Oriental Encounters Part 13

CHAPTER XVI

PRIDE AND A FALL

There was to be a grand fantasia at the castle of the greatest of Druze sheykhs in honour of a visit from the English Consul-General in Syria; and as an Englishman I was invited to be there. It was a journey of a day and a half. Upon the second morning Rashid and I had not gone far ere we fell in with other hors.e.m.e.n wending in the same direction as ourselves, well mounted and in holiday attire. All greeted us politely, but we kept apart, because they nearly all rode mares while we rode stallions--a fruitful source of trouble and a cause of war.

At length a young man mounted on a stallion overtook us with most cordial greetings. I had met him often. He was the son of a rich landowner in a neighbouring valley, and, I think, the most beautiful human creature I ever saw. That day he was particularly good to look at, his complexion of clear olive slightly flushed, his violet eyes beneath their long dark lashes dancing, his perfect white teeth gleaming with excitement and delight. He wore a cloak, broad striped, of white and crimson, a white frilled shirt of lawn showing above a vest of crimson velvet, fawn-coloured baggy trousers, and soft sheepskin boots. A snow-white turban crowned his whole appearance. His horse was thoroughbred and young, and he controlled its ceaseless dance to admiration. He told me that the stallion was his own, an uncle's gift, and quite the best in all the mountains; although mine, he added out of mere politeness, was undoubtedly a pearl of breeding and high spirit. He hoped with such a steed to gain renown in that day's horsemanship, and, if it might be, win the notice of the Consul-General and his lady.

'My father wished me to take out another horse,' he said; 'but I love this one, and am used to all his ways. I could not do myself full justice on another, nor would Rustem do his best for any other rider.'

He proceeded to discuss the horses which we saw before us on the road, pointing out in each of them some defect, and exclaiming: 'I shall excel them all, in sh' Allah! Does not your Honour also think my horse the best?'

I a.s.sured him that I did indeed, and all my wishes were for his success, 'because,' said I, 'I know and like you, and I do not know the others.'

'But some thou knowest for a certainty, for all the Mountain will be there. Come, let me name them to thee one by one.' And some of those he named were certainly well known to me.

'When thou seest Hasan, son of Ali, nicely mounted, wilt thou not think he is the better man?'

'No, no, by Allah!' I disclaimed such fickleness. 'Be sure that if good wishes can ensure success, all mine are with thee in to-day's event.'

'Allah increase thy wealth!' he cried in joy, as if I had bestowed on him a gift of price.

There was a crowd of many colours on the well-made road which wanders up through orchards to the village and ends on the meydan before the castle gate. There the crowd halted, making fast their horses to the many rings and tie-holes which were in the walls. Rashid took charge of my horse and his own, while I went on up steps on to a higher platform intersected by a stream of ice-cold water plunging down into the valley in a fine cascade whose spray and murmur cooled the air.

That rush of water was the greatest luxury in such a land, and the lord of the castle took much pride in its contrivance.

I went up to a door where soldiers and domestics lounged, but was informed: 'Our lord is out of doors.' A soldier pointed to a bunch of trees above the waterfall and overlooking the meydan, where many notables in black frock coat and fez sat out on chairs. He ran on to announce my coming. I was soon a member of the formal group, replying to the usual compliments and kind inquiries.

Coffee was handed round. Then came a tray of different kinds of sherbet, then a tray of eatables. The chiefs around me talked of harvests and the price of land, but, most of all, of horses, since it was a horsey day. The screaming of a stallion came persistently from the meydan--a naughty screaming which foreboded mischief. I recognised the voice. The culprit was my own Sheytan. The screams were so disturbing, so indecent, that several of the great ones round me frowned and asked: 'Whose horse is that?' in accents of displeasure.

I was ashamed to own him.

At length the lord of the castle called a servant to his side and whispered, pointing with his hand in the direction whence the screams proceeded. The servant hurried off, but presently returned and whispered something in his master's ear. His master looked at me and nodded gravely. He then addressed me in a deprecating tone, remarking: 'Your Honour's horse is too high-spirited; the crowd excites him. Will you allow him to be tethered in some other place?'

From the excessive smoothness of his manner I could guess that, had I been a native of the land, he would have told me to remove the vicious brute and myself likewise. I rose at once to go and see to it.

'Pray do not give yourself the trouble!' he exclaimed, distressed.

The servant went along with me, and, when we got to the meydan, Rashid came running. Sheytan was then indeed a terrifying sight, with streaming tail, mane bristling, and a wicked bloodshot eye, tearing at his head-rope, one minute pawing at the wall as if to climb it, the next kicking wildly with his head down. I know little of horses in general, but I knew that particular horse, and he knew me. I went up quietly and talked to him, then loosed the rope and led Sheytan away without much difficulty, Rashid meanwhile explaining to the servant of the house that no one else could possibly have done it. We tied him at the further end of the meydan.

Then I went back on to the terrace, where the notables had risen and were looking at the youths who were to take part in the fantasia, among them my companion of the road, the young Sheykh Abdul Hamid.

These were now on the parade-ground with their horses. My neighbour in the group of great ones said, politely:

'Your Honour should go with them; it is only proper, since their going is to compliment the representative of England. And you are, I see, a very skilful cavalier. The way you quieted that horse of yours was wonderful. We have all been talking of it. Ride with them!'

I begged to be excused. The essence of the fantasia is to show off one's own prowess and one's horse's paces while careering madly in a widish circle round some given object--an open carriage with some great one in it, or a bridal pair--taking no note of obstacles, dashing over rocks and gulleys and down breakneck slopes, loading and firing off a gun at intervals, in full career. I had tried the feeling of it once at a friend's wedding, and had been far from happy, though my horse enjoyed the romp and often tried to start it afterwards when there was no occasion. Remembering Abdul Hamid and his desire for praise that day, I said:

'There is only one good horseman here--Abdul Hamid, the son of the Sheykh Mustafa. All the rest of us, compared with him, are mere pedestrians.'

I pointed out the youth in question to my neighbour, who was a man of power in the mountains, and he praised the beauty of his form on horseback.

'By Allah, right is with thee,' he a.s.sented. 'There is none but he.'

Away they went--Jinblats, Talhuks, and Abdul Meliks--all in clean white turbans, with coloured cloaks a-stream upon the breeze, on horses gorgeously caparisoned. We waited half an hour--in silence, as it seemed; and then we heard the noise of their return, the shouts, the firing. I swear I saw a horse and man surmount a housetop in the village and then leap down upon the other side. At last, with yells and reckless gunshots and a whirl of dust, the crowd of hors.e.m.e.n came full tilt on the meydan. Their leader--in appearance a mad angel--was my friend, Abdul Hamid. Suddenly he drew his rein, flinging the steed right back upon his haunches. In so doing, looking up at me with a triumphant smile, he somehow missed his balance and pitched clear over his horse's head, just at the very moment when a carriage and pair containing the beaming Consul-General and his lady, with a glorious Cawwas upon the box, arrived upon the scene. I ran to help him, but another person was before me. A tall old man, whose garb bespoke him an initiated Druze, rushed out among the horses and the dust and beat the wretched lad about the shoulders, heaping curses on that lovely head for bringing shame upon an honoured house before such company. It was the lad's own father, the Sheykh Mustafa. I helped to drag the old man off, and would have gone on to console the son; but just then I beheld Sheytan approaching with a broken head-rope. I contrived to catch him and to mount without attending to the girths; and, once on horseback, I was glad to be there; for quite fifty of the tethered steeds had broken loose in the excitement, and were rushing here and there and fighting in a most alarming way. I have always had a dread of horse-fights, and this was not a single fight; it was a melee, fresh horses every minute breaking loose to join it. Right in my way two angry stallions rose up, boxing one another like the lion and the unicorn, and a little boy of ten or thereabouts ran in between and, jumping, caught their head-ropes.

I escaped at last and rode down through the village to the bottom of the valley, where a grove of walnut trees cast pleasant shade beside a stream. There Rashid found me later in the day. He told me that my disappearance had caused consternation and alarm, the Consul-General and his lady having asked for me. Bidding him remain with the two horses, I went back on foot to the castle, where I stayed only the time necessary to pay my respects.

As I was returning towards the valley, a litter borne between two mules was leaving the meydan. Beside it walked the stern Sheykh Mustafa, and in it, I had little doubt, reclined the beautiful Abdul Hamid.

I asked the serving-man who led the foremost mule if his young lord was seriously hurt. He answered:

'Yes; for he has broken his elbow and his shoulder and his collar-bone. But that is nothing, since he has disgraced our house.'

A bitter wail of 'Woe the day!' came from within the palanquin.

CHAPTER XVII

TRAGEDY

The sun was sinking down over the sea, the mountain wall with all its clefts and promontories wore a cloak of many colours, when we saw before us on a rock a ruined tower. We were looking for some human habitation where we might get food and shelter for the night; but we should have pa.s.sed by that building, taking it to be deserted, had not we espied a woman's figure sitting out before it in the evening light.

Experience of late had taught us to shun villages, belonging thereabouts to a peculiar sect, whose members made a virtue of inhospitality. At noon that day, when wishing to buy food, we had been met with such amazing insults that Rashid, my henchman, had not yet recovered from his indignation, and still brooded on revenge. On seeing that the ruined tower had occupants, he said:

'If these refuse us, we will force an entrance mercilessly; for see, they dwell alone, with none to help them.'

He rode before me towards the tower, with shoulders squared and whip upraised.

It surprised me that the woman sitting out before the door appeared indifferent to his approach, until, upon a closer view, I saw that she was old and blind. She must, I thought, be deaf as well, since she had failed to move at sound of hoof beats; which sound brought out an aged man, who shattered Rashid's plan of vengeance by exclaiming: 'Itfaddalu! (Perform a kindness!' that is, 'Enter!').

'It is thou who doest kindness,' I replied, by rote. 'We are thy suppliants for food and rest this night.'

'All mine is thine,' the old man answered, coming to hold my horse's head, while I dismounted. His wrinkled face was moulded to a patient, sad expression, which became more noticeable when he smiled; and he was always smiling.

I went into the tower and down a flight of much-worn steps, which ended in a heap of fallen masonry.

'Deign to proceed,' called out the tenant from behind me; when, climbing over the obstruction, I found myself in a large room, of which the only furniture consisted in a heap of bedding and some cooking things. Rather to my surprise the place was clean. The old man flung himself upon the ground and blew upon the ma.s.s of charcoal in a brazier, and presently a smell of coffee stewing filled the dungeon; for such it doubtless had been in the past, its only window being high above our heads, yet only just above the level of the rock, as I discovered when I went to seek Rashid, who, by our host's direction, had bestowed the horses in a cavern by the sea. The blind old woman still sat out before the door.

I walked all round the tower and noticed small fields neatly fenced below it on the landward side, and a few hobbled goats upon a strip of herbage near the sh.o.r.e; which, with some fishing-nets spread out upon the rocks to dry, informed me how our host obtained a livelihood.

As I went back towards the door, I met Rashid bringing our saddlebags.

He nodded to the woman, who still sat there motionless, and told me: 'She is mad, the poor old creature--but not dangerous. Fear nothing.

They are quite good people. It is strange, but he informs me she is not his mother nor his wife, nor anyone by birth allied to him. And yet he waits upon her, helpless as she is.'

Just then, the master of the tower appeared, and, going to the woman, took her hand and raised her. 'Itfaddalu!' he said, with just the same polite alacrity with which he welcomed us on our arrival, as if she, too, had been an honoured guest. We all went down the broken steps into the dungeon. A meal of fish and bread was set before us. The woman took her food apart. The master of the house did not sit down till she was satisfied; and, after supper, he set out a bed for her, and then washed out the vessels, before he came again and sat with us.

By that time the old woman was asleep. Two lighted wicks, pa.s.sed through a piece of cork which floated in a bowl of oil and water, roused the shadows of the vault. A sudden outcry at the far end of the room made us both jump.