It is a lieI, Âtma, IGive it the lieYe Bright Ones see me dieAvenge the lie!
It is a lieI, Âtma, IGive it the lieYe Bright Ones see me dieAvenge the lie!
The death-dagger of Âtma Devi's race rose high in the air above the silver fillet on her loosened hair, and the next moment it would have been buried in the heart beneath the silver hauberk had not a man's voice--not kingly at all in its hurried command--cried quickly:
"Hold her!"
As she staggered back, her balance gone by Birbal's swift arrest of the blow, a mocking voice fell on her ear.
"Did I not tell thee so, sister! Thou art too good-looking for death!"
It had all passed so quickly that folks were still almost incredulously craning to see, when sudden silence came to that group on the clear square before the dais. To Siyah Yamin, muffled in her chaste veil, to Âtma Devi with her bare defiance, to Birbal's eager acute face as he still held back that hand with the dagger.
"Speak! What hast thou to say?" said the King through the silence.
"This," came the reply, clear, resolute, as Âtma Devi drew from out her bosom a folded paper. "It was the death word of the King's Châran."
"Take it and read," said the King, and Abulfazl stepping forward, took the paper. His practised voice sounded sonorously through the wide hall.
"Avenge the lie for which I die. Siyah Yamin is Siyâla, daughter of Gokal, Brâhmin, of Chandankaura, Râjpûtana. We are sisters of the veil. I saw her married with the Seven Steps and the Sacrificial Fire to the death-dagger of my race which grants no divorce. She is Bride of the Gods for ever and ever and ever. The Gods curse him who steals her from them. Ye Bright Ones avenge the lie!"
"Is this true, woman?" asked the King, sternly.
From behind the veil came the gay mocking voice, "Let her prove it."
By this time the first shock of surprise was over, and men had begun to turn to each other, questioning and appraising the validity of Âtma's plea.
"And even if she can prove it, Oh! Most-Illustrious," began Budaoni, who from his translating work was cognisant of Hindu customs, "even if this evil woman was dedicated to the Gods, what then? She has read the creed, she hath become Musulman--she is duly married."
"If the Most-Illustrious will hear me," put in Birbal bowing low--"hear me, Bhât, Brâhmin, as one with knowledge and authority, I will tell the Most-Just that this is no ordinary dedication of a girl to the service of the Gods.Deva-dasisthere be--aye! even those married to a dagger or a basil plant, on whom rests no life-long, death-long tie. But this is not of those!--Married with the Seven Steps to a Châran's death-dagger! Accursed be he----"
"Accursed be thou, Hindu!" cried a voice from the crowd, and in an instant hands found sword-hilts and faces grew fierce.
"Sire! He is right," called Râjah Mân Singh. "The woman belongs to the Gods--who claims her, takes her through my body!"
"Idolater!" rose an answering sneer, "what Islâm claims is God's!"
But behind these voices in the packed mass of the crowd, men looked at each other dubiously; Hindu at Mahommedan, Mahommedan at Hindu. Should they claim this woman or let her go?
"If this slave may offer opinion," came Abulfazl's sonorous voice above the growing clamour, "the question must wait for proof."
"Enough!" said Akbar sternly. He had been standing with bent brows staring at Âtma, and at the veiled figure beside her, lost in thought. Then he turned to Birbal. "On thee, Maheshwar Rao, called by me Birbal, the burden of inquiry shall rest. Speak. As thou wilt answer to thy Gods, if what yon woman"--he pointed to Âtma Devi--"says be true, would this marriage to the dagger hold against all others?"
Quick and sharp came the answer. "The marriage is inviolable, sacred for Time and for Eternity."
"Then there must be proof. What proof hast thou?" His voice softened slightly with the words.
Âtma Devi standing tall and straight flung her left arm skyward. "I have none! None; save my own word. I saw it--we were children and I cried because she left me. Yea! I remember the bitterness of my tears."
There was a sudden gay laugh from the veilings at her side, a sudden wreathing and curving of draperies, and in an instant the woman within them stood revealed; revealed, not as the late wedded bride, not even as Siyah Yamin the courtesan, but as Siyâla the dancing girl of the Gods. Her nut-brown body, bare save for the tiny gold-encrusted bodice following each swelling line of her bosom, rose, seductively supple, from the innumerable fulnesses of the thin white muslin skirt which after clinging close to the loveliness of curve from hip to knees, fulled out like a bursting flower weighted by its heavy banding of gold tissue. She wore no veil, but her loose flowing hair was wreathed with jasmine chaplets, and round her neck, floating with each exquisite movement of her arms, was a multi-coloured gossamer silk scarf, rainbow hued, evanescent, ever-recurring, holding in its loopings, its doublings, something of the absolute grace of a coiling serpent.
And through the wide hall packed full of men instinct with anger, malice, hatred, and all uncharitableness, there ran, swiftly, at the mere sight of her, a common admiration, a common tremor of fear and hope.
Even the King stepped back from her pure womanhood.
"Lo! Weep not Âto! Wherefore should any weep; when all life is for laughter!" she said, and her polished voice sounded mysteriously sweet. "Great King! she says truth. I am Siyâl belovéd of the Gods, beloved of the Godhead in the man. I am no man's wife. I am no man's mistress. I am free to have and hold."
She flung both arms forward to the crowd and the rainbow scarf leaping up formed a halo round her head.
"Come! Come!" she murmured deeply, almost drowsily, "but seek not to bind. Or ever you were, I was. Yet I am yours!" Her eyes flashed down upon those liveried bearers of her dhooli, servants of her courtesanship. "Raise me shoulder high, slaves," she cried, "so that all may see Siyâl the Belovéd of the Gods, the beloved by men."
So shoulder high she stood smiling while a hoarse passionate breath surged through the vast assembly.
And then, suddenly, she set up the oldest chant in the world, the golden jingles about her feet clashing to its rhythm, the heavy gold bracelets sliding and clashing on her arms as she waved them in the dance of thedevaad-asi--
I am the dancer Prakrit,The wanton of change and unrest,And the sound of my dancing feetRoused the Sleeper self-em-meshed,And the eyes that were blind with peaceLooked out and saw I was sweet,So the worlds whirled to my feetAnd Life grew big with Increase.Death danced in the arms of BirthAnd Tears were coupled with MirthAnd Cold things hurried to HeatAnd Heat to Flame and Fire,Till the whole world, racked with desire,Kept time to my dancing feet."Prakrit! Prakrit!"
I am the dancer Prakrit,The wanton of change and unrest,And the sound of my dancing feetRoused the Sleeper self-em-meshed,And the eyes that were blind with peaceLooked out and saw I was sweet,So the worlds whirled to my feetAnd Life grew big with Increase.Death danced in the arms of BirthAnd Tears were coupled with MirthAnd Cold things hurried to HeatAnd Heat to Flame and Fire,Till the whole world, racked with desire,Kept time to my dancing feet.
"Prakrit! Prakrit!"
She paused in her swift twirling and the long sinuous end of her silken scarf which had floated round her undulating, almost alive in its likeness to the clutching creeping arm of an octopus, hovered in the air for a second then fell on her outstretched arm in delicate desireful folds.
Something like a faint sigh breathed through the audience. There was no other sound. Every man was spellbound, as swaying, posturing, yielding, she went on, allure in her eyes, her voice--
I am the Woman Prakrît,The Keeper and Wanton of Sex,And the clash of my dancing feetIs a lure that ruins and wrecks.Men's lips touch mine and desireThe Nothingness that is sweet,And their souls flock to my feetTo die in a kiss of fire.And I give them Death for Life,And I bring them Sorrow and Strife,As I suck their senses awayAs they follow and follow for ayeThe fall of my dancing feet.Prakrît! Prakrît!
I am the Woman Prakrît,The Keeper and Wanton of Sex,And the clash of my dancing feetIs a lure that ruins and wrecks.Men's lips touch mine and desireThe Nothingness that is sweet,And their souls flock to my feetTo die in a kiss of fire.And I give them Death for Life,And I bring them Sorrow and Strife,As I suck their senses awayAs they follow and follow for ayeThe fall of my dancing feet.
Prakrît! Prakrît!
"Prâkrîti!--Prâkrîti!--Prâkrîti!"
The answering cry came multitudinously. But on it came the voice of the King.
"Syeds of Bârha! Do you claim this woman or shall she go?"
There could be but one answer, with that unveiled, unabashed figure, challenging every eye, flaunting before all men, making their very bodies and souls thrill to the cadence of her dancing feet.
The Syeds' hands felt their sword hilts sullenly, but their spokesman had no choice of words.
"Let her go. We of Bârha harbour no harlots--no idolaters."
So through the audience, in obedience to her sign, the servants of her courtesanship carried her, seated, discreetly smiling, decorously salaaming. But once outside, the crowd which followed her to Satanstown caught up the song she had sung and bellowed it to the skies, filling the lanes and byways with the tale which, told so many ways, brings the mind back at last to the beginning of all things--to the "Sleeper sleeping self-em-meshed."
As the procession passed a narrow turn, two men dressed as natives, almost of native complexion, yet of such curious dissimilarity of features from the crowd around them that the eye picked them out instinctively as strangers, stood back on a high piled doorstep to escape the crush.
"Vadre retro Satanas" muttered the taller of the two, crossing himself and thus giving a glimpse of a violet ribbon on his breast hung with the Portuguese Order of Christ. Its white cross charged upon a red one glistened for an instant in the sun like silver.
They were Jesuit missionaries, and the smaller of the two, as he watched, crossed himself also and murmured under his breath, "God help us! She is like a Madonna!"
And, in truth, Siyah Yamin silent, possibly fatigued by the excitement, seated with her childish face upraised, her eyes seemingly full of wistful thought fixed on vacancy, as if somewhere out of sight lay something very precious, looked innocent enough to touch that other pivot of feminine life, Motherhood.
And I give them Death for Life,And I bring them Sorrow and Strife,And I suck their senses awayAs they follow and follow for ayeThe fall of my dancing feet.Prakrît! Prakrît!
And I give them Death for Life,And I bring them Sorrow and Strife,And I suck their senses awayAs they follow and follow for ayeThe fall of my dancing feet.
Prakrît! Prakrît!
The chorus bellowed out to the skies, as the procession swept on, leaving Father Ricci and Father Rudolpho Acquaviva to continue their way to the little mission chapel which Akbar had built for them.
So they went on their way, while in lessening sound came the chorus which holds the Secret of the Sin for which all religions promise forgiveness.
It brought a vague, throbbing restlessness to the hot air.
Opportunity flies, O brother.As the clouds that quickly pass.Make use of it now, for anotherWill never be yours, Alas!--Hafiz.
Opportunity flies, O brother.As the clouds that quickly pass.Make use of it now, for anotherWill never be yours, Alas!
--Hafiz.
"Birbal! Lo! It is always Birbal. May God's curse light on him for an infidel!"
Prince Salîm's young, sullen face lowered gloomily, he flung aside the half-tasted sweetmeat he had taken from the golden basket which was always held within his reach by a deaf and dumb slave.
"Ameen!" murmured Mirza Ibrahîm piously.
Khodadâd who in thepetit comiteof the Heir-Apparent's innermost circle of friends was enjoying the newly imported luxury of smoking, puffed a cloud into the scented air, smiled, bowed gravely; finally yawned. In truth the Prince wearied him not a little with his childish petulance, his hasty resentments, his invariable failure to take action; for he had just enough of his father in him to desire power, to feel aggrieved at his own subordinate position, yet not sufficient to make him set his desire above comfort, even above family affection.
They managed such matters better in Sinde. There, since time immemorial, fathers had killed superfluous sons, sons had killed a superfluous father, and brother removed brother without ridiculous reference to relationship.
Khodadâd looked at the Heir-Apparent negligently through a blown ring of tobacco smoke and appraised him critically. In a way, it was true, this great lout of a lad formed the most convenient nucleus round which conspiracy against the King might gather, since he would carry with him the sympathy of the Orthodox, that is, of at least two-thirds of the court.
But if he would not move he must be left behind, and conspiracy must go on without him. It was nothing to Sinde who sate on the throne of India, so it were not Akbar with his strong hand on the throat of all rulers who chose to rule in the good old fashion. If Salîm could be squared well and good, Sinde would help him to his own--on condition. But if not? Khodadâd's sinister face grew more sinister.
"That ended it anyhow," continued Mirza Ibrahîm who was recounting the events of the morning; for the Prince was a late riser and seldom attended audience. "His Majesty appealed to the infidel, who was backed, of course, by other idolaters such as Mân Singh."
Prince Salîm shot a savage glance at the speaker. "Have a care, fool," he cried, "Mân Singh will be of my house when I am married."
Mirza Ibrahîm spread out his hands in apology. "This slave's tongue slipped over the tangled knot of matrimony," he replied suavely. "But as I say, the King, forwarded by Birbal and others of his kidney began to inquire, the firebrand of a madwoman--she was a picture for looks as she stood breathing defiance--by the prophet! I envied the idolater his hold upon her!--began on childish tears, and ere one could cry rotten fruit there was Siyah Yamin, true daughter of the devil, outraging everybody and making each man's skin thrill to her dancing feet--even, I dare swear, the King your father's, if he be human enough for such frailty!"
Prince Salîm gloomed round from another sweetmeat.
"Some men stand above humanity, Sir Chamberlain," he said sullenly, "as some who call themselves men sit below monkeys."
Mirza Ibrahîm lifted his eyebrows in courtly surprise, bowed, and went on undisturbed. "In truth the jade was superb; so they carried her back shoulder-high to Satanstown, where half the young blades still linger, hoping for a smile. But not I. The madwoman is my quarry! Strange one can look fifty times at a woman and only fancy her the fifty-first."
He spoke calmly as one who took hisamoursrationally.
"And the Syedân? What said they?" asked the Prince.
"What could they say, with that dancing daughter of the devil all unveiled. In God's truth they breathed the more free, knowing themselves rid of the necessity for, sooner or later, sewing her into a sack and committing her and their honour to the silent bottom of the nearest river."
Khodadâd laughed suddenly, immoderately. "It will be a jest to hear the tale of how the virtuous mothers of Bârha received the Darling of the Town as daughter-in-law! Let us appoint a time for it! What say you, my Prince?"
Salîm frowned his silence; he was in a virtuous mood that morning, having as yet hardly recovered his rebellion after the check his father had given to it.
Ibrahîm looked at Khodadâd with a covert sneer, and took up provocation.
"The Most Illustrious Prince had better ask of Birbal what the Syedân said or what Akbar did; since he, only, was present at the secret interview."
Prince Salîm burst out with an oath, "Curse Birbal! I would to God the jesting hound were dead!"
Khodadâd's evil face came up alert, eager from his smoke-wreaths. "Is that, in truth, the wish of--of the Most Excellent the Heir-Apparent to the throne of India?" he asked, and there was something in his steady stare which made Salîm shift his eyes evasively.
"What good were death," he grumbled. "'Twould but make him and his advice grow in grace with my father, as do all folk who die in sanctity. If thou couldst kill the King's trust in him, that would be different."
"It, also, might be compassed," suggested Khodadâd suavely; but once more Salîm said nothing. Ibrahîm concealed a yawn by putting a scented sweatmeat into the cavern of his mouth, then proceeded with his daily task of poisoning the Prince's mind against authority.
"Yet, seeing that our gracious King Akbar gives up his Luck--as folk say he hath--to the infidel, Birbal's wisdom may yet be needed, so, 'twere a pity----"
"His Luck? What mean you?" asked the Prince quickly.
Khodadâd shrugged his shoulders lightly. "The diamond, Most Noble, was not in the kingly turban at the audience, and folk say--with what truth I know not--that it hath gone to the English jeweller to be cut Western fashion."
Salîm's heavy face became vital in an instant with a curious mixture of anger and fear. "Gone!" he echoed. "My father has no right!--it is mine to wear also when I am King. I tell thee 'tis an heirloom of luck----"
"Mayhap the luck will not be cut out of it, mayhap it is but talk after all," put in Ibrahîm deftly, diminishing the immediate wound, so that its venom might have time to work. "Remember the saying: 'The truth none heed; lies are the world's creed.' Time enough for trouble when your turn comes; meanwhile let us sing!"
He let his hand stray idly to the strings of the latest fashionable instrument which stood by his side. It was a sort of guitar, shaped like a peacock, real feathers being let into the frets to form a tail.
Nothing on earth is hidden; in the fieldThe little buds of ruby or of pearlBurst into flowers so tinted, and the blazeOf diamonds in hard marble heart concealedWaits for Time's touch on all things to unfurlTheir stony shroud, and give them back the raysIn which gems glisten as they were always.
Nothing on earth is hidden; in the fieldThe little buds of ruby or of pearlBurst into flowers so tinted, and the blazeOf diamonds in hard marble heart concealedWaits for Time's touch on all things to unfurlTheir stony shroud, and give them back the raysIn which gems glisten as they were always.
The tinkle of thesatara, and the high trilling voice filled the quaint arches of the building in which the Prince lounged idly, surrounded by all the luxuries of young and sensual life.
It was the Pânch-Mahal, or Five Palaces, that puzzle to archaeologists of to-day, few of whom seem to know that it was built as a playground for Akbar's long-looked-for, eagerly-loved heir to many hopes. Here from sun or storm alike, shelter could be found; shelter that could bring with it no sense of being cribbed, cabined, or confined, since in these four column-supported and arcaded platforms, each superimposed on the next in lessening squares, no two things are absolutely alike. Carven capital, fluted pillar, and scrolled entablature each tell a different tale, and in the wide aisles, open to every wind of heaven, a child might learn, almost as it might learn from nature, the unending mutation, the ceaseless variety of life.
Whether it served its purpose who can say? One thing is certain; Salîm as he lay sullenly, resentfully searching the long processions of bird and beast, fruit and flower, magical monsters and mythical men that lay carven before his eyes, seeking therein more cause for rebellion, found himself assailed on all sides by the memory of an eager-faced teacher who called him son.
His father!
Yes! A deep, unreasoning, jealous affection lay at the bottom of half his unreasoning revolt.
So, as he lay divided between resentment and pride, the sound of many hoofs outside disturbed the sleepy afternoon air, a swift step took the steep stairs to the second story in its stride, and Akbar showed at the stair-head, unannounced.
He was in riding dress, with untanned leathern gaiters to the knee, his white cloth jerkin buckled tight with a broad leathern belt. On his grizzled hair he wore a close-fitting leathern cap cut like a chain-helmet. It was devoid of all ornament save a heron's plume at the side. His lean figure and alert air made him look years younger than his age, and his entry brought instant change of atmosphere to the perfumed indolence of the young Prince's court. Akbar's quick eye took in at a glance the sweetmeat baskets, held appetisingly near by slaves, beautiful or quaint, the scent fountains, the fighting avitovats, the dice-boxes and all the other paraphernalia of luxurious sloth.
"Come, boy!" he said sharply, "thou canst not stay idling here till bed-time! I come to challenge thee to a game ofchaugan. Elders against Youngers, see you, and I and Birbal will----"
He turned affectionately as he spoke to the latter who had followed him more leisurely. But the very conjunction of names was sufficient for Salîm. His lustreless eyes flashed sudden fire, he was on his feet in a second.
"So be it, noble father!" he cried. "Since being foe to you makes me foe also to Râjah Birbal, I am content."
Without a moment's pause Khodadâd was on the Prince's heels in provocation. "Nay! most puissant Heir to Empire," he cried, with a sort of servile swagger, "filch not my foe from me. Firsts pair with firsts, seconds with seconds. So I, Khodadâd, lieutenant of the Prince's team, claim Birbal as my compeer to stand or fall together in all things."
There was no mistaking the utter unfriendliness of the challenge. Akbar stood frowning, but Birbal, suave, sarcastic, only smiled.
"Not in crime, Tarkhân-jee! I bar crime! 'Tis one thing to murder or steal without fear of punishment, another even to lie with a bowstring about one's neck! So, seeing the most excellent of lieutenants through being Tarkhân hath a supremacy in sin, I pray so far, to be excused; 'twill but bring Khodadâd one step nearer to judgment." He turned on his heel as he spoke; then continued nonchalantly: "Will your Majesty choose sides?"
"Nay!" replied the King, making an effort to restore good-humour. "Shaikie shall choose his, and a cast of the die as ever settle mine--save only for thee."
"May he be accursed!" muttered the young Prince as he flung aside his deftly-piled and jewel-strung turban, to don a close-eared leathern cap like his father. His mind was full of vague anger against that father. Had he indeed parted with the Luck of the House, leaving him, the heir, forlorn of hope? That must be Birbal's doing; Birbal with the sneering, bitter tongue, which found out the joints in one's armour with such deadly skill.
It was already late afternoon. An hour, or even less would see the rapid Indian dusk settle down over those wide plains below the Sikri ridge; but as yet the sun's slanting rays shone on thechauganground, catching the gilt spikes of the red boundary flags and the red and gold boundary ropes which were held at intervals by pages dressed to match in red and gold. Within the oblong thus marked out, the glittering white and gold and red and silver teams loosing their lean, low, be-tasselled ponies in preliminary canters, or gathering in knots to discuss the tactics of the coming game, made the scene show like some richly jewelled square of embroidery stretched out among the dusty levels.
Closely akin to polo,chauganwaspar excellencethe game of Mogul India; and Akbar excelled at it, holding it to be "no mere play, but a means of learning promptitude and decision, a test of manhood, a strengthener of the bonds of friendship."
It differed chiefly from the modern form of the game in having no set goal, the whole of each end of the oblong being counted as one. So, as a single flourish from the Royalnakârahsounded, ten riders ranged themselves at the farther end of the ground, eager, alert, their mounts (and themselves) hard held, all eyes--even those of the ponies--fixed on the ball which was held high in the King's right hand. On either side of the tense, vibrating line stood a pony, one for either team, its rider holding it by the reins ready on the instant to fling himself into the saddle and ride out to replace anyone disabled in the game. Beyond these again, at each corner, was a group of other ponies, other riders, also ready, when the gong sounded every twenty minutes, to ride out and replace two players in either team, thus ensuring a constant supply of fresh blood, fresh zest for the fight.
"Are you ready, Sahibân?" shouted the King, and with the cry dashed forward. The tense, vibrating line, giving a wild whoop, was not a second behind him, and so, tassels waving, sticks carried like lances came a veritable tornado of a charge that swept up to the centre of the ground where a red patch of brickdust showed set four-square.
Ralph Fitch, who with his companions was watching the strange new game, (perhaps the first Englishman who saw polo played), felt his pulses bound with excitement at this forward dash. "They be sportsmen, anyhow," he muttered under his breath. "Bravo! bravo!"
For Akbar's nimble little bay Arab pony, who played the game as keenly as its master, had propped on the red delivery point and stood quivering with the arrest, while its rider, holding back in his stirrups for all he was worth sent the ball spinning skyward with an awkward twist on it, then gripped his club, held till then with his reins.
"Hul-lul-la-la-la-la-Harri-ho! Ari!--Nila-kunta!"
The confused cries rose from the wrestling knot of caps, sticks, tassels, hoofs, and swinging arms which in an instant gathered, a whirling nebula of potential force about that nucleus point of a half-seen, falling ball.
"Ibrahîm!" shouted Khodadâd, whose vicious chestnut, hard held, flung itself high in air, almost unseating its rider, "to the left or the King has it."
So, swift as light, aid and prevention hustled each other, all so quickly that a snapshot would hardly have registered the contest, until a click, faint yet loud enough to fill each heart with joy or anger told that the King's stick catching the ball fairly ere it fell had sent it away in a clear swooping flight.
"He has it--ride! ride!" rose the cry from both sides and away they went helter-skelter, pell-mell.
Too late, however, for either side to intervene, for the ball driven with a will, dropped, rebounded, fell again within a foot of the fatal line at the end and so easily, softly, trickled over it.
"Well hit, father!" called Prince Salîm forgetful of anything but sheer pride in the King's prowess. His face, nevertheless, lowered again as in accordance with custom the defeated five rode back along the sides of the ground toward the starting end, pausing every twenty paces to pirouette their ponies and to salaam to the victors who, when the conquered had reached their places, rode triumphantly at a canter down the middle to take up theirs.
But consolation comes in all games, and the next throw-up decreed that the King should--not unwillingly--make obeisance to his son after a hard tussle.
The third goal also went to the juniors, for, whether due to the replacing in the King's team of Râjah Mân Singh by that inferior player his cousin Bhâwun Singh, or to a trifle of lameness in Akbar's little Arab, certain it is that after much swinging and driving of the ball backward and forward the cry arose amongst the spectators "He hath it--Khodadâd hath it this time!" And there was the Tarkhân, his eyes glued on the ground, deliberately trundling the ball along safe clipped in the crook of his stick, while the Prince and Dhâra beside him rode off all attempts at rescue.
"He hath bird-lime on it," muttered Birbal, as he swooped down fruitlessly. The ball trickled on deftly and even the King galloped forward to defend the goal, but it was in vain, for in the finalmêléesomeone--in the dust and glamour--God knows who, gave the final impetus, and the victors and vanquished wiped their streaming foreheads ere recommencing another struggle.
It began on both sides with almost fierce determination.
"God's truth! It stirs the blood!" gasped Ralph Fitch. He had seen many wonders at the court of the Great Mogul, but none so germane to his temperament as this. It was a game worthy of Englishmen he thought almost prophetically; since its lineal descendant, polo, has made India bearable to generations of an English garrison. So while John Newbery's eyes wandered over the jewels of the spectators around him, and William Leedes found his attention too much concentrated on the King's figure for due grip on the game as a whole, it was Ralph Fitch, who despite distance, dusk, and dust, cried excitedly:
"He hath it again--the Sindi hath it once more!"
True enough. Through the looming medley of dust, men, horses, Khodadâd (by many considered to be the best player ofchauganthis side the Indus), showed ahead, trundling the ball as he might have trundled an iron hoop in a hooked iron stick. But this time he had the King to contend with.
"Back Birbal! it will come back!" shouted Akbar suddenly, and Khodadâd's thin lips set firmer, his wrist stiffened itself in downward pressure as just ahead he saw a faint inequality of the ground. No! the ball should not rise nor swerve, not even if the hammer-head of the King's stick lay ... so ... close ...
Ten thousand devils!
It was but a quarter of an inch, but it was enough for dexterity--and, like a lofter at a bunkered golf ball, Akbar's club was underneath--the next instant, played backhanded, the ball shot rearward to Birbal's keeping.
Khodadâd riding back amongst the defeated with a wrist which still felt the forceful grapple of Akbar's, cursed under his breath. He had been bested, and everything else was forgotten for the moment in pure personal anger. The thought of revenge rose in him unhampered even by care for personal safety; for was he not--as Birbal had taunted him with being--Tarkhân? Unpunishable that is till he had told his full tale of crime. The Hindu dog might have to learn this to his cost!
The dusk had fallen. Here and there among the throng of spectators beyond the boundary ropes the twinkling light of a wandering sweetmeat-seller showed dimly amid the dust, and high on the towering palaces which backed the ground a few faint gleams from a lamp within gave outline to some latticed window, or corbeilled balcony.
"The game stands drawn," said Prince Salîm, wiping the sweat from his brow. "It grows too dark for more."
"Dark! 'Tis never too dark for victory," cried Akbar gaily. "Let us have out the blaze-balls, Shaiki! 'Twill be a point in thy favour, young eyes being sharper than old; so choose thy team and mine shall choose itself."
Either way they were likely players who ranged themselves in line while the blazing ball ofpilâswood, soaked in oil was handed to the King in the earthenware cup of a pipe stem.
He held it aloft flaring. "We play for life or death, gentlemen," he laughed, as with a bound his favourite countrybred mare Bijli, the fastest pony in the royal stable, answered to the spur.
"For life or death," murmured Khodadâd giving the rein to his mount, a chestnut Sindi stallion almost oversized for the game, but savagely keen in the playing of it.
By this time a perpetual film of dust lay square over the ground showing lighter than the undimmed dusk around it, and the watching eyes of the spectators strained into it, seeing now a faint star of light as the blazing ball sped onward, now a cloud of darkness as the huddled riders followed on its track. Not all of them, however; one rider held aloof, evidently biding his time for something which every instant of growing darkness would favour. It was Khodadâd, Tarkhân. A sinister indifference possessed him. If the chance came, as come it might, he had made up his mind to take it. A purely accidental collision would at least serve his purpose of personal revenge without much personal risk, his being by far the heavier horse, while its rider, of course, would be prepared for the shock.
Yes! if the chance came.
Like a skimming meteor the ball shot to the right of him and the King's voice came close on it. "Ride! Birbal, ride!"
Which of them was on the ball? No matter, thought Khodadâd, either was fair quarry!
He dug his spurs into the vicious chestnut and cut across to take them on the flank.
Birbal! Yes, that was Birbal's little gray. All the better since there could be no doubt as to who would have the worst of it. The Hindu pig would at least get a fall heavy enough to send better men to Jehannum.
Khodadâd's malicious chuckle ceased abruptly. A lean bay head showed close to his stirrup leather, and he realised in an instant that he was observed. Yes! he was being ridden off--ridden off by the King, damn him!
Well! let him try! Two could play at that game!
He jagged fiercely at the chestnut's tight rein and, overborne, the bay head yielded a point. But the pace of the brute was the devil. What right had even Kings to ride racers atchaugan?If once it crept past the stirrup level ... Curse it...!
Another fierce jag overreached its mark, the vicious beast he rode threw up its head, flung out its feet, so losing half a stride, and Khodadâd, beside himself with sheer temper, struck it madly over the ears with his polo-stick. That finished it. With a scream of rage and fear it plunged forward almost knocking over the smaller horse by force of its superior weight, but the next instant it was on its hind legs beating the air vainly, while the little bay at full racing stride swept under the battling hoofs. Only, however, to find itself in fresh danger. A horseman unseen till then had been creeping up on the right in support of Khodadâd.
Akbar who had been giving Bijli the rein in reckless devilry uttered a sharp cry as he recognised Salîm. Collision was inevitable, and the wonder as to which would suffer most flashed through the King's mind as after one vain, almost unconscious, tug, he realised the position, flung his stick from him, dug spurs to the bay and gripping it all he knew with his knees, rode straight to the crash. It came, but as it came Akbar's arm clipped his son, and borne on by the fierce impetus of Bijli's pace the two shot forward--Akbar underneath--over the bay's head to lie stunned for a moment by the fall.
The King was the first to speak. "Thou art not hurt, Shaikie?" he gasped, the breath well-nigh pommelled from him by the Prince's weighty body.
"Not I!" gasped Salîm in his turn, beginning to realise what his father had done for him--"but--thou--thou art bleeding."
"From the nose only," replied Akbar cheerfully, as a crowdingpossehelped him to rise, "it was thy foot did it--God sent as much strength to thine arm. Nay gentlemen! we are unhurt!"
The assurance was needed, for already on all sides the cry had risen: "The King is down--the King is killed!" and folk were, in the dusk and gloom, pressing round a figure which still lay prostrate on the ground.
And those on the outside of the ever-thickening ring could not see that it was only Khodadâd knocked out of time for the moment by that backward flung stick of the King's, which had caught him fair on the cheek bone and felled him like an ox.
Akbar walked over and looked at him contemptuously.
"Lo! Tarkhân," he said briefly to the man struggling back to consciousness in Ibrahîm's arms, "ride not so--sorecklessagain, or ill may befall thee, Tarkhân though thou be."
Sing me a ditty, sweet singer I sueAfresh and afresh, anew and anew;Sing of the wine cup the red roses brewAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.Sing of my sweetheart close claspt to my sideLove's lips to her lips in secret confideKisses to credit that still remain dueAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.Cup bearer, Sâki! Boy! Silver-limbed, slim,Cross thou, I pray thee, my poor threshold's rim,Fill up my goblet and fill my soul tooAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.How shall the guerdon of Love's life be mineWhen thou deniest me the red rose's wine?Fill up! and in thought my Beloved one I'll viewAfresh and afresh, anew and anew!Breeze of the morning that flyest so fleet,Haste thee! Ah haste thee, to her happy feetTell her the tale of her lover so trueAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.
Sing me a ditty, sweet singer I sueAfresh and afresh, anew and anew;Sing of the wine cup the red roses brewAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.
Sing of my sweetheart close claspt to my sideLove's lips to her lips in secret confideKisses to credit that still remain dueAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.
Cup bearer, Sâki! Boy! Silver-limbed, slim,Cross thou, I pray thee, my poor threshold's rim,Fill up my goblet and fill my soul tooAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.
How shall the guerdon of Love's life be mineWhen thou deniest me the red rose's wine?Fill up! and in thought my Beloved one I'll viewAfresh and afresh, anew and anew!
Breeze of the morning that flyest so fleet,Haste thee! Ah haste thee, to her happy feetTell her the tale of her lover so trueAfresh and afresh, anew and anew.
Siyah Yamin paused, ending the song--which echoes and re-echoes through every harlot's house in India--with a gay flourish of her small fingers on the drum which had been throbbing a monotonous accompaniment.
She looked more like a piece of confectionery than ever in saffron and white and silver, and her indifferent laugh rang through the arches of her balconied room and out into the wickedest alley in Satanstown without a hint of anything in it save pure contentment. Contentment at being set free from unwelcome trammellings, contentment at being once more the Darling of the Town.
As for Âto, serious old Âto, with her mock heroics, she, Siyâla, bore her no grudge for having supplied an excellent opportunity for dramatic effect. Of course the "memory of tears" had precipitated matters somewhat, but the dénouement was foreordained. Had not she come prepared for it with her dancing clothes, her dancing feet?
Thus she lay lazily, contentedly, among her cushions and watched Mirza Ibrahîm and Khodadâd smoking their drugged pipes in her balcony. Her house was the rendezvous of all evil things and scarcely a plot was hatched without her knowing something of it. So, after a time she rose, silently as a carpet snake, and crept behind their backs. Then she laughed.
"Hast not hit on payment yet for thy scarred cheek, Khodadâd?" she asked derisively. "Lo! it spoils thy beauty, friend, and I have a mind to pass thee off as damaged goods to Yasmeena over the way. She is not bad as a mistress, though somewhat too stout. But there! 'When the stomach's full the eye sees God.'"
"Daughter of the devil!" muttered Khodadâd succinctly.
Siyah Yamin's childish face grew hard and clear as if it were carved in crystal. "Bandy no names, O Gift of God," she said disdainfully, "Who made me, made thee. Are there not ever two splits in a pea? Yet would not I sit still with a firebrand in my face." She pointed at the red mark left by Akbar's polo stick.
"Neither do we!" broke in Ibrahîm angrily. "Leave us to our talk, fool. We will hit, this time, on some plan with which no woman's lack of good faith can interfere."
Siyah Yamin yawned imperturbably. "What would you?" she replied. "I am better as I am, as the rat said when the cat invited him out of his hole. Thy party purpose did not suit me. But blame me not with the luck that lies ever with the King."
"Curse him!" muttered Khodadâd sullenly, and the courtesan gave another evil little laugh.
"Yea! even atchauganthou hast no chance," she went on maliciously. "'Tis a pity he was not killed. Lo! being so stunned thou couldst not realise what the mere rumour of his death meant, or thou wouldst regret thy failure still more. The bazaar rang with the news for half-an-hour, half groaning, half cheering.Thenwas the time for action, not now, when the blind giant of India, formed of fools like my friends here, is ready once more to drive home Akbar's javelin head where it lists to go! God! did you but hate him as I, Woman, hate him the Man!"
"What wouldst thou do, harlot?" asked Ibrahîm turning on her sharply. "What couldst thou do?"
She half-closed her sleepy-looking eyes, and stared out into the sunshine in which the lane below lay festering. Not a hundred yards away, in the sunshine also, lay the high road from the great stretches of fields where the peasants toiled uncomplainingly, to the palace where the King dreamt his dream that was born out of due time, and along it the workers were passing bringing in the fruits of their labour. Piled baskets of green-skinned melons, red earthenware pots of milk, creaking wains of corn. For them life was simple, untouched by the imagination of either evil or good. For them even the gossip of their town-bred neighbours was unreal, fantastic.
"What would I do, pandar," replied the courtesan slowly, her eyes brightening in measure with her words, her voice gaining strength from her evil fancies, "If I believed that the Luckstone of Akbar brought luck as thou dost, it should bemine!Stay! It should be mine and bring discredit on the beast Birbal to whose charge 'tis given. Hold! interrupt me not! I see further--such thoughts come with the thinking. Aye! I would make Prince Salîm the thief, and so force him to revolt! See you not? See you not? Akbar's every thought of empire is bound up in the boy--that would be revenge indeed! There is no tie so strong as the tie of blood; loose that and the ship of a man's mind may go adrift. Make his son the thief I say, by guile if thou willst; but make Salîm the thief!"
Her large eyes had grown larger with her evil dreamings. They sate and looked at her as the fascinated bird looks at the snake.
"Impossible!" murmured the Lord Chamberlain, feeling nevertheless an answering quiver of assent.
"Naught is impossible to ultimate guile," she went on, every atom of her seeming to gain in vitality as her dream of deceit unfolded itself to her ready mind. "Where is the diamond kept--dost know?"
Khodadâd spoke then; he was gathering initiative from her malice. "He knows," he said, nodding his head at Ibrahîm, "as Chamberlain he must know."
"Where it cannot be touched," retorted the palace official, sullenly. "In the Hall of Labour, guarded, besentinelled, day and night. No chance of theft--save by deep treachery. And there is none to bribe. Shall I offer a price to virtue-ridden Budaoni, court preacher, who works there at his translations? Or blazon our attempt abroad by approaching the Râjpût soldiery or the King's paid artizans?"
Khodadâd's face fell. In truth bribery in such a stronghold of the King's as the Hall of Labour where the best workmen were employed at fabulous wages, seemed hopeless. But Siyah Yamin's took on a sudden expression of amused contempt.
"So!" she began, "but they are men; that is enough for me. And one of them is Diswunt--Diswunt the King's crippled painter----"
"Aye!" assented the Lord Chamberlain still more sullenly. "Diswunt who is devoted to his master. 'Tis next his studio the Englishman's lathe is set up; farthest therefore from the door, farthest from treachery."
Siyah Yamin stretched her beautiful arms in an all-embracing gesture and leant back against the wall that was grimed by a hundred, a million such contacts with vicious humanity.
"What wilt give me for the diamond, Ibrahîm?" she said suddenly, "a thousand golden pieces? I will not take a dirrhm less. 'Twill serve to pay the crazy painter for his likeness of me. Hast seen it? No?" She clapped her hands, and sate up with an odd expression of doubt, dislike, and desire on her small, childish face. "Then thou shalt see, and--and condemn it. What? Drum-banger?" she went on sharply as Deena's wicked old face showed at the stair-head in answer to her call. "How now? Where is Nargîz?"
"Gone out, Princess, leaving me the while devising a new devil's dance for my Lord Chamberlain's delectation this evening. He entertains the King's friends!"
Siyah Yamin interrupted a malicious leer at Ibrahîm with scant courtesy.
"Peace, fool! Go fetch the portrait of me Diswunt painted, these gentlemen would see it."
"Well?" she added when, a minute or two afterward four pairs of Eastern eyes were gazing at a picture which offended every canon of Eastern art. Here were no tiny smooth surfaced stipplings, no delicate dottings of jewellery no faultless complexion, no plastered hair. Even its size, its composition were unconventional. This was a life-sized face--the face and no more--peering out of a white swathing veil which filled up the small oval panel on which it was painted. But it stood there, propped against the humanity-grimed wall, a veritable marvel in the fierce determination to be quit of all convention which showed in its every touch.
The fighting quails called from their shrouded cages below, the sounds of the bazaar drifted upward, and on these sounds came Ibrahîm's sudden contemptuous laugh.
"Thou shouldst keep it as a scarecrow for unwelcome lovers," he said idly. "By God! Even hot lust would fly from such achurail."[11]
Siyah Yamin flushed angrily and bent forward to look at the picture more closely. Something there was even in its outrageous originality which she, as woman, recognised as true.
"The lad meant well, being my lover," she murmured softly, then her eyes turned to Mirza Ibrahîm with a whole world of malice in them.
"Thou shouldst get him to paint such an one for thee of Âtma Devi, friend; it might serve to heal thee of--of her scant courtesy--to say nothing of her bruises!"
The Lord Chamberlain grew purple with rage. "Curses on her!" he cried. "How didst hear? Did the jade dare to tell----"
The courtesan interrupted him with absolute contempt. "Truly thou hast a poor purblind brain concerning women, Mirza. Couldst not see, man, with half an eye that Âto is not of those who speak of insult? Nay! 'Twas old Deena yonder--who spends half his time with vice and half with virtue--who, when thou wast attempting to thrust thyself upon her, saw thee put through the door, and trundled down the stair like a bad baby! Fie upon thee, sonling!"
The raillery of her voice matched the derisive shaking of her jewelled finger as he rose sullenly, muttering curses and swearing to stop the old drum-banger's loose lip. "Aye! Thou canst do it with a handful of gold," yawned Siyah Yamin. "Deena's mouth just holds twenty good gold pieces. I have had to gag him myself ere now. Farewell then, conspirator! I will take a thousand of those same myself for the King's Luck, not one dirrhm less!"
Mirza Ibrahîm stood arrested at the stair head. Angry as he was, he knew her wit, and a glance at Khodadâd's face showed that he knew it also.
"How wilt thou compass it?" he asked sullenly.
She looked at him jeeringly. "By my wits, friend. Have I not all the vice of all India at my finger tips? Is not Pâhlu the subtlest thief in Hindustan amongst my brethren? Do not the stranglers, and poisoners, and beguilers rub shoulders with virtuous gentlemen as ye, in this my house? Nay! Leave it to me, Mirza, leave it to me, the courtesan!"
She lay softly laughing to herself when they had gone, until Deena the drum-banger coming up the stairs with laboriously secret creakings whispered: "Mistress Âtma Devi hath been waiting below for a private interview this hour past. Shall she come?"
Then she sate up, suddenly serious.
"Âto!" she said. "Yes! let her come--let her come!"
There was an almost malicious content in her tone, for she realised that here was metal worthy of her steel, that in the coming interview she would have no crass, heavy man's brain and heart to deal with, but a woman's. Dull they might be, it is true, yet would they be full of intuitions, of sudden unexpected grip on motive, and sudden clarities of vision. Yet for this alone, Âtma Devi might be useful to her in the immediate future; since she would need every atom of knowledge, every possible fulcrum, ere she could lay hands on the King's Luck. Aye! Âtma might help, though she was for the King; but that made it all the more imperative, all the more worthy skill, that she should be bent from her purpose, and be made unconsciously to work for the King's disadvantage.
So once more the whole vitality of the courtesan leapt up toward evil.
Woman against Woman! Aye! That was it! Woman glorying in her serpent-bruised heel against Woman treading on the serpent's head. Woman the Temptress, against Woman the Saviour.
Dimly she saw this--the unending conflict of the World--as she gave greeting with a mysterious smile on her baby-face to the tall somewhat gaunt figure with the harassed, perturbed look in its great grave dark eyes.
In truth, no imagination could have conceived a more subtle antagonism than lay between those two women as they sate for a second in silence, looking at each other across Diswunt the crippled painter's picture which still stood against the wall.
Something there seemed to be, indeed, in this man's ideal of the woman he loved, of his endeavour to solve the mystery of woman's dual nature which jarred upon the nerves of both these types of Womanhood; for as their eyes met, Siyah Yamin laughed hurriedly and pointed. "Dost recognise it?" she asked.
Âtma Devi's straight brows showed level and steady as she looked.
"Aye!" she answered, then added swiftly: "Lo! Siyah, with that before thee, I marvel thou canst be so unkind--to a poor lad who loves thee."
The last words came softly, lingeringly, for love was still to Âtma the one thing worth having in the world, though she denied it strenuously. The craving for it lay behind all her claims to Châranship. Vaguely she knew it, vaguely she was ashamed of it.
"Not more unkind than he who would fain thrust deformity uponmylove," retorted the courtesan airily. "Lo! Âto! even thou, with all thy fine feelings, couldst not love crooked legs and a hunchback--the King hath neither! Then wherefore should I be kind?"
"Wherefore indeed," assented Âtma, disdaining her own flush. "So why not give him dismissal instead of keeping him, as thou dost, on the rack? See you, I speak warmly, in that he had his food from my father's house for service done before the King found him drawing dogs upon a white wall with a burnt bone, and reft him from us for teaching. Thus it grieved me to see him, but now, so distraught, so----"
"But now?" echoed Siyah Yamin sharply. "What! Hast been at the Hall of Labour?"
Âtma's face fell. "Nay! Not there. No woman finds entry there! Else had I seen for myself and not come to thee, seeking news." Her troubled eyes sought Siyah Yamin's almost resentfully.
"News?" echoed the latter, craft growing to her face. "What news? Somewhat that Diswunt would not tell thee? Out with it Âto? Tell me thy end--God knows but it may fit mine, since, so they say, extremities meet."
"Aye," assented Âtma sombrely. "That is why I seek thee. Hate and love are not far distant with us womenkind."
Then, suddenly she reached out a tense, nervous hand to lay upon Siyah Yamin's smooth round arm.
"Lo! Sister! thou hearest all things here, and I--I hear nothing! What news is there of the King's Luck? Hath he in truth yielded it to the Englishman?"
Siyah Yamin stared for a second, then burst into a perfect cascade of high-pitched laughter.
"Said I not truly," she gurgled, "that extremes meet! See! I will send for a cooling sherbet, and I will tell thee all!"
It was not all, it did not even approach the truth, but it served her purpose. So she sate, watching the effect of each word, and Âtma Devi listened, weighing each word, both with the same indescribable intuitions of their sex, appraising this, discounting that, until at last the latter rose, tall, dark, menacing, to look down on the other, crouching like a coiled snake among her cushions.
"Yea! as thou hast said, Siyâl, true loyalty would lend itself even to theft, or rather to the snatching of luck from ill luck, and the protection of the King from evil magic; and so I will tell Diswunt--I, his mistress by inheritance. And to give it to the keeping of the Beneficent Ladies as I have said were well done. The Lady Hamida, the King's mother, carries his honour close day and night, even as she once carried him. And Khânzada Gulbadan Begum hath wit more than most men, so I will aid if I can, being bound also to the King's honour. But hearken, Siyah! Lo! draw thy veil so--let me have it." She sank to her knees and leaning forward caught the loose end of the courtesan's tinsel veil and flung it round her own head also. "Now let us swear once more, as sisters of the veil, to be true to each other until the death--until the death--dost hear?"
Taken by surprise Siyah Yamin shrank back from those blazing eyes, paled, faltered; finally, compelled thereto by the grip of a nature stronger than her own, muttered faintly:
"I swear."
"Till the death?"
"Till--death."
After Âtma had gone the courtesan sate for a while as if half-paralysed; she had gone further than was safe, seeing that she was to use Âtma as a tool; a half-crazed tool. Then she looked about her. The heat of the day was waxing. Below her the bazaar, becoming drowsy, was leaving a thousand wickednesses to welter and fester under the noon-tide sun while it slipped from them for a while in sleep; leaving them restlessly active, ceaselessly on the move like molecules in a sunray; thought hustling thought, intention seeking desire, making evil ready for the awakening of men to find a new stimulus to wrongdoing in the coolness of the afternoon. It was always so. Evil grew day by day. There was nothing else alive in the whole world.
So by degrees courage and confidence returned.
"Send for Pâhlu, the prince of thieves," she said "and bid Pooru, the false gem-maker, be here when I awaken. Meanwhile, let Deena take this to Diswunt at the Hall of Labour."
She sate for a second, pen in hand, cogitating half amusedly; then with a sudden smile wrote in delicate curvings a verse from Sa'adi's "Lamp and the Moth":