A Prince of Dreamers Part 24

"What could they say, with that dancing daughter of the devil all unveiled. In G.o.d's truth they breathed the more free, knowing themselves rid of the necessity for, sooner or later, sewing her into a sack and committing her and their honour to the silent bottom of the nearest river."

Khodadad laughed suddenly, immoderately. "It will be a jest to hear the tale of how the virtuous mothers of Barha received the Darling of the Town as daughter-in-law! Let us appoint a time for it! What say you, my Prince?"

Salim frowned his silence; he was in a virtuous mood that morning, having as yet hardly recovered his rebellion after the check his father had given to it.

Ibrahim looked at Khodadad with a covert sneer, and took up provocation.

"The Most Ill.u.s.trious Prince had better ask of Birbal what the Syedan said or what Akbar did; since he, only, was present at the secret interview."

Prince Salim burst out with an oath, "Curse Birbal! I would to G.o.d the jesting hound were dead!"

Khodadad's evil face came up alert, eager from his smoke-wreaths. "Is that, in truth, the wish of--of the Most Excellent the Heir-Apparent to the throne of India?" he asked, and there was something in his steady stare which made Salim s.h.i.+ft his eyes evasively.

"What good were death," he grumbled. "'Twould but make him and his advice grow in grace with my father, as do all folk who die in sanct.i.ty. If thou couldst kill the King's trust in him, that would be different."

"It, also, might be compa.s.sed," suggested Khodadad suavely; but once more Salim said nothing. Ibrahim concealed a yawn by putting a scented sweatmeat into the cavern of his mouth, then proceeded with his daily task of poisoning the Prince's mind against authority.

"Yet, seeing that our gracious King Akbar gives up his Luck--as folk say he hath--to the infidel, Birbal's wisdom may yet be needed, so, 'twere a pity----"

"His Luck? What mean you?" asked the Prince quickly.

Khodadad shrugged his shoulders lightly. "The diamond, Most n.o.ble, was not in the kingly turban at the audience, and folk say--with what truth I know not--that it hath gone to the English jeweller to be cut Western fas.h.i.+on."

Salim's heavy face became vital in an instant with a curious mixture of anger and fear. "Gone!" he echoed. "My father has no right!--it is mine to wear also when I am King. I tell thee 'tis an heirloom of luck----"

"Mayhap the luck will not be cut out of it, mayhap it is but talk after all," put in Ibrahim deftly, diminis.h.i.+ng the immediate wound, so that its venom might have time to work. "Remember the saying: 'The truth none heed; lies are the world's creed.' Time enough for trouble when your turn comes; meanwhile let us sing!"

He let his hand stray idly to the strings of the latest fas.h.i.+onable instrument which stood by his side. It was a sort of guitar, shaped like a peac.o.c.k, real feathers being let into the frets to form a tail.

Nothing on earth is hidden; in the field The little buds of ruby or of pearl Burst into flowers so tinted, and the blaze Of diamonds in hard marble heart concealed Waits for Time's touch on all things to unfurl Their stony shroud, and give them back the rays In which gems glisten as they were always.

The tinkle of the _satara_, and the high trilling voice filled the quaint arches of the building in which the Prince lounged idly, surrounded by all the luxuries of young and sensual life.

It was the Panch-Mahal, or Five Palaces, that puzzle to archaeologists of to-day, few of whom seem to know that it was built as a playground for Akbar's long-looked-for, eagerly-loved heir to many hopes. Here from sun or storm alike, shelter could be found; shelter that could bring with it no sense of being cribbed, cabined, or confined, since in these four column-supported and arcaded platforms, each superimposed on the next in lessening squares, no two things are absolutely alike. Carven capital, fluted pillar, and scrolled entablature each tell a different tale, and in the wide aisles, open to every wind of heaven, a child might learn, almost as it might learn from nature, the unending mutation, the ceaseless variety of life.

Whether it served its purpose who can say? One thing is certain; Salim as he lay sullenly, resentfully searching the long processions of bird and beast, fruit and flower, magical monsters and mythical men that lay carven before his eyes, seeking therein more cause for rebellion, found himself a.s.sailed on all sides by the memory of an eager-faced teacher who called him son.

His father!

Yes! A deep, unreasoning, jealous affection lay at the bottom of half his unreasoning revolt.

So, as he lay divided between resentment and pride, the sound of many hoofs outside disturbed the sleepy afternoon air, a swift step took the steep stairs to the second story in its stride, and Akbar showed at the stair-head, unannounced.

He was in riding dress, with untanned leathern gaiters to the knee, his white cloth jerkin buckled tight with a broad leathern belt. On his grizzled hair he wore a close-fitting leathern cap cut like a chain-helmet. It was devoid of all ornament save a heron's plume at the side. His lean figure and alert air made him look years younger than his age, and his entry brought instant change of atmosphere to the perfumed indolence of the young Prince's court. Akbar's quick eye took in at a glance the sweetmeat baskets, held appetisingly near by slaves, beautiful or quaint, the scent fountains, the fighting avitovats, the dice-boxes and all the other paraphernalia of luxurious sloth.

"Come, boy!" he said sharply, "thou canst not stay idling here till bed-time! I come to challenge thee to a game of _chaugan_. Elders against Youngers, see you, and I and Birbal will----"

He turned affectionately as he spoke to the latter who had followed him more leisurely. But the very conjunction of names was sufficient for Salim. His l.u.s.treless eyes flashed sudden fire, he was on his feet in a second.

"So be it, n.o.ble father!" he cried. "Since being foe to you makes me foe also to Rajah Birbal, I am content."

Without a moment's pause Khodadad was on the Prince's heels in provocation. "Nay! most puissant Heir to Empire," he cried, with a sort of servile swagger, "filch not my foe from me. Firsts pair with firsts, seconds with seconds. So I, Khodadad, lieutenant of the Prince's team, claim Birbal as my compeer to stand or fall together in all things."

There was no mistaking the utter unfriendliness of the challenge.

Akbar stood frowning, but Birbal, suave, sarcastic, only smiled.

"Not in crime, Tarkhan-jee! I bar crime! 'Tis one thing to murder or steal without fear of punishment, another even to lie with a bowstring about one's neck! So, seeing the most excellent of lieutenants through being Tarkhan hath a supremacy in sin, I pray so far, to be excused; 'twill but bring Khodadad one step nearer to judgment." He turned on his heel as he spoke; then continued nonchalantly: "Will your Majesty choose sides?"

"Nay!" replied the King, making an effort to restore good-humour.

"Shaikie shall choose his, and a cast of the die as ever settle mine--save only for thee."

"May he be accursed!" muttered the young Prince as he flung aside his deftly-piled and jewel-strung turban, to don a close-eared leathern cap like his father. His mind was full of vague anger against that father. Had he indeed parted with the Luck of the House, leaving him, the heir, forlorn of hope? That must be Birbal's doing; Birbal with the sneering, bitter tongue, which found out the joints in one's armour with such deadly skill.

It was already late afternoon. An hour, or even less would see the rapid Indian dusk settle down over those wide plains below the Sikri ridge; but as yet the sun's slanting rays shone on the _chaugan_ ground, catching the gilt spikes of the red boundary flags and the red and gold boundary ropes which were held at intervals by pages dressed to match in red and gold. Within the oblong thus marked out, the glittering white and gold and red and silver teams loosing their lean, low, be-ta.s.selled ponies in preliminary canters, or gathering in knots to discuss the tactics of the coming game, made the scene show like some richly jewelled square of embroidery stretched out among the dusty levels.

Closely akin to polo, _chaugan_ was _par excellence_ the game of Mogul India; and Akbar excelled at it, holding it to be "no mere play, but a means of learning prompt.i.tude and decision, a test of manhood, a strengthener of the bonds of friends.h.i.+p."

It differed chiefly from the modern form of the game in having no set goal, the whole of each end of the oblong being counted as one. So, as a single flourish from the Royal _nakarah_ sounded, ten riders ranged themselves at the farther end of the ground, eager, alert, their mounts (and themselves) hard held, all eyes--even those of the ponies--fixed on the ball which was held high in the King's right hand. On either side of the tense, vibrating line stood a pony, one for either team, its rider holding it by the reins ready on the instant to fling himself into the saddle and ride out to replace anyone disabled in the game. Beyond these again, at each corner, was a group of other ponies, other riders, also ready, when the gong sounded every twenty minutes, to ride out and replace two players in either team, thus ensuring a constant supply of fresh blood, fresh zest for the fight.

"Are you ready, Sahiban?" shouted the King, and with the cry dashed forward. The tense, vibrating line, giving a wild whoop, was not a second behind him, and so, ta.s.sels waving, sticks carried like lances came a veritable tornado of a charge that swept up to the centre of the ground where a red patch of brickdust showed set four-square.

Ralph Fitch, who with his companions was watching the strange new game, (perhaps the first Englishman who saw polo played), felt his pulses bound with excitement at this forward dash. "They be sportsmen, anyhow," he muttered under his breath. "Bravo! bravo!"

For Akbar's nimble little bay Arab pony, who played the game as keenly as its master, had propped on the red delivery point and stood quivering with the arrest, while its rider, holding back in his stirrups for all he was worth sent the ball spinning skyward with an awkward twist on it, then gripped his club, held till then with his reins.

"_Hul-lul-la-la-la-la-Harri-ho! Ari!--Nila-kunta!_"

The confused cries rose from the wrestling knot of caps, sticks, ta.s.sels, hoofs, and swinging arms which in an instant gathered, a whirling nebula of potential force about that nucleus point of a half-seen, falling ball.

"Ibrahim!" shouted Khodadad, whose vicious chestnut, hard held, flung itself high in air, almost unseating its rider, "to the left or the King has it."

So, swift as light, aid and prevention hustled each other, all so quickly that a snapshot would hardly have registered the contest, until a click, faint yet loud enough to fill each heart with joy or anger told that the King's stick catching the ball fairly ere it fell had sent it away in a clear swooping flight.

"He has it--ride! ride!" rose the cry from both sides and away they went helter-skelter, pell-mell.

Too late, however, for either side to intervene, for the ball driven with a will, dropped, rebounded, fell again within a foot of the fatal line at the end and so easily, softly, trickled over it.

"Well hit, father!" called Prince Salim forgetful of anything but sheer pride in the King's prowess. His face, nevertheless, lowered again as in accordance with custom the defeated five rode back along the sides of the ground toward the starting end, pausing every twenty paces to pirouette their ponies and to salaam to the victors who, when the conquered had reached their places, rode triumphantly at a canter down the middle to take up theirs.

But consolation comes in all games, and the next throw-up decreed that the King should--not unwillingly--make obeisance to his son after a hard tussle.

The third goal also went to the juniors, for, whether due to the replacing in the King's team of Rajah Man Singh by that inferior player his cousin Bhawun Singh, or to a trifle of lameness in Akbar's little Arab, certain it is that after much swinging and driving of the ball backward and forward the cry arose amongst the spectators "He hath it--Khodadad hath it this time!" And there was the Tarkhan, his eyes glued on the ground, deliberately trundling the ball along safe clipped in the crook of his stick, while the Prince and Dhara beside him rode off all attempts at rescue.

"He hath bird-lime on it," muttered Birbal, as he swooped down fruitlessly. The ball trickled on deftly and even the King galloped forward to defend the goal, but it was in vain, for in the final _melee_ someone--in the dust and glamour--G.o.d knows who, gave the final impetus, and the victors and vanquished wiped their streaming foreheads ere recommencing another struggle.

It began on both sides with almost fierce determination.