E. Hoffmann Price's Fables of Ismeddin MEGAPACK® Read online

  “‘Saidi,’ she continued, ‘I am more than the mother of that bandit, my son. I am all those women whose sons have died for that heaven-sent Justice of yours, heaven-sent prince!’

  “The lords and captains listened, and forgot to stroke their beards.

  “‘I am the mother of Persian Hafiz whose song is poison-sweet as hasheesh mingled with Shirazi wine.’

  “Her voice grew clear and mellow and chanting and golden rich.

  “‘I am the mother of that fierce Mongol who enthroned himself in Samarcand. I am the mother of Iskander of the Two Horns. I am the mother of al Khayyami whose sonorous phrases you sing of an evening when wine washes the dust of justice from your just lips. And I am the mother of those stout brigands who rode behind you, a brigand, and carved a kingdom for you out of this madhouse of the plains. And this man before you might be the equal of any of his brothers…’

  “The sultan stared, and his lean face became yet more drawn and lean. He rose from his dais, standing as one who has met destiny at the crossroads.

  “‘Old woman, who are you?’ he thundered in a voice great with wonder, and trembling with a fear that was gnawing at him.

  “‘I am Dhivalani the Kashmiri dancing girl,’ that golden voice intoned, ‘and that bandit my son is your own son who was born after Abdurrahman al Durani raided your camp and carried me to his stronghold.’

  “‘She tore aside her veil.

  “Old, and wrinkled, and leathery: but there was the firm stamp of ancient beauty, and the fire of those smoldering Kashmiri eyes.

  “‘Then if he is my son,’ spoke the dazed sultan in wide-spaced accents, ‘why did you not send him to me years ago?’

  “‘It has been twenty years since I last saw him, or knew that he was alive. Only yesterday I learned who he was. They loved him in the hills, and feared he might forget himself and descend to a throne.’

  “The just sultan stared at his son. Yet he made no sign of pardon; for from the sand on the tiles before him crept the fresh-spilled blood of his friend’s son.

  “Then he muttered in my ear. The man might yet cast off the bondage of justice.

  “I passed his command to the captains and the lords of the court.

  “They filed from the presence as dead men walking from their graves.

  “‘Allah, the Wise, the All-Knowing, is Just,’ pronounced the sultan. ‘And since it pleased him to put me on this throne, I can not be less.’

  “He glanced again at the stains on the floor. Then he advanced a pace…two paces…a third.

  “He halted, and stared full at the son of his first and favorite wife. The lost lion was doomed, leaving only those other sons, that litter of jackals.

  “The bandit smiled ever so slightly at the sultan’s misery.

  “Ayyub’s hand, half raised, dropped. Then it rose again, finger tips touching his left shoulder an instant, and back…

  “The blade flamed wide…

  “With a great cry, the sultan leaped forward, thrust the bandit full on the chest, striking him flat to the floor before the shearing stroke could behead him. But it was too late for the faultless executioner to check his blade and spare the sultan.”

  * * * *

  Ismeddin exhaled a deep draft of white smoke from the stem of the bubbling narghileh; stared me full in the eye for a moment; and then answered my unspoken question: “No, saidi, that was no dead man you heard me offer my scimitar. The headsman’s stroke was not quite true, so Ayyub did not catch enough of the blade. And for the sake of his one injustice, the Slave of Justice lives in a small cave in the mountains.”

  SHAYKH AHMAD AND THE PIOUS COMPANIONS

  Originally published in Oriental Stories, Summer 1931.

  As Sir John Lindsay approached the Isfayan Gate, he saw sitting there in the dust a hunchback whose tattered djellab and decrepit turban were grimier than his hands and matted beard. His left eye glared fiercely at Sir John. The other, or rather, the lack of the other, was masked by a patch.

  Sir John shuddered at the thought of the heavy purses of golden mohurs he had in the past three days vainly tossed to the beggars of Bir el Asad; but on the principle of throwing in the tail with the hide, there would be no virtue in ignoring this especially villainous fellow at the city gate. And besides, this one might as well be Ismeddin as any of the others he might in his search encounter, so he tossed him a mohur, which tinkled against the side of the bowl the beggar clutched in his grimy talon, and came to rest among the disreputable scraps of food and copper coins the day’s begging had netted.

  Sir John knew that a beggar thanks Allah, and not the giver of alms. But instead of thanks to anyone—

  “La anabu ’llahu!” enunciated the beggar very clearly. “May God not bless him!” And then he sonorously intoned, “I betake me to the Lord of the Daybreak for refuge against the mischiefs of Creation!”

  As he spoke, the beggar picked the coin from its nest of fragments of khubz and grains of rice, and flipped it spinning into the dust across the street.

  And by those signs Sir John knew that his quest was ended.

  “Old man,” he said, “call on me this evening at the Residency.”

  The beggar’s left eyebrow rose in a saracenic arch. He almost replied, then thought better of it.

  Sir John wheeled his horse about, and returned to his headquarters to contemplate anew the diverse problems of the Resident in Bir el Asad, capital of the tiny, turbulent sultanate of that same name.

  There was the ticklish task of preserving the neutrality of the sultanate: a status that would be upset overnight by a hotheaded sultan riding out with a detachment of the Guard to exact a blood indemnity from the hill tribes just across the border, who were subjects of a Power that coveted the rich mineral deposits now being worked in Bir el Asad by a British syndicate.

  And then, of course, he had in public to address the sultan as “Majesty,” and in private explain very clearly that while a reasonable number of hangings, and beheadings, and executions by firing squad would be acceptable in the course of justice, the gory, picturesque sentences so dear to the former sultan were decidedly de trop. Bir el Asad, in a word, was to become enlightened as rapidly as possible, and weaned away from its sanguinary spectacular barbarities and antique customs.

  Therefore when Maqsoud succeeded to the throne, Sir John anticipated the end of these trying encounters which had marked his dealings with Maqsoud’s predecessor and uncle, Shams ud Din, the tempestuous son of the Old Tiger, who considered a throne as a symbol, and as an actual seat preferred the bade of a horse. And thus it was that one night, after a stormy encounter with the Resident, Shams ud Din literally vanished without a trace, and when Maqsoud on the following day was proclaimed Sword of the Faith and Lion of the Desert, the Resident saw no reason for inquiring into the disappearance of the trouble-maker.

  “Since there is no evidence of assassination…no corpus delicti, so to speak,” reflected Sir John, “comment certainly isn’t called for.”

  And like the wise Resident that he was, Sir John reported that Shams ud Din had abdicated; for well enough, reflected Sir John, had best be let alone.

  Thus for a whole year: and then Sir John sensed, with the sixth sense inherent in all good Residents, that all was not well in Bir el Asad. He couldn’t report that he smelled trouble. Residents are not supposed to have olfactory nerves, except strictly in private. Yet he knew that if something was not done about it, soon, it would be too late to do anything.

  The concessions would be sacked and burned, a holy war proclaimed…and after the machine-guns and mountain batteries had had their say, a new Resident would be appointed, with instructions to avoid Sir John’s errors.

  One couldn’t, for instance, report that lean old men with scar-seamed faces sat in the souk, interminably smoking their
fuming, bubbling narghilehs and muttering of the great days of Shams ud Din, and his father before him. Reminiscence is no crime…

  Neither could one demand reprisals because when the Resident went abroad in the city, those same ancient, leather-faced ruffians…the pious Companions of the Old Tiger…ceased for a moment their interminable smoking, and spat with ceremonious ostentation at the Resident’s shadow as it passed them.

  And then, the Companions would at times be inclined to theological discussion…like all pious Muslimeen… “Ya ’Umar!” they would ejaculate betimes, invoking the sainted Omar, the conqueror and standard-bearer of the Faith. Only…when the Resident passed by…they mispronounced ’Umar in a curious way…the Arabic language has odd turns…so that it sounded strangely like “Ya humar!” And shaded off to a delicate suggestion of “Ya himar!”

  Which was yet again something else. Though Sir John couldn’t prove that it was he whom the pious companions were calling a jackass.

  * * * *

  “A disreputable beggar seeks audience of the Presence,” announced Sir John’s khadim that evening. “Shall I flog him, or give him a dirhem?”

  “Neither. Admit him,” directed Sir John.

  “I am Ismeddin!” proclaimed the beggar as he strode to the center of the carpet. “You were pleased to summon me.”

  “His late majesty,” began Sir John, “often spoke of Ismeddin the Darwish; but—”

  “But he said nothing,” interrupted the beggar, “of a hunchback or a missing eye?”

  “Exactly,” assented Sir John.

  “Wallahi! And that also can be explained!”

  With a swift gesture he reached into his djellab, right hand over left shoulder; twisted his deformed back; shrugged his shoulders, and bent forward—and suddenly straightened, erect as a spear, clutching in his fist the lacing loops of an embroidered Shirazi saddle-bag, which he tossed at the feet of the Resident. Then he snatched from his right eye the patch that had concealed it, and looked Sir John full in the face: no beggar, but a lean, hard-bitten fighting man whose dingy rags were but the expression of an eccentric whim.

  “My word!” exclaimed Sir John, as he regarded the bird of prey before him. “That was fast work. In another move you’d be captain of the sultan’s guard.”

  “Excellency,” confessed Ismeddin, “I have numerous talents.”

  “Then test them on this,” challenged Sir John. “There were four black slaves in the Sultan Maqsoud’s garden—four mute slaves who once served Shams ud Din. One of them was drawing on the sand, which was called to my attention by a pebble that another tossed, striking the leg of my boot. The third touched his lips with his forefinger. And the fourth pointed at what the first had traced on the sand. Then His Majesty strolled down the path toward the fountain to meet me: and he saw also.

  “Since that day, one has not seen any of those four blade mutes,” concluded Sir John.

  Ismeddin made a significant, swift motion with his hands: such as one might make in drawing snugly about someone’s throat a hard-spun cord with a running noose.

  “Quite,” agreed Sir John.

  “And what,” queried Ismeddin, “might that slave have marked on the sand? Good Arabic or Persian, which Your Excellency could have read?”

  “Neither,” replied Sir John. “He had drawn a picture.”

  “Subhan ’ullah!” ejaculated Ismeddin. “God alone is Wise, All-Knowing!”

  “It was a building,” replied Sir John to the implied question, “whose domes and towers resembled none in Bir el Asad or in any other place I have ever seen.”

  “And was that all?” queried Ismeddin.

  “No. There were three figures: a man standing, with a sword in his hand; a man who sat; and beside him who stood, there was a woman. All drawn like a schoolboy might scribble on a wall. A circle for a head, and straight strokes for trunk and limbs.”

  “Which proves to Your Excellency that Shams ud Din is living in some noteworthy house which has curious domes and towers?”

  “Rather,” amended Sir John, “that His Majesty disposed of four black mutes lest they draw more pictures.”

  “Therefore,” resumed Ismeddin, “your Excellency was pleased to make a lavish alms-giving. For the sake of marks on the sand…”

  “I learned,” explained the Resident, “that Ismeddin the Darwish would do such and such when one tossed him a coin. And further, that Ismeddin was in Bir el Asad, and could be identified by the curious thing he would do with a gold piece.”

  “Aywah!” assented Ismeddin. “I knew that my head was not worth seven hundred odd mohurs to you; so that at the end of three days of Your Excellency’s lavishness, I was fairly certain—though God alone is Wise, All-Knowing—that you wanted me to serve you, rather than vengeance. How therefore may I serve Your Excellency?”

  “You must prevail upon Shams ud Din to return to his throne.”

  “It is curious,” mused the Darwish, “how the noble British government wishes the Son of the Old Tiger to return…” And then, to Sir John: “Since Shams ud Din left of his own desire, might he not also elect to remain where he is? Why should he wish to return, seeing that the lordly estate of kings is departed? The noble British government—may it endure forever!—thwarted his vengeances, and frustrated his lavishness. He proposed to build a Peacock Throne like that of his ancestor. Your Excellency reminded him that Shah Jahan had done that too perfectly for repetition. And there was talk of roads, and schools, and hospitals to be built instead.

  “Shams ud Din therefore could not keep his word to the Companions of the Old Tiger, they who had for years given him their share of plunder to be hoarded until their Sultan had amassed enough to build a throne like that of Shah Jahan…

  “Aywallahi! And made of him an old woman, by thwarting his stern reprisal against his kinsmen, the robbers from the hills…

  “And then his nephew Maqsoud—may God not bless him!—fired at him from a minaret of the mosque, and missed. Whereat Shams ud Din took one vengeance which your Excellency did not thwart: he sentenced Maqsoud to occupy the throne he coveted, knowing that in these evil days a throne is a damnation devised by Satan the Stoned.

  “Aywah! Aywah! Aywah! I betake me to the Lord of the Daybreak for refuge against the envier when he envieth!” intoned Ismeddin. And then he resumed: “Shams ud Din in his weariness found solace in a vengeance, and in a jest; for where he is, he spends his time pleasantly, and contemplates Maqsoud’s dancing to the tunes piped by him who stands behind the throne.”

  “But I say,” protested Sir John, “really, now, this is most unusual. Of course, I may have made a tactless request of His Majesty—”

  “And now, Excellency, you command me to entice Shams ud Din back to this madhouse. What inducement am I to offer? To offer him a throne would be like offering me a gold piece…”

  The Darwish picked up the saddlebags at Sir John’s feet, and therefrom a pouch which he thrust into Sir John’s hands.

  “Excellency, speaking of gold pieces…here are your mohurs. Be pleased to count them.”

  And shouldering his saddle-bags, Ismeddin stalked from the Presence.

  Sir John opened the pouch, and examined half a dozen of the coins picked at random: and saw that each was of the same minting as those he had drawn to toss to the beggars.

  “Strike me blind! Salvaging seven hundred mohurs from the beggars of this town—the very selfsame coins…”

  Sir John smelled trouble no less than before.

  “That beggar Shams ud Din is causing more trouble in his hole in the ground than he ever did on his throne,” pondered the Resident sourly. “And”—he glanced again at the bag of mohurs—“that old highwayman of an Ismeddin could start a holy war overnight—if there isn’t a jihad well under way already…”

  Sir John t
hen and there dispatched a courier to Dar es Suyoof, and began drawing up a detailed report. And as he wrote, there came from afar the persistent, barely audible thump-thump-thump of kettledrums.

  “Hell to pay in the hills,” muttered Sir John. “Abd ur Rahman’s at it again…”

  A second courier, bearing a copy of the message carried by the first, set out for Dar es Suyoof by a route different from the first. With luck, at least one of the couriers could get through.

  * * * *

  “Lailu wa khailu wa baida’u tarifuni,” chanted Shams ud Din as with slow, deft strokes he whetted the blade of his scimitar. “Night, and the horses, and the desert know me…”

  But Shams ud Din had become sultan of the shadows: and neither horses nor the desert knew him any more. He looked up from the depths of the pit at the tiny patch of moonlit sky, no larger than a silver dirhem, then glanced at the great staircase that, spiraling around the walls of the pit, led to the courtyard far above.

  Shams ud Din tried the edge of his scimitar, and remembered that he had as little need of sharpening a blade as he had opportunity of dulling one. Whereupon Shams ud Din who had been sultan of Bir el Asad sheathed his scimitar and strode down a passageway that led deviously winding from the pit to the great hall where the Presence sat endlessly dreaming.

  The passage opened into a chamber whose vaulted ceiling swelled broad and high. Planets, and a new moon slim as a scimitar blade marched across the curved, abysmal blueness. Stars arranged in unheard-of constellations glittered frostily. And as he had always done on entering the vault, Shams ud Din paused a moment to wonder if the prodigious dome above him was the firmament of another world, or whether it also was illusion.

  Then Shams ud Din strode across the expanse of tiled floor and approached the foot of the dais at the further extremity of the vault, where sat, cross-legged, the white-bearded Lord of Illusion, the Presence that dominated the shadow world in which Shams ud Din had betaken himself for refuge against the vanity of thrones, and the envy of the envious.