Warriors of the Steppes

by Harold Lamb

  “Nay, they waited here to set upon me."

  The stranger looked at the boy keenly, but held his peace. Rao Singh wondered how much of their talk he had heard. The man had come from the brush with uncanny quietness, after the manner of one who was at home in such paths.

  “Warrior," spoke Ahmad Rumi, “this youth mounted and rode to aid you when you were attacked."

  “He came not overswiftly."

  Rao Singh bit his lip.

  “No fault of mine—you rode with speed."

  He frowned.

  “Are you a Muslim?"

  “Nay." The stranger spat into the stream indifferently.

  “Perchance a man of the Mogul."

  “Nay."

  Rao Singh sheathed his sword with sudden decision.

  “Verily you are blunt of speech. Yet you did me a service. And," condescendingly, “' tis plain you are not an ill swordsman. Will you enter my service? I have need of a keen sword this night."

  At this the owner of the black horse tugged at his mustache thoughtfully. From far below the three came the shrill cry of the Mogul's sentries. The wind bore a faint echo of the imperial kettledrums and brass cymbals playing a festive measure.

  “Harken, stripling," growled the stranger abruptly, “I like not many words. I eat the bread of Jahangir—"

  Rao Singh stepped back instinctively, but the other waved a gnarled hand impatiently.

  “I am no follower of the Mogul. In the Summer I came to his court from—another court. Because of a service Jahangir, who is lord of these lands, gave some horses and gold. Despite that his minions came near to slaying me."

  He pointed down to the South, where lay the border of Kashmir.

  “I saw some elephants bearing gilt castles, surrounded by fat horsemen, and watched, for I had not seen the elephants before. Then the horsemen and slaves with staffs began to strike me, crying that the Mogul's women rode upon the elephants.

  “Blood of Satan! I cared not to see the women. The Mogul is tenderer of his women than a bear of a bruised paw. Bethink you and molest them not."

  “Then you heard?"

  Rao Singh gnawed his lip and sprang suddenly to saddle.

  “Ho—wait here and you will see Kera of Kargan. Eunuchs are fat; they will make good slicing with a sharp sword!"

  The stranger grunted, either in agreement or dislike.

  “Wait here, Ahmad Rumi," cried the boy, fired with his purpose. “And at dawn you shall hear the music of the voice of the Flower of Kashmir. Aye, then we shall ride to the hills."

  He spurred forward with a wave of the hand and vanished down the caravan path.

  “Allah be kind to the youth!" cried the blind man.

  “A pity," mused the stranger, “to hazard such a horse for a woman."

  The stranger stared after Rao Singh, then glanced at the legend-teller's blind countenance. He tethered his horse carefully, then led Ahmad Rumi to a seat against a rock by the brook bed. He sat nearby, leaning upon the trunk of a fallen willow, his long, booted legs stretched idly before him. Here he could see both up and down the trail. Although his posture indicated idleness, even physical laziness, his eyes under tufted brows were keenly watchful.

  Ahmad Rumi squatted passively on his heels, his gentle face turned upward, as was his wont, to the stars he could not see, and waited what was to come with the calm of a fatalist. He made a strange contrast to the scarred, moody face of the warrior.

  “Ho, Ahmad Rumi," said the stranger at length, “you spoke of Jhilam and its lord. Something I have heard of it in the prattle of yonder courtiers. What is the true tale?"

  Thus did Khlit, the wanderer and the seeker after battles, hear the story of Jhilam. While the two waited the return of Rao Singh they talked, and Khlit learned much of what went on in the hills by the Wular lake and how Shaista Mirza scourged the villages of Jhilam with the whip of fear.

  II

  It was the beginning of the third watch of the night and the revelers had retired from the imperial kanates when Cheker Ghar poked his head from his ragged shelter.

  He scrambled nimbly to his feet, then drew a heavy pack wrapped in leopard-skin tenderly from the tent. Cheker Ghar was a wiry, bare-legged man of uncertain age with a crafty, fox face whitened with powder as a mark of his profession—conjuring.

  With a sigh he shouldered his pack and began to trot through the tents, keeping well in the shadows and avoiding the slaves who guarded the barriers of each noble's camping-site.

  The dense smoke rising from fires of dried dung and green wood had cleared away with the advent of early morning but a faint mist hung about the tents. Cheker Ghar sniffed the air as a dog does.

  He marked the position of the Light of Heaven—the lantern on the lofty pole erected beside the imperial yak-tail standard at the gate of the Mogul's pavilions. Toward this he made his way, skipping over tent-ropes and avoiding snarling dogs with the skill of one familiar with encampments.

  He avoided the avenue of torches by the imperial gate, and the tent of the ameer who was on guard that night. His way led to the kanate—the barrier of cotton cloth printed with flowers and supported by gilded poles—which surrounded the Mogul's enclosure. And to that portion of the cotton wall which veiled the tents of the seraglio.

  Outside the kanate were no sentries, for the ameer on guard was supposed to make the rounds with a troop of horsemen from time to time. Within, however, were stationed wakeful eunuchs, armed. Cheker Ghar shivered. He knew the cruelty of the eunuchs.

  But a stronger impulse than his own will drew him to the barrier. Here he listened attentively. Occasional voices reached him, showing that the guardians of the women were awake. Cheker Ghar glanced swiftly behind him to reassure himself as to his position.

  About the kanate was a cleared space; on the farther side of this the horse artillery that always accompanied the Mogul was parked. Through the mist reared the summits of the tents of the ameers and mansabdars, illumined by the pallid moonlight. For several miles the camp extended, to the hills.

  The only sounds were the measured cries of the outer sentries, the howl of a dog, the mutter of the hunting-beasts prisoned in the Mogul's menagerie, or the snort of a horse. The air was chill with a hint of coming dawn.

  There was no time to be lost. Satisfied as to his position, Cheker Ghar bared his teeth and, taking his pack in his arms, slipped under the kanate.

  He crept slowly into the moonlight on the farther side. A stout eunuch poised not twenty feet away saw him and squealed shrilly—then his warning cry changed to a laugh.

  “El Ghias," the guard called softly to his companions. “The buffoon."

  “Aye, gracious masters," bowed the conjurer; “aye, here is poor El Ghias. Eh—I starve for food. There is scanty picking among the dogs this night, and my belly yearns. I remember the gracious masters who gave me silver—"

  “Begone," warned the eunuch carelessly. “Misgotten cur— mongrel of a jackal's begetting! We have no silver for you. Entrance here is forbidden—"

  “O unutterable vileness, bred of dishonorable fathers and unknown mothers," said Cheker Ghar to himself. Aloud:

  “By the gods, 'tis a dreary night, masters. See, I would beguile the hour with a clever trick. A rare sight, noble swordbearers of Jahangir!"

  He shifted his pack from his shoulders to the ground, prostrating himself before the guardians. It was not the first time he had come, for he had prepared craftily for this night. The eunuchs had been amused at his arts.

  “O thrice-defiled maggot of a dung-hill," he whispered under his breath, adding:

  “Bara, grant me but a moment. I have an artful trick, taught me by my father's wisdom. The hour is fitting for such a feat. Watch in silence—"

  He swiftly unstripped his pack, disclosing a pot of earth and a white silk cloth. Bara and the others drew near, fired with curiosity. They ran great risk in allowing the conjurer to stay, but his cleverness had whiled away weary hours before this, and now he promised
a rare trick.

  “In this pot," said Cheker Ghar solemnly, “aided byHanuman, the monkey-face, and Ganesh, the elephant-head, I can make to grow—a tree. Name what tree you will, noble masters, and it will grow and bear fruit."

  He squatted behind the pot, glancing up at them. From the corner of his eye he saw a shadow appear under the awning of the tent nearest on the right—the one that sheltered the women in attendance on the seraglio. Four eunuchs now stood about him, leaving a bare space of some two hundred yards along the tent-line.

  “A lie," chattered Bara. “A tree! Nay, it cannot be, base-born."

  “Even as I say," nodded Cheker Ghar, “it will appear. Name but the tree."

  Incredulity, curiosity and uneasiness were in the black faces that bent over the conjurer.

  “A plane-tree," hazarded one.

  “Nay, a mulberry," broke in Bara, grinning. “Wretched one, sweeping of the offal-heap, noisome breeder of evil smells, grow me a mulberry tree with fruit! Six silver dinars if I taste of the fruit. The bastinado if you fail."

  The others laughed and pressed closer.

  Cheker Ghar did not laugh. Nor did he look up at Bara. Perhaps —for the conjurer had a way of hearing all the news of the imperial bazaars—Cheker Ghar had known Bara was fond of mulberries.

  “Take heed, exalted ones," he muttered, “and speak not."

  Whereupon he cast the white cloth over the pot. The trick was a favorite with Hindu conjurers but so difficult that it was not performed on ordinary occasions. The eunuchs had never witnessed it although they had heard of it.

  Cheker Ghar raised his bare, brown arms and lifted the cloth. A tiny green shoot was disclosed.

  “Nay," shrilled Bara, “that is no tree but a weed—"

  “It is the seed-shoot of the mulberry," reproved the conjurer sternly.

  Again he replaced the cloth with tense face. His half-closed eyes shot to the tent on the right. The slender shadow was still there. Without the enclosure sounded the trot of horses.

  “The horsemen make their rounds," observed Bara.

  He was unconcerned, for none of the outer guard would have dared look within the kanate.

  “Behold!"

  Cheker Ghar's bare arms writhed above his head and the cloth seemed to rise of itself into his hand. A young tree perhaps three feet in height stood in the pot.

  “Karamet, karamet!" cried the onlookers. “A miracle!"

  The conjurer's keen ears had noted that one horse lagged behind the others. A gleam of moonlight appeared against the kanate as if a weapon wielded from without had slit the cotton fabric. The eunuchs, absorbed in the tree, had sensed nothing untoward.

  “Pluck the fruit, noble Bara," he wheedled. “See, within the leaves. The six dinars are mine."

  Incredulously the chief eunuch, who bore the honorary title of Purified One of Paradise, felt among the branches of the tree. He plucked craftily at the stem, but it did not yield. The tree was in fact a mulberry.

  He stared angrily at the ripe fruit he had found and fumbled in his girdle for coins which he flung down with an oath. Cheker Ghar clutched them eagerly.

  Then the shadow flitted from the canopy toward the barrier. In the moonlight it was revealed as a veiled woman.

  A eunuch saw her and cried out. At once with incredible swiftness Cheker Ghar clutched his pot, thrust it into the pack and gained his feet, holding the leopard-skin.

  “Fools!" he chattered. “Offspring of swine!"

  Bara's sword whirled at him but the conjurer leaped back, still reviling his enemies, and scurried under the barrier with crab-like agility.

  The woman who had fled from the tent had passed through the opening in the cotton wall. Bara sprang after her, storming curses. As he plunged into the slit cloth a hand appeared in the aperture—a hand that grasped a dagger.

  Bara staggered back with the haft of the dagger sticking from his broad girdle. He gripped the haft moaning and sank to his knees. His companions hesitated, making the night shrill with their screams. Others ran up.

  On the outer side of the kanate the girl had been caught up in strong, young arms.

  “Kera! Flower of my heart!"

  She lay trembling in Rao Singh's grasp as the boy ran to his horse and swung into the saddle. He set spurs to his horse and wheeled away from the imperial enclosure as the beat of approaching hoofs neared them—but not before a diminutive figure had secured a firm hold on his stirrup and raced beside him, barelegged, a leopard-skin on its shoulders.

  “Into the cannon, noble lord," warned Cheker Ghar. “The ameer's guard is close behind."

  Rao Singh swerved and traced his way among the picketed horses. Slaves started up to gaze, but hung back perceiving a nobleman with a woman on his saddle peak.

  Behind them echoed the shouts of pursuers. Eunuchs and soldiers swept through the parked cannon, questing for the horseman they had glimpsed for a moment.

  Out of the red imperial tents came women slaves who gathered together and stared at a fat figure prone on the earth, hands clasped about a dagger-hilt and wide eyes staring up into the moon with a kind of helpless surprise.

  III

  Khlit was making his morning meal at the ford in the Jhilam caravan-trail. The sky overhead had changed from gray to blue and the stars had paled before a rush of crimson into the eastern sky.

  The wanderer had drawn rice-cakes and portions of dried mutton from his saddlebags and was eating hungrily, cutting the food with his dagger. He was alone at the ford. Fresh hoof prints showed on the farther bank. But here two trails crossed and the marks could not be traced beyond the stream edge.

  Khlit eyed the stream meditatively. Often he frowned. He had much to think about.

  From the Cossack steppe he had journeyed to the Tatar plains, where he had found men to his liking—indeed of his own blood. He had liked the life on the open steppe, where men lived on horseback and there were no cities.

  Here matters were different. Wherever Jahangir the Mogul went, there was a city of tents. And myriad courtiers, ambassadors from outlying tribes, trade cities, and kingdoms.

  Khlit had been interested at first in the splendor of the palaces and the temples of the Land of the Five Rivers (The Punjab). He had never seen such an array of soldiery assembled in one place. The very numbers oppressed him. Here was luxury, food in plenty. Here beat the pulse of the southern Asiatic world.

  He had been favored with gifts at first—slaves, which he gambled away, and horses, which he liked and kept. But since the affray with the guards of the seraglio he had been ignored, although he might still claim the favor of Jahangir in memory of the deed that had brought the wanderer to Hindustan.

  The heat of the plain had annoyed him and he was glad when the Mogul's court moved to the cool hills of Kashmir. And Khlit had been thinking. He saw unending caravans bear wealth to the Mogul, but he had noticed that Jahangir drained the nobles of their wealth to pay his enormous army.

  He had seen a fortunate Rajput chief raised at a word to the rank of two thousand horse; yet another of the same clan had been beheaded as promptly for a whispered word against the Mohammedans. He had listened while emissaries from Khorassan called Jahangir monarch of the world to his face and debated among themselves whether they should shake off the Mogul's yoke and throw their fortunes with the Persians.

  Curiously he had noted that Jahangir and his followers uttered their prayers even while drunk, yet massacred the garrison of a hill town with bland treachery when inviolability had been promised.

  Khlit perceived the greatness of the empire of Hindustan, and marveled. Yet these hive-like human beings were not of his race. And he was weary of the silken luxury which enwrapped the camp.

  The high civilization of the court held no interest for him. Khlit had seen too much of the evil ambition of the priests—for the most part—the astrologers and the physicians. With very few exceptions each man had his price.

  These matters and others Khlit considered while the li
ght grew in the East and he listened to the approach of a large body of horsemen. They came swiftly, but Khlit was not disturbed. He was not accustomed to yielding his place at the approach of strangers. Furthermore he had a purpose in staying where he was.

  The leaders of the cavalcade swept up to the ford and reined in with a shout.

  “Ho, graybeard!" one cried. “Saw you a horseman with a woman in his arms pass this way?"

  Others appeared—cavalry of the imperial guard, eunuchs, archers, and one or two ameers of rank gorgeously clad and profane in their anger and haste.

  “Speak, dullard!" exclaimed another. “A woman has been stolen from the exalted seraglio. Men will die for this. Saw you the traitorous rider?"

  Khlit surveyed them in silence. He had watched while Rao Singh with Kera and Ahmad Rumi, mounted behind Cheker Ghar, had taken the upper turn to the hills. Both horses—they had availed themselves of the animal belonging to the slain Persian master of horse—had been carrying double and they had but a brief start.

  If the pursuers were set on their tracks, at once they must be over-hauled. But Khlit was not minded that this should happen. His talk with Ahmad Rumi had not been in vain. Moreover, he had been pleased with the youthful Rao Singh.

  “How should I know?" he growled. “I am no stealer of women."

  The ranking ameer glanced anxiously at the divided trails and gnawed his lip. He had been commander of the guard when Kera escaped.

  “Perchance this will quicken your memory, warrior," he cried, fingering a gold mohar.

  Khlit's eyes gleamed shrewdly under their shaggy brows.

  “Aye, that is well spoken," he responded. “A rider with a woman across his knees passed this way and took the lower turn."

  He pointed to where the cross-trail led into the thickets, away from the path to the hills where Rao Singh had gone.

  The ameer who was leader of the party was about to sign for an advance after tossing Khlit the coin when a small, dun Arab pushed in front of him and a high voice not unlike a woman's addressed him.