Читать книгу At the Queen's Mercy - Mabel Fuller Blodgett - Страница 6

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The next day passed without event of any kind, save the welcome advent of three good meals. I can say, for my part, that no sweet adventure could so well have satisfied my palate; and I bore the lack of present peril with all fortitude. But Lestrade was not of my mind, and ate moodily and more sparely than is fitting for the wellbeing of a Christian stomach. He spoke, moreover, ungratefully of “fattening for the sacrifice,” which, I take it, was neither a wise nor a comfortable saying, inasmuch as there appears, to my way of thinking, little profit in vain forebodings of that which is to come, and much mischief in despising present good for fear of future evil.

To be tied like a dog to a ring in the wall vexed him also, and sorely; nor did my pointing out to him the value of a submissive spirit, and its purpose in mastering the carnal pride of the flesh, greatly avail him.

For myself, I believe in patience until the time be ripe for the chastisement of the enemy, to the hurt, indeed, of his mortal body, but to the everlasting benefit of his heathen soul. But Lestrade is of a fiery nature, that cannot brook delay. Still the day wore on, and at nightfall the sound of footsteps and the clang of metal resounded once more through the rock-hewn corridors without.

Nearer came the approaching feet, and soon the light of torches could be seen by us dimly in the distance.

Then he of the broad shoulders appeared, accompanied by a guard of armed men. The seal of our prison was cut asunder, the door opened, we were loosed from our chains, and cords were bound about our wrists. Then a sign to follow was given, and we went forth.

We passed from the temple into the street, and so on through many other streets, until we halted before a great building, whose walls were set with marbles of rare tints, and embellished with silver that glistened in the moonlight.

No time was given us to look and wonder; the massive gates swung open, and we went within. From Lestrade and myself there broke an exclamation of wonder, for we had come from darkness into the brightness of a hall, the like of which is not, I verily believe, in all Africa.

For a little the glare was blinding, but soon my eyes became used to the light, and I began to look attentively about me.

This then is what I saw. The audience room was brilliant with thousands of torches that hung from silver sockets set in the wall, and depending also from pillars of carved wood that held up the roof. These torches burned clearly and with a sweet smell, and their light was shed on a countless multitude of men that lined the room itself.

The walls, too, of this great hall, though of stone, were enriched with panels of rare woods in pink and in amber, polished like the supporting pillars to a rare excellence of mirror-like brightness.

The floor was fashioned of huge blocks of marble set close and in a curious pattern, and covered towards the centre with a silk rug woven with pictures of strange beasts and birds like to those carved upon the temple we had just left.

The corners of this room were filled with plants bearing vivid flowers that gave forth a strong but very sweet scent. One end of this strange apartment was fenced off from what might be called the outer court, by a silver screen of fine open-work. Opposite this, at the further end, stood a low chair of ebony, round which coiled a carven serpent wrought in the same black wood, but with scales overlaid also in silver.

On this seat, or throne, I beheld the aged man who had commanded the force that had captured us, and whom I felt must be the High Priest of the dread god Hed.

He sat now, his chin in his hand, and he regarded us, I saw, with the same dark disfavor.

Surrounding him were men with shaven crowns and wearing woven garments like to those of the dead priest Sagamoso, and without this circle stood another line of men, but these were clothed in white like the six who had received us at the entrance of our prison house.

Beyond these again were massed warriors, naked save for their leopard-skin girdles, their shields and swords. The outer ring was composed of a curious throng of every age and condition, with women closely veiled, and even children.

Near the silver screen, on each side of the hall, sat, cross-legged, six negroes, natives of a tribe I had never seen. These were richly dressed, and before each was a drum ornamented with gold, and these they beat constantly with long spoon-shaped pieces of wood.

Behind them stood still other negroes thrumming on rude harps; the whole producing a strange, not unmusical sound, very soul-stirring in effect on him who listened. Suddenly there came from behind the silver screen the clash of cymbals. The people bent to the earth, and even the white beard of the haughty High Priest swept the ground. The warriors clashed their shields together; a cry of reverence and of welcome broke from the waiting throng; the silver screen parted. It slipped noiselessly back into the wall on either side.

Lestrade drew a quick breath, and at the same instant my eyes rested on the most beautiful woman that I had ever seen. For a little her loveliness held me fixed as though some spell had been wrought upon my vision. It was not until her voice, full and musical, broke the tense silence, that I turned my eyes away to see what setting held so fair a jewel.

And truly it was worthy. For the throne was of pure gold, and the back a peacock’s tail, so encrusted with gems as to quite hide the precious yellow metal, and the seat supported by four elephants’ tusks banded at the top by a row of egg-shaped emeralds. Behind the throne crouched a circle of mute veiled women before negro fan-bearers, erect and naked save for turban and loin cloth of golden tissue. Surrounding with drawn swords their royal mistress stood the guard of the household, each a perfect specimen of manhood and each plainly but richly dressed.

Lah, the Queen, was arrayed in some Eastern fabric, not silver and not silk, but partaking of the nature of each, and bound about the waist by the girdle that I had seen in the hands of him who had committed us to the safe keeping of the temple.

This garment was held in its place over the bare shoulder, by a clasp whereof the diamonds were as big as hazel nuts. A fillet shaped like a serpent encircled the Queen’s head and kept back from her face the long, braided locks of blue-black hair that hung, heavy also with jewels, to her knees. She alone of all the women present was unveiled. I drank in the glory of her unfathomable eyes darker than midnight. I saw the scarlet of her lips, the warm olive of her skin, the graceful lines of her strong, supple, beautiful body.

But I have little skill in such portraying. To Lestrade that task. Enough that Lah, Queen of the people of the Walled City, was not only fair above the need of woman,—the Lord knoweth the ruin that hath followed the working of the tenth part of such charm,—but she held also a subtle something in the serene cruelty of her gaze, a something in the calm command that curved her lips, to drive men mad, to fill the heart with a love that was half hatred, and a hate that could not do its worst because of the love that stayed its ordering.

So much let me say in my defence for what has followed. I am a man not easily prone to fall into the toils of women; to whom has been given subtlety to offset their weakness. But to Lah, a man’s brain and a woman’s wit; a man’s will and a woman’s will; a man’s strength and a woman’s beauty. Aye! more than woman’s. Look to it, you who would judge me, and remember likewise the end, the end also with the beginning.

But enough. I will now set down for the better ordering of this tale, what befell at the Queen’s audience, although it was not for days after that I learned the true import of that fateful evening.

Lah then spoke in this wise:—

“Who are these two strangers, whence their coming, and what their purpose?”

Then arose Agno, the High Priest, and his eyes glowed with a strange fire, and we, watching, saw his aged hand clench fast the staff of office that it held. With a fine gesture of mingled scorn and anger, he threw out the other, palm open, towards us, where, still close guarded, we stood in silence.

“Behold!” he cried, “the invaders of our City, the murderers of the sacred ape, whose hands are red with the blood of our warriors, whose sacrilegious weapons have been turned against the dread god. Yes, I have said it—violators of Hed himself!”

A sudden thrill ran through the people, and there was something in the faces turned towards us, so pitilessly cruel, that a cold chill settled on my heart, and I was well put to it to preserve the calm disdain that sat, as was fitting, upon my countenance.

Only Lah, the Queen, looked straight before her at the speaker, and her lips, I thought, curved slightly with a little smile whose meaning was not plain to me.

Agno turned towards the listening throng with a sudden change of voice and manner.

“O worshippers of the Serpent and of Edba! Shall the wrath of the gods fall upon your heads because they look down from the appointed place and see such deeds unpunished?

“Nevertheless warmed and fed and unhurt have these two rested by royal order till now in the sacred temple, and the wrath above grows black, and the thirst of the Serpent is not slaked.”

I thought I beheld again a swift change pass over the face of the Queen, like a cloud that covers for an instant the glory of the sun, but when I looked closer I saw that I was wrong, since her lips still wore that same curious half-smile.

“Doubtless,” went on the High Priest smoothly, “doubtless the Queen, who is ever zealous for the glory of the gods, but bides her time, lest in too swift a death, some pang of body or soul be lost to these defamers. Surely such thought for the honor of Hed and of Edba shall not be without reward. But I warn you,” and here his voice rang out with its old passion, “the patience of the Serpent is at an end; the god clamors for vengeance. Woe! woe! to him who setteth a stumbling-block in the way of rightful punishment.

“Let Lah, the Queen, command it! Let the torture that is the portion of these begin! Let their death and the manner of their passing plead for us and turn away, while there be yet time, the wrath that is to come!”

A hoarse murmur of applause rang through the multitude, and of their number, a man richly dressed and I judged a warrior, stepped out from among his fellows and stood in the centre, alone.

“Agno, the High Priest, has said it. We, the people, repeat it. Oh Queen, let the blood of the stranger flow freely that the gods may be appeased.”

Lah turned, and I saw then, what, bewildered by the rising storm, I had not noticed; namely, that the Queen’s sandalled foot rested upon the head of an enormous tiger that lay motionless before the throne.

She uttered a low, brief word of command, and the great beast rose, stretched himself lazily, and then stepped noiselessly forth.

A shudder ran through the throng. I saw the face blanch of the man who had spoken. The soft, padding footfall sounded now through the tense silence as the tiger drew slowly near.

At length when about ten paces from the warrior, the beast paused. The victim tried to speak, but no words came. His fixed distended eyes were on the lithe form before him. The great cat was crouched to spring, its tail waving gently, its tawny head raised.

Lah’s voice broke the silence, caressingly, once more.

The creature bounded lightly through the air. The next instant the warrior lay prone on the marble floor, a swift, wide-spreading pool of blood speaking dumbly yet to heaven, of the doom that had fallen. The Queen turned to Agno.

“Behold,” she said, “your answer.”

With a graceful gesture she stopped the rising murmur of the multitude, and again her wonderful voice changed. It hid not the majesty of the speaker; no, truly, it hinted at power to enforce the words, but it was sweet, sweet and persuasive, over and above anything that I have ever heard.

“O my people!” thus spoke the Queen. “When, before to-night, has the highest in the land received an order of him who standeth next unto the throne? When before this hour has the chief servant of the Snake set a limit to the will of her who calls herself, and truly, the Snake’s Bride? Have I not borne the embrace of the holy one, the python? In the dread hour in the pit itself has not the marriage rite been held, and for this?

“Turn, O my people, ere it be too late! The fate of yonder man,” and she pointed to the loose-limbed, weltering form upon the pavement, “the fate of such as he is naught to the vengeance that shall surely fall on him who sets his neck stiffly against the will of her, the best beloved of Hed. Aye! of the highest! I have said it. Look you to it.

“I am Lah, the Queen, and the just gods have given unto the hollow of my hand all power. As for these,” and she turned her beautiful face an instant towards us, “rest quietly. The defamers of the Serpent may not hope for mercy. Nevertheless, in mine own time, and after mine own choosing, shall they pay the penalty.

“Guards, lead the prisoners behind the veil!” She turned smiling to the High Priest.

“More prudence would better befit thy white hairs, most pious Agno,” she said, and the clash of cymbals answering to her nod drowned the bitter answer that writhed upon his lips, and proved that the Queen was, after all, but yet a woman, and so holding fast to the sex’s dear privilege of the final word.

Obedient to Lah’s command, six stalwart negro warriors, gorgeous in loin cloths of scarlet and gold, advanced, and laying hands upon us, hurried us, Lestrade and me, through the gaping multitude, on past the silver screen, by the Queen’s glittering throne, the host of slave girls, the musicians, the courtiers, onward still, until we reached a shimmering network of silk and steel that draped securely an entrance at the back.

With averted eyes the guards drew aside this heavy veil, and we passed within, the plaudits of the fickle throng still ringing in our ears.