Tales of the Caravan, Inn, and Palace Part 19

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But the attention which had been attracted by Said was now concentrated upon the unusual skill and dexterity which he displayed in combat. His horse was swifter than a bird, while his sword whizzed about in still more rapid circles. He threw the lance at its mark as easily and with as much accuracy as if it had been an arrow shot from a bow. He conquered the bravest of the opposing force, and at the end of the tournament was so universally recognized as the victor, that one of the caliph's brothers and the son of the grand vizier, who had both fought on Said's side, requested the pleasure of breaking a lance with him.

Ali, the caliph's brother, was soon conquered by Said; but the grand vizier's son withstood him so bravely that after a long contest they thought it best to postpone the decision until the next meeting.

The day after the tournament, nothing was spoken of in Bagdad but the handsome, rich, and brave stranger. All who had seen him, even those over whom he had triumphed, were charmed by his well-bred manners. He even heard his own praises sounded in the shop of Kalum-Bek, and it was only deplored that no one knew where he lived.

The next week, Said found at the house of the fairy a still finer costume and still more costly weapons. Half Bagdad had rushed to the square, while even the caliph looked on from a balcony; he, too, admired Almansor, and at the conclusion of the tournament he hung a large gold medal, attached to a gold chain, about the youth's neck, as a mark of his favor.

It could not very well be otherwise than that this second and still more brilliant triumph of Said's should excite the envy of the young men of Bagdad. "Shall a stranger," said they to one another, "come here to Bagdad, and carry off all the laurels? He will now boast in other places that among the flower of Bagdad's youth there was not one who was a match for him." They therefore resolved, at the next tournament, to fall upon him, as if by chance, five or six at a time.

These tokens of discontent did not escape Said's sharp eye. He noticed how the young men congregated at the street corners, whispered to one another, and pointed angrily at him. He suspected that none of them felt very friendly toward him, with the exception of the caliph's brother and the grand vizier's son, and even they rather annoyed him by their questions as to where they might call on him, how he occupied his time, what he found of interest in Bagdad, etc., etc. It was a singular coincidence that one of these young men, who surveyed Said-Almansor with the bitterest looks, was no other than the man whom Said had thrown down when the a.s.sault was made on Kalum-Bek a few weeks before, just as the man was about to tear out the unfortunate merchant's beard.

This man looked at Said very attentively and spitefully. Said had conquered him several times in the tournament; but this would not account for such hostile looks, and Said began to fear lest his figure or his voice had betrayed him to this man as the clerk of Kalum-Bek--a discovery that would expose him to the sneers and anger of the people.

The project which Said's foes attempted to carry out at the next tournament failed, not only by reason of Said's caution and bravery, but by the a.s.sistance he received from the caliph's brother and the grand vizier's son. When these two young men saw that Said was surrounded by five or six who sought to disarm or unseat him, they dashed up, chased away the conspirators, and threatened the men who had acted so treacherously with dismissal from the course.

For more than four months, Said had excited the astonishment of Bagdad by his prowess, when one evening, on returning home from the tournament, he heard some voices which seemed familiar to him. Before him walked four men at a slow pace, apparently discussing some subject together. As Said approached nearer, he discovered that they were talking in the dialect which the men in Selim's tribe had used in the desert, and suspected that they were planning some robbery. His first thought was to draw back from these men; but when he reflected that he might be the means of preventing some great wrong, he stole up still nearer to listen to what they were saying.

"The gate keeper expressly said it was the street to the right of the bazar," said one of the men; "he will certainly pa.s.s through it to-night, in company with the grand vizier."

"Good!" added another. "I am not afraid of the grand vizier; he is old, and not much of a hero; but the caliph wields a good sword, and I wouldn't trust him; there would be ten or twelve of the body-guard stealing after him."

"Not a soul!" responded a third. "Whenever he has been seen and recognized at night, he was always unattended except by the vizier or the head chamberlain. He will be ours to-night; but no harm must be done him."

"I think," said the first speaker, "that the best plan would be to throw a noose over his head; we may not kill him, for it would be but a small ransom that they would pay for his body, and, more than that, we shouldn't be sure of receiving it."

"An hour before midnight, then!" exclaimed they, and separated, one going this way, another that.

Said was not a little horrified at this scheme. He resolved to hasten at once to the caliph's palace and warn him of the threatened danger.

But after running through several streets, he remembered the caution that the fairy had given him--that the caliph had received a bad report about him. He reflected that his warning might be laughed at, or regarded as an attempt on his part to ingratiate himself with the Caliph of Bagdad; and so he concluded that it would be best to depend on his good sword, and rescue the caliph from the hands of the robbers himself.

So he did not return to Kalum-Bek's house, but sat down on the steps of a mosque and waited there until night had set in. Then he went through the bazar and into the street mentioned by the robbers, and hid himself behind a projection of one of the houses. He might have stood there an hour, when he heard two men coming slowly down the street. At first he thought it must be the caliph and his grand vizier; but one of the men clapped his hands, and immediately two other men hurried very noiselessly up the street from the bazar. They whispered together for a while, and then separated; three hiding not far from Said, while the fourth paced up and down the street. The night was very dark, but still, so that Said had to depend almost entirely upon his acute sense of hearing.

Another half-hour had pa.s.sed, when footsteps were heard coming from the bazar. The robber must have heard them too, for he stole by Said towards the bazar. The steps came nearer, and Said was just able to make out some dark figures, when the robber clapped his hands, and, in the same moment, the three men waiting in ambush rushed out. The persons attacked must have been armed, for Said heard the ring of clashing swords. At once he drew his own Damascus blade, and sprang upon the robber's with the cry: "Down with the enemies of the great Haroun!" He struck one of them to the ground with the first blow, and turned upon two others, who were just in the act of disarming a man over whom they had thrown a rope. Said lifted the rope blindly in order to cut it, but in the effort to use his sword he struck one of the robber's arms such a blow, as to cut off his hand, and the robber fell to his knees with cries of pain. The fourth robber, who had been fighting with another man, now came towards Said, who was still engaged with the third, but the man who had been la.s.soed no sooner found himself free than he drew his dagger, and, from one side, plunged it into the breast of the advancing robber. When the remaining robber saw this, he threw away his sword and fled.

Said did not remain long in doubt as to whom he had saved, for the taller of the two men said: "The one thing is as strange as the other; this attack upon my life or liberty, as the incomprehensible a.s.sistance and rescue. How did you know who I was? Did you know of the scheme of these robbers?"

"Ruler of the Faithful," answered Said, "for I do not doubt that you are he, I walked down the street El Malek this evening behind some men, whose strange and mysterious dialect I had once learned. They spoke of taking you prisoner and of killing your vizier. As it was too late to warn you, I resolved to go to the place where they would lie in ambush for you, and give you my a.s.sistance."

"Thank you," said Haroun; "but it is not best to remain long in this place; take this ring, and come in the morning to my palace; we will then talk over this affair, and see how I can best reward you. Come, vizier, it is best not to stop here; they might come back again."

Thus saying, he placed a ring on Said's finger, and attempted to lead off the grand vizier, but the latter, begging him to wait a moment, turned and held out to the astonished Said a heavy purse: "Young man,"

said he, "my master, the caliph, can do anything for you that he feels inclined to do, even to making you my successor; but I myself can do but little, and that little had better be done to-day, rather than to-morrow. Therefore, take this purse. That does not, however, cancel my debt of grat.i.tude; so whenever you have a wish, come in confidence to me."

Overpowered with his good fortune, Said hurried home. But here he was not so well received. Kalum-Bek was at first angry at his long absence, and then anxious, for the merchant thought he might easily lose the handsome sign of his shop. Kalum therefore received him with abusive words, and raved like a madman. But Said--who had taken a look into his purse and found it filled with gold pieces, and reflected that he could now travel home, even without the caliph's favor, which was certainly not worth less than the grat.i.tude of his vizier--declared roundly that he would not remain in his service another hour. At first Kalum was very much frightened by this declaration; but shortly he laughed sneeringly and said:

"You loafer and vagabond! You miserable creature! Where would you run to, if I were to give up supporting you? Where would you get a dinner or a lodging?"

"You need not trouble yourself about that, Mr. Kalum-Bek," answered Said audaciously. "Farewell; you will never see me again!"

With these words, Said left the house, while Kalum-Bek looked after him speechless with astonishment. The following morning, however, after thinking over the matter well, he sent out his errand boys, and had the runaway sought for every-where. For a long time their search was a vain one; but finally one of the boys came back and reported that he had seen Said come out of a mosque and go into a caravansary. He was, however, much changed, wore a beautiful costume, a dagger sword, and splendid turban.

When Kalum-Bek heard this, he shouted with an oath: "He has stolen from me, and bought clothes with the money. Oh, I am a ruined man!" Then he ran to the chief of police, and as he was known to be a relative of Messour, the head chamberlain, he had no difficulty in having two policemen sent out to arrest Said. Said sat before a caravansary, conversing quietly with a merchant whom he had found there, about a journey to Balsora, his native city, when suddenly he was seized by some men, and his hands tied behind his back before he could offer any resistance. He asked them whose authority they were acting under, and they replied that they were obeying the orders of the chief of police, on complaint of his rightful master, Kalum-Bek. The ugly little merchant then came up, abused and jeered at Said, felt in the young man's pocket, and to the astonishment of the bystanders, and with a shout of triumph, drew out a large purse filled with gold.

"Look! He has robbed me of all that, the wicked fellow!" cried he, and the people looked with abhorrence at the prisoner, saying: "What! so young, so handsome, and yet so wicked! To the court, to the court, that he may get the bastinado!" Thus they dragged him away, while a large procession of people of all ranks followed in their wake, shouting: "See, that is the handsome clerk of the bazar; he stole from his master and ran away; he took two hundred gold pieces!"

The chief of police received the prisoner with a dark look. Said tried to speak, but the official told him to be still, and listened only to the little merchant. He held up the purse, and asked Kalum whether this gold had been stolen from him. Kalum-Bek swore that it had; but his perjury, while it gained him the gold, did not help to restore to him his clerk, who was worth a thousand gold pieces to him, for the judge said: "In accordance with a law that my all-powerful master, the caliph, has recently made, every theft of over a hundred gold pieces that transpires in the bazar, is punished with banishment for life to a desert island. This thief comes at just the right time; he makes the twentieth of his cla.s.s, and so completes the lot; to-morrow they will be put on a vessel and taken out to sea."

Said was in despair. He besought the officers to listen to him, to let him speak only one word with the caliph; but he found no mercy.

Kalum-Bek, who now repented of his oath, also pleaded for him, but the judge said: "You have your gold back, and should be contented; go home and keep quiet, or I will fine you ten gold pieces for every contradiction." Kalum quieted down; the judge made a sign, and the unfortunate Said was led away.

He was taken to a dark and damp dungeon, where nineteen poor wretches, scattered about on straw, received him as their companion in misfortune, with wild laughter and curses on the judge and caliph.

Terrible as was the fate before him, fearful as was the thought of being banished to a desert island, he still found consolation in the thought that the morrow would take him out of this horrible prison. But he was very greatly in error in supposing that his situation would be bettered on the ship. The twenty men were thrown into the hold, where they could not stand upright, and there they fought among themselves for the best places.

The anchor was weighed, and Said wept bitter tears as the ship that was to bear him far away from his fatherland began to move. They received bread and fruits, and a drink of sweetened water, but once a day: and it was so dark in the ship's hold, that lights always had to be brought down when the prisoners were to be fed. Every two or three days one of their number was found dead, so unwholesome was the air in this floating prison, and Said's life was preserved only by his youth and his splendid health.

They had been on the sea for fourteen days, when one day the waves roared more violently than ever, and there was much running to and fro on the deck. Said suspected that a storm was at hand, and he welcomed the prospect of one, hoping that then he might be released by death.

The ship began to pitch about, and finally struck on a ledge with a terrible crash. Cries and groans were heard on the deck, intermingled with the roar of the storm. At last all was still again; but at the same time one of the prisoners discovered that the water was pouring into the ship. They pounded on the hatch-door, but could get no answer; and as the water poured in more and more rapidly, they united their strength and managed to break the hatch open.

They ascended the steps, but found not a soul on board. The whole crew had taken to the boats. Most of the prisoners were in despair, for the storm increased in fury, the ship cracked and settled down on the ledge. For some hours they sat on the deck and partook of their last repast from the provisions they found in the ship, then the storm began to rage again, the ship was torn from the ledge on which it had been held, and broken up.

Said had climbed the mast, and held fast to it when the ship went to pieces. The waves tossed him about, but he kept his head up by paddling with his feet. Thus he floated about, in ever-increasing danger, for half an hour, when the chain with whistle attached once again fell out of his bosom, and once more he tried to make it sound. With one hand he held fast to the mast, and with the other put the whistle to his lips, blew, and a clear musical tone was the result. Instantly the storm ceased, and the waves became as smooth as if oil had been poured on them. He had hardly looked about him, with an easier breath, to see whether he could discern land, when the mast beneath him began to expand in a very singular manner, and to move as well; and, not a little to his terror, he perceived that he was no longer riding on a wooden mast, but upon the back of an enormous dolphin. But after a few moments his courage returned; and as he saw that the dolphin swam along on his course quietly and easily, although swiftly, he ascribed his wonderful rescue to the silver whistle and to the kind fairy, and shouted his most earnest thanks into the air.

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His wonderful horse carried him through the waves with the speed of an arrow; and before night he saw land, and also a broad river, into which the dolphin turned. Up stream it went more slowly, and, that he might not starve, Said, who remembered from old stories of enchantment how one should work a charm, took out the whistle again, blew it loudly and heartily, and wished that he had a good meal. The dolphin stopped instantly, and out of the water rose a table, as little wet as if it had stood in the sun for eight days, and richly furnished with the finest dishes. Said attacked the food like a famished person, for his rations during his imprisonment were scant and of miserable quality; and when he had eaten to his fill, he expressed his thanks; the table sank down again, while he jogged the dolphin in the side, and the fish at once responded by continuing on its course up stream.

The sun was setting when Said perceived in the dim distance a large city, whose minarets seemed to bear a resemblance to those of Bagdad.

This discovery was not a pleasant one; but his confidence in the kind fairy was so great that he felt sure she would not permit him to fall again into the clutches of the unscrupulous Kalum-Bek. To one side, about three miles distant from the city, and close to the river, he noticed a magnificent country house, and, to his astonishment, the fish seemed to be making directly towards this house.

Upon the roof of the house stood a group of handsomely dressed men, and on the bank of the river Said saw a large crowd of servants, who were looking at him in wonder. The dolphin stopped at some marble steps that led up to the house, and hardly had Said put foot on the steps when the dolphin disappeared. A number of servants now ran down the steps, and requested him in the name of their master to come up to the house, at the same time offering him a suit of dry clothes. Said dressed himself quickly, and followed the servants to the roof, where he found three men, of whom the tallest and handsomest came forward to meet him in a pleasant manner.

"Who are you, wonderful stranger," said he, "you who tame the fishes of the sea, and guide them to the right and left, as the best horseman governs his steed. Are you a sorcerer, or a being like us?"

"Sir," replied Said, "things have gone very badly with me for the last few weeks; but if it will please you to hear me, I will relate my story."

Then he told the three men all of his adventures, from the moment of leaving his father's house up to his wonderful rescue from the sea. He was often interrupted by their expressions of astonishment; and when he had ended, the master of the house, who had received him in so kind a manner, said: "I trust your words, Said; but you tell us that you won a medal in the tournament, and that the caliph gave you a ring; can you show them to us?"

"I have preserved them both upon my heart," said the youth, "and would sooner have parted with my life than with these precious gifts, for I esteem it my most valiant and meritorious deed that I freed the caliph from the hands of his would-be murderers." So saying, he drew from his bosom the medal and ring, and handed them to the men.

"By the beard of the Prophet! It is he! It is my ring!" cried the tall, handsome man. "Grand vizier, let us embrace him, for here stands our savior." To Said it was like a dream. The two men embraced him, and Said, prostrating himself, said:

"Pardon me, Ruler of the Faithful, that I have spoken so freely before you, for you can be no other than Haroun-al-Raschid, the great Caliph of Bagdad."

"I am he, and your friend," replied Haroun; "and from this hour forth, all your sad misfortunes are at an end. Follow me to Bagdad, remain in my dominion, and become one of my most trustworthy officers; for you have shown you were not indifferent to Haroun's fate, though I should not like to put all of my faithful servants to such a severe test."

Said thanked the caliph, and promised to remain with him,--first requesting permission to make a visit to his father, who must be suffering much anxiety on his account; and the caliph thought this just and commendable. They then mounted horses, and were soon in Bagdad. The caliph showed Said a long suite of splendidly decorated rooms that he should have, and, more than that, promised to build a house for his own use.

At the first information of this event, the old brothers-in-arms of Said's--the grand vizier's son and the caliph's brother--hastened to the palace and embraced Said as the deliverer of their n.o.ble caliph, and begged him to become their friend. But they were speechless with astonishment when Said, drawing forth the prize medal, said: "I have been your friend for a long time." They had only seen him with his false beard and dark skin; and when he had related how and why he had disguised himself--when he had the blunt weapons brought to prove his story, fought with them, and thus gave them the best proof that he was the brave Almansor--then did they embrace him with joyful exclamations, considering themselves fortunate in having such a friend.