by Sax Rohmer
II
Three weeks later I had my first sight of the secret oasis. The fate from which Abdûl had fled had overtaken him as I have related, in my tent, and from that moment until we parted company — for this poor wretch survived his mutilation — not another hint could I glean from him respecting the discovery for which he had paid so terrible a price.
In the first place, he lacked the accomplishment of writing and in the second place his fear of the vengeance of Ismail had become a veritable madness. I left him at Beni Suêf, filled with a determination to probe this mystery for myself. Suitably prepared for such an undertaking I set out alone from Dér Byâd, and undertook the four days’ journey which I had planned.
In a little gorge, arid, shadeless, in which only a few stunted tamarisks grew, but affording a sort of hiding-place for myself and my camel, I made my base of operations. Provisions of a sort I had plenty, but for water I must depend on the secret oasis, which I estimated to be not more than four miles distant. In the dead of night I set out, making for a series of mounds or hillocks rising up from the rocky face of the plateau. Cautiously I ascended their slopes, ever watchful and with eagerly beating heart; and it was lying prone upon the crest of the greatest of these that I first saw the village and the oasis.
There was nothing extraordinary in the appearance of the village; it presented to the eye the usual group of small, squat houses clinging to the trunks of the palm trees and surrounding a shrine or mosque boasting a wooden minaret. There were tilled fields and palm groves to the left of the village and a large house surrounded by white walls embracing extensive gardens. My spirits rose high. Within that house lay the secret of Ismail.
I determined to approach from the left, where I should be able to take advantage of the far-cast shadows of the palm groves and of the direction of the faint breeze; for most of all I feared the dogs, without which no Arab village is complete. Sure enough, although I had elected to approach the left of the village and although I crawled laboriously upon hands and knees, the accursed brutes apparently scented me or heard me and made night hideous with their clamor.
Flat upon the ground I lay, awaiting the dogs who bore down upon me snarling, their fangs bared. I had come prepared for this; but, mysteriously, at a point by the end of the palm grove and some twenty yards away from me, the pack halted, and after a time became silent. This was unaccountable but fortunate; and after waiting a while longer to learn if anyone had been aroused by the outcry, I advanced towards the wall of the garden, passing stealthily from palm to palm.
I observed that the mosque was a more important building than I had supposed, with a tomb on the right of the entrance surmounted by a white dome. A passage leading to the courtyard, which presented a charming picture in the moonlight, its fountain overshadowed by acacias, reminded me very much of that in the Mosque of Muayyâd in Cairo. As in the latter, a double arcade surrounded it on three sides and the columns were of some kind of marble and sculptured with inscriptions in Arabic. I had a glimpse of a blue-tiled sanctuary, through a fine mushrabîyeh screen beneath the pointed arches. Arabesques in colored glass rendered the windows very beautiful to look upon. Nothing stirred within the village, as I crept along the narrow lane separating the mosque from the wall of the garden. Beyond prospecting the ground, I had no definite plans for to-night; but Fate had willed it that I was to become more deeply involved in the affair than I had designed or intended.
A side door opened from the garden at a spot nearly opposite the little wooden platform which served as the minaret of the mosque; and the mud bricks of the porch were so broken and decayed by time that I perceived here an opportunity of mounting to the top of the wall, an opportunity of which I instantly availed myself.
Yes, in spite of my peaceful calling (I have explained that I have cotton interests in the Delta) my life has not been unadventurous nor have I ever hesitated to incur risk where profit might be gained. Therefore, having climbed to the top of the wall, unmolested, and perceiving at a spot some little distance to the right a sort of trellis overgrown with purple blossom, I did not hesitate to make for it and to descend into the garden. I had just completed the descent, and stood looking cautiously about me, when a sound disturbed the silence — a sound so entirely unexpected, in that place, at such an hour, that it turned my blood cold, bringing to my mind all those stories of the black magic for which the people of this oasis were famed.
It was the sound of a woman singing; and although the song she sang was a familiar Arab love song and the voice of the singer was sweet, if very mournful, the effect, as I have said, was weird to a degree.
Ashik yekul l’il hammám hát le genáhak yom
(A lover said to a dove, “Lend me your wings for a day,” etc.)
Overcoming the fear and astonishment which momentarily had deprived me of action, I advanced with the utmost caution in the direction from whence this mysterious singing seemed to proceed. Passing an angle of the house, where the stucco wall ran sheerly up to a mushrabîyeh window, I perceived before me a smaller, detached building in the form of a sort of pavilion. Some fine acacias overhung its white and glistening dome, in which were little windows of colored glass. Concealed in the shadow of the house, I stood looking towards this smaller building, observing with astonishment that it possessed a massive, bronze-mounted door.
Indeed, in many respects, and in spite of the charming picture which its jeweled appearance presented, it might well have been the tomb of some holy Sheikh. But seated on an old-fashioned mastabah before the entrance were two huge negroes of most ferocious aspect, armed with scimitars which glittered evilly in the light of the moon!
I drew back sharply into the shelter of the projecting wall. One of the negroes seemed to slumber, but the wicked black eyes of his companion were widely open and he revealed his ivory teeth in a frightful leer. The beating of my heart almost suffocated me, for I ascribed that ghastly grimace to the fact that the negro had detected my presence and was already gloating over the pleasing prospect of my swift and bloody despatch. For many agonized moments I lurked there, one hand clutching the stucco wall and the other resting upon the butt of a new Colt magazine pistol which I had taken the precaution to purchase in Alexandria a week earlier.
When again I ventured to protrude my head, I learned how groundless my fears had been; I realized that the loathsome contortion of the negro’s countenance represented a smile of appreciation. He was listening to the unseen singer whose voice now stole again upon the silence of the night! His blubber lips drooped open cavernously and his fierce little eyes blinked in stupid rapture.
It appeared to me, now, that the sweet voice proceeded from some subterranean place: I thought that I was listening to the song of a ginneyeh. I remembered how the Sheikh Ismail was reputed to be the son of an Efreet and an Arabian princess, and to have lived in that oasis for generations, since the reign of the Sultan Mohammed Nâsir ibn-Kalaûn, who had expelled him from Cairo as a magician. He was said to possess the secrets of Geber and of Avicenna — the great Ibn Sina of Bokhara; to possess the Philosophers’ Stone and the Elixir Vitæ. In this pavilion with the bronze door I beheld the magician’s treasure-house, guarded, within, by a ginneyeh and, without, by ghouls or black Efreets!
You will understand that these childish superstitions sometimes overcome me, because I have lived so long among those who believe them; but to me, a Greek, possessing the consolation of the true religion, it was only momentary, this cold fear which belongs to ignorance and is bred in the blood of the Moslem but finds no place in the heart of a true Christian.
And now the Fates again took a hand in the game. The pack of curs in the distant palm grove set up a sudden tempest of sound, so that they seemed to have become possessed of a million devils. It was a disturbance infinitely louder and more prolonged than that with which the dogs had greeted my appearance, and I had barely time to throw myself flat in the depths of a black and friendly shadow ere the two negroes, monstrous in the moonlight
, passed me silently and trotted off in the direction from whence the uproar proceeded. You will say, no doubt, that a madness as great as that of the dogs possessed me; but because what I tell you is true, you must not be surprised to find it strange.
Allowing the negroes time to reach the gate for which I divined them to be making, I ran across the moon-bathed garden to the door of the pavilion.
You must understand that my madness was not entirely without method; for I had a vague plan in my mind: it was to ascertain the character of the lock upon the bronze door (for you must know that I am skilled in the craft of the locksmith), and then, passing beyond the pavilion, which I was assured was the treasure-house of Ismail, to make my escape over the garden wall at some point to the west and return to my base in the desert ravine armed with a knowledge of the enemy’s dispositions.
But, as I have said, the Fates took a hand. The sweet-voiced singer ceased her song as I approached the pavilion; and, at the moment that I set foot upon the lower step, her voice — by Allah! whose Name be exalted, it was sweet as honey! — addressed to me these words:
“O my master, at last thou art come! Here is the key! enter ere they return.”
Whilst I stared blankly upward to the open lattice from whence the invisible speaker thus addressed me, an antique key wrapped in a piece of perfumed silk, fell almost upon my head!
III
Dazed though I was by the complete unexpectedness of this happening I doubt if I should have had the temerity to pursue the matter further that night but for the sound of fleetly running footsteps of which at this moment I became aware.
My escape was cut off! If I endeavored to pass around the pavilion in accordance with my original plan I should undoubtedly be perceived. My only hope lay in accepting the invitation so singularly given. With trembling hands I fitted the key to the cumbersome lock, opened the door, and entered the pavilion. My presence of mind had not completely deserted me and before closing the door I withdrew the key.
I found myself in a saloon of extraordinary magnificence, furnished with mattresses covered with silk and lighted by hanging lamps and by candles, and having at its upper end a couch of alabaster decorated with pearls and canopied by curtains of satin peacock-blue. From a carved wooden archway draped with cloth of gold there leaped forth a girl of such surpassing loveliness that her image must forever reside in my heart together with those of the saints.
Conceive all the dark-eyed beauties of Oriental poetry, of Hafiz, of Omar, of Attâr, and from each distil the very essence of female loveliness; though you combine them all in one rapturous vision of delight you will have conceived but a feeble shadow of shadows of this wondrous reality who now stood panting before me, her red lips parted and her bosom tumultuous.
I think if the light in her eyes had been for me I could gladly have died for her and found death sweet; but as her gaze met mine a pitiful change took place in that lovely countenance. Her color fled and she swayed and almost fell.
“Oh,” she whispered, “thou art not my beloved! O Allah! this is some snare that Ismail hath set for my feet! Who art thou? who art thou?”
But because of the excess of the loveliness of the speaker, from whom I could not remove my eyes, and because as I stood in that perfumed apartment it seemed to me that I was no longer a real man, but a figment of some Efreet’s dream, I found myself incapable of both speech and action.
Yet I was speedily to know that the Fates, which had thrust me into that saloon — nay, which had brought me across the desert to that secret oasis — were not yet wearied of their sport.
A soft call, a lover’s signal (for no true Believer will whistle at night, since to do so is to summon the evil ginn) sounded from immediately outside the bronze door, followed by a muffled rapping upon the door itself!
“Saîd, my beloved!” cried the girl wildly, and ran towards the door.
At that very moment, and whilst I stood there like a man of clay, I heard the negro guardians returning to their posts; I heard the clatter of their sandals and I heard their guttural cries of rage! Uttering a long tremulous sigh, the beautiful occupant of the pavilion fell swooning upon the floor.
A loud imperious voice now rose above the sounds of conflict which had commenced outside the pavilion; I heard the sound of many running feet, and — my blood turned to ice — that of a key being inserted in the lock of the bronze door! Power of action returned to me, though I confess that I now grew sick with dread. Only one hiding-place was possible: the first I could reach.
I leaped across the lovely form extended upon the floor and dropped, almost choking with emotion, behind the alabaster couch. I had barely gained this cover when the door was hurled open and a tall, excessively gaunt, and hawk-faced old man entered, his eyes blazing, his thin nostrils quivering, and his lean hands opening and closing at his sides in a sort of clutching movement horribly suggestive and terrifying.
He was followed by the two negroes, who were dragging between them a young Egyptian of prepossessing appearance down whose pale face blood was pouring from a wound in the brow.
Several other persons, principally servants of the harêm, brought up the rear.
Towering over the recumbent body of the girl, the terrible old man — in whom I could not fail to recognize the Sheikh Ismail — glared down at her for some moments in passionate silence; then he made as if to spurn her with his foot; then he clutched his long white beard with both hands and plucked at it frenziedly, whilst tears began to course down his furrowed cheeks, which had the frightful appearance of those of a mummy.
“O light of mine eyes!” he exclaimed; “O shame of my house! O reproach of my white hairs!”
He recovered himself by dint of a stupendous effort and turning a fiery glance upon the captive:
“Cast him down upon the floor,” he cried, “that I may spit upon him, who is a scorn among swine and the son of a disease!”
To my unspeakable horror, the Sheikh then strode across the saloon and seated himself upon the alabaster couch! I almost choked with fear; I felt my teeth beginning to chatter and the beating of my heart sounded in my ears like the throb of a darâbukeh. The Sheikh, fortunately ignorant of my proximity, thus addressed the unfortunate young man who lay at his feet:
“Know, O disgrace of thy mother, that thy death hath been decided upon, and it shall visit thee in a most painful and unfortunate manner. O thou spawn of offal, learn that I have been aware of thy malevolent intentions since first thou didst seek to penetrate into my secret. What! am I heir to all the wisdom of the ages, that I should remain ignorant of the presence of such as thee, O thou gnat’s egg, in my house? When the partner in thine infamy didst steal the key of the door from me, thinkest thou that mine eyes were blind to the theft, O thou foredoomed carrion? It was in order that thy culpability should be made manifest that I permitted thee to enter. Thy double stratagem for quelling and then exciting the dogs, in order that the guards might be drawn from their posts, was known to me, and the negroes had received my orders to run to the gate in seeming accordance with thine accursed desires, O filthy insect!”
Throughout the time that this dreadful old man thus addressed his victim, the latter crouched upon the floor, apparently paying no heed to his words but keeping an agonized glance fixed upon the lovely form of the girl. I was now in a condition of such profound and dejected fear as I had never known before and trust I may never know again. The Sheikh continued:
“Learn of the fate of some of those who sought the secret of Ismail before thee. One there was, Mustapha Mirza, a Persian, who came hither to despoil me. With his eyes did he behold my treasure. To-day he hath no eyes! And there was one Hassan of the Khân Khalîl. He dared to lay violent hands upon the treasure of my house — the ‘treasure’ not of gold nor jewels but of fairest flesh and blood. To-day he hath no hands! Wouldst like to know of Abdûl Moharli, who learned much of this “secret” of mine, and would have spoken of it? His tongue I threw to the carrion crows! Thou, O sink of
iniquity, hast not only seen with thine eyes, heard with thine ears and laid thy filthy hands upon the treasure of Ismail: thou hast approached thy foul lips to this peach of Allah’s garden! thou hast....”
He choked in his utterance and seemed upon the point of hurling himself upon the young man before him: but again he recovered his composure after a great effort and proceeded:
“The unpleasant punishments visited upon those others shall likewise fall to thy portion, since thou hast committed like crimes; but this shall only be in order to prepare thee for a most protracted and painful death. Bear him forth into the courtyard.”
As one who dreams an evil dream, I saw the company stream out of the saloon, the wretched prisoner in their midst. When at last the bronze door was reclosed and I found myself alone with the swooning girl, I could scarce believe that even this respite was mine.
I offered a prayer to St. Antony of the Thebäid — my patron saint — as I listened to the sound of their receding footsteps; when I was aroused from the lethargy of fear into which I had fallen by a distant scream — a long wailing cry....
* * * * * *
I have often asked myself: How did I make my escape from that dreadful village? You will remember that I had the purloined key of the bronze door in my possession? Then it was to this in the first place that I owed my preservation. To regain the garden was a simple matter, for the Sheikh and his bloodthirsty following were engaged in the courtyard of the house, but to St. Antony be all praise for the circumstance that the little door opposite the mosque had been left open — possibly by the unhappy Saïd, — and to St. Antony be all praise that a second time I avoided the dogs....
Dawn found me staggering down into that friendly ravine which sheltered my camel. I was utterly exhausted, for I bore a burden, but triumphant, delirious with joy and rapture, because my burden was so sweet. You may question me of these matters, and I shall reply: As well as my cotton interests I have now another interest in the Delta — the lovely “Secret” of the Sheikh Ismail Ebn al As![D]
