Then, on a sudden, the vast view seemed to fall away into an immeasurable distance, and, as a landscape contracts when seen from the wrong end of the telescope, drew inwards from its edges with incredible rapidity until it occupied no more s.p.a.ce than is enclosed by the circ.u.mference of the smallest coin. And in the same flash of time it was gone altogether.
As it went, Abdulla felt his fingers close on the cold metal.
They closed on the metal, and Abdulla saw without the least surprise that the thing he held in his hand was the knocker of bra.s.s on the door of the Interpreter of Dreams.
He knew no shock, asked himself no questions, perceived no breach of continuity. He lifted the knocker, and its fall sounded in the street of Damascus at the very instant that the boom of the bursting sh.e.l.l, which had blown the water-seller to fragments, was reverberating over Tchatalja.
Abdulla knocked. As he waited for the door to open he looked up and down the street. He had arrived in Damascus overnight, and his surroundings were yet strange to him. Nevertheless, as he continued to look at the houses and the pa.s.sers-by, a suspicion crossed his mind that he had been in this place before. "Perhaps I have dreamed of such a place," he thought. "But surely the face of yonder man is familiar. Where did I see one like him? In Paris? In London? Ho thou, with the courier"s badge on thine arm! A word with thee."
The man paused at the doorstep, and Abdulla looked him full in the face.
Instantly his mind became confused, his tongue began to stammer, and he heard himself speaking of he knew not what. "Hast thou life in thee?" he said. "If so, bestir thyself and thou and I----" But the words broke off, and Abdulla stood mouthing.
"Thou babblest like one intoxicated," said the man. "May Allah preserve thy wits!" And he pa.s.sed on.
The door opened, and Abdulla"s mind became clear. A moment later he stood in the presence of the Interpreter of Dreams.
"Who art thou?" said the Interpreter, "and what is the occasion of thy coming?"
"I am a Cairene," said Abdulla, "born of Syrian parentage in this city, but taken hence when I was an infant of five years. I am come to Damascus for a purpose which thou and I have in common. I, too, am a student of dreams."
"Of which kind?" asked the Interpreter. "For know that dreams are of two kinds: dreams of the worlds that were, and dreams of the worlds that are to be. Of which hast thou knowledge?"
"Of a world that was," said Abdulla.
"Thou hast chosen a thankless study," answered the other. "Few will trust thy discoveries. For a thousand who will believe thee if thou teachest of a world that is to be, there is scarce one who will listen if thou speakest of a world that was. But tell me thy history, and name thy qualifications."
"I have been educated in the Universities of the West," said Abdulla, "and there I sat at the feet of one who taught me a doctrine which he had learnt from a master of the ancient time. And the doctrine was this: that worlds without end lie enfolded one within the other like the petals of a rose; and the next world after differs from the next world before no more than a full water-skin differs from itself when two drops of water have fallen from its mouth. "The world," taught the master, "is a memory and a dream, and at every stage of its existence it beholds the image of its past and the fainter image of its future reflected as in a gla.s.s.""
"And why makest thou the world that was before of more account than the world that comes after?"
"I said not that I made it of more account," answered Abdulla, "but that my knowledge was of this rather than of that. But know that I am a dreamer of dreams, and it is the world before that my dreams have revealed to me."
"Tell me thy dreams."
"It is of them that I came to speak with thee. There is one dream that ever recurreth both in the day and the night. Seventy times seven have I seen a frayed water-skin, having a hole in a certain part, no larger than an olive-stone."
"That is a small matter," said the Interpreter, "and such things concern us not. But I suspect that thou art not at the end of thy story. For, verily, thou hast not travelled from the cities of the West to speak of a thing so slight. Say, therefore, what has brought thee to Damascus."
"That also I would tell thee; for it is a matter to be pondered. Thou art of the wise, and knowest, therefore, that there is a virtue in places and a power in localities. In one, the light of the soul is extinguished; in another, it is kindled; in one, the reason dies; in another, the half-thought becomes a whole, and the doctrine that is dimly apprehended becomes clear. Now, being in the city of Paris, I conversed with one of the French who had visited the holy places of his religion, where he had meditated in solitude and seen visions and dreamed dreams; and I told him that I had a doctrine newly born, half grown. "O Abdulla," he said, "there is a virtue in places and a power in localities. Go thou, therefore, to the city of Damascus, for that is a place where, in days that are gone, the half-thought became a whole, and the doctrine dimly apprehended became clear. Put thyself on the way to Damascus and await the issue.""
At these words the Interpreter rose from his seat and paced the room in thought.
"The man of whom thou speakest," he said at length, "is known to me; and many are they whom he has guided to this place. Rightly sayest thou that there is a virtue in places and a power in localities. And here the power still lingers which the world lost when mankind took to babbling.
Thy reason for coming hither is mine also. Seest thou not that I have made my dwelling in the Street that is called Straight?"
"I see and understand," said Abdulla.
There was another pause, and again the Interpreter paced the room. Then he resumed:
"Between thee and me there is need of little speech to attain a comprehension, and the short sentence meaneth more than the long explanation. Nevertheless, I would fain hear the rest of thy story.
Proceed then, and tell me of the dreams that came to thee on the way to Damascus."
"On the way itself," said Abdulla, "there came no dreams. But this very day I sat by the bank of the river, full of thought, and methinks sleep overpowered me--though I know not. And there came a poor man carrying a water-skin, and I, looking upon him, saw that his face was like unto mine own, but marred by his toil and his poverty. And the man sat himself down, leaning against a palm-tree on the side away from the sun, and slept. Then I arose and stood before him, and expounded to him my doctrine, and he seemed as one that saw and heard, though asleep. And when his eyes were opened he saw me no more, but took up his water-skin and filled it at the river, making mention of the name of G.o.d.
"I followed him into the city, and saw one thrust him against the wall so that his water-skin was frayed. Thereafter the water-skin burst, and a hole appeared in a certain part the size of an olive-stone, and the remnant of the water flowed forth. But, pa.s.sing a certain street, a woman called to him to give her little ones to drink. And I, being hard by, and seeming to know the woman, whispered to the man that he should pa.s.s his hands craftily over the skin, if peradventure a drop remained to moisten the lips of them that cried out for the thirst. But none remained, and the man went on his way sorrowing.
"Then I lost him for a while; but as night fell I found him again, standing in front of a gla.s.s window and meditating a thing that was dishonest. And the man looking through the window saw me standing among the goods that were in the shop. Whereupon he changed his design and ran away.
"I wandered through the streets of the city, and pa.s.sing by a certain house, a frivolous woman looked out from a lattice and reviled me. I understood not the things that she spake, and having answered the woman I departed. Then I bethought me that she had taken me for another, and, remembering that the face of the water-seller was like unto mine own, I surmised that it was he.
"Suddenly, I know not how, I found myself in a place of battle, armed like the rest, and, turning aside, I saw, standing among the harnessed horses of a gun-team, the man whose water-selling I had watched in the city. And the spirit of fear was upon him; his countenance was blanched and his body all aquake; and I, ashamed that one who bore my own semblance should stand disgraced among his fellows, rebuked him for his cowardice; and methought I blew a fire through his nostrils into the marrow of his bones. Then the man took courage and, mounting his horse with alacrity, went forward with the bravest to the place of death.
"Thereafter I saw him no more. But this very hour, even as I lifted thy knocker of bra.s.s, a great light shone round about me, a sound of thunder shook the air, and a voice said, "Lo! thy broken water-skin is mended and full of water. Go forth, therefore, and give to them that are athirst." Whereupon it seemed to me that the half-thought became a whole, and the doctrine that was dimly apprehended grew clear. And now I am a man prepared to go forward, even as he was into whom I blew the breath of courage on the field of death. A thing that was holding me back is gone from me, and lo! I am free."
"Perchance one has ministered unto thee, even as thou didst minister to that other in the hour when he was afraid," said the Interpreter.
"That may be," said Abdulla. "But did I not tell thee that as yet I have no knowledge of the world that will be?"
"The knowledge awaits thee, and will begin from this hour," said the Interpreter. "Most a.s.suredly that which thou tellest is an image of the world that was; and he that dreameth of the one world dreameth also in due season of the other. But hearken now while I put thee to the question; and if thou answerest according to thy doctrine, peradventure the interpretation of thy vision will appear in the issue."
"Say on," said Abdulla.
"This, then, is the question. Thinkest thou, O Dreamer, that when a man dies and enters Paradise, he knows of his condition, as who should say, "Lo, I am now a disembodied spirit, having just pa.s.sed through the article of death, and these before me are the Gates of Heaven, and yonder shining thing is the Throne of G.o.d?""
"Nay, verily," said Abdulla, "in this and in every world the Throne of G.o.d is revealed after one and the same manner, and never shall it be seen in any world save by such as follow there the Loyal Path whereby it is found in this. And he who beholdeth not the Gates of Paradise in the world where he is, will look for them in vain in the world where he is to be."
"Art thou willing to think, then, that thou and I are in Paradise even at this hour?"
"Thou hintest at the doctrine that has been revealed to me," said the other. "It may be even as thou sayest. For certain am I that thou and I have died many deaths; and as there is another world in respect of this, so is this world another in respect of them that went before. Great is the error which deemeth that the number of the worlds is but two, and that death, therefore, cometh once only to a man, when he pa.s.seth from the first to the second. Of death, as of life, the kinds are innumerable; and of these, that which destroyeth the body at the end is only one, and perhaps not the chief. Whatsoever changeth into its contrary must needs die in the act; so that except one die, grief cannot pa.s.s into joy, nor darkness into light, nor evil into good; neither can the lost be found, nor the sleeper awake. Wherefore it may be that thou and I are in Paradise even now."
"Thou speakest to the question," said the Interpreter. "Some there are, as thou sayest, who, being in Paradise already, will still be asking whether Paradise awaits them. And if the enlightened go thus astray, how much deeper is the ignorance of the darkened! For in no place, O Abdulla, is h.e.l.l more doubted of than in h.e.l.l itself."
"I have lived in the cities of the West and have observed that very thing," said Abdulla. "Many a d.a.m.ned soul have I heard making boast of his good estate, and many a doubt of Judgment shouted forth from the very flames of the Pit. For how shall a man know when he is now dead and come to Judgment? Doth he live in his dying, and, taking note of his last breath, say within himself, "Lo, now I am dead"? And if he know not the single occasion of his dying, how should he remember even though death worketh upon him daily and pa.s.seth over him a thousand times?"
"Death and forgetting are one," said the Interpreter, "and the memory of dying perisheth like a dream. But some there are to whom Allah hath appointed a station at the place of pa.s.sage and set as watchmen at the intermingling of the worlds. These pa.s.s to and fro over the bridges, gathering tidings from forgotten realms; and much of majesty and worth that escapeth the common sort is apparent unto them. And of such, O Abdulla, thy dreams declare thee to be one."
"Hast thou no further interpretation?" asked Abdulla.
"Hark!" said the other. "The full interpretation cometh even now."
And, as he spoke, the bra.s.s knocker sounded on the door.
_Thus endeth "The Hole in the Water-skin."_