The two men
stumbled, heavy-limbed and heavy-eyed, over the ashes of a brick-set
cooking-place, and dropped down under the shelter of the branches, while
the rain and river roared together.
The stumps of the indigo crackled, and there was a smell of cattle, as a
huge and dripping Brahminee bull shouldered his way under the tree. The
flashes revealed the trident mark of Shiva on his flank, the insolence
of head and hump, the luminous stag-like eyes, the brow crowned with a
wreath of sodden marigold blooms, and the silky dewlap that almost swept
the ground. There was a noise behind him of other beasts coming up
from the flood-line through the thicket, a sound of heavy feet and deep
breathing.
"Here be more beside ourselves," said Findlayson, his head against the
treepole, looking through half-shut eyes, wholly at ease.
"Truly," said Peroo, thickly, "and no small ones."
"What are they, then? I do not see clearly."
"The Gods. Who else? Look!"
"Ah, true! The Gods surely--the Gods." Findlayson smiled as his head
fell forward on his chest. Peroo was eminently right. After the Flood,
who should be alive in the land except the Gods that made it--the Gods
to whom his village prayed nightly--the Gods who were in all men's
mouths and about all men's ways.
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