“Thou hast spoken truth; the return is the easiest part; the coming hither, and the being, that is the trouble,” answered the other, his luminous face marked by the deep furrows of age and sorrow.
“With Mahmud of Ghaznin out of thy mind, Firdusi, would that still be thy mood?” inquired the younger man in a soft voice.
“Mahmud’s court is the sea of evil which swallowed my island of happiness. Whom did I murder that I should be a footsore fugitive like the blood-stained son of Adam?” cried the old man in a faltering tone, having stopped to take breath.
“Thy ethereal spirit has murdered grossness, giving this world a foretaste of Eden. Thy Shah-Namah is the song of the skies, and Eblis, who revels in discord and confusion, took vengeance on thee by poisoning Mahmud’s mind, O, Firdusi.—Thy own version shows not that thy enemy is Mahmud, but his envious treasurer. It shall end well, however. Nasir Lek’s message will not leave Mahmud unmoved,” said the younger man, who was the Governor of Kohistan, a friend of the Sultan of Ghaznin, and a boundless admirer of Persia’s famous poet, Firdusi.
“May Allah bless thy kindness; yea, it shall end well; it is well that things here come to an end,—or with poverty to sting, with oppression to harass, and the dread of the executioner’s axe to torture one, life were a hell without redemption. Ah, I have emptied the cup of bitterness to its dregs! But it cannot now last long; my human frame’s time of final crumbling has been nearly reached. May Firdusi’s misery be Mahmud’s pillow!” cried the poet, turning his liquid eyes heavenward.
By this time the men had ascended to a height of over nine thousand feet above the sea level, and Tehran spread far away, like a patch covered with all kinds of mushrooms. The sun was near the end of his course and the golden flood turned the vast reaches into a magic picture of light and shade, under a dome suffused with rippled waves of translucent purple, crimson, silver and gold. With their faces turned toward the East, the Moslems knelt and lay prostrate in prayer. This done, the escort was ordered to await their lord’s return where they stood, and the two men soon disappeared in a labyrinth of crags, rocks, loose bowlders, and heaps of stone, with no vestige of vegetation. Firdusi had the question at his tongue’s end, how could a sentient being live in so inhospitable a region, in a temperature so freezing that it chilled him to his marrow? But he said nothing. The cold grew with the dreariness of the surroundings, and now they plunged into a sea of dense fog, still climbing higher and higher, the younger assisting his older friend. At last Nasir brought forth a horn to which he gave wind. The blast reverberated with appalling effect, followed by a profound silence. There was no answer. Another blast startled the echoes of the mountain a thousandfold, ringing like muffled drums, and lo! there came a note in response,—a shrill note like that of a whistle.
“We are welcome, and thou wilt be rewarded for thy toil, Firdusi,” said Nasir.
“He is thy mystery of the Damavant,” observed the poet skeptically.
“Thou wilt face a man who might pass for the spirit of this mountain; as to his occult power, thou shalt thyself be judge,” suggested Nasir.
“Is one permitted to ask him questions?” inquired Firdusi.