Part 13 (1/2)

”And now, _Pir_-sahib,” continued the Queen, with a look of loving anxiety at her lord, ”for this strange ailment of which I spoke to you----”

The King's face lost its self-importance as if he had been suddenly recalled to unpleasant memory. ”'Tis naught of import,” he said hastily. ”The Queen will have it I start and sweat of nights. But this is but the timorous dread of one in her condition. I am well enough.”

”My lord, _Pir_-sahib, hath indeed renewed his youth through thy pious breathing of thy own life into his mouth--as time will show,” murmured the Queen with modest, downcast look. ”But last night he muttered in his sleep of enemies----”

Bahadur Shah gave a gasp of dismay. ”Of enemies! Nay!--did I truly?

Thou didst not tell me this.”

”I would not distress my lord, till fear was over. Now that the pious priest, who hath the ear of the Almighty----”

Hussan Askuri, who had stepped forward to gaze at the King, began to mutter prayers. ”'Tis that cooling draught of Ahsan-Oolah's stands in the way,” he gasped, his hands and face working as if he were in deadly conflict with an unseen foe. ”No carnal remedy--Ah! G.o.d be praised! I see, I see! The eye of faith opens--_Hai!_ venomous beast, I have you!” With these words he rushed to the King's couch, and, scattering its cus.h.i.+ons, held up at arm's length a lizard. Held by the tail, it seemed in semi-darkness to writhe and wriggle.

”_Ouee! Umma!_” yelled the Great Moghul, shrinking to nothing in his seat, and using after his wont the woman's cry--sure sign of his habits.

”Fear not!” cried the priest. ”The mutterings are stilled, the sweats dried! And thus will I deal also with those who sent it.” He flung his captive on the ground and stamped it under foot.

”Was it--was it a bis-cobra, think you?” faltered the King. He had hold of Zeenut Maihl's hand like a frightened child. The priest shook his head. ”It was no carnal creature,” he said in a hollow, chanting voice. ”It was an emissary of evil made helpless by prayer. Give Heaven the praise.” Bahadur Shah began on his creed promptly, but the priest frowned.

”Through his servant,” he went on. ”For day and night, night and day, I pray for the King. And I see visions, I dream dreams. Last night, while my lord muttered of enemies, Hussan Askuri saw a flood coming from the West, and on its topmost wave, upon a raft of faithful swords, as on a throne, sate----”

”With due respect,” came voices from the curtained door. ”The disciples await initiation in the Hall of Audience.”

Hussan Askuri and the Queen exchanged looks. The interruption was unwelcome, though strangely germane to the subject.

”I will hear thee finish the dream afterward,” fussed the King, rising in a bustle; for he prized his saints.h.i.+p next to his poetry. ”I must not keep my pupils from grace. Hast the kerchiefs ready, Zeenut?”

There was something almost touching in the confidence of his appeal to her. It was that of a child to its mother, certain of what it demanded.

”All things are ready,” she replied tartly, with a meaning and vexed look at the miracle-monger; for they had meant to finish the dream before the initiation.

”A goodly choice,” said the royal saint, as he looked over the tiny silk squares, each embroidered with a text from the _Koran_, which she took out of a basket. ”But I need many, _Pir_-sahib. Folk come fast, of late, to have the way of virtue pointed by this poor hand. And thou hast more in the basket, I see, Zeenut, ready against----”

”They are but begun,” put in the Queen, hastily covering the basket.

”Nor will they, likely, be needed, since the leave season pa.s.ses, and 'tis the soldiers who come most to be disciples to the defender of their faith.”

”I am the better pleased,” replied the King with edifying humility.

”This summer hath too many pupils as it is. Come! _Pir_-sahib, and support me through mine office with real saints.h.i.+p.”

As the curtain fell behind them Zeenut Maihl crossed swiftly to the crushed lizard and raised it gingerly.

”No carnal creature,” she repeated. It was not; only a deft piece of patchwork. Yet it, or something else, made her s.h.i.+ver as she dropped the tell-tale remains into the basket. This man Hussan Askuri sometimes seemed to her own superst.i.tion a saint, sometimes to her clear head a mere sinner. She was not quite certain of anything about him save that his delusions, his dreams, his miracles, suited her purpose equally, whether they were false or true.

So she crossed over again to a marble lattice and peered through a convenient peephole toward the Audience Hall, which rose across an intervening stretch of platform in white shadow, and whiter light. She could not see or hear much; but enough to show her that everything was going on the same as usual. The disciples, most of them in full uniform, went up and down the steps calmly, and the wordy exordium on the cardinal virtues went on and on. How different it might be, she thought, if she had the voice. She would rouse more than those faint ”_Wah! Wahs_.” She would make the fire come to men's eyes. In a sort of pet with her own helplessness, she moved away and so, through another room, went to stand at another lattice. It looked south over a strip of garden, and there was an open square left in the tracery through which a face might look, a hand might pa.s.s. And as she stood she counted the remaining kerchiefs in the basket she still held. They were all of bright green silk and bore the same lettering. It was the Great Cry: ”_Deen! Deen! Futteh Mohammed!_” As dangerous a woman this, as Hussan Askuri was a man; as dangerous, both of them, to peaceful life, as the fabled bis-cobra, at the idea of which the foolish old King had cried, ”_Ouee, Umma!_” like any woman.

And now at last that wordy exordium must be over, for, along the garden path, came the clank of accouterments. Zeenut Maihl's listless figure seem galvanized to sudden life, there was a flutter of green at the open square, and her voice followed the shower of silk.

”These banners from the Defender to his soldiers.”

But as she spoke, a stir of excitement, a subdued murmur of expectation reached her ear from outside, and, leaning forward, she caught a glimpse of a swinging litter coming along the path.