Then Sir Weyand came to my side.
“St. George for England!” he cried. I asked him later what it was, and he told me.
As he shouted, he pushed the cauldron over on its side. The boiling fat fell on the broad rump of Most Alast.
An elephant has a thick hide, but he is sensitive and nervous as a woman—and the boiling grease was very hot. Most Alast lifted up his trunk and bellowed his pain. Then he charged forward. The howdah, with Said Afzel and Kasim Kirlas, slipped its girths as Most Alast shook himself—the fat had missed the howdah, to my sorrow—and the two went to earth.
Then Most Alast dashed among the riders. Several horses leaped over the slope in their fright. Finding himself against the stones, the elephant turned in the narrow path and charged back against the camels, which gave way before him. Some stumbled into the brush of the slope. Others pressed against the cliff wall. B’illah, there was much confusion!
The camels, being frightened and hurt, began to yell also, and the horses too. The black slaves had leaped to shelter and stood watching, their eyeballs showing white. The camelmen sought safety where they could.
Shirzad Mir had reckoned well what havoc an angered elephant would make along that narrow path.
I was a middling shot with a bow, but my lord was a marksman among many. His shafts sought out the Pathans, who had no time to use their matchlocks before they had to leap out of the way of Most Alast. Yet he killed none. Before long, I knew why.
“Hai—Shirzad el kadr—hai!” cried my lord for the last time, and ordered me to seek the horses.
While the boy plied his arrows from the cliff, we two, with the Ferang, rode rapidly down until our horses stood at the slope above the pile of stones. Here Shirzad Mir called upon the Pathans to throw down their arms.
A Pathan is a good fighter when and if it suits him. These men were less afraid of us than of Most Alast, who was trumpeting back and forth along the path, heedless of the efforts of his mahout. They saw that we were armed and ready. They did not know how many more of us there were.
Three of the Pathans were hurt by the arrows of Shirzad Mir. Two others had fallen among the rocks and thorns of the slope below. The other two were afoot and watching the elephant.
All who could do so put down their muskets and swords and said that they had had enough of the affair. Shirzad Mir would not move until he had seen the two who were in the thorn thicket climb out, cursing, but little the worse for their fall, and join the others. Then we left Sir Weyand, who had picked up a brace of their discarded pistols, to watch the group, and went forward with me at his side.
“Find Said Afzel,” he ordered me.
I saw the Uzbek prince leaning turbanless against a rock, feeling of himself tenderly. It is no light thing to fall from the howdah of an elephant. Kasim Kirlas, the professional courtier, was stretched on the ground at his feet—but this was no salaam; the man was stunned.
Shirzad Mir caught the dazed prince by the shoulder and bade him sternly walk before his horse. My lord had drawn his sword, and this he kept near the bare neck of Said Afzel.
“Where is the elephant?” he asked me.
I pointed to the stream below and Shirzad Mir laughed aloud. He ever appreciated a good jest. Most Alast had smelled water, and had somehow got himself down the slope to the stream unhurt. He was drawing water up in his trunk and squirting it over his sore back—mahout and all. Later Most Alast lay down in the mud. It was many hours before we could get him to leave it.
Shirzad Mir pushed through the bewildered bearers swiftly. Half of the camelmen had fled. One or two of the eunuchs drew their scimitars when my lord came near the camels on which were the women, but when they saw the plight of Said Afzel, with my lord’s sword at his ear, they threw down their weapons.
It was a sorry gathering that we grouped against the cliff wall. Eunuchs and slaves are masters of brave words, but I have yet to see the ones who will face danger to their bodies without shrinking. I cast about and discovered that the Pathan who had formed the rear guard had fled.
Shirzad Mir was now master of the field. He called to the boy on the cliff—our foes thought that many more were there—to shoot down the first man of the caravan who moved from his place.
Then he ordered me to ride my horse slowly back and forth among the remaining camels, the women and their attendants, and see that none escaped.
It was now growing dark, so of my own will I set four of the camelmen to building a great fire at the lower end of the caravan and another by the heap of stones. So it happened that when it grew dark we had our prisoners securely between the two fires and could see all that passed.
Shirzad Mir had gone straight to the Pathans and talked with them a long time. Presently he came to me and said:
“They will join my party, being men who sell their swords: For this reason I did not slay them. They were near enough for good shooting. I have cared for those who were hurt. The others are cooking food. In the morning we will give them a sword apiece—perhaps.”
With the other attendants we did not speak. They were men of low breeding and jumped to obey our orders. Shirzad Mir kept Said Afzel ever at his side, in case of treachery.
One at a time we ate of the food for which we yearned. The boy joined us proudly, and Shirzad Mir set him to collecting the few weapons of the eunuchs. Of these he made a pile and sat on it, feeling greatly the honor we did him.
Shirzad Mir talked with Said Afzel through the night. There was no chance for me to sleep, but I think Sir Weyand slept a little during his watch over the Pathans. Before dawn I had spoken with the mahout of Most Alast and given him a handful of gold from the treasure bags. He—one master being as good as another—consented to serve us.
At dawn I had finished my task. The loads were all recovered and placed on the camels and the slaves’ backs. All had eaten. The women were put back on their camels, and the eunuchs herded in front.
At first break of light in the sky we set out, my lord and Said Afzel mounted on the elephant, who was now quiet, the injured in litters borne by the slaves, the Pathans on their own horses, and the sheep boy on another.
We struck away from the Shyr Pass into the hills. Then, for the first time in two days and nights, I slept a little in the saddle, being weary, but only a little.
CHAPTER III
Said I not our star was in the ascendant, so that for a space we were given strength to trick our enemies? Later, evil fortune came upon us again, but not then.
Three courses were open to my lord. He could slay Said Afzel, to strike terror into the Uzbeks; he could exchange the prince and the women for his own family, and perhaps a strip of Badakshan; or he could ransom our prisoners for gold with which to pay an army. I urged the first plan, Sir Weyand the second, and the Pathans, who had now cast their fortunes with us, the third.
Our danger was great, for when news of what had happened in the pass reached Khanjut by way of some escaped bearers, the whole army of Jani Beg was sent to hunt us down. As yet we had no followers other than the four uninjured Pathans and the sheep boy, whom Shirzad Mir appointed head of the camelmen and gave a sword, to his great satisfaction. The bearers, the slaves and the camel drivers were useless to us and would have been glad to fall again into the hands of Jani Beg, who would not drive them through the by-paths of the hills, as we did.
* * * *
It is written in the annals of India, the curious thing that my master did in this difficulty.
“We will keep the prisoners and the treasure,” he said, “and we will regain the foothills of Badakshan from Jani Beg; also we will gather together a small army.
And this thing we did, by the will of God. How was it done? We held a durbar—that is, a crowning ceremony. The people of Badakshan had been told my lord was dead. The durbar showed them he was not.
Verily, not before or since has such a durbar been held in Hindustan or Badakshan or Turkestan. We traveled with the caravan through the villages of the hills.
At each village Shirzad Mir would dismount from Most Alast and spend money—from the bags of Said Afzel—for a feast.
Wine he bought freely, and food, and scattered silver among the people. So that all might see, he held his durbar. Said Afzel, the opium-eating prince, he forced to do homage in public to him; fat Kasim Kirlas, the professional courtier, Shirzad Mir made pay him extravagant compliments; el ghias, the buffoon of the caravan, performed his tricks; the musicians of Said Afzel sang—at the sword points of the Pathans—and the dancing girls danced. It was a great feast. Shirzad Mir, looking the proud king he was by birth, sat on cushions under a cloth-of-gold tent which we found in the baggage, and watched idly, saying nothing.
Sir Weyand cleaned his soiled garments and sat at the right hand of Shirzad Mir, as the ambassador from England. Only I did not attend, for at every feast I was out in the lookout places, with certain men of the hills who rallied to our standard, keeping watch. The men of Jani Beg pressed us close. We moved each day, marching in the night to a new village. I kept a good watch and at each new place more of our men came in to see and hear, for rumors of what had happened spread through the hills. Shirzad Mir gave to them gold and weapons from the store we had taken.
In the plain of Badakshan we could not have avoided being overtaken by the cavalry of the Uzbeks. But in the hills they were at a loss—and the people aided us. It was a mad scheme, yet its very madness protected us.
He himself put on the jewels he took from Said Afzel, and—sitting placidly on Most Alast, the black elephant, with the two crimson stripes of the Mogul on his nose—he looked the king he was. The hearts of his old soldiers, who thronged to us from the hills, were uplifted at this sight.
Always Shirzad Mir directed me to travel in a circle, through Anderab, Ghori and Bamian, back to where we had started, at the Shyr Pass. In spite of danger he did this, and we all wondered, until one day we came to the desolate aul of Iskander Khan, as Shirzad Mir had planned.
When the old Kirghiz chieftain came forth and lifted up his hands at the sight, Shirzad Mir in his gorgeous robes dismounted from Most Alast and embraced Iskander Khan, while we all watched.
Then my lord pointed to the caravans, to the camels, the treasure and the women.
“Choose,” said he to Iskander Khan; “it is all yours for the asking.”
But Iskander Khan would not, saying that he was unworthy of such honor. Whereupon Shirzad Mir called for us all to see. He loaded the horse Iskander Khan had given him in his need—the fine Arab stallion—with pots of gold and gems, and put the bridle in the Kirghiz’ hand himself.
He put a robe of ceremony on Iskander Khan and girded on him the sword from his own waist.
“This man,” he said loudly, “shall be always at my left hand until he dies. Those who do homage to me shall bow to him also.”
In this manner did Shirzad Mir pay his debt to Iskander Khan. He was a good man. A man among ten thousand. Aye, among ten times ten thousand.
ADVENTURE’S HEART, by Albert Dorrington
CHAPTER I
A VISITOR IN THE DARK
The schooner labored and sagged in the fresh cyclones of wind and brine that blew through and over her. At dawn on the ninth day after her departure from Honolulu, the Pocahontas struck coral in a blinding smother of surf and wind. Mace was hurled into a maelstrom of wreckage and smothering water, and the sensation reminded him of a knock-out he had once received in the early days of his career as a boxer. Above him was the subdued murmur of incoherent voices, while within him was a feeling of intense lassitude, broken only by a faint desire to rise and stand erect.
He rose to the surface with faculties numbed, but with a fighter’s knowledge of his desperate chances within the surf-hammered channels of coral. He fought and floated, kicked and dived when the green-headed slopes of water threatened to amputate him on the razor-backed shoals. An old ring veteran had once told him that brains will beat death itself, and the man who at one time had killed an opponent in a boxing contest learned in a flash how not to fight wind and sea on a dead lee shore.
And when his tiring limbs recognized this fact, the sea helped him and the tornado that had blown the schooner to her undoing blew him onto a narrow belt of reef where the tamanu shrubs held true to his drowning grasp. Another green-crested wall of surf hurled him high and dry, where he lay in the hot sun until the fainting blood about his heart resumed its life-giving pressure.
He slept for thirteen hours without a move. When he awoke it was to find that another day had begun with the sun standing like the torn rim of a volcano in the east.
Slowly Mace collected his jaded senses and began an investigation. The tornado had cast him upon a deserted atoll fringed with skeleton puroa trees and wind-shriveled palms. In the center of the atoll was the remnant of a forgotten banana plantation, with here and there a group of upright stakes showing where some native huts once had stood. Everywhere there were signs of recent habitation. The ashes of cooking fires were blown among the rocks and crevices.
Searching the ground closely Mace came upon Scraps of clothing that did not belong to the dresses of South Sea islanders. There were rags of half-scorched cloth that had come from the looms of American factories. In a declivity adjoining some upright stakes, he came upon a charred watch guard that must have belonged to a seafaring man or white trader.
The mental suggestion following the discovery of the relics left Mace in a state of horror and bewilderment. A further search merely confirmed the suspicion that the atoll had recently been the scene of a horrible orgy. Near midday hunger drove him into the deserted plantation searching among the stunted bushes for food. Bananas and papaws were there in abundance; the ground was littered with fiber-covered coconuts, delicious and thirst quenching after his long fast.
Pieces of wreckage drifted in from the outer reefs where the schooner had broken up in the mountainous surf. But the sight of the useless deck hamper scattering about the low beach brought small comfort to Mace as he wandered and crawled along the saucer-shaped edge of the atoll.
Although not faced with immediate starvation he viewed with dismay the loneliness of his surroundings. He dared not count on a ship approaching within hailing distance. Night came with a wisp of moon and the large tropic stars that seemed to lean from the violet dome of mid-heaven. The storm had subsided, leaving no trace of its pitiless wrath on the windless horizon.
Mace found cover inside a jungle of fronds and tamanu leaves on the sheltered side of the atoll. The water had ruined his watch, but he guessed it was late by the sudden nip in the air. Yet he found sleep difficult even on his bed of fragrant ferns.
The stillness was unbroken save for the slow, measured boom of distant breakers. The crying of a tern under the shelf of reef near by added pang on pang to his overwrought nerves. Unable to settle his mind to sleep, Mace crept from his lair of ferns and peered across the coral barriers that seemed to stretch to the horizon.
A faint, splashing sound reached him as if a paddle had struck water near by. Straining forward he listened and again caught the soft swirl and rippling motion as of something afloat. It came nearer, became more audible as the minutes passed. Mace slipped forward in the direction of the sound, scarce daring to breathe.
A native canoe shot into the narrow channel a dozen yards from where he crouched. In the faint moonlight he discerned the solitary figure of an old man paddling close in. Without hesitation Mace approached and saluted with an affectation of geniality.
“Hello, friend! Do you live here, or is it just a place where you come home to sleep?”
The ancient figure in the canoe turned sharply in Mace’s direction, the paddle staying in mid-air as if sound of the human voice had petrified his movements. Slowly, very slowly, his glance took in Mace’s outline, the supple, Herculean young figure that could have lifted him, canoe and all, from the water.
“Taeo, papalagi! It is well I speak your tongue. I once was cook on a steamer that traded from Sydney to Samoa.
At first I thought you were a spirit come to mock me. Oho, there are many spirits here after the burnings and the great storm.”
The canoe touched the beach, but the old man made no effort to get out. He sat with his paddle across his huddled knees, while the bones of his face seemed to protrude. Some metal ornaments pierced his ear lobes; a necklace of shark’s teeth encircled his wizen throat. He was the oldest man Mace had ever seen, a mummified human, moving and speaking with ineffable weariness and languor. Yet he was human at least, with a brain and heart among the infinite solitudes of sea and sky. Mace stared down at him with a feeling of pity and welcome.
“I’ll help you out,” he volunteered, placing a hand on the bow of the canoe. “Skipping from a boat is no joy at your time in life, eh?”
“You do not explain,” the old man returned without moving. “How did you come here?”
Mace laughed easily. “I got blown in by the big wind yesterday. Our schooner broke up out there. Not a soul came out of it but me!” he added, a sudden tremor in his voice.
The old man nodded and again favored the white man with a covert glance. “Only the broken ships reach here,” he said. “I have not seen a ship in eight years; not one!”
“White men have been here,” Mace asserted. “And somebody did the cremating pretty thoroughly.”
The old man shrugged wearily. “All white people die who come here. It is the law!”
“Why?” Mace demanded hotly.
“Because they destroy happiness—our lives, children, women. They bring disease, they carry plagues that sweep our islands from end to end. There is also the gin and rum. We are a clean race here, stranger. We kill white men so that we may live.”
“Seems to me,” Mace protested sharply, “that our doctors and missioners have been busy cleaning up your hotbeds of disease since Noah made his first trip. The white man is all right when you don’t eat him.”
Something like a low chuckle escaped the old man as he crouched over his paddle. “Come, sit near me,” he invited. “Let us talk. Big men are always my friends.”
The Adventure Megapack: 25 Classic Adventure Stories Page 19