And where was it?--What? thou wilt not say. Go! Umm Kulsum and thou also Khadija--go to the threading the beads. Thou _shalt_ tell me, boy. Whisper it--What! Siyah Yamin"s! And thou new-betrothed! Oh! had but thy father settled thee with a true bride of my race she would have kept--or killed thee!" She gave a little shriek. "What!
Jamal-ud-din--the scorpion! saith he hath married her--the piece!
Shame! Shame!"
Then she suddenly put her head on one side and regarded her grand-nephew distastefully. "Lo! Salim thou growest too fat. Wine and women will kill thee, and "tis well that Birbal--mind you I say naught for him or against him, though he hath made me laugh often enough."
"He shall laugh on the wrong side ere long," cried Salim savagely.
"Aye! he shall learn not to jest at me."
The lively little face grew keen. "At thee? What said he? Come, sweetheart, let me hear. I will decide if there be wit in it."
"Wit!" echoed the Prince angrily. "No wit, but insult for which he shall pay. Look you, when the Hindu infidel interfered with sermons I bid him silence. "Am I not King?" said I (as I shall be), "and the Shadow-of-G.o.d?" "No," says he with that cursed bow of his, "thou art drunk, boy, and the substance of a fool.""
Aunt Rosebody attempted gravity; then her laughter brimmed over, and the whole room giggled in response, including the bead-threading girls.
"Oh! my life," the little lady was beginning when one of the women guards entered hurriedly, crying, "The King! honourable ladies, the King!"
He was amongst them almost before the circle of fond relatives about the young Prince had time to rise, so hiding him from view. For an instant Akbar stood to make his courtly greeting, then, seeing his mother"s pale face light up, he flung his turban with its royal heron"s plume aside--his shoes he had already left at the door--and so pa.s.sing quickly to Hamida"s side took both her hands and raised them to his head.
"Mother! I thank thee--for all!"
Her fingers even in his strong grip lingered there lovingly as if she felt the child"s curls still; then she said with a quiver in her voice:
"It was nothing, son--the good wishes were more weighty than the gold."
He gave her hands a little squeeze ere he released them.
"Than the jewels, mayhap!"--here he turned with a mischievous smile to Aunt Rosebody who stood divided between joy at seeing him, and dread lest he should see Salim. "For _them_ I have to thank my aunt----"
"How dost know it was I?" she challenged furiously.
He looked at her with immense gravity.
"First," he said, ""twas the smallest hand in India! Next, no other woman could shy so straight. When one has played ball, polo, G.o.d knows what, in one"s youth----"
"Calumnies! Calumnies!" interrupted Aunt Rosebody, her face puckering with amus.e.m.e.nt. "The Most Excellent"s remark was truly scandalous!"
The word was unfortunate; it roused memories.
"There be worse scandals than that to the King"s honour this day," he said, his face clouding. "Know then, Beneficent Ladies, that the son I have forgiven--how many times? sure it comes nigh to the Padre"s seventy times seven--has been found drunk again in a common stew. And he is coward too; he hath not dared to face his father----"
He paused, his anger turning to ice, for Prince Salim--to do him justice no coward--took heart of grace, and rose above the shelter of the women-folk, who seeing themselves no longer needed stood back, leaving the father and son face to face.
They were a great contrast. Both tall and strong; but the one all curves and softness, the other lean, sinewy.
"I was ill," began the Prince sullenly, when Akbar interrupted him with a contemptuous laugh.
"Ill? Hast not even a body for drunkenness? Go thy way, boy, if thou wilt. I have other strings to my bow."
"My son!" appealed Lady Hamida who, knowing the King"s temper, knew that once lost it might carry much with it, "the boy has come to us----"
"And what does he here amongst virtuous women, madam, and how came they to admit him?" asked Akbar sternly. "Did I, son and nephew, even in the hottest hours of youth inure them to such insult? Go, boy! Go with Jamal-ud-din, the exile, and his paramour. I have other sons!"
A blank horror settled down on the Beneficent Ladies. Never had things come to such a pitch before, and some of the younger women sobbed audibly. Only little Auntie Rosebody, with the courage of despair stood looking first at the father then at the son, regret, anger, irritation, showing in her small puckered face.
"Oh! my life! Oh! nephew Jalal-ud-din Mahomed Akbar," she cried at last. "Look at him--oh! look at him! He is a fat-tailed sheep and thou art a hunting leopard! How can he race with thee? Give him time, nephew, give him time!"
Something in Salim"s sheepish att.i.tude appealed to the King"s sense of humour, a suspicion of a smile showed about his mouth.
"At his age, madam," he began sternly, the memory of his strenuous youth rushing in upon him. Why! at eighteen, dissatisfied with his agents of Empire he had dismissed them, and taken the whole conduct of affairs upon his own shoulders. At eighteen he had begun to dream. At eighteen his mind was busy with the problem of how to unite a conquered India; how to efface from it all memory of coercion, and make it look to him and his, not as to ephemeral conquerors but as G.o.d"s viceregents, the upholders of justice, mercy, toleration, and freedom. At eighteen----
Suddenly he flung his right hand out in a hopeless gesture of finality. What use were dreams, even the dreaming of a King, if they were only to last for one poor mortal life?
"There is no end to the dreaming of Kings." Bah! The woman had lied.
There was an end! An end to all things.
But the worst of his pa.s.sion was over. He turned yet once more to his son and forgave him yet once again.
CHAPTER V
_The world-revealing cup of the King Jamsheed Counselled the King in his pleasures and in his need_.
--Firdusi.
The Prince Salim, despite all efforts of his friends, accepted his father"s reprimand in dutiful fashion. Truly Akbar--may he be accursed!--hath a very devil of persuasion in him for those he loves."--The scribe"s hand paused in its swift swooping over the Persian curves, and he looked up for an instant with all the evil of his handsome face concentrated into an expression of bitterest antagonism. Then he turned his head, listening ere he went on with his news-letter.
"So far little has been gained. Yet the poison works. The prince, grown older, than his brothers--who are themselves coming on for rebellion--resents this leading, as of a young colt, and will ere long a.s.sert himself. Already he is fit for intrigue; by and by it may be for murder. And Akbar once gone--by what means G.o.d knows!--Salim will be our tool. Thus the dead to-day brings forth another to-day, and so we (more especially this Mote-speck-in-the-Light, Dalil, of the Kingly House, Tarkhan, who waits in unmerited exile for his Lord"s service expectant of his Lord"s recall) hope, knowing that all G.o.d"s strength dwells not in one man"s body. Meanwhile the King"s action in this matter hath stirred up the whole city. Ere noon Jamal-ud-din left, accompanied by a goodly gathering of his clan all incensed at the sentence of exile pa.s.sed on their captain. He hath gone to his relatives of Barha and will doubtless rouse them to resistance. But the jade Siyah Yamin hath done more for our cause than any, since I have but now returned from seeing her leave-taking; for the baggage hath elected to follow her lawful spouse. Truly "tis said "A torn ear clamours for more earring!" Half the town were at the heels of her palanquin wherein she sate veiled like any cupola of chast.i.ty, but full of an evil tongue. Truly it was a sight to set pumpkins a-sinking and mill-stones a-floating, since none knew what to make of it, with the light men gathering up the flowers she flung, and the light women praising her in jest for her fidelity. But it hath done our cause good service, and the King may repent him of his virtue ere long. Thus remaineth matters at this present. Whilst I, Dalil, knowing that straight fingers hold naught, crook mine in the service of the Head of my House, Mirza Jani Beg, _looking for reward_. This goes by the hand of Sufardar, envoy, whom I await this day past, but----"
In the act of writing the words "who comes not" the scribe paused again. This time there was no doubt of a sound presaging interruption, and the writer, thrusting the papers under a fold of his embroidered shawl took up a lute which lay beside him, and leaning back amongst the scented cushions began to strum a love song and sing in a high tenor voice:
Oh! Love! I am caught in the snare Of the scented net of her hair Oh! Love! I am stricken dead With hunger for her, and with drouth Her foot is upon my head Would my kisses were on her mouth.
"A merchant selling essence of rose by my Lord"s orders," said an obsequious dwarf extravagantly dressed; one of the smartest deformities in fact to be found in the service of the young n.o.bility of the court. His cunning face, full of almost malignant comprehension, had been overlaid with servile admiration as he had waited for the song to end.
"Let him enter," came the yawning reply, "and, Yahed, close the doors on us. The lamp flickers in the evening wind!"
The song went on lazily--
Oh! Love! I am held by the power Of her bare brown bosom-flower Oh! Love! I am lost in the mesh!
In the very thought of a sip At the nectar of soft warm flesh And the touch of her lip.
Then the door closed, and he turned swiftly on the figure which had entered.