Swords From the West (60 page)

"My lord," he asked, "what is your answer-yea or nay?"

Hugo curled an oiled ringlet around his forefinger and sucked in his lips. Silence fell on the company, and Mistress Bengli exchanged a quick glance with Guiblo.

"Alas," she sighed audibly, "our table doth lack of gaiety since the coming of Sir Robert. Will your Grace permit me to answer the Englishman?"

"Aye," quoth Hugo, pleased. "Let us hear the judgment of Diana. Pardi, Sir Robert, it would have availed you more to urge your suit more gallantly. Then the madonna might have smiled upon you-for you are comely enough to win favor with the fair."

"The fairest face in Palestine," murmured the Hospitaler a little vaguely.

"And now," she added, "having heard the plea of the vassal, we must take counsel of the learned. How now, 0 seneschal and merchants-are not we in the hands of the moneylenders? Hath his Grace of Montserrat such a sum where it can be called in and rendered into gold?"

Piculph, the Lombard seneschal, had gauged the pleasure of the marquis and made answer accordingly.

"Nay, domna, the very jewels of the rings you wear are paying usury to the Jews."

"Then must we pawn our very lives, that this dour Englishman-"

A chuckle from Hugo interrupted her, and she wrinkled her brows in pretended displeasure. The marquis lolled in his chair, delighted with the wordplay of his favorite, while he stroked the feathers of a favorite hawk perched beside him.

"-be safe," she concluded, "unless he dare seek his ransom with his sword from the hands of those Moslems about whom he doth prate so roundly."

It became clear to Robert that they were mocking him, for the marquis was lord of wide lands and great treasure. Guiblo disliked him, realizing that the former castellan of Antioch might urge his claim upon the king. Hugo, indifferent to everything that did not minister to his pleasure, had little desire to grant a small store of gold to the knight for what he held to be merely a quirk of conscience.

"And so," said Mistress Bengli, smiling full upon Robert, "it is our pleasure that you should seek to gain your treasure from the castles of the paynims-a worthy quest for the Longu'-espee-"

"Aye, let the wild boar root i' the thicket," shouted Piculph.

"-for a year and a day," cried the woman shrilly above the maudlin merriment of the feasters, "and that is the sentence of the court of his peers."

"Is it yours, my lord?" Robert leaned forward to address his host.

"It is so," responded Hugo without looking up.

But up from the table rose the Sieur de la Marra unsteadily, yet with a purpose in his bleared eyes.

"By the throne of Antichrist, by the palladium of the Horned One, 'tis a foul wrong so to mischief a warrior of the Cross. Has your Grace forgotten that he kept your wall of Antioch against the Saracen spears when the waters of the moat were red with blood?"

Alone of those present the knight of the Marra was not bound to the fortunes of Montserrat by ties of ambition, and Guiblo frowned at his words. The recent truce had altered the situation in Palestine and the mastery of the rich coast cities was passing into the hands of the Lombards and Venetians who had no wish to see the barons of England or France return to the court. Knowing that Hugo wished to be rid of the Longsword, Guiblo made answer accordingly:

"Hast wooed the cup too long this night, Sir Hospitaler. Art a fool to give belief to the tale of this wanderer. If my lord of Montserrat had not deemed his tale a lie, he would have granted the Longu'-espee his boon. But two thousand pieces of gold for a vassal's ransom passes belief-when the asker rides with a Moslem."

"Now by Venus, her girdle," cried the Sieur de la Marra, reaching a quivering hand for his sword, "that touches upon mine honor-"

"I give you thanks, Sir Hospitaler," broke in Robert, "for your abetment, but no man's aid seek I."

The red lips of Mistress Bengli curled, for here was a quarrel brewing, and she loved well to see men put themselves to the hazard of drawn steel. She did not fear for Guiblo, knowing that her cousin was well able to make shift for himself, and as for Hugo-a vassal might not strike or miscall his lord. But she was more than a little puzzled when Robert signed for his cup to be filled and waited until Hugo had done likewise.

"My lord," he said slowly, "I greet you with this, my stirrup cup. In this hour I ride from Montserrat, and my allegiance is at an end. No vassal am I, but my own man henceforth, by your will. With Messer Guiblo and the seneschal I shall have other speech."

He emptied his goblet and Hugo did the same. Then the Englishman beckoned to Abdullah at the lower table, and in the silence that had fallen upon the company his summons was clearly heard.

"0 minstrel, a song for the people of the castle. We have had our dinner, it seems, and the wine thereof, and in this place a man must pay a reckoning for all that is bestowed upon him. Sing, 0 Abdullah, of gold and gear and treasure, that they may be pleasured, for my entertainment was but indifferent and dull."

At this the marquis flushed, while his followers fingered the poniards in their belts; but Mistress Bengli laughed musically, for the Englishman promised to be entertaining after all. Abdullah rose without comment and salaamed to the marquis and the woman. Advancing to the edge of the dais, he lifted his lute and plucked softly at the strings.

"In the name of Allah, the All-Compassionate, the All-Wise," he began in liquid Arabic, "will the illustrious lords hearken to the tale of a poor wayfarer?"

His powerful hand swept over the lute, and he chanted, deep-voiced:

"With Allah are the keys of the unseen, and who is bold enough to take in hand the keys? Doth lack of gold, 0 king, or jewels for the hilts of swords, or horses fleeter than the desert storm, or garments softer than the petals of flowers? Then hearken to my tale of Khar, the Land of the Throne of Gold."

Those of the listeners who understood Arabic, and they were many, glanced up in some surprise. The legend of Khar had come to their ears before this, but never in the same guise.

They had heard that beyond the eastern mountain wall was a wide desert and beyond this a sea of salt water. Far to the east lay the greatest of the Moslem kingdoms, so it was said. This was known as Khar, or Khoras- san,*
and many were the tales of its wealth.

Like Cathay or the land of Prester John, the myth was voiced by wandering minstrels, and no man knew the truth of it, and no warrior of the Croises had penetrated farther to the east than the city of Damascus.

"Know, 0 auspicious lord," chanted Abdullah, "that it hath been my lot to follow the path of a wayfarer. From the Roof of the World I have looked down upon a land fairer than moonlight on a mountain lake; I have walked through gardens where roses were wrought of rubies, with emeralds for leaves; I have sat in a marble tower and beheld the passing of a monarch who hath more riders to his command than the Sultan of Damascus hath stones in his highways. Verily, as grains of sand is the number of warriors in this land. They walk in silvered mail with the plumes of birds upon their heads; their weapons are of blue steel, and the power of their host is such that the mamelukes of Egypt would bow down to them, even as grass before a rising wind."

Some of the guests smiled, and the Venetians, who were the wisest of the assemblage, sneered openly as at a palpable lie.

"Yah maulaya, 0 my lord, this is truth. The very trees of the palace gardens in this place are silver; and the monarch thereof hath a lake within his city-a lake built by the hands of his slaves. Within the courtyard of his castle stands a fountain, casting forth water perfumed with musk and aloes."

Hugo of Montserrat sighed and curled the lock of hair upon his forehead.

"In this land the lords are carried about by their slaves; save to mount a horse they do not set foot to earth. When the king drinks nakars and trumpets sound; when he walks in his chambers, rolls of silk are spread before him. He dwells in a city so great that the eye cannot measure it from one place. The women of his court are the fairest in the world, for they are brought from every land that his riders can adventure to.

"Verily," said the teller of tales slowly, "this king is the lord of life and death, for men seeking the joys of his court oft-times perish in the journey thither. But, having come, their joys are the fullest that life can measure out."

Chapter III

The Riders from Khar

"With Allah are the keys of the unseen." Abdullah ceased his say and took his hand from his lute. "But who will seek them out?" he added.

The listeners glanced at each other, and Mistress Bengli, chin on hand, smiled and watched the gleaming jewels on her fingers. Many had come to Palestine believing that it held the lure of the fabulous Khar and had found it otherwise.

"I have not heard the tale related so," observed Hugo. "Ha, minstrel, you are skilled in your craft-for you make us think you have dwelt in Khar."

"Sire, I have."

Guiblo shook his head.

"Then, rogue, you must have crossed the great desert and passed through the Iron Gates of which your folk prate."

Abdullah bowed assent.

"The road is no easy one. Nay, a full three moons must a man sit in the saddle, and the horse should be of good blood. In an elder day one of the heroes of the Franks led his host over the desert and saw the salt sea that lies in the desert."

"His name?"

"Iskander."

From the end of the table a monk who had not spoken until now looked up with a gleam of interest.

"By your leave, my lord, that should be Alexander, King of Macedon. Aye, the misguided scholasticists do relate in their profane books the deeds of the Macedonian."

"And how did Alexander pass the Iron Gates?"

"With his sword," Abdullah said calmly. "And yet-did he live to set foot in his own land again? Nay; the Iron Cates take their toll."

"What manner of thing are they?"

"In the books of the cosmographers Strabo and Herodotus, Messer Guiblo," explained the monk, "there is a mark on the road to the East inscribed with the words 'Caspiae Pylae,' or Gates of the Caspian. Their nature is unknown, for since the day of the caesars no Christian hath ventured there."

"Riddles," scoffed Hugo in his own speech. "'Tis a myth that holds no profit for us."

Abdullah appeared to grasp his meaning.

"0 king," he observed gravely, "riders have come out of Khar on a foray, and the traces of their horses can be seen within your borders."

"My watchers beheld them not."

"Who can behold the stars in broad day, or the djinn folk who ride upon the winds at night? Does the lord of the castle wish to see a talsmin-a token that his servant's word is true?"

Thrusting his hand into his girdle, the minstrel drew forth something that flashed in the flickering candlelight-a neck chain of rubies cut into the semblance of roses, strung on a cord of finely wrought gold.

"Such jewels as these the women of Khar wear upon their throats."

Mistress Bengli caught up the chain in her white fingers, and the others crowded close to stare from the gleaming rubies to Abdullah, who seemed inwardly amused by the excitement he had caused.

Now, considering him narrowly, Longsword thought that no playing of the lute could fashion such muscular hands, and no warbling of nights could give such note of command to a voice. Abdullah bore himself more like an atabeg-a leader of a host-than a minstrel.

"Here is a strange rogue forsooth," muttered the seneschal, Piculph, "with a baron's ransom in his belly band."

Robert frowned, for he wished no ill to the teller of tales, and Abdullah might as well have cast his valuable chain into the Orontes as to have shown it to the woman of the Montserrat. Hugo would cheerfully slit open a hundred natives on the chance that one had swallowed a single ruby like these. But Abdullah seemed no whit fearful of the fate he had called down on himself, for he had ceased to watch Mistress Bengli and was eyeing the great tapestries that shook and bellied upon the walls as the gusts of a rising wind buffeted the castle walls and whined through the cracks. The man, heedless of the company at the table, was listening to the sounds of the night beyond the walls.

At that moment there was heard a mutter of voices at the entrance to the hall, the clank of a long scabbard on the stone flagging of the floor, and the captain of the warders stood within the curtain with uplifted hand.

"Pardon, good my lord, I bear tidings. On the river road we have seen an array of Moslems. At midnight I went forth beyond the hamlet to overlook the valley, and in the lower gorge armed men do assemble in ranks. Wilt give command to man the walls, or sally forth?"

"Ha-so!"

Hugo stroked his heavy chin and glanced at his companions. "Sir Robert had the right of it, methinks-and the watchers upon the hill towers shall taste of the strappado. What is your counsel, messires?"

The young Sieur de la Marra struck the table with his fist and set the flagons dancing.

"By the Cross, messires, the paynims do challenge us. My men and I fare forth to seek them."

Hugo exchanged a low word with Messer Guiblo, and the Hospitaler caught the mention of Longu'-espee's name.

"Let it be so. Ho, armiger-my helm and shield. Without there, sound the oliphant to muster our followers."

Mistress Bengli put her hand to her throat to stifle a scream, and the chain of rubies fell to the table and slid down upon the rushes, whence Abdullah picked them up without being observed. This done, the minstrel made his way quietly to the wind-whipped tapestries in a dim corner.

An ivory horn sounded a mellow note in the courtyard, and the clatter of horses, led from the stables, made answer. When Hugo's helm was laced on by a squire-at-arms, he summoned the captain of the guard and peered around the hall.

"In the fiends' name, where went the infidel? Seek him out-you, and you-and retrieve me his chain, or Piculph shall strip and flag you. He stood here but a moment agone-"

"The knave bath a rare trick of foretelling the mind of your Grace," muttered Guiblo. "And his crony the English boar hath forsaken us as well. Methinks he bears you ill intent."