 Chapter 13 of King of the Kyber Rifles by Talbot Mundy This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Brett Downey Grand was thy goal, thy vision new, Ave Caesar Conquest ends of the earth thy view, Ave Caesar To sow, to reap, to play God's game How many Caesars did that same until the great Grim Reaper came Who plows with death shall garner rue Under all skies is nothing new, Ave Caesar Telling the story afterward, King never made any efforts to describe his own sensations. It was surely enough to state what he saw After a breathless climb among the rat runs of a mountain With his imagination fired already by what had happened in the cavern of earth's drink The leather curtains slipped through his fingers and closed behind him With the clash of rings on a rod, but he was beyond being startled He was not really sure he was in the world He knew he was awake, and he knew that he was glad he had left his shoes outside But he was not certain whether it was the 20th century Or 55 BC, or earlier yet, or whether time had ceased Very vividly in that minute there flashed before his mind Mark Twain's suggestion of the transposition of epics The place where he was did not look like a cave, but a palace chamber For the rock walls had been trimmed square and polished smooth Then they had been painted pure white except for a wide blue frieze With a line of gold leaf drawn underneath it And on the frieze, done in gold leaf too, was the Grecian lady of the lamps Always dancing. There were 50 or 60 figures of her, no two the same A dozen lamps were burning, set in niches cut in the walls and measured intervals They were exactly like the two outside, except that their horn chimneys were stained yellow instead of red Suffusing everything in a golden glow Opposite him was a curtain, rather like that through which he had entered Near to the curtain was a bed, whose great wooden posts were cracked with age And it was at that bed he stared, with eyes that took in every detail but refused to believe Despite of its age it was spread with fine new linen, richly embroidered Not very ancient Indian draperies hung down from it to the floor on either side On it, above the linen, a man and a woman lay hand in hand And the woman was so exactly like Yasmineie, even to her clothing and her naked feet That it was not possible for a man to be self-possessed They both seemed to sleep It was as if Yasmineie, weary from the dancing, had laid herself down to sleep beside her lord But who was he, and why did he wear Roman armor And why was there no guard to keep intruders out It was minutes before he satisfied himself that the man's breast did not rise and fall under the bronze armor And that the woman's jeweled, gauzy stuff was still Imagination played such tricks with him that in the stillness he imagined he heard breathing After he was sure they were both dead, he went nearer But it was a minute yet before he knew the woman was not she At first a wild thought possessed him that she had killed herself The only thing to show who he had been were the letters SPQR on the great plumed helmet On a little table by the bed, but she was the woman of the lamp bowls and the frieze A life-sized stone statue in a corner was so like her, and like Yasmineie too That it was difficult to decide which of the two it represented She had lived when he did, for her fingers were locked in his And he had lived 2,000 years ago, because his armor was about as old as that And for proof that he had died in it, part of his breast had turned to powder inside the breastplate The rest of his body was whole and perfectly preserved Stern, handsome in a high-beaked Roman way, gray on the temples, firm-lipped He lay like an emperor in harness, but the pride and resolution on his face were outdone by the serenity of hers Very surely those two had been lovers Something he could not tell what, but the man's appearance kept him staring for 10 minutes Holding his breath unconsciously and letting it out in little silent gasps It annoyed him that he could not pin down the elusive thing And when he went on presently to be curious about more tangible things It was only to be faced with the unexplainable at every turn How had the bodies been preserved, for instance? They were perfect, except for that one detail of the man's breast The air was full of the perfume he had learned to recognize as Yasmineies But there was no sniff about the bodies of pitch or bitumen Or of any other chemical Nor was there any sign of violence about them Or means of telling how they died, or when, except for the probable date of the man's armor Both of them looked young and healthy, the woman younger than 30, 25 at a guess And the man perhaps 40, perhaps 45 He bent over them, every stitch of the man's clothing had decayed in the course of centuries So that his armor rested on the naked skin, except for a dressed leather kilt about his middle The leather was as old as the curtains at the entrance, and as well preserved But the woman's silken clothing was as new as the bedding And that was so new that it had been woven in Belfast, Ireland by machinery And bore the mark of the firm that made it Yet they both died at about the same time, or how could their fingers have been interlaced And some of the jewelry on the woman's clothes was very ancient as well as priceless He looked closer at the fingers for signs of force, and suddenly caught his breath Under the woman's flimsy sleeve was a wrought gold bracelet Smaller than that one he himself had worn in Delhi, and up the kyber Exactly like the little one that Yasmineie wore on her wrist in the cavern of earth's drink He raised the loose sleeve to look more closely at it The sleeve overlaid the man's forearm, and the movement laid bare another bracelet On the man's right wrist Size for size, this was the same as the one that had been stolen from himself Memory prompted him He felt its outer edge with a fingernail There was the little nick that he had made in the soft gold when he struck it against the cell bars In the jail at the Mirkan Palace That put another thought in his head It was less than two hours since Yasmineie danced in the arena Might well be much less than that since she had taken off her bracelets He laid a finger on the dead man's stone cold hand and let it rest so for a minute Then, running it slowly up the wrist, he touched the gold It was warm He repeated the test on the woman's wrist Hers was warm too Both bracelets had been worn by a living being within an hour Probably within minutes He muttered and frowned in thought and then suddenly jumped backward The leather curtain near the bed had moved on its bronze rod Aren't they deers? a voice said in English behind him Aren't they sweet? He had jumped so as to face about and somebody laughed at him Yasmineie stood not two arms lengths away, lovelier than the dead woman because of the merry life in her Young and warm, aglow, but looking like the dead woman and the woman of the freeze The woman of the lamp, bowls, the statue, come to life Speaking to him in English more sweetly than if it had been her mother tongue The English abused their language Yasmineie caressed it and made it do its work twice over Being dressed as a native, he salomed low Knowing him for what he was, she gave him the senestane tips of her warm fingers to kiss And he thought she trembled when he touched them But a second later, she snatched them away and was treating him to railery Man of pills and blisters, she said Tell me how those bodies are preserved Spill the knowledge from that learned skull of thine He did not answer, he never shown in conversation at any time Having made as many friends as enemies by saying nothing until the spirit moves him But she did not know that yet If I knew for certain why those two did not turn to worms, she went on Almost I would choose to die now while I am beautiful Foggy museum men She called them by a far less edifying name really For the East is frank in that way, especially in its use of other tongues What would they say, think you, King Sahib, if they found us two dead besides those two Would not that be a mystery? Don't you love mysteries? Speak, man, speak! Has Kenjin struck you dumb? But he did not speak, he was staring at her arm The two whitish marks on the skin betrayed that bracelets had been Oh, those! They are theirs, I would not rob the dead or the gods would turn on me I robbed you instead while you slept Fee, King Sahib, while you slept But her steel did not strike on flint It was her eyes that flashed He would have done better to have seemed ashamed For then he might have fooled her, at least for a while But having judged himself he did not care a fig for her judgment of him She realized that instantly and having found a tool that would not work Discarded it for a better one She grew confidential I borrow them She explained I put them back I take them for so many days and when the day comes The gods like us to be exact Once there was an Englishman to whom I lent the larger one And he refused to return it He wanted it to wear to bring him luck Collins of the Gurkas A cobra bit him King's eyes changed For Collins of the Gurkas had died in his two arms Saying never a word He had always wondered why the native who ran in to kill the cobra Had run away again And left Collins lying there after seeming to shake hands with him Yezmini, watching his eyes and reading his memory, missed nothing You saw, she said excitedly You remember, then you understand You yourself were near death when I took the bracelet last night The time was up I would have stabbed you if you had tried to prevent me Now he spoke at last and gave her a first glimpse of an angle of his mind she had not suspected Princess, he said He used the word with a deference some men can combine with a frontery So that very tenderness has barbs You might have had that thing back if you had sent a messenger for it at any time A word by a servant would have been enough You could never have reached Kenjin, then She retorted, her eyes flashed again, but his did not waver Princess, he said Why speak of what you don't know He thought she would strike like a snake, but she smiled at him instead And when Yezmini has smiled on a man, he has never been just the same man afterward He knows more for one thing He has had a lesson in one of the finer arts I will speak of what I do know, she said No, there is no need, look, look She pointed at the bed, at the man on the bed Fingers locked in those of a woman who looked so like herself You see, yet you do not see Men are blind, men look into a mirror And see only whiskers they forgot to shave the day before Women look once and then remember Look again He looked, knowing well there was something to be understood That stared him in the face But for the life of him he could not determine the question or answer What is in your bosom? She asked him He put his hand to his shirt Draw it out She said as a teacher drills a child He drew out the gold-hilted knife with the bronze blade With which a man had meant to murder him He let it lie on the palm of his hand And looked from it to her and back again The hilt might have been a portrait of her modeled from the life Here is another like it She said, stepping to the bedside She drew back the woman's dress at the bosom And showed a knife exactly like that in King's hand One lay on her bosom and one on his when I found them She said Now, think again He did think of thirty thousand possibilities And of one impossible idea that stood up prominent among them all And insisted on seeming the only likely one I saw the knife in your bosom last night She said And laughed so that I nearly wakened you Man, are you stupid? Were that ready-wit of yours not work? Have I bewildered you? Is it my perfume? My eyes My jewels What is it? Think, man, think! But if she wanted to make him guess aloud for her amusement She was wasting time Had he known the answer he would have held his tongue As he did not know it He had all the more reason to wait indefinitely if need be But interminable waiting was no part of her plan Words were welling out of her I gave a fool that knife to use Because he was afraid It gave him courage When he failed I knew it by telegram And I sent another fool before the wires were cold To kill him in the police station cell for having failed One fool has been stabbed and the English will hang the other Then I sent twenty men to turn India inside out To find the knife again For like the bracelets it has its place And that is why I laughed They are hunting They will hunt until I call them off Why didn't you take it with the bracelet? King asked her, holding it out Take it now, I don't want it She accepted it and laid it on the man's bronze armor Then, however, she resumed it and played with it Look again, she said Think and look again He looked, and he knew now But he still preferred that she should tell him And his lips shut tight Why, having ordered your death, did I counterman that order When your life had been attempted once? Why, as soon as Riba Gunja had seen you Did I order you to be aided in every way? Still he did not answer Although the solution to that riddle too Was beginning to dawn on his consciousness He suspected she would be annoyed If he deprived her of the fun of telling him So that by being silent he played both her game and his own Why did I order your death in the first place? The answer to that was obvious But she answered it for him Because, since the Serkar insisted That one man must come with me to Kinjin I preferred a fool Who could be lost on the way I knew your reputation I never heard any man call you a fool She laughed, he nodded She was obviously telling truth Can you guess why I changed my mind about you, wise man? She looked from him to the man on the bed And back to him again Having solved her riddle King had leisure to be interested in her eyes And watched them analytically Like a jeweler appraising diamonds They were strangely reminiscent But much more changeable and colourful Than any he had ever seen They had the baffling trick Of changing while he watched them Having sent a man to kill you Why did I cease to want you killed? Instead of losing you on the way to Kinjin Why did I run wrist to protect you After you reached here? Why did I save your life in the cavern Of earth's drink tonight? You do not know yet? Then I will tell you something else You do not know I was in Delhi when you were I watched and listened while you And Riba Gunja talked in my house I was in Riba Gunja's carriage On the train that he took And you did not I have learned at first hand That you are not a fool But that was not enough You had to be three things Clever and brave and one other The one other you are The brave you have proved yourself to be Clever you must be To trick your way into Kinjin caves Even with Ishmael at your elbow That is why I saved your life Because you are those two things And And One other She snatched a mirror from a little ivory table A modern mirror Bad glass Bad art Bad workmanship But silver warranted Look at it And then at him She ordered But he did not need to look The bed was not so much like himself As the woman was like her But the resemblance seemed to grow under his eyes As such things do It was helped out by the stain His brother had applied to his face in the kyber King was the taller And the younger by several years But the noses were the same And the wrinkled foreheads Both men had the same firm mouth Both looked like Romans How did you get that scar? She came closer and took his hand Holding it in both hers And he felt the same thrill Samson knew He steeled himself As Samson did not A Masudi got me with a martini At long range in the blockade of 1902 He said dryly Look! Did he get his from a spear Or from an arrow? Almost in the same spot Also on the dead man's left hand Was a scar so nearly like it That it needed a third and fourth glance To tell the difference They both bent over the bed to see it And she laid a hand on his shoulder Touch and scent and confidence All three were bewitching All three were calculated too He could have killed her And she knew he could have killed her Just as she knew he would not Yet what right had she to know it? Athelstan She pronounced his given name As if she loved the word Standing straight again Into his eyes There were highlights in hers That out gleamed the diamonds on her dress Your gods and mine have done this, Athelstan When the gods combine They lay plans well indeed I only know one god He answered simply As a man speaks of the deep things In his heart I know of many They love me They shall love you too Many are better than one My gods, for we are to be partners You and I She laughed at him Looking like a goddess herself But he frowned, and the more he frowned The better she seemed to like him Partners in what, princess? Thou Ishmael dub thee ready a wit Answer thine own question She took his hand again Her eyes burning with excitement And mysticism and ambition Like a fever More than physical possession of him What brought them here? Tell me that, she demanded Pointing to the bed You think he brought her? I tell you she was the spur that drove him Is it a wonder that men called her The heart of the hills? I found them ten years ago And clothed her and put new linen on their bed For the old was all rags and dust There have always been hundreds And sometimes thousands But this has been a secret within a secret Someone Who knew the secret before I Saw those bracelets through And fitted hinges and clasps The men you saw in the cavern of earth's Drink have no doubt I In the heart of the hills Come to life They shall know thee as him Within a little while She held his hand a little tighter And pressed closer to him laughing softly He stood as if made of iron And that only made her laugh the more Tales of the heart of the hills Have puzzled the Raj, haven't they These many years They sent me to find the source of them Me, they chose well There are not many like me I have found this one dead woman Who was like me And in ten years until you came I found no man like him She tried to look into his eyes But he frowned straight in front of him His native costume And Rangar Turban did not Make him seem any less a man His jowl, that was beginning to need Shaving, was as grim And as satisfying as the dead Romans She stroked his left hand with soft Fingers I used to think I knew how to dance She laughed For ten years I have taken those pictures Of her for my model And have striven to learn what she knew I have surpassed her I used to think I knew how to Use myself with man's dreams Until I found this Then I dreamed on my own account My dream was true, my warrior You have come Our hour has come She tugged at his hand He was hers, soul and harness If outward signs could prove it Come, she said Is this my hospitality You are weary and hungry Come She led him by the hand And forced to pry her fingers loose She drew aside the leather curtain That hung on a bronze rod near the bed Led him through it and let it clash Two again behind them Now they were in the dark together And it was not comprehended in her scheme Of things to let circumstances lie fallow She pressed his hand and sighed And then hurried Whispering tender words he could scarcely catch When they burst together through a curtain At the other end of a passage in the rock His skin was red under the tan And for the first time her eyes refused to meet his Why did they choose that cave to sleep in She asked him Is not this a better one Who laid them there He stared about They were in a great room far more splendid than the first There was a fountain in the center Splashing in the midst of flowers They were cut flowers The hills must have been scoured for them Within a day There were great cushioned couches all about And two thrones made of iron And gold Between two couches was a table Layed in with golden plates And a golden jug On pure white linen There were two goblets of beaten gold And knives with golden handles And bronze blades The whole room seemed to be drenched In the senty asmini favored And there was the same frieze running round all four walls With a woman depicted on it dancing Come, we shall eat She said, leading him by the hand to a couch She took the one facing him And they lay like two romans of the empire With a table in between She struck a golden gong then And a native woman came in Who stared at king as if she had seen him before And did not like him Except for the jewels She was dressed exactly like yasmini Which is to say that her gazi stuff Was all but transparent But yasmini used raiment as she does her eyes It is part of her and of her art The maid who would have shown Among many women Looked stiff and dull by contrast I trust no hill-woman They are cattle with human tongues Yasmini said Frowning at the maid Even in Delhi there was only this woman Who I dared bring here with me You brought my men's servants They are loyal, but as clumsy as the bears In their cold hills Riva Ganja brought me this one Disguised as a man You remember? She nodded to the servant who clapped her hands At once came a stream of hill-men Robed in white Who carried sherbert in bottles cooled in snow And dishes fragrant with hot food He recognized his own prisoners From the mirkan palace jail And nodded to them as they set the things down Under the maid's direction When they had done The woman chased them out And came and stood behind yasmini with a fan For though it was not too hot She liked to have her golden hair Blown into movement My cook was a viceroy's She said, beginning to eat He killed an officer who said The curry had pigs fat in it Had made him free of kinship But of not many other places I have promised him a swim in earth's drink When he ever forgets his art King ate because a man Cannot talk and eat at once It was true that he was hungry That hunger is a pecan's sauce And that artist was an adjective He was too mild to apply to the cook But the other reason was his chief one Yasmini ate daintily As if only to keep him company He would rather have wine She asked suddenly, All sahibs drink wine, bring wine She ordered But king shook his head and she looked pleased He had thought she would be disappointed When he had finished eating She drove the maid away with a sharp word And when king jumped to his feet She led him towards the gold and ivory thrones Taking her seat on one of them And bidding him adjust the footstool Would I might offer you the other? She said merrily enough But you must sit at my feet Until our hearts are one It was clear that she took no delight In easy victories, for she laughed Allowed at the quizzical expression on his face He guessed that if she could have Conquered him at the first attempt A day would have found her weary of him There was deliberate wisdom In his plan for the present He seemed to let her win by little inches At a time He reasoned that so she would tell him more Than if he divide her outright He brought an ivory footstool And set it about a yard away from her wax and toes And she, watching him with burning eyes Wound tresses of hair Around the golden dagger handle Making her jewels glitter With each movement You pleased me by refusing wine She said You pleased me, oh you pleased me Christians drink wine and eat beef And pig meat Hindu and Muslim both despise them Having each a little understanding of his own The gods of India Who are the only real gods What do they think of it all? They have been good to the English But they have had no thanks They will stand aside now And watch a greater jihad Than the world has ever seen And the Hindu Who holds the cow sacred And Christians who hold nothing sacred Against Mohammedans Who loathe the pig Christianity has failed The English must go down with it Just as Rome went down When she dabbled in Christianity Oh, I know all about Rome And the gods of India He asked to keep her to the point Now that she seemed well started He was there to learn, not to teach I know them too I know them as nobody else does They are neither Hindu nor Mohammedan But are older By a thousand ages than either foolishness I love them And they love me As you shall love me too If they did not love both of us We would not both be here We must obey them None of the East amazing ways of courtship Are ever tedious Love springs into being on an instant And lives a thousand years inside an hour She left no doubt as to her meaning She and King were to love As the East knows love And then the world might just have What they too did not care to take from it His only possible course As yet was the defensive And there was no defense like silence He was still The sirkar She went on The silly sirkar fears that perhaps Turkey may enter the war Perhaps a jihad may be proclaimed So much for fear I have known for a very long time And I have not let fear trouble me at all Her eyes were on his steadily And she read no fear in his Either, for none was there In hers he saw ambition Triumph already Excitement The gambler's love of all the hugest risks Behind them burn genius And the devilry that would stop at nothing As the general had told him in Peshawar She would dare open hell's gate And ride the devil down the kyber For the fun of it Oh diable, diable est de me The French say And like most French proverbs it is a wise one But whence the devil and a half Should come to thwart her was not obvious I must be a devil and a half He told himself And very nearly laughed aloud at the idea She mistook the sudden humor In his eyes for admiration of herself Being used to that from men Listen While I tell you all from the beginning The sirkar sent me to discover What may be this Hard to the hills men talk about I found these caves And this I told the sirkar a little about the caves And nothing at all about the sleepers But even at that They only believed a third of what I said And I Back in Delhi I bought books Borrowed books Sent to Europe for more books And hired Babu Sittambram To me Until his tongue grew dry and swollen And he used to fall asleep in a corner I know all about Rome Days I spent Weeks, months Listening to the history of their great Caesar And their little Caesars Of their conquests and their games It was good And I understood it all Rome should have been true to the old gods And they would have been true to her She fell when she fooled with Christianity She was speaking dreamily now With her chin resting on a hand And an elbow on the ivory arm of the throne Remembering as she told her story And it meant so much to her She was so in earnest That her voice conjured up pictures For king to see When I had read enough I came back here to think I knew enough now to be sure That the sleeper is a Roman And the heart of the hills Is a Grecian maid She is like me That is why I know she drove him to make an empire Choosing for a beginning these hills Where Rome had never penetrated He found her in Greece He plunged the Persia to build a throne for her I have seen it all in dreams And again in the crystal And because I was all alone I saw that I would need all the skill I could learn And much patience So I began to learn to dance as she danced Using those pictures of her as a model I have surpassed her I can dance better than she ever did Between times I would go to Delhi And dance there a little And a little in other places Once indeed before a viceroy And once before the king of England And all men The king too Told me that none in the world can dance as I can And all the while I kept looking for the man The man who should be like the sleeper Even as I am like her Whom he loved Many a man Many and many a man I have tried and found wanting For I was impatient In spite of resolutions I burned to find him at once And began But you are the first of all the men I have tested Who answered all the tests Languages He must speak the native tongues Brave he must be And clever Resembling the sleeper in appearance I began to think long ago That I must forgo that last test For there was none like the sleeper until you came And when this world war broke For it is a world war A world war I tell you I thought at last That I must manage all alone And then you came But there were many I tried Many Especially after I abandoned the thought That I must resemble the sleeper There was a prince of Germany Who came to India on a hunting trip You remember King pricked his ears and allowed himself To grin For in common with many hundred other men Who had been lieutenants at the time He would once have given an ear and an eye To know the truth of that affair The grin transformed his whole appearance Until Yesmini beamed on him I am listening princess He reminded her The prince of Germany the borrower Borrower of what princess? Of wit Of brains Of platitudes Of reputation There came a crowd with him of such clumsy plunderers Asking such rude questions That even the sircar could not shut its ears And eyes I did not know all about Sahebs in those days I thought that Although this man is what he is Yet he is a prince I could not have second fire him with my genius I could have taught him the native tongues I thought he had ambition But I learned he is only greedy You see I was foolish Not knowing yet That in good time if I am patient My man will come to me But I learned all about Germans All I offered him India first Then Asia Then the world Even as I now offer them to you The sircar sent him to see me dance And he stayed to hear me talk When I saw at last That he had the head and heart of a hyena I told him lies But he being drunk told me truth That I have remembered Later he sent two of his officers To ask me questions And they were little better than he Although a little better mannered I told them lies too and they told me lies But they told me much that was true Then the prince came again A last time And I was weary of him The sircar was very weary of him too He offered me money to go to Germany And dance for the Kaiser in Berlin He said I will be shown there Much that will be to my advantage I refused He made me other offers So I spat in his face And threw food at him He complained to the sircar against me Sending one of his high officers To demand that I be whipped So I told the sircar some Not much indeed but enough Of the things he and his officers Had told me And the sircar said at once That there was both cholera and bubonic plague And he must go home I have heard Three men told me That he said he will never rest Until I have been whipped But I have heard that his officers Left behind his back And ever since that time I have had more money from Berlin Than would bribe the viceroy's council And I have not once been in the dark About Germany's plans Although they have always thought I am in the dark I went on looking for my man Studying all Germans, English, Turks, French And there was a Frenchman whom I nearly chose And an American A man who used the strangest words Who laughed at me I studied Hindu Islam, Christian Every good looking fighting man who came my way Knowing well that all creeds are won When the gods have named their choice It came that old Bull with a beard, Mohammed Anim And for a time I thought he is the man For he is a man whatever else he is But I tired of him I called him Bull with a beard And the hills took it up And mocked him until the new name stuck He still thinks he is the man Having more strength to hope And more will to will wrongly Than any man I ever met Except a German I have even been sure sometimes That Mohammed Anim is a German Yet now I am not sure From all the men I met and watched I have learned all they knew And I have never neglected to tell The Serkar sufficient of what Man have told me to keep the Serkar Pleased with me Nor have I ever played Germany's game No, no, I have talked with The Prince of Germany And I understand too well Who sups with a boar may yet Get good roots to eat But must endure pigs feet in the trough Pigs hides make good saddles I have used the Germans As they think they have used me I have used them ruthlessly Knowing all I knew And being ready except that I had not found My man yet, I dallied in India On the eve of war Watching a certain Sikh to discover The man or not But he lacked imagination And I was caught in Delhi when war broke And the English closed the Khyber Pass Yet I had to come up the Khyber To reach Kinjan So it was fortunate that I knew Of a German plot I could spoil at the last minute I fooled the Germans by letting the Sikh Whom I had watched discover it The Germans still believed me Their accomplice and the Serkar Was so pleased that I think If I had asked for an English peerage He answered me soberly A million dynamite bombs was a big haul For the Serkar My offer to go to Kinjan and keep the hills quiet Was accepted that same day But what are a million dynamite bombs? Dynamite bombs have been coming Into Kinjan month by month these three years Bombs and rifles and cartridges Mohammed Animsman Whom he trusts because he must Hit it all in a cave I showed them That they think And he thinks has only one entrance To it Mohammed Anims sealed it And he has the key But I have the ammunition There was another way out of that cave Although there is none now For I have blocked it My men whom I trust because I know them Carried everything out by the back way And I have it all I will show it to you presently I know all Mohammed Anims' plans Bo with a beard believes himself A statesman But all he knows He has told me how Germany plans to draw Turkey in And to force Turkey to proclaim a Jihad As if I did not know it first Almost before the Germans knew it Fools! The Jihad will recoil on them It will be like a cobra Striking whomever stirs it A typhoon smiting right and left Christianity is doomed And the Germans call themselves Christians Fools! But we, my warrior When Mohammed Anims gets the word from Germany And gives the sign And the hills are a fire And the whole east roars in the flames of Jihad We will put ourselves At the head of that Jihad And the east and the world is ours King smiled at her The east isn't very well armed He objected Mere numbers Numbers? She laughed at him The west has the west by the throat It is tearing itself They will drag in America There will be no armed nation with its hands free And while those wolves fight Other wolves shall come and steal the meat The old gods Who built these caverns in the hills Are laughing They are getting ready Thou and I As she coupled him and herself together In one plan She read the changed expression on his face The very quickly passing cloud That even the best trained man cannot control I know She asserted Sitting upright and coming out of her dream To face facts as their master She looked more lovely now than ever Although twice as dangerous You are thinking of your brother Of his head That I am a murderous who can never be your friend Is that not so? He did not answer But his eyes may have betrayed something For she looked as if he had struck her Leaning forward She held the gold-hilted dagger out to him Hilt first Take it and stab me She ordered Stab if you would blame me for your brother's death I should have known him for your brother If I had come on him in the dark His head might have come from your shoulders You are like a man holding up his own head As I have seen in pictures In a book I would never have killed him Her golden hair fell about his shoulders And it sent Was not intended to be sobering She ran warm fingers through his hair While she held the knife towards him With the other hand Take it and stab No, he said No, she laughed No, you are my warrior My man My well beloved You have come to me alone out of all the world You would know more stab me Than the gods would forget me Their eyes were on each other's Deep looking into deep Strength She said, flinging him away And leaning back to look at him Almost as a fed cat stretches in the sunlight Courage Simplicity Directness Strength I have too And courage never failed me But my mind is a river winding in and out Gathering as it goes Directness No simplicity You go straight from point to point My sending from the gods I have needed you Oh, I have needed you so much These many years And now that you have come You want to hate me because you think I killed your brother Listen I will tell you all I know about your brother Without a scrap of proof Of any kind He knew she was telling the truth unadorned In truth as she saw it Eye to eye there are times when no proof is needed Without my leave Muhammad Anim sent 500 men on a foray Towards the kyber Bull with a beard needed an Englishman's head For proof for a spy Of his who could not enter Kinjin caves They trapped your brother outside Alimajid With fifty of his men They took his head after a long fight Leaving more than a hundred of their own In payment Bull with a beard was pleased But he was careless And I sent my men to steal the head from his men I needed evidence for you And I swear to you I swear to you by my gods Who have brought us two together That I first knew it was your brother's head When you held it up in the cavern Of earth's drink Then I knew it could not be anybody else's head Why bid me throw it to them then? He asked her Scorn before the words had left his lips She leaned back again And looked at him through lowered eyes As if she must study him all anew She seemed to find it hard to believe That he really thought so in the common place What is a head to me or to you? A head with no life in it Carrion Compared to what shall be Would you have known it was his head If you had thrown it to them when I ordered you? He understood Some of her blood was Russian Some Indian A friend is a friend but a brother is a rival Says the east Out of world old experience And in some ways Russia is more eastern Than the east itself Muhammad on him shall answer to you For your brother's head She said with a little nod As if she were making concessions to a child At present we need him Let him preach his jihad And lose it at the right time After that he will be in the way You shall name his death Earth's drink, slow torture Fire Will that content you? No, he said with a dry laugh What more can you ask? Less My brother died at the head of his men He couldn't ask more Let bull with a beard alone She set both elbows on her knees And laid her chin on both hands To stare at him again He began to remember long forgotten The boy lore about chemical reagents That dissolved materials into their component parts Such was the magic of her eyes There were no eyes like hers That he had ever seen Although Riva Gunjas had been something like them Only Riva Gunjas had not changed so Thought of the Rangar No sooner crossed his mind Than she was speaking of him Riva Gunja met you in the dark Beyond those outer curtains Did he not? He nodded He asked the curtains You shall be told all I know He nodded again and she laughed It would take time to tell you all I know First I think I will show you things Afterward you shall ask me questions And I will answer them She stood up and of course He stood up too So she on the footstool of the throne Her eyes and his were on a level She laid hands on his shoulders And looked into his eyes Until he could see his own twin portraits In hers that were glowing sunset pools Heart of the hills The heart of all the east Seemed to burn in her rebellious Are you believing me? She asked him He nodded for no man could have helped Believing her as she knew the truth She was telling it to him As surely as she was doing her skillful Best to mesmerize him But the secret service is made up Of men trained against that Come! she said She took his arm She let him pass the thrones To other leather curtains in a wall And threw them into long hewn passages From cavern into cavern Until even the rock of Gibraltar Seemed like a doll's house in comparison In one cave there were piles of javelins That had been stacked there by the sleeper And his men In another were sheaves of arrows And in one were spears in racks Against a wall There were empty stables Hundred horses could have stood in line She showed him a cave containing great forges Where the bronze had been worked With charcoal still piled up Against the wall at one end There were copper and tin ingots In there of a shape he had never seen I know where they came from She told him I have mated my business to know all the hills I know things The hillmen's great great great Grandfathers forgot I know old workings that would make Modern nation rich We shall have money when we need it Never fear We shall conquer India While the English backs are turned And the best troops are overseas We will bring a hundred thousand slaves Back here to work our mines With what they dig from the mines Copper and gold and tin We will make ready to buy the English off When they are free to turn this way again The English will do anything for money They will be in debt when this war is over And their price will be less than Than now She laughed merrily at him Because his face showed that he did not appreciate that Stricture Then she called him her warrior And her well-beloved And took him down a long passage Holding his hand all the way To show him slots cut in the floor For the use of archers You entered Kingen caves by a tunnel Under this floor, well-beloved There is no other entrance By this time, well-beloved Was her name for him Although there was no air of finality about it It was as if she paved the way For use of Athelston And that was a sacred name It was amazing how she conveyed that impression Without using words The sleeper cut these slots for his archers Then he had another thought And set these cauldrons in place To boil oil to pour down Could any army force a way through By the route by which you entered No, he said, marvelling at the Tonweight copper cauldrons One to each hole Even without rifles for the defence? No, he said And I have more than a thousand Mauser rifles here And more than a million rounds of ammunition How did you get them? I shall tell you that later Come and see some other things See and believe She showed him a cave In which boxes were stacked In high square piles Dynamite bombs, she boasted How many boxes? I forget Too many to count Women brought them all the way from the sea For even Mohammed Anim Could not make a 3D rifleman carry loads I have wondered what Bo with a beard Will say when he misses his precious dynamite You've enough in there To blow the mountain up King advised her If anybody fired a pistol in here At least would be the collapse of this floor Into the tunnel below with a hundred thousand Tons of rock on top of it There was no other way out Earth's drink? She said and he made a grimace that set her to laughing But she looked at him darkly after that And he got the impression That the thought was not new to her And that she did not thank him for the advice He began to wonder whether there was Anything she had not thought of Any loophole she had left him for escape Any issue she had not foreseen Kill her A secret voice urged him But that was the voice of the hills That are violent first and regretful afterward He did not listen to it And then the wisdom of the west came to him As epitomized by cocker Along the lines laid down by Solomon It isn't possible to make a puzzle That has no solution to it The fact that it's a puzzle Is the proof that there's a key Go ahead It was the go ahead That Solomon omitted And that makes cocker such cheerful reading King seized conjecturing And gave full attention to his guide She showed him where eleven hundred Mouser rifles stood in racks in another cave With boxes of ammunition piled beside them Each rifle and cartridge Worth its weight in silver coin Of very Raja's ransom The Germans are generous in some things Only in some things Very mean in others She told him They sent no medical stores And no blankets Past caves were provisions of every imaginable kind Were stored Sufficient for an army She led him to wear her guards slept together With the thirty special men whom king had brought With him up the kyber I have five hundred others whom I dare trust To come in here, she said But they shall stay outside until I want them A mystery is a good thing It is good for them all to wonder What I keep in here It is good to keep this sanctuary It makes for power Pressing very close to him She guided him down another dark tunnel Until he and she stood together In the jaws of the round hole above the river Looking down into the cavern Of earth's drink Nobody looked up at them The thousands were too busy working up a frenzy For a great jihad that was to come Stacks of wood had been piled up Six man high in the middle And then fired A furnace blast And the smoke was a great red cloud Among the stalactites Round and round that holocaust The thousands did their sword dance Yelling as the devils yelled at king's birth They needed no wine to craze them They were drunk with fanaticism Frenzy, lust The women brought the wood From fifty miles away Yezmini shouted in his ear For the din, mingling with the river's voice Made a volcano cord This is a weak supply of wood But so they are, so they will be They will lay waste to India They will butcher and plunder and burn It will be what they leave of India That we shall build anew and govern For India herself will rise up To help them lay her own city's waste It is always so Conquest always are so Come She tugged at him And led him back along the tunnel And threw other tunnels to the throne room Where she made him sit at her feet again The food had been cleared away In their absence Instead, on the ebony table There were pens and ink and paper She leaned back on her throne With bare feet pressed tight against the footstool Staring Staring at the table and the pens And then at king As if she would compose and automate him To the world and send king to deliver it I said I will tell you She said slowly Listen End of chapter Read by Brett Downey Chapter 14 Of King of the Kyber Rifles By Talbot Mundy This LibriVox recording is in the public domain Read by Brett Downey Nothing new, nothing new Nowhere to hide when our reckonings do But right earns right And wrong gets rue With nothing deducted Or given in lieu Neither the war god, I nor you Ever could make one lie come true Valey, Caesar As Jasmini herself had admitted She headed from point to point After a manner of her own You know where is Dar es Salaam She asked East Africa, said king How far is that from here Two or three thousand miles And English warships Watched the Persian Gulf And all the seas from India to Aden King nodded Have the English any ships That dive under water? He nodded again In these waters? I think not, I'm not sure But I think not The grenades you have seen And the rifles and cartridges Were sent by the Germans to Dar es Salaam To suppress a rising of African natives Does it begin to grow clear to you, my friend? He smiled as well As nodded this time Muhammad Anim used to wait With a hundred women at a certain place On the seashore What he found on the beach there He made the women carry on their heads To kinship And by the time he had hidden what he found And returned from kinship to the beach There were more things to find and bring So they worked, he and the Germans For I know not how long With the English watching the seas As on land, lean wolves comb the valleys Did you ever hear of the big whale Of the Gulf? No, said King That was natural There are as a rule about as many whales As salmon in the Persian Gulf A German who came to me in Delhi He first showed me pictures of an underwater ship Said that at that time The officers and crew of one such ship Were getting great practice Do you suppose their practice Made whales take refuge in the Gulf? How should I know, Princess? Because I heard a story later The English cruiser on its way up the Gulf That collided with a whale The shock of hitting it bent many steel plates And the cruiser had to put back For repair It must have been a very big whale For there was much oil on the sea For a long time afterward So I heard And no more dynamite came Nor rifles nor cartridges Although the Germans had promised more And orders from Mohammed Anim That had been said to come by sea On the way of Baghdad Carried by pilgrims returning from the holy places I know that Because I intercepted a letter And threw its bearer into earth's drink To save Mohammed Anim the trouble Of asking questions What were the terms of the German bargain? King asked her What stipulations do they make? With the tribes? None They were too wise A jihad was decided on in Germany's good time And when that time should come The hills and a thousand cartridges Would mean not only a hundred dead Englishmen But ten times that number Visually engaged Why bargain when there was no need? A rifle is what it is The hills are the hills Tell me about your lamp oil then He said, you burn enough oil In kingen caves to light Bombay That does not come by submarine The surcar knows how much of everything Goes up the kyber I have seen the printed lists myself The blood cans of kerosene A few score gallons of vegetable oil And all bound for farther north There isn't enough oil pressed among the hills To keep these caves going for a day Where does it all come from? She laughed as a mother laughs At a child's questions Finding delicious enjoyment in instructing him There are three villages Not two days march from Kabul Where men have lived for centuries By pressing oil for kingen caves She said The sleeper fetched his oil thence There are the bones of a camel In a cave I did not show you And beside the camel are the leather bags still In which the oil was carried Nowadays it comes in second hand cans And drums The sleeper left gold in there Those who kept the sleeper's secret Paid for the oil in gold No afghan troubled why oil was needed So long as gold paid for it Until Abdulrahman heard the story He made a ten year long effort But he failed When he cut off the supply of oil for a time There was a rebellion so close to Kabul gates That he thought better of it Of gold and Abdulrahman Gold was the stronger And I know where the sleeper dug his gold They sat in silence for a long while after that She looking at the table with its ink and pens and paper And he thinking With hands clasped round one knee For it is wiser to think than to talk Even when a woman is near You can read thoughts that are not guarded Most disillusionments come simply King said it last Do you know, princess What has kept the sirkar from really believing In kinship caves? She shook her head The gods, she said The gods can blindfold governments and hold peoples As easily as they can make us see It was the fact that they knew What provisions and what oil And what necessities of life went up the kyber And came down it To a place such as this was said to be Could not be They knew it, they could prove it Yes, Meanie nodded Let it be a lesson to you, princess She stared and her fiery oval eyes Began to change and glow She began to twist her golden hair Around the dagger-hilt again But always her feet were still On the footstool of the throne As if she knew Knew that she stood on firm foundations No sirkar ever doubted less than she And the suggestions in King's little homily Did not please her She looked towards the table again Then again into his eyes Athelstan, she said It sounds like a king's name What was the sleeper's name? I have often wondered I found no name in all the books about Rome That seemed to fit him None of the names I mouthed Could make me dream as the sight of him could But Athelstan That is a name like a king's It seems to fit him too Was there such a name in Rome? No, he said What does it mean? She asked him Slow of resolution She clapped her hands Another sign, she laughed That gods love me There is always a sign when I need one Slow of resolution, art thou? I will speed thy resolution Well, beloved You were quick to change from Your judgment to Karam Khan Change now into my warrior My dear lord, my king again She rose With arms outstretched to him All her dancers' art Her untamed poetry, her witchery Were expressed in a movement Her eyes melted as they met his And since he stood up too, for manor's sake They were eye to eye again Almost lip to lip Her sweet breath was in his nostrils In another moment He was in his arms, clinging to him Kissing him And if any man has felt on his lips The kiss of all the scented glamour of the east Let him tell what king's sensations were Let Caesar, who was kissed by Cleopatra Come to life and talk of it King's arm is strong And he did not stand like an idol His head might swim But she too tasted the delirium Of human passion, loosed and given For a mad swift minute If his heart swelled to bursting What must hers have done? I have needed you She whispered, I have been all alone I have needed you Then her lips sought his again And neither spoke Neither knew how long it was Before she began to understand that he Not she was winning The human answer to her appeal was full He gave her all she asked of admiration Kiss for kiss And then her arms did not cling so tightly Although his strong right arm was like a stanchion Because he knew that he Not she was winning He picked her up in his arms and kissed her As if she were a child And then, because he knew he had won He set her on her feet on the footstool of the throne And even pitied her She felt the pity As she tossed the hair back over her shoulder Her eyes glowed with another meaning Dangerous, like a tiger's glare You pity me You think because I love you You can feed my love on a plate to the Indian government You think my love is a weapon to use against me? Your love for me may wait for a better time You are not so wise as I thought you, Athelstan But he knew he had won His heart was singing down inside him As it had not sung since he left India behind But he stood quite humbly before her Or had he not kissed her? You think a kiss is the bond between us? You mistake You forget The kiss, my Athelstan, was the fruit Not the seed The seed came first If I lost you, if I set you free You would never dare go back to India He scarcely heard her He knew he had won His heart was like a bird, fluttering wildly He knew that the next step would be shown him And for the present he had time And grace to pity her Knowing how he would have felt if she had won Besides, he had kissed her And he had not lied Each kiss had been a tribute of admiration For was she not splendid, amazing More to be desired than wine? He stood with bowed head Lest the triumph in his eyes offend her Yet if anyone had asked him How he knew that he had won He never could have told If you were to go back to India except as its conqueror They would strip the buttons from your uniform And tear your medals off And shoot you in the back against a wall My signature is known in India And I am known What I write will be believed Rewa Gunja shall take a letter He shall take two, four Witnesses He shall see them on their way And shall give them a letter when they reach the kyber And shall send them into India with it Have no fear Bow with a beard shall not intercept them As I have intercepted his men When Rewa Gunja shall return And tell me he saw my letter On its way down the kyber Then we shall talk again about pity You and I Rewa's arm, as if her threats had been caresses Triumph shown from her eyes She tossed her brave chin And laughed at him Only encouraged to greater daring by his attitude Why don't you kill me She asked And though his answer surprised her It did not make her angry It would do no good He said simply Would you kill me if you thought it would do good Certainly He said And by the time they reached the ebony table And she had taken the pen And dipped it in the ink She was chuckling to herself As if the one good joke had grown into a hundred She wrote in Urdu It is likely that for all her knowledge Of the spoken English tongue She was not so swift or ready With the trick of writing it She had said herself that a babu Read English books to her aloud But she wrote in Urdu with an easy flowing hand And in two minutes She had thrown sand on the letter And had given it to King to read It was not like a woman's letter It did not waste a word Your Captain King has been too much trouble He has taken money from the Germans He adopted native dress He called himself Kerum Khan He slew his own brother at night In the Khyber Pass These men will say that he carried the head to Kingen And their word is true For I, Yasmini, saw He used the head for a passport To obtain admittance He proclaims a jihad He urges invasion of India He held up his brother's head before five thousand men And boasted of the murder The next you shall hear of your Captain King Of the Khyber Rifles He will be leading a jihad into India You would have better trusted me Yasmini He read it and passed it back to her They will not disbelieve me She said, triumphant As the very devil over a branded soul all hot They will be sure you are mad And they will believe the witnesses He bowed She sealed the letter and addressed it With only a scrawled mark on its outer cover That, by the way, was utter insolence For the mark would be understood At any frontier post by the officer commanding Riba Ganja shall start with this today She said With more amusement than malice After that she was still for a moment Watching his eyes at a loss to understand His carelessness And strangely unabased His folded arms were not defiant But neither were they yielding I love you, Athelston She said, do you love me? I think you are very beautiful, Princess Beautiful? I know I am beautiful But is that all? Clever, he added She began to drum with a golden dagger hilt On the table and to look dangerous Which is not to infer by any means That she looked less lovely She asked Forgive me, Princess, but you forget I was born east of Mecca But my folk were from the west We are slower to love than some other nations With us love is more often growth Less often surrender at first sight I think you are wonderful She nodded and tucked the sealed letter In her bosom It shall go, she said darkly And another letter with it They looted your brother's body In his pocket they found the note you wrote him And that you asked him to destroy That will be evidence That will convince Come! He followed her through leather curtains again And down the dark passage into the outer chamber And the illusion was of walking behind A golden-haired Madonna To some shrine of innocence Her perfume was like incense Her manner perfect reverence She passed into the cave where the two dead bodies lay Like a high priestess performing a rite Walking to the bed For minutes, gazing at the sleeper and his queen And from the new angle from which King saw him The sleeper's likeness to himself Was actually startling Startling, weird Like an incantation where he has many words When at last she spoke Muhammad lied He lied in his teeth His sons have multiplied his lie Siddhartha, whom men have called Gautama, the Buddha Was before Muhammad and he knew more He told of the wheel of things And there is a wheel Yet what knew the Buddha of the wheel? He spoke of Dharma The customs of the law Not knowing Dharma This is true Of old there was a wish of the gods Of the old gods And so these two were There is a wish again now of the old gods So are we two not as they two were? It is the same wish And lo, we are ready This man and I Will obey ye gods Ye old gods She raised her arms and going closer to the bed Stood there in an attitude of mystic reverence Giving and receiving blessings Dear gods She prayed Dear old gods, older than these hills Show me in a vision what their fault was Why these two were Ended before the end I know all the other things you have shown me I know the world's silly creeds have made it mad And it must rend itself And this man and I shall reap Where the nations sowed If only we obey Wherein ye old gods Who love me did these two disobey I pray you tell me in a vision She shook her head and sighed Sadness seemed to have crept over her Like a cold mist from the night It was as if she could dimly see her plans For doomed and yet she hoped on In spite of it The fatalism that she scorned As Mohammed's lie held her in its grip And her natural courage fought with it Womanlike she turned to king in that minute And confided to him her very inmost thoughts And he, without an inkling As to how she must fail Yet knew that she must And pitied her Have you seen that breast under the armor? She asked suddenly Come nearer, come and look Why did his breast decay And his body stay whole like hers? Did she kill him? Was that a dagger stab in his breast? I found perfume in these caves Great jars of it And I use it always It is better than temple incense And all the breath of gardens in the spring I have put it on slaughtered animals Where the knife has touched them They decay as that man's breast did But the rest of them remain Undecaying year after year It was a knife, I think, that pierced his breast I think that scent is the preservative Did she kill him? Was she jealous of him? How did she die? There was no mark on her Athelstan, listen I think he would have failed her I think she stabbed him rather than see him fail And then swallowed poison Afterward their servants laid them there She smiles in death Because she knew the wheel will turn And that death dies too He looks grim because he knew less than she It is always woman who understands And man who fails I think she stabbed him She should have loved him better And then there would have been no need I will love you better than she loved him She turned and devoured him with her eyes So that it needed all his manhood To hold him back from being her slave that minute For in that minute she left no charm Unexercised Sex Mesmerism Beauty Flattery Her eyes could flatter as a dumb dog's Flatter a huntsman Unutterable mystery She used every art on him she knew Yet he stood the test Even if you fail me well beloved I will love you The gods who gave you to me will know How to make you love and lessons are to learn If you fail me I will forgive Knowing that in the end the gods Will never let you fail me You are mine And earth is ours For the old gods intended so She seemed to expect him To take her in his arms again But he stood respectfully and made no answer Nor any move Grim and strong his jowl was Like the sleepers and the dark hair Three days old on it softened nothing Of its lines his Roman nose And steady dark full eyes Suggested no compromise Yet he was good to look at She had not lied when she said she loved him And he understood her and was sorry But he did not look sorry Nor did he offer any argument To quench her love He was a servant of the Raj His life and his love had been India's Since the day he first buckled on his spurs And Yasmini wouldn't have understood that Nor did she understand that Even supposing he had loved her With all his heart Not on any conditions would he have admitted it Until absolutely free Any more than that if she had crucified him He would love her the same Supposing that he loved her at all Nor did she trust the old gods too well Or let them work unaided Come with me, Athelstan She said she took his arm Found little jeweled slippers in a closet Hewn in the wall Put them on and led him to the curtains He had entered by She led him through and read his cardinals In the lamp light on the other side They stood hand in hand back to the leather Facing the unfathomable dark Her fingers were so strong That he could not have wrenched his own away Without using the other hand to help Where are your shoes? She asked him At the foot of these steps, Princess Can you see them yonder in the dark? No Can you guess where the darkness leads to? No He shuddered and she chuckled Could you return alone by the way Ishmael brought you? I think not Will you try? If I must, I am not afraid You have heard the echo? Yes, I know you heard the echo Hear it again She raised her head and howled like a wolf Like a lone wolf that has found no quarry Melancholy, mean, grown reckless with his hunger There was a pause of nearly a minute Then, in the hideous darkness, a phantom wolf pack Took up the howl and chorus And for three long minutes there was din Beside which the voice of living wolves at war Would be a slumber song Ten times gaslier than if it had been real The chorus wailed and eululated Back and forth along immeasurable distances Became one yell again And went howling down into earth's bowels As if the last of a phantom pack were left behind And yelling to be waited for When it ceased at last, king was sweating Nor am I afraid She laughed, squeezing his hand yet tighter She led him down the steps And at the foot told him to put on his slippers As if he were a child Then, hurring as if those opal eyes of hers Were indifferent to dark or daylight She picked her way among the bowlers That he could feel but not see Along a floor that was only smooth in places For a distance that was long enough By two or three times to lose him altogether When he looked back there was no sign Of red lights behind him And when he looked forward there was a dim Outer light in front and a whiff Of the cool fresh air that presages the dawn She led him through a gap onto a ledge Of rock that hung thousands of feet Above the home of thunder A ledge less than six feet wide Less than twenty long, tilted back Towards the cliff There they sat, watching the stars And there they saw the dawn come Morning looks down into Kingen Hours after the sun has risen Because the precipices shut it out But the peaks on every side Are very beacons of the range At the earliest peep of dawn In silence they watched days herald Touch the peaks with rosy jeweled fingers She waiting as if she expected The marvel of it all to make King speak It was cold She came and snuggled close to him And it was so they watched The sparkle of dawn's jewels die And the peaks grow gray again She with an arm on his shoulder And strands of her golden hair Blown past his face Of what are you thinking? She asked him at last Of India, Princess What of India? She was helpless Ah, you love India? Yes You shall love me better You shall love me better than your life Then, for love of me You shall own the India you think you love This letter shall go She tapped her bosom It is best to cut you off from India first You shall lose that you may win She got up and stood in the gap Smiling mockingly Framed in the darkness of the cave behind I understand, she said You think you are my enemy Love and hate never live side by side You shall see Then in an instant she was gone Backward into the dark He sat and waited for her Cross-legged on the ledge As daylight began to filter downward He could dimly make out the waterfall Thundering like the whelming of a world He sat staring at it Trying to formulate a plan Until it dawned on him As he was nearly chilled to the bone Then he got up and stepped through the gap too Princess, he called Then louder Princess When the echo of his voice died It was as if the ghoul who made the echoes Had taken shape A beard, red eye-rims And a hooked nose came out of the dark And Ishmael bared yellow teeth Come, he said Come, little Hakim End of chapter Chapter 15 Of King of the Kyber Rifles By Talbot Mundy This LibriVox recording is in the Public Domain Recording by Brett Downey Private preserves New notions Measure me a court of honesty And I will trade it for a pound-weight Of my thoughts Then you and I shall go and dream together A brand new dream of things That never happened, nor ever can be Come, trade with me What Yasmini had been doing in the minutes While King stared from the ledge In the dawn was unguessable Perhaps she had been praying to her old gods At least she had given Ishmael strict orders For he said nothing But seized King's hand And led him through the dark As a rat leads a blind one Swiftly, surely, unhesitating King had no means whatever Of guessing their direction And led the lights again with the curtain And the steps all glowing red They came instead to other steps Narrow and steep That led upward in a semi-circle To a rough hole in a rock wall At the top there was a little yellow light So dim and small That it's rays scarcely sufficed To show the opening Go up! said Ishmael Giving King a shove and disappearing at once One side-step into blackness And he might have been a mile away So King went up Stooping to feel each next footing With a cautious hand He was beginning to be sleepy And to suspect that Yasmine He had taken him to view the dawn With just that end in view Nothing can make tired eyes So long for sleep As a glimpse of waking day Sleepy eyes are easiest to trick It was not many minutes Before he was sure his guess was right The opening at the head of the stairs Led into a tunnel He followed it with a hand on either wall And reached another of King's strange Leather curtains His face struck the leather unexpectedly And at that instant As if his touch were electric The curtain sprang aside And his eyes were dazzled By the light of diamonds It was Aladdin's cave With her acting spirit of the lamp It needed effort of self-control To know that the huge, white Cut crystals that sparkled All about the hewn cell Could not be diamonds They were as big as his head And bigger, at least a hundred of them And they multiplied the light Of a half-dozen little oil lamps Until the cave seemed the home of light Yasmine had not a jewel on her She was in a new mood And new garments to suit it Her feet were still bare But she was robed from head to heel In pure white linen And her shone as if it were truly strands of gold She received him With an air of mystic calm Gracious and dignified As the high priestess of a Grecian temple She seemed devout To have forgotten that she ever killed a man Or made a threat or plotted for a kingdom Be still She said, raising a finger The old gods talk to us in here It is not for us to answer them in words But in deeds Let us listen Let us listen And do There were two cushions Great billowy modern ones Covered in gold brocade On the floor in the midst of the cave Between them was a stand of ivory Some two feet high Whose top was a disk Cut from the largest tusk that ever could have been On the disk Resting in a little hollow in the ivory Was a pure, perfect crystal sphere Of a foot diameter He could see his reflection in it And Yasmini's too The moment he entered the cave In whichever way they moved Both images remained undistorted He suspected that the lighting And the crystal reflectors had not been arranged At random In each corner of the four square cave There was a brazier of bronze And from each rose incense smoke Straight upward The four streams of smoke met at the ceiling And converged into a cloud With a long, almost motionless Yasmini stepped very reverently To a cushion by the crystal in the middle And signed a king to imitate her They stood facing She seemed to pray For her eyes were hidden under long lashes Then she knelt And king did the same His knees sinking deep into another cushion So they knelt, eye to eye Above the crystal for many minutes Without either saying a word It was Yasmini who spoke first The old gods have showed me the past Many and many a time in this She said It is their way of speaking to me Now today I have prayed to them to show me the future Look Look, Athelstan Do as I do So There seemed nothing to be gained by disobeying her To obey her might be to win new insight Into the ramifications of her plans Men who have experience of the east Are the last to deny that there is method in eastern magic They glimpse the knowledge that belonged To Pharaoh's men Although unlike Moses They are not always able to confound it The east forgets nothing The west ignores But there are men from the west Who are willing to look and to listen And to try to understand Like king They go high in the service There are others who look on at the magic With an understanding eye And are caught by it Their end is not good to contemplate The east is fettered In her own mesmeric spell And must suffer until she wakes Yasmine held the upright column Of the ivory stand with both hands Close under the disk at the top He copied her placing His hands below hers Her slipped down and covered his Soft and warm and so they stayed Look She said Her own eyes were grown big and round And she gazed at the crystal ball As she had looked into king's eyes that night With the very hunger of her soul Her lips were parted Watching her king grew expectant too His eyes followed hers To stare into the middle of the crystal No longer feeling sleepy And in less than a minute He could not have withdrawn them had he tried The crystal clouded over Yasmine's breath came steadily With a little hissing sound between her teeth And the crystal, or else the whole world, Seemed to sway in time to it Then the man in Roman armor Strowed out of a mist And all was steady again and easy to understand When the man in armor Opened his lips to speak One knew what he had said When he frowned, one knew why he frowned When he smiled, one knew That she was coming And she did come Dancing out of the mist behind him To fling soft arms round his neck And whisper praises in his ear He stood like a king who has come Into his own With an arm round her and his chin held high She kissed him on his proud chin And laughed into his face There were troubles, difficulties All in the mist behind But he stood and despised them Then, whilst she caressed him Just as spoken words had no part in the vision Yet the whole was understood So time did not come And the man in armor Had understood So time did not enter into it There was no connecting link between each scene Each dissolved into the other And all were one She faded into mist In a swirl of graceful drapery And he frowned again A long line of men in arms stood before him Grim as he and his discontented They leaned on spears At ease And that seemed to annoy him most of all A spokesman stood out from the ranks And addressed him with gesticulations And a head so far thrown back That his helmet plume stood out Like a secretary's pen behind him He was not a Roman, although there was Something Roman about his attitude and armor None of the men at arms was a Roman They demanded to be led home Wherever home was It was as plain as if their spokesman Had shouted it into King's ear Allowed And he refused them bluntly Proudly A native woman Each holding an arm and thrusting her forward Between them She was not at all unlike a native woman of today Either in dress or sullenness She had the beak and the keen eyes And the cruel lips of the hills They showed her to him And it was quite clear that they compared her To their own women left behind The comparison was plainly To her disadvantage He wasted no argument on them But his scorn made the two men fade away The woman with them Yet he had no scorn for his lined up fighting men And so could act none He ordered the spokesman back to the ranks And the man obeyed He gave another order and the long line Stood at attention, speared straight up And down, and their round shields Like great medallions on a wall He ordered them away But they stood still Then he did a truly Roman thing He got his harness off Unbuckled and took off the great Bronze corslet In which he lay dead in another cave He threw it down Tor opened the white shirt underneath And held his arms out He bade them come and kill him He bade them dry their spears into his unprotected breast There was not a movement down the line of men They stood as a cliff looks at the tide He dared them He called them cowards Women, weaklings afraid of blood But they stood still He strode up and down the line Seeking a man with heart enough to plunge a spear into him And no man moved Then he stood still before them all again And wept because they loved him And he loved them And then she came, not dancing this time But barefooted and walking like a poem Of the early days of Greece She picked up his corslet And buckled it on him Making him hold up his arms and kneel While she slipped it over his head And the grim men at arms Bove their long spears up into the air And roared her in ovation Bringing down their right feet With a thunder altogether Ave! But the mist closed up And then the crystal was clear again It was Yasmini's voice that spoke King looked up into her eyes And they made him shudder For he had never seen eyes like them Her hands still clasped his own Burning hot She was more terrible than Kingen She said, It is because you are here We shall see it all now We shall know it all We shall know whether it was she who killed him Or whether his own men took him at his word We shall know Look again Look again His eyes seemed unable to obey His own will any longer They obeyed her voice He gazed again into the crystal And it clouded over And then he looked at him And answered at least in part The questions his imagination asked He was not conscious of asking anything But, being a soldier His curiosity followed a more or less definite line Yasmini's breath began to come And go again With the little hissing sound Her hot hands pressed his own The mist suddenly dissolved There was a road A long white road Cross a plane They were facing east Archers opposed them Archers on foot and cavalry Parthians The Parthians were wild But the drill of the men at arms were a thing to marvel at When the flight of arrows came They knelt behind their shields When the horsemen charged they closed in a solid phalanx And the inner ranks hurled javelins At ten yard range When the fury of the onslaught died They formed in a column and went forward Gaining furlongs at a time The enemy watched and wondered It was plain that the enemy expected them To retreat sooner or later For the archers and cavalry were at great pains To get behind them So that before long the road ahead Was less well defended than that behind And it did not seem to occur to the enemy That they were pressing toward the distant line of hills And did not seek to return at all They had no baggage to impede them It was absurd to suppose They would not try to fight away back soon They must be a Roman raiding party Out to teach Parthians a lesson Yet they pressed ever forward And the hills grew ever nearer While he sat a great brown charger Calmly in their midst And gave them not too many orders But here and there a word of praise And once or twice a trumpet shout of encouragement He seemed to own the knack Of being wherever the fight was fiercest His mere presence seemed better than a hundred men When the phalanx bent before the charging cavalry She rode a little white horse Beside him always an utterly scornful Of the risk She wore no armor, carried no shield Her bare feet showed through the sandal straps And the outlines of her lithsom body Were quite visible through the Muslim stuff She wore She might have just come from the dancing She had a flower in her hand And a wreath of flowers in her hair She shouted more encouragement than he She shouted too much Once he laid a strong brown hand Across her mouth And she held it there and kissed it They lost men Five or six or ten or twenty At each onslaught Perhaps they had been a thousand strong In the beginning Their own men, the regimental surgeons probably Cut the throats of the badly wounded To save them from the enemy's attentions And by this time they were not more Than seven or eight hundred strong But they went forward, ever forward And the line of hills drew near Then he began to stir himself And she with him He shouted to them to charge And she echoed him, leaving his side at last To take command of a wing And sting the tired-out men at arms Into new enthusiasm In a minute they were a roaring tide That swept forward to the foot of the hills And surged upward without a check In a little while they were hurling boulders Down on an enemy that seemed inclined To parley Then, like a shadow of the incense cloud above The mist closed up in the crystal again And in a moment more King and Yasmineie Were looking into each other's eyes again Above it I have seen that before She said, shaking her head I am weary of their battles They won, that is enough I must know how they failed So that we make no such mistakes Her face was flushed And her eyes glowed with the fire That is not lit by ordinary passion She was being eaten by ambition Burned by her own fire By ambition not totally selfish For she yearned to shepherd King As she seemed to think this woman of the vision Had not shepherded the man in armor Look again, she said Look again And oh, ye old gods, show Show me wherein she failed They stared again And once more the crystal clouded Out of the cloud came a city In the middle of a plain And the city was besieged It was not a very great city But from the outside it looked rich For domes and roofs and towers Showed above the wall All well built and well preserved He and she, sitting their horses Out of arrow range from the main gate Seemed confident of taking it And eager to get it over with They no longer had only six or seven hundred men But men by the thousand Their veterans in Roman armor Were in command of others now And they had a human pack train with them Heavily burdened captives Who sulked in chains under a guard The mist cleared further And the gate gave in under the blows Of an improvised battering ram Covered by showers of arrows From short range Then, like a river breaking down a dam The thousands stormed in howling Smoke rose There were screams of women A great tower near the gate There was half wood, half stone Crackled and curled up in yellow And crimson flame He and she rode in together As modern men and women ride through A gate to the covert side At a fox hunt They chatted and laughed together And their horses pranced Responding to the humor of their riders King would have liked to tear his eyes away From the scenes that followed in the treeline streets But the crystal ball held him as if in a trance That and Yezmini s hands That clasped his own Like hot, tortured chamber clamps Animals fighting to the death Are not so vile nor so inhuman As men can be in the hour Of what they call victory Even the little children of that city Paid the penalty for having closed the gate Time was no measure to the crystal ball In minutes it showed the devil s work Of hours the city went up In smoke and flame and from the far Side through a great breach in the wall The conquerors went out with their Plunder and such prisoners as had been Saved to drag and carry it Now there were wagons and camels And horses Now there were tents and furniture Now each of the fighting force Had as much as he himself could carry As well as what was loaded on the prisoners Only he and she seemed to care nothing For the loot and rode as if each Was all the other needed Still he wore nothing but his armor And she no more than her dancing dress And sandals But now she had eight prisoners To hold a peniply above her horse And keep the sun from her She had flowers woven in her hair And others in her hand As if she rode from a bridal feast And were not in mourning for a plundered Butchered city They were headed northward now Toward distant mountains And the dust of their long column Went up like a river of smoke Flowing from the holocaust behind Yasmini shook her head impatiently The crystal clouded over And King's eyes were free I am tired of it She said I have seen that so many times I know they found their way to Kenshin I know they began to build an empire here I've seen all that a hundred times What I must know is what mistake they made What did they do wrong How did they come to fail Look again Let us look again She never once let King's hands go But pressed them tighter and tighter Until the circulation nearly stopped And they grew numb Her own strength seemed endless To grow rather than to wane in proportion As her yearning to look into the past grew Her attitude would have been more understandable If she had believed herself and King To be reincarnations of those forgotten conquerors But she was too original for that She had said the old gods wished And the man and the woman were The old gods wished the same wish again And she and King were Why then if the old gods were contriving it all Should she seek to steady the ark for them But down at bottom there is no logic Connected with God's many She clutched King's fingers as if to hold him there And to make him see and understand The distant past were the only way To save him from mistakes Look, she insisted Look again And he obeyed her By this time obedience was much the easiest course Between times his eyes were so weary He could hardly hold them open And it was only when he gazed into the crystal That he could rest them and feel easy He knew well that she was winning control Over him in some sort And he fought against it grimly Soon he became weirdly conscious Of being two men One whom she had grasped and overcome A physical man who did not matter much And another mental man who was free from her Who could understand her Whom she could not reach or touch Look, she insisted Look And the crystal clouded over He strode out of the mist again With his chin hung low And his fists clenched tight at his sides Four of his own men came out of the mist to him And greeted him respectfully Yet not without a touch of irony They spoke to him and pointed westward One laid a hand on his shoulder But he shook it off and the man reeled back As if he had been struck Another man took up the argument But he shook his head They all spoke together, gesticulating And growing angry But he stood calm among them In the storm He folded his arms across his breast After a while and listened, saying nothing Then, as if to end the argument for good and all He drew his sword and held it outward Towards them, hilt first Telling them again to kill him And have done with it They refused, he laughed at them But they still refused So he put his sword back into the sheath One of the men stepped into the mist And disappeared Presently he came again with two others And along between them Whoever the wounded man might be He was treated with respect Prouder than Lucifer, he would Struck another man's hand from off his shoulder Nelt to give this wounded man a knee And seemed pained when the man refused him The wounded man pointed to the westward too And argued in short, clipped off sentences He had a day or two to live, certainly not longer For the blood flowed slowly from a wound That would not staunch Yet he argued as a man With no interest in life But rather sees its problems truly now That his own are near an end He demanded something almost truculently He took his helmet off And passed it down to him With fingers that were growing feeble The wounded man held it and traced out the letters S P Q R on the front Go home He said, passing it back to him Fight your way back home What he said was as distinct The voice in the cave had spoken it Then, vision within a vision Dream within a dream There was a view of the Via Appia With gaunt grim gallows set along it In a row and on them a regiment's commander Crucified along with the remnant of his men So Rome treats traitors Said a voice that might have been either man's But instantly there was another vision Of ten thousand wolves Banging down a Himalayan gorge in wintertime The sleet frozen stiff on the fur And their tongues hanging Eye and fang flashed altogether And made one gleam Choose! said a voice So he chose He nodded The men saluted him And the wounded man was helped away to die And then she came Angry as a flash of lightning To spring at him and cling to him And call him names Begging, demanding, ordering, crying Abusing him and praising him in turn He shook his head She sobbed but he shook his head again And pointed westward Then she took him by the hand and led him away Not looking at his face again The crystal ball grew clouded Yasmini's breath came and went As if she were running in a race And her pressure on King's fingers was actually painful The mist dissolved and King forgot the pressure Forgot everything The man in armor lay dead on his back In the cave on the wooden bed And she bent over him, dagger in hand Ah Said Yasmini, her teeth chattering But what else could she do? The mist closed in again And the crystal grew opaque The future She begged It is the future I must know He owed gods tell me Show me The mist turned red The crystal ball became as if it were a ball of fire Revolving within itself The fire turned to blood And the blood to fire again It was very cavern that they knelt in seemed to sway Yasmini screamed and moaned She loosed King's hand to cover her own eyes And as she did that King sank Like a sack half empty And toppled over sideways on the floor asleep He neither dreamed nor was conscious of anything But slept like a dead man Having fought against her mesmerism Harder than he knew Statesmen, generals, outlaws All make their big mistakes and managed to recover Very nearly always it is an apparently little mistake That does most damage in the end Something unnoticeable at the time That grows in geometrical proportion Minus instead of plus Yasmini made her little mistake that minute In believing King was utterly mesmerized at last And utterly in her power Whereas in truth he was only weary It may be that she gave him orders in his sleep After the accepted manner of mesmerists But if she did they never reached him He was far too fast asleep He slept so deep and long That he was not conscious of men's voices Nor being carried, nor of time, nor of anxiety Nor of anything End of chapter Read by Brett Downey