The Prince of India; Or, Why Constantinople Fell Volume I Part 32

"With my most dutiful protestations."

"Look for me then at midnight."

"I shall be awake, and ready."

"Meantime, Prince, I will seek an apartment more in correspondence with the degree of my Lord's most honored guest."

"Nay, good Mirza, suffer me to advise in that matter. The bringing me into this place was a mistake of the Governor's. He could not divine the merit I have in your master's eyes. He took me for a Christian. I forgive him, and pray he may not be disturbed. He may be useful to me.

Upon the springing of a mischance--there is one such this instant in my mind's eye--I may be driven to come back to this Castle. In such an event, I prefer him my servant rather than my enemy."

"O Prince!"

"Nay, Emir, the idea is only a suggestion of one of the Prophets whom Allah stations at the turns in every man's career."

"But every man cannot see the Prophets."

The Jew finished gravely: "Rather than disturb the Governor further, soothe him for me; and when the Lord Mahommed goes hence, do thou see an instruction is left putting the Castle and its chief at my order. Also, as thou art a grateful friend, Mirza, serve me by looking into the kettles out of which we are to have our refreshment, and order concerning them as for thyself. I feel a stir of appet.i.te."

The Emir backed from the apartment, leaving a low salaam just outside the door.

If the reader thinks the Prince content now, he is not mistaken. True he paced the floor long and rapidly; but, feeling himself close upon a turn in his course, he was making ready for it perfectly as possible by consulting the Prophet whom he saw waiting there.

And as the Lord Mahommed failed not to remember them what time he betook himself to supper, the three guests up in the prison fared well, nor cared for the howling of the wind, and the bursting and beating of the rain still rioting without the walls.

CHAPTER XIII

MAHOMMED HEARS FROM THE STARS

The second recall of the Emir Mirza departing with the appointment for the Prince of India was remarkable, considering Mahommed's usual quickness of conclusion and steadiness of purpose; and the accounting for it is noteworthy.

So completely had the young Turk been taken up by study and military service that leisure for love had been denied him; else he either despised the pa.s.sion or had never met a woman to catch his fancy and hold it seriously.

We have seen him make the White Castle by hard galloping before the bursting of the storm. While at the gate, and in the midst of his reception there, the boats were reported making all speed to the river landing; and not wishing his presence at the Castle to be known in Constantinople, he despatched an under officer to seize the voyagers, and detain them until he had crossed the Bosphorus _en route_ to Adrianople. However, directly the officer brought back the spirited message of the Princess Irene to the Governor of the Castle, his mind underwent a change.

"What," he asked, "sayst thou the woman is akin to the Emperor Constantine?"

"Such is her claim, my Lord, and she looks it."

"Is she old?"

"Young, my Lord--not more than twenty."

Mahommed addressed the Governor:

"Stay thou here. I will take thy office, and wait upon this Princess."

Dismounting, then, in the capacity of Governor of the Castle, he hastened to the landing, curious as well as desirous of offering refuge to the n.o.ble lady.

He saw her first a short way off, and was struck with her composed demeanor. During the discussion of his tender of hospitality, her face was in fair view, and it astonished him. When finally she stepped from the boat, her form, delicately observable under the rich and graceful drapery, and so exquisitely in correspondence with her face, still further charmed him.

Before the chairs were raised, he sent a messenger to the Castle with orders to place everybody in hiding, and for his Kislar-Aga, or chief eunuch, to be in the pa.s.sage of entrance to receive and take charge of the kinswoman of the Emperor and her attendant. By a further order the Governor proper was directed to vacate his harem apartments for her accommodation.

In the Castle, after the Princess had been thus disposed of, the impression she made upon him increased.

"She is so high-born!--so beautiful!--She has such spirit and mind!--She is so calm under trial--so courageous--so decorous--so used to courtly life!"

Such exclamations attested the unwonted ferment going on in his mind.

Gradually, as tints under the brush of a skilful painter lose themselves in one effect, his undefined ideas took form.

"O Allah! What a Sultana for a hero!"

And by repet.i.tion this ran on into what may be termed the chorus of a love song--the very first of the kind his soul had ever sung.

Such was Mahommed's state when Mirza received the turquoise ring, and, announcing the Prince of India, asked for orders. Was it strange he changed his mind? Indeed he was at the moment determining to see again the woman who had risen upon him like a moon above a lake; so, directly he had despatched the Emir to the Prince of India with the appointment for midnight, he sent for an Arab Sheik of his suite, arrayed himself in the latter's best habit, and stained his hands, neck, and face-turned himself, in brief, into the story-teller whom we have seen admitted to amuse the Princess Irene.

At midnight, sharply as the hour could be determined by the uncertain appliances resorted to by the inmates of the Castle, Mirza appeared at his master's door with the mystical Indian, and, pa.s.sing the sentinel there, knocked like one knowing himself impatiently awaited. A voice bade them enter.

The young Turk, upon their entrance, arose from a couch of many cushions prepared for him under a canopy in the centre of the room.

"This, my Lord, is the Prince of India" said Mirza; then, almost without pause, he turned to the supposed Indian, and added more ceremoniously: "Be thou happy, O Prince! The East hath not borne a son so worthy to take the flower from the tomb of Saladin, and wear it, as my master here --the Lord Mahommed."

Then, his duty done, the Emir retired.

Mahommed was in the garb used indoors immemorially by his race--sharply pointed slippers, immense trousers gathered at the ankles, a yellow quilted gown dropping below the knees, and a turban of balloon shape, its interfolding stayed by an aigrette of gold and diamonds. His head was shaven up to the edge of the turban, so that, the light falling from a cl.u.s.ter of lamps in suspension from the ceiling, every feature was in plain exposure. Looking into the black eyes scarcely shaded by the upraised arching brows, the Prince of India saw them sparkle with invitation and pleasure, and was himself satisfied.

He advanced, and saluted by falling upon his knees, and kissing the back of his hands laid palm downward on the floor. Mahommed raised him to his feet.

"Rise, O Prince!" he said--"rise, and come sit with me."

From behind the couch, the Turk dragged a chair of ample seat, railed around except at the front, and provided with a cushion of camel's hair--a chair such as teachers in the Mosques use when expounding to their cla.s.ses. This he placed so while he sat on the couch the visitor would be directly before him, and but little removed. Soon the two were sitting cross-legged face to face.

"A man devout as the Prince of India is reported to me," Mahommed began, in a voice admirably seconding the respectful look he fixed upon the other, "must be of the rightly guided, who believe in G.o.d and the Last Day, and observe prayer, and pay the alms, and dread none but G.o.d--who therefore of right frequent the temples."

"Your words, my Lord, are those of the veritable messenger of the most high Heaven," the Wanderer responded, bending forward as if about to perform a prostration. "I recognize them, and they give me the sensation of being in a garden of perpetual abode, with a river running beneath it." Mahommed, perceiving the quotation from the Koran, bent low in turn, saying: "It is good to hear you, for as I listen I say to myself, This one is of the servants of the Merciful who are to walk upon the earth softly. I accost you in advance, Welcome and Peace."

After a short silence, he continued: "A frequenter of mosques, you will see, O Prince, I have put you in the teacher's place. I am the student.

Yours to open the book and read; mine to catch the pearls of your saying, lest they fall in the dust, and be lost."

"I fear my Lord does me honor overmuch; yet there is a beauty in willingness even where one cannot meet expectation. Of what am I to speak?"

Mahommed knit his brows, and asked imperiously, "Who art thou? Of that tell me first."

Happily for the Prince, he had antic.i.p.ated this demand, and, being intensely watchful, was ready for it, and able to reply without blenching: "The Emir introduced me rightly. I am a Prince of India."

"Now of thy life something."