"Forbid it, O God, forbid it! Let not Thy justice be taken out of Thine awful hand."
Four days later the old Chancellor came yet again to say that the King's Pardon had been granted; that Colonel Lord was free; that the people were rejoicing; that everybody attributed the happy issue of the Christian's case mainly to zealous efforts on his behalf of the woman who loved him, the daughter of the dead General whose unwise command had been the cause of all his trouble; and finally that it was expected that these two would soon heal their family feud by marriage.
At this news Ishmael's tortured heart was aflame and his brain was reeling. The thought that "Omar" was not to be punished, that he was to be honoured, that he was to be made happy, filled him with passions never felt before. Behind the strongest and most spiritual soul there lurks a wild beast that seems to be ever waiting to destroy it, and in the torment of Ishmael's heart the thought came to him that, as his earthly judges were permitting the guilty one to escape, God called on him to punish the man.
Irresistible as the thought was, it brought a feeling of indescribable dread. "I must be going mad," he told himself, remembering how he had spent his life in the cause of peace. All day long he fought against a hatred that was now so fierce that it seemed as if death alone could satisfy it. His soul wrestled with it, battled for life against it, and at length conquered it, and he rose from his knees saying to himself—
"No, vengeance belongs to God! When did He ask for my hand to execute it?"
But the compulsion of great passion was driving him on, and after dismissing the thought of his own wrongs he began to think of the Rani's. Where was she now? What had become of her? He dared not ask. Ashamed, humiliated, abased, he had become so sensitive to pain on the subject of the woman whom he had betrothed, the woman who had betrayed him, the woman he still loved in spite of everything, that he was even afraid that some one might speak of her.
But in the light of what the Chancellor had said about the daughter of the General, he pictured the Rani as a rejected and abandoned woman. This thought was at first so painful that it deprived him of the free use of his faculties. He could not see anything plainly. His mind was a battlefield of confused sights, half hidden in clouds of smoke. That, after all the Rani had sacrificed for "Omar"—her husband, her happiness, and her honour—she should be cast aside for another—this was maddening.
He asked himself what he was to do. Find her and take her back? Impossible! Her heart was gone from him. She would continue to love the other man, whatever he might do to her. That was the way of all women—Allah pity and bless them!
Then a flash of illumination came to him in the long interval of his darkness. He would liberate the Rani, and the man she loved should marry her! No matter if she belonged to another race—he should marry her! No matter if she belonged to another faith—he should marry her! And as for himself—his sacrifice should be his revenge!
"Yes, that shall be my revenge," he thought.