"Poor Mirza!"
"My Lord, I am not afraid."
Mahommed struck the table violently, and his eyes glittered. "That ever one should think I loved a coward! Yet more intolerable, that he whom I have called brother should know me so little! Can it be, O Mirza, can it be, you tell me these things imagining them new to me? ... Let me have done. What we are saying would have become us ten years ago, not now. It is unmanly. I had a purpose in sending for you.... Your mission in Constantinople ends in the morning at four o"clock. In other words, O Mirza, the condition pa.s.ses from preparation for war with the _Gabour_ to war. Observe now. You are a fighting man--a knight of skill and courage.
In the rencounters to which I am going--the sorties, the a.s.saults, the duels single and in force, the exchanges with all arms, bow, arbalist, guns small and great, the mines and countermines--you cannot stay out.
You must fight. Is it not so?"
Corti"s head arose, his countenance brightened.
"My Lord, I fear I run forward of your words--forgive me."
"Yes, give ear.... The question now is, whom will you fight--me or the _Gabour?_"
"O my Lord"--
"Be quiet, I say. The issue is not whether you love me less. I prefer you give him your best service."
"How, my Lord?"
"I am not speaking in contempt, but with full knowledge of your superiority with weapons--of the many of mine who must go down before you. And that you may not be under restraint of conscience or arm-tied in the melee, I not only conclude your mission, but release you from every obligation to me."
"Every obligation!"
"I know my words, Emir, yet I will leave nothing uncertain.... You will go back to the city free of every obligation to me--arm-free, mind-free.
Be a Christian, if you like. Send me no more despatches advisory of the Emperor"--
"And the Princess Irene, my Lord?"
Mahommed smiled at the Count"s eagerness.
"Have patience, Mirza.... Of the moneys had from me, and the properties heretofore mine in trust, goods, horses, arms, armor, the galley and its crew, I give them to you without an accounting. You cannot deliver them to me or dispose of them, except with an explanation which would weaken your standing in Blacherne, if not undo you utterly. You have earned them."
Corti"s face reddened.
"With all my Lord"s generosity, I cannot accept this favor. Honor"--
"Silence, Emir, and hear me. I have never been careless of your honor.
When you set out for Italy, preparatory to the mission at Constantinople, you owed me duty, and there was no shame in the performance; but now--so have the changes wrought--that which was honorable to Mirza the Emir is scandalous to Count Corti. After four o"clock you will owe me no duty; neither will you be in my service. From that hour Mirza, my falcon, will cease to be. He will have vanished. Or if ever I know him more, it will be as Count Corti, Christian, stranger, and enemy."
"Enemy--my Lord"s enemy? Never!"
The Count protested with extended arms.
"Yes, circ.u.mstances will govern. And now the Princess Irene."
Mahommed paused; then, summoning his might of will, and giving it expression in a look, he laid a forcible hand on the listener"s shoulder.
"Of her now.... I have devised a promotion for you, Emir. After to-night we will be rivals."
Corti was speechless--he could only stare.
"By the rose-door of Paradise--the only oath fit for a lover--or, as more becoming a knight, by this sword of Solomon, Emir, I mean the rivalry to be becoming and just. I have an advantage of you. With women rank and riches are as candles to moths. On the other side your advantage is double; you are a Christian, and may be in her eyes day after day. And not to leave you in mean condition, I give you the moneys and property now in your possession; not as a payment--G.o.d forbid!--but for pride"s sake--my pride. Mahommed the Sultan may not dispute with a knight who has only a sword."
"I have estates in Italy."
"They might as well be in the moon. I shall enclose Constantinople before you could arrange with the Jews, and have money enough to buy a feather for your cap. If this were less true, comes then the argument: How can you dispose of the properties in hand, and quiet the gossips in the _Gabour"s_ palace? "Where are your horses?" they will ask. What answer have you? "Where your galley?" Answer. "Where your Mohammedan crew?" Answer."
The Count yielded the debate, saying: "I cannot comprehend my Lord. Such thing was never heard of before."
"Must men be restrained because the thing they wish to do was never heard of before? Shall I not build a mosque with five minarets because other builders stopped with three? ... To the sum of it all now.
Christian or Moslem, are you willing to refer our rivalry for the young woman to G.o.d?"
"My wonder grows with listening to my Lord."
"Nay, this surprises you because it is new. I have had it in mind for months. It did not come to me easily. It demanded self-denial--something I am unused to.... Here it is--I am willing to call Heaven in, and let it decide whether she shall be mine or yours--this lily of Paradise whom all men love at sight. Dare you as much?"
The soldier spirit arose in the Count.
"Now or then, here or there, as my Lord may appoint. I am ready. He has but to name his champion."
"I protest. The duel would be unequal. As well match a heron and a hawk.
There is a better way of making our appeal. Listen.... The walls of Constantinople have never succ.u.mbed to attack. Hosts have dashed against them, and fled or been lost. It may be so with me; but I will march, and in my turn a.s.sault them, and thou defending with thy best might. If I am beaten, if I retire, be the cause of failure this or that, we--you and I, O Mirza--will call it a judgment of Heaven, and the Princess shall be yours; but if I success and enter the city, it shall be a judgment no less, and then"--Mahommed"s eyes were full of fire--"then"--
"What then, my Lord?"
"Thou shalt see to her safety in the last struggle, and conduct her to Sancta Sophia, and there deliver her to me as ordered by G.o.d."
Corti was never so agitated. He turned pale and red--he trembled visibly.
Mahommed asked mockingly: "Is it Mirza I am treating with, or Count Corti? Are Christians so unwilling to trust G.o.d?"
"But, my Lord, it is a wager you offer me."
"Call it so."
"And its conditions imply slavery for the Princess. Change them, my Lord--allow her to be consulted and have her will, be the judgment this or that."
Mahommed clinched his hands.
"Am I a brute? Did ever woman lay her head on my breast perforce?"
The Count replied, firmly:
"Such a condition would be against us both alike."
The Sultan struggled with himself a moment.
"Be it so," he rejoined. "The wager is my proposal, and I will go through with it. Take the condition, Emir. If I win, she shall come to me of her free will or not at all."