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

  “You are a clever designer. But you can’t wear that outside of the ziggurât. Hadn’t I better go to town and get you some clothes in which you could travel?”

  “Well…yes…if I’m in the way…or grating on your nerves.”

  “Oh, not at all,” reassured Landon, lying valiantly. “Only, I don’t want to keep you here against your best interests. The Knights—”

  “Never mind them. Unless I am wearing out my welcome.”

  “No danger. Just stay away from the seventh stage. And stay away from that bronze door, whatever you do. Otherwise, the place is yours. But remember, keep clear of the seventh stage,” concluded Landon solemnly.

  That afternoon Landon rode to town for mail which he was not expecting. He returned with a mountainous aggregation of boxes and parcels which by some miracle he contrived to balance on his saddlebow: civilized apparel, traveling-clothes for his guest, the cabaret girl.

  “Ismeddin, take this stuff up to our guest,” he commanded.

  “Very well, saidi,” agreed the old man. But for such an agile, sprightly veteran, Ismeddin was strangely clumsy and feeble in his attempts to collect and shoulder the assortment of packages.

  “Never mind,” countermanded Landon, “I’ll take them up in the morning.”

  And that night, after Landon had gone to the seventh stage to pass through the purification by water and fire, the girl and the darvish met in what she called her throne-room.

  “Thanks for the coffee, Ismeddin. But that’s not why I rang for you.”

  “To hear is to obey, bibi!”

  “Then sit down and listen to me. The master brought home a load of traveling-clothes for me this evening—”

  “Who am I to say?” evaded Ismeddin.

  “You needn’t say. I know what I know. Now tell me the truth: just how anxious is the master to get me out of here?”

  Ismeddin marveled that he could no more resist that girl’s compelling eye than he could the master’s. And strangely, he did not resent the fact.

  “I will tell you the truth. Your presence disturbs the master’s studies.”

  “Indeed?”

  The girl’s eyebrows rose in saracenic arches; and she smiled as one who is more pleased than amused.

  “Then tell me, Ismeddin,” she purred in the rippling syllables of a language the darvish had not heard for many months, “tell me what manner of studies he pursues, and how I could possibly disturb his meditations. You can trust me, Ismeddin,” she continued, ignoring his amazement at hearing that unexpected language, “and speak to me freely. For I have seen and heard, without having intended to eavesdrop. And I know that you were pleased at my arrival; even as I know also that you did not care to bring me my traveling-clothes this evening…oh, but it is very strange, Haaj Ismeddin…yet I know many things…so tell me more, wise Haaji…what manner of studies does the master pursue, and how could I disturb him?”

  Again her eyebrows rose in pointed arches; and her eyes smoldered through their long lashes. Loyalty to the master melted under that mordant, burning gaze; reticence and reserve fell asleep, drugged by those rippling, caressing tones of a familiar tongue.

  “…And thus it is,” concluded the darvish, “that the master fears that even your presence in the very basements of this tower would arouse the inhuman jealousy of Sarpanit whom he seeks to summon from across the Border; fears that she will not reveal herself in human form; fears that he will be cheated of his doom and robbed of the fiery destruction of the Hundred and First Kiss which in the end she bestows on her lovers.”

  “And you, Haaji?” murmured the girl. Strangely enough, she had heard the old man’s mad tale of the Infidel’s Daughter without surprise or amazement, accepting it as of all things in the world the most logical and reasonable. “And you, Haaj Ismeddin, do you share his fears?”

  “I? By the black hands of Abaddon! If you could only save him from himself! Whoever and whatever you are, bibi…if only…but no; you could not even pass the brazen door tomorrow night. Your presence there, in that holy of unholies, would break the powerful spell he intends to chant; and she would not cross the Border. But your being in any other place in this ziggurât would not suffice. And a hundred men could not batter down that heavy door, nor the most cunning smith pick its locks and bars—”

  “Once it is closed, no.” The girl smiled, and patted her dusky coiffure. “And I will not leave in the morning as he designs, Haaji…”

  “Ismeddin,” began Landon the next morning, as the old man entered with the master’s meal of barley cakes and water, “how long must one shelter a stranger who has eaten one’s bread and salt?”

  “Your enemy may stay three days; and for a whole day after his departure you may not pursue him.”

  “But this girl is not my enemy. Though her presence—”

  “Saidi, as long as she does not enter the seventh stage, her presence makes no difference. So that though she can now leave in safety, you can scarcely send her away. Lawfully, yes; but when did you ever urge a guest to leave? You are not of Feringhistan; you could not ask a guest to leave, saidi. And she does no harm. If she should enter the seventh stage…but she can not do that.”

  And then the girl herself entered Landon’s apartment.

  “How can I ever thank you? Those clothes are really adorable. Only…forgive me for mentioning it… I simply couldn’t leave here barefooted.”

  “Barefooted? Why, I included shoes!”

  “Then you must have lost them on the road. I’m so sorry.”

  “I’ll replace them tomorrow. No trouble whatever. But in the meanwhile,” concluded Landon, pausing at the door, “I’ll be very busy. Surely you’ll pardon my haste?”

  Ismeddin, following the master, wondered what had become of the pair of shoes that had fallen from a mountainous heap of parcels he had that morning carried to the girl’s apartment.

  “It is written, saidi,” observed the old man. “She must stay another day. Surely you could not send her away barefooted.”

  “Very well then. But tomorrow morning…no matter what happens tonight—”

  “I understand, saidi. If she appears from across the Border, the girl will leave.”

  * * * *

  It was late that night when Landon, in the seventh stage of the ziggurât, completed the final purification by passing through fire. And then, barefooted, and robed in purple, he stepped into the center of a circle of powdered cinnabar which flamed luridly in the violet light of the adytum of the Infidel’s Daughter. On his head was a three-storied miter woven of purple plumage; on his wrists were bracelets of silver, and around his throat he wore a collar of hammered bronze. In his right hand he carried a diadem of curiously wrought silver, and in his left was a tiny drum whose head was of serpent’s hide.

  At the center of the circle he knelt, bowed low in obeisance, then rose, and advancing toward the altar of unsculptured stone, placed thereon the drum and the diadem.

  “Infidel’s Daughter, this is the drum to whose cadence you shall dance to the evening star, on the terraces of the house which I have built for you; and this is the diadem you shall wear when you reign in this house which rises to the heavens to meet you: and all this is proof that I sought you on the Mount of the Infidel as you commanded.”

  Then, inclining his head for a moment, he retreated to the circle of cinnabar, raised his arms, and began his invocation; haltingly at first, and then more surely and firmly as the spirit of those ancient words overcame him.

  “Flaming lords of the two horizons and watchers of the treble gates, stand one at the right and one at the left as the star of Sarpanit rises to his throne and rules over his sign,” he intoned as he gazed through the central cruciform cleft in the ceiling, looking out into blackness beyond that great height. “And you, dark princes of Aralû
, open the gates of that dim land where you keep her imprisoned, and release her once more to spread gladness and woe without end over this earth which dries and wanes, lacking her presence. Hear ye, hear ye, hear ye, dark lords and shining presences, and by your secret names which I know and can pronounce, hear ye and obey my will.”

  Pausing in his invocation, he drew from a pouch at his girdle a small vial whose contents he poured in a circle about him, concentric to, and within the circle of cinnabar. And as the fluid touched the floor, it burst into quivering, lapping flames whose spectral blueness exhaled a poison-sweetness which overwhelmed the dense fumes rising from the censers that smoldered at each side of the altar.

  “Belît Nûri,” he resumed, “light of heaven and earth, Sarpanit, shining torch of heaven, return from Aralû! Seven times and seven times have I passed through fire; food have I not eaten; sorrow was my nourishment; water have I not drunk; grief was for my thirst. I am Adôn, for whom you wept; I am the Lord of the Great House; I am the builder of the Ziggurât; and it is I who call you from Aralû, from the gloomy realm of Ereshkigal; it is I who summon you from across the Border, Belît Nûri, Lady of Light!”

  Statuesquely, with formal precision, he made gestures reminiscent of the mitered kings who in the lower halls of the ziggurât rode to battle and poured libations on lofty altars. And all the while he chanted in that dim, forgotten tongue, summoning the Infidel’s Daughter from across the Border.

  “It is I who seek you, Bint el Kafir who danced before me on the mound of Koyunjik; therefore ride on your lions past the throne of Allatu, and appear before me, Sarpanit, Bright and Shining One!”

  The Lord of the Sign rose into the predicted configuration. Great clouds of purple smoke, choking and blinding, rose from the censers and overwhelmed Landon with their awful sweetness; but still he chanted. And then as the star hung for an instant on the silver cross-hair in the cleft, flaming like an incandescent bead on a string of light, he raised his arms and called in a great voice that final word, the uttermost and hidden name of the Infidel’s Daughter: “Come from across the Border, Kadishtu!”

  The blue flames shrank into blackness. Landon collapsed, sprawling across the edge of the cinnabar circle. His three-staged miter rolled to the foot of the altar. Uncrowned, and mocked by the star that flamed its way up the silver cross-hair, Landon lay senseless in the darkness of the shrine sacred to the Bright and Shining One.

  CHAPTER 3

  That very evening, shortly after nightfall, the Knights of the Saffron Mask met in secret conclave. Under cover of darkness they slunk in pairs down side streets and alleys, uncouth figures in robes and miters, converging in all directions toward their rendezvous in the basement of a house at the outskirts of the village.

  “Good evening, Brethren,” greeted the Grand Master with punctilious solemnity as he ascended the rostrum. “Be seated.”

  Whereat the Knights took seats and respectfully awaited the opening of the Book of Seals, wherein were inscribed not only the rules and minutes of the Order, but also, in the appendix, the names of offenders, actual as well as prospective; the list of the proscribed, and the proceedings instituted against them.

  “Tonight,” began the Grand Master, “we shall try and sentence this Landon whose manifold iniquities have become a disgrace and a scandal to this Christian community. Brethren, what is your good pleasure?”

  “Let him be tried,” intoned forty voices in the monotone of a litany; “and let him be sentenced; and let this sentence be forthwith executed.”

  “Who prefers a charge?”

  A dozen robed figures leaped to their feet.

  With a gesture the Grand Master yielded the floor to one of them.

  “Master,” began the Knight, “this man is an infidel; he worships the sun and moon and the hosts of heaven.”

  “What proof have you?” demanded the Grand Master.

  “I’ve seen him on the terraces of his tower, making strange gestures to the evening star, and bowing to the morning star.”

  “For this he shall be stripped and flogged and driven from the county,” decreed the Master.

  “Let it be recorded,” chanted the assemblage in unison.

  The Scribe at the Grand Master’s elbow wrote on the pages of the Book of Seals.

  “What further charges?” demanded the chief, and again singled out one of those who had taken the floor.

  “He’s an atheist. One day when he was riding through town, the parson invited him to attend church; and this Landon thanked him with supercilious politeness, but told him he didn’t believe in churches.”

  And before the Scribe could record this charge, another Knight assumed the floor.

  “This man is a blasphemer: he claims his tower will outlast the world itself.”

  “H-m-m…yes, that is blasphemy. Scribe, did you get that?” demanded the Grand Master, lapsing from the stilted phrases of the ritual. “What else have we got on this fellow?”

  “He’s living with that de las Torres woman we ran out of town a while ago,” ventured another, uneasily as though picking his way over quicksands.

  “The devil he is!” flared the Grand Master. “How do you know?”

  “Well, me and Judson were watching that tower with a field-glass one evening, and we saw her dancing on the what did you call it—”

  “Terrace?”

  “Yeah. Terrace, that’s the word. Something like a Hula dance, only worse. And what little clothes she did wear was scandalous.”

  “So that bird found herself a home, did she? After we told her to clear out?”

  “Ain’t nothin’ else but that, Master.”

  “Did he get our warning letter, telling him to get rid of the girl?”

  “Sure did, Master. I saw him at the post-office, readin’ it, and then he tore it up and grinned. And a couple of days later, he came to town to get her some clothes and trappings.”

  “Enough!” thundered the Grand Master, resuming his dignity. “Order, please! We have enough to hang this fellow a dozen times. And especially the girl, the way she was corrupting the town.”

  At this last remark, several Knights turned their masked faces and choked coughs which sounded strangely like snickers.

  “We’ll take the place by surprise. Tonight. He has only that one old man for a servant. Right?”

  “You said it, Master. But he’s a hard old duffer. Nearly strangled me one night I tried to look into things while his boss was away,” replied one of the forty.

  “Does he always leave his front door open?” continued the Grand Master.

  “Used to. But now he keeps it barred.”

  “Any secret entrances or exits from which he could escape?”

  “There used to be,” announced a Knight who had worked as a laborer during the construction of the ziggurât. “But they’ve been blocked up.”

  “Well, then we’ve got him sewed up,” declared the Master. “But how about that front door? I hear it’s made of heavy steel bars we couldn’t saw in a month of Sundays.”

  “That’s simple,” volunteered one of the conclave. “I’ll take an acetylene torch from my shop, and we can cut those bars in a few minutes, even if they’re a couple of inches thick. Easy enough.”

  “Very good, Brother. All of you, at 2 a.m., be prepared to raid him. We’ll tar and feather the both of them. Or, while we’re at it…yes, bring some rope; we might change our minds. Remember, we start from here at 2 a.m. Dismissed!”

  The Knights rose and bowed; the Grand Master acknowledged their reverence; and the conclave dissolved.

  “To hell with the man,” muttered the Grand Master as he stepped from the rostrum. “It’s that hell-cat’s hide I want.” And he wiped his chin in memory of a certain tête-à-tête in a booth at Tiptoe Inn.

  CHAPT
ER 4

  A slender, nebulous presence emerged from the shadows of the holy of holies of the seventh stage of the ziggurât, coming from behind the hangings to the left of the altar and picking its way through the gloom. The apparition paused at the altar steps and one by one struck light to the fifteen sacred candles before the shrine. Then, turning from the altar, the girl knelt beside the ziggurât builder.

  “Couldn’t you wait…did you have to cross the Border to meet her?”

  The touch of her fingertips and the murmur of her voice aroused Landon.

  “Sarpanit… Bright and Shining One…” he muttered as he opened his eyes. Then, collecting himself, and in the flickering light of the candles recognizing his protégée: “You! What are you doing here? Flames and damnation!” he thundered, rising and snatching the girl to her feet, “You and your curiosity!… Meddling fool!” he continued; and then, releasing her wrist, glared at her, transfixing her for an age-long instant with the mordant hatred of his eyes. “If strangling you would do any good…”

  A petty rage is expressed in violence; but a great wrath can not quite conceive the vengeance for which it blindly gropes: so that Landon, instead of tearing his evil genius into small pieces, seated himself wearily on the altar steps, head bowed in despair, shoulders drooping with the burden of adventurous years, perilous quests, soul-racking studies and speculations; beaten, cracked, broken; a colossus shattered by an idle gust of wind.

  “Sarpanit… Bright and Shining One… I have failed you…”

  “You have failed me,” breathed a voice at his side, speaking in the rippling, forgotten tongue of Agade. “Looked me full in the face and did not see me… Look again, Adôn! Adôn, for whom I once went into mourning, in another avatar…”

  The girl took the silver diadem from the altar, set it upon the abysmal blackness of her hair, patted her dusky coiffure, and smilingly regarded Landon. The piquant irregularity of her features was softening into a loveliness the like of which he had seen but once before: the cabaret girl he had a moment before cursed as his evil genius was before his very eyes merging her identity with that of the apparition which had once danced in the pavilion on the mound of Koyunjik. The girl and the vision were fusing into one, into a radiant and unbelievable beauty.