That was a degradation not to be borne. The Calcutta Brahmin did not resent the Lascar’s taunt more keenly. With a swerve that almost unseated Malcolm, the Arab dashed in front of a bullock-cart, swept between the trees on the west side of the road, leaped a broad ditch, and crashed into a field of millet. Another ditch, another field, breast high with tall castor-oil plants, a frantic race through a grove of mangoes—when Malcolm had to lie flat on Nejdi’s neck to avoid being swept off by the low branches—and horse and man dived headlong into deep water.
The splash, far more than the ducking, frightened the horse. Malcolm, in that instant of prior warning which the possessor of steady nerves learns to use so well, disengaged his feet from the stirrups. He was thrown clear, and, when he came to the surface, he saw that the Arab and himself were floundering in a moat. Not the pleasantest of bathing-places anywhere, in India such a sheet of almost stagnant water has excessive peculiarities. Among other items, it breeds fever and harbors snakes, so Malcolm floundered rather than swam to the bank, where he had the negative satisfaction of catching Nejdi’s bridle when that disconcerted steed scrambled out after him.
The two were coated with green slime. Being obviously unhurt, they probably had a forlornly comic aspect. At any rate, a woman’s musical laugh came from the lofty wall which bounded the moat on the further side, and a woman’s clear voice said:
“A bold leap, sahib! Did you mean to scale the fort on horseback? And why not have chosen a spot where the water was cleaner?”
Before he could see the speaker, so smothered was he in dripping moss and weeds, Malcolm knew that some lady of rank had watched his adventure. She used the pure Persian of the court, and her diction was refined. Luckily, he had studied Persian as well as its Indian off-shoot, Hindustani, and he understood the words. He pressed back his dank hair, squeezed the water and slime off his face, and looked up.
To his exceeding wonder, his eyes met those of a young Mohammedan woman, a woman richly garbed, and of remarkable appearance. She was unveiled, an amazing fact in itself, and her creamy skin, arched eyebrows, regular features, and raven-black hair proclaimed her aristocratic lineage. She was leaning forward in an embrasure of the battlemented wall. Behind her, two attendants, oval-faced, brown-skinned women of the people, peered shyly at the Englishman. When he glanced their way, they hurriedly adjusted their silk saris, or shawls, so as to hide their faces. Their mistress used no such bashful subterfuge. She leaned somewhat farther through the narrow embrasure, revealing by the action her bejeweled and exquisitely molded arms.
“Perhaps you do not speak my language,” she said in Urdu, the tongue most frequently heard in Upper India. “If you will go round to the gate—that way—” and she waved a graceful hand to the left left—“my servants will render you some assistance.”
By that time, Malcolm had regained his wits. A verse of a poem by Hafiz occurred to him.
“Princess,” he said, “the radiance of your presence is as the full moon suddenly illumining the path of a weary traveler, who finds himself on the edge of a morass.”
A flash of surprise and pleasure lit the fine eyes of the haughty beauty perched up there on the palace wall.