THE MASTER'S PRICE
A dim and subtly perfumed corridor opened out before them, its walls hung with tapestries, between which, by the light of sandal-oil mash'als, or cressets, the glimmer of the dull-gold walls could be distinguished.
Pillars rose to the roof, and these were all inlaid with mother-of-pearl, with fine copper and silver arabesques of amazing complexity. Every minutest architectural detail had been carved out of the solid gold dyke that had formed the city; nothing had been added to fill out any portion. The imagination was staggered at thought of the infinite skill and labor required for such a task. The creation of this city of El Barr seemed far beyond the possible; yet here it was, all the result of the graver's chisel.[1]
[Footnote 1: If any reader doubts the existence of El Barr, as a city of gold carved from a single block, on the ground that such a work would be impossible, I refer him to an account of Petra, in the National Geographic Magazine for May, 1907. Petra, in all details, was carved from granite—a monolithic city.]
Blasé as the Legionaries were and hardened to wonders, the sight of this corridor and of the vast banquet-hall opening out of it, at the far end, came near upsetting their aplomb. The major even muttered an oath or two, under his breath, till Leclair nudged him with a forceful elbow.
Not thus must Franks, from Feringistan, show astonishment or admiration.
"May the peace be upon thee," all at once exclaimed Bara Miyan, gesturing for the Master to enter the vast hall. "Peace, until the rising of the day!"
"And upon thee, the peace!" the Master answered, with the correct Arabic formula. They entered, and after them the other Legionaries and the sub-chiefs of Jannati Shahr.
The banquet-hall was enormous. The Master's glance estimated it as about two hundred and fifty feet long by one hundred and seventy-five wide, with a height from golden floor to flat-arched roof of some one hundred and twenty-five. Embroidered cloths of camel's-hair and silk covered the walls. Copper braziers, suspended from the pillars, sent dim spirals of perfumed smoke aloft into the blue air.
About sixty feet from the floor, a row of clerestory windows, unglazed, admitted arrows of sunlight through a golden fretwork; and these arrows, piercing the incense vapor, checkered intricate patterns on the enormous, deep-piled Persian rugs of rose, lilac, and misty blue.
Tables and chairs, of course, there were none. A dakkah, or platform, in horseshoe shape, at the far end, covered with rugs and cushions, and with water-jars, large copper fire-pans, coffee-pots of silver, and shishahs (water-pipes) told where the feast was to be offered.
From a side door, as a silken curtain was drawn back, some fifteen slave-girls entered—whiter than their masters and in tight jackets and loose, silk trousers. These girls brought copper basins of rose-water for the Arabs' "lesser ablution" before a meal. Bara Miyan smiled slightly as he gestured the Legionaries also to wash hands and faces; but the Master, little relishing the idea of using this same water after the Arabs, shook his head.
Not thus slyly could the Olema inflict humiliation on unbelievers. A hard look crept into the Master's eyes. This covert insult, after the exchange of salt, boded very ill.
In silence the Legionaries watched the Arabs dry their hands and faces on towels given them by the slave-girls, who then noiselessly withdrew. All the Arabs prostrated themselves and prayed. The Master was the only one who noticed one significant fact: that now the kiblah, or direction of prayer, was not to the north-west, where lay Mecca, but—judging by the sun—was almost due west, toward the spot where lay the Black Stone. This reassured him once more.
"They recognize the Stone, right enough," thought he. "As long as nothing happens to that, we hold the whip-hand of them. Our only real danger is that something might happen to it. But a few hours, now, will end all this. And in a few hours, what can happen?"
The Arabs ceased their droning supplications to Allah, which had been rising with hypnotically soothing murmurs through the incensed air, and now followed Bara Miyan toward the raised platform. The old Sheik beckoned his guests. All disposed themselves comfortably among the cushions. The Legionaries ignored what seemed a disposition on the part of the Arabs to separate them—to scatter them along the platform.
"Keep together, men," the Master commanded. "Group yourselves closely here, in the middle. Say nothing. Watch everything. Make no move without specific orders. If it comes to a fight, and I am killed, Leclair will command you. His knowledge of Arabic temporarily ranks him above Bohannan. Don't shoot unless it comes to hard necessity; but if you do shoot, make every bullet count—and save the last one for yourselves!"
Bara Miyan clapped his hands. Through two arched doorways, to right and left, entered a silent file of the huge, half-naked Maghrabi men. All were unarmed; but the muscles of their heavy shoulders, the gorilla-like dangle of their steel-fingered hands produced an effect more ominous even than the gleam of simitars in the dim cressets' light would have been.
Along the walls these black barbarians disposed themselves, a full hundred or more, saying nothing, seeming to see nothing, mere human automata. Bohannan, seated cross-legged between Captain Alden and the Master, swore an oath.
"What are these infernal murderers here for?" growled he. "Ask the
Sheik, will you? I thought you and he had eaten salt together! If this
isn't a trap, it looks too damned much like it to be much of a picnic!
Faith, this is a Hell of a party!"
"Silence, sir!" commanded the Master; while Leclair, at his other side, cast a look of anger at the Celt. "Diplomacy requires that we consider these men as a guard of honor. Pay no attention to them, anybody! Any sign of hesitation now, or fear, may be suicide. Remember, we are dealing with Orientals. The 'grand manner' is what counts with them. I advise every man who has tobacco, to light a cigarette and look indifferent. Verb sap!"
Most of the Legionaries produced tobacco; but the Olema, smiling, raised a hand of negation. For already the slave-girls were entering with trays of cigarettes and silver boxes of tobacco. These they passed to the visitors, then to the Arabs. Such as preferred cigarettes, suffered the girls to light them at the copper fire-pans. Others, choosing a shishah, let the girls fill it from the silver boxes; and soon the grateful vapors of tobacco were rising to blend with the spiced incense-smoke.
A more comfortable feeling now possessed the Legionaries. This sharing of tobacco seemed to establish almost an amicable Free Masonry between them and the Jannati Shahr men. All sat and smoked in what seemed a friendly silence.
The slave-girls silently departed. Others came with huge, silver trays graven with Koran verses. These trays contained meat-pilafs, swimming in melted butter; vine leaves filled with chopped mutton; kababs, or bits of roast meat spitted on wooden splinters; crisp cucumbers; a kind of tasteless bread; a dish that looked like vermicelli sweetened with honey; thin jelly, and sweetmeats that tasted strongly of rosewater. Dates, pomegranates, and areca nuts cut up and mixed with sugar-paste pinned with cloves into a betel leaf—these constituted the dessert.
The Arabs ate with strict decorum, according to their custom, beginning the banquet with a Bismillah of thanks and ending with an Al Hamd that signified repletion. Knives and forks there were none; each man dipped his hand into whatever dish pleased him, as the trays were passed along. The Legionaries did the same.
"Rather messy, eh?" commented the major; but no one answered him. More serious thoughts than these possessed the others.
After ablution, once more—this time the white men shared it—tobacco, pomegranate syrup, sherbet, water perfumed with mastich-smoke, and thick, black coffee ended the meal.
The Master requested khat leaves, which were presently brought him—deliciously green and fresh—in a copper bowl. Then, while the slave-girls removed all traces of the feast, all relaxed for a few minutes' kayf, or utter peace.
Utter peace, indeed, it seemed. Nothing more soothing could have been imagined than the soft wooing of repletion and of silken cushions, the dim sunlight through the smoke of incense and tobacco, the gentle bubbling of the water-pipes, the half-heard courting of pigeons somewhere aloft in the embrasures of the clerestory windows.
All possibility of warfare seemed to have vanished. Under the magic spell of this enchanted, golden hall, even the grim Maghrabis, black and motionless along the tapestried walls, seemed to have sunk to the role of mere spectators.
The Arabs' glances, though subtly curious, appeared to hold little animosity. Now that they had broken bread together, cementing the Oath of the Salt, might not hospitality have become inviolable? True, some looks of veiled hostility were directed against "Captain Alden's" strangely masked face, as the woman sat there cross-legged like the rest, indifferently smoking cigarettes. For what the Arab cannot understand is always antipathetic to him. But this hostility was not marked. The spirits of the Legion, including those of the Master himself, rose with a sense of greater security.
Even Bohannan, chronic complainer, forgot to cavil and began to bask in contentment.
"Faith, but this is a good imitation of Lotus-land, after all," he murmured to Janina, at his side. "I wouldn't mind boarding at this hotel for an indefinite period. Meals excellent; waitresses beat anything on Broadway; atmosphere very restful to wandering gentlemen. Now if I could only get acquainted with one of these lovely Fatimas, and find out where the bar is—the bar of El Barr! Very good! Faith, very good indeed!"
He laughed at his own witticism and blew perfumed smoke toward the dim, golden roof. But now his attention was riveted by the silent entrance of six dancing-girls, that instantly brought him to keen observation.
Their dance, barefooted and with a minimum of veils, swayed into sinuous beauty to the monotonous music of kettle-drums, long red flutes and guitars of sand-tortoise shell with goat-skin heads—music furnished by a dozen Arabs squatting on their hunkers half-way down the hall. The gracious weaving of those lithe, white bodies of the girls as they swayed from sunlit filigree to dim shadow, stirred even the coldest heart among the Legionaries, that of the Master himself. As for Bohannan, his cup of joy was brimming.
The dance ended, one of the girls sang with a little foreign accent, very pleasing to the ears of the Master and Leclairs the famous chant of Kaab el Ahbar:
A black tent, swayed by the desert wind
Is dearer to me, dearer to me
Than any palace of the city walls.
Dearer to me!
[1]And the earth met with rain!
A handful of dates, a cup of camel's milk
Is dearer to me, dearer to me
Than any sweetmeat in the city walls.
Dearer to me!
And the earth wet with rain!
A slender Bedouin maid, freely unveiled
Is dearer to me, dearer to me
Than harem beauties with henna-stained fingers.
My Bedouin maid is slim as the ishkil tree.
Dearer to me!
And the earth wet with rain!
Black tent, swift white mare, camel of Hejaz blood
Are dear to me, are dear to me!
Dearest is my slim, unveiled one of the desert sands!
Dearest to me!
Ibla her name is; she blazes like the sun,
Like the sun at dawn, with hair like midnight shades,
Oh, dear to me!
Paradise is in her eyes; and in her breasts, enchantment.
Her body yields like the tamarisk,
When the soft winds blow over the hills of Nedj!
Dearest to me!
And the earth wet with rain!
[Footnote 1: W'al arz mablul bi matar. A favorite refrain for songs among the Arabs, to whom rain represents all comforts and delights.]
A little silence followed the ending of the song and the withdrawal of the girls and musicians. The major seemed disposed to call for an encore, but Janina silenced his forthcoming remarks with a sharp nudge. All at once, old Bara Miyan removed the amber stem of the water-pipe from his bearded lips and said:
"Now, White Sheik, thou hast eaten of our humble food, and seen our dancing. Thou hast heard our song. Wilt thou also see jugglers, wrestlers, trained apes from Yemen? Or wilt thou take the kaylulah (siesta)? Or doth it please thee now to speak of the gifts that my heart offers thee and thine?"
"Let us speak of the gifts, O Bara Miyan," answered the Master, while Leclair listened intently and all the Arabs gave close heed. "We have not many hours more to stay in this paradise of thine. We must be away to our own Feringistan, in our flying house. Let us speak of the gifts. But first, I would ask thee something."
"Speak, in Allah's name, and it shall be answered thee!"
"The salt is still in thy stomach for us?"
"It is still in my stomach."
"Thou dost swear that, O Bara Miyan, by a great oath?"
"By the rising of the stars, which is a great oath!"
"And by the greatest oath, the honor of thy women?"
"Yea, Frank, by the honor of my women! But thou and thine, too, have covenants to keep."
Old Bara Miyan bent shaggy white brows at the Master, and peered out intently from under the hood of his burnous. The Master queried:
"What covenants, great Olema?"
"These: That no harm shall befall Myzab and the Great Pearl Star and the Black Stone, before thou and thine fly away to the Lands of the Books. Then, that no blood of our people shall be shed in El Barr, either the city of Jannati Shahr or the plain. These things thou must understand, O Frank. If harm befall the sacred relics, or blood be shed, then the salt will depart from my stomach, and we will be kiman,[1] and the thar[2] will be between thine and mine. I have spoken!"
[Footnote 1: Kiman, of hostile tribes.]
[Footnote 2: Thar, the terrible blood-feud of the Arabs.]
The Master nodded.
"These things be very clear to my heart," he answered. "They shall be treasured in my memory."
"It is well. Now speak we of the gifts."
The fixed attention of the Arabs told the Legionaries, despite their ignorance of Arabic, that at last the important negotiation of the reward was under way. Pipes and cigarettes smoldered, unsmoked; all eyes turned eagerly toward the Master and Bara Miyan. Silence fell upon the banquet-hall, where still the thin, perfumed incense-smoke writhed aloft and where still the motionless Maghrabi men stood in those ominous lines along the silk-tapestried walls.
"And what things," began the Olema, "doth thy heart desire, in this city of Jannati Shahr? Tell thy wish, and perchance it shall be granted thee!"
The Master paused, deliberately. Well he understood the psychological value of slow action in dealing with Orientals. Bargaining, with such, is a fine art. Haste, greed, eagerness defeat themselves.
Contemplatively the Master chewed a khat leaf, then smiled a very little, and asked:
"Is it permitted to tell thee that this gold, of which thou hast carved thy city—this gold which to thee is as stones and earth to the people of Feringistan—hath great value with us?"
"It is permitted, O Frank. This thing we already know." The old man frowned ominously. "Dost thou ask gold?"
The Master nerved himself for the supreme demand, success in which would mean fortune beyond all calculation, power and wealth to shame all plutocrats.
"Gold?" he repeated. "Yea, that is what we ask! Gold! Give unto us what gold our flying house can carry hence to our own land beyond the salted seas, and we will depart. Before the rising of the stars we will be gone. And the peace be unto thee, O Bara Miyan, master of the gold!"
Tension as of a wire about to snap contracted the Master's nerves, strong as they were. Leclair leaned forward, his face pale, teeth set hard into his lip.
"Yea, gold!" the Master repeated with hard-forced calm. "This is the gift we ask of thee, for the Myzab and the holy Black Stone and Kaukab el Durri—the gift of gold!"