Midst the Wild Carpathians Part 17

"All in this purse is yours if our plan succeeds, but if you betray us, this dagger will surely reach you. I'd hunt you down even if you took refuge in h.e.l.l itself!"

The hag grinned.

"No threats, please! I know something which will not only make you hand over that purse of gold to me instantly, but will also fill you with such insane joy that you'll be ready to cover me with kisses. I have about me a letter which, if once your master reads, he would cover me with gold from head to foot."

"Who wrote it?"

"That is a very dear question. If you paid for the answer down, I'm afraid you would not have enough money left to carry you home."

"I want to know who wrote that letter. I'm not going to buy a pig in a poke."

"Then farewell! If you want to know anything more, you must pay for it."

And she prepared to go.

"Stop! Give me that letter, or I'll kill you."

"No, you won't! One shriek from me and you are lost."

"Where's the letter?"

"You surely don't think me fool enough to tell you! I don't carry it on my person, so you need not look for it!"

The man angrily threw the purse towards her, whereupon she tripped to the entrance of the cavern, fetched from thence her crutch and unscrewed its handle, and drew forth from the hollow of the stick a crumpled silken roll, which the man unravelled and began to read, and as he read his face began to tremble for joy, disbelief, and surprise.

"If all this really happens, what you have now received is a mere earnest of what you will receive hereafter."

"Didn't I tell you so?" returned the beldame complacently. "Didn't I say that you'd gladly pay me in advance at least one-half of the sum stipulated?"

"Now, take heed that nothing is observed!"

"Pst! Go round by the stream, the usual path is to-day infested by marauding parties."

With these words the two shapes glided hastily out of the cavern, and vanished in different directions among the thickets of the wood.

And now begone, thou inhospitable outer world! thou oppressive mountain panorama! thou desolate horizon!

Appear, ye fairy realms! ye earthly counterfeits of the paradise of dreams! Permit us one glance into the sanctuary of mysterious joys, of stifled kisses, of glowing sighs, where Love and Love's satellites alone do dwell and live!

We see before us a gorgeous circular saloon. Its s.p.a.cious walls are made of mirrors, the perpetual reflection of which lends a peculiar l.u.s.tre to every object, nowhere suffering a shadow to fall. The sky-blue cupola of the domed ceiling is supported by slender, dark-red porphyry columns, half concealed by cl.u.s.ters of exotic flowers, which, heaped profusely together in rose-coloured porcelain vases, scatter the gold-dust of their velvet blossoms on the floor. The floor itself is covered with silk carpets--only here and there does the mosaic pavement shimmer forth. In the midst of the room, in a basin of rose-coloured marble, bubbles a crystal-clear fountain, from the centre of which springs a jet glistening with all the hues of the rainbow, and falling back in showers of liquid pearls. The water of this fountain is introduced into the fortress through a secret pa.s.sage by hidden pipes. All along the walls extend rows of velvet divans with cylindrical, flowered cashmere cushions; and on every side of us are fairies, laughing young girls dancing on the carpets, romping on the divans, and splashing one another with the water of the fountain. One odalisk swings a cymbal above her head, and dances with audacious leaps and bounds among the rest, who, winding their hands together, weave a magic circle around her. Three Nubian eunuchs accompany the dancers, singing love-lorn lays to the music of their simple pipes.

The veils of these fairy forms flutter left and right, revealing faces whose youthful charms no eye of man has ever gazed upon. The patter of their tiny feet is scarcely audible on the soft carpets. They seem to fly. Their light muslin robes ill conceal their youthful forms, and their tresses, escaping from their turbans, writhe down their snow-white shoulders like tame serpents.

A black slave is playing with the little gold fish that dart about in the basin of the fountain, and laughs aloud whenever any of the nimble little animals wriggle out of her hands. Her white, embroidered robe is held together by a golden girdle, and as she sits there on the rosy marble, the hemispheres of her ebony-black bosom and her plump round arms glisten in the sunbeams. The glow of youth shines through her dark features, and her coral lips, radiant with mirth and joy, allow us a glimpse at rows of the purest pearly teeth, as, with childish glee, she laughs at her own simple sport.

At the end of this oval saloon, raised a few feet above the floor, stands a purple ottoman. The rosy-coloured damask curtains, which form a baldachin over it, are tied to the branches of enormous jasmine trees by heavy golden ta.s.sels. Oriental b.u.t.terflies, with ultramarine wings, flutter round about the silvery jasmine blossoms; and at the head of the ottoman, on a perch in a golden cage, two little inseparable paroquets, with emerald wings and carmine heads, nestle close together and kiss each other perpetually.

Stretched out to her full length upon the ottoman lies Corsar Beg's favourite odalisk[21] Azrael. Beneath her snow-white elbows, left bare by the loose-falling, laced sleeves of her ample kaftan, lies a living panther, like a bright speckled cushion, licking his glossy skin, and playing like a young kitten with his mistress's jasper-black locks which descend upon his head.

[Footnote 21: _Odalisk_, from Turkish Odalyk = chamber-maid. Applied particularly to the chief concubines of the Sultan.]

The young lady has well chosen her companion. She too is as slender and as supple as he; her limbs are just as flexible as his; her slight figure has the same undulating motion, and in her languid eyes burns just the same savage, half-quenched fire which we see in the eyes of the half-tamed beast of prey. She lies supine on the ottoman. The amber mouthpiece of her fragrant narghily droops from her listless hand. Close by, on a little ivory table, spiced sherbet exhales from a golden bowl.

There too, on j.a.panese dishes, lie heaps of luscious fruit--golden, warty melons; pine-apples; the red fruit of the palm; fragrant cl.u.s.ters of grapes--and, dripping down upon a little silver platter, snow-white comb-honey, gathered by the bees in the days of the acacia's bloom.

Azrael bestows not a glance on the luscious fruits. When, from time to time, she raises her languid eyes, half hidden by their long silken lashes, one is almost thunderstruck: such burning glances are only to be found beneath southern skies, whose summer is as glowing, as languishing, as parching as the eyes of this girl. An eternal desire burns in those eyes, unspeakable, unappeasable, which enjoyment feeds without satisfying. If you gave her a world she would instantly demand another. Even when every sense is sated with bliss and rapture, her heart remains empty, and yearns after the unattainable. Those who love her, she hates; those who hate her, she loves. Die for her, and she will mock you; kill her, and she will adore you.

Her oval face is as pale as though the burning rays of her eyes had burnt up all its roses; but when she closes her eyes, and her bosom heaves convulsively beneath the fire of her secret thoughts, the bright crimson blood suffuses her cheeks once more.

And how her lips tremble! She is in a brown study. She speaks to no one.

Dancing and singing, the girls of the harem circle round her. A little negro boy kneels before her with a silver mirror. Half-naked female slaves shower down rose-leaves upon her, and fan her with peac.o.c.k's feathers. Azrael sees them and hears them not. She looks into the mirror, and speaks to herself, as if she would read her own thoughts from her own features; her lips tremble, smile, and pout defiance; her eye entices, languishes, weeps, or flashes rejection; at one moment she transports you into the seventh heaven of delight, at the next she dashes you to the earth. And now some cruel thought, some demoniacal idea has got hold of her. She retracts her upper lip, exposing her tightly-clenched teeth; her contracted eyebrows draw a trembling furrow across her snow-white forehead; the pupils of her eye disappear, leaving only the upturned whites visible; the beauty lines round the corners of her mouth grow crooked, and give the expression of a Fury to the beautiful countenance; her curling tresses, like writhing snakes, twist down on both sides of her. Her tremulous fingers, involuntarily and spasmodically, clutch at the smooth neck of the panther, and the tortured beast roars aloud for pain.

The favourite shrinks back from her own countenance. She thrusts aside the little negro, mirror and all; wraps her starry veil around her; turns upon her side with her tiny scarlet-slippered feet beneath her; presses her supple body against the panther's neck, and leaning upon her elbows, glances around with such a savage, menacing look, that every one on whom it falls, not even excepting the wild beast, shrinks back with fear.

But she cannot keep still a moment. A tormenting weariness compels her every moment to shift her position. Now she reclines on her divan, and raising her arms aloft, throws back her head and neck; all her limbs writhe like the folds of a serpent; in her eyes sparkle the tears of smothered desires.

None dare ask her, "What ailest thee?" Azrael is so capricious. Perhaps the questioner might please her, and she would command her to straightway leap down before her eyes from the highest pinnacle of the Corsar's castle into the abyss below. It is therefore neither wise nor safe to try to please Azrael.

But lo! a gold-trellised door opens, and Azrael's tearful eyes sparkle with joy when she perceives who it is that enters. It is the old woman with the warty chin, whom we have already met at the cavern's mouth. A ghastly, hideous duenna! Turkish women age prematurely. Ten years ago Babaye was Corsar Beg's favourite mistress, now she is Azrael's favourite slave.

The hag sits down at Azrael's feet. She alone has the privilege of sitting down before Azrael.

"Are we weary then?" said the beldame to the beautiful odalisk, with a confidential leer, displaying a row of jagged fangs black from sugar-sucking and betel-chewing. "We find no joy in anything, eh? What!

have not the Bayaderes[22] danced amidst a circle of burning tapers? Or has that also lost its charm? Are the Persian silks already shabby and threadbare? Is there no longer any flavour in the honeycomb or any perfume in the pine-apple? Have the pearls of Ceylon lost their l.u.s.tre?

Do the songs of the Italian eunuchs vex and weary? And has the mirror nothing beautiful to show? Wherefore is the Sun of suns so moody and so impatient? Why should a cloud obscure the heaven of Damanhour? Shall I delight her of the alabaster forehead with a tale? Shall I tell the story of the captive lion which Medzsnun, the immortal poet, has written?"

[Footnote 22: _Bayaderes._ Indian singing and dancing girls. A Portuguese word.]

Azrael cast down her languid eyelids by way of a.s.sent.

"Once upon a time they captured a lion in the palm forests of Bilidulgherid. A rich and powerful Dey bought the beast for a thousand gold pieces. The Dey was a mighty man. At his command they built for the lion a cage of gold so large that palm-trees could stand upright therein. The ceiling of the cage was inlaid with lapis-lazuli. They brought to it, from the distant mountains, a spring of living water, and the floor was decked with purple carpets. But the lion was sad and silent. All day it lay there sullen and morose. Only when the sun had set would it arise with an angry roar, shake the door of its cage, and terrify the silence of the night. The Dey asked the lion, 'What dost thou lack, my beautiful beast? Thy house is of gold. Thou dost eat with me out of the same dish, and thy drink is the crystal spring! What more dost thou desire? Wouldst thou bathe in ambergris? Or dost thou desire for supper the hearts of my favourite odalisks?' The lion roared and made answer, 'My cage, though it be of gold, is still a cage; these palm-trees are not the groves of Nubia, and this basin is not the springs of the desert of Berzendar. I want neither thy perfumes nor thy spices, nor the throbbing hearts of thy slaves. Give me back the free air of the desert, there will I speedily find again my good-humour!'"

Babaye was silent. The odalisk, with a tremulous sigh, bowed down her head upon her aching bosom, and beckoned to the duenna to tell her yet another tale.

"Wouldst thou hear the story of the fairy and the mortal maiden? Once upon a time the fairy of the rainbow perceived a lovely maiden, enticed her away with sweet words, and took her over the bridge of the seven colours into the third heaven. There, everything was more beautiful than it is on earth--the flower a languid diamond; the sigh of the zephyr a melodious song; the pillars of the palaces nought but crystal and gems.

There every sense experienced a threefold greater bliss than here below.

The fairy treated the maiden like the apple of her eye--fairies know the secret of loving tenderly--and yet the girl was sad. She grew weary in heaven, and whenever the fairy went away to suck up water for the sky from the ocean, she saw how the girl bent over the rainbow-bridge, and looked longingly down upon the cloudy earth. 'What lackest thou?' she asked the maiden. 'Wherefore dost thou look down so upon the earth?

Speak! What dost thou want? Command me, and I'll fetch it for thee!'--'Stars are falling down from heaven,' replied the girl, 'and they fall upon the earth. Give me of them, and I will make a pearly coronet for my hair!' And the fairy went and brought the stars. Again the maiden looked down sadly upon the earth. Again the fairy asked her, 'What dost thou lack? Is there aught on earth that thy soul desirest?'

The maiden answered, 'There below dance slim damsels, and look up smilingly at me! Wherefore are they happier than I? Would that I had their heads to play at ball with!' And the fairy brought the heads of the damsels for the maiden to play at ball with."

Azrael looked at the hag with contracted eyebrows, half raised herself upon her elbows, and sought in her golden girdle for the malachite handle of her little dagger.

"Once more the maiden looked down upon the earth," resumed Babaye, smiling. "'Is aught else to be found there that is worth a wish?' asked the fairy in despair. 'Below there, youthful heroes are walking to and fro,' returned the maiden, 'and they are all so sweet and so lovely.

Thou art a fairy, 'tis true, but thou art alone in heaven. Thou canst not give me fresh love. Let me go back again to earth.'"

Azrael sprang from the ottoman with glowing cheeks, and seized the beldame by the shoulder. Her bosom heaved tumultuously; a threatening scarlet flamed upon her burning face. All the muscles of her snow-white arms seemed to quiver.

Babaye looked up at her with a grin.