Two gun bob, p.170
Two-Gun Bob, page 170
As they approached Shalizahr the secret of the groves and gardens became apparent. Soil, doubtless brought laboriously from distant valleys, had been used to fill some of the many depressions which pitted the surface of the plateau, and an elaborate system of deep, narrow irrigation canals threaded the gardens, obviously originating in some natural water supply near the center of the city. The plateau, sheltered by the ring of crumbling peaks, presented a more seasonal climate than was common in those mountains.
The road ran between large orchards and entered the city proper — lines of flat-roofed stone houses fronting each other across the wide, paved street, each with an expanse of garden behind it. There was no wall about the city. The plateau itself was a fortress. Half a mile of ravine-gashed plain separated the city from the mountain which frowned above and behind it. The plateau was like a great shelf jutting out from the massive slope.
Men at work in the gardens and loitering along the street halted and stared at the Kurds and their captive. Gordon saw Druses, many Persians, Arabs, a few Indians. But no Afghans. Evidently the heterogenous population had no affiliations with the native inhabitants of the land.
The people did not carry their curiosity beyond questioning stares. The street widened into a suk closed on the south side by a broad wall which enclosed the palacial building with its gorgeous dome.
There was no guard at the massive bronze-barred gates, only a gay-clad negro who salaamed deeply as he swung open the portals. Gordon and his escort came into a small courtyard paved with colored tile, in the midst of which a fountain bubbled and pigeons fluttered about it. The Kurds marched straight on across the court and were halted on the broad pillared portico by a guard of thirty Arabs whose plumed helmets of silvered steel, gilded corselets and gold-chased scimitars contrasted curiously with the modern rifles in their hands.
The hawk-faced captain of the guard conversed briefly with Yusuf ibn Suleiman, and Gordon divined that no love was lost between them. The captain, whose name was Muhammad ibn Ahmed, presently made a gesture with his slim brown hand, and Gordon was surrounded by a dozen glittering Arabs, and marched among them up the broad marble steps and through the wide arch whose bronze doors stood wide. The Kurds followed, without their rifles, and not looking at all happy.
They passed through wide, dim-lit halls, from the vaulted and fretted ceilings of which hung smoking bronze censers, while on either hand velvet-curtained arches hinted at inner mysteries. Tapestries rustled, soft footfalls whispered, and once Gordon saw a slim white hand grasping a hanging as if the owner peered from behind it.
Even the swagger of the Arabs — all except their captain — was modified. The Kurds were openly uneasy. Mystery and intangible menace lurked in those dim, gorgeous halls. Gordon felt that he might have been traversing a palace of Nineveh or ancient Persia, but for the modern weapons of his escort.
Presently they emerged into a broader hallway and approached a double-valved bronze door, flanked by even more gorgeously-clad guardsmen, Persians, these, scented and painted like the warriors of Cambyses. These bizarre figures stood impassively as statues while the Arabs strode by with their captive, or guest, and entered a semi-circular room where dragon-worked tapestries covered the walls, hiding all possible doors or windows except the one by which they had entered. Golden lamps hung from the arched ceiling which was worked in fretted gold and ebony. Opposite the great doorway there stood a marble dais. On the dais stood a great canopied chair, scrolled and carved like a throne, and on the velvet cushions which littered the seat lolled a slender figure in a pearl-sewn khalat. On the rose-colored turban glistened a great gold brooch, made in the shape of a human hand gripping a three-bladed dagger. The face beneath the turban was oval, the color of old ivory, with a small pointed black beard. The dark eyes were contemplative. The man was a Persian.
On either side of the throne stood a giant Sudanese, like images of heathen gods carved out of black basalt, naked but for sandals and silken loin-cloths, with broad-tipped tulwars in their hands.
“Who is this?” languidly inquired the man on the throne, in Arabic.
“El Borak, ya sidna!” answered Muhammad ibn Ahmed, with a swagger in his consciousness that the announcement of that name would create something of a sensation anywhere East of Stamboul.
The dark eyes quickened with interest, sharpened with suspicion, and Yusuf ibn Suleiman, watching his master’s face with painful intensity, drew in a quick breath and clenched his hands so the bails bit into the palms.
“How comes he in Shalizahr uannounced?”
“The Kurdish dogs who watch the Stair say he came to them, swearing that he had been sent for by the Shaykh ez Zurim.”
Gordon stiffened as he heard that title. It was incredible, fantastic; yet it was true. His black eyes fixed with fierce intensity on the oval face.
He did not speak. There was a time for silence as well as for bold speech. His next move depended entirely on the Shaykh’s next words. They might brand him as an imposter and doom him. But he depended on two things: the belief that no Eastern ruler would order El Borak slain without first trying to learn the reason behind his presence; and the fact that few Eastern rulers either enjoy the full confidence of their followers, or themselves wholly trust those followers.
After a pause the man on the throne spoke at, but not to, the Kurd: “This is the law of Shalizahr: no man may ascend the Stair unless he makes the Sign so the Watchers of the Stair can see. If he does not know the Sign, the Warder of the Gate must be summoned to converse with the stranger before he may mount the Stair. El Borak was not announced. The Warder of the Gate was not summoned. Did El Borak make the Sign, below the Stair?”
Yusuf ibn Suleiman sweated as he wavered between a dangerous truth and a lie that might be even more dangerous. He shot a venomous glance at Gordon and spoke in a voice harsh with apprehension: “The guard in the cleft did not give warning. El Borak appeared upon the cliff before we saw him, though we were vigilant as eagles. He is a magician who makes himself invisible at will. We knew he spoke truth when he said you had sent for him, otherwise he could not have known the Secret Way —”
Perspiration beaded the Kurd’s narrow forehead. The man on the throne did not seem to hear his voice and Muhammad ibn Ahmed, quick to sense that the Kurd had fallen in disfavor, struck Yusuf savagely in the mouth with his open hand.
“Dog, be silent until the Shaykh deigns to command thy speech!”
Yusuf reeled, blood starting down his beard, and looked black murder at the Arab, but he said nothing.
The Persian moved his hand languidly, yet with impatience.
“Take the Kurds away. Keep them under guard until further orders. Even if a man is expected, the Watchers should not be surprized. El Borak did not know the Sign, yet he climbed the Stair unhindered. If they had been vigilant, not even El Borak could have done this. He is no magician. You have my leave to go. I will talk to El Borak alone.”
Muhammad ibn Ahmed salaamed and led his glittering swordsmen away between the silent files of warriors lined on each side of the door, herding the shivering Kurds before them. These turned as they passed through the door and fixed their burning eyes on Gordon in a silent glare of hate.
Muhammad ibn Ahmed pulled the bronze doors shut behind them. The Persian spoke in English to Gordon.
“Speak freely. These black men do not understand English.”
Gordon, before replying, kicked a divan up before the dais and settled himself comfortably on it, with his feet propped on a velvet footstool. He had not established his prestige in the Orient by meek bearing or timid behavior. Where another man might have tip-toed, hat in hand and heart in mouth, Gordon strode with heavy boots and heavy hand, and because he was El Borak, he lived where other men died. His attitude was no bluff. He was ready at all times to back up his play with hot lead and cold steel, and men knew it, just as they knew that he was the most dangerous man with any sort of weapon between Cairo and Peking.
The Persian showed no surprize that his captive — or guest — should seat himself without asking permission. His first words showed that he had had much dealings with Westerners, and had, for his own purposes, adopted some of their directness. For he said, without preamble: “I did not send for you.”
“Of course not. But I had to tell those fools something, or else kill them all.”
“What do you want here?”
“What does any man want who comes to a nest of outlaws?”
“He might come as a spy,” pointed out the Shaykh.
Gordon laughed at him. “For whom?”
“How did you know the Road?”
Gordon took refuge in the obscurity of Eastern subtlety.
“I followed the vultures; they always lead me to my goal.”
“They should,” was the grim reply. “You have fed them full often enough. What of the Mongol who watched the cleft?”
“Dead; he wouldn’t listen to reason.”
“The vultures follow you, not you the vultures,” commented the Shaykh. “Why did you not send word to me of your coming?”
“Send word by whom? Last night as I camped in the Gorge of Ghosts, resting my horses before I pushed on to Shalizahr, a gang of your fools fell on my party in the darkness, killed one and carried another away. The fourth man was frightened and ran away. I came on alone as soon as the moon rose.”
“They were Yezidees, whose duty it is to watch the Gorge of Ghosts. They did not know you sought me. They limped into the city at dawn, with one man dying and most of the others sorely wounded, and swore that they had slain a sahib and his servants in the Gorge of Ghosts. Evidently they feared to admit that they ran away, leaving you alive. They shall smart for their lie. But you have not told me why you came here.”
“I seek refuge. And I bring news. The man you sent to kill the Amir wounded him and was himself cut to pieces by the Uzbek guardsmen.”
The Persian shrugged his shoulders impatiently.
“Your news is stale. We knew that before the noon of the day after the night the execution was attempted. And we have since learned that the Amir will live, because an English physician cleansed the wounds of the poison which was on the dagger.”
That sounded like black magic, until Gordon remembered the pigeons in the courtyard. Carrier birds, of course, and agents in Kabul to release them with the messages.
“We have kept our secret well,” said the Persian. “Since you knew of Shalizahr and the Road to Shalizahr, you must have been told of it by some one of the Brotherhood. Did Bagheela send you?”
Gordon recognized the trap laid for him and avoided it. He had no idea who Bagheela was, and this question was too obviously a bait an imposter might be tempted to seize.
“I don’t know the man you call Bagheela,” he answered. “I don’t have to be told secrets. I learn them for myself. I came here because I had to have a hideout. I’m out of favor at Kabul, and the English would have me shot if they could catch me.”
One of the most persistent legends in circulation about Gordon is that he is an enemy of the English. This has its basis in his refusal to be awed by gold braid and brass buttons, and in his comings and goings in tranquil disregard of all rules and regulations. He has no reverance for authority which bedecks itself in pomp and arrogance, and as a result is hated by certain types of officials, both civilian and military. But the men who actually rule India are his friends, and have profited by his aid again and again.
But the Persian had no way of knowing this. To the Shaykh El Borak was merely a lawless adventurer, not quite gone native, but still beyond the pale of respectability, and quite likely to fall foul of the government at any time.
He said some thing in scholarly and archaic Persian and Gordon, knowing he would not change the language of their conversation without a subtle reason, feigned ignorance of the tongue. Sometimes Oriental deviousness is childishly transparent.
The Shaykh spoke to one of the blacks, and that giant stolidly drew a silver hammer from his girdle and smote a golden gong hanging by the tapestries. The echoes had scarcely died away when the bronze doors opened long enough to admit a slim man in plain silken robes who stood bowing before the dais — a Persian, like the Shaykh. The latter addressed him as Musa, and questioned him in the tongue he had just tested on Gordon. Musa replied in the same language.
“Do you know this man?”
“Aye, ya sidna.”
“Have our spies included him in their reports?”
“Aye, ya sidna. The last despatch from Kabul bore word of him. On the night that your servant attempted to execute the Amir, this man talked with the Amir secretly, an hour or so before the attack was made. After leaving the palace hurriedly, he fled from the city with three men, and was seen riding along the road that leads to the village of the outlaw, Baber Khan of Khor. He was pursued by a horseman from Kabul, but whether he gave up the chase or was slain by the men of Khor, I do not know.”
Gordon, lounging on the divan and showing no sign to betray his understanding of what was being said, realized two things: the spy system of the Hidden Ones was more far-reaching than he had guessed; and a chain of misinterpreted circumstances were working in his favor. It was natural for these men to think that he had fled from Kabul under the shadow of royal displeasure. That he should ride for the village of an outlaw would seem to clinch the matter, as well as the fact of his “pursuit” by a horseman from Kabul — obviously not recognized as Lal Singh.
“You have my leave to go.”
Musa bowed and departed, closing the doors, and the Shaykh meditated in silence for a space. Presently he lifted his head, as if coming to a decision, and said: “I believe you are telling the truth. You fled from Kabul, to Khor, where no friend of the Amir would be welcome. Your enmity toward the English is well known. We need such a man as you. But I can not initiate you into the Brotherhood until Bagheela sees and passes on you. He is not now in Shalizahr, but will be here by tomorrow dawn.
“In the meantime I would like to know how your learned of our society and of our city.”
Gordon shrugged his shoulders.
“I hear the secrets the wind sings as it blows through the branches of the dry tamarisks; and the tales the men of the caravans whisper about the dung-fires in the serais.”
“Then you know our purpose? Our ambition?”
“I know what you call yourselves.” Gordon’s answer was purposely ambiguous, for he was groping his way, guided more by intuition and guesswork than by actual knowledge. His sole means of identification of the cult with which he was dealing was the title the Arab had given the Persian — the title of the lord of an ancient and mysterious race. That race and that title had once existed, beyond the shadow of a doubt, but both were clouded by the legends and myths of many centuries.
“Do you know what my title means?” asked the Shaykh suddenly, as if guessing Gordon’s thoughts.
“Shaykh ez Zurim — Lord of the Zurim,” answered Gordon. “The Zurim were a pre-Canaanitish race who lived in Syria before the coming of the Semitic tribes. They were given to heathenish worship and practised all kinds of black magic and human sacrifice. The Israelites destroyed the last remnants of them.”
“So say the historians,” sneered the Shaykh. “But the descendents of the Zurim still dwell in the mountains of Syria.”
“I suspected as much,” said Gordon. “Their practises persisted in a devil-worshipping cult of the same name. I’ve heard tales of it, but until recently I set them all down as legends.”
“Aye!” exclaimed the Persian. “The world deems them legends — but since the Beginning of Happenings the Fire of Zurim has not been wholly extinguished — though for more than a century it smoldered to glowing coals.”
“I’ve always suspected the existence of cults in the East that reach back before the time of Mohammed,” said Gordon, slowly.
“You speak the truth! And the society of the Hidden Ones is the oldest of all. It lies behind and beyond Islam, Buddha or Brahma. It recognizes no difference in race or religion.
“In the ancient past its branches extended all over the East, from Mongolia to Egypt. Mohammed thought he had destroyed the cult in Arabia, but he only broke one of its branches.
“Men of many races belong, and have belonged, to the society of the Hidden Ones. In the long, long ago the Zurim were only one branch, though from their race the priests of the cult were chosen. In later days the Assassins of Mount Alamut were a branch of the Hidden Ones, as were the Druses who worship the Gold Calf, the Yezidees of Mount Lalesh, and the Mongol Sons of Yellow Erlik. In Egypt, Syria, Persia and India were bands of the cult, cloaked in mystery and only half-suspected by the races among which they dwelt. But as the centuries passed these groups became isolated and fell apart, each branch going its separate way, and each dwindling in strength and importance because of a lack of unity.
“In olden days the Hidden Ones swayed the destinies of empires. They did not lead armies in the field, but they fought by poison and fire and the triple-bladed dagger that bit in the dark. Their scarlet-cloaked emissaries of death went forth to do the bidding of the Shaykh ez Zurim, and kings died in Cairo, in Jerusalem, in Samarcand, in Brusa.
“And I am a descendent of that one who was Shaykh ez Zurim in the days of Saladin — he who was the unseen, unguessed master of Hassan ibn Sabah, the Old Man of the Mountain. All Asia feared the Shaykh al Jebal, but he only did the bidding of the Shaykh ez Zurim!”
A fanatical gleam lit the dark eyes.
“Throughout my youth I dreamed of the former greatness of the cult, into which I was initiated when I was but a child. Wealth that flowed suddenly from the barren lands of my estate — western money that came to me from minerals found there — made the dream become reality. Othman el Aziz became Shaykh ez Zurim, the first to hold the title in a hundred years.
“The creed of the Hidden Ones is broad and deep as the sea, ignoring racial and religious differences, uniting men of opposing sects. Strand by strand I drew together and united the separate branches of the cult. My emissaries travelled throughout Asia, seeking members of the ancient society and finding them — in teeming cities, among barren mountains, in the silence of upland deserts. Slowly, surely, my band has grown, for I have not only united all the various branches of the cult, but have gained new recruits among the bold and desperate spirits of a score of races. All are one before the Fire of Zurim; I have among my followers Moslems, Buddhists, Hindus, devil-worshippers.
