“Should the King say that it is night at noon,Be sure to cry: ‘Behold, I see the moon!’”
“Should the King say that it is night at noon,Be sure to cry: ‘Behold, I see the moon!’”
Yet Mowbray, alert to discern the slightest straw-twist on the swirl of the current, thought that some of the older men glanced askance at each other, which puzzled him, as he knew quite well that the death of a Feringhi was of little account to an Asiatic.
The “sheep” alluded to by Jahangir were veritable carcases of those animals, slung from poles by the feet tied in a bunch. They were carried by servants onto the terrace itself, and forthwith a few athletic youths created some excitement by endeavoring, in the first place, to cut through the four feet at one blow, and, secondly, to divide the body in the same way. They used their razor-edged simitars with much skill, science rather than great strength being demanded by the task.
When half a dozen carcases had been dissected with more or less success, Jahangir shouted a question to Sainton, of whose presence he seemed to be unaware hitherto.
“Tell me, Hathi,” he cried. “Canst perform eithertrick with thy long sword? Thy arm is strong, but is thy wrist supple?”
All eyes were instantly bent on Roger, to whom Mowbray whispered the King’s meaning lest he had not properly caught the words. The giant grinned genially.
“A slung sheep offers but slight resistance to a blow,” he said. “Were he fresh from the spit I’d sooner eat him.”
Discreet mirth rewarded his humor, but Jahangir wheeled round in his chair towards the ditch and clapped his hands as a signal to the attendants. At once began a series of sanguinary events in which buffaloes contended withnilgau, hunting dogs tore down bears let loose from invisible caverns, and panthers made magnificent leaps after flying deer. Few were real combats. In most cases a helpless creature was ruthlessly slaughtered by some vicious and snarling enemy, and the more ghastly the dying struggles of the doomed antelope or bellowing cow the more excited and vociferous became the spectators.
A fight between elephants was a really thrilling affair. Two magnificent brutes, specially imported from Ceylon, were led up on opposite sides of a low mud wall built on wood and carried into the arena by a host of men. Gorgeously caparisoned, and trumpeting strange squeals of defiance, each elephant was urged towards this barrier by his two riders. Separated at first by the wall, they fought furiously with heads, tusks, and trunks, while the leadingmahoutencouraged his mount by shrill cries, forcing him to the attack with a steelankus, or striving to ward off the blows of the opposing beast’s trunk with the same instrument. It was quickly apparent why there were two men astride an elephant. Each cunning brute knew that it was an advantage to get rid of his adversary’smahout, and, indeed, one rider was killed before the fight was long in progress. But the death of the man so enraged his elephant that he sprang onto the wall ere the second attendant could climb to his head, and gored his opponent in the flank with such ferocity that the other turned and fled.
The two rushed towards the end of the enclosure, and the leading animal charged a stout barricade so blindly that it yielded before his great bulk. He fell, and the pursuer attacked him furiously. At once a terrific fanfare of hautboys and cymbals burst forth, and a number of men ran with lighted fireworks, mostly Catherine wheels, attached to long sticks, which they thrust under the legs and before the eyes of the victor. This device caused him to abandon the assault, and he allowed his remainingmahoutto drive him away, but not until two unfortunatebhois, or attendants, had been trodden to death.
Jahangir nodded his satisfaction, and the riders of the elephants were permitted to alight, each man being given a sackful of pice, while the ears of the conquering animal were decorated with tails of the white Tibetan ox, or yak. As for the inanimate corpses of the haplessmahoutand his assistants, they were huddled ontobiers and borne away, followed by some shrieking women, whose plaints were drowned by the din of trumpets six or seven feet in length and a foot wide at the mouth.
It must not be imagined that the spectacle disgusted the English onlookers. In an age when men lived by the sword, when personal bravery and physical hardihood were the best equipment a youth could possess, there were no fastidious notions as to the sacredness of human life or the deliberate cruelty involved in such encounters.
They were wondering what would provide the next act in this drama of blood and death when a stir towards the rear of the platform on which they stood caused them to look in that direction.
Sainton, by reason of his height, could see over the heads of the crowd.
“By the cross of Osmotherly!” he cried, “the mystery is cleared. Here comes Sher Afghán, closely tended, if not a prisoner.”
It was, indeed, the Persian noble himself who now advanced towards Jahangir, the Emperor having swung his chair, which was on a pivot, to face the palace. Sher Afghán’s mien was collected, his dress in good order. He was unarmed, and the mace-bearers who marched behind him might be merely doing him honor.
With eyes for none save Jahangir he strode on with firm step. At the proper distance he stopped and bowed deeply.
“To hear the King’s order is to obey,” he said quietly.“Your Majesty’s messenger rode far, for I hastened to Burdwán, but when he reached me I turned my horse’s head that moment.”
“Say rather, you gave orders to your litter carriers. When last we parted you had pleasant company in thepalki,” replied Jahangir.
“Neither my wife nor I love indolence, O King of Kings. We have ridden hither at the rate of sixty miles a day.”
“I am glad of it. Being newly come to the throne I did not wish the most beautiful and the bravest of my subjects to be banished from the capital to far Burdwán.”
“Your Majesty’s words are more propitious than a favorable sign in the heavens.”
“They carry no better augury than the hour of your arrival, for, in very truth, I feared you might be tardy. I owe these strangers from beyond the black waters some slight debt in my illustrious father’s behalf. Certain monies shall be paid them, but first I have discharged a promise of the great Akbar’s to entertain them.”
He waved a jeweled hand towards Mowbray and Sainton, and the Persian saw them for the first time. But Jahangir went on slowly, his white teeth showing as if he wished to bite each word:—
“Thy coming, friend, hath provided for all a truly marvelous close to a day of pleasure. Art thou not named Sher Afghán, Slayer of Tigers? Behold, then, a foe worthy even of thy reputation.”
Again he clapped his hands. A door was opened in the cellars beneath, and a great Bengal tiger, maddened by hours of torture, sprang into the center of the arena, the broken barrier having been hastily repaired with strong hurdles. The lissome beast, whose striped skin shone like cloth of gold and brown velvet in the rays of the declining sun, stood for a little while lashing his sides in fury with his tail until he caught the scent of blood. Then he crouched, and began to stalk, he cared not what. The air was fetid with killing, and this past master in the hunter’s art knew the tokens of his craft.
But the arena was otherwise empty, and his lambent eyes, searching eagerly for the cause of so much reek, were raised at last to the intent row of faces looking down at him.
“What sayest thou, Sher Afghán,” cried the Emperor. “Art thou minded to vindicate thy title with one who seems to dispute it, or has a happy marriage robbed thy arm of its prowess?”
The Persian hesitated. He, like his English friends, had thought it better to brave Jahangir’s animosity in Agra itself than fall beneath the attack of hirelings in some distant fray. In the capital, there was always a chance of a political upheaval as the outcome of a quarrel, whereas, in a remote part, the minions of a vengeful monarch might strike unheeded. Jahangir’s tenure of the throne was far from stable. Yet, though he might not dare openly to put to death a noble of high rank, this challenge meant little else, even if it heldthe plausible pretext that Sher Afghán chose his doom voluntarily.
A thrill of anticipation shook all hearers as they awaited the Persian’s answer. He gazed around on them disdainfully, for he was well aware that many there would utter a protest did they not fear for their own skins. Then he spoke.
“Give me arms and a ladder,” he said, “and I shall try to kill the beast.”
A murmur arose, like the hum of wind-tossed leaves presaging a storm. Some men might have been warned by it, but the Emperor, already half intoxicated, was now goaded to utter madness by his rival’s cool daring.
“Arms thou shalt have,” he screamed, “but what need is there of a ladder? Why not jump? There is sand beneath!”
Now this, indeed, was spurring Sher Afghán to his death, for the tiger would be on him with inconceivable speed ere he could recover his feet.
Among those who thronged breathlessly forward to hear all that passed, Roger Sainton listened and understood. The big Yorkshireman’s eyes glowed like live coals, and the veins on his neck bulged with sudden passion. It was in his mind to end the quarrel then and there by sweeping the Emperor and a row of his guards into the fosse, but a quaint idea suddenly gripped him, and, without any hesitation, he put it in force.
Thrusting the gapers left and right he reached the royal dais.
“If not a ladder, friend,” he said to Sher Afghán, “why not a step?”
With that, he stooped and caught hold of the huge block of black marble. Before anyone so much as grasped his intent he lifted it from its supports, toppling Jahangir and several of his favorites in a confused heap on the terrace. Then he pitched the mass of stone into the arena and it chanced to fall flat onto the crouching tiger.
His sword flashed out as several spear-men, having recovered their wits, made lunges at him.
“Hold back, good fellows!” he cried cheerily, for Roger’s anger never continued when steel was bared. “Mayhap the Emperor thinks the revel is ended!”
“I do not set my life at a pin’s fee.”Hamlet, Act I.
“I do not set my life at a pin’s fee.”Hamlet, Act I.
Mortal fear has caused many a man to run who thought himself unable to walk. It now gave a tonic to an inebriate king. Jahangir, struggling to his feet, obtained a fleeting glimpse of Roger Sainton’s amazing achievement. He heard more definitely the crashing fall of the great stone into the arena, and his first emotion was one of profound thankfulness that he and several of his boon companions had not gone with it.
But instantly there came the knowledge that he had been treated with contumely before all his court. So his face, already pallid with terror, became even more white with anger, and words trembled on his lips which, if uttered, would have been the irrevocable signal for a wild tumult. Yet, hidden away in the brain of this headstrong debauchee there was a latent sense of king-craft which taught him caution, and deep down in his soul was a certain nobility of character which age and the cares of a ruler developed in later years. His quick eyes discovered what Roger had truly divined. There was many a powerful noble there ready to espouse the cause of Sher Afghán, whilst, such was the awe inspired by Sainton’s almost supernatural feat, it wasmore than likely the giant’s onslaught would create a mad stampede. Moreover, Jahangir himself was as conscious as any present that he had witnessed a deed whose memory would endure through the ages, and the warring influences in his breast sobered him for the moment.
With a self-control that was wholly creditable, he held up an authoritative hand.
“Who dares to strike ere the Emperor commands?” he cried, and his strong voice stilled the rising waves of agitation as oil beats down the crests of troubled waters.
Heedless, or perhaps unknowing, that his turban was awry, he walked to the edge of the parapet and looked over. There lay the fine marble slab, broken in two as it remains to this day, though it was quickly restored to its old-time site. Bound to it were the silken cords which fastened the imperial chair, the seat itself having been crushed into a thousand splinters underneath.
He turned towards Roger; though a cruel despot, Jahangir was a sportsman:—
“Did it fall on the tiger?” he asked.
The big man pretended to scan the arena.
“As the beast is nowhere else to be seen I doubt not he is on the right side of the stone, your Majesty,” he answered.
“Why did you not warn me of your intent? I would have given a lakh of rupees to have seen this thing.”
Roger was far too quick-witted not to accept the cue thus thrown to him.
“There was scant time for words, your Majesty,” hesaid. “In another instant your devoted servant, Sher Afghán, would have been in the pit with the snarling brute. For sure you meant but to try him. Nevertheless, I made bold to interfere, as there is many a tiger, but only one such man among your vassals.”
The big man’s humor was mordant, but the excited throng chose to ignore the implied disparagement, and a murmur of applause told the Emperor that in curbing his wrath he had acted with exceeding wisdom.
“You are right,” he said slowly. “I am much beholden to you, and that is more than some kings would say who had been flung headlong to the ground. But see,” he added, making a brave show of nonchalance as he faced the crowd and waved a haughty hand toward the west, “the hour of evening prayer approaches. Let us to the mosque!”
“Now look you,” murmured Sainton to Walter, who stood watchful, with sword-arm ready, during these thrilling moments, “there goes a man with murder in his heart, yet will he turn his jowl to Mecca and chant verses from the Koran with the best of them.”
“I fear he only bides his time. But what good fairy prompted you to act in such a way? I knew not what to do. I felt that any moment we might be fighting for our lives, yet I saw no loophole of escape.”
“Ecod, I remembered my mother telling me that a white sheet makes nine parts of a ghost on a dark night. I reckoned to scare ’em with a bogie, and succeeded.”
In company with Sher Afghán, they quitted the palacefortress without let or hindrance. The gallant Persian, after thanking Roger for his aid, explained his motive in returning to Agra. He had reached the Garden of Heart’s Delight only an hour after they quitted it that morning. Hence, Jahangir was evidently quite well informed as to his movements, and had planned the escapade with the tiger as a means of requiting one, at least, of his avowed enemies. Indeed, they learned later that, in the event of Sher Afghán’s death, the spear-men were ordered to close round Sainton and Mowbray and bear them down by sheer force of numbers if they strove to assist their friend. Roger had defeated the scheme only by taking advantage of a prior moment of intense excitement.
When Sher Afghán told them that Nur Mahal and he, with their retinue, had taken up their residence in the Diwán’s house, the Englishmen wished to return forthwith to the caravansary. But this the Persian would in no wise permit. He sat late with them that evening, and, from words which fell now and then in the talk, they gathered that while he was even more enamored than ever of his wife the haughty beauty herself was far from being content with her lot.
“She intended to be a queen,” he sighed once, “and, alas, my kingdom is too small and rude to suit her tastes.”
“Why, then, did you not send her to Burdwán, and come here alone in deference to the king’s command?” asked Walter.
“Because there she would pine in solitude. Here,I have good hopes that Jahangir’s profligacy will disgust her. Already I have heard grave rumors of court dissensions. Saw you not to-day how ready were many to oppose him?”
“Thank Heaven it was so, else naught could have saved us. But what of the morrow? You will incur constant danger. As for us, we have well nigh abandoned all hope of gaining the reward of our venture. Were it not for my stout-hearted friend we had endeavored long ere this to leave our fortunes a sunken ship in Agra.”
“Say not so. The shame of foregoing Akbar’s obligations would travel far, and the King cannot afford to lose his good name with traders. Bide on in content. His mood changes each hour, and surely the day will come when he shall treat you royally. I have good cause to hate Jahangir, yet I would never say of him that he is wholly ignoble.”
Their conversation was interrupted by a servant, who announced that a store of wine had been sent from the palace for the Feringhis.
“Gad!” cried Roger, “that cat-footed servitor hath not forgotten my request. And it is good liquor, too.”
Sher Afghán was very suspicious of the gift until they apprised him of all that had happened. Though he would not drink he smelt and tasted samples of the wine, which, apparently, had not been tampered with in any way. His brow cleared when he convinced himself that no trick was intended.
“I told you,” he said, “that Jahangir’s nature owedsomething to his lineage. May Allah grant him wit enough to win me and others to his side by reason of his forebearance!”
With this magnanimous wish on his lips he quitted them. They were fated soon to recall his words in bitterness and despair. Jahangir, sunk in renewed orgy, and twitted by his evil associates with the failure of the afternoon’s device, was even then devoting himself, with an almost diabolical ingenuity, to a fresh plot for their undoing.
He limned the project fully, but declared with scorn that it needed a man of courage to carry it out, and there was not one such in his court.
Whereupon, Kutub-ud-din, his foster-brother, who was noted chiefly for the girth of his paunch, but who, nevertheless, had some reputation for personal bravery, sprang up from the cushions on which he reposed and cried:—
“Give me the vice-royalty of Bengal and I swear, by the beard of the Prophet, to bring you news of Sher Afghán’s death ere day dawns.”
The Emperor paused. It was a high price, but the memory of Nur Mahal’s beauty rushed on him like a flood, and he said:—
“Keep thy vow and I shall keep my bond.”
The conspirators knew nothing of Roger’s pact with the chamberlain, else their task were made more easy. But there is in India a poisonous herb calleddhatura, the presence of which cannot be detected in food or drink. Taken in any considerable quantity, it conveyssure death, quick and painless as the venom of a cobra; in less degree it induces lethargy, followed by heavy sleep.
Now, Sher Afghán’s doubts of the Emperor’s wine were justified to this extent, that it had been slightly tinctured withdhatura, in the belief that Mowbray and Sainton would drink heavily during the midday meal, and thus be rendered slow of thought and sluggish in action when put to the test by the Persian’s encounter with the tiger. Such drugs, thwarted by the unforeseen, oft have exactly the opposite effects to those intended. Their state of rude health, and the exciting scenes which took place before the Emperor played his ultimate card and failed, caused the poison to stimulate rather than retard their faculties.
With night came reaction and weariness. Nevertheless, they did not retire to rest until nearly an hour after Sher Afghán left them. They drank a little more of the wine, discussed their doubtful position for the hundredth time, and thus unconsciously spun another strand in the spider’s web of fate, for Jahangir, whom fortune so aided, might have spent his life in vain conjecture ere he guessed the circumstance which in part defeated his malice.
While the two talked the glorious moon of India, late risen, sailed slowly across the blue arc of the heavens, and garbed all things in silver and black. The air was chill, but these hardy Britons were warmly clad, and they preferred the cold majesty of nature’s own lamp to the evil-smelling oil and smoky wickswhich, at that period, were the only means of lighting Indian houses.
When, at last, they stretched themselves on the charpoys which, for greater safety, they placed side by side in a spacious chamber of the suite they occupied, they did not undress, but threw off their heavy riding-boots, unfastened their coats, and arranged their swords so as to be ready to hand at a moment’s notice. They knew that Sher Afghán’s trusty retainers guarded the gate and slept in each veranda. There was little fear of being taken by surprise in the unlikely event of an armed attack being made during the night, yet they neglected no precautions.
“Sleep well, Roger, and may the Lord keep thee!” was Walter’s parting word; and Sainton answered drowsily, for something more potent than the day’s emotions had wearied him:—
“An He fail either of us, lad, naught else shall avail.”
The bright moon circled in the sky. Her beams, low now on the horizon, penetrated to the recesses of the room and fell on the low trestle-beds on which they reposed in deep slumber. It was a small matter, this nightly course of the luminary, yet, perchance, in those still hours, the direction of a stray shaft of light made history in India.
About two o’clock, when the tall cypress trees of the Garden of Heart’s Delight threw black shadows toward the house, a small, naked man, smeared with oil lest anyone should seize him, and covered again with dustto render him almost invisible, crawled along the dark pathway of the shadow and crossed the veranda outside the Englishmen’s room. He moved with the deathly silence of a snake, passing between two sleeping Rajputs, so quickly and noiselessly that one who saw him would most likely have rubbed his eyes and deemed the flitting vision a mere figment of the imagination.
Once inside the house he crouched in the shade of a pillar, and waited until another ghoul joined him in the same manner. These two were Thugs, murderers by caste, who worshiped the pickaxes with which they buried their victims. Had Milton or Dante ever heard of such the abode of harpy-footed furies and the lowest circle of Inferno would alike have been rendered more horrific by a new demoniac imagery. No man was safe from them, none could withstand their devilish art. Sainton, whom not a score of Thugs could have pulled down in the open, was a mere babe in their clutch when he knew not of their presence.
For these fiends never failed. They were professional stranglers, with sufficient knowledge of anatomy to dislocate the neck of him whom they had marked down as their prey. Never a cry, scarce a movement, would betray a strong man’s death. Of them it might indeed be truly said:—
Their fatal handsNo second stroke intend.
Their fatal handsNo second stroke intend.
Creeping stealthily, they reached the two charpoys, and each squatted at the back of his intended victim.Sainton slept nearer the veranda, and his wide-brimmed hat was lying on the floor. Throughout his wanderings he ever sported a plume of cock’s feathers and he still retained the curious ornament which served as a brooch. It was lit up now by a moonbeam, and the Thug, whose watchful eyes regarded all things, saw what he took to be a headless snake, coiled in glistening folds and surrounded by a ring of gold. The wretch, in whose dull brain glimmered some dim conception of a deity, drew back appalled. Here was one guarded by his tutelary god, the snake, a snake, too, of uncanny semblance, reposing in a precious shrine. He had never before encountered the like. Weird legends, whispered at night in trackless forests, where he and his associates had their lair, trooped in on him. He quaked, and shrank yet further away, a fierce savage tamed by a mere fossil.
The sibilant chirp of a grasshopper brought his fellow Thug to his side. Glaring eyes and chin thrown forward sufficed to indicate the cause of this danger signal. No words were needed. With one accord they retreated. Squirming across the veranda and along the path of the lengthening shadows they regained the shelter of the cypresses.
“Brother,” whispered one, “they have a jadu!”[H]
“Who shall dare to strike where the jungle-god reposes!” was the rejoinder.
“A snake without a head, ringed and shining! Saw one ever the like?”
“Let us escape, else we shall be slain.”
The trees swallowed them, and, although sought vengefully, they were never seen again by those whose behests they had not fulfilled.... Minutes passed, until the stout Kutub-ud-din, hiding near the gate with a horde of hirelings, grew impatient that his vice-regal throne in Bengal was not assured. So he growled an order and strode openly to the gate, where, in the Emperor’s name, he demanded of a wakeful sentry audience of Sher Afghán.
“My master sleeps,” was the answer. “The matter must wait.”
“It cannot wait. It concerns thy master’s safety. Here is Pir Muhammed Khan, Kotwal[I]of Agra, who says that two Thugs are within. We have come in all haste to warn Sher Afghán to search for the evil-doers.”
Now, the mere name of the dreaded clan was enough to alarm his hearer, who well knew that none could guard against a Thug’s deadly intent. Warning his comrades he unbound the door, but showed discretion in sending messengers to arouse Sher Afghán. Kutub-ud-din, thinking the Persian and the Englishmen had been killed half an hour earlier, deceived the guard still further by his earnestness. Giving directions that some should watch the walls without, while others searched every inch of the gardens, he, followed by a strong posse, went rapidly towards the house. Almost the first person he encountered was Sher Afghán himself. The young nobleman, awakened from soundsleep by strange tidings, no sooner recognized his visitor than his brow seamed with anger.
“What folly is this?” he cried. “Why hast thou dared to come hither with a rabble at such an hour, Kutub-ud-din?”
Surprise, disappointment, envious rage, combined to choke the would-be viceroy, but he answered, boldly enough:—
“You should not requite with hasty words one who thought to do thee a service.”
“I am better without any service thou canst render. Be off, dog, and tell thy tales to some old woman who fears them.”
Beside himself with anger and humiliation, Kutub-ud-din raised his sword threateningly. It was enough. Sher Afghán, seeing naught but some new palace treachery in this untimely visit, drew a dagger and sprang at his unwieldy opponent with the tiger-like ferocity for which he was famous. Kutub-ud-din endeavored to strike, but, ere his blow fell, he was ripped so terribly that his bowels gushed forth. Here was no vice-royalty for him, only the barren kingdom of the grave.
“Avenge me!” he yelled, as he fell in agony, for your would-be slayer is ever resentful of his own weapons being turned against him.
Pir Muhammed Khan, an astute Kashmiri, seeing his own advancement made all the more certain by reason of the failure of the Emperor’s foster-brother—thinking, too, that Sher Afghán might be taken at a disadvantage whilst he looked down on his prostratefoe—leaped forward and dealt the Persian a heavy stroke on the head with a scimitar. Sher Afghán turned and killed him on the spot.
It chanced, unhappily, that among those in the immediate vicinity of this sudden quarrel the Kotwal’s retainers far outnumbered the followers of Sher Afghán, many of whose men were yet asleep, while others were scouring the gardens. The native of India may always be trusted to avenge his master’s death, so a certain dog-like fidelity impelled a score or more to attack the Persian simultaneously. Realizing his danger he possessed himself of the fallen Kotwal’s sword and fought furiously, crying loudly for help. Oh, for a few lightning sweeps of the good straight blades reposing peacefully in their scabbards by the beds of his English allies! How they would have equalized the odds in that supreme moment! How Roger would have shorn the heads and Walter slit the yelling throats of the jackals who yelped around the undaunted but over-powered Persian!
For the blood from the Kotwal’s blow poured into his eyes, and he struck blindly if fiercely. Closer pressed the gang, and, at last, he fell to his knees, struck down by a matchlock bullet. He must have felt that his last hour had come. Struggling round in order to face towards Mecca, he used his waning strength to pick up some dust from the garden path. He poured it over his head by way of ablution, strove to rise and renew the unequal fight, and sank back feebly. A spear thrust brought the end, and the manwho had dared to rival a prince’s love died in the garden to which the presence of Nur Mahal had lent romance and passion.
Roger, whom the clash of steel might have roused from the tomb, stirred uneasily in his sleep when the first sounds of the fight smote his unconscious ears. The shot waked him, though not to thorough comprehension, so utterly possessed was he with drowsiness.
Then a light flashed in the room, and he saw a beautiful woman standing in an inner doorway, a woman whose exquisite face was white and tense as she held aloft a lamp and cried:—
“Why do ye tarry here when my husband is fighting for his life and for yours?”
Now he was wide awake. It was Nur Mahal, unveiled and robed all in white, who stood there and spoke so vehemently.
Up he sprang, and roused Mowbray with his mighty grip. The new conflict raging over Sher Afghán’s body was music in his ears, for several Rajputs had come, too late, to their master’s assistance.
“God in heaven, lad!” he roared, “here’s a fray in full blast and we snoring. Have at them, Walter! The pack is on us!”
His words, no less than a vigorous shaking, awoke his companion.
“Oh, come speedily!” wailed Nur Mahal again. “I know not what is happening, but I heard my husband’s voice calling for aid.”
They needed no further bidding, though their eyeswere strangely heavy and their bodies relaxed. Once they were out in the night air and running toward the din of voices the stupor passed. Yet, when they reached the main alley, where Sher Afghán lay dead, they knew not whom to strike nor whom to spare, so intermixed were the combatants and so confused the riot of ringing simitars, of hoarse shouts, of agonized appeals for mercy.
But Nur Mahal, quicker than they to distinguish between native and native, cried as she ran with them:—
“My husband’s men wear white turbans. All the others are strangers.”
They needed no further instruction. When they saw a bare poll, a skull cap, or a dark turban, they hit it, and the battle, equal before, soon became one sided. The presence of Roger alone determined the fight instantly. Kutub-ud-din and the Kotwal had assured their supporters that the Feringhis were dead, and hinted, in vague terms, that the looting of the Diwán’s house would not be too strictly inquired into if the “search” for the Thugs were resisted.
But here was the terrific mass of the giant looming through the night, and here was his sword sweeping a six-foot swath in front of him. No man who saw him waited for closer proof of his existence. Soon the Garden of Heart’s Delight was emptied of the gang save those who were dead or too badly injured to crawl. Then lights were brought.
Nur Mahal was the first to find her husband’s body. She threw herself by his side in a gust of tears.
“Alas!” she sobbed, “they have slain him! It is my fault, O prince of men! What evil fate made thee wed me, Sher Afghán? I vow to Allah, though I could not love thee living, I shall mourn thee dead. Jahangir, if thou hast done this thing, bitterly shalt thou rue it! Oh, my husband, my husband, thou art fallen because of an unworthy woman!”
It was with difficulty that Walter could persuade her to leave the corpse of the dead hero. Tears choked her voice, and her self-reproach was heartrending, inasmuch as it was quite undeserved. The distraught girl could not be blamed because a marriage planned for state reasons had not prospered, and even Mowbray, who was prejudiced against her, knew quite well that she was no party to this night attack against her father’s house.
Finally, he led her to the trembling serving-women who cowered within, and then addressed himself to an inquiry into all that had taken place.
Piece by piece, the tangle resolved itself. At first, the references of the watchman at the gate, supported by certain wounded prisoners who gave testimony to the presence of Thugs in the garden, were puzzling. But a Rajput, who knew the ways of these human gnomes, found a smear of oil and dust against the wall of the sahibs’ bedroom, and even traced their tracks, to some extent, by similar marks on the floor. None could guess the reason of the Thugs’ failure, which was unprecedented, but the remainder of the sordid story was legible enough.
Two hours before dawn, Walter sent word to Nur Mahal that he wished to consult her. She came instantly, and he noted, to his surprise, that she was garbed as for a journey.
He began to tell her what he had discovered, but soon she interrupted him.
“I know all that, and more,” she said. “I can even tell you what will be done to-morrow. Jahangir will repudiate the deed, and execute those concerned in it whom he can lay hands on. But you and I are doomed. With Sher Afghán dead, who shall uphold us? We have but one course open. We must fly, if we would save our lives. Let us go now, ere daybreak, and ride to Burdwán. Once there, I can frame plans for vengeance, whilst you shall go to Calcutta, not unrewarded.”
The firmness of her tone astounded Mowbray as greatly as the nature of her proposal. When he came to seek Roger’s advice he found that his friend had swung round to the view that it was hopeless now to seek redress from the Emperor. The number and valor of Sher Afghán’s retainers gave some promise of security, and, once away from the capital, there was a chance of escape.
So Nur Mahal was told that they would adopt her counsel, and it was wonderful to see how a woman, in that hour of distress and danger, imposed her will on every man she encountered.
It was Nur Mahal who instructed certain servants of her father’s to see to the embalming of her husband’sbody and its safe conveyance to Burdwán. It was she who sent couriers to start the caravan of the Feringhis on a false trail back to Delhi. It was she who arranged the details of the first march, forgetting nothing, but correcting even the most experienced of Sher Afghán’s lieutenants when he declared impossible that which she said was possible.
And finally, it was Nur Mahal who, after a last look at the face of him whom she revered more in death than in life, rode out again into the darkness, from the Garden of Heart’s Delight. But, this time, Walter Mowbray and Roger Sainton rode with her, and those three, as it happened, held the future of India in the hollows of their hands.
“Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?”Marlowe, “Hero and Leander.”
“Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?”Marlowe, “Hero and Leander.”
Of all the perils encountered by Walter Mowbray since he left his home in Wensleydale, there was none so impalpable, and therefore none so mortal, as the daily companionship of Nur Mahal. She used no wiles, practised no arts—her subtle mesmerism was the unseen power of the lodestone. At first, there never was woman more retiring. Mowbray and Sainton were seldom absent from her side; nevertheless, she spoke only when the exigencies of the journey demanded a few simple words. The horror of Sher Afghán’s death seemed to weigh on her heart, and her natural vivacity was almost wholly eclipsed. Yet her face would kindle with a rare smile when acknowledging some trivial act, and the fragrance of her presence might be likened to the scent of roses in a garden by night. It was there, ravishing the very air, whilst its source remained invisible. Though she rode fast during many a weary hour, and bore without a murmur hardships under which her more robust waiting women sank, one by one, until five out of eight were perforce left to recuperate in various small towns passed on the way, she never lost that wondrous sense of delightfulfemininity which constituted her chief attraction and her most dangerous allurement.
In guiding, counselling, controlling, her intellect was crystal ice, but let any man render her a service, let him help her to dismount or bring her a cup of water, and, with the touch of her hand, the flash of her deep violet eyes, she thrilled him to the core. It was natural that Walter should be her attendant cavalier on many such occasions, a fact greatly to be regretted in the interests of Nellie Roe, whose saucy blue eyes and golden locks were too far away to deaden completely the effect of Nur Mahal’s bewitching personality. And, truth to tell, England had a somewhat shadowy aspect in those days. After three years of sojourn in the East, here were Mowbray and his faithful companion no better off than when they rode along the North Road into London one fair summer’s afternoon to seek their fortunes. Then they had their swords, some equipment, and a few crowns in their pockets. Their case was even worse in this semi-barbarous land, for their worldly goods were not enhanced, while they themselves were fugitives from the spleen of a vengeful tyrant!
Not even Roger was proof against the magic of Nur Mahal’s smile. At the close of the third march, when their leg-weary horses were unable to reach the hamlet of Mainpura, the intended goal of the night, they camped under a tope of trees, lit fires, and proceeded to make themselves as comfortable as circumstances permitted until the dawn. Nur Mahal, having takenleave of them with her accustomed grace, rested in a small tent which was carried by a pack animal. Mowbray and Sainton sat on saddles piled near a fire, and Roger showed the trend of his thoughts by asking:—
“Is it in your mind, Walter, to tarry long in Burdwán after we have brought my lady thither?”
“How can I answer? We are but a degree removed from beggars. If she gives us the wherewithal to journey speedily to Calcutta, why should we remain at Burdwán?”
“You parry one question with another. I may be much mistaken, yet I doubt if my lady sought our escort for the sake of the journey.”
Mowbray, who was striving to burnish a rusted bit, looked sharply at his big comrade, whose broad red face, propped on his hands, was clearly revealed by the dancing flames.
“Out with it, Roger,” he cried. “Thou hast not been so chary of thy words for many a year.”
“Well, to be plain,” said the other, “I think yon bonny head is well dowered wi’ brains. Here is a land where wit, wedded to a good sword, can win its way. Were you and she married—nay, jump not in that fashion, like a trout on a hook, else I may deem the fly well thrown—were you and she married, I say, she is just a likely sort of quean to carve out a kingdom for herself. Here you have Mahmouds, Rajputs, Hindustanis, Bengalis, and the Lord knows what hotch-potch of warring folk, each at variance with the other, and all united against a galling yoke such as may fairly beexpected from Jahangir! Why, man, were you lord of Burdwán and husband of Nur Mahal, you might run through India like a red hot cinder through a tub of butter.”
Mowbray breathed hard on the steel in his hands.
“Roger,” he said, “had you not eaten half a kid an hour gone I would have dosed you for a fever.”
“Aye, aye, make a jibe of it, but there’s many a true word spoken in jest. If King Cophetua could woo a beggar-maid, the devil seize me if it be not more likely that the beauty tucked up under yonder canvas should make pace with a fine swaggering blade like thyself.”
“Thou art too modest, Roger. If she wants a hammer wherewith to beat out an empire, where could she find a mallet to equal thee? And is it not reasonable to suppose, if such were her intent, she would have furthered the aims of our poor friend, Sher Afghán? He was of her own people, and would soon find a backing.”
“It seems that any man will suit her needs save the one she fancies,” said Roger drily, and, to Mowbray’s exceeding relief, he pursued the matter no further.
Yet the notion throve on certain doubts which it must have found imbedded in Walter’s own mind, and, next day, with memories of Nellie Roe very tender in his heart, now that all chance of wedding her was lost in gloom, he avoided Nur Mahal as thoroughly as politeness would admit. She gave no sign of discontent, but suffered him to go his new gait in silence. Once, indeed, when he made to help her onto her Arabhorse, she sprang to the saddle ere he could approach, and, at night, when she parted from him and Roger with a few pleasant words, a fold of her veil screened her face.
It were idle to pretend that Mowbray was in his usual happy vein during this part of the journey, and when, at the next evening’s halt, Nur Mahal signified that after Sainton and he had eaten she would be glad of some conversation with them, he was, if not elated, certainly much more cheerful.
She received them with smiling gravity, and bade them be seated on stools which her servants had procured in the village where their little camp was pitched. She herself reclined on a number of furs which served as a couch when she slept. They noticed that her dress, which, by some marvel, was white and fresh, was devoid of ornament. Indian widows wear purple, but the exigencies of the hour might well excuse this neglect of custom, and, for that matter, Nur Mahal was not one to pay any heed to such ordinances.
“I have fancied,” she said, addressing Roger, “that you are not wholly satisfied with this present journey, Sainton-sahib.”
Now, Roger was so taken aback by this side stroke that he blurted out:—
“In the name of your excellent prophet, Princess, why do you charge this to me?”
She flashed her star-like eyes on Mowbray.
“Perhaps I am mistaken. Is it you, Mowbray-sahib, who would gladly be quit of my poor company?”
The attack on Roger had prepared him, as, indeed, Nur Mahal may have meant that it should.
“Your Highness,” he said, “has some good motive in stating a belief which would otherwise be incredible. What is it?”
She sighed, and answered not for a moment. Maybe she wished Walter had been more confused and, by consequence, more lover-like. But, when she spoke, her sweet voice was well controlled. The affair was of slight import from all the index that her manner gave.
“A woman’s mind is oft like a smooth lake,” she said. “It mirrors that which it sees, but a little puff of wind will distort the image into some quaint conceit. Let that pass. My object in seeking your presence has naught to do with idle thoughts. To-morrow, an hour after sunrise, we reach that point on the road whence one track leads to the Ganges, and to Calcutta, and the other to Burdwán. It will, I do not doubt, be better for you to make your way to the river, and leave me and my wretched fortunes to the hazard which the future has in store. I am greatly beholden to you for all that you have done in the past, and it grieves me sorely that this journey, taken so unexpectedly, leaves me so short of money that I can only offer you a sum which is barely sufficient for the expenses of the voyage down the Ganges. But I have in my possession a goodly store of jewels, and in Calcutta, or in your own country, there are merchants who will buy them at a fair price. Take them,and be not angered with me, for I would not have you go away thinking that my acquaintance had brought you naught but ill luck.”
From beneath a fold of hersarishe produced a small cedar wood box which she offered to Walter. He sprang to his feet, with face aflame.
“I may be only a poor merchant, Princess,” he cried, “but I have yet to learn from your own lips what word or deed of mine leads you to believe that I would rob a woman of her diamonds.”
“Ohé,” she wailed, with a very pleasing pout, “how have I offended your lordship, and who talks of robbery where a free gift is intended? Tell me, you whom they call Hathi-sahib, see you aught amiss in taking the only valuable articles I can presently bestow?”
“Please God!” said Roger, “we shall set you and your gems safe within the walls of Burdwán ere we turn our faces towards Calcutta, and that is all my friend Walter meant by his outburst.”
Her eyes fell until the long lashes swept the peach bloom of her cheeks, for the physical difficulties of the journey, instead of exhausting her, had added to her beauty by tinting with rose the lily white of her complexion.
“Is that so?” she murmured, and Walter, who knew that she questioned him, said instantly:—
“No other thought entered our minds.”
“It is well. I shall retain my trinkets a little while longer, it seems.”
She laughed quietly, with a note of girlish happinessin her mirth that he had not caught since the day of their first meeting in the Garden of Heart’s Delight.
“Now that you have repaired my imagined loss,” she said, “will you not be seated again, and tell me something of your country. I have heard that women there differ greatly from us in India. Are they very pretty? Do they grow tall, like Sainton-sahib?”
Here was a topic from which their talk might branch in any direction. Soon Walter was telling her of his mother, of life in London and the North, while a chance reference to his father led up to the story of Dom Geronimo’s crime, and the implacable hatred he bore towards even the son of his victim.
Nur Mahal followed the references to the Jesuit with close interest. When Mowbray would have passed to some other subject she interrupted him, and clapped her hands as a signal to one of her women, whom she bade summon Jai Singh, the Rajput chief of her guard.
“What was the story you heard on the road as we returned to Agra?” she asked when the rissalder stood before her. “It dealt with certain Christian priests who dwell in that city, and with others at Hughli, if I mistake not.”
“A dervish, who sought some grain, maharáni, told us that Jahangir was privately minded to seize all the black robes because they encouraged the Portuguese traders to greater boldness. He ever counseled the great Akbar to that effect, but the Emperor, his father, was too tolerant towards the Feringhis to listen to him. Now, said the dervish, Jahangir would make all themen good Mahomedans and send their young women to the zenana.”
“You hear,” she said, as Jai Singh saluted and disappeared. “Jahangir is opposed to strangers, and it is quite probable he harbors some such project, which he has discoursed with themoullahs, being anxious to win their favor.”
“But the crow was standing by his side when we went to the palace,” put in Roger.
“That may well be. If this man spoke evil against you, Jahangir would listen, though his own purpose remained unchanged. I had this in my mind when you spoke of going to Calcutta.”
“When you spoke of sending us thither to-morrow, you mean,” cried Walter.
“I should have warned you,” she replied, but her hearers saw another purpose behind her words, because anything in the shape of a disturbance on the Hughli rendered it very necessary that they should tarry at Burdwán and avoid the river route until the trouble was ended.
Again, a sense of distrust welled up in Mowbray’s breast, but Nur Mahal’s soft voice allayed it.
“It must not be forgotten,” she said, “that affairs at Agra may cause the King to forego the folly he contemplates. Khusrow, his brother, has many adherents, and if Jahangir, as I am told is true, devotes his waking hours to wine and dissolute companions, he shall not long retain the throne his father built so solidly.”
Both men recalled Sher Afghán’s words. Howstrange it was that his wife, who had not quitted the walls of Dilkusha during the few hours of her recent tenancy, should be so well informed as to events in the palace.
Walter laughed.
“If I could not see your face and hear your voice,” he cried, “’twere easy to believe it was the Diwán, and not his incomparable daughter, who spoke with such wisdom.”
“Incomparable! It is an idle word. Who is incomparable? Not I. Assuredly there is a maid beyond the sea whose attractions far outweigh mine in your estimation, Mowbray-sahib. Nay, seek not for some adroit phrase to flatter and mislead. Men tell me I am beautiful, but there never yet was rose in a garden which the next south wind did not help to destroy while fanning its budding rival into greater charm.”
She spoke with a vehemence that caused Roger, who followed her poetic Persian simile with difficulty, to believe that Walter had said something to vex her.
“What ails thy tongue to-night, lad?” he cried in English. “It is not wont to rasp so harshly on such fair substance.”
“You disturb my comrade,” said Mowbray, glancing covertly into the girl’s eyes. “He thinks I have offended you.”
She flung a quick glance at Sainton, and laughed. Some pleasant quip was on her lips, but, in that instant, the hoof-beats of horses, hard ridden, came to their ears. In the present state of the fugitives, the soundwas ominous. At once the men were on their feet. Mowbray bade Nur Mahal retire to her tent, an order which she was slow to obey, and then betook himself to the disposal of his small force, lest, perchance, the distant galloping signaled the approach of pursuers. The night was dark but clear, the only light being that of the stars, and it was strange indeed that any party of horse should ride with such speed over a broken road.
It was essential that the nature of the cavalcade should be ascertained before it was permitted to come too close. Flight was not to be thought of, owing to the condition of the horses. If the newcomers were the Emperor’s minions the only way to avoid capture was to show a bold front and strike first.
Rissalder Jai Singh was ordered to mount and ride forward with two sowars to bring the party to a halt. If they were strangers, of peaceable intent, he would courteously request them to pass, after explaining the necessity of the precautions taken. Were they the King’s men, he was to demand a parley with their leader, failing which, he and his companions must turn and ride at top speed towards the village, giving the defending force, stationed under a clump of trees on both sides of the road, an opportunity to ambush the enemy on both flanks.
It was a hasty scheme, evolved so hurriedly that Jai Singh cantered off while as yet the invisible horsemen were quarter of a mile away. Mowbray and Sainton, adjusting their sword-belts, stood on the road betweentheir men and listened for the first sounds which should indicate the reception given to the rissalder.
Suddenly Roger said: “Lest harm should befall Nur Mahal, is it not better that you should take a couple of horses and lead her to some point removed from the track? Then, if this force overwhelms us, you have a chance of escape, whereas the presence of one sword more or less will make slight difference to the odds.”
“Did I think you meant what you have said, you and I should quarrel,” retorted Walter.
“Sooner would my right hand quarrel with the left. Yet my counsel is good. Whilst one of us lives she is not wholly bereft, and you are the lad of her choosing. I’ faith, if she showed me such preference, I’d take a similar offer from thee.”
“You are not wont to anticipate disaster, Roger, nor yet to frame such clumsy excuse.”
“I have never before been so mixed up with a woman. Argue not, Walter, but away with her. I’ll strike more freely if I ken you are safe. It is good generalship, too. She is the treasure they seek, and she should not be left to the hazard of a rough-and-tumble in the dark.”
“Then let her ride alone if she be so minded. We have fought side by side too often, Roger, that we should be separated now.”
Sainton’s huge hand reached out in the gloom and gripped his comrade’s shoulder.
“Gad, Walter,” he growled, “thou art tough oak. Least said is soonest mended, but the notion jumblesin my thick head that Nur Mahal will surely be a quean, and that thou art fated to help in her crowning. Hark! What now?”
They heard Jai Singh’s loud challenge, followed by the confused halting of a large body of horse. The clang of arms and the champing of bits came to them plainly. The distance was too great to distinguish voices at an ordinary pitch, but it was reasonable to suppose that Jai Singh was conversing with some one in authority.
They were not kept long in suspense. A few horsemen advanced slowly, Jai Singh at their head.
“Sahiba!” he called, when close at hand, “there is one here who would converse with your Lordships in privacy.”
Although the fealty of a Rajput to his salt can never be doubted, there was a chance that Jai Singh might have been deluded into an exhibition of false confidence. Walter, therefore, ordered his little force to march close behind Roger and himself, but when he saw that Jai Singh and the two sowars were accompanied by only one man he knew that his suspicions were not well founded.
The stranger was the Chief Eunuch of Jahangir’s court, and the mere presence of such a functionary betrayed the object of the pursuit.
He dismounted and salaamed deeply.
“Praised be the name of Allah that this undertaking nears its close!” he cried, his queer, cracked voice rising and falling in irregular falsetto. “Seldom havemen and never has a woman ridden so fast and far during so many days. Had not those whom you left on the way assured me that you were truly before me, I had returned to Agra long since, though my head might have paid the forfeit of a fruitless errand.”
The Chief Eunuch, important official though he was, commanded little respect from other men. Even the manner of Jai Singh’s announcement of his presence betrayed the contempt with which creatures of his type were held. So Walter said, sternly enough:—
“The length of the journey might well serve to condense thy speech. Hast thou brought some message from the Emperor? If so, out with it.”
“Honored one, I am charged to escort the Princess Nur Mahal back to Agra, where, sayeth my Lord, the King, she can dwell in peace and content in her father’s house.”
“What sayeth the capon?” demanded Roger, who caught the peremptory tone of the man’s words and was minded to clout him, for such a menial is apt to become unconsciously insolent when he carries his master’s commands.
Mowbray’s restraining hand warned Roger not to interfere.
“Is that all?” he said with ominous calm.
“No, protector of the poor. The Emperor Jahangir sends his compliments to you and to the Hathi-sahib. He says that if you return with the Princess you shall be received with all honor, paid in full, and forwarded, at his proper charge, to Ajmere on the road to Bombay.”
“And if we refuse the King’s offer?”
“Why should you refuse, sahib? My Lord, the King, is wroth that any should dare act as did that foolish man, Kutub-ud-din. All those who took part in the attack on Sher Afghán have been impaled alive on the road leading from Dilkusha to the bridge of boats. I and my companions rode between their writhing bodies as we quitted Agra.”
“It were foolish to distrust so just a monarch, yet what say you if we choose rather to proceed to Burdwán?”
The Chief Eunuch suddenly became very humble.
“I am only an envoy,” he said. “Behind, there are two hundred soldiers, mounted on the best horses in the King’s stables and commanded by a valiant officer. Behind them, there is the might of the Empire. I pray you believe that my Lord, Jahangir, means to do well by you.”
There is an Indian story of a crocodile inviting a lamb to inspect his beautiful teeth as he lay with his mouth open, but the messenger’s fair words placed Walter in a quandary. Obviously, he must consult Nur Mahal ere he returned the answer which was ready enough on his lips, for he thought that the two hundred, however valiant their officer, would never dare to attack half the number of stalwart Rajputs trained by Sher Afghán, especially when they knew that they must also encounter the terrible Man-Elephant. As for the King’s armies, Burdwán was a far cry.