The Weavers, Complete - Gilbert Parker
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He handed her the letter with a respectful salutation.
"In the hour he left, madame, he came to know that the name of Foorgat
Bey was not blotted from the book of Time, nor from Fate's reckoning."
After all these years! Her instinct had been true, then, that night so
long ago. The hand that took the letter trembled slightly in spite of her
will, but it was not the disclosure Nahoum had made which caused her
agitation. This letter she held was in David Claridge's hand, the first
she had ever seen, and, maybe, the last that he had ever written, or that
any one would ever see, a document of tears. But no, there were no tears
in this letter! As Hylda read it the trembling passed from her fingers,
and a great thrilling pride possessed her. If tragedy had come, then it
had fallen like a fire from heaven, not like a pestilence rising from the
earth. Here indeed was that which justified all she had done, what she
was doing now, what she meant to do when she had read the last word of it
and the firm, clear signature beneath.
"Excellency [the letter began in English], I came into the desert
and into the perils I find here, with your last words in my ear,
'There is the matter of Foorgat Bey.' The time you chose to speak
was chosen well for your purpose, but ill for me. I could not turn
back, I must go on. Had I returned, of what avail? What could I do
but say what I say here, that my hand killed Foorgat Bey; that I had
not meant to kill him, though at the moment I struck I took no heed
whether he lived or died. Since you know of my sorrowful deed, you
also know why Foorgat Bey was struck down. When, as I left the bank
of the Nile, your words blinded my eyes, my mind said in its misery:
'Now, I see!' The curtains fell away from between you and me, and I
saw all that you had done for vengeance and revenge. You knew all
on that night when you sought your life of me and the way back to
Kaid's forgiveness. I see all as though you spoke it in my ear.
You had reason to hurt me, but you had no reason for hurting Egypt,
as you have done. I did not value my life, as you know well, for it
has been flung into the midst of dangers for Egypt's sake, how
often! It was not cowardice which made me hide from you and all the
world the killing of Foorgat Bey. I desired to face the penalty,
for did not my act deny all that I had held fast from my youth up?
But there was another concerned--a girl, but a child in years, as
innocent and true a being as God has ever set among the dangers of
this life, and, by her very innocence and unsuspecting nature, so
much more in peril before such unscrupulous wiles as were used by
Foorgat Bey.
"I have known you many years, Nahoum, and dark and cruel as your
acts have been against the work I gave my life to do, yet I think
that there was ever in you, too, the root of goodness. Men would
call your acts treacherous if they knew what you had done; and so
indeed they were; but yet I have seen you do things to others--not
to me--which could rise only from the fountain of pure waters. Was
it partly because I killed Foorgat and partly because I came to
place and influence and power, that you used me so, and all that I
did? Or was it the East at war with the West, the immemorial feud
and foray?
"This last I will believe; for then it will seem to be something
beyond yourself--centuries of predisposition, the long stain of the
indelible--that drove you to those acts of matricide. Ay, it is
that! For, Armenian as you are, this land is your native land, and
in pulling down what I have built up--with you, Nahoum, with you--
you have plunged the knife into the bosom of your mother. Did it
never seem to you that the work which you did with me was a good
work--the reduction of the corvee, the decrease of conscription, the
lessening of taxes of the fellah, the bridges built, the canals dug,
the seed distributed, the plague stayed, the better dwellings for
the poor in the Delta, the destruction of brigandage, the slow
blotting-out of exaction and tyranny under the kourbash, the quiet
growth of law and justice, the new industries started--did not all
these seem good to you, as you served the land with me, your great
genius for finance, ay, and your own purse, helping on the things
that were dear to me, for Egypt's sake? Giving with one hand
freely, did your soul not misgive you when you took away with the
other?
"When you tore down my work, you were tearing down your own; for,
more than the material help I thought you gave in planning and
shaping reforms, ay, far more than all, was the feeling in me which
helped me over many a dark place, that I had you with me, that I was
not alone. I trusted you, Nahoum. A life for a life you might have
had for the asking; but a long torture and a daily weaving of the
web of treachery--that has taken more than my life; it has taken
your own, for you have killed the best part of yourself, that which
you did with me; and here in an ever-narrowing circle of death I say
to you that you will die with me. Power you have, but it will
wither in your grasp. Kaid will turn against you; for with my
failure will come a dark reaction in his mind, which feels the cloud
of doom drawing over it. Without me, with my work falling about his
ears, he will, as he did so short a time ago, turn to Sharif and
Higli and the rest; and the only comfort you will have will be that
you destroyed the life of him who killed your brother. Did you love
your brother? Nay, not more than did I, for I sent his soul into
the void, and I would gladly have gone after it to ask God for the
pardon of all his sins--and mine. Think: I hid the truth, but why?
Because a woman would suffer an unmerited scandal and shame.
Nothing could recall Foorgat Bey; but for that silence I gave my
life, for the land which was his land. Do you betray it, then?
"And now, Nahoum, the gulf in which you sought to plunge me when you
had ruined all I did is here before me. The long deception has
nearly done its work. I know from Ebn Ezra Bey what passed between
you. They are out against me--the slave-dealers--from Senaar to
where I am. The dominion of Egypt is over here. Yet I could
restore it with a thousand men and a handful of European officers,
had I but a show of authority from Cairo, which they think has
deserted me.
"I am shut up here with a handful of men who can fight and thousands
who cannot fight, and food grows scarcer, and my garrison is worn
and famished; but each day I hearten them with the hope that you
will send me a thousand men from Cairo. One steamer pounding here
from the north with men who bring commands from the Effendina, and
those thousands out yonder beyond my mines and moats and guns will
begin to melt away. Nahoum, think not that you shall triumph over
David Claridge. If it be God's will that I shall die here, my work
undone, then, smiling, I shall go with step that does not falter, to
live once more; and another day the work that I began will rise
again in spite of you or any man.
"Nahoum, the killing of Foorgat Bey has been like a cloud upon all
my past. You know me, and you know I do not lie. Yet I do not
grieve that I hid the thing--it was not mine only; and if ever you
knew a good woman, and in dark moments have turned to her, glad that
she was yours, think what you would have done for her, how you would
have sheltered her against aught that might injure her, against
those things women are not made to bear. Then think that I hid the
deed for one who was a stranger to me, whose life must ever lay far
from mine, and see clearly that I did it for a woman's sake, and not
for this woman's sake; for I had never seen her till the moment I
struck Foorgat Bey into silence and the tomb. Will you not
understand, Nahoum?
"Yonder, I see the tribes that harry me. The great guns firing make
the day a burden, the nights are ever fretted by the dangers of
surprise, and there is scarce time to bury the dead whom sickness
and the sword destroy. From the midst of it all my eyes turn to you
in Cairo, whose forgiveness I ask for the one injury I did you;
while I pray that you will seek pardon for all that you have done to
me and to those who will pass with me, if our circle is broken.
Friend, Achmet the Ropemaker is here fighting for Egypt. Art thou
less, then, than Achmet? So, God be with thee.
"DAVID CLARIDGE."
Without a pause Hylda had read the letter from the first word to the
last. She was too proud to let this conspirator and traitor see what
David's words could do to her. When she read the lines concerning
herself, she became cold from head to foot, but she knew that Nahoum
never took his eyes from her face, and she gave no outward sign of what
was passing within. When she had finished it, she folded it up calmly,
her eyes dwelt for a moment on the address upon the envelope, and then
she handed it back to Nahoum without a word. She looked him in the eyes
and spoke. "He saved your life, he gave you all you had lost. It was not
his fault that Prince Kaid chose him for his chief counsellor. You would
be lying where your brother lies, were it not for Claridge Pasha."
"It may be; but the luck was with me; and I have my way."
She drew herself together to say what was hard to say. "Excellency, the
man who was killed deserved to die. Only by lies, only by subterfuge,
only because I was curious to see the inside of the Palace, and because I
had known him in London, did I, without a thought of indiscretion, give
myself to his care to come here. I was so young; I did not know life, or
men--or Egyptians." The last word was uttered with low scorn.
He glanced up quickly, and for the first time she saw a gleam of malice
in his eyes. She could not feel sorry she had said it, yet she must
remove the impression if possible.
"What Claridge Pasha did, any man would have done, Excellency. He struck,
and death was an accident. Foorgat's temple struck the corner of a
pedestal.
"His death was instant. He would have killed Claridge Pasha if it had
been possible--he tried to do so. But, Excellency, if you have a
daughter, if you ever had a child, what would you have done if any man
had--"
"In the East daughters are more discreet; they tempt men less," he
answered quietly, and fingered the string of beads he carried.
"Yet you would have done as Claridge Pasha did. That it was your brother
was an accident, and--"
"It was an accident that the penalty must fall on Claridge Pasha, and on
you, madame. I did not choose the objects of penalty. Destiny chose them,
as Destiny chose Claridge Pasha as the man who should supplant me, who
should attempt to do these mad things for Egypt against the judgment of
the world--against the judgment of your husband. Shall I have better
judgment than the chancellories of Europe and England--and Lord
Eglington?"
"Excellency, you know what moves other nations; but it is for Egypt to
act for herself. You ask me why I did not go to the Effendina. I come to
you because I know that you could circumvent the Effendina, even if he
sent ten thousand men. It is the way in Egypt."
"Madame, you have insight--will you not look farther still, and see that,
however good Claridge Pasha's work might be some day in the far future,
it is not good to-day. It is too soon. At the beginning of the twentieth
century, perhaps. Men pay the penalty of their mistakes. A man's
life"--he watched her closely with his wide, benevolent eyes--"is neither
here nor there, nor a few thousands, in the destiny of a nation. A man
who ventures into a lion's den must not be surprised if he goes as Harrik
went--ah, perhaps you do not know how Harrik went! A man who tears at the
foundations of a house must not be surprised if the timbers fall on him
and on his workmen. It is Destiny that Claridge Pasha should be the
slayer of my brother, and a danger to Egypt, and one whose life is so
dear to you, madame. You would have it otherwise, and so would I, but we
must take things as they are--and you see that letter. It is seven weeks
since then, and it may be that the circle has been broken. Yet it may not
be so. The circle may be smaller, but not broken."
She felt how he was tempting her from word to word with a merciless
ingenuity; yet she kept to her purpose; and however hopeless it seemed,
she would struggle on.
"Excellency," she said in a low, pleading tone, "has he not suffered
enough? Has he not paid the price of that life which you would not bring
back if you could? No, in those places of your mind where no one can see
lies the thought that you would not bring back Foorgat Bey. It is not an
eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth that has moved you; it has not
been love of Foorgat Bey; it has been the hatred of the East for the
West. And yet you are a Christian! Has Claridge Pasha not suffered
enough, Excellency? Have you not had your fill of revenge? Have you not
done enough to hurt a man whose only crime was that he killed a man to
save a woman, and had not meant to kill?"
"Yet he says in his letter that the thought of killing would not have
stopped him."
"Does one think at such a moment? Did he think? There was no time. It was
the work of an instant. Ah, Fate was not kind, Excellency! If it had
been, I should have been permitted to kill Foorgat Bey with my own
hands."
"I should have found it hard to exact the penalty from you, madame."
The words were uttered in so neutral a way that they were enigmatical,
and she could not take offence or be sure of his meaning.
"Think, Excellency. Have you ever known one so selfless, so good, so
true? For humanity's sake, would you not keep alive such a man? If there
were a feud as old as Adam between your race and his, would you not
before this life of sacrifice lay down the sword and the bitter
challenge? He gave you his hand in faith and trust, because your God was
his God, your prophet and lord his prophet and lord. Such faith should
melt your heart. Can you not see that he tried to make compensation for
Foorgat's death, by giving you your life and setting you where you are
now, with power to save or kill him?"
"You call him great; yet I am here in safety, and he is--where he is.
Have you not heard of the strife of minds and wills? He represented the
West, I the East. He was a Christian, so was I; the ground of our battle
was a fair one, and--and I have won."
"The ground of battle fair!" she protested bitterly. "He did not know
that there was strife between you. He did not fight you. I think that he
always loved you, Excellency. He would have given his life for you, if it
had been in danger. Is there in that letter one word that any man could
wish unwritten when the world was all ended for all men? But no, there
was no strife between you--there was only hatred on your part. He was so
much greater than you that you should feel no rivalry, no strife. The
sword he carries cuts as wide as Time. You are of a petty day in a petty
land. Your mouth will soon be filled with dust, and you will be
forgotten. He will live in the history of the world. Excellency, I plead
for him because I owe him so much: he killed a man and brought upon
himself a lifelong misery for me. It is all I can do, plead to you who
know the truth about him--yes, you know the truth--to make an effort to
save him. It may be too late; but yet God may be waiting for you to lift
your hand. You said the circle may be smaller, but it may be unbroken
still. Will you not do a great thing once, and win a woman's gratitude,
and the thanks of the world, by trying to save one who makes us think
better of humanity? Will you not have the name of Nahoum Pasha linked
with his--with his who thought you were his friend? Will you not save
him?"
He got slowly to his feet, a strange look in his eyes. "Your words are
useless. I will not save him for your sake; I will not save him for the
world's sake; I will not save him--"
A cry of pain and grief broke from her, and she buried her face in her
hands.
"--I will not save him for any other sake than his own."
He paused. Slowly, as dazed as though she had received a blow, Hylda
raised her face and her hands dropped in her lap.
"For any other sake than his own!" Her eyes gazed at him in a bewildered,
piteous way. What did he mean? His voice seemed to come from afar off.
"Did you think that you could save him? That I would listen to you, if I
did not listen to him? No, no, madame. Not even did he conquer me; but
something greater than himself within himself, it conquered me."
She got to her feet gasping, her hands stretched out. "Oh, is it true--is
it true?" she cried.
"The West has conquered," he answered.
"You will help him--you will try to save him?"
"When, a month ago, I read the letter you have read, I tried to save
him. I sent secretly four thousand men who were at Wady Halfa to relieve
him--if it could be done; five hundred to push forward on the quickest
of the armed steamers, the rest to follow as fast as possible. I did my
best. That was a month ago, and I am waiting--waiting and hoping,
madame."
Suddenly she broke down. Tears streamed from her eyes. She sank into the
chair, and sobs shook her from head to foot.
"Be patient, be composed, madame," Nahoum said gently. "I have tried you
greatly--forgive me. Nay, do not weep. I have hope. We may hear from him
at any moment now," he added softly, and there was a new look in his wide
blue eyes as they were bent on her.
CHAPTER XLI
IN THE LAND OF SHINAR
"Then I said to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear
the Ephah?
"And he said unto me, To build it an house in the land of Shinar;
and it shall be established, and set there upon her own base."
David raised his head from the paper he was studying. He looked at Lacey
sharply. "And how many rounds of ammunition?" he asked.
"Ten thousand, Saadat."
"How many shells?" he continued, making notes upon the paper before him.
"Three hundred, Saadat."
"How many hundredweight of dourha?"
"Eighty--about."
"And how many mouths to feed?"
"Five thousand."
"How many fighters go with the mouths?"
"Nine hundred and eighty-of a kind."
"And of the best?'
"Well, say, five hundred."
"Thee said six hundred three days ago, Lacey."
"Sixty were killed or wounded on Sunday, and forty I reckon in the
others, Saadat."
The dark eyes flashed, the lips set. "The fire was sickening--they fell
back?"
"Well, Saadat, they reflected--at the wrong time."
"They ran?"
"Not back--they were slow in getting on."
"But they fought it out?"
"They had to--root hog, or die. You see, Saadat, in that five hundred I'm
only counting the invincibles, the up-and-at-'ems, the blind-goers that
'd open the lid of Hell and jump in after the enemy."
The pale face lighted. "So many! I would not have put the estimate half
so high. Not bad for a dark race fighting for they know not what!"
"They know that all right; they are fighting for you, Saadat."
David seemed not to hear. "Five hundred--so many, and the enemy so near,
the temptation so great."
"The deserters are all gone to Ali Wad Hei, Saadat. For a month there
have been only the deserted."
A hardness crept into the dark eyes. "Only the deserted!" He looked out
to where the Nile lost itself in the northern distance. "I asked Nahoum
for one thousand men, I asked England for the word which would send them.
I asked for a thousand, but even two hundred would turn the scale--the
sign that the Inglesi had behind him Cairo and London. Twenty weeks, and
nothing comes!"
He got to his feet slowly and walked up and down the room for a moment,
glancing out occasionally towards the clump of palms which marked the
disappearance of the Nile into the desert beyond his vision. At intervals
a cannon-shot crashed upon the rarefied air, as scores of thousands had
done for months past, torturing to ear and sense and nerve. The confused
and dulled roar of voices came from the distance also; and, looking out
to the landward side, David saw a series of movements of the besieging
forces, under the Arab leader, Ali Wad Hei. Here a loosely formed body of
lancers and light cavalry cantered away towards the south, converging
upon the Nile; there a troop of heavy cavalry in glistening mail moved
nearer to the northern defences; and between, battalions of infantry took
up new positions, while batteries of guns moved nearer to the river,
curving upon the palace north and south. Suddenly David's eyes flashed
fire. He turned to Lacey eagerly. Lacey was watching with eyes screwed up
shrewdly, his forehead shining with sweat.
"Saadat," he said suddenly, "this isn't the usual set of quadrilles. It's
the real thing. They're watching the river--waiting."
"But south!" was David's laconic response. At the same moment he struck a
gong. An orderly entered. Giving swift instructions, he turned to Lacey
again. "Not Cairo--Darfur," he added.
"Ebn Ezra Bey coming! Ali Wad Hei's got word from up the Nile, I guess."
David nodded, and his face clouded. "We should have had word also," he
said sharply.
There was a knock at the door, and Mahommed Hassan entered, supporting an
Arab, down whose haggard face blood trickled from a wound in the head,
while an arm hung limp at his side.
"Behold, Saadat--from Ebn Ezra Bey," Mahommed said. The man drooped
beside him.
David caught a tin cup from a shelf, poured some liquor into it, and held
it to the lips of the fainting man. "Drink," he said. The Arab drank
greedily, and, when he had finished, gave a long sigh of satisfaction.
"Let him sit," David added.
When the man was seated on a sheepskin, the huge Mahommed squatting
behind like a sentinel, David questioned him. "What is thy name--thy
news?" he asked in Arabic.
"I am called Feroog. I come from Ebn Ezra Bey, to whom be peace!" he
answered. "Thy messenger, Saadat, behold he died of hunger and thirst,
and his work became mine. Ebn Ezra Bey came by the river. . . ."
"He is near?" asked David impatiently.
"He is twenty miles away."
"Thou camest by the desert?"
"By the desert, Saadat, as Ebn Ezra effendi comes."
"By the desert! But thou saidst he came by the river."
"Saadat, yonder, forty miles from where we are, the river makes a great
curve. There the effendi landed in the night with four hundred men to
march hither. But he commanded that the boats should come on slowly and
receive the attack in the river, while he came in from the desert."
David's eye flashed. "A great device. They will be here by midnight,
then, perhaps?"
"At midnight, Saadat, by the blessing of God."
"How wert thou wounded?"
"I came upon two of the enemy. They were mounted. I fought them. Upon the
horse of one I came here."
"The other?"
"God is merciful, Saadat. He is in the bosom of God."
"How many men come by the river?"
"But fifty, Saadat," was the answer, "but they have sworn by the stone in
the Kaabah not to surrender."
"And those who come with the effendi, with Ebn Ezra Bey, are they as
those who will not surrender?"
"Half of them are so. They were with thee, as was I, Saadat, when the
great sickness fell upon us, and were healed by thee, and afterwards
fought with thee." David nodded abstractedly, and motioned to Mahommed to
take the man away; then he said to Lacey: "How long do you think we can
hold out?"
"We shall have more men, but also more rifles to fire, and more mouths to
fill, if Ebn Ezra gets in, Saadat."
David raised his head. "But with more rifles to fire away your ten
thousand rounds"--he tapped the paper on the table--"and eat the eighty
hundredweight of dourha, how long can we last?"
"If they are to fight, and with full stomachs, and to stake everything on
that one fight, then we can last two days. No more, I reckon."
"I make it one day," answered David. "In three days we shall have no
food, and unless help comes from Cairo, we must die or surrender. It is
not well to starve on the chance of help coming, and then die fighting
with weak arms and broken spirit. Therefore, we must fight to morrow, if
Ebn Ezra gets in to-night. I think we shall fight well," he added. "You
think so?"
"You are a born fighter, Saadat."
A shadow fell on David's face, and his lips tightened. "I was not born a
fighter, Lacey. The day we met first no man had ever died by my hand or
by my will."
"There are three who must die at sunset--an hour from now-by thy will,
Saadat."
A startled look came into David's face. "Who?" he asked.
"The Three Pashas, Saadat. They have been recaptured."
"Recaptured!" rejoined David mechanically.
"Achmet Pasha got them from under the very noses of the sheikhs before
sunrise this morning."
"Achmet--Achmet Pasha!" A light came into David's face again.