Every Man for Himself Part 31

"Ay, ay," Tommy Hand answered. "I'll be jumpin' about a bit, I'm thinkin', t' keep warm-as me father bid me do."

"Queek!" cried Salim, laughing.

"Ay," Tommy muttered; "as me father bid me do."

"Jump, Tom-ee!" Salim clapped his hands. "Hi, hi! Dance, Tom-ee!"

In the beginning Tommy was deliberate and ponderous; but as his limbs were suppled-and when his blood ran warm again-the dance quickened; for Salim Awad slapped strangely inspiring encouragement, and with droning "la, la!" and sharp "hi, hi!" excited the boy to mad leaps-and madder still. "La, la!" and "Hi, hi!" There was a mystery in it. Tommy leaped high and fast. "La, la!" and "Hi, hi!" In response to the strange Eastern song the fisherboy's grotesque dance went on.... Came then the appalling catastrophe: the pan of rotten, brittle salt-water ice cracked under the lad; and it fell in two parts, which, in the heave of the sea, at once drifted wide of each other. The one part was heavy, commodious; the other a mere unstable fragment of what the whole had been: and it was upon the fragment that Salim Awad and Tommy Hand were left.

Instinctively they sprawled on the ice, which was now overweighted-unbalanced. Their faces were close; and as they lay rigid-while the ice wavered and the water covered it-they looked into each other's eyes.... There was, not room for both.

"Tom-ee," Salim Awad gasped; his breath indrawn, quivering, "I am-mus'-go!"

The boy stretched out his hand-an instinctive movement, the impulse of a brave and generous heart-to stop the sacrifice.

"Hush!" Salim Awad whispered, hurriedly, lifting a finger to command peace. "I am-for one queek time-have theenk. Hush, Tom-ee!"

Tommy Hand was silent.

And Salim Awad heard again the clatter and evening mutter of Washington Street, children's cries and the patter of feet, drifting in from the soft spring night-heard again the rattle of dice in the outer room, and the aimless strumming of the canoun-heard again the voice of Khalil Khayyat, lifted concerning such as lose at love. And Salim Awad, staring into a place that was high and distant, beyond the gaudy, dirty ceiling of the little back room of Nageeb Fiani's pastry-shop near the Battery, saw again the form of Haleema, Khouri's star-eyed daughter, floating in a cloud, compa.s.sionate and glorious. "'The sun as it sets,'" he thought, in the high words of Antar, spoken of Abla, his beloved, the daughter of Malik, when his heart was sore, "'turns toward her and says, "Darkness obscures the land, do thou arise in my absence." The brilliant moon calls out to her: "Come forth, for thy face is like me, when I am in all my glory." The tamarisk-trees complain of her in the morn and in the eve, and say: "Away, thou waning beauty, thou form of the laurel!" She turns away abashed, and throws aside her veil, and the roses are scattered from her soft, fresh cheeks. Graceful is every limb; slender her waist; love-beaming are her glances; waving is her form. The l.u.s.tre of day sparkles from her forehead, and by the dark shades of her curling ringlets night itself is driven away!'".... They who lose at love? Upon what quest must the wretched ones go? And Khalil Khayyat had said that the Thing was to be found in this place.... Salim Awad's lips trembled: because of the loneliness of this death-and because of the desert, gloomy and infinite, lying beyond.

"Tom-ee," Salim Awad repeated, smiling now, "I am-mus'-go. Goo'-bye, Tom-ee!"

"No, no!"

In this hoa.r.s.e, gasping protest Salim Awad perceived rare sweetness. He smiled again-delight, approval. "Ver' much 'bliged," he said, politely.

Then he rolled off into the water....

One night in winter the wind, driving up from the Battery, whipped a gray, soggy snow past the door of Nageeb Fiani's pastry-shop in Washington Street. The shop was a cosey shelter from the weather; and in the outer room, now crowded with early idlers, they were preaching revolution and the shedding of blood-boastful voices, raised to the falsetto of shallow pa.s.sion. Khalil Khayyat, knowing well that the throne of Abdul-Hamid would not tremble to the talk of Washington Street, sat unheeding in the little back room; and the coal on the narghile was glowing red, and the coffee was steaming on the round table, and a cloud of fragrant smoke was in the air. In the big, black book, lying open before the poet, were to be found, as always, the thoughts of Abo Elola Elmoarri.

Tanous, the newsboy-the son of Yusef, the father of Samara, by many called Abosamara-threw _k.a.w.kab Elhorriah_ on the cook's counter.

"News of death!" cried he, as he hurried importantly on. "_k.a.w.kab_! News of death!"

The words caught the ear of Khalil Khayyat. "News of death?" mused he.

"It is a ma.s.sacre in Armenia." He turned again, with a hopeless sigh, to the big, black book.

"News of death!" cried Nageeb Fiani, in the outer room. "What is this?"

The death of Salim Awad: being communicated, as the editor made known, by one who knew, and had so informed an important person at St. John's, who had despatched the news south from that far place to Washington Street.... And when Nageeb Fiani had learned the manner of the death of Salim Awad, he made haste to Khalil Khayyat, holding _k.a.w.kab Elhorriah_ open in his, hand.

"There is news of death, O Khalil!" said he.

"Ah," Khayyat answered, with his long finger marking the place in the big, black book, "there has been a ma.s.sacre in Armenia. G.o.d will yet punish the murderer."

"No, Khalil."

Khayyat looked up in alarm. "The Turks have not shed blood in Beirut?"

"No, Khalil."

"Not so? Ah, then the mother of Shishim has been cast into prison because of the sedition uttered by her son in this place; and she has there died."

"No, Khalil."

"Nageeb," Khayyat demanded, quietly, "of whom is this sad news spoken?"

"The news is from the north."

Khayyat closed the book. He sipped his coffee, touched the coal on the narghile and puffed it to a glow, contemplated the gaudy wall-paper, watched a spider pursue a patient course toward the ceiling; at last opened the big, black book, and began to turn the leaves with aimless, nervous fingers. Nageeb stood waiting for the poet to speak; and in the doorway, beyond, the people from the outer room had gathered, waiting also for words to fall from the lips of this man; for the moment was great, and the poet was great.

"Salim Awad," Khayyat muttered, "is dead."

"Salim is dead. He died that a little one might live."

"That a little one might live?"

"Even so, Khalil-that a child might have life."

Khayyat smiled. "The quest is ended," he said. "It is well that Salim is dead."

It is well? The people marvelled that Khalil Khayyat should have spoken these cruel words. It is well? And Khalil Khayyat had said so?

"That Salim should die in the cold water?" Nageeb Fiani protested.

"That Salim should die-the death that he did. It is well."

The word was soon to be spoken; out of the mind and heart of Khalil Khayyat, the poet, great wisdom would appear. There was a crowding at the door: the people pressed closer that no shade of meaning might be lost; the dark faces turned yet more eager; the silence deepened, until the m.u.f.fled rattle of trucks, lumbering through the snowy night, and the roar of the Elevated train were plain to be heard. What would the poet say? What word of eternal truth would he speak?

"It is well?" Nageeb Fiani whispered.

"It is well."

The time was not yet come. The people still crowded, still shuffled-still breathed. The poet waited, having the patience of poets.

"Tell us, O Khalil!" Nageeb Fiani implored.

"They who lose at love," said Khalil Khayyat, fingering the leaves of the big, black book, "must patiently seek some high death."

Then the people knew, beyond peradventure, that Khalil Khayyat was indeed a great poet.

IX-THE REVOLUTION AT SATAN'S TRAP