A Prince of Dreamers. Flora Annie Webster Steel
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the night wore on; until at last only a few lay sparsely about its feet circling the outcast colony of Satanstown where, by Akbar's orders, vice dwelt and turned darkness into day. Above, all was shadow, save for one light high up on the palace whose outline struck firm against the velvet of the sky. It shone from Akbar's balcony; Akbar who after his usual habit watched while his subjects slept. To-night, however, something more than mere meditation absorbed him, as he sate, girt about the middle of his loose, white, woollen garment like some Franciscan monk. His face dark, aquiline, not so much ascetic as strenuous, was bent on William Leedes, the English jeweller, as he weighed in his balance the great uncut diamond from the King's turban.
The gold and gemmed setting from which it had been removed lay on the floor, and the irregularly ovoid stone itself gave out flickering brightnesses as it oscillated gently under the light of the seven branched golden cresset-stand in the alcove. Beneath this stand, backed partly by the tendril-inlaid curves of agate and chalcedony, lapis-lazuli and cornelian upon the marble wall, and partly by the pearl embroidered yellow satin cushions amongst which the King reclined, was a beautifully embossed silver clepsydre, or water clock, in which the floating bowl was fashioned in enamel like a sacred lotus; and beside this stood the marvellous censer, a triumph of goldsmith's and jeweller's art from which day and night arose the scented smoke which Akbar loved. Beyond, through the arches of the balcony, lay the night, velvety dark.
"Five hundred and sixty carats," murmured William Leedes to himself, "the largest known diamond in this world!--and of a most elegant water; but----" He looked up, his face full of denial. "It would mayhap lose half its weight in the cutting, great King," he said sharply, "and--God knows in His grace but we might cut out the King's Luck thereby."
He looked as if for support to the two men who stood behind him. They were Râjah Birbal and Shaik Abulfazl. The latter, seeing his master frown, interrupted the jeweller in hasty excuse.
"I but told him, Most Exalted, that the populace hold the stone a talisman; and sure at all times the luck of the Most Excellent has been stupendous. Still, we of the enlightened give praise where praise is due and not to stocks and stones."
Birbal shrugged his shoulders. "Say, rather, Shaikjee," he remarked urbanely, "that the wise see an Eternal cause even in stocks and stones."
The eyes of those two counsellors of the King were on each other in rivalry; but the King himself bent forward to touch the diamond with one pliant finger, and a faint fear showed in his face. Then he leant back once more.
"Luck is of God," he said, "and this stone----" he paused beset by recollections of the years he had worn it--ever since as a boy of three he had made his way safely through the great Snow-land.
"The stone, sire," put in William Leedes, firmly, "is as God made it. 'Tis well to remember that----"
He was looking at the King and the King's eyes were on his; for the time the whole of the rest of the world was empty for them both.
"Aye! But what of that He wishes it to be? What of that, sir jeweller?" came the swift answer, "therein lies kingcraft, to see what His will needs--and give it."
William Leedes bowed silently and there was a pause; then bluntly, suddenly, he said, "Yet, Great King, would I rather have naught to do with the cutting thereof."
In an instant Akbar's eyes flashed fire.
"Thou hast not, slave! 'Tis I who order it. Birbal! to thy charge the arrangements. The room next Diswunt the painter's, in the Court of Labour, is vacant. See it prepared. Double the guards if necessary--to thee I leave--the King's Luck."
A faint smile came to his face, but Birbal and Abulfazl looked at each other, and finally the latter spoke.
"This dust-like one," he said tentatively and yet with firmness, "presumes not to offer wisdom to its fount; but to the minds of the Most Exalted's devoted slaves it seems as if to the populace, there might be danger in Royalty appearing without the talisman to which all have looked as security for the King's success in all ways. Therefore if Majesty will ordain the cutting of the Eastern gem in Western fashion, let it at least condescend to wear in its place--until the gem return--a veritable Mountain of Light doubtless a substitute. Pooroo, the false jewel maker, who can deceive all but a diamond itself, hath the cast of the King's Luck, made when the Most Exalted changed the setting thereof. Let him fashion a double to deceive----"
"Deceive?" came Akbar's voice with a note of affectionate reproach in it, "deceive whom? Fate or the people? Lo! Abulfazl! to what end? Since if the tale be not true that luck lies in the stone, what need to regard it? And if it be true, how shall the false gem hoodwink God?"
He raised himself as he spoke, holding the diamond in his palm as an orb.
"Luck!" he said dreamily, "thou art mine to-night; and to-morrow is Fate's! Go!"
He gave the Eastern wave of dismissal and sank back amongst his cushions; sank back with more than usual lassitude, for the day had left him weary. It was no small thing to one of his temperament to quarrel with his son, his heir. It was a still greater thing to forgive him causelessly.
Therein lay the sting. The causelessness of the forgiveness, the lack of any security against a recurrence of the offence. So, as he thought of this, with a rush came back the memory of many a similar scene, and his fingers clasped in upon themselves as the disappointment ate into his very soul. Surely he had a right to expect more of Fate?--he who had waited so long, so patiently for an heir--since in those long years of waiting the very thought of mere sonship had been forgotten in the heirship. Yes, even now, Love seemed too trivial to count against Empire! Yet it was Love which had prompted forgiveness. Love of what?--what? Of himself surely--the love which claimed to live in his son--to live on. …
"Shall I bid the Reader of Wisdom to the Wise resume his task," came Birbal's voice. Noting the King's weariness he had lingered behind the others.
The King started, then looked round cheerfully. "Not to-night, friend; I have food for thought, and if I lack more--it waits below," he said, and leaning forward, rested his arm on the marble balustrade of the balcony, so pointed downward into the void darkness of the night. Through it like a little line of light fading into nothingness, ran the signal string attached to the quaint contrivance by which the King could secure, when the mood seized him, the presence of an opponent for some midnight argument. One touch at the cord and through the darkness the disputant waiting below, would by an ingenious system of counterpoise rise in a domed dhooli to the level of the balcony. Akbar laid his finger on the tense string, then once more looked back suddenly into Birbal's face.
"Ah! friend!" he said bitterly. "Could we but sound the Great Darkness as I can sound this little night, certain that my need will bring some sage, or fool, or knave, to keep Jalâl-ud-din Mahomed Akbar, Defender of the Faith, from wearying for sleep! But from the great Depths there comes no answer. The mystery is unfathomable--man's reason wanders bewildered in the streets of the City of God."
His voice sank in silence; then yet once again, he roused himself.
"Farewell, friend, for the night--the night that will bring to-morrow--Ye Gods! How will it be when the Night of Death closes in--on one of us?"
Birbal sank to his knees and touched his master's feet with his forehead. He had no other answer; so silently he passed through the great wadded curtains of gold tissue which separated the alcove from the rest of the room, leaving the King alone, lost in thought.
The problem of a future life had pressed on him all his days, and yet, he told himself as he sate thinking, the fact had not interfered with his enjoyment of the present one. Verily he had drunk of the cup of life to the dregs. His vitality had spared neither himself nor his world.
The memory of man is curiously creative. Out of the welter of remembrance it chooses this and that in obedience to no law, but arbitrarily, whimsically. It passes by unseen the peaks of past passion, and makes mountains of the merest mole-hill of caprice.
So, as Akbar looked back over his life, he found many a triviality standing out as clear, as untouched by Time, as many a tragedy, many a palpable turning