For what they gazed upon here was but a beginning. It was the mark of Murad Afzul.
Chapter Nine.
A Legacy of Vengeance.
The Nawab Mahomed Mushîm Khan, commonly known as Mushîm Khan, Chief of the Gularzai, was seated beneath the shade of an apricot tope, discussing affairs of state with his brother and vizier, Kuhandil Khan.
The hour of prayer was just over, yet here and there a group of belated worshippers was still engaged in the prescribed ceremonial, bowing down, low and oft, in the direction of the Holy City, while others were wending their way towards the gate in the long low mud wall behind which stood the village. Here and there, too, knelt camels, in process of being loaded for a journey, eternally snarling and roaring, as is the way of those cross-grained, hideous, but essentially useful animals, and flocks of black goats and of fat-tailed Persian sheep moved lazily off to their browsing grounds attended by tall, shaggy herdsmen armed with their long-barrelled, sickle-stocked guns—and accompanied by great savage dogs, a match for wolf or panther, and far more dangerous than either to any human being not well armed, who should incur their hostility. Even as Raynier had set forth, there was not anything here of the jewelled gorgeousness and architectural splendour popularly associated with the conventional Nawab, yet it was Mushîm Khan’s principal and favourite place of abode.
It lay in a basin-like hollow. Overhead and around, a grim array of chaotic peaks towered to a considerable height—the slopes lined with cliffs, and strewn with tumbled rocks, representing a vastness of area which the unaccustomed eye took some time to appreciate. Through this valley a small river flowed, having for its outlet a narrow, cliff-hung pass, which was, in fact, the principal access to the great natural amphitheatre.
In describing the chief’s personal appearance Raynier had not exaggerated. Mushîm Khan was unquestionably a fine-looking man. Tall and straight, his powerful frame was well set off by the flowing whiteness of his garments, and the symmetrical folds of his snowy turban made an effective framework to the strong and dignified face. It was a finer face than those possessed by most of his countrymen, being somewhat fuller, and, though regular of feature, yet had not that hawk-like and predatory expression engendered by the lean and exaggeratedly aquiline cast of profile of the rest. His full beard and the two long tresses hanging low down on either side of his broad chest were jet black, but in view of the custom of dyeing such his age would be hard to determine approximately. His brother, the Sirdar Kuhandil Khan, was scarcely his inferior in appearance—in fact, there was so strong a family likeness between them that they might easily have been mistaken for each other.
“I know not why we should join in this jihad,” the chief was saying, “nor do I know who is this Hadji Haroun who is stirring it up. He comes from the Orakzai, and he had better return to them in peace.”