But when the old men saw Jamuga, and observed his gentle hesitant manners, and saw his blue eyes and his smile, their hearts lifted with joy. Here was one they could understand, and who would understand them. “The lord Temujin,” they cried, “is a lord of great wisdom!”
On the second night of his arrival, the old man who had been the previous nokud suggested, with a simple forthrightness, that Jamuga marry his granddaughter, Yesi, and become in truth, one of the Naiman.
“I have no desire to marry,” replied Jamuga abruptly. “There are men who are celibate, and live only for their own thoughts, and service.”
The old man spread out his hands with deprecating gentleness. “But how can a man serve men unless he giveth sons to serve his people, also?”
“Thou dost mean, to serve Temujin,” answered Jamuga, with bitterness.
The old man sighed. “It is the will of God. We must give tribute to our lord, not only in corn and horses and herds, but in soldiers, also. But peace is precious, and no price is too high to pay for it.”
He urged Jamuga to look at Yesi at least, who was skilled in all womanly duties, a gentle Christian woman who knew her place and had a soft tongue. At first Jamuga, remembering Bortei, and recalling that women were at best a danger to men, refused. But later, he reconsidered. Perhaps the old men were right; perhaps it would be comfortable to have a wife, whom he need not look at except at night. She would bear him children and tend his fires and his yurt. Suddenly he was conscious of his great loneliness. A wife became a warm fire in the midst of strangers. If he truly wished to be one of this people, he must marry one of their women.
He sent for Yesi and her grandfather. The old man came at once, gleefully, leading the girl by the hand. Jamuga saw that she was tall, and that she kept her head modestly bent, covered by a striped shawl. She stood before him, trembling a little, her head hidden.
Jamuga felt a great tenderness and gentleness. He stretched out his hand and removed the girl’s shawl. He looked long at her blushing face. And then he knew that never again would he be lonely and homeless, without a friend and without love.
Then man and woman regarded each other in a deep silence. The girl had a sweet and tinted face, full of honesty and innocence and fearlessness, with a pale rosy mouth, a small straight nose, and the bluest eyes he had ever seen. In her eyes he saw courage and gentleness and modesty, and a steadfast intelligence. Her hair, pale brown and smooth and straight as silk, hung to her knees in shining braids, and gave her a look of proud meekness and aristocracy. Her figure was slender and exceedingly beautiful in its robe of rough white wool. She had tied a scarf of multi-colored striped silk about her narrow waist, and a silver cross hung between her breasts.
Jamuga’s heart turned over with a sensation of infinite sweetness and pain. For a moment he thought that she resembled Azara, who had so bewitched and changed Temujin.
He extended his hand to her, and said: “Come.” She hesitated; color flooded her cheeks. Her eyes filled with tears. Then she smiled, and gave him her hand, bending her head to hide her face. He felt her hand tremble, then nestle closely in his.
There was a great marriage feast. The Uighur came, singing hoarsely, and stamping their rough deerskin boots in an uncouth dance. The Naiman rejoiced. The fires burned until dawn, and there was more wine than any one man could drink. The old men sang songs, not of warlike heroes, but of sunlight and earth, wheat and rain, peace and love.
Yesi sat by the side of her husband, and received, with him, the homage of their people. And Jamuga, listening and looking and smiling, with Yesi’s hand in his, thought at last that he had come home, and that never again for him would there be unrest and misery, homelessness and sorrow.
When he slept that night with Yesi beside him, he had a strange dream, which, upon waking, seemed an omen not only of the present, but of the world to come, still in the embryo of the future.
He thought that he stood on the white crystalline shores of the Lake of the Damned. He was filled with his old pain and sadness, his old sensation of imminent death and disaster and complete hopelessness. The sky was as red as blood, and streaked with yellow fire. The Lake lay in its awful mystery of purple shadows and silence. And then, all at once, he heard a dim far shout, and saw an army of men approaching the Lake, on foot. But they were not armed with swords. Their horses went before them, dragging plows. And they drove these horses and plows over the terrible Lake, shouting and singing and calling to each other in voices of jubilant triumph. The ominous silence of the red-lit air was broken, and echoes flew through it, like white doves. And then, in the wake of the plows rose the wheat, wave upon wave, resistless and golden, the sound of its growing like a loud and rustling wind. The bloody sky faded; it was sunset, and the sky was a deep shadowy blue, full of peace and promise. And the men continued to plow until all the earth was waving with grain, and the Lake was gone. Then, the plowers rested on their plows, and looked back at what they had done. And their faces were filled with the peace of the fertile land.
Jamuga sighed in his dream. It seemed to him that all the hot anguish flowed out of him and was lost in the fruitful silence. Some one was speaking to him, but he could not see the speaker.
“The earth is the Lord’s,” said the unseen one. “Always, and forever, the earth is the Lord’s!”
Chapter 9
Temujin’s face was inscrutable as he was read the letter from his anda. It was Kurelen who read the letter to him, and in all its words Temujin heard peaceful joy and contentment.
“This year I can send only forty young men to thee, for the winter was cold and the last harvest was meager. This spring we are planting many more acres of reclaimed earth, and as the river overflowed and fertilized the land, we expect that we shall have more wheat than ever. Therefore, because of the last harvest, I regret that I cannot send thee the usual amount of grain. What I am sending is all I can spare, both of grain and men, for our people need every hand to bring forth an abundance of harvests.”
Temujin looked at the forty young Naiman. They were strong and comely young men, with calloused hands and sun-black-ened amiable faces. Their military equipment was poor and neglected. Temujin frowned. Jamuga had said these men were unmarried; they had not brought wives or children or yurts with them. But the horses they rode, and the stallions and mares they had brought as tribute, were fat and sleek, and oversized.
“These are not soldiers,” he said contemptuously. “They are herdsmen and farmers.” He added, with a vicious undertone: “How can men who have planted grain learn the arts of war?”
“Nevertheless,” said old Kurelen, “planters are needed, as well as destroyers.”
He continued to read the letter, and as he did so, he seemed pleased.
“I ask thee, as mine anda, to rejoice with me in the birth of my first children, twins, a son and a daughter, Yuzjani and Khati. The old men say they are the sun and the moon, which is an extravagance. However, pardon the prejudice of a father when I tell thee that the boy is as strong as the girl is beautiful. I do not know which I love the better. But the girl hath the beauty of her mother, my beloved Yesi, and is already showing the artfulness of her sex. She can do with me as she wilt. The boy shall be a Buddhist, like Yesi’s grandfather, and the girl shall be a Christian. It was a beautiful sight to see the Buddhists and the Christians celebrating their individual masses in the names of my children. My wife and I feel that God hath given us every blessing, and there is nothing more we can desire.”
Kurelen looked at Temujin’s dark face with its obscure and brooding expression. He saw there contempt and envy, and a somber restlessness.
“Jamuga never desired the world,” he said to his nephew.
Temujin snorted. “He who desireth little is content with nothing,” he replied. “A woman, children, herds and grain! What a small soul he hath!”
Kurelen shrugged, but said nothing. However, he was alarmed. For he saw that some rage had Temujin, and he was afraid for Jamuga,
who had been indiscreet enough to be happy in the face of a man who would never be happy.
Finally the old man said: “Thou art right, Temujin. The little life led by Jamuga would never appeal to thee. Thou wert made for destiny, for the conquest of the earth, not its meager cultivation.” He made a wry mouth as he said this, and watched Temujin keenly.
But for some reason Temujin did not look soothed nor placated. He walked away, scowling right and left, and, even his warriors and officers fell back, uneasily, at his look. He had his favorite white stallion brought to him, and then rode off furiously into the barrens. He mounted a low gray hill, which was strewn with tamarisk and dead thorn-bushes, and descended another side. There he was alone, in a frozen sea of such low gray hills, lifeless under a sky the color of dull silver. Here the wind stung his face with mingled dust and sand, the erosions of the ages. There was no sound, but this wind, and the impatient snuffling of his horse. He sat, huddled in his saddle, gloomily staring off into the distance, not moving, a cloaked statue, immobile and somber, his thoughts as lifeless and dark as the barrens and the skies.
He had come here to sort out his restless emotions and dull angry thoughts. But as he sat on his horse, his mind took on the color of this dead world, this empty and dusty space. The gale moaned heavily about him, and all at once it seemed to him that it was freighted with a multitude of lost voices, desolately speaking of what had once lived in this world, which had gone forever.
Kurelen had long ago told him the legends of these barrens, that once a mighty empire of mighty cities had stood here, blazing with life and color and movement, restlessly seething with a thousand dynasties. Here had been temples and market places, academies and schools, fountains and thronged streets, palaces and endless houses, gardens and pools and terraces. Here had been walls and bronze gates, and the hubbub of caravans and commerce, countinghouses and traders and merchants from a hundred towns. Where had they gone? This world had rolled up like a painted scroll, and had vanished into dust.
Kurelen had said this was the inevitable fate of all empires and all glories—dust and laden wind and eroded emptiness. The banners of triumph had crumbled and been blown away. The halls where conquerors had walked had become heaps of stone, covered by the ages. Kings had ridden down streets now buried in sand, and sand drifted where their generals had stood in a forest of lances. Oppressor and oppressed lay side by side now, in the tomb of nothingness, their mouths filled with earth’. Those who had loved and those who had hated were alike in that they had gone, leaving no trace behind them. Multitudes had wept here, and rejoiced, and there was nothing left of them but this wind and this enormous death.
A horrible pang went through Temujin, and he spoke aloud, simply and harshly:
“What does it matter, then, what I do, and what I covet, and what I seize? I may gain the world, and tomorrow, there shall be nothing left but desert and silence, and the laden wind! What doth drive me? Revenge? But Kurelen hath said to me that a man who longeth for revenge, and taketh it, is still defeated. Envy? But such is the end of envy—this barrenness and this gray sand-filled void! Power? But the end of power is surely waste and nothingness!
“Death, then, is the end of everything. What doth anything matter, but today? And even today is lost, if there be no love in it.”
He heard his own words, and was aghast. A dreadful sense of emptiness and hopelessness swept over him. He could taste the dry sand and dust in his mouth, and it appeared to him that the taste was on the lips of his soul. His heart ached and throbbed, and his eyes went blind.
“Azara!” he cried in anguish. “If thou wouldst have remained with me, if we could have been together, then every day would have been a day of life, and not of death! There would have been depth in every hour, and every night would have had its meaning. But now, there is nothing for me!”
‘He bent his head. His hands fell from the reins. The stallion, feeling his thoughts, began to tremble. The sky darkened, and the hills became lost in shadow and grayness. The whole desolate landscape was flooded with a wan and macabre light, in which there was no outline of any living thing, and the world became a dream still held in chaos. And in the midst of this dream of dead ages stood the horse and the man.
Why do I go on? thought Temujin. What is there on the earth for me? Why cannot I have rest, and love, as lesser men have them?
He lifted his head. He looked about him. He could feel his warm heart beating painfully in this universal death. He thought of the things he had done, and which he must do, though he did not know why. He was suddenly permeated by an enormous weariness.
Why must I do these things? I know not. I only know that there is an impelling force in me, as mysterious as the lights of the North, as resistless as the hurricane, as wild as the desert, as savage as the wolf, as terrible as life and death. There is in me an awful hunger. I am filled with voices and a sense of limitless power.
But after all I am a leaf in the wind, a feather upon the river. I am blown and driven, and I know not where. I only know I must do as I must do.
I am not a man, but only violence and chaos. I am part of the universal upheaval. Such as I am one with the volcano and the wave, the earthquake and the storm. I am part of the furious destiny of the earth, and have no more volition or will than any other part, and am as helpless.
If I leave behind me the shattered and blackened walls of cities—if my path is heaped with victims—this do I know in truth: My spirit is no less shattered and blackened. I am the first victim.
Chapter 10
A servant came hurriedly to Jamuga.
“Lord, there is a caravan coming, and one doth carry the banner of the nine yak-tails!”
Jamuga’s heart alternately sank, then rose. “Temujin!” he said aloud. His breath came fast. He did not know why he was at once filled with apprehension and joy. He went out to greet his visitors, and brought his wife with him.
But the visitor, accompanied by a detachment of warriors and servants, was not Temujin. Jamuga, seeing this, was conscious of a sinking disappointment, then relief. The visitor was Kurelen, so wrapped in furs that he resembled an old dejected bear. Seeing Jamuga, he shouted and waved.
Jamuga helped him to dismount, then embraced him. “How glad I am to see thee!” he exclaimed. He had never been overly fond of the old cripple, but now his face was lighted with pleasure and affection.
Kurelen spat. “My mouth is as dry as a withered sack!” he said, “and my old bones rattle. Well, Jamuga! Thou hast not aged a day! Such is a result of joy. And a good wife,” he added genially, seeing Yesi, who was gazing at him with a modest and innocent smile.
She bowed before him. “My husband’s friend is as a father to me,” she answered in a low voice, and kissed his dark and twisted hand.
Kurelen was touched. To cover his emotion, he looked about him. He saw throngs of smiling and contented faces. Then Jamuga led him to his yurt, and ordered wine and food. Kurelen ate with his old gusto, and commented on the good bread and mutton.
“We grew the corn ourselves,” said Jamuga, proudly.
Then there was a sudden silence between them. At last Jamuga asked diffidently: “And how is Temujin?”
Kurelen laughed. “He hath a score of children. Thou, I presume, hast only one wife, but Temujin hath a harem. His little daughters are very beautiful, and though he doth make a huge fuss over Bortei’s sons, I suspect he loveth his girls the best. He is already talking about marrying the oldest to princes of Cathay. What an ambition doth consume him!”
Jamuga was yearning to ask if Temujin ever spoke of him, but instead he said: “But is he happy? And well?”
Kurelen shrugged. “Sometimes he doth complain of his liver, but I believe he doth eat too much, and is too fond of wine. But that is a family failing. Happy? I do not think so. How can a man be happy when he hath a fire in him? Sometimes he doth look despairing, as though seeking help. I ofttimes wonder if that Persian girl, the daughter of Toghrul Khan, did not eat
too deeply into him. Yet, he never speaks of her.”
Jamuga said, with a touch of his old bitterness: “Temujin never loved any one.”
Kurelen raised an eyebrow quizzically. “I do not agree with thee. He loved thee, Jamuga. I believe he doth love thee still.”
Jamuga looked up with involuntary eagerness. But he said: “I cannot believe it.” His face darkened sadly, and he looked away.
Kurelen laid his hand on his arm. “Thou wert always suspicious, and a cold doubter. Nevertheless, when I asked permission of Temujin to visit thee, he seemed pleased. And in my bags there are gifts for thee and thy wife.”
He had his bags brought into the yurt, and opened them like a jovial pasha. Yesi, who had been serving them, stopped near by, a plate in her hand, and a look of young anticipation on her face. Kurelen produced a fine Chinese dagger for Jamuga, with a handle of gold encrusted with turquoises. There was also a pair of deerskin boots, as fine and soft as silk, and elaborately embroidered. And best of all, there were several Chinese manuscripts of poetry and philosophy, seized from a luckless caravan. For Yesi, there were lengths of yellow and scarlet silk, a shawl of the finest crimson wool, a necklace of opals and silver, bracelets of carved green jade, and a silver box of attar of roses. For her children, there were a cloak of white wolfskins and a cluster of jingling silver bells.
Jamuga was so moved by these rich gifts that he could not speak, but Yesi took them with cries of joy. Jamuga watched her with a sad and loving smile. She held the fur up to her face; she thrust the bracelets upon her arms. Then she looked at her husband, pleading for his admiration. But again his expression darkened.
“Did he send me no message?” he asked.
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