The Great Mogul

“Sleep well, Roger, and may the Lord keep thee!” was Walter’s parting word; and Sainton answered drowsily, for something more potent than the day’s emotions had wearied him: —

“An He fail either of us, lad, naught else shall avail.”

The bright moon circled in the sky. Her beams, low now on the horizon, penetrated to the recesses of the room and fell on the low trestle-beds on which they reposed in deep slumber. It was a small matter, this nightly course of the luminary, yet, perchance, in those still hours, the direction of a stray shaft of light made history in India.

About two o’clock, when the tall cypress trees of the Garden of Heart’s Delight threw black shadows toward the house, a small, naked man, smeared with oil lest anyone should seize him, and covered again with dust to render him almost invisible, crawled along the dark pathway of the shadow and crossed the veranda outside the Englishmen’s room. He moved with the deathly silence of a snake, passing between two sleeping Rajputs, so quickly and noiselessly that one who saw him would most likely have rubbed his eyes and deemed the flitting vision a mere figment of the imagination.

Once inside the house he crouched in the shade of a pillar, and waited until another ghoul joined him in the same manner. These two were Thugs, murderers by caste, who worshiped the pickaxes with which they buried their victims. Had Milton or Dante ever heard of such the abode of harpy-footed furies and the lowest circle of Inferno would alike have been rendered more horrific by a new demoniac imagery. No man was safe from them, none could withstand their devilish art. Sainton, whom not a score of Thugs could have pulled down in the open, was a mere babe in their clutch when he knew not of their presence.

For these fiends never failed. They were professional stranglers, with sufficient knowledge of anatomy to dislocate the neck of him whom they had marked down as their prey. Never a cry, scarce a movement, would betray a strong man’s death. Of them it might indeed be truly said: —

Their fatal hands

No second stroke intend.

Creeping stealthily, they reached the two charpoys, and each squatted at the back of his intended victim. Sainton slept nearer the veranda, and his wide-brimmed hat was lying on the floor. Throughout his wanderings he ever sported a plume of cock’s feathers and he still retained the curious ornament which served as a brooch. It was lit up now by a moonbeam, and the Thug, whose watchful eyes regarded all things, saw what he took to be a headless snake, coiled in glistening folds and surrounded by a ring of gold. The wretch, in whose dull brain glimmered some dim conception of a deity, drew back appalled. Here was one guarded by his tutelary god, the snake, a snake, too, of uncanny semblance, reposing in a precious shrine. He had never before encountered the like. Weird legends, whispered at night in trackless forests, where he and his associates had their lair, trooped in on him. He quaked, and shrank yet further away, a fierce savage tamed by a mere fossil.

The sibilant chirp of a grasshopper brought his fellow Thug to his side. Glaring eyes and chin thrown forward sufficed to indicate the cause of this danger signal. No words were needed. With one accord they retreated. Squirming across the veranda and along the path of the lengthening shadows they regained the shelter of the cypresses.

“Brother,” whispered one, “they have a jadu!”8

“Who shall dare to strike where the jungle-god reposes!” was the rejoinder.

“A snake without a head, ringed and shining! Saw one ever the like?”

“Let us escape, else we shall be slain.”

The trees swallowed them, and, although sought vengefully, they were never seen again by those whose behests they had not fulfilled… Minutes passed, until the stout Kutub-ud-din, hiding near the gate with a horde of hirelings, grew impatient that his vice-regal throne in Bengal was not assured. So he growled an order and strode openly to the gate, where, in the Emperor’s name, he demanded of a wakeful sentry audience of Sher Afghán.

“My master sleeps,” was the answer. “The matter must wait.”

“It cannot wait. It concerns thy master’s safety. Here is Pir Muhammed Khan, Kotwal9 of Agra, who says that two Thugs are within. We have come in all haste to warn Sher Afghán to search for the evil-doers.”

Now, the mere name of the dreaded clan was enough to alarm his hearer, who well knew that none could guard against a Thug’s deadly intent. Warning his comrades he unbound the door, but showed discretion in sending messengers to arouse Sher Afghán. Kutub-ud-din, thinking the Persian and the Englishmen had been killed half an hour earlier, deceived the guard still further by his earnestness. Giving directions that some should watch the walls without, while others searched every inch of the gardens, he, followed by a strong posse, went rapidly towards the house. Almost the first person he encountered was Sher Afghán himself. The young nobleman, awakened from sound sleep by strange tidings, no sooner recognized his visitor than his brow seamed with anger.

“What folly is this?” he cried. “Why hast thou dared to come hither with a rabble at such an hour, Kutub-ud-din?”

Surprise, disappointment, envious rage, combined to choke the would-be viceroy, but he answered, boldly enough: —

“You should not requite with hasty words one who thought to do thee a service.”

“I am better without any service thou canst render. Be off, dog, and tell thy tales to some old woman who fears them.”

Beside himself with anger and humiliation, Kutub-ud-din raised his sword threateningly. It was enough. Sher Afghán, seeing naught but some new palace treachery in this untimely visit, drew a dagger and sprang at his unwieldy opponent with the tiger-like ferocity for which he was famous. Kutub-ud-din endeavored to strike, but, ere his blow fell, he was ripped so terribly that his bowels gushed forth. Here was no vice-royalty for him, only the barren kingdom of the grave.

“Avenge me!” he yelled, as he fell in agony, for your would-be slayer is ever resentful of his own weapons being turned against him.

Pir Muhammed Khan, an astute Kashmiri, seeing his own advancement made all the more certain by reason of the failure of the Emperor’s foster-brother – thinking, too, that Sher Afghán might be taken at a disadvantage whilst he looked down on his prostrate foe – leaped forward and dealt the Persian a heavy stroke on the head with a scimitar. Sher Afghán turned and killed him on the spot.

It chanced, unhappily, that among those in the immediate vicinity of this sudden quarrel the Kotwal’s retainers far outnumbered the followers of Sher Afghán, many of whose men were yet asleep, while others were scouring the gardens. The native of India may always be trusted to avenge his master’s death, so a certain dog-like fidelity impelled a score or more to attack the Persian simultaneously. Realizing his danger he possessed himself of the fallen Kotwal’s sword and fought furiously, crying loudly for help. Oh, for a few lightning sweeps of the good straight blades reposing peacefully in their scabbards by the beds of his English allies! How they would have equalized the odds in that supreme moment! How Roger would have shorn the heads and Walter slit the yelling throats of the jackals who yelped around the undaunted but over-powered Persian!

For the blood from the Kotwal’s blow poured into his eyes, and he struck blindly if fiercely. Closer pressed the gang, and, at last, he fell to his knees, struck down by a matchlock bullet. He must have felt that his last hour had come. Struggling round in order to face towards Mecca, he used his waning strength to pick up some dust from the garden path. He poured it over his head by way of ablution, strove to rise and renew the unequal fight, and sank back feebly. A spear thrust brought the end, and the man who had dared to rival a prince’s love died in the garden to which the presence of Nur Mahal had lent romance and passion.

Roger, whom the clash of steel might have roused from the tomb, stirred uneasily in his sleep when the first sounds of the fight smote his unconscious ears. The shot waked him, though not to thorough comprehension, so utterly possessed was he with drowsiness.

Then a light flashed in the room, and he saw a beautiful woman standing in an inner doorway, a woman whose exquisite face was white and tense as she held aloft a lamp and cried: —

“Why do ye tarry here when my husband is fighting for his life and for yours?”

Now he was wide awake. It was Nur Mahal, unveiled and robed all in white, who stood there and spoke so vehemently.

Up he sprang, and roused Mowbray with his mighty grip. The new conflict raging over Sher Afghán’s body was music in his ears, for several Rajputs had come, too late, to their master’s assistance.

“God in heaven, lad!” he roared, “here’s a fray in full blast and we snoring. Have at them, Walter! The pack is on us!”

His words, no less than a vigorous shaking, awoke his companion.

“Oh, come speedily!” wailed Nur Mahal again. “I know not what is happening, but I heard my husband’s voice calling for aid.”

They needed no further bidding, though their eyes were strangely heavy and their bodies relaxed. Once they were out in the night air and running toward the din of voices the stupor passed. Yet, when they reached the main alley, where Sher Afghán lay dead, they knew not whom to strike nor whom to spare, so intermixed were the combatants and so confused the riot of ringing simitars, of hoarse shouts, of agonized appeals for mercy.

But Nur Mahal, quicker than they to distinguish between native and native, cried as she ran with them: —

“My husband’s men wear white turbans. All the others are strangers.”

They needed no further instruction. When they saw a bare poll, a skull cap, or a dark turban, they hit it, and the battle, equal before, soon became one sided. The presence of Roger alone determined the fight instantly. Kutub-ud-din and the Kotwal had assured their supporters that the Feringhis were dead, and hinted, in vague terms, that the looting of the Diwán’s house would not be too strictly inquired into if the “search” for the Thugs were resisted.

But here was the terrific mass of the giant looming through the night, and here was his sword sweeping a six-foot swath in front of him. No man who saw him waited for closer proof of his existence. Soon the Garden of Heart’s Delight was emptied of the gang save those who were dead or too badly injured to crawl. Then lights were brought.

Nur Mahal was the first to find her husband’s body. She threw herself by his side in a gust of tears.

“Alas!” she sobbed, “they have slain him! It is my fault, O prince of men! What evil fate made thee wed me, Sher Afghán? I vow to Allah, though I could not love thee living, I shall mourn thee dead. Jahangir, if thou hast done this thing, bitterly shalt thou rue it! Oh, my husband, my husband, thou art fallen because of an unworthy woman!”

It was with difficulty that Walter could persuade her to leave the corpse of the dead hero. Tears choked her voice, and her self-reproach was heartrending, inasmuch as it was quite undeserved. The distraught girl could not be blamed because a marriage planned for state reasons had not prospered, and even Mowbray, who was prejudiced against her, knew quite well that she was no party to this night attack against her father’s house.

Finally, he led her to the trembling serving-women who cowered within, and then addressed himself to an inquiry into all that had taken place.

Piece by piece, the tangle resolved itself. At first, the references of the watchman at the gate, supported by certain wounded prisoners who gave testimony to the presence of Thugs in the garden, were puzzling. But a Rajput, who knew the ways of these human gnomes, found a smear of oil and dust against the wall of the sahibs’ bedroom, and even traced their tracks, to some extent, by similar marks on the floor. None could guess the reason of the Thugs’ failure, which was unprecedented, but the remainder of the sordid story was legible enough.

Two hours before dawn, Walter sent word to Nur Mahal that he wished to consult her. She came instantly, and he noted, to his surprise, that she was garbed as for a journey.

He began to tell her what he had discovered, but soon she interrupted him.

“I know all that, and more,” she said. “I can even tell you what will be done to-morrow. Jahangir will repudiate the deed, and execute those concerned in it whom he can lay hands on. But you and I are doomed. With Sher Afghán dead, who shall uphold us? We have but one course open. We must fly, if we would save our lives. Let us go now, ere daybreak, and ride to Burdwán. Once there, I can frame plans for vengeance, whilst you shall go to Calcutta, not unrewarded.”

The firmness of her tone astounded Mowbray as greatly as the nature of her proposal. When he came to seek Roger’s advice he found that his friend had swung round to the view that it was hopeless now to seek redress from the Emperor. The number and valor of Sher Afghán’s retainers gave some promise of security, and, once away from the capital, there was a chance of escape.

So Nur Mahal was told that they would adopt her counsel, and it was wonderful to see how a woman, in that hour of distress and danger, imposed her will on every man she encountered.

It was Nur Mahal who instructed certain servants of her father’s to see to the embalming of her husband’s body and its safe conveyance to Burdwán. It was she who sent couriers to start the caravan of the Feringhis on a false trail back to Delhi. It was she who arranged the details of the first march, forgetting nothing, but correcting even the most experienced of Sher Afghán’s lieutenants when he declared impossible that which she said was possible.

And finally, it was Nur Mahal who, after a last look at the face of him whom she revered more in death than in life, rode out again into the darkness, from the Garden of Heart’s Delight. But, this time, Walter Mowbray and Roger Sainton rode with her, and those three, as it happened, held the future of India in the hollows of their hands.

CHAPTER XII

“Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?”

Marlowe, “Hero and Leander.”

Of all the perils encountered by Walter Mowbray since he left his home in Wensleydale, there was none so impalpable, and therefore none so mortal, as the daily companionship of Nur Mahal. She used no wiles, practised no arts – her subtle mesmerism was the unseen power of the lodestone. At first, there never was woman more retiring. Mowbray and Sainton were seldom absent from her side; nevertheless, she spoke only when the exigencies of the journey demanded a few simple words. The horror of Sher Afghán’s death seemed to weigh on her heart, and her natural vivacity was almost wholly eclipsed. Yet her face would kindle with a rare smile when acknowledging some trivial act, and the fragrance of her presence might be likened to the scent of roses in a garden by night. It was there, ravishing the very air, whilst its source remained invisible. Though she rode fast during many a weary hour, and bore without a murmur hardships under which her more robust waiting women sank, one by one, until five out of eight were perforce left to recuperate in various small towns passed on the way, she never lost that wondrous sense of delightful femininity which constituted her chief attraction and her most dangerous allurement.

In guiding, counselling, controlling, her intellect was crystal ice, but let any man render her a service, let him help her to dismount or bring her a cup of water, and, with the touch of her hand, the flash of her deep violet eyes, she thrilled him to the core. It was natural that Walter should be her attendant cavalier on many such occasions, a fact greatly to be regretted in the interests of Nellie Roe, whose saucy blue eyes and golden locks were too far away to deaden completely the effect of Nur Mahal’s bewitching personality. And, truth to tell, England had a somewhat shadowy aspect in those days. After three years of sojourn in the East, here were Mowbray and his faithful companion no better off than when they rode along the North Road into London one fair summer’s afternoon to seek their fortunes. Then they had their swords, some equipment, and a few crowns in their pockets. Their case was even worse in this semi-barbarous land, for their worldly goods were not enhanced, while they themselves were fugitives from the spleen of a vengeful tyrant!

Not even Roger was proof against the magic of Nur Mahal’s smile. At the close of the third march, when their leg-weary horses were unable to reach the hamlet of Mainpura, the intended goal of the night, they camped under a tope of trees, lit fires, and proceeded to make themselves as comfortable as circumstances permitted until the dawn. Nur Mahal, having taken leave of them with her accustomed grace, rested in a small tent which was carried by a pack animal. Mowbray and Sainton sat on saddles piled near a fire, and Roger showed the trend of his thoughts by asking: —

“Is it in your mind, Walter, to tarry long in Burdwán after we have brought my lady thither?”

“How can I answer? We are but a degree removed from beggars. If she gives us the wherewithal to journey speedily to Calcutta, why should we remain at Burdwán?”

“You parry one question with another. I may be much mistaken, yet I doubt if my lady sought our escort for the sake of the journey.”

Mowbray, who was striving to burnish a rusted bit, looked sharply at his big comrade, whose broad red face, propped on his hands, was clearly revealed by the dancing flames.

“Out with it, Roger,” he cried. “Thou hast not been so chary of thy words for many a year.”

“Well, to be plain,” said the other, “I think yon bonny head is well dowered wi’ brains. Here is a land where wit, wedded to a good sword, can win its way. Were you and she married – nay, jump not in that fashion, like a trout on a hook, else I may deem the fly well thrown – were you and she married, I say, she is just a likely sort of quean to carve out a kingdom for herself. Here you have Mahmouds, Rajputs, Hindustanis, Bengalis, and the Lord knows what hotch-potch of warring folk, each at variance with the other, and all united against a galling yoke such as may fairly be expected from Jahangir! Why, man, were you lord of Burdwán and husband of Nur Mahal, you might run through India like a red hot cinder through a tub of butter.”

Mowbray breathed hard on the steel in his hands.

“Roger,” he said, “had you not eaten half a kid an hour gone I would have dosed you for a fever.”

“Aye, aye, make a jibe of it, but there’s many a true word spoken in jest. If King Cophetua could woo a beggar-maid, the devil seize me if it be not more likely that the beauty tucked up under yonder canvas should make pace with a fine swaggering blade like thyself.”

“Thou art too modest, Roger. If she wants a hammer wherewith to beat out an empire, where could she find a mallet to equal thee? And is it not reasonable to suppose, if such were her intent, she would have furthered the aims of our poor friend, Sher Afghán? He was of her own people, and would soon find a backing.”

“It seems that any man will suit her needs save the one she fancies,” said Roger drily, and, to Mowbray’s exceeding relief, he pursued the matter no further.

Yet the notion throve on certain doubts which it must have found imbedded in Walter’s own mind, and, next day, with memories of Nellie Roe very tender in his heart, now that all chance of wedding her was lost in gloom, he avoided Nur Mahal as thoroughly as politeness would admit. She gave no sign of discontent, but suffered him to go his new gait in silence. Once, indeed, when he made to help her onto her Arab horse, she sprang to the saddle ere he could approach, and, at night, when she parted from him and Roger with a few pleasant words, a fold of her veil screened her face.

It were idle to pretend that Mowbray was in his usual happy vein during this part of the journey, and when, at the next evening’s halt, Nur Mahal signified that after Sainton and he had eaten she would be glad of some conversation with them, he was, if not elated, certainly much more cheerful.

She received them with smiling gravity, and bade them be seated on stools which her servants had procured in the village where their little camp was pitched. She herself reclined on a number of furs which served as a couch when she slept. They noticed that her dress, which, by some marvel, was white and fresh, was devoid of ornament. Indian widows wear purple, but the exigencies of the hour might well excuse this neglect of custom, and, for that matter, Nur Mahal was not one to pay any heed to such ordinances.

“I have fancied,” she said, addressing Roger, “that you are not wholly satisfied with this present journey, Sainton-sahib.”

Now, Roger was so taken aback by this side stroke that he blurted out: —

“In the name of your excellent prophet, Princess, why do you charge this to me?”

She flashed her star-like eyes on Mowbray.

“Perhaps I am mistaken. Is it you, Mowbray-sahib, who would gladly be quit of my poor company?”

The attack on Roger had prepared him, as, indeed, Nur Mahal may have meant that it should.

“Your Highness,” he said, “has some good motive in stating a belief which would otherwise be incredible. What is it?”

She sighed, and answered not for a moment. Maybe she wished Walter had been more confused and, by consequence, more lover-like. But, when she spoke, her sweet voice was well controlled. The affair was of slight import from all the index that her manner gave.

“A woman’s mind is oft like a smooth lake,” she said. “It mirrors that which it sees, but a little puff of wind will distort the image into some quaint conceit. Let that pass. My object in seeking your presence has naught to do with idle thoughts. To-morrow, an hour after sunrise, we reach that point on the road whence one track leads to the Ganges, and to Calcutta, and the other to Burdwán. It will, I do not doubt, be better for you to make your way to the river, and leave me and my wretched fortunes to the hazard which the future has in store. I am greatly beholden to you for all that you have done in the past, and it grieves me sorely that this journey, taken so unexpectedly, leaves me so short of money that I can only offer you a sum which is barely sufficient for the expenses of the voyage down the Ganges. But I have in my possession a goodly store of jewels, and in Calcutta, or in your own country, there are merchants who will buy them at a fair price. Take them, and be not angered with me, for I would not have you go away thinking that my acquaintance had brought you naught but ill luck.”

From beneath a fold of her sari she produced a small cedar wood box which she offered to Walter. He sprang to his feet, with face aflame.

“I may be only a poor merchant, Princess,” he cried, “but I have yet to learn from your own lips what word or deed of mine leads you to believe that I would rob a woman of her diamonds.”

“Ohé,” she wailed, with a very pleasing pout, “how have I offended your lordship, and who talks of robbery where a free gift is intended? Tell me, you whom they call Hathi-sahib, see you aught amiss in taking the only valuable articles I can presently bestow?”

“Please God!” said Roger, “we shall set you and your gems safe within the walls of Burdwán ere we turn our faces towards Calcutta, and that is all my friend Walter meant by his outburst.”

Her eyes fell until the long lashes swept the peach bloom of her cheeks, for the physical difficulties of the journey, instead of exhausting her, had added to her beauty by tinting with rose the lily white of her complexion.

“Is that so?” she murmured, and Walter, who knew that she questioned him, said instantly: —

“No other thought entered our minds.”

“It is well. I shall retain my trinkets a little while longer, it seems.”

She laughed quietly, with a note of girlish happiness in her mirth that he had not caught since the day of their first meeting in the Garden of Heart’s Delight.

“Now that you have repaired my imagined loss,” she said, “will you not be seated again, and tell me something of your country. I have heard that women there differ greatly from us in India. Are they very pretty? Do they grow tall, like Sainton-sahib?”