By this time the rest of the Abyssinians, the Arabs, and other foreigners, had assembled in the square, and the majority of the Dekhanies, who were deploring the Queen's murder with passionate weeping, separated quietly, crying to Abbas Khan to lead them against the Moghuls, for they were true to their King, of whom he was now the only protector.
CHAPTER IX.
CONCLUSION.
By the time Abbas Khan could reach the room to which the body of the murdered Queen had been taken, it had been laid out with the usual formalities. He could have done nothing there, and it was necessary for him to satisfy himself that no deep-laid treachery or disaffection was at work. And of these there appeared no traces. All the leaders of Dekhany parties came forward and made their salutations, as usual, and the men crowded round him with professions of attachment and devotion, which left no cause for doubt that the dreadful act that had been committed was one of sudden frenzy, enacted by the eunuch, whom he had long suspected, though undefinably, of sinister designs. He was a man in whom the Queen had reposed as great confidence as in himself; and to breathe idle suspicion to her would have been only to excite suspicion of himself, and he had not attempted to do so; but since the flight of Nihung Khan, the eunuch's manner had been changed, and the former unreserved confidence that had existed no longer continued at heart, though outwardly the two men were apparently as cordial as ever.
Satisfied that all was tranquil, and that the fort and garrison had subsided into their usual calm, Abbas Khan returned to the palace, and reverently visited the remains of his beloved mistress and mother, for he had always looked on her in the place of one; and as such, and his Queen, paid her reverence. Outside, in the hall of audience, and in the ante-chamber of the room in which she lay, were Moollas, reading and chanting the stated portions of the Korán. Incense was burning, and its smoke hung about the clustered pillars, niches, and fretted ceilings; and within, the women and eunuchs of the household were wailing, moaning, and occasionally breaking into passionate cries and adjurations. Zóra and the young mother of the boy King were sitting at the head of the Queen, with their faces covered, and heads bowed down, wailing like the rest; and as Zóra looked up, her husband saw her face and eyes swollen with weeping, and full of unutterable woe. She could not speak, and longed to throw herself into his arms. But that was not the place for such an action, and she remained kneeling.
Nor could Abbas Khan say more than the usual salutation to the dead. "Peace be with thee, and the blessing of the Lord," and burst into an almost uncontrollable passion of weeping. All the majesty, all the heroism, all the benevolence, all the political ability of the noble woman lying there, in the last sleep of death, surged up to his memory, mingled with tender thoughts of her loving kindness, her bearing with all his waywardness from boyhood; and now a traitors sword had closed that noble life, without a warning or a suspicion.
The Queen's face was not changed, except to wear the expression of a glorious death. A soft smile, as if of peace in the last supreme moment, lingered on her lips; and though her poor slight body was covered with wounds, the face had escaped mutilation, and had become more beautiful, if possible, in death than in life. Who could forget it? and long they gazed and watched. Who ever would forget it? Zóra would fain have had him stay, for she needed comfort; but with a few soothing words he said, "I must not sleep to-night, darling; but watch, too, over ye all, as is my duty. It may be that the enemy may be unquiet, and the people need all my vigilance." Then he took up his boy and kissed him, and blessed them both.
At the earliest dawn he was with the mourners again, and what remained of the Noble Queen was reverently taken up and carried to a little private cemetery in an angle of the fort, and there laid in the earth. Abbas Khan had sent a flag of truce to the Moghul trenches to say that unshotted guns would be fired for the Queen; and the salvoes of artillery which mingled with the chants of the Moollas and the wailings of the people, who crowded every point from which the last procession could be seen, were not noticed; while during the day a letter of condolence, in the name of the young King, was sent by the Prince Daniel, an act of unexpected courtesy.