Two days later, Farrell and Zobeide followed the Tigris upstream. Being accompanied by a native woman enabled him to avoid undue association with fellow travelers halting at village taverns. Zobeide in more ways than one, was a priceless acquisition…
* * * *
Weeks later, they reached the last leg of the trip. Nurredin Shirkuh, Farrell learned, was an emir. That made him easy to find; but getting into his house, or even venturing into the village at the foot of the hill which it crowned, was like tickling a tiger’s tonsils.
In a grimy, verminous serai, Farrell and Zobeide plotted the approach.
“By Allah, sahib,” she explained as she grilled bits of mutton over a charcoal fire, “each day when I go to the market, I will look for Nurredin’s servants. The rest will be easy…”
“You’re priceless,” interrupted Farrell, affectionately eyeing the plump, pleasant-faced girl who had adopted him as a protector. “I don’t know how I’d get along without you.”
They were far from the arm of British or any other law, and surrounded by Kurdish tribesmen who cherished age-old feuds, plotted assassinations for pleasure or profit, and raided in the lowlands for food or sport.
“And you will always love me, Shir Khan?” she would whisper of an evening when the glow of the charcoal fire on the packed earth floor barely peeped through the film of gathering ashes.
“Always, Zobeide,” he would answer, half meaning it.
The end of his quest was far away. Looting the house of Nurredin Shirkuh was fantastic beyond reckoning.
Then came Ramadan, when for a month every Moslem fasts from sunrise to sunset, and spends the night in gluttony. The local dignitaries held open house, feasting until the sunrise gun announced the beginning of the day’s long fast.
The upsetting of all routine was Farrell’s opportunity.
* * * *
Late that night he scaled the wall of Nurredin’s courtyard. The horses in the stable on the ground floor were restive, but the grooms were noisily making away with a roasted lamb.
Farrell ascended the stairs to the reception room. It was dark. Nurredin was out, as Zobeide had predicted. The sky glow filtering in through barred windows coaxed reflections from brazen tea pots, and silver mounted blades. He risked using his pocket flash he had hoarded ever since leaving Bagdad.
Long narrow rugs ran along the stone benches that skirted the wall, and an oblong carpet was in the center. They were all ancient and mellow and precious, but the antique he sought was not at the master’s seat of honor, near the hearth, where he had expected to find it displayed.
He would have to search the entire house. It might even be in some secret treasure vault. No one except the master and perhaps some trusted steward would know where the crypt was: and in that case his quest was hopeless.
Then he heard the tinkling notes of a sitar, and the voices of women on the floor above. One was singing, and the sound was like a draught of old wine. But while their presence was an added peril, it suggested the next move: they would be gathered about to listen to her, and thus might not notice Farrell’s prowling.
He crept up the narrow stairway. It opened into an arched passage that had cross branches which penetrated the murky depths of that massive heap. He heard the tinkle of anklets, feminine laughter, then again that girl’s heart stirring voice.
“…sabiyat il unsi ilaya
Badri quabl al fawat
Wunshéri tibun sakiyun
Mun ’ashan fi el-hyat…”
“Come to me, Gazelle, before I die…” He wondered where she had learned that one, and in Arabic, up here in the wrong end of Kurdistan. He grimaced wryly, muttered, “Stay where you are, Gazelle, or I die!”
But as he headed in the opposite direction, he wished that he could have one glimpse of her. If she looked like she sounded…!
Farrell was now in the quarters reserved to the master and his immediate family. Even the emir’s closest male friends would not dare go that far.
Finally he reached a room where boots and holstered pistols and curved swords in gilded scabbards took the place of cosmetics and massive jewelry.
Slowly the pencil of light picked out one barbaric detail after another, but not the prayer rug of an emperor’s grandson. Yet there was still time; the women in the other wing were still chattering…
Farrell’s first warning was a faint rustling behind him. A breath of sweetness invaded the scent of tobacco and leather and horses. He whirled to silence the person whose outcry was to be his death-warrant. One scream, and the house would be in an uproar. The grooms in the stable would be aroused…
A girl was in the doorway. She held a taper whose flickering glow was reflected from the uncounted jewels of her ornate headdress. Her eyes were dark and long, slightly widened with amazement. They glistened, and tears beaded her lashes.
She was startled, but her lovely face betrayed not a trace of fear. Though standing fast, she was poised like a young tigress. The sudden rise of her breasts betrayed the momentary catching of her breath; but she was utterly unafraid. That suggested a better play than trying to throttle an outcry.
Even one yeep would bring the house down on his neck. Peril and tension sharpened his wits.
“What’s the trouble?” he asked. The steadiness of his voice surprised him. “Didn’t you like their singing?”
She blinked away her tears, narrowly regarded him, and smiled somberly.
“No. I came here to my father’s rooms to get away from them. And if you are poor, go abroad tonight, where men are giving alms. Allah will provide.” Having been tripped up at the start, Farrell’s quest was over. Henceforth the house would be guarded. Bitterness made him reckless.
“Then it was you that I heard singing,” he said, as if he had not noted her gesture.
“Yes. And they mocked me. My father’s new wife. She hates me because my own mother was the daughter of a prince in Gurjestan.”
That explained her indifference to the presence of a harmless looter. She had troubles of her own. And that gave Farrell his next play…
“The sweetness lingered in my ears, and from listening for the next verse I did not hear your approach.”
“You don’t look like a thief.” She smiled, and the imperiously gesturing arm dropped to her side. “Who are you?”
“No friend of your father’s,” he answered. “He robbed me, but I am Shir Khan and I do not forget.”
A feud is a debt of honor which any Kurd could understand.
“I’m Djenane.” The smile became dazzling. “I prefer my father’s enemies to his wives. Let us wait for him,” she mocked. “I know he will receive you well.”
Djenane knew that she was in no danger from an honest assassin. Her invitation gave him choice of immediate flight or staying and facing murderous odds.
The challenge was too good to decline. Not even her loose garments could hide the shapeliness of her body. If she listened long enough, let him help her damn her stepmother…the evening was rich with possibilities.
“I will wait,” he said, seating himself beside her. “But not too long.”
“You’re much wiser than my father’s usual choice of enemies, Shir Khan. Most of them would have snubbed me by taking to their heels at once.”
Farrell’s thoughts were no longer concerned with prayer rugs. He could not misunderstand Djenane’s scrutiny. He had interested her, and in Kurdistan, to lie in wait to assassinate one’s enemy is one of the traits of a man of honor.
“Malika,” resumed Farrell, “if your father were my friend, I could oftener hear you sing…what was that last one about the gazelle?”
She hummed a line, cast an anxious glance at the door, and silently closed it. The gleam of the taper light on her lustrous dark hair, the shimmer of brocaded silk that clung to her slender body, and the sweetness she exhaled made
Farrell’s brain a whirling madness.
He caught her in his arms, and though she drew back, she did not raise her voice. Her dark eyes flashed a haughty reproof, but after a long moment, she yielded, drawing closer into his embrace. Her warmth was intoxicating, and the touch of her dinging silk was maddening.
Farrell kissed her full on the mouth. She gasped and protested…but not as vigorously as she might have. She broke away, then smiled and curled up in his aims like a silken kitten.
“I rather like you, Shir Khan,” she sighed, “though I’m sure you’ll die an early death…”
“But a happy one,” he answered; and this time his embrace squeezed her breathless, and his mouth crushed her eager lips.
Farrell meant it. She was unlike any native woman he had ever seen. She was an intoxicating fragrance, and an armful of heart-stabbing beauty.
Djenane Hanoun was lonely, and though Shir Khan was her father’s enemy, he had kissed away her tears. She no longer repulsed him as he pressed her closer…
* * * *
The taper had sputtered down to a bit of wick floating in a pool of wax when Djenane at last extricated herself from his embrace and whispered, “He’ll soon be returning from the feast. I’ll show you a way out. The next night he is gone, come back again. But promise not to try to slay him…”
“Let him live for another day,” Farrell generously conceded. He followed her down a maze of passages that finally opened in a secret exit in a cluster of trees just outside the palace.
Farrell floated on air back to the village at the foot of the hill.
If was not until he was almost at the serai that it occurred to him that he had made absolutely no progress in finding Khalil Sultan’s prayer rug. But he was on the right track, and this was more than squaring up with Nurredin Shirkuh!
Then his face lengthened. Zobeide had an overload of intuition…
He shook his head, grimaced, and picked his way among the grumbling camels and sleeping jackasses in the courtyard. Maybe Zobeide was asleep…
Ramadan was wearing on. Farrell and Djenane were flirting with sudden death but neither any longer cared for anything except the kisses exchanged in the shadow of the sword. He forgot himself so far as to tell Djenane that he had come to loot and not to slay; and Djenane reciprocated by telling him of the secret vault in which the emir had stored the plunder of generations.
“Loot enough to break the back of a dozen camels,” she whispered as Farrell again left her at the secret door. “In another day or two I will have the secret. I will watch him when he digs out some gold for Ramadan alms-giving. It will be easy. And you will take me away from this place.”
Farrell’s heart was heavy as he went to the serai. The rug might not be missed at once, but with Djenane also gone, the lid would blow off. They’d have to ride hard. Nor did he want to leave her. Sooner or later she would be connected with the looting…he’d have to take her.
“It’ll be great when she and Zobeide tangle up,” he muttered.
Zobeide had followed his account of exploring Shirkuh’s house, and without the least trace of suspicion. But one lingering trace of Djenane’s perfume could betray him; and until it was all over, he would be as uneasy as a cat with wet feet.
* * * *
Farrell spent the following day selecting fast horses, and picking up information as to the mountain passes he would have to clear.
Zobeide was honey and sweetness that night as they awaited the time for the raid.
“I almost had it,” he told her, “but one of the servants broke in, just as Nurredin was returning. I barely slipped out. But I found the treasure vault.”
“Who else could be as clever?” marveled Zobeide.
And presently Farrell was prowling through the village to assure himself against upsets, such as the chance that the emir would be entertaining at home.
As he circled towards the north of the village, he heard the click-click of hoofs, and the jingle of arms. Two horsemen were entering the village. Farrell slipped behind a buttress. But as they emerged from the shadow of an overhanging rock, a crackle of musketry and the savage screech of ricochet bullets told Farrell that this was no Ramadan celebration.
The first of the two riders pitched from his saddle. His horse screamed and reared, and toppled over in a kicking heap. The other, drawing a pistol and firing as he wheeled his beast, suddenly slumped, wobbled crazily, and slid to the ground, jerking a wild shot as his horse bolted into the darkness.
Another feud, and no business of Farrell’s. A clean sweep…so he thought for a split second, and then pistol fire spurted from the further darkness. Black figures were ducking from rock to rock, firing as they ran. Steel gleamed, and the cleft in the cliff echoed with yells and curses. The town would be in an uproar in another moment.
The man firing from behind the body of his fallen horse was wounded, but evidently far from dead. At the first sign of peril, he must have taken a dive from his beast. But while the horse had caught the slugs intended for its rider, the carcass had pinned him to the rocks.
The further side of the cleft blossomed into a crop of curved blades and flaming pistols as the raiders closed in to finish their victim and get away before help came from the village.
It was none of Farrell’s business, but something urged him to take the part of the man pinned down by his horse. Moreover, he might come in handy. His good will would spare Farrell embarrassing questions; and flight would make him dangerously conspicuous.
Revolver in hand, he bounded from cover as the dismounted slayers charged, and hosed them with lead. The leader pitched headlong across the fallen horse.
Another staggered and shifted his weapon toward the new attack; and then Farrell was in the midst of it. Two more shots and his revolver was empty; but the odds were whittled down and he gained the shelter of the dead horse. He snatched a pistol from the belt of the last fallen. The attack overwhelmed him and his unknown protégé.
It was over before it was fairly started. The two survivors bolted to their horses. There was a clattering of hoofs and a shower of sparks as they charged forth to safety. Their retreat was hastened by the farewell chatter of Farrell’s salvaged revolver.
He was creased and slashed and half a dozen slugs had seared him, but he managed to jerk the horseman clear of his riddled beast.
“Allah requite you,” grimly chuckled the man whose life but a few seconds ago had not been worth one of the cartridges used against him. “Who are you and why…?”
Farrell laughed bitterly. Face to face, he recognized Nurredin Shirkuh; and it was mutual.
“Father of a thief,” said Farrell, “I should have helped your assailants.”
“It is not yet too late, infidel,” retorted the Kurd, his steel gray eyes gleaming in the moonlight. “There is still a weapon in your hands.”
For a long moment they stared each other in the face. Then Farrell handed Shirkuh the red blade he still gripped.
“Take this so that you can defend yourself on your way,” he said. “Our blood is mixed in the ground. I will have my reckoning with you later.”
A swarm of natives came charging up from the village. Half of them were the emir’s retainers.
“You may tell then that I am an infidel,” Farrell remarked in a careless tone, “but your enemies left a spare horse behind…”
“Then ride in peace,” said Shirkuh, turning toward his friends. “Your life is now on my head…but whatever your business, infidel, you would do better not to linger.”
Farrell caught the bridle of a beast belonging to one of the fallen, vaulted to the saddle, and headed north. Shirkuh, thinking him either a spy or a trader, had given him a break by way of gratitude. It would never occur to him that Farrell was planning to loot his house.
And since Farrell had in error saved his life, the Kurd considered that the score
was even. Which it would be, when Farrell had the rug. Half an hour later, he was backtracking toward the palace.
* * * *
Djenane was waiting. He followed her to her father’s apartment. There she fingered a block of stone that in no way varied from its fellows except that it had been worn somewhat smoother by the probing fingers of many generations. It swung upward revealing the treasure vault.
He watched her reaching into the shadowy crypt. His hand was trembling as he took the time-worn, frayed prayer rug and shoved it under his arm.
“Never mind the rest,” he said, drawing her from the niche. “Let’s get going…quick…”
But a tinkle of anklets and a murmur of voices warned them. They lost precious moments waiting for the other women of the household to clear the hall. And when they finally dared move, he fairly dragged Djenane toward the secret staircase. They crossed the garden. Farrell froze at the sound that came in from the direction of the village: the muffled tinkle of steel, a muttered oath, a whispered warning.
Shirkuh’s enemies were attempting a stealthy raid, hoping to elude the vigilance of the guards at the palace gate, or else someone had seen him tracking back and had turned out a scouting party to investigate. In any case, there would be hell to pay. There was only one thing to do. He thrust the rug into her hands.
“Put it back. No matter what’s going on outside, two of us wouldn’t have a chance. Alone, I’ll be able to sneak through and get to my horse. And I can’t stay here, particularly if there is a raid on the house.”
“But take the rug,” she urged.
“No. It would hamper my getaway. I’d have to move fast. Anyway, if he missed it after this disturbance, there’d be no more chance for anyone either to get in or out. Play it my way, and we can make it tomorrow night.”
That settled it. Djenane slipped from his arms and back into the house, leaving him to skirt the shadow of the wall until he reached the secret exit.
Lucky that she had not come with him, that he had no prayer rug to hinder his moves. He had scarcely left the thicket when half a dozen lurkers bounded toward him. He evaded the rush, but the shadows became a blaze of yellow and purple flame as he flung himself to the saddle and headed for the hills: but in pausing to fire, they lost their chance to mount up and pursue.
E. Hoffmann Price's Pierre d'Artois: Occult Detective & Associates Page 50
