Part 17 (2/2)
”I don't know,” I answered; ”but if so, I think it will be that chief's burial service”
”Will it?” he exclaimed, and instantly liht it wise to follow In the Sanctuary a curious scene was in progress Ayesha was seated in front of the statue Before her, very htened, knelt a brawny, red-haired chieftain and five of his followers, who still carried their hunting spears, while with folded arrim look upon his face, Leo, who, as I learned afterwards, had already interfered and been silenced, stood upon one side listening to what passed At a little distance behind were a dozen or uards, th and stature
Ayesha, in her sweetest voice, was questioning the men as to how the leopard, of which the skin lay before her, had come to attack Leo The chief answered that they had tracked the brute to its lair between two rocks; that one of the upon hied it while thewith it on the ground, he stabbed and slew the animal That was all
”No, not all,” said Ayesha; ”for you forget, cowards that you are, that, keeping yourselves in safety, you left my lord to the fury of this beast Good Drive thes of beasts, and ives the no prayer for pity or excuse, the chief and his followers rose, bowed, and turned to go
”Stay a ive rows stiff; I cannot walk fast We will finish this hunt together”
”What doest thou? Art mad?” asked Ayesha
”I know not whether I am mad,” he answered, ”but I know that thou art wicked and unjust Look now, than these hunters none braver ever breathed That man”-and he pointed to the one whom the leopard had struck down-”took my place and went in before me because I ordered that we should attack the creature, and thus was felled As thou seest all, thouona chance to strike, which at first they could not do unless they would have killed me with it, since I and the brute rolled over and over in the snow As it was, one of them seized it with his bare hands: look at the teeth marks on his arm So if they are to perish on the Mountain, I, who am the man to blame, perish with theratitude in their eyes, Ayesha thought a little, then said cleverly enough-”In truth, htest thou have named me wicked and unjust; but I knew only what I saw, and out of their own mouths did I condemn them My servants, iven; more, he who rushed in upon the leopard and he who seized it with his hands shall be rewarded and advanced Go; but I warn you if you suffer er, you shall not escape so easily again”
So they bowed and went, still blessing Leo with their eyes, since death by exposure on the Mountain snoas the most terrible form of punishment known to these people, and one only inflicted by the direct order of Hes upon reat criain in the hall, the stor upon Leo's face broke in earnest Ayesha renewed her inquiries about his wounds, and wished to call Oros, the physician, to dress theed that she would leave his wounds alone, and then, his great beard bristling rath, asked her solmenly if he was a child in ar
Then he scolded her-yes, he scolded Ayesha! Wishi+ng to knohat she ift that he had always disliked and ood friends, to a death of fiendish cruelty upon such evidence, or rather out of tee of the them that they would have to answer for it if he were hurt: he who, in his tiah some perils and encounters?
Thus he beat her with his words, and, wonderful to say, Ayesha, this being more than woman, submitted to the chastisement hness even, I doubt not that his speech and his life would have come to a swift and simultaneous end, for I knew that now, as of old, she could slay by the mere effort of her will But she did not slay; she did not even threaten, only, as any other loving woathered in those lovely eyes of hers and, rolling one by one down her face, fell-for her head was bent humbly forward-like heavy raindrops on theevidence of her hurew penitent and prayed her pardon hu-”Let others speak to me as they will” (sorry should I have been to try it!) ”but from thee, Leo, I cannot bear harsh words Oh, thou art cruel, cruel In what have I offended? Can I help it if h thou knewest it not, it has done ever since we parted yonder in the Place of Life? Can I help it if, like some e, ers that I am powerless to prevent or share? What are the lives of a few half-wild huntsainst thy safety, seeing that if I slew these, others would be more careful of thee? Whereas if I slay them not, they or their fellowsabout-thy death,” and she gasped with horror at the word
”Listen, beloved,” said Leo ”The life of the humblest of those men is of as ht to kill him than thou hast to kill me It is evil that because thou carest for me thou shouldst suffer thy love to draw thee into cruelty and crime If thou art afraid for me, then clothe h I dread it so unholy, and, on this earth, not permitted by my Faith, I should still rejoice to inherit for thy dear sake, knowing that then we could never more be parted Or, if as thou sayest, this as yet thou canst not do, then let us be wed and take what fortune gives us All men must die; but at least before I die I shall have been happy with thee for a while-yes, if only for a single hour”
”Would that I dared,” Ayesha answered with a little piteous e me no more, Leo, lest that at last I should take the risk and lead thee down a dreadful road Leo, hast thou never heard of the love which slays, or of the poison that h she feared herself, Ayesha turned from him and fled
Thus this reat one, for Leo's hurts werekilled, were prouard Yet it told us s For instance, that whenever she chose to do so, Ayesha had the power of perceiving all Leo's th of h to help him in any predicament she appeared to have no pohich, of course, accounted for the hideous and ever-present ht of her anxiety
Think what it would be to any one of us e er, every risk of sickness, every secret peril through which our best-belovedto its fall and they loitering beneath it; to see them drink of water and know it full of foulest poison; to see them embark upon a shi+p and be aware that it was doomed to sink, but not to be able to warn them or to prevent them Surely no mortal brain could endure such constant terrors, since hour by hour the arrows of death flit unseen and unheard past the breasts of each of us, till at length one finds its ho with her spirit's eyes all the hair-breadth escapes of our journeyings? When, for instance, in the beginning she saw Leo at my house in cumberland about to kill hihty effort of her superhu from whatever Power it was that held her in its fearful thraldoth to hurl her soul across the world and thereby in his sleep reveal to hi-place where he would find her
Or to take oneby that slender thread of yak's hide from the face of the waterfall of ice and herself rele moment and learn whether or no he was about to meet a hideous death, in which event she ain
Nor can her sorrows have ended with theseonies of her jealous heart when she knew her lover to be exposed to the temptations incident to his solitary existence, and more especially to those of her ancient rival Atene, who, by Ayesha's own account, had once been his wife Ie should do their natural work on hith, and the iht, and with the her who had endured so long, forgotten and alone at last
Truly, the Power that limited our perceptions did so in purest oin its terrors
Thus it would see to win life and love eternal and lorious, was in truth but another blind Pandora From her stolen casket of beauty and super-huly, a hundred torturing des
Yes; and that the parallel ered in that rifled chest
CHAPTER XX
AYESHA'S ALCHEMY
It was shortly after this incident of the snow-leopard that one of these demon familiars of Ayesha's, her infinite ambition, made its for, Ayesha's habit was to discuss plans for ourfuture, that awful inheritance which she had promised to us
Here I raciously infor my refusal in past years of such a priceless opportunity, I also was to be allowed to bathe uise I should ee from theypt, if she knew, she did not think it lawful to reveal
Secretly I hoped that e for the better, as the prospect of being fixed for ever in the shape ofpersonality, did not appeal to me as attractive In truth, so far as I was concerned, the matter had an academic rather than an actual interest, such as we take in a fairy tale, since I did not believe that I should ever put on this kind of immortality Nor, I may add, now as before, was I at all certain that I wished to do so
These plans of Ayesha's were far reaching and indeed terrific Her acquaintance with the modern world, its political and social developments, was still strictly lirowth and activities, certainly it was one of which she e see the few brief talks which took place between us upon this subject in past time at Kor Now her thirst for inforh it is true that ours was scarcely up to date, seeing that ever since we lost touch with the civilized peoples, namely, for the last fifteen years or so, we had been as much buried as she was herself
Still ere able to describe to her the condition of the nations and their affairs as they were at the period e bade them farewell, and, more or less incorrectly, to draw maps of the various countries and their boundaries, over which she pondered long
The Chinese were the people in whom she proved to be most interested, perhaps because she was acquainted with the Mongolian type, and like ourselves, understood a good many of their dialects Also she had a ht she revealed to us in the most matter-of-fact fashi+on
Those who have read the first part of her history, which I left in England to be published, may remember that e found her at Kor, She horrified us by expressing a determination to possess herself of Great Britain, for the sied to that country Noever, like her powers, her ideas had grown, for she purposed to make Leo the absolute monarch of the world In vain did he assure her hed at him and said-”If I arise amidst the Peoples, I must rule the Peoples, for how can Ayesha take a second place a mortal men? And thou, my Leo, rulest me, yes, mark the truth, thou art my master! Therefore it is plain that thou wilt be the master of this earth, aye, and perchance of others which do not yet appear, for of these also I know soh hitherto I have had no un Its little space within this world has been filled with thought and care for thee; in waiting till thou wast born again, and during these last years of separation, until thou didst return
”But now a few more y eternal, with all the wisdoth that can bend the in to be Oh! how I sicken for that hour when first, like twin stars new to the firmament of heaven, we break in our iht of men It will please me, I tell thee, Leo, it will please me, to see Powers, Principalities and Doovernors, bow themselves before our thrones and humbly crave the liberty to do our will At least,” she added, ”it will please s”
So she spoke, while the radiance upon her brow increased and spread itself, gleaolden fan, and her sluht, they beca mirrors in which I saw pomp enthroned and suppliant peoples pass
”And how,” asked Leo, with soroan-for this vision of universal rule viewed fro these things about?”
”How, hts I have listened to the wise discourses of our Holly here, at least he thinks them ho still has sothem with those that are written in my memory, who of late have had no tihed and pondered your reports of the races of this world; their various follies, their futile struggling for wealth and small supremacies, and I have determined that it would be wise and kind to weld the ourselves at the head of them to direct their destinies, and cause wars, sickness, and poverty to cease, so that these creatures of a little day (ephemeridae was the word she used) rave
”Noere it not because of thy strange shrinking from bloodshed, however politic and needful-for my Leo, as yet thou art no true philosopher-this were quickly done, since I can command a weapon which would crush their armouries and whels and Nature's eleht of death, and thou believest that Heaven would be displeased because I make myself-or am chosen-the instrument of Heaven Well, so let it be, for thy will is entler path”
”And hoilt thou persuade the kings of the earth to place their crowns upon thy head?” I asked, astonished
”By causing their peoples to offer them to us,” she answered suavely ”Oh! Holly, Holly, how narrow is thy ination! Set its poor gates ajar, I pray, and bethink thee When we appear aold to satisfy their want, clad in terrifying power, in dazzling beauty and in immortality of days, will they not cry, 'Be ye our monarchs and rule over us!'”
”Perhaps,” I answered dubiously, ”but where wilt thou appear?”
She took aher finger upon Pekin, said-”There is the place that shall be our home for some few centuries, say three, or five, or seven, should it take so long to shape this people toand our purposes I have chosen these Chinese because thou tellest me that their numbers are uncountable, that they are brave, subtle, and patient, and though noerless because ill-ruled and untaught, able with their multitudes to flood the little western nations Therefore aes be at rest while they learn wisdom from us, and thou, ivest their land good governion”
What the new religion was to be I did not ask It seemed unnecessary, since I was convinced that in practice it would prove a form of Ayesha-worshi+p, Indeed, my mind was so occupied with conjectures, soh, as to ould happen at the first appearance of Ayesha in China that I forgot this subsidiary development of our future rule
”And if the 'little western nations' will not wait to be flooded?” suggested Leo with irritation, for her conteered him, one of a prominent western nation ”If they combine, for instance, and attack thee first?”