Part 29 (2/2)
”Stand back,” he cried in sudden dignity, waving both counselors aside with trembling, outstretched hands. ”I will speak mine own words.”
But the sight of him, rousing a fresh burst of enthusiasm, left him no possibility of speech for a time. The Lord had been on their side, they cried. They had killed every h.e.l.l-doomed infidel in Meerut! They would do so in Delhi if he would help! They were but an advance guard of an army coming from every cantonment in India to swear allegiance to the Padishah. Long live the King! and the Queen!
In the dim room behind, Zeenut Maihl and the physician listened to the wild, almost incredible, tale which drifted in with the scented air from the garden, and watched each other silently. Each found in it fresh cause for obstinacy. If this were true, what need to be foolhardy? time would show, the thing come of itself without risk. If this were true, decisive action should be taken at once; and would be taken.
But the King, a.s.sailed, molested by that rude interrupting loyalty, above all by that cry of the Queen, felt the Turk stir in him also.
Who were these intruders in the sacred precincts, infringing the seclusion of the Great Moghul's women? Trembling with impotent pa.s.sion, inherited from pa.s.sions that had not been impotent, he turned to Ahsan-Oolah, ignoring the Queen, who, he felt, was mostly to blame for this outrage on her modesty. Why had she come there? Why had she dared to be seen?
”Your Majesty should send for the Captain of the Palace Guards and bid him disperse the rioters, and force them into respect for your royal person,” suggested the physician, carefully avoiding all but the immediate present, ”and your Majesty should pa.s.s to the Hall of Audience. The King can scarce receive the Captain-sahib here in presence of the Consort.” He did not add--”in her present costume”--but his tone implied it, and the King, with an angry mortified glance toward his favorite, took the physician's arm. If looks could kill, Ahsan-Oolah would not, he knew, have supported those tottering steps far; but it was no time to stick at trifles.
When they had pa.s.sed from the anteroom Zeenut Maihl still stood as if half stupefied by the insult. Then she dashed to the open lattice again, scornful and defiant; dignified into positive beauty for the moment by her recklessness.
”For the Faith!” she cried in her shrill woman's voice, ”if ye are men, as I would be, to be loved of woman, as I am, strike for the Faith!”
A sort of s.h.i.+ver ran through the cl.u.s.tering crowd of men below; the s.h.i.+ver of antic.i.p.ation, of the marvelous, the unexpected.
The Queen had spoken to them as men; of herself as woman.
Inconceivable!--improper of course--yet exciting. Their blood thrilled, the instinct of the man to fight for the woman rose at once.
”Quick, brothers! Rouse the guard! Close the gates! Close the gates!”
It was a cry to heal all strife within those rose-red walls, for the dearest wish of every faction was to close them against civilization; against those prying Western eyes and sniffing Western noses, detecting drains and sinks of iniquity. So the clamor grew, and faces which had frowned at each other yesterday sought support in each other's ferocity to-day, and wild tales began to pa.s.s from mouth to mouth. Men, crowding recklessly over the flower-beds, trampling down the roses, talked of visions, of signs and warnings, while the troopers, dismounting for a pull at a pipe, became the center of eager circles listening not to dreams, but deeds.
”Dost feel the rope about thy neck, Sir Martyr?” said a bitter jeering voice behind one of the speakers. And something gripped him round the throat from behind, then as suddenly loosed its hold, as a shrouded woman's figure hobbled on through the crowd. The trooper started up with an oath, his own hand seeking his throat involuntarily.
”Heed her not!” said a bystander hastily, ”'tis the Queen's scribe, Hafzan. She hath a craze against men. One made her what she is. Go on!
Havildar-jee. So thou didst cut the _mem_ down, and fling the babe----”
But the doer of the deed stood silent. He did in truth seem to feel the rope about his neck. And he seemed to feel it till he died; when it _was_ there.
But Hafzan had pa.s.sed on, and there were no more with words of warning. So the clamor grew and grew, till the garden swarmed with men ready for any deed.
Ahsan-Oolah saw this, and laid a detaining hand on the Captain of the Guard's arm, who, summoned in hot haste from his quarters over the Lah.o.r.e gate, came in by the private way, and proposed to go down and harangue the crowd.
”It is not safe, Huzoor,” he cried. ”My liege, detain him. These men by their own confession are murderers----”
The King looked from one to the other doubtfully. Someone must get rid of the rioters; yet the physician said truth.
”And if aught befall,” added the latter craftily, ”your Majesty will be held responsible.”
The old man's hand fell instantly on the Englishman's arm. ”Nay, nay, sahib! go not. Go not, my friend! Speak to them from the balcony. They will not dare to violate it.”
So, backed by the sanct.i.ty of the Audience Hall of a dead dynasty, the Englishman stood and ordered the crowd to desist from profaning privacy in the name of the old man behind him; whose power he, in common with all his race, hoped and believed to be dead.
It was sufficient, however, to leave some respect for the royal person, and make the crowd disperse. To little purpose so far as peace and quiet went, since the only effect was to send a leaven of revolt to every corner of the Palace. And the Palace was so full of malcontents, docked of power, privilege, pensions; of all that makes life in a Palace worth living.
So the cry ”Close the gates” grew wider. The dazed old King clung to the Englishman's arm imploring him to stay; but now a messenger came running to say that the Commissioner-sahib had called and left word that the Captain was to follow without delay to the Calcutta gate of the city. The courtiers, who had begun to a.s.semble, looked at each other curiously; the disturbance, then, had spread beyond the Palace.
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