Ortho spent that winter in Morocco City, but in the spring was sent out
with a force against the Zoua Arabs south of the Figvig Oasis, which had
been taken by Muley Ismail and was precariously held by his descendants.
They spent a lot of time and trouble dragging cannon up, to find them
utterly useless when they got there. The enemy did not rely on strong
places—they had none—but on mobility. They played a game of sting and
run very exasperating to their opponents. It was like fighting a cloud
of deadly mosquitoes. The wastage among the Crown forces was alarming;
two generals were recalled and strangled, and when Ortho again saw the
Koutoubia minaret rising like a spear-shaft from the green palms of
Morocco it was after an absence of ten months.
Ourida met him in transports of joy, a two-month baby in her arms. It
was a son, the exact spit and image of him, she declared, a person of
already incredible sagacity and ferocious strength. A few years and he
too would be riding at the head of massed squadrons, bearing the green
banner of the Prophet.
Ortho, burned black with Saharan suns, weak with privation, sick of the
reek of festering battlefields, contemplated the tiny pink creature he
had brought into the world and swore in his heart that this boy of his
should follow peaceful ways.
Fighting men were, as a class, the salt of the earth, simple-hearted,
courageous, dog-loyal, dupes of the cunning and the cowardly. But apart
from the companionship he had no illusions concerning the profession of
arms as practiced in the Shereefian empire; it was one big bully
maintaining himself in the name of God against a horde of lesser bullies
(also invoking the Deity) by methods that would be deemed undignified in
a pot-house brawl. He was in it for the good reason that he could not
get out; but no son of his should be caught in the trap if he could help
it. However, he said nothing of this to Ourida. He kissed her over and
over and said the boy was magnificent and would doubtless make a fine
soldier—but there was time to think about that.
He saw winter and summer through in Morocco, with the exception of a
short trip on the Sultan’s bodyguard to Mogador, which port Mahomet had
established to offset fractious Agadir and taken under his special
favor.
The sand-blown white town was built on the plans of an Avignon engineer
named Cornut, with fortifications after the style of Vauban. This gave
it a pronounced European flavor which was emphasized by the number of
foreign traders in its streets, drawn thither by the absence of custom.
Also there was the Atlantic pounding on the Island, a tang of brine in
the air and a sea wind blowing. Ortho had not seen the Atlantic since he
left Sallee; homesickness gnawed at him.
He climbed the Skala tower, and, sitting on a cannon cast for the third
Philippe in 1595, watched the sun westering in gold and crimson and
dreamed of the Owls’ House, the old Owls’ House lapped in its secret
valley, where a man could live his life out in fullness and peace—and
his sons after him.
Walking back through the town, he met with a Bristol trader and turned
into a wine shop. The Englishman treated him to a bottle of Jerez and
the news of the world. Black bad it was. The tight little island had her
back to the wall, fighting for bare life against three powerful nations
at once. The American colonists were in full rebellion to boot, India
was a cock-pit, Ireland sharpening pikes. General Burgoyne had
surrendered at Saratoga. Eliott was besieged in Gibraltar. French,
American and Spanish warships were thick as herring in the Channel; the
Bristolian had only slipped through them by sheer luck and would only
get back by a miracle.
Taxation at home was crippling, and every mother’s son who had one leg
to go upon and one arm to haul with was being pressed for service; they
were even emptying the jails into the navy. He congratulated Ortho on
being out of the country and harm’s way. Ortho had had a wild idea of
getting a letter written and taken home to Eli by this man, but as he
listened he reflected that it was no time now. Also, if he wanted to be
bought out he would have to give minute instructions as to where the
smuggling money was hidden. Letters were not inviolate; the bearer, and
not Eli, might find that hidden money. And then there was Ourida and
Saïd II. Saïd would become acclimatized, but England and Ourida were
incompatible. He could not picture the ardent Bedouin girl—her bangles,
silks and exotic finery—in the gray north; she would shrivel up like a
frost-bitten lotus, pine and die.
No, he was firmly anchored now. One couldn’t have everything; he had
much. He drank up his wine, wished the Bristolian luck with his venture
and rode back to the Diabat Palace.
A week later he was home again in Morocco.
Added means had enabled him to furnish the Bab Ahmar house very
comfortably, Moorish fashion, with embroidered _haitis_ on the walls,
inlaid tables and plenty of well-cushioned lounges. The walls were
thick; the rooms, though small, were high and airy; the oppressive heat
of a Haouz summer did not unduly penetrate. Ourida bloomed, Saïd the
younger progressed from strength to strength, waxing daily in fat and
audacity. He was the idol of the odd-job boy and the two slave women
(the household had increased with its master’s rank), of Osman Bâki and
Ortho’s men. The latter brought him presents from time to time: fruit
stolen from the Aguedal, camels, lions and horses (chiefly horses)
crudely carved and highly colored, and, when he was a year old, a small,
shy monkey caught in the Rif, and later an old eagle with clipped wings
and talons which, the donor explained, would defend the little lord from
snakes and such-like. Concerning these living toys, Saïd II. displayed a
devouring curiosity and no fear at all. When the monkey clicked her
teeth at him he gurgled and pulled her tail till she escaped up the
wistaria. He pursued the eagle on all fours, caught it sleeping one
afternoon, and hung doggedly on till he had pulled a tail feather out.
The bird looked dangerous, Saïd II. bubbled delightedly and grabbed for
another feather, whereat the eagle retreated hastily to sulk among the
orange shrubs. Was the door left open for a minute, Saïd II. was out of
it on voyages of high adventure.
Once he was arrested by the guard at the Ahmar Gate, plodding cheerfully
on all fours for open country, and returned, kicking and raging, in the
arms of a laughing petty officer.
Ortho himself caught the youngster emerging through the postern onto the
Royal parade ground.
“He fears nothing,” Ourida exulted. “He will be a great warrior and slay
a thousand infidels—the sword of Allah!—um-yum, my jewel.”
That battered soldier and turncoat infidel, his father, rubbed his chin
uneasily. “M’yes . . . perhaps. Time enough yet.”
But there was no gainsaying the fierce spirit of the Arab mother,
daughter of a hundred fighting _sheiks_; her will was stronger than his.
The baby’s military education began at once. In the cool of the morning
she brought Saïd II. to the parade ground, perched him on the parapet of
the Dar-el-Heni and taught him to clap his hands when the Horse went by.
Once she hoisted him to his father’s saddle bow. The fat creature
twisted both hands in the black stallion’s mane and kicked the glossy
neck with his heels, gurgling with joy.
“See, see,” said Ourida, her eyes like stars for radiance. “He grips, he
rides. He will carry the standard in his day _zahrit_.” The soldiers
laughed and lifted their lances. “Hail to the young Kaid!”
Ortho, gripping his infant son by the slack of his miniature jellab,
felt sick. Ourida and these other simple-minded fanatics would beat him
yet with their fool ideas of glory, urge this crowing baby of his into
hardship, terror, pain, possibly agonizing death.
Parenthood was making a thoughtful man of him. He was no longer the
restless adventurer of two years ago, looking on any change as better
than none. He grudged every moment away from the Bab Ahmar, dreaded the
spring campaign, the separation it would entail, the chance bullet that
might make it eternal.
His ambition dimmed. He no longer wanted power and vast wealth, only
enough to live comfortably on with Ourida and young Saïd just as he was.
Promotion meant endless back-stair intrigues; he had no taste left for
them and had other uses for the money and so fell out of the running.
A Spanish woman in the royal harem, taking advantage of her temporary
popularity with Mahomet, worked her wretched little son into position
over Penhale’s head and over him went a fat Moor, Yakoub Ben Ahmed by
name, advanced by the offices of a fair sister, also in the seraglio.
Neither of these heroes had more than a smattering of military lore and
no battle experience whatever, but Ortho did not greatly care. Promotion
might be rapid in the Shereefian army, but degradation was apt to be
instantaneous—the matter of a sword flash. He had risen as far as he
could rise with moderate safety and there he would stop. Security was
his aim nowadays, a continuance of things as they were.
For life went by very happily in the little house by the Bab Ahmar,
pivoting on Saïd II. But in the evening, when that potential conqueror
had ceased the pursuit of the monkey and eagle and lay locked in sleep,
Ourida would veil herself, wind her haik about her and go roaming into
the city with Ortho. She loved the latticed _souks_ with their displays
of silks, jewelry and leather work; the artificers with their long
muskets, curved daggers, velvet scabbarded swords and pear-shaped powder
flasks; the gorgeous horse-trappings at the saddlers’, but these could
be best seen in broad daylight; in the evening there were other
attractions.
It was the Djeema-el-Fna that drew her, that great, dusty, clamorous
fair-ground of Morocco where gather the story-tellers, acrobats and
clowns; where feverish drums beat the sun down, assisted by the pipes of
Aissawa snake charmers and the jingling _ouds_ and cymbals of the Berber
dancing boys; where the Sultan hung out the heads of transgressors that
they might grin sardonically upon the revels. Ourida adored the
Djeema-el-Fna. To the girl from the tent hamlet in the Sahara it was
Life. She wept at the sad love stories, trembled at the snake charmers,
shrieked at the crude buffoons, swayed in sympathy with the Berber
dancers, besought Ortho for coin, and more coin, to reward the charming
entertainers. She loved the varied crowds, the movement, the excitement,
the din, but most of all she liked the heads. No evening on the Djeema
was complete unless she had inspected these grisly trophies of imperial
power.
She said no word to Ortho, but nevertheless he knew perfectly well what
was in her mind; in her mind she saw young Saïd twenty years on,
spattered with infidel blood, riding like a tornado, serving his enemies
even as these.
Ferocious—she was the ultimate expression of ferocity—but knowing no
mean she was also ferocious in her love and loyalty; she would have
given her life for husband or son gladly, rejoicing. Such people are
difficult to deal with. Ortho sighed, but let her have her way.
Often of an evening Osman Bâki came to the house and they would sit in
the court drinking Malaga wine and yarning about old campaigns, while
Ourida played with the little ape and the old eagle watched for mice,
pretending to be asleep.
Osman talked well. He told of his boyhood’s home beside the Bosporus, of
Constantinople, Bagdad and Damascus with its pearly domes bubbling out
of vivid greenery. Jerusalem, Tunis and Algiers he had seen also and now
the Moghreb, the “Sunset land” of the first Saracen invaders. One thing
more he wanted to see and that was the Himalayas. He had heard old
soldiers talk of them—propping the heavens. He would fill his eyes with
the Himalayas and then go home to his garden in Rumeli Hissar and brood
over his memories.
Sometimes he would take the _gounibri_ and sing the love lyrics of his
namesake, or of Nêdim, or “rose garden” songs he had picked up in Persia
which Ourida thought delicious. And sometimes Ortho trolled his green
English ballads, also favorably received by her, simply because he sang
them, for she did not understand their rhythm in the least. But more
often they lounged, talking lazily, three very good friends together,
Osman sucking at the hookah, punctuating the long silences with shrewd
comments on men and matters, Ortho lying at his ease watching the
brilliant African stars, drawing breaths of blossom-scented air wafted
from the Aguedal, Ourida nestling at his side, curled up like a sleepy
kitten.
Summer passed and winter; came spring and with it, to Ortho’s joy, no
prospect of a campaign for him. A desert marabout, all rags, filth and
fervor, preached a holy war in the Tissant country, gathering a few
malcontents about him, and Yakoub Ben Ahmed was dispatched with a small
force to put a stop to it. There were the usual rumors of unrest in the
south, but nothing definite, merely young bucks talking big. Ortho
looked forward to another year of peace.
He went in the Sultan’s train to Mogador for a fortnight in May, and at
the end of June was sent to Taroudant, due east of Agadir. A trifling
affair of dispatches. He told Ourida he would be back in no time and
rode off cheerfully.
His business in Taroudant done, he was on the point of turning home when
he was joined by a kaid mia and ten picked men from Morocco bearing
orders that he was to take them on to Tenduf, a further two hundred
miles south, and collect overdue tribute.
Ortho well knew what that meant. Tenduf was on the verge of outbreak,
the first signal of which would be his, the tax collector’s head, on a
charger. Had he been single he would not have gone to Tenduf—he would
have made a dash for freedom—but now he had a wife in Morocco, a
hostage for his fidelity.
Seeking a public scribe, he dictated a letter to Ourida and another to
Osman Bâki, commending her to his care should the worst befall, and rode
on.
The Basha of Tenduf received the Sultan’s envoy with the elaborate
courtesy that is inherent in a Moor and signifieth nothing. He was
desolated that the tribute was behindhand, enlarged on the difficulty of
collecting it in a land impoverished by drought (which it was not), but
promised to set to work immediately. In the meantime Ortho lodged in the
kasba, ostensibly an honored guest, actually a prisoner, aware that the
Basha was the ringleader of the offenders and that his own head might be
removed at any moment. Hawk-faced sheiks, armed to the teeth, galloped
in, conferred with the Basha, galloped away again. If they brought any
tribute it was well concealed. Time went by; Ortho bit his lip, fuming
inwardly, but outwardly his demeanor was of polite indifference.
Whenever he could get hold of the Basha he regaled him with instances of
Imperial wrath, of villages burned to the ground, towns taken and put to
the sword, men, women and children; lingering picturesquely on the
tortures inflicted on unruly governors.
“But why did Sidi do that?” the Basha would exclaim, turning a shade
paler at the thought of his peer of Khenifra having all his nails drawn
out and then being slowly sawn in half.
“Why?” Ortho would scratch his head and look puzzled. “Why? Bless me if
I know! Oh, yes, I believe there was some little hitch with the taxes.”
“These walls make me laugh,” he remarked, walking on the Tenduf
fortifications.
The Governor was annoyed. “Why so? They are very good walls.”
“As walls go,” Ortho admitted. “But what are walls nowadays? They take
so long to build, so short a time to destroy. Why, our Turk gunners
breached the Derunat walls in five places in an hour. The sole use for
walls is to contain the defenders in a small space, then every bomb we
throw inside does its work.”
“Hum!” The Basha stroked his brindled beard. “Hum—but supposing the
enemy harass you in the open?”
Ortho shrugged his shoulders. “Then we kill them in the open, that is
all. It takes longer, but they suffer more.”
“It took you a long time at Figvig,” the Basha observed maliciously.
“Not after we learned the way.”
“And what is the way?”
“We take possession of the wells and they die of thirst in the sands and
save us powder. At Figvig there were many wells; it took time. Here—”
He swept his hand over the burning champagne and snapped his fingers.
“Just that.”
“Hum,” said the Basha and walked away deep in thought. Day after day
came and went and Ortho was not dead yet. He had an idea that he was
getting the better of the bluffing match, that the Basha’s nerve was
shaking and he was passing it on.
There came a morning when the trails were hazy with the dust of horsemen
hastening in to Tenduf, and the envoy on the kasba tower knew that the
crisis had arrived.
It was over by evening. The tribute began to come in next day and
continued to roll in for a week more.
The Basha accompanied Ortho ten miles on his return journey, regretting
any slight misconstruction that might have arisen and protesting his
imperishable loyalty. He trusted that his dear friend Saïd el Inglez
would speak well of him to the Sultan and presented him with two richly
caparisoned horses and a bag of ducats as a souvenir of their charming
relations.
Slowly went the train; the horses were heavy laden and the heat
terrific. Ortho dozed in the saddle, impatient at the pace, powerless to
mend it. He beguiled the tedious days, mentally converting the Basha’s
ducats into silks and jewelry for Ourida. It was the end of August
before he reached Taroudant. There he got word that the court had moved
to Rabat and he was to report there. Other news he got also, news that
sent him riding alone to Morocco City, night and day, as fast as driven
horseflesh would carry him.
He went through the High Atlas passes to Goundafa, then north across the
plains by Tagadirt and Aguergour. From Aguergour on the road was
crawling with refugees—men, women, children, horses, donkeys, camels
loaded with household goods staggering up the mifis valley, anywhere out
of the pestilent city. They shouted warnings at the urgent horseman:
“The sickness, the sickness! Thou art riding to thy death, lord!”
Ortho nodded; he knew. It was late afternoon when he passed through
Tameslouht and saw the Koutoubia minaret in the distance, standing
serene, though all humanity rotted.
He was not desperately alarmed. Plagues bred in the beggars’ kennels,
not in palace gardens. It would have reached his end of the city last of
all, giving his little family ample time to run. Osman Bâki would see to
it that Ourida had every convenience. They were probably down at Dar el
Beida reveling in the clean sea breezes, or at Rabat with the Court. He
told himself he was not really frightened; nevertheless he did the last
six miles at a gallop, passed straight through the Bab Ksiba into the
kasba. There were a couple of indolent Sudanese on guard at the gate and
a few more sprawling in the shadow of the Drum Barracks, but the big
Standard Square was empty and so were the two further courts.
He jumped off his horse at the postern and walked on. From the houses
around came not a sound, not a move; in the street he was the only
living thing. He knocked at his own door; no answer. Good! They had
gone!
The door swung open to his push and he stepped in, half relieved, half
fearful, went from room to room to find them stripped bare. Ourida had
managed to take all her belongings with her then. He wondered how she
had found the transport. Osman Bâki contrived it, doubtless. A picture
flashed before him of his famous black horse squadron trekking for the
coast burdened with Ourida’s furniture—a roll of haitis to this man, a
cushion to that, a cauldron to another—and he laughed merrily.
Where had they gone, he wondered—Safi, Dar el Beida, Mogador, Rabat?
The blacks at the barracks might know; Osman should have left a message.
He stepped out of the kitchen into the court and saw a man rooting the
little orange trees out of their tubs.
“Hey!”
The man swung about, sought to escape, saw it was impossible and flung
himself upon the ground writhing and sobbing for mercy.
It was a beggar who sat at the Ahmar Gate with his head hidden in the
hood of his haik (he was popularly supposed to have no face), a
supplicating claw protruding from a bundle of foul rags and a muffled
voice wailing for largesse. Ortho hated the loathly beast, but Ourida
gave him money—“in the name of God.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Great lord, have mercy in the name of Sidi Ben Youssef the Blest, of
Abd el Moumen and Muley Idriss,” he slobbered. “I did nothing, lord,
nothing. I thought you had gone to the south and would not return to
. . . to . . . this house. Spare me, O amiable prince.”
“And why should I not return to this house?” said Ortho.
The beggar hesitated. “Muley, I made sure . . . I thought . . . it was
not customary . . . young men do not linger in the places of lost love.”
“Dog,” said Ortho, suddenly cold about the heart, “what do you mean?”
“Surely the Kaid knows?” There was a note of surprise in the mendicant’s
voice.
“I know nothing; I have been away . . . the lalla Ourida?”
The beggar locked both hands over his head and squirmed in the dust.
“Kaid, Kaid . . . the will of Allah.”
The little court reeled under Ortho’s feet, a film like a heat wave rose
up before his eyes, everything went blurred for a minute. Then he spoke
quite calmly:
“Why did she not go away?”
“She had no time, lord. The little one, thy son, took the sickness
first; she stayed to nurse him and herself was taken. But she was buried
with honor, Kaid; the Turkish officer buried her with honor in a gay
bier with tholbas chanting. I, miserable that I am, I followed
also—afar. She was kind to the poor, the lalla Ourida.”
“But why, why didn’t Osman get them both away before the plague struck
the palace?” Ortho muttered fiercely, more to himself than otherwise,
but the writhing rag heap heard him and answered:
“He had no time, Muley. The kasba was the first infected.”
“The first! How?”
“Yakoub Ben Ahmed brought many rebel heads from Tissant thinking to
please Sidi. They stank and many soldiers fell sick, but Yakoub would
not throw the heads away—it was his first command. They marched into
the kasba with drums beating, sick soldiers carrying offal.”
Ortho laughed mirthlessly. So the dead had their revenge.
“Where is the Turk officer now?” he asked presently. “Rabat?”
“No, Muley—he too took the sickness tending thy lancers.”
Ortho walked away. All over, all gone—wife, boy, faithful friend.
Ourida would not see her son go by at the proud head of a regiment, nor
Osman review his memories in his vineyard by the Bosporus. All over, all
gone, the best and truest.
Turning, he flung a coin at the beggar. “Go . . . leave me.”
Dusk was flooding the little court, powder blue tinged with the
rose-dust of sunset. A pair of gray pigeons perched on the parapet made
their love cooings and fluttered away again. From the kasba minaret came
the boom of the muezzin. High in the summer night drifted a white petal
of a moon.
Ortho leaned against a pillar listening. The chink of anklets, the plud,
plud of small bare feet.
“Saïd, my beloved, is it you? Tired, my heart’s dear? Rest your head
here, lord; take thy ease. Thy fierce son is asleep at last; he has four
teeth now and the strength of a lion. He will be a great captain of
lances and do us honor when we are old. Your arm around me thus, tall
one . . . äie, now am I content beyond all women . . .”
From twilight places came the voice of Osman Bâki and the subdued tinkle
of the gounibri. “Allah has been good to me. I have seen many
wonders—rivers, seas, cities and plains, fair women, brave men and
stout fighting, but I would yet see the Himalayas. After that I will go
home where I was a boy. Listen while I sing you a song of my own country
such as shepherds sing . . .”
Ortho’s head sank in his hands. All over now, all gone. . . . Something
flapped in the shadows by the orange trees, flapped and hopped out into
the central moonlight and posed there stretching its crippled wings.
It was the old eagle disgustingly bloated.
That alone remained, that and the loathly beggar, left alone in the dead
city to their carrion orgy. A shock of revulsion shook Ortho. Ugh!
He sprang up and, without looking round, strode out of the house and
down the street to where his horse was standing.
A puff of hot wind followed him, a furnace blast, foul with the stench
of half-buried corpses in the big Mussulman cemetery outside the walls.
Ugh!
He kicked sharp stirrups into his horse and rode through the Ksiba Gate.
“Fleeing from the sickness—eh?” sneered a mokaddem of Sudanese who
could not fly.
“No—ghosts,” said Ortho and turned his beast onto the western road.
“The sea! The sea!”