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.