places trees have forced themselves up from between the stones of forgotten cities. Men live there, known now as junglis, naked and afraid, whose ancestors were kings in lost Lemuria if the very ancient books are true. ”

“ His brain was already figuring in terms of import duties, labor, and exchange—sea-freight—subsidies—and a market where the men who put in number nineteen bolts all day long must have what they can pay for ready-made. ”

“ They only kill for food, and let alone what they can’t use. A few of them are greedy, and kill too much. Some are lazy, and kill cattle, which is stealing. Sometimes you can drive those and make them go to work. They’ve a right to be tigers, just as we’ve a right to be men ”