On the Face of the Waters: A Tale of the Mutiny by Flora Annie Webster Steel

  CHAPTER I.

  IN THE PALACE.

  It was a day in late September. Nearly six months, therefore, had goneby since Jim Douglas had passed the Bailey-guard at gunfire, and theEnglish flag had risen behind the trees to float over Lucknow. Itfloated there now, serenely, securely, with an air of finality in itsfolds; for folk were becoming accustomed to it. At least so said theofficial reports, and even Jim Douglas himself could trace no waxingin the tide of discontent. It neither ebbed nor flowed, but beatplacidly against the rocks of offense.

  But at Delhi there was one corner of the city over which the Englishflag did not float. It lay upon the eastern side above the river wherefour rose-red fortress walls hemmed in a few acres of earth from themarch of Time himself, and safe-guarded a strange survival ofsovereignty in the person of Bahadur Shah, last of the Moghuls. An oldman past eighty years of age, who dreamed a dream of power among thegolden domes, marble colonnades, and green gardens with which hisancestors had crowned the eastern wall.

  The sun shone hotly, steamily, within those four inclosing walls, saveon that eastern edge, where the cool breezes from the plains beyondblew through open arches and latticed balconies. For the rest, thepalace-fort--shut in from all outside influence--was like some tepid,teeming breeding-place for strange forms of life unknown to purer,clearer atmospheres.

  It was at the Lahore gate of this Delhi palace that on this lateSeptember day a tawdry palanquin, followed by a few tawdry retainers,paused before a cavernous arch, ending the quaint, lofty vaultedtunnel which led inward for some fifty yards or more to anotherbarrier. Here an old man in spectacles sat writing hurriedly.

  "Quick, fool, quick! Read, and let me sign," called the huge unwieldyfigure in the palanquin, as the bearers, panting under their grossburden, shifted shoulders. Mahboob Ali, Chief Eunuch and PrimeMinister, groaned under the jolt; it was a foretaste of many to beendured ere he reached the Resident's house, miles away on thenorthern edge of the river. Yet he had to endure them, for importantnegotiations were on foot between the Survival and Civilization. Theheir-apparent to those few acres where the sun stood still had died,had been poisoned some said; and another had to be recognized. Therewas no lack of claimants; there never was a lack of claimants toanything within those walls, where everyone strove to have the firstand last word with the Civilization which supported the Survival. Andhere was he, Mahboob, Prime Minister, being delayed by a miserablescrivener.

  "Read, pig! read," he reiterated, laying his puffy hand on his jeweledsword-hilt; for he was still within the gate, therefore a despot. Afew yards further he would be a dropsical old man; no more.

  "Your slave reads!" faltered the editor of the Court Journal."Mussamat Hafzan's record of the women's apartments being late to-day,hath delayed----"

  "'Twas in time enough, uncle, if thou wouldst make fewer flourishes,"retorted a woman's voice; it was nothing but a voice by reason of thevoluminous Pathan veil covering the small speaker.

  "Curse thee for a misbegotten hound!" bawled Mahboob. "Am I to losethe entrance fee I paid Gamu, the Huzoor's orderly, for firstinterview--when money is so scarce too! Read as it stands, idiot--'tisbut an idle tale at best."

  The last was an aside to himself as he lay back in his cushions; for,idle though the tale was undoubtedly, it suited him to be its PrimeMinister. The editor laid down his pen hurriedly, and the polishedPersian polysyllables began to trip over one another, while theirmurmurous echo--as if eager to escape the familiar monotony--sped fromarch to arch of the long tunnel, which was lit about the middle byside arches on the guards' quarters, and through which the sunlightstreamed in a broad band of gold across the red stone causeway.

  The attributes of the Almighty having come to an end the reader beganon those of Bahadur Shah, Father of Victory, Light of Religion,Polestar and Defender of the Faith----

  "Faster, fool, faster," came the fat voice.

  The spectacled old man swallowed his breath, as it were, and went onat full gallop through the uprisal and bathing of Majesty, throughfeelings of pulses and reception of visitors, then slowed down a bitover the recital of dinner; for he was a _gourmet_, and his tongueloved the very sound of dainty dishes.

  "May your grave be spat upon!" shouted the Chief Eunuch. "So none werepoisoned by it what matters the food? Pass on----"

  "The Most Exalted then said his appointed prayers," gasped the reader."The Light-of-the-World then slept his usual sleep. On awakening, thephysician Ahsan-Oolah----"

  Mahboob sat up among his cushions. "Ahsan-Oolah! he felt the Royalpulse at dawn also----"

  "The Most Noble forgets," interrupted a voice with the veiled venom ofa partisan in its suavity. "The King--may his enemies die!--took acooling draught yesterday and requires all the care we can give him."

  "The King, Meean-sahib, needs nothing save the prayers of the holypriest, who has piously made over long years of his own life toprolong his Majesty's," retorted Mahboob, scowling at the speaker, whowore the Moghul dress, proclaiming him a member of the royal family.There was no lack of such in the palace-fort, for though Bahadur Shahhimself, being more or less of a saint, had contented himself withsome sixty children, his ancestors had sometimes run to six hundred.

  The Meean-sahib laughed scornfully as he passed inward, and mutteredthat those who went forth with the dog's trot might return with thecat's slink, since the great question had yet to be settled. Mahboob'sscowl deepened; the very audacity of the interruption rousing a fearlest the king's eldest son, Mirza Moghul, whose partisan the speakerwas, might have some secret understanding with Civilization. All themore need for haste.

  "Read on, fool! Who told thee to stop?"

  "The Princess Farkhoonda Zamani entered by the Delhi gate."

  Mahboob gave a scornful laugh in his turn. "To visit the Mirza'shouse, no doubt. Let her come--a pretty fool! Yet she had wiser staywhere she hath chosen to live, instead of being princess one day andplain Newasi the next. There are enough women without her in thepalace!"

  So it seemed, to judge by the stream of female names and titlesbelonging to the curtained dhoolies, which had passed and repassed thebarriers, upon which the editor launched his tongue. But Mahboob, asChief Eunuch, knew the value of such information and cut it short witha sneer.

  "If that be all! quick! the pen, and I will sign."

  A bystander, also in the Moghul dress, laughed broadly at thewell-worn inuendo on the possibilities of curtained dhoolies inintrigue. "Thou art right, Mahboob," he said, "God only knows."

  "His own work," chuckled the Keeper of Virtue. "And the Devil mademost of the women here. Now pigs! Canst not start? Am I to be kepthere all day?"

  As the litter went swaying out between the presented arms of thesentries, the white chrysalis of a Pathan veil stepped lamely downinto the causeway. "That, seeing there is no news, will be somethingto amuse the Queen withal," came the sharp voice.

  "There may be news enough, when that fat pig returns, to make it hardto amuse thy mistress, Mussamat Hafzan," suggested another bystander.

  The chrysalis paused. "My mistress! Nay, sahib! Hafzan is that toherself only. I am for no one save myself. I carry news, and themore the better for my trade. Yet I have not had a real good day forgifts of gratitude from my hearers, since Prince Fukrud-deen, theheir-apparent, died." There was a reckless cynicism in her voice, andhe of the Moghul dress broke in hotly.

  "Was poisoned, thou meanest, by----"

  Hafzan's shrill laugh rang through the arches.

  "No names, Mirza sahib, no names! And 'tis no news surely to have folkpoisoned in the fort; as thou wouldst know ere long, may be, if Hafzanwere spiteful. But I name no names--not I! I carry news, that is all."

  So, with a limp, showing that the woman within was a cripple, theformless figure passed along the tunnel through the inner barrier, andso across the wide courtyard where the public hall of audience stoodblocking the eastern end. It was a massive, square, one-storiedbuilding, with a
remorseless look in its plain expanse of dull redstone, pierced by toothed arches which yawned darkly into a reddergloom, like monstrous mouths agape for victims. Past this, with itshigh-set fretted marble _baldequin_ showing dimly against the endwall--whence a locked wicket gave sole entrance from the palace tothis seat of justice or injustice--the Pathan veil flitted like aghost; so, through a narrow passage guarded by the King's ownbody-guard, into a different world; a cool breezy world of white andgold and blue, clasping a garden set with flowers and fruit. Blue sky,white marble colonnades, and golden domes vaulting and zoning theburnished leaves of the orange trees, where the green fruit hung likeemeralds above a tangle of roses and marigolds, chrysanthemums andcrimson amaranth. Hafzan paused among them for a second; then, allunchallenged by any, passed on up the steps of the marble platform,which lies between the Baths and the Private Hall of Audience. Thatmarvelous building where the legend, Cunningly circled into thedecorations, still tells the visitor again and again that, "If earthholds a haven of bliss, It is this, it is this, it is this."

  Here, on the platform, Hafzan paused again to look over the lowparapet. The wide eastern plains stretched away to the pale bluehorizon before her, and the curving river lay at her feet edging thehigh bank, faced with stone, which forms the eastern defense of thepalace-fort. Thus the levels within touch the very top of the wall; sothat the domes, and colonnades, and green gardens, when seen from theopposite side of the streams cut clear upon the sky, like a castle inthe air at all times; but in the sunsettings, when they show in shadesof pale lilac, with the huge dome of the great mosque bulging like abig bubble into the golden light behind them as a veritable Palace ofDreams.

  She looked northward, first; along the sheer face of the rosyretaining wall to its trend westward at the Queen's favorite bastion,which was crowned by a balconied summer-house overhanging the moatbetween the fort itself and the isolated citadel of Selimgurh; which,jutting out into the river, partially hid the bridge of boats spanningthe stream beyond. Then she looked southward. Here was the sheer faceof rosy wall again, but it was crowned, close at hand, by thecolonnade and projecting eaves of the Private Hall of Audience.Further on it was broken by the carved _corbeilles_ of the King'sbalcony, and it ended abruptly at a sudden eastward turn of theriver, so giving a view of rolling rocky hillocks sweeping up to thehorizon where, faint and far like a spear-point, the column of theKutb showed on a clear day. The Kutb! that splendid promise, neverfulfilled,--that first minaret of the great mosque that never was, andnever will be built; symbol of the undying dream of Mohammedansupremacy that never came, that never can come to pass.

  As she paused, a troop of women laden with cosmetics and combs andquaint baskets containing endless aids to beauty, came shuffling outof the baths, gossiping and chattering shrilly, and clanking heavyanklets as they came. And with them, a heavy perfumed steam suggestiveof warm indolence, luxury, sensuality, passed out into the garden.

  "What! done already?" called Hafzan in surprise.

  "Already!" echoed a bold-faced trollop pertly, "_Ari_, sister. Artgrown a loose-liver? Sure this is Friday, and the King, good man,bathes apart, religiously! So we be religious too, matching his humor.That is the way with us women."

  An answering giggle met the sally.

  "Thou art an impudent hussy, Goloo!" said Hafzan angrily. "And theQueen--where is she?"

  "In the mosque praying for patience--in the summer-house playinggames--in the King's room coaxing him to belief--in the vestibulefeeding her son with lollipops--he likes them big, and sweet, andlively, and of his own choosing, does the prince, as I know to mycost." Here a general titter broke in on the unabashed recital.

  "_Loh!_ leave Hafzan to find out what the Queen does elsewhere,"suggested another voice. "We speak not of such things."

  "Then speak lower of others," retorted Hafzan. "Walls have echoes,sister, and thy mistress would fare no better than others if thy talkreached Zeenut Maihl's ears."

  "Tell her, spy! if thou wilt," replied the woman carelessly. "We havefriends on our side now, as thou mayst understand mayhap erenightfall, when the answer comes."

  Hafzan laughed. "Thou hast more faith in friends than I. _Loh!_ Itrust none within these four walls. And out of them but few."

  So saying she limped back into the garden, giving a glance as shepassed it into the Pearl Mosque, which showed like a carven snowdriftagainst the blue of the sky, the green of the trees. Finding nonethere, she went straight to the Queen's favorite summer-house on thenorthern bastion.

  It was a curious fatality which made Zeenut Maihl choose it, since allher arts, all her cunning, could scarcely have told her that it wouldere long be a watch-tower, whence the chance of success or failurecould be counted. For the white road beyond the bridge of boats, andtrending eastward to the packed population of Oude, to Lucknow, to allthat remained of the vitality in the Mohammedan dream, was to be erelong like a living, growing branch to which she, the spider, hung byan invisible thread, spinning her cobwebs, seemingly in mid-air.

  "Hush!" The whispered monition made Hafzan pause in the screenedarchway till the game was over. It was a sort of dumb-crambo, and amost outrageous _double entendre_ had just brought a smile to thebroad heavy face of a woman who lay among cushions in the alcovedbalcony. This was Zeenut Maihl, who for nearly twenty years hadkept her hold upon the King, despite endless rivals. She wasdark-complexioned, small-eyed, with a curious lack of eyebrows whichtook from her even vivacity of expression. But it was a man withexperience in many wives who remarked that favor is deceitful andbeauty is vain; he knew, no doubt, that in polygamy, the victory mustgo to the most unscrupulous fighter. Zeenut Maihl, at any rate,secured hers by ever-recurring promises of another heir to heroctogenarian husband; a flattery to which his other wives either couldnot or would not stoop. But the trick served the Queen's purpose inmore ways than one. Her oft-recurring disappointments could have butone cause: witchcraft. So on such occasions, with her paid priest,Hussan Askuri, saying prayers for those _in extremis_ at her bedside,Zeenut Maihl's enemies went down like nine-pins, and she rose from herbed of sickness with a board cleared of dangerous rivalry. For none inthe hot-bed of shams felt secure enough to get into grips with her.Ahsan-Oolah, the physician, might have; she had cried quarter from hiskeen fence before now; but he did not care to take the trouble. For hewas a philosopher, content to let his world go to the devil its ownway, so long as it did not interfere with his passionate greed ofgold. And this master-passion being shared by Zeenut Maihl theyhoisted the flag of truce for the most part against mutualspoliations. So the Queen played her game unmolested, as she playeddumb-crambo; at which her servants, separated like their betters intocliques, tried to outdo each other.

  "_Wah!_" said the set, jubilant over the _double entendre_. "That isthe best to-day."

  "If you like it, a clod is a betel nut," retorted the leader ofanother set. "I'll wager to beat it easily."

  The Queen frowned. There was too much freedom in this speech ofFatma's to suit her.

  "And I will be the judge," she said with a cruel smile. "Fatma must betaught better manners."

  Fatma--a woman older than the rest--salaamed calmly; and the fact madethe other clique look at each other uneasily. What certainty gave hersuch confidence as she plucked a gray hair from her own head andplaced it on the black velvet cushion which lay at the Queen's feet?

  "That is my riddle," she said. "Let the world guess it, and honor thereal giver of it."

  What could it be? Even the Queen raised herself in curiosity; a signin itself of commendation.

  "Sure I know not," she began musingly, when Fatma sprang to her feetin theatrical appeal.

  "Not so! Ornament of Palaces," she cried. "This may puzzle the herd;it is plain to the mother of Princes. It lies too lowly now forrecognition, but in its proper place----" She snatched the hair fromthe cushion, and, with a flourish, laid it on the head of a figurewhich appeared as if by magic behind her. A figure dressed as a youngMoghul Prince, and wearing all the cr
own jewels.

  "My son, Jewun!" cried the Queen, starting angrily. And the adverseclique, taking their cue from her tone, shrieked modestly, andscrambled for their veils.

  Fatma salaamed to the very ground.

  "No! Mother of Princes, 'tis but my riddle--the heir-apparent."

  Zeenut Maihl paused, bewildered for an instant; then in the figurerecognized the features of a favorite dancing girl, saw the pun, andlaughed uproariously, delightedly. The English sentry on thedrawbridge leading to Selimgurh might have heard her had there beenone; but within the last month the right to use the citadel as aprivate entry to the palace had been given to the King. It enabled himto cross the bridge of boats without the long circuit by the Calcuttagate of the city.

  "A gold mohur for that to Fatma!" she cried, "and a post nearer myperson. I need such wits sorely." As she spoke she rose to her feet,the smiles fading from her face as she looked out along that whiteeastward streak; for the jest had brought her back to earnest, to thatmixture of personal ambition for her son and real patriotism for hercountry which kept her a restless intriguer. "I need men, too," shemuttered. "Not dissolute, idle weathercocks or doting old pantaloons!There are plenty of them yonder." So she stood for a second, thenturned like lightning on her attendants. "What time----" she began,then seeing Hafzan, who had unveiled at the door, she gave a cry ofpleasure. "'Tis well thou hast come," she said, beckoning to her, "forthou must know God! if I were free to come and go, what could I notcompass? But here, in this smothering veil----" She flung even thegauze apology for one which she wore from her, and stood with smooth,bare head, and fat, bare arms, her quaint little pigtail dangling downher broad back. Not a romantic figure truly, but one in its savagetemper, strength, obstinacy, to be reckoned with. "What time"--shewent on rapidly--"does the King receive his initiates?"

  "At five," replied Hafzan. Seen without its veil, also, her figureshowed more shrunk than ill-formed, and her pale, thin face would havebeen beautiful but for its look of permanent ill-health. "The ceremonyof saintship begins then."

  "Saints!" echoed the Queen, with a hard laugh. "I would make themsaints and martyrs, too, were I free. Quick, woman! pen and ink! Andstay! Fatma's puzzle hath driven all else from my head. What timewas't that Hussan Askuri was bidden to come?"

  "The saintborn comes at four," replied Hafzan ceremoniously, "so as toleave leisure ere the Chief Eunuch's return with the answer."

  Zeenut Maihl's face was a study. "The answer! My answer lies there inFatma's riddle; take two gold mohurs for it, woman, it hath given menew life. Write, Hafzan, to the chamberlain, that the disciples mustpass the southern window of the King's private room ere they leave thepalace. And call my litter; I must see Hussan Askuri ere I meet him atthe King's."

  An hour afterward, with bister marks below her eyes, and delicatehints of causeful, becoming languor in face and figure, she waswaiting the King's return from the latticed balcony overhanging theriver, where he always spent the heats of the day; waiting in thecluster of small, dark rooms which lie behind it, on the other side ofthe marble fountain-set aqueduct which flows under a lace-like marblescreen to the very steps of the Hall of Audience.

  "Is all prepared?" she asked anxiously, as a glint of light from alifted curtain warned her of the King's approach.

  "All is prepared," echoed a hollow, artificial voice. The speaker wasa tall, heavily built man with long gray beard, big bushy grayeyebrows, and narrow forehead. A dangerous man, to judge by the mixedspirituality and sensuality in his face; a man who could imagine evil,and make himself believe it good. It was Hussan Askuri, the priest andmiracle-monger, who led the last of the Moghuls by the nose. It wasnot a difficult task, for Bahadur Shah, who came tottering across theintervening sunlit space, was but a poor creature. The firstimpression he gave was of extreme old age. It was evident in thesparse hair, the high, hollow cheeks, the waxy skin, the purple glazeover the eyes. The next was of a feebleness beyond even his apparentyears. He seemed fiberless, mind and body. Yet released at the door ofprivacy, from the eunuch's supporting hands, he ambled gayly enough toa seat, and exclaimed vivaciously:

  "A moment! A moment! good priest and physician. My mind first; my bodyafter. The gift is on me. I feel it working, and the historian mustwrite of me more as poet than king."

  "As the king of poets, sire," suggested Hussan Askuri pompously.

  Bahadur Shah smiled fatuously. "Good! Good! I will weave that thoughtwith mine into perfumed poesy." He raised one slender hand forsilence, and with the fingers of the other continued counting feetlaboriously, until with a sigh of relief, he declaimed:

  "Bahadur Shah, sure all the world will know it, Was poet more than king, yet king of poets."

  Zeenut Maihl gave a cry of admiration. "Quick! _Pir_-sahib, quick!"she exclaimed. "Such a gem must not be lost."

  "But 'tis yet co be polished," began the King complacently.

  "That is the office of the scribe," replied Hussan Askuri, as he drewout his ink-horn. He was by profession an ornamental writer, andgained great influence with the old poetaster by gathering up theroyal fragments and hiding their lameness amid magnificent curves andflourishes.

  "And now, _Pir_-sahib," continued the Queen, with a look of lovinganxiety at her lord, "for this strange ailment of which I spoke toyou----"

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

  "My lord, _Pir_-sahib, hath indeed renewed his youth through thy piousbreathing of thy own life into his mouth--as time will show," murmuredthe Queen with modest, downcast look. "But last night he muttered inhis 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 piouspriest, who hath the ear of the Almighty----"

  Hussan Askuri, who had stepped forward to gaze at the King, began tomutter prayers. "'Tis that cooling draught of Ahsan-Oolah's stands inthe way," he gasped, his hands and face working as if he were indeadly conflict with an unseen foe. "No carnal remedy--Ah! God bepraised! 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 cushions, held up at arm's length a lizard. Held by thetail, it seemed in semi-darkness to writhe and wriggle.

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

  "Fear not!" cried the priest. "The mutterings are stilled, the sweatsdried! And thus will I deal also with those who sent it." He flung hiscaptive on the ground and stamped it under foot.

  "Was it--was it a bis-cobra, think you?" faltered the King. He hadhold of Zeenut Maihl's hand like a frightened child. The priest shookhis head. "It was no carnal creature," he said in a hollow, chantingvoice. "It was an emissary of evil made helpless by prayer. GiveHeaven the praise." Bahadur Shah began on his creed promptly, but thepriest 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 comingfrom the West, and on its topmost wave, upon a raft of faithfulswords, as on a throne, sate----"

  "With due respect," came voices from the curtained door. "Thedisciples await initiation in the Hall of Audience."

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

  "I will hear thee finish the dream afterward," fussed the King, risingin a bustle; for he prized his saintship next to his poetry. "I mustnot keep my pupils from grace. Hast the kerchiefs ready, Zeenut?"There was something almost touching in the confidence of his appeal toher. It was that of a child to its mother, certain of what itdemanded.

/>   "All things are ready," she replied tartly, with a meaning and vexedlook at the miracle-monger; for they had meant to finish the dreambefore the initiation.

  "A goodly choice," said the royal saint, as he looked over the tinysilk squares, each embroidered with a text from the _Koran_, which shetook 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 thouhast 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 passes, and'tis the soldiers who come most to be disciples to the defender oftheir faith."

  "I am the better pleased," replied the King with edifying humility."This summer hath too many pupils as it is. Come! _Pir_-sahib, andsupport me through mine office with real saintship."

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

  "No carnal creature," she repeated. It was not; only a deft piece ofpatchwork. Yet it, or something else, made her shiver as she droppedthe tell-tale remains into the basket. This man Hussan Askurisometimes seemed to her own superstition a saint, sometimes to herclear head a mere sinner. She was not quite certain of anything abouthim save that his delusions, his dreams, his miracles, suited herpurpose equally, whether they were false or true.

  So she crossed over again to a marble lattice and peered through aconvenient peephole toward the Audience Hall, which rose across anintervening stretch of platform in white shadow, and whiter light. Shecould not see or hear much; but enough to show her that everything wasgoing on the same as usual. The disciples, most of them in fulluniform, went up and down the steps calmly, and the wordy exordium onthe cardinal virtues went on and on. How different it might be, shethought, 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 sortof pet with her own helplessness, she moved away and so, throughanother room, went to stand at another lattice. It looked south over astrip of garden, and there was an open square left in the tracerythrough which a face might look, a hand might pass. And as she stoodshe counted the remaining kerchiefs in the basket she still held. Theywere all of bright green silk and bore the same lettering. It was theGreat Cry: "_Deen! Deen! Futteh Mohammed!_" As dangerous a woman this,as Hussan Askuri was a man; as dangerous, both of them, to peacefullife, as the fabled bis-cobra, at the idea of which the foolish oldKing had cried, "_Ouee, Umma!_" like any woman.

  And now at last that wordy exordium must be over, for, along thegarden path, came the clank of accouterments. Zeenut Maihl's listlessfigure seem galvanized to sudden life, there was a flutter of green atthe 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 ofexpectation reached her ear from outside, and, leaning forward,she caught a glimpse of a swinging litter coming along the path.Mahboob returned already! Vexatious, indeed, when she had turned andplanned everything so as to be sure of having the King in herapartments when the answer arrived. None others would know it beforeshe did--unless!--the thought obliterated all others, and she flewback to the further lattice. The King, returning from the initiation,had paused in the middle of the platform at the sight of theapproaching litter, and his courtiers, as if by instinct, had groupedthemselves round him, leaving him the central figure. The cruelsunlight streamed down on the tawdry court, on the worn-out old man.

  It seemed interminable to the woman behind the lattice, that pausewhile the fat eunuch was helped from his litter. She could havescreamed to him for the answer, could have had at his fat carcass withher hands for its slowness. But the old King had better blood in hisveins. He stood quietly, his tawdry court around him; behind him themarble, and gold, and mosaics of his ancestors.

  "What news, slave?" he asked boldly.

  "None, Light of the Faithful," replied the Chief Eunuch.

  "None!" The semi-circle closed in a little, every face full ofdisappointed curiosity.

  "I have a letter for the Lord of the World with me. Its substance isthis. The _Sirkar_ will recognize no heir. During the lifetime of ourGreat Master, whose life be prolonged forever, the _Sirkar_ will makeno promise of any kind, either to his majesty, or to any other memberof the royal family. It is to remain as if there were no succession."

  No succession! Above the sudden murmur of universal surprise anddissent, a woman's cry of inarticulate rage came from behind thelattice. The King turned toward the sound instinctively. "I must tothe Queen," he murmured helplessly, "I must to the Queen."