CHAPTER VIII
A Moment's Halt--a momentary taste
Of Being, from the Well amid the Waste,
And lo!--the phantom Caravan has reached
The Nothing it set out from.
Omar Khayyam.
Fate had called a halt in Babar's life. A court had once more gathered round him, and, as King of Samarkand, a city of colleges and culture, this was of different stamp from that of Andijân. It occupied itself with other things than the edge of a sword-blade or the merits of a polo-ball.
"Lo!" said Mulla Binâi the poet, his voice lubricated with artificial adulation to extreme oiliness, "I have at last found fitting memorial for the magnificent victory of the King in these poor words:
"'Tell me, my soul, the conquering day
Fateh Babar Bahadur,' I say."
The horrid doggerel, with its inlay of numerical letters giving the date of Babar's surprise of Samarkand, was allowed to pass muster in that crowd of flattering courtiers.
Only Kâsim Beg, bluff as he had been from the beginning, said, smartly:
"Good enough, if so be 'tis accurate; but of that, thank God, I know naught; for whilst thou rememberest fine fights by dots and strokes, I keep them by the dents on my good sword."
The old noble disliked Binâi; he disliked all poets in general; but this one in particular. He knew nothing good of him but his riposte to Ali-Shîr--who was worth ten of him since he had at least been born a Beg and who, before he was bitten by the mad craze for jingling words, had struck a good few shrewd blows for the right. Besides, he had been author and patron of many useful inventions, and it was not his fault if the gilded youth of Herât named every new fashion after him, and when he, in consequence of an earache, bound up his face with a kerchief, bound up theirs also and called it à la mode Ali-Shîr. Still Binâi's riposte to the sarcasms which had driven him from Herât was a good joke. To order a ridiculous pad for the ass he was to ride and call it the Ali-Shîr pad! The recollection of it always made good old Kâsim laugh broadly. The humour of it suited his sturdy outlook. An outlook that was disturbed by the jingle-jangle of words and wits that began to arise about his young master. It was all very well, and affairs were doubtless in a most prosperous state. All the same there was no counting on any continuance of fine weather with half-a-dozen claimants to the throne and Shaibâni-Khân close at hand. The Usbek raider was no man to give in because of one reverse; his whole life was war.
So Kâsim frowned at culture, and as Prime-Minister looked to his weapons.
It was not however for many months that his fear came true and Shaibâni, reinforced, appeared again on the horizon of Babar's world.
But when he did, the young King set aside everything else and buckled on his sword once more with zest. He had been studying military art in his great ancestor Timur's memoirs, and was eager for a pitched battle. No sooner, therefore, did Shaibâni's hordes show themselves, than the young general marched to meet them, and, over-impatient, precipitated a collision before his own re-enforcements of over five thousand men had time to join him.
But it was his first pitched battle, he was keen as mustard, and had planned it all out on paper beautifully on strategical lines.
And the astronomers were to the fore with a lucky conjunction of stars.
So the right and left wings marched out in orderly array, and wheeled admirably to meet the first attack of their flank. But somehow this separated Babar from his staff of veterans, who possibly did not believe in the virtue of disciplined movements; and though in person he led a dashing and impetuous charge of his centre on the foe, which drove the Usbeks back to the point of rout, Shaibâni would not accept defeat. He stood firm, despite his officers' advice to withdraw while he could, and continued the wild desert tactics of repeated charges on the enemy's flank, repeated withdrawals to wheel and reform.
And Babar's army, but half-disciplined, divided by conflicting ideals became hopelessly confused. His Moghul troops, refusing to obey orders, reverted to their old habit of killing and plundering, with the result of rout--complete absolute rout.
That night the young leader, stern and calm, despite the ache at his heart for his own broken ideals as well as for the loss of the many Begs of the highest rank, the many admirable soldiers, the many devoted friends who had perished in the action, held a council of war in the citadel as to what had best be done under the circumstances. Capitulation on terms, or unconditional defence?
Belief in their leader and the devotion of the Andijân nobles carried the day against the more lukewarm Samarkandis. It was resolved to hold the citadel to the death, to the very last drop of blood; and with vitality renewed by the need for immediate action Babar set to work strengthening the fortifications. Here at any rate he was master; bricks and earth could not disobey orders; they must remain where they were put.
Yet most of the nobles sent away their wives and families secretly. Babar's mother and sister, however, refused to leave their beloved one whose fortunes they had followed for so long through thick and thin. Grandmother Isân-daulet, also, remained of course. Her brave old heart rather gloried in the thought of a siege, and with all the hatred of a desert-born Chagatâi, she hated the Usbek raider who had dared to beat her grandson.
Though on that point she and Babar had many words. He reviling her Moghul horde as the cause of his failure; she asserting it to be his cramping conditions which had prevented the success of the old methods of warfare that had served his fathers well enough.
As for Ayesha Begum she had long since retired in a huff to her own relations, making as her excuse the plea of grief for the death of the little Glory of Womanhood. But Babar knew better. She had not cared at all. Her other plea that he did not love her was more to the purpose. Anyhow it was as well, thought the young husband grimly; she would only have wept and been uncomfortable.
For discomfort was inevitable even from the very beginning of the siege; at any rate for the men. The nightly round of the ramparts alone entailed lack of proper sleep, since but a small portion of them was ridable, the rest had to be done on foot. And so long was the circuit that, starting at dusk, it was dawn before every place had been inspected. Still, even with the small force at his command, Babar kept the foe at bay, though, more than once he had a narrow squeak of it. Once when a feint attack of Shaibâni's on the Iron-Gate covered a daring escalade at the Needle-makers Gate. An escalade that was all but successful. Four of the attacking party were actually over the wall, dozens of others were swarming up it, when one Kuch-Beg, noble by birth and by nature, caught a glimpse of someone where someone should not be. To draw his sword single-handed as he was, and spring to the attack was the work of an instant. It was an exploit for ever to be cited to his honour, though his ringing war-shout brought three more heroes to his aid. Even so, there were but four against dozens; but furious blows, daredevil recklessness do much, and almost before the nodding guards were roused, the danger was over, the escaladers driven back, to fall a confused heap of ladders and men leaving a dead body or two on the ramparts.
Then Kâsim Beg sallied out again and again to engage the enemy's pickets and returned, bringing heads to set on pikes upon the walls.
For war was war in those days; there was no talk of Red-Crosses and ambulance-wagons.
And yet two women went about inside the fortress, bandaging wounds and applying simples. For the Khânum, Babar's mother, could not bear to see pain, and though old Isân-daulet sniffed at new fangled ways, asserting that men could but die once and that it was waste of time to tend a common soldier as though he were a noble, she came of a fighting tribe and could give many an inherited recipe for the healing of cuts, the prevention of wound fever. Then Dearest-One despite her youth, had a claim, as one who had renounced the world to freedom for good works; so mother and daughter went about in their close white veils applying the simples which the old woman pounded and compounded, and doing all they could for the brave men who were helping the beloved of their eyes to keep his kingdom. They could do no less; they could do no more; so at least said the Khânum, as often in the dark nights the mother and daughter lay awake trembling in each other's arms, listening during an attack or a sally.
Grandmother Isân-daulet would fall foul of them for their red eyes.
"When a man comes in to his food," she would say, "reeling from blows at his head or sick at stomach with hunger, 'tis no comfort to him to see tears, or the signs of tears. Thou sayest, daughter, thou can'st do no more for thy son? Then I can. I can make him angry."
And she did: so that Babar went from his breakfast with his soft heart hardened to disdain.
Dearest-One used to admire her grandmother's pluck. Not to care if one hurt the beloved for his good! That was great. And she would wring her hands tight and say to herself: "I told him long ago that there was nothing I would not do for him; but there is nothing, nothing I can do."
So the months dragged by. Harvest came and went without bringing fresh supplies to the beleaguered fortress, and Shaibâni, cynical, somewhat afraid of his daring young antagonist, withdrew from actual collision, and contented himself with blockade. Starvation would do the work without his aid.
The grain for the horses had already given out; however, while the leaves lasted the mulberry trees and the rose-wood trees in the fortified gardens were stripped and did for fodder. But the winter winds ended this supply, and the shift was made to keep some few horses alive with the rispings of wood moistened with water and sprinkled with salt. A sorry appearance was that of the poor steeds on such miserable fare; but Babar's charger did better, with a daily share of his master's bread; though the big-boned lad could ill spare it. For all alike were on short commons; and they grew shorter day by day. The dying horses were killed and eaten, the donkeys went next--then the cats and dogs. When matters came to this pass, however, night after night men--brave men--began to let themselves down over the wall and make their escape. The haggard young King never knew when he called a council of war, what trusted, what honoured face, might not be absent. Yet still he clung to that last drop of blood. The oath might have been foolish, since, as the ancients said, a fortress can only be maintained by the joint action of head, and feet, and hands; that is to say by generalship, two friendly forces on either side, and a good supply of water and stores as the starting point of all. Still he had made it, and he meant to stick to it. The others might go if they pleased.
"If I could only secure thine and my mother's and my grandmother's safety," he said to Dearest-One--"the other few women also," he added--"though there is little fear for them, they count not enough for harm; and Shaibâni hath his army well in hand. That is how he scored against me. Those accursed Moghuls of my grandmother's would not obey orders. If they killed a man they plundered him--and what is that, when a turning movement hath been ordered? Ah! it was devilish! devilish!" And the tall, thin, young figure would throw out its arms almost appealingly. For Babar was ever high-strung, and his nerves were going.
He gave himself no rest either. Night and day he was always on the watch. So it did not matter so much to him as to others when Shaibâni Khân, changing his tactics, commenced making the darkness hideous by beating large kettle drums and sounding the alarm. Yet the young King shook his fist over the battlements at his foe, who had now pitched his headquarters tent close to the Lovers' Cave, and said to Dearest-One, "It is not fair, and yet it is! I would do it in his place--and yet I don't know--I don't know!" He was very near the end of his tether, yet his grip was tight as ever and he would sit on the top of the gateway with a crossbow and shoot at everyone and everything living that showed itself.
"I struck a palish white-coloured horse to-day," he said to his sister with a cruel exultant look in the eyes that had always been so tender for God's dumb creatures, "and it fell dead--would it had been a man!"
And Dearest-One turned pale. This was worse than death; worse than anything--anything in the wide, wide world!
She lay face downwards beside her mother that night and thought, and thought, and thought, until the grey dawn came. Then she sat up and looked at her mother sleeping beside her.
Yes! it was best. The plan was worth the trying at any rate; and she would be the only one to suffer.
She lay down again, and laid her head on that gentle, loving, sleeping breast. And the motherly arms, unconscious as they were, closed round her and held her fast until she, too, slept, outwearied. That morning she was closeted with her grandmother for hours, and at the midday meal the old woman's eyes showed red; but Dearest-One's were clear and bright; when the mind is made up there is no use in tears.
The evening was stormy. The bitter east wind swept along the ramparts and drove the dust in blinding clouds into the eyes of all. The very foe ceased from their disturbing shouts of alarm, and on many a post the sentry slept awhile.
Did one at the wicket gate by the Lovers' Cave sleep or did he not; and did the white-robed figure that slipped after dusk through the deserted streets pass out, unseen, to challenge fate in the Usbek leader's camp?
Or did Dearest-One send a message only?
Or was it only chance which the very next morning brought the ultimatum to the haggard young King? Who knows? Certain it is it came.
There was no reason, Shaibâni wrote, why those who had been brave foes should not be brave friends. None could deny the King of Samarkand's bravery; few would care to deny his own. Why then should they not be friends? A marriage was ever the best way of securing peace. Let Babar therefore give his sister Khanzâda Begum in lawful marriage to his foe--who, be it said, was in strong enough position to take her--and so form a lasting alliance.
"My sister!" burst out Babar in a fury. "Go back to the savage Usbek Shaibâni, robber, raider, sir ambassador; and tell him that Zahir-ud-din Mahomed is not his peer--he is his master!"
This was all very well in the saying; it sent the blood, growing a bit sluggish from sheer starvation, flooding to heart and brain; but afterwards when the envoy had gone, and the hungry anxious faces of the few who still remained to him showed bitter disappointment, he leant his head on his hands drearily in the quiet of the women's room, and tried to put himself in the place of those bearded Begs to whom a woman's honour or happiness or indeed affection, was, as a rule, of small account.
He could not, of course, assent; and yet it seemed a pity that he could not.
And while he sat crouched in upon himself, spent and weary, Dearest-One herself came and crouched beside him and laid her pretty head on his shoulder.
"Brother!" she said, "I have heard. Come let us talk it over as in old days. So let me hold thy poor hand as we used to do; for we have ever been friends, Babar-ling--have we not?"
Her voice was calm and steady despite the clamant note of tears that was in every word.
"Talk not of it, sister! I will not have it," he muttered; and his voice was broken, husky. "By God and his prophet! I could strike him dead for the thought that I could be such a cur as even to think of it."
She shrank just for a second. "Many men would think it naught," she said, "but it is because it means much to thee that thou must think."
"I will not think," he cried passionately, "I will not be coerced. I will not be cozened. I, Babar, take the consequence."
He left her, baffled, yet still determined, to return to the charge in a day or two; and in starvation times a day or two means much. So much, that she spoke sternly with finality.
"Wilt thou kill thy mother by thy pride, Babar? Listen! Long years ago I said I would do aught for thee--"
"And I answered I would never ask aught," interrupted her brother hotly; but she went on unheeding:
"And now thou deniest me the right to save thee. I who have so few pleasures. Lo! as thou knowest, my heart is dead for love; and this man--this Shaibâni--is not all bad--I--I know he is not. Brotherling! women have borne more for love than I shall have to bear maybe--for the man must be kind in a way--for--for if it ended, Babar--he could take me--without marriage--so grandmother says--"
Babar started up with an oath. "So she also is against me!"
Yet in his heart of hearts he knew that the old woman spoke truth. It was generous in Shaibâni even to offer marriage.
"I will not have it!" he cried. "I will not yield! I would sooner kill thee, myself."
"Thou wilt kill--us all," she said calmly. Then she broke down and clung to him sobbing. "Let it be, brotherling, for my sake. There is so little I can do--let me do this."
The quick tears of understanding ran down his cheeks, but he shook his head and left her.
So, after a day or two, yet another proposition came from Shaibâni to his brave foe. Babar might go with bare life, taking his womenkind with him if he chose, provided he capitulated utterly and acknowledged he was beaten.
There were parleyings and parleyings and who knows what secret promisings beside, what innocent lies, what heart-broken yielding on Babar's part. At last, protesting vainly that had he had the slightest hope of relief, or had he had another week's stores remaining he would never have listened to either threats or entreaties, he agreed to capitulate for bare life to him and his. His mother, his sister, his grandmother, these three must share his freedom. The others must take their chance of horses, or remain, unharmed. Grandmother Isân-daulet, however, flatly refused to come. She was too old, she said, to be cocked up on a horse for days. She was not afraid. Thrice, already, when she was young and good-looking she had fallen into the enemies' hands and had been unmolested--save once and how that business ended Babar knew. So, being now wrinkled and undesirable she would just remain and mayhap give Shaibâni a piece of her mind. So her horse had better go to Mingilek-Gokultâsh who was perchance over good-looking. It was ever best not to put temptation in men's way. Besides Dearest-One might like to have her foster-sister with her. It was convenient to have some woman one could trust beside one in dangerous times.
As the old woman spoke, she held her granddaughter by the hand, and her old fingers tightened themselves on the young ones with a grip firm as steel, soft as a caress. And Dearest-One stooped and kissed the old face on the lips.
So by midnight all was ready for the preconcerted escape. The few sorry horses left in the citadel were standing saddled, the enemy's pickets, it is to be presumed, were looking another way. Babar, fierce, miserable, helped his mother to her pad and settled the stirrups for her. He could scarcely see for the hot tears held back so angrily in his eyes. He could scarcely speak for the hard-held breath that seemed to choke him.
Defeated, flying for his life--No! not for his own only; for theirs also!
He gave a glance round at his party. "Is everyone there? Is everyone ready?"
And from the midst of the little crowd clustering round the fugitives with sobs and tears a voice came clearly:
"Yea! brother! I am ready."
It was Dearest-One's voice. That must be she leaning from her horse to whisper a word to old Isân-daulet who stood waving farewells.
"Then in God's name let us begone, and end the business," he shouted fiercely, leapt to his charger, dug spurs to its flanks and was off careless of disturbance. He had sold himself for the sake of those who loved him, man and woman alike; but the blackness as of death was before his eyes; he could not think; he could do nothing but dig spurs to his horse, and ride on recklessly.
And the night itself was dark as death; he had to rein up amid the great branches of the Soyd Canal, and with difficulty rallied his party to the right road. Yet, still entangled in the intricacies of the irrigated fields, there was time for no other thought save that of getting as far from Samarkand as possible before the dawn. Since though the Usbek leader himself had given order for free pass, his followers, still less his allies, were not to be trusted.
The sky was grey with coming day before they reached the comparative safety of a wild valley set amid encircling hills. Here Babar called a minute's halt to breathe the horses, and for the first time turned to take stock of those who followed him.
His keen eye took in his mother's veiled form. But that bundle like a sack of corn, that crumpled heap like a withered rose leaf--neither of these were Dearest-One? She rode! In a flash, a sense of pride at her upright carriage on her horse came to him, even as a suffocating leap of his heart made him speechless for a second. An awful fear seized him. He knew, and yet he would not know what had happened.
"Khanzâda Begum!" he muttered hoarsely. "Where--where is she?"
No one spoke, and anger--hopeless, helpless anger and grief kept him silent. Then someone said almost fearfully:
"Mayhap in the night time--in the darkness--"
"It is a lie!" burst out Babar. "It is a lie!--I have been tricked!" Then something of the innate truth that was ever in his soul made him pause. He ought to have known--he ought to have guessed. Foes were not usually so generous, and he saw himself not altogether free from blame. "I have tricked myself--I ought to have known," he burst out. "I--oh! may God's curse light on everyone--everyone--"
So he stood, his face turned towards the distant city for a moment, then with a reckless laugh he loosed the rein on his horse's neck and threw his arms above his head.
"Come on!" he shouted as the horse bounded forward. "We are free! Let us ride to hell--to hell and damnation!" And his laughter echoed back, bringing terror to his mother's heart.
"He is beside himself," she cried. "After him, Kâsim--for God's sake keep him from harm."
But Kâsim and Kambar-Ali his squire, were already at the gallop, and the sound of their horses' feet followed Babar as he fled.
From what?
From everything in the wide world. From anger, love, remorse, helpless grief, even from resolve not to be beaten. His nerves were unstrung; for the moment his one thought was escape.
But only for a moment. The sound of those galloping hoofs behind him brought immediate self-control, immediate grip on kingly dignity.
He turned back on his saddle to cast a word that would re-instate him in sanity to those following fools.
"A race!" he cried gaily. "Come on! A race let it be!--Ten dinars ..."
But even as he spoke, he overbalanced. Perhaps he felt giddy, perhaps the girths on his starving horse were all too slack. Anyhow the saddle turned with him and he fell; fell clear on his head.
He was up again, however, ere they reached him, standing unsteadily with dazed eyes, passing his hand gently backwards and forwards over his brow.
"What was it all about?" he murmured cheerfully. "I've clean forgotten it all." And he had.
He mounted again after a minute and rode on; but the memory of that night had gone out of his mind for ever and aye.