<h2><SPAN name="chap08"></SPAN>CHAPTER VIII.<br/> THE SHADOW OF FATE</h2>
<p>Our ride from the plains up the pass that led to the high tableland of Mur was
long and, in its way, wonderful enough. I doubt whether in the whole world
there exists another home of men more marvellously defended by nature.
Apparently the road by which we climbed was cut in the first instance, not by
human hands, but by the action of primæval floods, pouring, perhaps, from the
huge lake which doubtless once covered the whole area within the circle of the
mountains, although to-day it is but a moderate-sized sheet of water, about
twenty miles long by ten in breadth. However this may be, the old inhabitants
had worked on it, the marks of their tools may still be seen upon the rock.</p>
<p>For the first mile or two the road is broad and the ascent so gentle that my
horse was able to gallop up it on that dreadful night when, after seeing my
son’s face, accident, or rather Providence, enabled me to escape the
Fung. But from the spot where the lions pulled the poor beast down, its
character changes. In places it is so narrow that travellers must advance in
single file between walls of rock hundreds of feet high, where the sky above
looks like a blue ribbon, and even at midday the path below is plunged in
gloom. At other spots the slope is so precipitous that beasts of burden can
scarcely keep their foothold; indeed, we were soon obliged to transfer
ourselves from the camels to horses accustomed to the rocks. At others, again,
it follows the brink of a yawning precipice, an ugly place to ride or turn
rectangular corners, which half-a-dozen men could hold against an army, and
twice it passes through tunnels, though whether these are natural I do not know.</p>
<p>Besides all these obstacles to an invader there were strong gates at intervals,
with towers near by where guards were stationed night and day, and fosses or
dry moats in front of them which could only be crossed by means of drawbridges.
So the reader will easily understand how it came about that, whatever the
cowardice of the Abati, though they strove for generations, the Fung had as yet
never been able to recapture the ancient stronghold, which, or so it is said,
in the beginning these Abati won from them by means of an Oriental trick.</p>
<p>Here I should add that, although there are two other roads to the
plains—that by which, in order to outflank the Fung, the camels were let
down when I started on my embassy to Egypt, and that to the north where the
great swamps lie—these are both of them equally, if not more, impassable,
at any rate to an enemy attacking from below.</p>
<p>A strange cavalcade we must have seemed as we crawled up this terrific
approach. First went a body of the Abati notables on horseback, forming a long
line of colour and glittering steel, who chattered as they rode, for they
seemed to have no idea of discipline. Next came a company of horsemen armed
with spears, or rather two companies in the centre of which rode the Child of
Kings, some of her courtiers and chief officers, and ourselves, perhaps, as
Quick suggested, because infantry in the event of surprise would find it less
easy to run away than those who were mounted upon horses. Last of all rode more
cavalry, the duty of whose rear files it was to turn from time to time, and,
after inspection, to shout out that we were not pursued.</p>
<p>It cannot be said that we who occupied the centre of the advance were a
cheerful band. Orme, although so far he had borne up, was evidently very ill
from the shock of the explosion, so much so that men had to be set on each side
of him to see that he did not fall from the saddle. Also he was deeply
depressed by the fact that honour had forced us to abandon Higgs to what seemed
a certain and probably a cruel death; and if he felt thus, what was my own
case, who left not only my friend, but also my son, in the hands of savage
heathens?</p>
<p>Maqueda’s face was not visible because of the thin spangled veil that she
wore, but there was something about her attitude suggestive of shame and of
despair. The droop of the head and even her back showed this, as I, who rode a
little behind and on side of her, could see. I think, too, that she was anxious
about Orme, for she turned toward him several times as though studying his
condition. Also I am sure that she was indignant with Joshua and others of her
officers, for when they spoke to her she would not answer or take the slightest
notice of them beyond straightening herself in the saddle. As for the Prince
himself, his temper seemed to be much ruffled, although apparently he had
overcome the hurt to his back which prevented him from accepting the
Sultan’s challenge, for at a difficult spot in the road he dismounted and
ran along actively enough. At any rate, when his subordinates addressed him he
only answered them with muttered oaths, and his attitude towards us Englishmen,
especially Quick, was not amiable. Indeed, if looks could have killed us I am
sure that we should all have been dead before ever we reached the Gate of Mur.</p>
<p>This so-called gate was the upper mouth of the pass whence first we saw, lying
beneath us, the vast, mountain-ringed plain beyond. It was a beautiful sight in
the sunshine. Almost at our feet, half-hidden in palms and other trees, lay the
flat-roofed town itself, a place of considerable extent, as every house of any
consequence seemed to be set in a garden, since here there was no need for
cramping walls and defensive works. Beyond it to the northward, farther than
the eye could reach, stretching down a gentle slope to the far-off shores of
the great lake of glistening water, were cultivated fields, and amongst them
villas and, here and there, hamlets.</p>
<p>Whatever might be the faults of the Abati, evidently they were skilled
husbandsmen, such as their reputed forefathers, the old inhabitants of Judæa,
must have been before them, for of that strain presumably some trace was still
present in their veins. However far he may have drifted from such pursuits,
originally the Jew was a tiller of the soil, and here, where many of his other
characteristics had evaporated under pressure of circumstances—notably
the fierce courage that Titus knew—this taste remained to him, if only by
tradition.</p>
<p>Indeed, having no other outlet for their energies and none with whom to trade,
the interests of the Abati were centred in the land. For and by the land they
lived and died, and, since the amount available was limited by the mountain
wall, he who had most land was great amongst them, he who had little land was
small, he who had no land was practically a slave. Their law was in its
essentials a law of the land; their ambitions, their crimes, everything to do
with them, were concerned with the land, upon the produce of which they existed
and grew rich, some of them, by means of a system of barter. They had no
coinage, their money being measures of corn or other produce, horses, camels,
acres of their equivalent of soil, and so forth.</p>
<p>And yet, oddly enough, their country is the richest in gold and other metals
that I have ever heard of even in Africa—so rich that, according to
Higgs, the old Egyptians drew bullion from it to the value of millions of
pounds every year. This, indeed, I can well believe, for I have seen the
ancient mines which were worked, for the most part as open quarries, still
showing plenty of visible gold on the face of the slopes. Yet to these alleged
Jews this gold was of no account. Imagine it; as Quick said, such a topsy-turvy
state of things was enough to make a mere Christian feel cold down the back and
go to bed thinking that the world must be coming to an end.</p>
<p>To return, the prince Joshua, who appeared to be generalissimo of the army, in
what was evidently a set phrase, exhorted the guards at the last gates to be
brave and, if need were, deal with the heathen as some one or other dealt with
Og, King of Bashan, and other unlucky persons of a different faith. In reply he
received their earnest congratulations upon his escape from the frightful
dangers of our journey.</p>
<p>These formalities concluded, casting off the iron discipline of war, we
descended a joyous mob, or rather the Abati did, to partake of the delights of
peace. Really, conquerors returning from some desperate adventure could not
have been more warmly greeted. As we entered the suburbs of the town, women,
some of them very handsome, ran out and embraced their lords or lovers, holding
up babies for them to kiss, and a little farther on children appeared, throwing
roses and pomegranate flowers before their triumphant feet. And all this
because these gallant men had ridden to the bottom of a pass and back again!</p>
<p>“Heavens! Doctor,” exclaimed the sardonic Quick, after taking note
of these demonstrations, “Heavens! what a hero I feel myself to be. And
to think that when I got back from the war with them Boers, after being left
for dead on Spion Kop with a bullet through my lung and mentioned in a
dispatch—yes, I, Sergeant Quick, mentioned in a dispatch by the biggest
ass of a general as ever I clapped eyes on, for a job that I won’t
detail, no one in my native village ever took no note of me, although I had
written to the parish clerk, who happens to be my brother-in-law, and told him
the train I was coming by. I tell you, Doctor, no one so much as stood me a
pint of beer, let alone wine,” and he pointed to a lady who was
proffering that beverage to some one whom she admired.</p>
<p>“And as for chucking their arms round my neck and kissing me,” and
he indicated another episode, “all my old mother said—she was alive
then—was that she ‘hoped I’d done fooling about furrin’
parts as I called soldiering, and come home to live respectable, better late
than never.’ Well, Doctor, circumstances alter cases, or blood and
climate do, which is the same thing, and I didn’t miss what I never
expected, why should I when others like the Captain there, who had done so much
more, fared worse? But, Lord! these Abati are a sickening lot, and I wish we
were clear of them. Old Barung’s the boy for me.”</p>
<p>Passing down the main street of this charming town of Mur, accompanied by these
joyous demonstrators, we came at last to its central square, a large, open
space where, in the moist and genial climate, for the high surrounding
mountains attracted plentiful showers of rain, trees and flowers grew
luxuriantly. At the head of this square stood a long, low building with
white-washed walls and gilded domes, backed by the towering cliff, but at a
little distance from it, and surrounded by double walls with a moat of water
between them, dug for purposes of defence.</p>
<p>This was the palace, which on my previous visit I had only entered once or
twice when I was received by the Child of Kings in formal audience. Round the
rest of this square, each placed in its own garden, were the houses of the
great nobles and officials, and at its western end, among other public
buildings, a synagogue or temple which looked like a model of that built by
Solomon in Jerusalem, from the description of which it had indeed been copied,
though, of course, upon a small scale.</p>
<p>At the gate of the palace we halted, and Joshua, riding up, asked Maqueda
sulkily whether he should conduct “the Gentiles,” for that was his
polite description of us, to the lodging for pilgrims in the western town.</p>
<p>“No, my uncle,” answered Maqueda; “these foreign lords will
be housed in the guest-wing of the palace.”</p>
<p>“In the guest-wing of the palace? It is not usual,” gobbled Joshua,
swelling himself out like a great turkey cock. “Remember, O niece, that
you are still unmarried. I do not yet dwell in the palace to protect you.”</p>
<p>“So I found out in the plain yonder,” she replied; “still, I
managed to protect myself. Now, I pray you, no words. I think it necessary that
these my guests should be where their goods already are, in the safest place in
Mur. You, my uncle, as you told us, are badly hurt, by which accident you were
prevented from accepting the challenge of the Sultan of the Fung. Go, then, and
rest; I will send the court physician to you at once. Good-night, my uncle;
when you are recovered we will meet again, for we have much that we must
discuss. Nay, nay, you are most kind, but I will not detain you another minute.
Seek your bed, my uncle, and forget not to thank God for your escape from many
perils.”</p>
<p>At this polite mockery Joshua turned perfectly pale with rage, like the turkey
cock when his wattles fade from scarlet into white. Before he could make any
answer, however, Maqueda had vanished under the archway, so his only resource
was to curse us, and especially Quick, who had caused him to fall from his
horse. Unfortunately the Sergeant understood quite enough Arabic to be aware of
the tenor of his remarks, which he resented and returned:</p>
<p>“Shut it, Porpoise,” he said, “and keep your eyes where
Nature put ’em, or they’ll fall out.”</p>
<p>“What says the Gentile?” spluttered Joshua, whereon Orme, waking up
from one of his fits of lethargy, replied in Arabic:</p>
<p>“He says that he prays you, O Prince of princes, to close your noble
mouth and to keep your high-bred eyes within their sockets lest you should lose
them”; at which words those who were listening broke into a fit of
laughter, for one redeeming characteristic among the Abati was that they had a
sense of humour.</p>
<p>After this I do not quite know what happened for Orme showed signs of fainting,
and I had to attend to him. When I looked round again the gates were shut and
we were being conducted toward the guest-wing of the palace by a number of
gaily dressed attendants.</p>
<p>They took us to our rooms—cool, lofty chambers ornamented with glazed
tiles of quaint colour and beautiful design, and furnished somewhat scantily
with articles made of rich-hued woods. This guest-wing of the palace, where
these rooms were situated, formed, we noted, a separate house, having its own
gateway, but, so far as we could see, no passage or other connection joining it
to the main building. In front of it was a small garden, and at its back a
courtyard with buildings, in which we were informed our camels had been
stabled. At the time we noted no more, for night was falling, and, even if it
had not been, we were too worn out to make researches.</p>
<p>Moreover, Orme was now desperately ill—so ill that he could scarcely walk
leaning even on our shoulders. Still, he would not be satisfied till he was
sure that our stores were safe, and, before he could be persuaded to lie down,
insisted upon being supported to a vault with copper-bound doors, which the
officers opened, revealing the packages that had been taken from the camels.</p>
<p>“Count them, Sergeant,” he said, and Quick obeyed by the light of a
lamp that the officer held at the open door. “All correct, sir,” he
said, “so far as I can make out.”</p>
<p>“Very good, Sergeant. Lock the door and take the keys.”</p>
<p>Again he obeyed, and, when the officer demurred to their surrender, turned on
him so fiercely that the man thought better of it and departed with a shrug of
his shoulders, as I supposed to make report to his superiors.</p>
<p>Then at length we got Orme to bed, and, as he complained of intolerable pains
in his head and would take nothing but some milk and water, having first
ascertained that he had no serious physical injuries that I could discover, I
administered to him a strong sleeping-draught from my little travelling
medicine case. To our great relief this took effect upon him in about twenty
minutes, causing him to sink into a stupor from which he did not awake for many
hours.</p>
<p>Quick and I washed ourselves, ate some food that was brought to us, and then
took turns to watch Orme throughout the night. When I was at my post about six
o’clock on the following morning he woke up and asked for drink, which I
gave to him. After swallowing it he began to wander in his mind, and, on taking
his temperature, I found that he had over five degrees of fever. The end of it
was that he went off to sleep again, only waking up from time to time and
asking for more drink.</p>
<p>Twice during the night and early morning Maqueda sent to inquire as to his
condition, and, apparently not satisfied with the replies, about ten in the
forenoon arrived herself, accompanied by two waiting-ladies and a long-bearded
old gentleman who, I understood, was the court physician.</p>
<p>“May I see him?” she asked anxiously.</p>
<p>I answered yes, if she and those with her were quite quiet. Then I led them
into the darkened room where Quick stood like a statue at the head of the bed,
only acknowledging her presence with a silent salute. She gazed at
Oliver’s flushed face and the forehead blackened where the gases from the
explosion had struck him, and as she gazed I saw her beautiful violet eyes fill
with tears. Then abruptly she turned and left the sick-chamber. Outside its
doors she waved back her attendants imperiously and asked me in a whisper:</p>
<p>“Will he live?”</p>
<p>“I do not know,” I answered, for I thought it best that she should
learn the truth. “If he is only suffering from shock, fatigue, and fever,
I think so, but if the explosion or the blow on his head where it cut has
fractured the skull, then——”</p>
<p>“Save him,” she muttered. “I will give you all I—nay,
pardon me; what need is there to tempt you, his friend, with reward? Only save
him, save him.”</p>
<p>“I will do what I can, Lady, but the issue is in other hands than
mine,” I answered, and just then her attendants came up and put an end to
the conversation.</p>
<p>To this day the memory of that old rabbi, the court physician, affects me like
a nightmare, for of all the medical fools that ever I met he was by far the
most pre-eminent. All about the place he followed me suggesting remedies that
would have been absurd even in the Middle Ages. The least harmful of them, I
remember, was that poor Orme’s head should be plastered with a compound
of butter and the bones of a still-born child, and that he should be given some
filthy compound to drink which had been specially blessed by the priests.
Others there were also that would certainly have killed him in half-an-hour.</p>
<p>Well, I got rid of him at last for the time, and returned to my vigil. It was
melancholy work, since no skill that I had could tell me whether my patient
would live or die. Nowadays the young men might know, or say that they did, but
it must be remembered that, as a doctor, I am entirely superannuated. How could
it be otherwise, seeing that I have passed the best of my life in the desert
without any opportunity of keeping up with the times.</p>
<p>Three days went by in this fashion, and very anxious days they were. For my
part, although I said nothing of it to any one, I believed that there was some
injury to the patient’s skull and that he would die, or at best be
paralyzed. Quick, however, had a different opinion. He said that he had seen
two men in this state before from the concussion caused by the bursting of
large shells near to them, and that they both recovered although one of them
became an idiot.</p>
<p>But it was Maqueda who first gave me any definite hope. On the third evening
she came and sat by Orme for awhile, her attendants standing at a little
distance. When she left him there was a new look upon her face—a very
joyful look—which caused me to ask her what had happened.</p>
<p>“Oh! he will live,” she answered.</p>
<p>I inquired what made her think so.</p>
<p>“This,” she replied, blushing. “Suddenly he looked up and in
my own tongue asked me of what colour were my eyes. I answered that it depended
upon the light in which they might be seen.</p>
<p>“‘Not at all,’ he said. ‘They are always
<i>vi-o-let</i>, whether the curtain is drawn or no.’ Now, physician
Adams, tell me what is this colour <i>vi-o-let</i>?”</p>
<p>“That of a little wild flower which grows in the West in the spring, O
Maqueda—a very beautiful and sweet-scented flower which is dark blue like
your eyes.”</p>
<p>“Indeed, Physician,” she said. “Well, I do not know this
flower, but what of that? Your friend will live and be sane. A dying man does
not trouble about the colour of a lady’s eyes, and one who is mad does
not give that colour right.”</p>
<p>“Are you glad, O Child of Kings?” I asked.</p>
<p>“Of course,” she answered, “seeing that I am told that this
captain alone can handle the firestuffs which you have brought with you, and,
therefore, that it is necessary to me that he should not die.”</p>
<p>“I understand,” I replied. “Let us pray that we may keep him
alive. But there are many kinds of firestuffs, O Maqueda, and of one of them
which chances to give out violet flames I am not sure that my friend is master.
Yet in this country it may be the most dangerous of all.”</p>
<p>Now when she heard these words the Child of Kings looked me up and down
angrily. Then suddenly she laughed a little in a kind of silent way that is
peculiar to her, and, without saying anything, beckoned to her ladies and left
the place.</p>
<p>“Very variegated thing, woman, sir,” remarked Quick, who was
watching. (I think he meant to say “variable.”) “This one,
for instance, comes up that passage like a tired horse—shuffle, shuffle,
shuffle—for I could hear the heels of her slippers on the floor. But now
she goes out like a buck seeking its mate—head in air and hoof lifted.
How do you explain it, Doctor?”</p>
<p>“You had better ask the lady herself, Quick. Did the Captain take that
soup she brought him?”</p>
<p>“Every drop, sir, and tried to kiss her hand afterward, being still
dazed, poor man, poor man! I saw him do it, knowing no better. He’ll be
sorry enough when he comes to himself.”</p>
<p>“No doubt, Sergeant. But meanwhile let us be glad that both their spirits
seem to have improved, and if she brings any more soup when I am not there, I
should let him have it. It is always well to humour invalids and women.”</p>
<p>“Yes, Doctor; but,” he added, with a sudden fall of face,
“invalids recover sometimes, and then how about the women.”</p>
<p>“Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof,” I answered; “you
had better go out for exercise; it is my watch.” But to myself I thought
that Fate was already throwing its ominous shadow before, and that it lay deep
in Maqueda’s violet eyes.</p>
<p>Well, to cut a long story short, this was the turning-point of Orme’s
illness, and from that day he recovered rapidly, for, as it proved, there was
no secret injury to the skull, and he was suffering from nothing except shock
and fever. During his convalescence the Child of Kings came to see him several
times, or to be accurate, if my memory serves me right, every afternoon. Of
course, her visits were those of ceremony—that is to say, she was always
accompanied by several of her ladies, that thorn in my flesh, the old doctor,
and one or two secretaries and officers-in-waiting.</p>
<p>But as Oliver was now moved by day into a huge reception room, and these people
of the court were expected to stop at one end of it while she conversed with
him at the other, to all intents and purposes, save for the presence of myself
and Quick, her calls were of a private nature. Nor were we always present,
since, now that my patient was out of danger the Sergeant and I went out riding
a good deal—investigating Mur and its surroundings.</p>
<p>It may be asked what they talked about on these occasions. I can only answer
that, so far as I heard, the general subject was the politics of Mur and its
perpetual war with the Fung. Still, there must have been other topics which I
did not hear, since incidently I discovered that Orme was acquainted with many
of Maqueda’s private affairs whereof he could only have learned from her
lips.</p>
<p>Thus when I ventured to remark that perhaps it was not altogether wise for a
young man in his position to become so intimate with the hereditary ruler of an
exclusive tribe like the Abati, he replied cheerfully that this did not in the
least matter, as, of course, according to their ancient laws, she could only
marry with one of her own family, a fact which made all complications
impossible. I inquired which of her cousins, of whom I knew she had several,
was the happy man. He replied:</p>
<p>“None of them. As a matter of fact, I believe that she is officially
affianced to that fat uncle of hers, the fellow who blows his own trumpet so
much, but I needn’t add that this is only a form to which she submits in
order to keep the others off.”</p>
<p>“Ah!” I said. “I wonder if Prince Joshua thinks it only a
form?”</p>
<p>“Don’t know what he thinks, and don’t care,” he
replied, yawning; “I only know that things stand as I say, and that the
porpoise-man has as much chance of becoming the husband of Maqueda as you have
of marrying the Empress of China. And now, to drop this matrimonial
conversation and come to something more important, have you heard anything
about Higgs and your son?”</p>
<p>“You are more in the way of learning state secrets than I am,
Orme,” I answered sarcastically, being rather irritated at the course of
events and his foolishness. “What have you heard?”</p>
<p>“This, old fellow. I can’t say how she knows it, but Maqueda says
that they are both in good health and well treated. Only our friend Barung
sticks to his word and proposes to sacrifice poor old Higgs on this day
fortnight. Now, of course, that must be prevented somehow, and prevented it
shall be if it costs me my life. Don’t you suppose that I have been
thinking about myself all the time, for it isn’t so, only the trouble is
that I can’t find any plan of rescue which will hold water.”</p>
<p>“Then what’s to be done, Orme? I haven’t spoken much of the
matter before for fear of upsetting you when you were still weak, but now that
you are all right again we must come to some decision.”</p>
<p>“I know, I know,” he answered earnestly; “and I tell you
this, that rather than let Higgs die alone there, I will give myself up to
Barung, and, if I can’t save him, suffer with him, or for him if I can.
Listen: there is to be a great council held by the Child of Kings on the day
after to-morrow which we must attend, for it has only been postponed until I
was well enough. At this council that rogue Shadrach is to be put upon his
trial, and will, I believe, be condemned to death. Also we are formally to
return Sheba’s ring which Maqueda lent to you to be used in proof of her
story. Well, we may learn something then, or at any rate must make up our minds
to definite action. And now I am to have my first ride, am I not? Come on,
Pharaoh,” he added to the dog, which had stuck at his bedside all through
his illness so closely that it was difficult to entice him away even to eat;
“we are going for a ride, Pharaoh; do you hear that, you faithful
beast?”</p>
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