Blood of the Eagle/Chapter 7
VII
In the room was silence, while Ardzrouni cut the bonds of the brown man.
"I know you," he said. "You are Ninh Bang, the head boy of that man Smith."
Ninh Bang nodded, and worked his members, since the bonds and his wounds had stiffened his whole body. Again there was silence. The dead priest sprawled back in his chair; the others watched with impassive faces.
Outside the room there sounded a clash of arms, a cry, another clash. A moment afterward a door opened, and Colonel Chou appeared in his common soldier's garb. Ardzrouni made a gesture, and he vanished again; but now certain of the priests glanced one at another, and the fear deepened in their faces.
Ardzrouni looked at them, and his eyes darkened stormily.
"Regard these men, Ninh Bang!" he said, touching the brown hunter on the shoulder. "Two of them are honest priests and worthy men, who are masters of this temple; they are my friends. The other three, with him who lies there dead, come from the college of fang shi within the inner city. They are allied with the eunuch Liu Ku, meaning to kill me and to seize upon Ngong for themselves. Wizards though they be, however, it is evident that they have not the power to resist bullets!"
At this speech Ninh Bang grinned. Three of the priests turned pale. Two of them smiled slightly, and to these Ardzrouni beckoned. They rose and prostrated themselves. He ordered them to get up.
"Lead these three brethren of yours outside," he ordered, "and give them to the guards who are waiting there."
The priests left the room in silence. When the door had closed behind them, Ardzrouni tucked away his revolver and turned to the Tais hunter.
"Your message," he said.
Ninh Bang squatted down, thrust a pill of opium into his mouth, and spoke.
"My master said that you were his friend. He is detained by guards, but he sent me to you with a message. When he comes here, there are two things which you must be prepared to do. First, you must punish those who killed the French resident and the mandarin Wang Ling. Second, you must pay a sum of money for the dead resident and make a treaty with the French."
Ardzrouni sat down in one of the temple chairs, lighted a cigarette, and surveyed the brown man curiously.
"These things shall be done," he said briefly.
"My master wished to let you know in advance of his coming, that you might be prepared to do them," said Ninh Bang.
Ardzrouni chuckled.
"Is your master a hunter of horn, or an agent of the French?"
"He is both," said the hunter solemnly. "Also, he ordered me to find out what I could here in the town, and inform you of it. Shall I speak?"
"Speak," said Ardzrouni.
"I reached her late last night and listened to many men speaking. I heard that certain men were leaving the town to-day with their arms. To-morrow a caravan of mules and porters goes forth. This caravan, they said, bears gold which you are sending away, having stolen it from the treasury. They mean to fall upon the caravan, kill those who accompany it, and return the gold to Liu Ku. After I had learned these things, I tried to enter the inner town, but was denied, and some one found I was a stranger. Then I was followed and captured. That is all."
Ardzrouni threw a cynical glance at the fragments of the lattice, where Florence Wemyss was listening. He beckoned, and she came into the room with the two guards.
"You heard?" he asked. "It appears that our friend the eunuch has set a very pretty trap for you and your father. I do not think you will leave here to-morrow, after all."
"No," she assented quietly. "Good evening, Ninh Bang! You remember me?"
The hunter grinned and nodded.
Ardzrouni sent one of the guards for Colonel Chou. After a moment the latter appeared, and saluted respectfully.
"I gave you orders at the feast," said the dark man, "to fetch that white stranger who is held at one of the watchtowers. What did you do about it?"
"I sent my brother for him, son of heaven, with an escort of fifty men. He will arrive here to-morrow."
"Very well! See that this brown man is cared for, and let him join the stranger when the latter arrives. Those three priests are outside?"
"They are under guard."
"Good! Return to the palace, take a force of men whom you can trust, and seize every wizard who is in the college. Turn over the buildings to the archers as quarters. At dawn, strip those priests and set them at work cleaning the streets of the outer city. Let us see if their magic can avail them or not! If any one interferes, slay him."
A slight smile appeared upon the stern face of Chou. It was evident that he had no love for the fang shi.
"Let an edict be posted," continued Ardzrouni in his lordly fashion, "that I have abolished the college of wizards."
He handed Chou a white jade fish as evidence of the royal command, and turned to Florence Wemyss. A smile lightened his face.
"Shall we return, dear lady? Your father may be anxious for your welfare." She assented with a gesture, and accepted his arm.
Outside, under the stars, they returned as they had come, accompanied only by the two guards. When they approached the gate of the walled palace city, the girl looked up and drew a deep breath.
"It seems like a dream!" she said quietly. "We're not living in the common world of realities."
Ardzrouni laughed happily, and patted her hand, which lay on his arm.
"Delightfully true, dear lady! Shall I confess that I begin to prefer realities to dreams? Well, it is so. Even the eagle's blood finds kingship rather tiring, I assure you."
She gave him a glance of astonishment.
"You say this? But—"
She broke off, hesitant. Ardzrouni lifted his head. In the light of the cresset that blazed above the high gateway, his face appeared almost mournful.
"I know what you would say, lady." His voice was somber. "You have in mind the wild rhetoric, the bombast, with which I bolster up myself. Well, that is all false. In the days when I wore rags, I wove me a golden cloak out of high words and proud boastings. I found it necessary to think myself a king, in order to forget my hunger and poverty. You understand?"
The girl nodded.
"And now," he went on, "where has this led me? To a throne, it is true—but to a throne in Ngong! It is miserable irony, I assure you. I would give much to be rid of it all, to be a man again among my own folk; but I am in the grip of a fate which must be carried out to the end. My boastings and high words have betrayed me. I must act like an adventurer, I must hold myself as a king, I must carry the thing off with a proud magnificence—or disaster threatens. All the while I am acting a lie. Oh, intolerable! Before I came here, I had not the heart to kill a chicken, and now I must be cruel! Once I hurt a man grievously in a fight, back in Marseilles. I shall never forget the sobs in his throat as they carried him away; but look what I must do here!"
The outburst of words came to an abrupt end, and Ardzrouni's head drooped dejectedly.
Florence Wemyss listened to this astounding confession in silence. She slowly comprehended that there was being revealed to her the innermost soul of this man, and the revelation left her wordless.
Something told her that Ardzrouni spoke the truth. She had a glimpse past all the orotund sham of him. She pierced all the grandiose cant of his usual manner, and reached in this moment to the man below. She felt the shame and revulsion of spirit which prompted this admission. More, she comprehended suddenly that it was she herself, her presence and influence, which had drawn these words from Ardzrouni.
Singularly enough, this brought a glow of happiness into her heart.
"You are disappointed," he said abruptly. "You thought that all this tawdry, romantic cloak of mine was real. Instead, I am the instrument of an inexorable fate which punishes me, and you shrink—"
"Oh, no, no!" she cried suddenly, a break in her voice. "I could never understand it before; there was so much in you that I liked! I could not understand why you should be so deluded with thoughts of royalty and—"
Ardzrouni lifted his head and broke into a roar of laughter that drew shouts of alarm from the soldiers who guarded the gates and wall.
"You thought me mad!" he exclaimed, and laughed again. "Good! And now you know that I was only a sorry actor playing a part! Then you do not think so ill of me?"
"I think you are magnificent," she said softly.
To this Ardzrouni made no response whatever. With the two guards, they had come to the little postern gate. This was flung open, and torchlight fell upon them. As they passed through, the girl stole a glance at his face, and she saw a glitter of tears upon his cheek.
He said no word as they walked through the streets of the inner city and came to the palace grounds; but when they stood before the entrance of the palace, Ardzrouni turned and lifted her hand to his lips. It was a gesture, not of magnificence, but of simplicity.
"You are a woman such as a man might die for gladly," he said in a low voice. "If we ever get out of this place—well, no matter! Tell your father what has happened to-night. Tell him that I shall send a sufficient escort with that gold of his, and guarantee that it arrives safely in Yunnan; but he must remain here in Ngongfu with you until Smith arrives. I cannot risk sending you off through the hills alone. Good night!"
"Good night," she said, and he was gone.
The guards brought her safely to the quarters which she occupied with her father. She found him asleep over his pipe of jade and gold, the little lamp of peanut oil still burning beside him, the room heavy with the sweet reek of opium.
She went to the window, flung open the wooden shutter, and sat there for a long while, until the night was shattered by a tumult of shouts, cries, and shots. These quieted again, very swiftly. Colonel Chou had fulfilled his orders.
Still she sat there in the window, staring out at the starlit gardens of the palace. Presently she dropped her head upon her hands, and her shoulders shook with quiet sobs.
"If we ever get out of this place—" She repeated the words Ardzrouni had used to her. " Oh, we must get out, we must get out! Dear God, you must let him get out!"
After a little she shivered, lifted her head, and rose. She turned from the window and went to wake her father from his poppy stupor.