Part 4 (2/2)
At last Eminah grasped the girl's hand and bade her make haste. So she dried her tears, and after placing the severed head in front of that of the sleeping pasha so that they confronted each other, and cutting off one of the locks from its temples, she covered the cold eyes with bitter, burning kisses, and then, taking up her things, rapidly followed Eminah through the long suite of rooms.
A few minutes later they were in the torture-chamber. It was quite empty; the blood stains had been washed away, there was nothing to recall the horrors of the night before.
They opened the trap-door through which the dead bodies were wont to be cast. At the bottom of the deep black void there was a roaring sound as if the lake were in a commotion. No doubt a tempest was raging outside. How were these girls to escape by way of the subterranean stream? Perhaps some of the headless corpses were also swimming down yonder amidst the foaming waves. Would those who ventured down into those depths ever see the light of day again? But to them it was all one. Better to perish in the deep void than be condemned to the embraces of Ali Pasha. How the two girls abominated him!--the one because he had murdered her love, the other because he had loved her.
”Don't be afraid,” they said to each other; and fastening their bundles to a long rope which was used in torturing, they let it down into the deep well, with a lamp at the end of it, and when the water put out the light they fastened the other end of the rope to the hinge of the door, and each in turn let herself down by it.
And whether they lived or whether they died, Ali Pasha lost on that day two talismans which he should have guarded more jealously than the light of his eyes: one was the spirit of blessing, the other the spirit of cursing, both of which he had held fast bound, and both of which had now been let loose.
At the moment when the two damsels plunged into the lake of Acheruz the slumber of tranquillity disappeared from the eyes of Ali Pasha, and he began to see spectres.
A peculiar feeling came over him. He whom phantoms avoided even when he slept, he who had never even dreamed of fear, he whom the angel of sleep had never known to be a coward, now began to experience a peculiar sensation which was worse than any sickness and more painful than any suffering. He was afraid!
He dreamed that the head of the young Suliot, which had been cut off by his order, and which had rolled away and disappeared so that n.o.body could find it, was now standing face to face with him on a table, staring at him fixedly with stony eyes, and repeatedly addressing the sleeper by name: ”Ali Pasha! Ali Pasha!”
The limbs of the sleeper shook all over in a strange tremor.
”Ali Pasha!” he heard the head call for the third time.
Groaning, writhing, and turning himself about, he contrived to knock the head off the cus.h.i.+on, smearing all the bed with blood. And now he saw and heard more terrible things than ever.
”One, two,” said the severed head. And Ali understood that this was the number of the years he had still to live. ”Thy head hath no longer either hand or foot,” continued the head; and Ali was obliged to listen to what it said. ”Two severed heads now stand face to face, mine and thine. Why dost thou not reply to me? Why dost thou not look into my eyes? Two headless trunks stand before the throne of G.o.d, mine and thine. How shall the Lord recognize thee? He inquires which is Ali. For every soul there is a white garment laid up. And thou deniest thy name, with thy right hand on thy heart. Thou _art_ Ali, for on thy white garment are five b.l.o.o.d.y finger-prints.”
Ali writhed in his sleep, and covered with his hand that part of his caftan which lay over his heart. And all the time the head never disappeared from before his eyes and its lips never closed. Presently it went on again.
”Listen, Ali! Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin! The hand which guided thee in the performance of thy mighty deeds is also bringing thine actions to an end, and thou shalt no longer be a hero whom the world admires, but a robber whom it curses. Those whom thou lovedest will bless the day of thy death, but thine enemies will weep over thee. Moreover, G.o.d hath ordained that thou shalt be the ruin of thine own nation.”
Ali tossed, sighing and groaning, upon his couch, and could not awake; a world of crime lay upon his breast. He felt the earth shake beneath him, and the sky above his head was dark with ma.s.ses of black cloud, and the thought of death was a terror to him.
The head went on speaking. ”Two birds quitted thy rocky citadel at the same hour, a white dove and a black crow. The white dove is Peace, which has departed from thy towers; the black crow is Vengeance, which will return in search of carca.s.ses at the scent of thy ruin. The white dove is thy damsel, the black crow is mine; and woe to thee from them both!”
Ali, in the desperation of his rage, roared aloud in his sleep, and his violent cry tore asunder the light fetters of sleep. He sprang from his couch and opened wide his eyes--and lo! the severed head was standing before him on the table.
The pasha looked about him in consternation; he was not sufficiently master of himself at first to tell how much of all this was a dream and how much reality. He still seemed to hear the terrible words which had proceeded from those open lips, and his hand involuntarily clutched at his breast as if he would have covered there the five b.l.o.o.d.y finger-marks. Then the cut cord from which the key was missing fell across his hand, and immediately his presence of mind returned.
Drawing his sword, he rushed towards the brazen door, and discovered that the fugitives had had sufficient forethought to close the door and leave the key in the lock outside, so that it could only be opened by force. He turned back and rushed to the end of the dormitories.
Some of the odalisks were awakened by the sound of his heavy footsteps, and perceiving his troubled face, plunged underneath their bedclothes in terror; in front of the doors stood the dumb eunuch sentries, leaning on their spears like so many bronze statues.
He rushed down into the garden to the end of the familiar walks, and when he came to the gate was amazed to perceive that the drawbridge which separated his palace from the dwellings of his sons had been let down and n.o.body was guarding it. The topids.h.i.+s, the negroes, knowing that Ali always turned into his harem on the Feast of Bairam, had gone across to the palace of Mukhtar Bey, who was giving a great banquet in honor of Vely Bey and Sulaiman Bey, his brothers. All three had brought together their harems to celebrate the occasion, and while the masters were diverting themselves upstairs, their servants were making merry below. Music and the loud mirth of those who feast resounded from the house; every gate of the citadel was open; slaves and guards lying dead drunk in heaps, victims of the forbidden fluid, c.u.mbered the streets. A whole hostile army, with drums beating and colors flying, might easily have marched into the citadel over their prostrate bodies.
Wrath and the cold night air gradually gave back to Ali his soul of steel. Wary and alert, he entered the palace of Mukhtar Bey.
CHAPTER III
A TURKISH PARADISE
<script>