The Weavers: Chapter 40

Chapter 40

HYLDA SEEKS NAHOUM

It was as though she had gone to sleep the night before, and waked again
upon this scene unchanged, brilliant, full of colour, a chaos of
decoration--confluences of noisy, garish streams of life, eddies of petty
labour. Craftsmen crowded one upon the other in dark bazaars; merchants
chattered and haggled on their benches; hawkers clattered and cried their
wares. It was a people that lived upon the streets, for all the houses
seemed empty and forsaken. The sais ran before the Pasha's carriage, the
donkey-boys shrieked for their right of way, a train of camels calmly
forced its passage through the swirling crowds, supercilious and
heavy-laden.

It seemed but yesterday since she had watched with amused eyes the
sherbet-sellers clanking their brass saucers, the carriers streaming the
water from the bulging goatskins into the earthen bottles, crying, "Allah
be praised, here is coolness for thy throat for ever!" the idle singer
chanting to the soft kanoon, the chess-players in the shade of a high
wall, lost to the world, the dancing-girls with unveiled, shameless
faces, posturing for evil eyes. Nothing had changed these past six years.
Yet everything had changed.

She saw it all as in a dream, for her mind had no time for reverie or
retrospect; it was set on one thing only.

Yet behind the one idea possessing her there was a subconscious self
taking note of all these sights and sounds, and bringing moisture to her
eyes. Passing the house which David had occupied on that night when he
and she and Nahoum and Mizraim had met, the mist of feeling almost
blinded her; for there at the gate sat the bowab who had admitted her
then, and with apathetic eyes had watched her go, in the hour when it
seemed that she and David Claridge had bidden farewell for ever, two
driftwood spars that touched and parted in the everlasting sea. Here
again in the Palace square were Kaid's Nubians in their glittering armour
as of silver and gold, drawn up as she had seen them drawn then, to be
reviewed by their overlord.

She swept swiftly through the streets and bazaars on her mission to
Nahoum. "Lady Eglington" had asked for an interview, and Nahoum had
granted it without delay. He did not associate her with the girl for whom
David Claridge had killed Foorgat Pey, and he sent his own carriage to
bring her to the Palace. No time had been lost, for it was less than
twenty-four hours since she had arrived in Cairo, and very soon she would
know the worst or the best. She had put her past away for the moment, and
the Duchess of Snowdon had found at Marseilles a silent, determined, yet
gentle-tongued woman, who refused to look back, or to discuss anything
vital to herself and Eglington, until what she had come to Egypt to do
was accomplished. Nor would she speak of the future, until the present
had been fully declared and she knew the fate of David Claridge. In Cairo
there were only varying rumours: that he was still holding out; that he
was lost; that he had broken through; that he was a prisoner--all without
foundation upon which she could rely.

As she neared the Palace entrance, a female fortune-teller ran forward,
thrusting towards her a gazelle's skin, filled with the instruments of
her mystic craft, and crying out: "I divine-I reveal! What is present I
manifest! What is absent I declare! What is future I show! Beautiful one,
hear me. It is all written. To thee is greatness, and thy heart's desire.
Hear all! See! Wait for the revealing. Thou comest from afar, but thy
fortune is near. Hear and see. I divine--I reveal. Beautiful one, what is
future I show."

Hylda's eyes looked at the poor creature eagerly, pathetically. If it
could only be, if she could but see one step ahead! If the veil could but
be lifted! She dropped some silver into the folds of the gazelle-skin and
waved the Gipsy away. "There is darkness, it is all dark, beautiful one,"
cried the woman after her, "but it shall be light. I show--I reveal!"

Inside these Palace walls there was a revealer of more merit, as she so
well and bitterly knew. He could raise the veil--a dark and dangerous
necromancer, with a flinty heart and a hand that had waited long to
strike. Had it struck its last blow?

Outside Nahoum's door she had a moment of utter weakness, when her knees
smote together, and her throat became parched; but before the door had
swung wide and her eyes swept the cool and shadowed room, she was as
composed as on that night long ago when she had faced the man who knew.

Nahoum was standing in a waiting and respectful attitude as she entered.
He advanced towards her and bowed low, but stopped dumfounded, as he saw
who she was. Presently he recovered himself; but he offered no further
greeting than to place a chair for her where her face was in the shadow
and his in the light--time of crisis as it was, she noticed this and
marvelled at him. His face was as she had seen it those years ago. It
showed no change whatever. The eyes looked at her calmly, openly, with no
ulterior thought behind, as it might seem. The high, smooth forehead, the
full but firm lips, the brown, well-groomed beard, were all indicative of
a nature benevolent and refined. Where did the duplicity lie? Her mind
answered its own question on the instant; it lay in the brain and the
tongue. Both were masterly weapons, an armament so complete that it
controlled the face and eyes and outward man into a fair semblance of
honesty. The tongue--she remembered its insinuating and adroit power, and
how it had deceived the man she had come to try and save. She must not be
misled by it. She felt it was to be a struggle between them, and she must
be alert and persuasive, and match him word for word, move for move.

"I am happy to welcome you here, madame," he said in English. "It is
years since we met; yet time has passed you by."

She flushed ever so slightly--compliment from Nahoum Pasha! Yet she must
not resent anything to-day; she must get what she came for, if it was
possible. What had Lacey said? "A few thousand men by parcel-post, and
some red seals-British officers."

"We meet under different circumstances," she replied meaningly. "You were
asking a great favour then."

"Ah, but of you, madame?"

"I think you appealed to me when you were doubtful of the result."

"Well, madame, it may be so--but, yes, you are right; I thought you were
Claridge Pasha's kinswoman, I remember."

"Excellency, you said you thought I was Claridge Pasha's kinswoman."

"And you are not?" he asked reflectively.

He did not understand the slight change that passed over her face. His
kinswoman--Claridge Pasha's kinswoman!

"I was not his kinswoman," she answered calmly. "You came to ask a favour
then of Claridge Pasha; your life-work to do under him. I remember your
words: 'I can aid thee in thy great task. Thou wouldst remake our Egypt,
and my heart is with you. I would rescue, not destroy. . . . I would
labour, but my master has taken away from me the anvil, the fire, and the
hammer, and I sit without the door like an armless beggar.' Those were
your words, and Claridge Pasha listened and believed, and saved your life
and gave you work; and now again you have power greater than all others
in Egypt."

"Madame, I congratulate you on a useful memory. May it serve you as the
hill-fountain the garden in the city! Those indeed were my words. I hear
myself from your lips, and yet recognise myself, if that be not vanity.
But, madame, why have you sought me? What is it you wish to know--to
hear?"

He looked at her innocently, as though he did not know her errand; as
though beyond, in the desert, there was no tragedy approaching--or come.

"Excellency, you are aware that I have come to ask for news of Claridge
Pasha." She leaned forward slightly, but, apart from her tightly
interlaced fingers, it would not have been possible to know that she was
under any strain.

"You come to me instead of to the Effendina. May I ask why, madame? Your
husband's position--I did not know you were Lord Eglington's wife--would
entitle you to the highest consideration."

"I knew that Nahoum Pasha would have the whole knowledge, while the
Effendina would have part only. Excellency, will you not tell me what
news You have? Is Claridge Pasha alive?"

"Madame, I do not know. He is in the desert. He was surrounded. For over
a month there has been no word-none. He is in danger. His way by the
river was blocked. He stayed too long. He might have escaped, but he
would insist on saving the loyal natives, on remaining with them, since
he could not bring them across the desert; and the river and the desert
are silent. Nothing comes out of that furnace yonder. Nothing comes."

He bent his eyes upon her complacently. Her own dropped. She could not
bear that he should see the misery in them.

"You have come to try and save him, madame. What did you expect to do?
Your Government did not strengthen my hands; your husband did
nothing--nothing that could make it possible for me to act. There are
many nations here, alas! Your husband does not take so great an interest
in the fate of Claridge Pasha as yourself, madame."

She ignored the insult. She had determined to endure everything, if she
might but induce this man to do the thing that could be done--if it was
not too late. Before she could frame a reply, he said urbanely:

"But that is not to be expected. There was that between Claridge Pasha
and yourself which would induce you to do all you might do for him, to be
anxious for his welfare. Gratitude is a rare thing--as rare as the flower
of the century--aloe; but you have it, madame."

There was no chance to misunderstand him. Foorgat Bey--he knew the truth,
and had known it all these years.

"Excellency," she said, "if through me, Claridge Pasha--"

"One moment, madame," he interrupted, and, opening a drawer, took out a
letter. "I think that what you would say may be found here, with much
else that you will care to know. It is the last news of Claridge Pasha--a
letter from him. I understand all you would say to me; but he who has
most at stake has said it, and, if he failed, do you think, madame, that
you could succeed?"

He handed her the letter with a respectful salutation.

"In the hour he left, madame, he came to know that the name of Foorgat
Bey was not blotted from the book of Time, nor from Fate's reckoning."

After all these years! Her instinct had been true, then, that night so
long ago. The hand that took the letter trembled slightly in spite of her
will, but it was not the disclosure Nahoum had made which caused her
agitation. This letter she held was in David Claridge's hand, the first
she had ever seen, and, maybe, the last that he had ever written, or that
any one would ever see, a document of tears. But no, there were no tears
in this letter! As Hylda read it the trembling passed from her fingers,
and a great thrilling pride possessed her. If tragedy had come, then it
had fallen like a fire from heaven, not like a pestilence rising from the
earth. Here indeed was that which justified all she had done, what she
was doing now, what she meant to do when she had read the last word of it
and the firm, clear signature beneath.

   "Excellency [the letter began in English], I came into the desert
   and into the perils I find here, with your last words in my ear,
   'There is the matter of Foorgat Bey.' The time you chose to speak
   was chosen well for your purpose, but ill for me. I could not turn
   back, I must go on. Had I returned, of what avail? What could I do
   but say what I say here, that my hand killed Foorgat Bey; that I had
   not meant to kill him, though at the moment I struck I took no heed
   whether he lived or died. Since you know of my sorrowful deed, you
   also know why Foorgat Bey was struck down. When, as I left the bank
   of the Nile, your words blinded my eyes, my mind said in its misery:
   'Now, I see!' The curtains fell away from between you and me, and I
   saw all that you had done for vengeance and revenge. You knew all
   on that night when you sought your life of me and the way back to
   Kaid's forgiveness. I see all as though you spoke it in my ear.
   You had reason to hurt me, but you had no reason for hurting Egypt,
   as you have done. I did not value my life, as you know well, for it
   has been flung into the midst of dangers for Egypt's sake, how
   often! It was not cowardice which made me hide from you and all the
   world the killing of Foorgat Bey. I desired to face the penalty,
   for did not my act deny all that I had held fast from my youth up?
   But there was another concerned--a girl, but a child in years, as
   innocent and true a being as God has ever set among the dangers of
   this life, and, by her very innocence and unsuspecting nature, so
   much more in peril before such unscrupulous wiles as were used by
   Foorgat Bey.
   "I have known you many years, Nahoum, and dark and cruel as your
   acts have been against the work I gave my life to do, yet I think
   that there was ever in you, too, the root of goodness. Men would
   call your acts treacherous if they knew what you had done; and so
   indeed they were; but yet I have seen you do things to others--not
   to me--which could rise only from the fountain of pure waters. Was
   it partly because I killed Foorgat and partly because I came to
   place and influence and power, that you used me so, and all that I
   did? Or was it the East at war with the West, the immemorial feud
   and foray?
   "This last I will believe; for then it will seem to be something
   beyond yourself--centuries of predisposition, the long stain of the
   indelible--that drove you to those acts of matricide. Ay, it is
   that! For, Armenian as you are, this land is your native land, and
   in pulling down what I have built up--with you, Nahoum, with you--
   you have plunged the knife into the bosom of your mother. Did it
   never seem to you that the work which you did with me was a good
   work--the reduction of the corvee, the decrease of conscription, the
   lessening of taxes of the fellah, the bridges built, the canals dug,
   the seed distributed, the plague stayed, the better dwellings for
   the poor in the Delta, the destruction of brigandage, the slow
   blotting-out of exaction and tyranny under the kourbash, the quiet
   growth of law and justice, the new industries started--did not all
   these seem good to you, as you served the land with me, your great
   genius for finance, ay, and your own purse, helping on the things
   that were dear to me, for Egypt's sake? Giving with one hand
   freely, did your soul not misgive you when you took away with the
   other?
   "When you tore down my work, you were tearing down your own; for,
   more than the material help I thought you gave in planning and
   shaping reforms, ay, far more than all, was the feeling in me which
   helped me over many a dark place, that I had you with me, that I was
   not alone. I trusted you, Nahoum. A life for a life you might have
   had for the asking; but a long torture and a daily weaving of the
   web of treachery--that has taken more than my life; it has taken
   your own, for you have killed the best part of yourself, that which
   you did with me; and here in an ever-narrowing circle of death I say
   to you that you will die with me. Power you have, but it will
   wither in your grasp. Kaid will turn against you; for with my
   failure will come a dark reaction in his mind, which feels the cloud
   of doom drawing over it. Without me, with my work falling about his
   ears, he will, as he did so short a time ago, turn to Sharif and
   Higli and the rest; and the only comfort you will have will be that
   you destroyed the life of him who killed your brother. Did you love
   your brother? Nay, not more than did I, for I sent his soul into
   the void, and I would gladly have gone after it to ask God for the
   pardon of all his sins--and mine. Think: I hid the truth, but why?
   Because a woman would suffer an unmerited scandal and shame.
   Nothing could recall Foorgat Bey; but for that silence I gave my
   life, for the land which was his land. Do you betray it, then?
   "And now, Nahoum, the gulf in which you sought to plunge me when you
   had ruined all I did is here before me. The long deception has
   nearly done its work. I know from Ebn Ezra Bey what passed between
   you. They are out against me--the slave-dealers--from Senaar to
   where I am. The dominion of Egypt is over here. Yet I could
   restore it with a thousand men and a handful of European officers,
   had I but a show of authority from Cairo, which they think has
   deserted me.
   "I am shut up here with a handful of men who can fight and thousands
   who cannot fight, and food grows scarcer, and my garrison is worn
   and famished; but each day I hearten them with the hope that you
   will send me a thousand men from Cairo. One steamer pounding here
   from the north with men who bring commands from the Effendina, and
   those thousands out yonder beyond my mines and moats and guns will
   begin to melt away. Nahoum, think not that you shall triumph over
   David Claridge. If it be God's will that I shall die here, my work
   undone, then, smiling, I shall go with step that does not falter, to
   live once more; and another day the work that I began will rise
   again in spite of you or any man.
   "Nahoum, the killing of Foorgat Bey has been like a cloud upon all
   my past. You know me, and you know I do not lie. Yet I do not
   grieve that I hid the thing--it was not mine only; and if ever you
   knew a good woman, and in dark moments have turned to her, glad that
   she was yours, think what you would have done for her, how you would
   have sheltered her against aught that might injure her, against
   those things women are not made to bear. Then think that I hid the
   deed for one who was a stranger to me, whose life must ever lay far
   from mine, and see clearly that I did it for a woman's sake, and not
   for this woman's sake; for I had never seen her till the moment I
   struck Foorgat Bey into silence and the tomb. Will you not
   understand, Nahoum?
   "Yonder, I see the tribes that harry me. The great guns firing make
   the day a burden, the nights are ever fretted by the dangers of
   surprise, and there is scarce time to bury the dead whom sickness
   and the sword destroy. From the midst of it all my eyes turn to you
   in Cairo, whose forgiveness I ask for the one injury I did you;
   while I pray that you will seek pardon for all that you have done to
   me and to those who will pass with me, if our circle is broken.
   Friend, Achmet the Ropemaker is here fighting for Egypt. Art thou
   less, then, than Achmet? So, God be with thee.
                    "DAVID CLARIDGE."

Without a pause Hylda had read the letter from the first word to the
last. She was too proud to let this conspirator and traitor see what
David's words could do to her. When she read the lines concerning
herself, she became cold from head to foot, but she knew that Nahoum
never took his eyes from her face, and she gave no outward sign of what
was passing within. When she had finished it, she folded it up calmly,
her eyes dwelt for a moment on the address upon the envelope, and then
she handed it back to Nahoum without a word. She looked him in the eyes
and spoke. "He saved your life, he gave you all you had lost. It was not
his fault that Prince Kaid chose him for his chief counsellor. You would
be lying where your brother lies, were it not for Claridge Pasha."

"It may be; but the luck was with me; and I have my way."

She drew herself together to say what was hard to say. "Excellency, the
man who was killed deserved to die. Only by lies, only by subterfuge,
only because I was curious to see the inside of the Palace, and because I
had known him in London, did I, without a thought of indiscretion, give
myself to his care to come here. I was so young; I did not know life, or
men--or Egyptians." The last word was uttered with low scorn.

He glanced up quickly, and for the first time she saw a gleam of malice
in his eyes. She could not feel sorry she had said it, yet she must
remove the impression if possible.

"What Claridge Pasha did, any man would have done, Excellency. He struck,
and death was an accident. Foorgat's temple struck the corner of a
pedestal.

"His death was instant. He would have killed Claridge Pasha if it had
been possible--he tried to do so. But, Excellency, if you have a
daughter, if you ever had a child, what would you have done if any man
had--"

"In the East daughters are more discreet; they tempt men less," he
answered quietly, and fingered the string of beads he carried.

"Yet you would have done as Claridge Pasha did. That it was your brother
was an accident, and--"

"It was an accident that the penalty must fall on Claridge Pasha, and on
you, madame. I did not choose the objects of penalty. Destiny chose them,
as Destiny chose Claridge Pasha as the man who should supplant me, who
should attempt to do these mad things for Egypt against the judgment of
the world--against the judgment of your husband. Shall I have better
judgment than the chancellories of Europe and England--and Lord
Eglington?"

"Excellency, you know what moves other nations; but it is for Egypt to
act for herself. You ask me why I did not go to the Effendina. I come to
you because I know that you could circumvent the Effendina, even if he
sent ten thousand men. It is the way in Egypt."

"Madame, you have insight--will you not look farther still, and see that,
however good Claridge Pasha's work might be some day in the far future,
it is not good to-day. It is too soon. At the beginning of the twentieth
century, perhaps. Men pay the penalty of their mistakes. A man's
life"--he watched her closely with his wide, benevolent eyes--"is neither
here nor there, nor a few thousands, in the destiny of a nation. A man
who ventures into a lion's den must not be surprised if he goes as Harrik
went--ah, perhaps you do not know how Harrik went! A man who tears at the
foundations of a house must not be surprised if the timbers fall on him
and on his workmen. It is Destiny that Claridge Pasha should be the
slayer of my brother, and a danger to Egypt, and one whose life is so
dear to you, madame. You would have it otherwise, and so would I, but we
must take things as they are--and you see that letter. It is seven weeks
since then, and it may be that the circle has been broken. Yet it may not
be so. The circle may be smaller, but not broken."

She felt how he was tempting her from word to word with a merciless
ingenuity; yet she kept to her purpose; and however hopeless it seemed,
she would struggle on.

"Excellency," she said in a low, pleading tone, "has he not suffered
enough? Has he not paid the price of that life which you would not bring
back if you could? No, in those places of your mind where no one can see
lies the thought that you would not bring back Foorgat Bey. It is not an
eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth that has moved you; it has not
been love of Foorgat Bey; it has been the hatred of the East for the
West. And yet you are a Christian! Has Claridge Pasha not suffered
enough, Excellency? Have you not had your fill of revenge? Have you not
done enough to hurt a man whose only crime was that he killed a man to
save a woman, and had not meant to kill?"

"Yet he says in his letter that the thought of killing would not have
stopped him."

"Does one think at such a moment? Did he think? There was no time. It was
the work of an instant. Ah, Fate was not kind, Excellency! If it had
been, I should have been permitted to kill Foorgat Bey with my own
hands."

"I should have found it hard to exact the penalty from you, madame."

The words were uttered in so neutral a way that they were enigmatical,
and she could not take offence or be sure of his meaning.

"Think, Excellency. Have you ever known one so selfless, so good, so
true? For humanity's sake, would you not keep alive such a man? If there
were a feud as old as Adam between your race and his, would you not
before this life of sacrifice lay down the sword and the bitter
challenge? He gave you his hand in faith and trust, because your God was
his God, your prophet and lord his prophet and lord. Such faith should
melt your heart. Can you not see that he tried to make compensation for
Foorgat's death, by giving you your life and setting you where you are
now, with power to save or kill him?"

"You call him great; yet I am here in safety, and he is--where he is.
Have you not heard of the strife of minds and wills? He represented the
West, I the East. He was a Christian, so was I; the ground of our battle
was a fair one, and--and I have won."

"The ground of battle fair!" she protested bitterly. "He did not know
that there was strife between you. He did not fight you. I think that he
always loved you, Excellency. He would have given his life for you, if it
had been in danger. Is there in that letter one word that any man could
wish unwritten when the world was all ended for all men? But no, there
was no strife between you--there was only hatred on your part. He was so
much greater than you that you should feel no rivalry, no strife. The
sword he carries cuts as wide as Time. You are of a petty day in a petty
land. Your mouth will soon be filled with dust, and you will be
forgotten. He will live in the history of the world. Excellency, I plead
for him because I owe him so much: he killed a man and brought upon
himself a lifelong misery for me. It is all I can do, plead to you who
know the truth about him--yes, you know the truth--to make an effort to
save him. It may be too late; but yet God may be waiting for you to lift
your hand. You said the circle may be smaller, but it may be unbroken
still. Will you not do a great thing once, and win a woman's gratitude,
and the thanks of the world, by trying to save one who makes us think
better of humanity? Will you not have the name of Nahoum Pasha linked
with his--with his who thought you were his friend? Will you not save
him?"

He got slowly to his feet, a strange look in his eyes. "Your words are
useless. I will not save him for your sake; I will not save him for the
world's sake; I will not save him--"

A cry of pain and grief broke from her, and she buried her face in her
hands.

"--I will not save him for any other sake than his own."

He paused. Slowly, as dazed as though she had received a blow, Hylda
raised her face and her hands dropped in her lap.

"For any other sake than his own!" Her eyes gazed at him in a bewildered,
piteous way. What did he mean? His voice seemed to come from afar off.

"Did you think that you could save him? That I would listen to you, if I
did not listen to him? No, no, madame. Not even did he conquer me; but
something greater than himself within himself, it conquered me."

She got to her feet gasping, her hands stretched out. "Oh, is it true--is
it true?" she cried.

"The West has conquered," he answered.

"You will help him--you will try to save him?"

"When, a month ago, I read the letter you have read, I tried to save
him. I sent secretly four thousand men who were at Wady Halfa to relieve
him--if it could be done; five hundred to push forward on the quickest
of the armed steamers, the rest to follow as fast as possible. I did my
best. That was a month ago, and I am waiting--waiting and hoping,
madame."

Suddenly she broke down. Tears streamed from her eyes. She sank into the
chair, and sobs shook her from head to foot.

"Be patient, be composed, madame," Nahoum said gently. "I have tried you
greatly--forgive me. Nay, do not weep. I have hope. We may hear from him
at any moment now," he added softly, and there was a new look in his wide
blue eyes as they were bent on her.

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