A Prince of Dreamers Part 20

It was a time for swift, decisive action.

"I tell no fortunes," she replied. "I look only in the magic mirror after the fas.h.i.+on that a pious pilgrim of Mahomed taught my father, and if G.o.d sends a vision, I see!"

It was a fortunate hit. Rakiya Begum sate stiff with excitement. "Not the magic mirror of ink, such as is used in Room? Lo! ladies! this is a chance indeed! and I, at the moment, in one of my-poor verses was using it as an allegory for the vast enlargement of the mind by literature! Good woman! Let us see the process without delay. What dost require?"

atma's native wit was equal to the occasion. "A drop of ink from the inkpot of the poetess must bring visions," she replied readily, and Khanum Rakiya Begum smiled her approval. So the inkpot came and atma, her full red skirts billowing about her, sank to the ground opposite Mihr-un-nissa whose bare limbs, the colour of freshly garnered wheat overlaid with a faint tinsel sheen, showed almost white in contrast with the intensity of the scarlet. Then holding the inkpot high in her right hand the Charan began to sing softly:

Drop, ink! and hide my flesh Cover my worldly ways Then let G.o.d's Light afresh Mirror G.o.d's praise Drop ink! Drop deep Cover in Sleep My Night of Nights and bring the Day of Days.

A little pool of ink lay, with curved surface like a dewdrop, on her left palm as the song ceased.

"If the gracious child will almost touch the mirror with her left forefinger and complete the circle of magic by touching my right arm with her right hand," she suggested in a mysterious monotonous voice.

For answer Mihr-un-nissa's firm little fingers closed round her wrist tightly. "Aye! it shall not stir," she said coolly. "I want to know for certain--no clouds and waves and mists--I want to know. Dost hear?"

Childishly imperative her eyes questioned atma's. "Nay!" replied the latter, feeling in a measure at bay. "The gracious maid must close her eyes. I, atma, will look alone into the mirror and see--if G.o.d wills--the fortune of the Princess."

Aunt Rosebody's laugh came sudden, sarcastic.

"Not Princess yet, woman! Not as yet," she continued, turning to Bibi Azizan, "even in the inmost heart of the house of Ghia.s.s Beg, the Lord Treasurer."

"I protest," began the fat fas.h.i.+onable one feebly.

atma gave a swift glance round at the speakers and the little pool of ink in her palm wavered despite Mihr-un-nissa's almost fierce grip.

"How now, slave?" cried the latter; "I said no wavering."

"There shall be none, Highness," replied atma bending her brows over her task again. But the mention of Ghia.s.s Beg's name had brought back the thought of Siyah Yamin. For the only clue of any sort which the two days of search had given to atma was a possible connection between the Lord High Treasurer's House and that of the Syeds of Barha.

They were distantly related by marriage. It was the faintest of clues but the thought of it filled atma's mind in an instant with a pressing desire.

Siyah Yamin! Siyah Yamin! She must be found! Time was pa.s.sing! The very next morning the Audience would be held.

Siyah Yamin! Siyah Yamin----

"I see naught," she went on monotonously, forcing herself to words foreign to her thoughts--"I see, I see--what do I see? A crowd of banners waving. 'Tis a marriage procession! And lo! the bridegroom--Ohe! like the young Krishn for beauty--tall, slim, and fair."

"Thou liest," came Mihr-un-nissa's voice full of pa.s.sion. "Thou dost not see it. Thou dost not----"

As she spoke she flung up the wrist she held so roughly that the ink drops spurted over atma's scarlet dress; then, with a sudden bound, she stood confronting her, a tornado in silver tissue. "Lo! I was looking too, and I saw no crowd, no banners, no bridegroom. All I saw was Siyah Yamin playing on the lute as she played last night when----"

She broke off with a sudden dismay, then laughing round defiantly to her mother went on recklessly:

"There! I have let that musk-rat go! but I did see her, Marmita, just as she sate last night when you and she----"

Bibi Azizan's shriek drowned the rest.

Then came Auntie Rosebody's voice of horror; "Siyah Yamin! At--at thy house, Azizan! This pa.s.ses indeed! Go, woman, and venture hither no more!"

"I offer excuse," remarked Rakiya Begum who had risen and come forward in sedate annoyance. Her stiff brocaded petticoat looked almost regal, but her thin angular body still suffered from lack of attire, and her veillessness showed her scanty hair screwed back tightly, ready for subsequent additions. Withal she had a certain dignity of thin, harsh, high features and scraggy uprightness. "That question, Khanzada Gulbadan Kkanum is, as the lawyers have it, _sub-judice_. To-morrow the King decides."

"Decides!" echoed Auntie Rosebody wrathfully. "And if he does decide!--what then? You can't beat a drum with one hand, and all the other five fingers are in the b.u.t.ter! No! No! Marry her fifty times, Siyah Yamin _is_ Siyah Yamin. You can't hide an elephant under a hencoop. So there! That's my say!"

Rakiya Begum took a pinch of snuff. "And I say nothing. A wise man learns to shave upon strangers."

Meanwhile Mihr-un-nissa, her swift anger pa.s.sing into amused wonder, stood looking at the ink spots on the scarlet dress, until suddenly her cupid's-bow mouth curved itself into a smile.

"'Twas thy fault," she said nodding her head. "Thou must have been thinking of her, for I saw her clear; but see--that for thy spoilt dress!"

She tore off a gold bangle from her arm and held it out. They were standing close together, almost un.o.bserved, the rest of the company being more interested in crowding about the discussion which still went on regarding Siyah Yamin.

"Why wilt not take it?" continued the little maiden stamping her foot, as atma Devi drew back.

"Because I want a bigger boon," she replied hurriedly, seizing her chance.

"A greater boon?" echoed Mihr-un-nissa curiously.

"Aye!" almost whispered atma Devi. "If the gracious child--in truth her head well deserves a crown--would take this in exchange for me," she hastily wrenched off a thin silver band-bracelet all too small for the matured wrist on which it was worn. "Take it to Siyah Yamin--it--it is hers. See! there is her name upon it."

She pointed to a word engraved on the bracelet. Mihr-un-nissa took it and stood holding it, her unfathomable eyes full of malicious contempt. "So! there is a mystery! La! I love mysteries--they are so easy to guess! Yea! I will give it--and find out! Is there any message?"

"None."

The childish face broke into almost sinister smiles. "Then the bracelet means the message! What is it? Come, or go? No matter! I will find out!"

She slipped the bracelet round her own slender wrist and turned away nonchalantly, a veritable Queen of Women.

CHAPTER IX

_Fling back thy veil, Beloved! Lo! how long Shall it avail To hide thy womanish nature, and so wrong Thy beauty frail_.

"Is it thou, Siyala?"

atma holding the cresset high peered out into the darkness of the stair.

A tinkle of soft laughter came from the shadows. "So! thou hast not forgotten the old signal, ato! yet it was years agone that I gave thee the bracelet, and thou gavest me thine. Still have I come for the sake of it! That is enough, Yasmeen! I stay here till an hour ere dawn; then fetch me."

The last was called in a low voice down the darkness and thereinafter followed the sound of retreating steps; yet still no figure showed in the circle of cresset light.

"Wilt not come in Siyal?" said atma impatiently, "if by chance someone came and found us women----"

Another tinkle of laughter rose from the shadows and out of them stepped swaggering a slender youth, the very print and spit of fas.h.i.+on, made taller by a high-wound turban, his hand on the jewelled scimitar stuck in his tight-wound girdle.