so very happy—”
She stopped for breath. She kissed him.
“And,” she went on, “I talked to my cousin, the Khan of Kulistan. He will make you a captain in the palace guard, although—” with a fleeting smile curling her lips—“he is a little angry at you.”
“Why?”
“Because of Gotha.”
“Oh!”
“He liked her, and,” she laughed—“more than merely liked her. Hayah—the old cat, though blind and lame, still hankers after mice! And you, like the generous soul you are, giving all your jewels to Timur Bek, so that he could pay back to Yengi Mehmet what he owed him, and free Gotha, and marry her!”
He gave a start.
“You said—marry?”
“Did you not know? Very early this morning they went to the mosque and became man and wife. And now they are off to the steppe, the wilderness, to spend their honeymoon. For they are young. They can stand the rigor, the chill harsh winds, the open air. Well”—and again she smiled, while again he winced a little—“we are not young, you and I. But our love is as great as theirs—is it not, my lord?”
He did not reply immediately. He looked at her, with a long and searching look. And then—nor was it altogether because he feared her brother the Grand Khan, and knew that this time he would have no chance at all to get away, but also, and chiefly, because of a queer feeling in his soul, something akin to tender pity—he inclined his head and said: “There was never love greater than mine, O heart of seven roses!”
He was silent; and he thought, with supreme self-satisfaction: When I do a thing, by Allah and by Allah, I do it in style! It is the glorious way of me.
So he bowed gallantly in the Persian manner, his hand on his breast. He was about to kneel before her, and had already bent his left leg, when suddenly he felt a stabbing pain and gave a cry.
“Why! Oh,” was her anxious query
“What is the matter?”
“Nothing, nothing.”
“But I heard you—”
“A little pain—in my left leg.”
“A wound?”
“No. A touch of rheumatism.”
She shook a finger at him.
“Your own fault!”
“Eh?”
“Yes. To be up here on the roof late at night, in the cold, as if you were in your teens!”
“But—”
“You are old enough to have more sense! Off to bed with you—and a hot brick at your feet, and a glass of mulled wine to put you to sleep. Tomorrow we’ll leave this draughty house, and stay with my cousin the Khan of Gulistan, and—”
“Look—” he interrupted indignantly.
“Be quiet! I know what is good for you.”
Firmly she took him by the arm and led him down the stairs.
He did not resist. They passed Omar the Red’s room. And Omar the Black bit his lips and frowned as he heard a faint, “Yoo-yoo-yoo!” heard, a moment later, something which sounded, suspiciously, like laughter.
* * * *
IT cannot be said that, during the days that followed, Omar the Black was exactly unhappy. In fact, though he hated to admit it, he was enjoying life.
There was his wife. Faded, sure enough, and wrinkled. Not lovely at all, not the one to quicken a man’s heartbeat and set his flesh to aching. On the other hand, she was so kindly, so very, very kindly—and so strangely humble when, frequently, she said to him:
“You bring me great happiness. I love you, O best beloved!”
He would kiss her gently; lying like a gentleman, and after a while not lying at all, though he thought he did, he would reply:
“So do I love you, O delight!”
Furthermore—oh, yes, Fathouma was right—he was no longer in his teens, no longer eager to travel the hard road, with ever danger and death lurking around the corner. And it was pleasant to be once more, as formerly at the court of the Grand Khan of the Golden Steppe, a man of fashion, dressed in cloak and breeches of handsomely embroidered, Bokharan satin, and hose of gossamer silk, and boots of soft red leather, and a voluminous turban that had cost fifty pieces of silver—and always a deal of money clanking in his breeches, what with his captain’s pay and his wife’s generosity—and the work quite suiting his fancy.
Indeed, Omar did no work to speak of. Except that, as a captain in the service of the Khan of Gulistan, he would mount guard at the palace every forenoon for a leisurely, strolling hour or two, swapping yarns and boasts and lies with the other tall captains. And in the afternoons he would whistle to his tawny Afghan hound and stalk through the streets and bazaars, buying whatever he wished, and once in a while getting into a row because of insult real or, more often, imagined.
And in the evenings he would go on an occasional riotous drinking-bout, rolling home late and noisy—and Fathouma would be waiting for him, would cool his throbbing temples with scented water, nor give him the sharp edge of her tongue, but warn:
“You must be careful, best beloved. A man of your years—”
He would flare up.
“What do you mean—a man of my years?” he would demand. “Why, my heart is the same as ever it was, keen and lightsome! And my soul has the same golden fire, and my joints are still greased with the rich grease of youth, and—”
“Of course,” she would agree soothingly. “And yet you look a little tired, and so you had better have your breakfast in bed tomorrow. And here”—stirring a cup that held a steaming, dark, strong-smelling broth—“some tea of bitter herbs for your stomach.”
“No, no!”
“Yes, yes! Drink it at one swallow, hero, and it will not taste so bad.”
He would sigh—and obey.
He would, to tell the truth, feel better for it the next day, and get up later and later as morning succeeded morning.
And as time progressed, moreover, Omar went on fewer drinking-bouts; and, gradually he became less, eager at smelling out insults and picking quarrels with all and sundry. In fact, the only quarrel which he had—and carefully nursed—was with his brother.
It was the latter, he would reflect, who by persuading him to return to Gulabad, had been responsible for everything: his marriage as well as the loss of his fine black beard. And while, a little grudgingly, he might forgive him the marriage, he could not forgive the matter of the beard.
It had grown again—and rapidly—oh, yes! But thanks to the shaving, it was not as silky as formerly; and two gray hairs sprouting for each one he plucked out; and he, with his wife knowing it, rather embarrassed at using gallnut dye.
And furthermore, the mocking way his brother, that night after the wedding, had yoo-yoo-yooed and laughed!
No, no—he could not forgive him.
Therefore when Omar the Red called at the palace, asking his twin brother to fulfil his side of the agreement—to supply the cash for settling the old debts and help him get back to the castle and to Ayesha—Omar the Black raised an eyebrow.
“Do you expect me, an honorable Tartar gentleman,” he demanded, “a captain in the Khan’s service, to take part in such a wicked enterprise as robbing a shop? Ah—shame on you!”
“We don’t have to rob the shop.”
“Then how—”
“You