Chapter 3

"Its secret remained unrevealed," replied the tax-collector. "Trusty friends told me later that the flight of Abdul on a fiery stallion, with a female figure clinging to him on the saddle behind, ever remained a mystery. So the youth had had the presence of mind to close the sliding panels above and below."

"He escaped? He lived?" queried the Rajput.

"Assuredly," came the quiet reply. "I have never seen nor heard from Abdul from that day to this. But as destiny had provided, long years before the actual event, a means for the accomplishment of his happiness, I have ever rested content in the belief that all was well with him--that all is well with him even yet perhaps--with him and his beloved in the valley of far-away Bokhara."

"I should like to find that hollow column," muttered the Afghan.

"As I have said, the column was contrived for love and not for rapine, my friend. Should the white stone from Coromandel that can be cunningly wrought into marble ever cross your fate, be on your guard lest the omen mean, not the gaining of a fortune, but the making of a tomb."

The Afghan smiled, half disdainfully, half uneasily, and silence reigned for a spell.

III. WHAT THE STARS ORDAINED

TOLD BY THE ASTROLOGER

"And now, master star-gazer, your proffered story," said the tax-collector, bestirring the company from its meditative mood.

"As I have promised," responded the astrologer, "I shall recount an experience that shows how the stars, if read aright, can tell us the influences for good or for evil that weigh upon a man and inevitably determine his destiny at the critical moments of his life. What is written is written, and it is impossible to strive against fate."

"Nay," objected the Rajput, "that is a teaching of helplessness to which I cannot subscribe--the pitiful excuse of the coward who folds his hands in the hour of danger, or of the self-indulgent weakling who yields to seductive temptation because his heart inclines to seize the pleasure of the moment even when his conscience counsels otherwise. I hold that man is the master of his own fate. Most assuredly have I been the master of mine," he added with a proud smile, his fingers closing significantly on the handle of a dagger at his belt.

"Be it so," answered the astrologer. "But as Allah knows everything that is to happen, so must it happen."

"Which does not forbid the exercise of my own free will," argued the Rajput. "The Supreme Being, the presiding power of creation, call him Allah if you will, understanding my heart as he understands all things, knows beforehand what choice of action I shall make at the moment of an emergency. But that still leaves me responsible for the deed which I elect to do. Such is my understanding of destiny. It gives fore-knowledge to God, but leaves free will to man."

"From all of which I do not dissent," rejoined the astrologer. "It is only the ignorant or the base that makes kismet the excuse for helplessness or for wrongdoing. But as the stars under which a man is born influence that man's acts, then does the reading of the stars guide us as to what the future has in store."

"I know little about your stars," replied the Rajput. "But let us have the story," he added, crossing his hands on his knees in an attitude of expectancy. The astrologer, saluting his audience generally with a bow of acquiescence, thus began:

* * * * *

"By your courtesy let me first explain, as necessary to the understanding of the tale which is to follow, that I am from Persia, from the city of Teheran, where for many generations my ancestors were profound students of astrology, some of them famous men because of their skilful divinations, with reputations that reached even to Stamboul. For thither in my early boyhood to the court of the Sultan of the Osmanlis was my father summoned, and him I never beheld again. It was from my aged grandfather that I learned my first lessons in astrology--about the twelve houses, the ruling star of each day, the coming and the going of the planets, their conjunctions and oppositions, and the influences they exercise on men's lives. I learned with avidity, and was an apt pupil, for at fifteen I had begun the practice of my profession, casting horoscopes and reading the nocturnal heavens with constant care, understanding also the flight of birds and the cries of wild beasts of the jungle.

"Yet at that time was my mind assailed with grievous doubts. I often caught myself wondering whether the stars did really rule the fates of men. And with this inward questioning a restless spirit grew upon me. I longed to see more of the world--to enlarge the sphere of my observations. Just then I chanced to hear some gossip in the bazaars about a great expedition that was getting ready at Kabul to descend upon Hindustan. The hunger of adventure seized me, and was not to be denied. Despite the tears and implorings of my family, I set forth on foot for Afghanistan, a stripling; in my hand the staff I used in my divinations, in the bag slung at my side a single change of raiment. Money I had none, but my ability to read the stars I knew well would earn me a livelihood wherever I might wander.

"With my adventures during the next two years this story has no concern. It is enough to say that, after many vicissitudes of fortune, I found myself installed as astrologer in the court of a Moslem prince, sovereign over an extensive region in Kashmir.

"My lord was a man of noble heart and of high mental gifts. He ruled over his people not by fear of the sword, but by absolute justice, which he himself personally administered, every day holding audience so that grievances, even those of the most poor, might be heard and wrongs redressed. And his royal duties were shared by his wife, who, although she might sit behind the screen of the women's quarters, none the less shared in the counsels of state, and contributed words of wisdom in the direction of affairs.

"Never in my experience have I encountered such mutual love, trust, and devotion as subsisted between this pair. For no other woman in the world had Mirza Shah thought or regard or desire--I call him Mirza Shah, but that was not his real name. For reasons that will presently appear, I refrain from disclosing the identity of places and persons connected with my story.

"Well, it was my privilege from the outset to be on relations of close intimacy with my master. He used to come through the palace gardens to the shrub-embowered tower which I occupied, and from the roof of which I nightly contemplated the heavens. For long hours he would abide with me, learning something of the stars while enjoying the cool of the night air after the heat and fatigues of the day. And many times of an afternoon the sultana, veiled, would come with her lord, and together they would seek to gain from me knowledge of the heavenly bodies and of divination. Some things I told to them, but others I withheld, which is just and right, for skill in astrology is hereditary, descending from father to son, and new minds are unprepared for such teachings, so that too much knowledge conveyed to outsiders may become a source of disturbance to themselves and perchance of danger and hurt to their fellow men. Thus, following the rules laid down for me by my grandfather, always, even when closely pressed with questions, did I exercise a discreet reserve.

"Gradually the friendship accorded to me by my lord and his lady waxed stronger, and I found myself being admitted to some of their innermost thoughts. Thus did I come to learn the passionate longing of the wife to become a mother: for six years had she waited, but no child had blessed her love for her husband. As for Mirza Shah, just so soon as the subject was mentioned I could see the cloud of melancholy rest on his brow. And when, as time went on, sadness seemed to settle upon him continuously, I knew full well that this disappointment in his wedded life had at last taken complete possession of his mind, to the exclusion of all other matters.

"And from the sultana's manner I could see the trepidation that filled her heart--the dread that her childlessness might in the end rob her of her husband's love. It was not given to me to look upon her face--to get more than a glimpse of her eyes as they shot an occasional glance at me through the parted folds of her veil. But in these glances I had read the prayers of entreaty that I should use all the spells of my art in her favour, so as to obtain for her from God the gift of a son.

"Well, after a time an unexpected thing happened. Mirza Shah was absent from his home--gone on a full week's journey, engaged in the settling of some dispute on the confines of his territory. To me there came one afternoon the sultana, attended by one of her women--the most trusted one, I knew, for both were from the same country, near to Amritsar, where the famous rugs are woven. So much I had learned, and this further I also knew, that by birth the sultana was a Hindu, although on being wed to her lord as a little girl, she had of course embraced the true faith of Islam, in so far as it matters for a woman to have any religion at all.

"It was the female attendant who spoke to me, her mistress listening in silence. But the questions came so readily that it was clear the lesson had been well rehearsed by the twain.

"'Astrologer,' she began, 'can you swear on the Koran that the stars speak truth?'

"'That I can swear,' I replied, with due dignity and respect for myself and my profession.

"'Can the stars bring about the wishes of man or of woman?'

"'Nay, that I do not declare. They rule the lives of men and women only in so far as their movements forecast the future. If we can read the stars aright, we may gain foreknowledge of events destined to happen. For what is written in the scroll of fate cannot be changed. From kismet there is no escape."

"'Then tell me this, O astrologer, from your stars: is my noble lady here ever going to have a child, a son?'

"'That question I cannot answer. Unless I have the horoscope of her highness, cast by skilled hands at the time of her birth, I cannot tell which planet rules her destiny.'

"'Alas, we knew not these things among my people down in Amritsar,' I heard my lady murmur.

"'Bah!' exclaimed the serving woman contemptuously. She had flung open her veil, unashamed as are women of her station that I, not her brother or her husband, should gaze upon her face. It was a pleasant enough face of a woman of five-and-twenty years of age; yet, methought, as I looked into it now, that there was unseemly boldness in her eye and even something of wanton abandonment in her manner.

"'Bah! If your stars cannot get us what we wish, what good are they? Better pray at a Hindu shrine to Krishna, god of love revels, than waste time in consulting a Moslem astrologer. That is what I have said all along, dear lady'; and with undoubtedly great affection the woman folded to her breast her now sobbing mistress.

"I turned away, as was proper, and busied myself with a chart of the heavens over which I had been poring when my visitors had arrived. On again raising my eyes, I found that I was alone.

"This incident I had well nigh forgotten, and near a year had elapsed. For some months I had not seen the sultana; she remained in the strict seclusion of the harem. Her highness was unwell, most people said. But I knew the truth; Mirza Shah himself had told it to me, his face beaming with pride and pleasure. At last his dearest hopes were to be realized; the sultana was about to become a mother.

"Meanwhile I was on the alert to cast the horoscope of the child the very hour it should arrive. My preparations had been all made for some time past. Now was I only studying the stars night by night, so that I should be the better prepared to read them correctly.

"At last, almost at the midnight hour, came a messenger running to the tower with the news that a child had been born--a son, Allah be praised. Then I set me instantly to my task, and it was with deep thankfulness I saw that the conjunction of the planets and stars was highly favourable. I carefully recorded the exact position of each heavenly body, and had already read from my rough chart strength and valour for the boy that had just been born, beauty of figure, good endowments of mind, when once again I lifted my eyes to the heavens. But to my horror and dismay at that very instant a streak of fire shot from west to east across the first house, straight toward the planet there ruling, where it disappeared. Just the fraction of a second had passed in the passing of that fiery star. But I knew what it meant, for my grandfather had instructed me in this matter. The child into whose horoscope had come this dread intruder was destined, if he lived beyond infancy, to slay his own father. And with the heaviness of lead this foreknowledge of destiny settled on my soul.

"My head had sunk dejectedly on my breast, when I started up at the touch of a hand on my shoulder, and the greeting of a joyous voice--that of Mirza Shah.

"'A son, Syed Ali, a son. Joy, joy, joy! And now, what do the stars say?'

"Was it cowardice, was it pity, was it sympathy for him in his long deferred happiness, that prompted me to act as I did? Even at this day I myself cannot answer the question. Perhaps it was just unthinkingly on the spur of the moment that I did what I did. Without a word I thrust into Mirza Shah's hand the roughly completed horoscope. There was no note in it of the flaming star that at the last had marred the favourable showing.

"Mirza Shah, under my instructions, had become skilled enough to interpret the general significance of such a diagram with its accompanying symbols.

"'Ah, my friend,' he exclaimed in fervent delight, 'this is indeed excellent. He will be clever and brave and handsome, everything that a father could wish. Get ready the emblazoned scroll at once. Now I shall go. There are others to whom to tell the glad news, and to your mistress even now shall I try to whisper the splendid omens the stars have traced for us here.'

"He tapped the rough chart with a forefinger, then handed it back to me, and was gone.

"Let my story hasten on, just as the years hastened on. The boy grew up to be a comely lad, much in my companionship, for he came to me to learn to read and write Persian and Arabic. But although I loved him well, never any single day did he come into my sight but my heart was smitten with self reproach. Why had I, by suppressing the truth, allowed this child to live even for an hour beyond the hour of his birth? The foreordained murderer of his good and noble father!--to my eyes the decree of fate was branded on the very brow of the boy.

"Yet did I console myself and justify myself. At times I even dared to indulge a doubting mood as to the certainty of the celestial writing of fate. Could a bright, open-faced child like this one seated at my knee, book in hand, ever come to commit the most abominable of human crimes--to slay his own dearly loving father?

"'Impossible!' I would murmur to myself, and would thus resolutely shut the gates of my heart to the whispering of conscience.

"But in any case it was now too late to speak. The boy was endeared to his father and to his mother, the idol of both their lives. Mirza Shah would have gladly died, well I knew, for his son. Why then should I interfere? Kismet! Let destiny take its course. Even I, in withholding the truth, had been an instrument in the hand of fate. And had it not been written that I should so act? Who, indeed, but Allah can change the course of events?

"By such arguments I became reconciled to abide with peace of mind the workings of destiny. And so years rolled on.

"When Prince Hasan, as the lad had been named, had attained the age of seventeen, it befell that the Emperor Humayun, son of Baber, made a progress through the Kashmir Valley, receiving homage from his feudatories, among whom was Mirza Shah. And the magnificent retinue of the mighty Mogul so impressed our young prince, that he must needs beg the privilege of joining the imperial bodyguard. This request was readily granted, for Humayun was trying to gather around him the best young blood in Hindustan, Rajput as well as Moslem, so that each race alike might be keen in the defence and proud of the glory of the great Mogul Empire.

"Thus it came about that Prince Hasan, superbly mounted and dressed in a suit of fine chain armour beneath his upper silken garments, rode forth from the valley where he had been reared, accompanied by the tearful blessings of his father and mother.

"A year passed, and then Mirza Shah himself, summoned by special messenger, departed on a visit to the Court at Agra. When two months later he returned, never did I know such a change to have been wrought in so brief a time on any man. He was grey and haggard; his eyes were sunken. And to me he came almost first of all in the palace, to consult the stars.

"And for my better guidance he told me some things. Prince Hasan had fallen into ways of dissipation and habits of drunkenness--most accursed of vices--in the city of Agra. It was in the hope of reclaiming him that an old friend had called Mirza Shah to the capital. But at the meeting of father and son, instead of repentance on the part of the misguided youth, there had been defiance and revilement, and at last, as the father confessed to me, with the tremor of shame in his voice, an insulting blow in the face. This was too much to endure. Mirza Shah had disowned his son. He declared he was henceforth childless, for, perhaps as I have told you, there had been no other babe born all these years to the sultana.

"Even now did I conceal my guilty knowledge, though well I knew that the inexorable scroll of destiny was beginning to unfold itself. In fact, I was afraid to speak, for Mirza Shah had challenged me straightway to show a flaw in the happy horoscope I had drawn. And flaw in the emblazoned scroll there was none that I could lay finger on; only in my secret heart was the one sinister line traced--surely traced, as I remorsefully reflected.

"For months thereafter Mirza Shah kept away from me--I knew that his faith in the stars or in my skill to interpret them aright had been shaken. But I held my place and kept to the even tenor of my ways, for I had resolved that, if ever Prince Hasan should return home, then assuredly would I be on hand to warn Mirza Shah, so that, the crisis approaching, steps might at least be tried to avert the blow of destiny. Of this I was determined, even though death itself would come to me as the penalty of my long silence.

"But all of a sudden the storm of impending events broke. One day there came to Kashmir the intelligence that Prince Hasan, incensed at his father's just rebukes, was marching against him with a mighty host gathered together from the forces of his companions in revelry. Preparations for defence on our side were at once made, the armed men gathered in from the surrounding villages, and carronades mounted on the walls and at the gateway of the citadel, which hung on sloping ground, with a precipitous mountain guarding it in the rear.

"Too true proved to be the news. One morning the army of Prince Hasan came into view ascending the valley, and before nightfall the semi-circle of ground beneath the walls of the citadel, at a distance of four or five hundred yards, was occupied by the hosts of our enemy. Among these were both horsemen and foot soldiers, also full two score of great elephants dragging a train of siege guns.

"Now at last were the seals of silence broken from my lips. Without further delay I must tell everything to Mirza Shah. Just as the sun was setting I intercepted him when making a round of the walls, and begged of him to come with me to my tower.

"'Later,' he said, sternly, as he passed on to complete his plans for repelling the assault expected at daybreak on the morrow.

"The night was far advanced when at last my lord came to me, and, to my surprise, clinging to his arm, was his wife, the sultana. I placed cushions for her close to one of the casements, where she had been wont to sit on the occasions of her visits in days gone by. Without a word she sank into the place thus assigned to her.

"But Mirza Shah strode into the centre of the little circular room, and took his stand right under the lamp that illuminated it.

"'Now what have you to say, thou false astrologer?' he demanded, without word of prelude.

"Then did I take my courage in both hands, and told him everything--that the stars had in truth revealed to me that the son was destined to be his father's slayer, and that in my foolish desire to give the parents immediate joy I had suppressed the incident of the flaming star.

"As my narrative reached the end I watched the changes in the face of Mirza Shah. I had expected anger-righteous anger against my own self, but in place of this there came over his handsome countenance a serene look of happiness.

"'I thank you, Syed Ali,' he said, 'for the service you have done me. Had you told me eighteen years ago what you tell me to-night, then for a certainty would the guilt of murder be now upon my soul. To-day I am indeed in sore sorrow, but, Allah be praised, there is not my own child's blood upon my hands.'

"As he spoke he spread out his palms, as if in testimony of their stainlessness.

"But at that moment a great burst of lamentation came from beneath the sultana's veil, and, in a shrill tone of agony, she began to reproach herself.

"'It is I who am the cause of all this misery,' she wailed.

"Instantly Mirza Shah bent down and silenced her, then gathered her, almost like a bundle, into his arms.

"'I shall return straightway,' he cried to me, as he disappeared down the narrow stairway.

"Two full hours passed, however, before Mirza Shah came back. His face was white as marble--every feature seemed set, as the sculptor's chisel fixes each line of the carved stone. He spoke to me quite abruptly:

"'Syed Ali, ask no questions, but do my bidding immediately. Yours will be a dangerous task, but it is right that you, who have so long concealed the truth from me, should be called upon to take the risk. The successful accomplishment of your mission is the only reparation I require.'

"'Most gladly will I die for you, Mirza Shah,' I murmured, kissing the hem of his robe.

"'I know it,' he answered, 'and that is why I trust implicitly in you, relying both on your courage and on your discretion. Take this ring,' he went on, handing me a finger ring set with a large turquoise, 'and hide it among your garments. Use your best wits to evade the enemy's outposts. Follow the mountain path. You will get a horse from Abdulla Beg at the head of the gorge. Then ride night and day for Talakabad. There you will go to the house of a man named Gholab Khan, overlooking the town. You will hand to him the finger ring I have just given you. And this you will say: 'Mirza Shah is dead. You are to come to the person who has sent this ring.'

"'But my lord lives--Allah be praised! he will yet live many a long day.'

"'I like not deceit, Syed Ali, but when deceit has been used, then must deceit reply. Carry to Gholab Khan the ring and the exact words I have spoken: "Mirza Shah is dead. You are to come with me to the person who has sent this ring. Hasten." Gholab Khan will without delay respond to this summons. And here will I await your return,' added my lord grimly, 'for your stars have told me beyond all peradventure that I can hold this citadel until Gholab Khan arrives. Now go. Here is the key for the postern in the wall.'

"I had already tied the ring into a fold of my inner garment, and, taking only my staff, I set forth straightway.