Читать книгу Tamerlane: The Earth Shaker - Harold Lamb - Страница 8

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Westward stretched the desert floor, red and barren and bare. Red clay, gashed and cracked by the baking of the sun, glared underfoot. Hot puffs of wind stirred the surface sand and lifted it in a haze of dust. This haze wavered about the crests of rotting sandstone like the spray of a dry sea. Only in the early morning and late afternoon could objects be seen clearly because in the middle of the day this haze and the shimmering furnace of the sky overhead made sight a torment.

But it was not the true desert, because empty river-beds twisted among outcroppings of grey granite, toward the wide river Amu. The yellow water of the river—that had made a paradise of Sali Sarai four thousand feet above this plain—bred a sterile kind of growth about it. Near it the clay banks were covered with reeds and a scum of saxaul, sometimes half buried in sand, sometimes projecting upward grotesquely with its gnarled roots exposed.

Besides the river, there were wells with water good enough for the animals but unfit for humans. Wherever the water was sweet the camps of the desert dwellers could be found—nomad Turkomans guarding their sheep with an eye out for a passing caravan that might be weakly guarded enough to raid. And men who had fled from blood-guilt to the barren land.

Across the Red Sands, as they called this clay steppe, Timur made his way. He had brought Aljai with him, and a score of followers who had chosen to make trial of adversity with him. They had pack-horses with spare armour, some weapons and odds and ends of jewels by way of wealth. They had ample water-skins and they travelled swiftly, being strong enough to guard the horses that grazed nightly on the dry grass of the hillocks. They went from one well to another until they found Aljai’s brother, Amir Hussayn. He also was a fugitive, a lean and obstinate man, courageous enough and avaricious. At Kabul he had been the prince of a reigning house, and his chief desire was to regain what he had lost.

Secretly, Hussayn thought himself superior to Timur—he was a little older—but he appreciated the magnificent fighting ability of the Tatar. Timur, on the other hand, could not understand Hussayn’s greed, but he was glad of an ally.

Aljai was the bond between them. She was a true grandchild of the Kingmaker; she could laugh at adversity, even while her quick brain pondered its problems. She never complained of their hardships, and her high spirits banished Timur’s moodiness.

The four of them—Hussayn had brought with him one of his wives, Dilshad Agha, a notable beauty—discussed the situation while they camped at the well where they had met. They had now sixty men well mounted, and they decided to go on to the west, where they would find the trade roads and large cities below the Sea of Kharesm, now called the Sea of Aral.

Timur led them to Khiva, where the governor recognized his unexpected guests. He seemed more than willing to pillage them and sell them to the Jat Mongols. It was no tarrying place for the fugitives and they set out into the plain. They were pursued by several hundred horsemen and the governor himself.

Riding off to the summit of a ridge, Timur and Hussayn turned on the Khivans in spite of the odds against them, and their headlong charge down the slope surprised the assailants.

There followed one of the bitter struggles between horsemen in which the Tatars were at home. They thrust their small round shields high on their left arms. Their powerful double curved bows sped the heavy, steel tipped arrows with force enough to smash through chain mail. And these warriors could wield a bow with either hand, and shoot to the back as well as the front.

They carried their bows ready strung in open sheaths at one hip, the arrow case also open at the other. The bows were often strengthened with iron and horn, and had the range and impact of the English long bow of the time. With such weapons under their finger tips the Tatars were almost as formidable as modern cavalry armed with the revolvers of three generations ago. Drawing the bow with one hand, the arrow with the other, in a single motion, they could shoot as quickly, and did not need to stop to reload a cylinder. In fact, the open sheaths are similar to the modern belt holster, the iron forearm pieces to the leather cuff of the range rider of to-day.

The small shield bound to the biceps, and the short bow enabled them to shoot around the head of a horse with ease.

They guided their quick-footed ponies in and out among the Khivans, weaving through their more numerous foemen, bending over their saddle horns, yelling as they rode. They rushed in groups of twelve, scattered among the Khivans and retreated as swiftly as they had come. Only at need did they draw their scimitars or short battle maces. With edged steel they were ferocious, but the bow was their favourite weapon.^[1]

Saddles emptied rapidly on both sides. The various leaders kept out of the heart of the struggle, knowing that they would be surrounded and cut down at all cost if they ventured in. Riders unhorsed had to look out for themselves, and get another mount if they could. But one of the Tatars, Elchi Bahatur, stood his ground on foot with such recklessness that Timur rode up and snatched away his bow, cutting the cord so that he would be forced to go and look for safety.

At this moment Amir Hussayn charged through the Khivans toward the governor. He cut down the standard bearer, but was hemmed in by foemen, and was circling desperately when Timur saw him, and went to aid him. Timur’s sudden onset made the Khivans turn to meet him, and Hussayn slipped out from among them unhurt, while the young Tatar reined back his horse, defending himself with his sword on either hand, until several of his men came up and the Khivan riders scattered.

It was the moment for a charge and Timur shouted to his warriors. Hussayn’s horse was struck by an arrow and threw its master. Dilshad Agha, the amir’s wife, saw him fall and galloped up, dismounting to offer him her horse. Again in the saddle, Hussayn joined the Tatars.

Timur made for the Khiva governor and shot an arrow at him. The shaft smashed into the man’s cheek and knocked him to the ground. Bending down from the saddle, Timur picked up a short spear without drawing rein, and drove it through the Khivan’s body. At the death of their leader the assailants scattered, the Tatars following them up with arrows until their arrow cases were empty. Then Timur mounted Dilshad Agha on the same horse with Aljai, and drew back to the ridge with the women and the survivors of the conflict.

Only seven men remained alive upon the ridge, and most of these were slightly hurt. The Khivans dismounted in the plain and consulted for a while. It was near sunset, and Timur decided to strike off into the desert, the Khivans following but missing them in the darkness.

“Nay,” Timur laughed at his companions, “we have not yet come to the end of our road.”

Blindly they wandered through the night and came upon a well by sheer good fortune, finding there also three of their men, soldiers from Balkh who had escaped on foot. While the rest slept, refreshed—the water of the well proved to be sweet—Timur and Hussayn discussed the situation and agreed to separate to avoid the chance of recognition again.

In the first daylight they found that the three Balkhis were gone, with three of the seven horses. They divided the remaining mounts, agreeing to meet again, if possible, far to the south in Hussayn’s homeland. Timur watched Hussayn ride away, and then loaded what remained of his baggage on one pony, giving the better horse to Aljai. He had kept only one man with him, and Aljai smiled, seeing him trudging through the sand who had never gone from his house unless in the saddle.

“Surely,” she cried, “our fate cannot be worse than this—that we should be obliged to walk.”

They had no food, but they noticed goat herders in the distance and turned off to buy several goats, roasting the quarters of one at once, rejoicing in the food. The others they dressed on stones and added to the packs. Timur asked the herders if there was any trail out of the country, and they pointed to a path.

“It leads to the huts of some Turkomans.”

They followed the path and found the huts, which seemed to be deserted. Timur took possession of one of the dwellings, when outcry rose around them. The Turkomans, it seems, were in some of the other shelters and had taken Timur’s party for thieves. Placing Aljai behind them in a hut, Timur ran to the entrance with his solitary follower. Lacking arrows, they made pretence of using their bows, but the nomads ran in to attack them.

Drawing his sword and throwing down his useless bow, Timur stepped out to meet them. As he did so the leader of the Turkomans recognized him, having known him in the Green City. He called off his men and went up to embrace the young Tatar and to ask questions.

“Yah allah!” he cried. “This is verily the lord of Beyond the River.”

The Turkomans, lank men in evil-smelling sheepskins, being rid of suspicion, clustered around to kneel and ask forgiveness. That night they killed a sheep and feasted. The young Tatars ate from the common pot, and even the children of the tribe came as near the fire as they dared to stare and listen. Timur was plagued with questions about what was happening in the rest of the world, and had no sleep until daylight. This was an unexpected source of news to the nomads, as well as honour, and they made the most of it.

The next day Timur gave the Turkoman khan valuable presents—a ruby of price, and two suits, pearl-sewn. To return the courtesy the khan presented him with three horses chosen from the tribal string and a guide for the southern road.

In twelve days they crossed the desert, seeking the great Khorassan road. The first village they reached was deserted, ruined. It was necessary to dig for water, and when they had done so, to stay in the ruins to rest the horses.

And here new disaster came upon them. They were seen by men of a neighbouring clan, who rode up and carried them off to the chieftain, a certain Ali Beg. He saw a chance for profit in Timur’s capture, and took all the Tatar’s belongings, putting him and his wife in a cowshed full of vermin.

Timur was not inclined to submit to such quarters for Aljai, but the guards overpowered him, and there they were for sixty and two days during the end of the dry season when the heat was a torment. Afterward Timur swore that, guilty or not, he would never keep a man in prison.

Ali Beg’s bargaining for his captives brought about their release in an unexpected way. The brother of Ali Beg, a Persian chieftain, heard what was passing and wrote to the tribesman sending gifts to Timur and pointing out the folly of meddling between the lord of the Green City and the Jats.

After a long delay Ali Beg obeyed his brother and released his prisoners but with an ill grace. He kept the presents, and provided Timur and Aljai with no more than a sorry looking horse and a mangy camel.

Still Aljai of the dark tresses could smile at continued misfortune. “O my Lord, this is not the end of the road.”

[1] See Note II, p. 241.