Warriors of the Steppes

by Harold Lamb

  A cloud of dust rose about them and hung in the air, for there was no wind. The jewels gleamed in the turban of the Rajput and he laughed more than once, but Jani Beg did not laugh.

  Nearer they came and nearer. I could see the sweat on the donkeys' shoulders and marked the outline of the powder boxes under the packs.

  God has given me keen sight, and all that followed I saw clearly. I saw the Rajput halt the donkey-men and order them off with a contemptuous gesture and Jani Beg and Sir Weyand peer at the packs as if to make sure of what they held. I saw the beasts begin to nuzzle for grass to crop, and Raja Man Singh ride up to the waiting two. By now the donkey-men were a good bow-shot distant.

  Then all four of the riders dismounted, watching one another. I leaned upon the peak of my saddle and swallowed hard, for my throat was dry. The dust settled down. I marked a pigeon wheeling overhead.

  There was a great stillness on the plain of Badakshan. Khanjut was far, far distant and Shirzad Mir stood with three men at his side, all being armed.

  The Rajput's white teeth showed in a laugh. This time Jani Beg smiled. He was in a cordial mood, for he advanced to Shirzad Mir and made a low salaam.

  Afar off, I heard a holy man cry to prayers.

  Then suddenly I saw the lean arms of Jani Beg spring forth and grip Shirzad Mir. Like a swift snake he twined about my master, holding Shirzad Mir's arms to his sides.

  “Strike him!" cried Jani Beg. “In the throat above the armor!"

  It was to the Ferang that he had said this. The eyes of Raja Man Singh widened in astonishment.

  Sir Weyand's muscles quivered, but he did not move to aid the treacherous Uzbek. Instead he stepped toward the litter.

  The thing was clear to me. Jani Beg had thought that the Ferang would slay Shirzad Mir, as he had cried for him to do. Something had gone amiss with Jani Beg's plan, for neither Sir Weyand nor the Rajput moved. Aye, the Rajput was a man of high honor.

  Shirzad Mir strained at the Uzbek's grip. Jani Beg's face grew dark with rage. I dug my spurs deep into the side of my horse. He sprang forward—a leap that would have unsettled another rider—and I bore down on Jani Beg.

  Hot was my heart with anger at the sight of Shirzad Mir helpless among the three. I had lifted my scimitar to strike down Jani Beg. I had galloped within arm's reach and there reined in my mount on its haunches.

  Aye, I drew rein at sight of the three, for the Rajput and Sir Weyand and Shirzad Mir were staring not at Jani Beg but at the litter, and on the three faces was the mark of amazement and horror.

  I also looked down at the litter. Krishna Taya had pushed back the shawl. She sat upon her knees with the head of Said Afzel on her lap. The sleek face of Said Afzel was red and his eyes glazed, as in the opium trance. He lay still, very still.

  From his gaping mouth hung the end of a string of pearls. The pearls looked like the tip of a necklace. I had seen them before. I looked from the mottled face that glared up at me to the neck of the maiden. The necklace had gone from the throat of Krishna Taya.

  She sat very straight on the litter and there was a smile on her childlike face.

  “Here is Said Afzel, Jani Beg," she said softly, “whole and without a scratch upon his skin."

  The Uzbek looked from her to the head of the dead man on her knee, and his mouth opened slowly. His arms that were about Shirzad Mir dropped to his side and he tried vainly to swallow, like one who has the palsy. I heard my lord mutter in his beard— “By the ninety holy names of God, I knew naught of this."

  Yet I heeded not. The pigeon overhead fluttered away.

  Then hate leaped into the evil face of Jani Beg as flame sears paper.

  “Wench! Child of sin—traitress—" he gasped, and then choked to silence.

  “Nay," she spoke calmly, “What I promised you has been done.

  I have cut the prop from him who would usurp the throne of Badakshan."

  So great was the rage of Jani Beg that his hand trembled so he could scarce grip the dagger in his girdle. He raised the dagger with one hand; the other he twisted in the hair of the maiden, who looked up at him and smiled.

  “It is well," I heard her whisper. “I have made clean the honor of the Rajput."

  Neither I nor Shirzad Mir would have checked Jani Beg in the slaying of Krishna Taya, but the dagger did not reach her slender throat. Sir Weyand had gripped the hand that held the weapon. For the space of a long breath the eyes of the Ferang and the Uzbek met and held. The arms of the two quivered and strained. The lips of the Ferang were closed in a tight line.

  Then Jani Beg spoke in level words.

  “Every soul in Khanjut shall die if this woman is not slain."

  Sir Weyand did not relax his grip.

  “She avenged the wrong that was done her." His voice was curiously strained. He turned his face to the Rajput.

  “Krishna Taya needs the protection of the Rajputs."

  Raja Man Singh sighed and twisted a strand of his curly beard. His glance went from the end of the pearl necklace that had strangled Said Afzel to the woman.

  “Come," he said at length, curtly. He took the girl and lifted her to the back of his horse behind the saddle. We knew and Jani

  Beg knew that Krishna Taya was now safe under the sword of the Rajput.

  Many things were in my mind as I drove the donkeys up to Khanjut, following after Shirzad Mir and Sir Weyand. I thought of the reckless honor of Shirzad Mir that had let Jani Beg depart unharmed, because of his pledge. I wondered whether one of us would live to tell of the Uzbek storm that would be launched upon us because Sir Weyand had guarded the life of Krishna Taya when Jani Beg lusted for vengeance. But among these thoughts one was uppermost. It was a verse from the Koran:

  Who knows what is in the heart of a woman?

  Ameer of the Sea

  In a hundred ages of the gods there is no glory like the glory of the hills.

  Before Ganesh, the elephant-head, and Hanuman, the mon-key-god, walked the night together, the snow-peaks of the Himalayas rose to the stars.

  In the hills may a man find peace. Men die but the hills do not alter. They bless the eyes that look upon them. Where else is there such a place as this?

  Hindu saying

  Dawn was striking against the snow peaks of the Koh-i-Baba Range, among the foothills of the Himalayas. It was the year of our Lord 1608, and of the Ox, by the Muslim calendar.

  The sky behind the peaks was streaking red, but in the valleys the cold morning mist still held. Through the mist rose the black towers of Khanjut. There was just light enough to make out the upper surface of stones and the glint of running water, when a man bobbed to the center of a pool in the stream.

  He had not stepped into the stream. He broke through the surface panting as if he had long held his breath, and swam soundlessly to the rocks at one side. He glanced back once over his shoulder at the loom of the towers in the midst and began to run forward up the rocky nullah.

  The light was strong enough for him to choose his way, and he threaded the boulders in the manner of one who knew his course. On either side, thick-set pines pressed upon him. The summits of the cliffs over the pines were still invisible.

  The man ran steadily upward, any noise that he made being lost in the rush of the stream. The spreading dawn overhead showed him naked to the waist—a lean, dark body, its white muslin loincloth and trousers plastered tight by the water. A hillman—by his gait and his tireless progress—of the northern Afghan mountains.

  At sight of light glinting on steel in a thicket ahead, the man swerved nimbly up into the pines. He caught the scent of the watchfire kindled by the sentries, whose helmets he had glimpsed, and passed the half-dozen figures lying about the embers without pausing.

  Once safely by the outpost, he dropped into the trail that ran by the stream. Then he halted in his tracks, crouching instinctively as a cat does at sight of danger.

  Ahead of him the figure of a sentry leaning on a spear was visible. The watcher was alar
med, had heard something, and was glancing into the pines with the indifferent caution of one who has been long on post and expects relief.

  The hillman advanced swiftly, still crouching. Within two paces he leaped, metal gleaming in his hand as he did so. His free hand struck on the brow of the sentinel, two fingers catching in the nostrils, bending the other's head back.

  The hand with the dagger smote softly into the throat, above the coat of mail. Three times the hillman plunged his weapon in. Coolly he caught the spear that was about to fall to the stones. For a moment he held the sentry, then lowered the body to the ground.

  Dexterously the slayer unlaced the throat fastenings of the Turkish mail and drew it over the head of the dead man. He donned the mail, tucking its loose ends into his loincloth. He put on the pointed Kallmark helmet, thrusting his long, black hair up under it as he did so.

  Then he resumed his run up the nullah.

  The sky was blue overhead—the clear, tranquil blue of Afghanistan—and the pines had turned from black to gray to green when the runner reached the summit of the pass and turned aside from the stream into a sheep-track.

  He went forward more confidently now, as if he had left his enemies at his back. He had passed under the siege works of the enemy, slipped around the outpost in the nullah and was free from all except wandering cavalry patrols.

  He avoided the caravan track that ran beside him, leading from Khanjut over the Shyr Pass to the Kabul Valley and to the city of that name, the farthest walled town of the Mogul, his Majesty, the King of Kings, whose court is a heaven, the shadow of God, Jahangir, emperor of India.

  Then, crossing a cleared space, he came upon several horsemen. Their shaggy ponies and the bows slung at their shoulders indicated to him that they were Uzbeks, even if the distance was too great to distinguish their drooping mustaches and high cheekbones.

  The hillman hesitated only a brief second and went on as if unconcerned. The Uzbeks glanced at his mail and were passing on when one reined in sharply and shouted a challenge, pointing at him.

  The runner did not answer. Altering his course, he ran for the nearest pine grove. He had not noticed, or had forgotten, the crimson stain on his mail that had come from the throat of the man he had slain.

  This was what had aroused the suspicion of the riders. They spurred after him with growling curses. An arrow flicked into the sod ahead of him.

  His legs were moving more slowly now; yet he was near the protecting pines. He glanced back, calmly measuring the distance to his pursuers—and fell with an arrow in his thigh.

  He was up at once, limping forward. He heard the beat of horses' hoofs and wheeled, drawing his dagger with a grin of hate. The foremost horse ran him down. He struck vainly at the rider, who turned in the saddle.

  The second Uzbek bent in his stirrups and slashed down with his scimitar. The curved blade bit deep through the mail; the hillman's limbs twisted, then fell limp.

  Dismounting, the Uzbeks inspected their victim. At a sign from the leader one tore open the dead man's flimsy garments and ran his hand through the muslin. His effort was rewarded, for he stood up with a small square of parchment in his hand.

  After a brief conference the leader of the patrol took the paper and the head of the runner and galloped off to the caravan track.

  It was just after sunrise prayers that he threaded his way through the tents of the Uzbek camp, to the red felt yurt of Jani Beg, chieftain of the Uzbeks.

  Jani Beg looked up as the guard at the door passed in the patrol leader. His broad, seamed face rested close to a pair of massive bent shoulders. A thin mustache drooped over a broad, hard mouth.

  The eyes that scanned the newcomer sharply were peculiar. Jani Beg had tawny eyes, almost yellow, with the iridescent quality sometimes seen in those of an animal. The visitor put hand to forehead and bent in an uneasy salaam as he extended the paper, explaining how he had chanced upon it.

  “The head is that of a thrice-cursed hillman," he added. “But none of the ameers of the guard can read the missive. Thus it was that they ordered it brought before you."

  The eyes of Jani Beg focused on the man without expression.

  “Leave it and go!" he ordered in a high voice strange in a man of his bulk.

  Idly he turned over the paper on the silk rug. He scanned the writing at first indifferently, then with as much curiosity as he ever permitted himself to show. Not for some time did he speak to the man at his side.

  “May I rot on camel's droppings, Shah Abbas! By the beard of my grandsire—may he rest in peace—but I know not this unblessed script.

  “You are a learned man even among the astrologers and fools of Isphahan. You can recite the Koran and read the portents of the stars. Read me this!"

  The Persian who sat on his heels at the farther side of the rug scanned the Uzbek coolly. Deciding that no affront was meant, he bent his bearded head over the missive.

  Shah Abbas, chief of the Persian generals in the first decade of the early seventeenth century, was a bulky and handsome man. He formed a striking contrast to his gaunt companion. His mellow eyes were those of a voluptuous liver, his high, smooth brow under the heavy turban that of a philosopher and scholar.

  He was a poet of no mean ability, a master of the chessboard, well versed in Greek medical lore and in the mingled culture of Damascus and Bokhara. A follower of no single religion, he was a diplomat of the highest intelligence, a plausible talker and a man without faith except when it suited him to keep his word.

  His person, from the sky-blue cloak to the carefully trimmed beard and the silk vest that exuded musk, was that of a dandy— setting off the rough, fur-trimmed tunic of Jani Beg, and the lat-ter's dingy morocco shoes.

  “Who am I," he responded in limpid Persian, “to interpret this thing, which the wisdom of Jani Beg has failed to read?"

  “Dog of Satan!" fretted Jani Beg. “Did I ask for riddles from your smooth cat's tongue? Read me this writing!"

  The Persian stroked his beard delicately and surveyed the rubies on his plump fingers with the utmost calm.

  “It is written, Jani Beg, in the books of wisdom, that by his words the speaker may be known. Doubtless you are familiar with the breeds of dogs, even mongrels. Were not your grandsires mongrels?"

  Jani Beg's hazy eyes glowed with a sullen fire. Few men dared to match words with him.

  “Aye, you know that I am descended from Timurlane the Great. Where is the equal of the lame Conqueror?"

  “Doubtless," purred Shah Abbas. “Yet it is a strange thing, for while the Conqueror was lame, he was a man of honor and he lacked not wits."

  The Uzbek glowered. “Ho—you prate like a woman. We Mongols care not for the dusty Persian plain."

  “Aye, the dust of Persia is not to be compared with the glories of the Mongol steppe."

  “You are ripe with words. You are not the same figure with a sword as with speech."

  “Nay, I waste not good steel upon a boaster."

  Jani Beg's hand jerked toward the hilt of his scimitar. Shah Abbas surveyed him mildly and he dropped his hand. He could not afford to quarrel with the powerful Persian and the latter knew it. At mutual recrimination Shah Abbas was much the better.

  Both were serving the same cause. Jani Beg had volunteered to serve the Mogul himself in the northern hills, and for a space Isphahan was at peace with Delhi. The Uzbek chieftain had sent Shah Abbas treasure to the amount of a dozen camel-loads of gold to come to aid him in Afghanistan.

  The Persian had come with several thousand picked and excellently mounted horsemen, for two reasons. He knew that Jani Beg was at war with Shirzad Mir, known in Persia as Shah Beg, who was his own enemy, and he knew that Jani Beg had reasons for sending for him other than the crushing of a few hundred hillmen under Shirzad Mir, beleaguered in Khanjut.

  But for the moment both ostensibly were acting in the interest of the Mogul and must remain friends.

  “Nay," muttered Jani Beg with ill grace, “I meant not
to offend you. But surely your wisdom can decipher this accursed missive. It may be a matter of moment, and I am not learned in script."

  Shah Abbas shrugged his plump shoulders “The writing is not Turki and certainly not Persian. Nor is it the tongue of Hind. Nor Greek, with which I am familiar."

  Both stared at the letter in silence, and in both minds was the same thought. The bearer should not have been slain. Torture— molten silver poured into ears or the fire-pencil applied to the man's eyes—would have elicited the truth of the matter. Now all they knew was that the missive had been sent from the citadel of Khanjut down the pass toward India. Jani Beg, in spite of his professed ignorance, was scholar enough to be aware that his companion spoke the truth concerning it.

  As a matter of fact, the intercepted message—which never reached its destination—read as follows:

  To the Notorious and Honourable Captain Hawkins,

  Servant in like Manner as the Writer to

  Our Sovereign Lord, James I, king of England—

  Greetings from ye Fortress of Khanjoot in N.W. Ind, N. of Kabool.

  It has been told by divers Personne that ye be laden for Surat, with certain Goodes. Wherefore, sink the Fleete of the Portugals to Hell in Surat, and make shift to accompanie me to the Moghooul with a Companie of Musket Men and Falcon Gunnes.

  I have beene kept from the Personne of ye Moghool by divers evil Stratagies of ye Portugals; still, I have taken Oath to gain the Trade for Our Lord, and this I shall yet do with the Grace of God; despite the Portugals, who are like to mad Dogges, labouring to work my Passauge out of the World.

  I shall contrive to haste to meet you, as beseemeth fittinge, despite the black Peril frome ye Idolators and Portugals alike.

  The name signed to the scrawled and misspelled missive was that of Ralph Weyand.

  “It may work us evil; we had best be rid of it."

  Jani Beg took up the letter in his huge claw of a hand and tore it into shreds. These he tossed indifferently into the brazier that warmed the interior of the yurt.