Читать книгу Zoraida: A Romance of the Harem and the Great Sahara - Le Queux William - Страница 14

Having placed the quaintly-shaped lamp on the pearl and silver stool in the centre of the harem, the negro went out, returning immediately with a small bronze urn marvellously chased, which on bended knee he carefully handed to his mistress. At a word from Zoraida, her women and the tall Soudanese prostrated themselves facing the table, pressing their foreheads to the carpet. Then, turning to me, she said in deep earnestness —

“Knowest thou that the deeds we are about to commit are a terrible sacrilege? Though thou wilt witness strange things, yet peradventure they may cost us our lives – nay, our very souls.”

“Why?” I asked, somewhat alarmed at her sudden seriousness. “Is it imperative that we should risk everything?”

“Every sin beareth its fruit,” she replied, as, slowly rising from her divan and holding above her head the urn the negro had brought, she added, “Hath not the Prophet told us that when the earth shall be shaken by a violent shock, and the mountains shall be dashed to pieces and shall become as dust scattered abroad, we shall be separated into three distinct classes? Those who have preceded others in the Faith shall precede them to Paradise. The Companions of the Right Hand shall go and dwell in the Gardens of Delight, among lote trees free from thorns and trees of mauz always fruitful; but the Companions of the Left Hand – how miserable shall they be! They who, like ourselves at this moment, invoke the secret power of Eblis the Terrible, will dwell amidst the burning winds under the shade of the great black smoke. They are the damned, for they, in their error, have gone astray in the Valley of Perdition. Then know, O Roumi! that thou hast chosen to accompany me unto the dreaded Shrine of Darkness, to seek of the beneficent Granter of Requests what is hidden, to face the terrors of the tomb, so that thou mayest hold over thy fellows a power terrific, fatal, awful!”

Her eyes were dilated, filled with a strange, unnatural light, and I stood aghast at her solemn speech.

“Art thou not one of the chosen?” I asked. “Art thou not – ”

“Hold thy peace!” she commanded. Then, holding forth the bronze urn, she exclaimed, “See! in this vessel are the ashes of the great Masinissa, the Numidian king, whose body was entombed at Medrassen two thousand years ago. By their light we will search for the Great Unknown.”

With a sudden movement she took from the urn a small handful of white dust, and, holding it high over the lamp, sprinkled it slowly into its faint blue flame. In a moment the place was illuminated by a white glare so brilliant that I was compelled to shade my blinking eyes with my hands, while at the same time the apartment was filled with a dense smoke of a light green hue, but so pungent as to plunge me into the agonies of asphyxiation.

Thrice she threw into the flame the ashes of the King; thrice she uttered strange words in a drawling monotone, that were repeated by the three servants who lay prostrate and appalled. Then, dipping her finger in the dust, she drew it across my forehead from left to right, and afterwards made the same sign across her own bejewelled brow and across her bare breast.

“Rise,” she said, turning to her servants. “Bring hither the elixir. Then leave us.”

All three scrambled to their feet in haste to do the bidding of their imperious mistress, and, after the lapse of a few moments, the two houris in white reappeared, one bearing a tiny bowl containing a colourless liquid, while the other brought between her fingers a long thin poignard, the hilt of which was studded with rubies and turquoises. When they had placed them beside the lamp, and the heavy curtains had fallen behind the two girls, Zoraida turned her great dark eyes upon me, exclaiming —

“Thou wilt ere long learn a wonderful secret which hath been revealed to none on earth except myself. Already hast thou taken an oath never to disclose what thou mayest see between these walls. Know, O Cecil! that by thy passionate love for me thou wilt bind thyself to one who can produce strange effects from simple causes, and who can show thee wonders undreamed of. Yonder knife and potion will bind thy soul unto mine; thou wilt become one of the Companions of the Left Hand, whose habitation is the shadowless Land of Torment, where the burning wind scorches and water scalds like boiling pitch.”

“Is there then no hope for those who love thee?” I asked, so mystified and my senses so dulled by the curious odour of the smoke, that I scarce knew what words escaped me.

“None,” she replied, sighing. “Neither rest, mercy, nor the Garden of Delights can fall to the lot of he who loveth me.”

“Why?”

“Because, by regaining the wondrous secret lost to the world for so many ages, the mark is set indelibly upon thee. Knowest thou not what is written in Al Korân? The Prophet hath declared that when the heavens shall be rent in sunder and shall become red as a rose and shall melt like ointment, then neither man nor genius shall be asked concerning his sin. The wicked will be known by their marks, and they shall be taken by the forelocks and the feet and cast into the place of grievous torments.”

“Yes,” I said. “But why is the search after this hidden force an act of such heinous wickedness?”

“Because the secret is only to be obtained at the Shrine of Darkness. Dost thou, after the warnings I have given thee, still consent to accompany me among the Companions of the Left Hand – to gain the knowledge that is forbidden?”

I gazed upon her marvellous beauty. Her magnificent eyes, bright as those of the gazelle, were turned to mine with a look of earnest appeal as the little hand I held trembled with suppressed excitement. The mystic rite she had practised had intoxicated me with a burning desire to learn more of these strange revelations that she promised, and, dazzled by her loveliness, I was utterly reckless of the future.

“I do not fear,” I replied. “I place implicit confidence in thee, and am prepared to serve thee, and to seek the wisdom so long withheld.”

“Ibtidâ-an,” she exclaimed. “Thou, the Amîn, must be inoculated with the elixir;” and, taking up the gleaming poignard, she felt its point. “It is a deadly decoction. One drop is sufficient to cause death, yet, strangely enough, three drops have only the effect of stimulating the brain and preparing the vision for the strange things of which thou must remain a silent witness.”

Taking my hand in hers, she pushed back the sleeve of my coat, exposing my arm. Then, grasping a small rod of glass that lay beside the bowl, she dipped it in the liquid and allowed a single drop to fall upon my flesh. It burned and ate into my arm like an acid, causing me to draw back quickly in pain, but ere I realised her intention, she had raised the dagger and made a punctured wound, thus allowing the poison to enter my veins and mingle with my blood.

“Quick! The second drop!” she cried, dipping the rod into the bowl again.

“It feels like molten metal,” I gasped, drawing my arm away. “It – ”

“Do not hesitate,” she exclaimed concernedly. “If thou dost not receive the three drops into thy veins, the poison will prove fatal. Come, let me conclude the formality;” and, grasping me firmly, she placed another spot of the acid upon my arm and punctured the flesh with her knife, repeating the operation a third time, until I had been fully inoculated with the mysterious virus.

Then, stretching forth her own well-moulded white arm, whereon I noticed several small red spots, – which she explained were the marks of previous inoculations, – she stuck the point of the dagger three times into her own delicate flesh, until the blood flowed and the fluid she had placed upon the spots was wholly absorbed.

Casting the dagger from her with an expression of repugnance, she passed her hand quickly across her brow, saying —

“Henceforward, O Cecil, an affinity existeth between us. Though deserts, mountains, and rolling seas may separate us, our souls will hold converse. We shall no longer be strangers.”

The poison was taking effect upon me. Its action was slow, but a strange, sickening giddiness crept over my brain, a feeling that the objects around me were gradually fading. Even Zoraida’s voice sounded hollow and distant in the dreamy half-consciousness that the secret decoction of my enchantress produced.

Was she, so young, so eminently handsome, so bewitching, the ingenious sorceress who, according to the rumour current among the Spahis, directed the movements of Hadj Absalam and his daring band of outlaws? Could it be possible that beneath those fair features was a heart so brutal and depraved as to plot murder, robbery, and horrible atrocities? As she stood before me in her dainty silks and flashing gems, she had no appearance of a wild freebooter and desert-wanderer, but rather that of an Oriental child of Fortune into whose languorous life the demon ennui had entered.

Had she not, however, called herself the Daughter of the Sun? Was not that the name by which the homards knew the guiding star of the murderous Ennitra?

“Hearken, O Cecil!” she said, placing her hand suddenly to her breast as if a pain shot through her heart. “The inoculation is accomplished, and life is now fast ebbing – we are dying – ”

“Poisoned!” I gasped, alarmed. “Thou dost not mean that the three punctures will prove fatal?”

“Thou, the Amîn, hast placed thy faith in me. Of a verity will I reveal unto thee that which is known to me alone. Only by thus inviting death can we seek converse with the Great Unseen who ruleth the Kingdom of Shades. Our mental power, our sensibility, our very souls must be severed from our bodies and concentrated into separate existence, ere we may seek the knowledge that giveth us power. Even now at this moment our souls are parting from our bodies, the dim spark of life flickers, and we stand together on the threshold of the grave!”

I was touched and awed by the extraordinary change that came over her while she had been speaking. Something in her tone appealed to my sympathy, while at the same time her words made my heart sink. A woman lying in her coffin, ready to be buried alive, might have had such a strain in her voice. Her face was white, with that ghastliness which comes in extreme moments to a brunette, and her eyes, starting from their sockets, burned with a dusky, deep-set brilliance. When her voice, that sounded in my ears like a far-off wail, had ceased, she stood motionless, and her countenance assumed an inscrutable mask of quiet, almost serene resignation, behind which something suggested immeasurable depths of poignant suffering. Pale, haggard, and deathlike, she gazed at me with dry, half-parted lips. Then I saw in her wild eyes the fearful but unmistakable light of madness!

I was appalled at the slow, mysterious transformation of the woman I loved.