I
Now the Shah-in-Shah, Shah Jahan, Emperor in India, loved his wife with
a great love. And of all the wives of the Mogul Emperors surely this
Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal---the Chosen of the Palace--was the most
worthy of love. In the tresses of her silk-soft hair his heart was
bound, and for none other had he so much as a passing thought since
his soul had been submerged in her sweetness. Of her he said, using the
words of the poet Faisi,--
“How shall I understand the magic of Love the Juggler? For he made thy
beauty enter at that small gate the pupil of my eye, And now--and now my
heart cannot contain it!”
But who should marvel? For those who have seen this Arjemand crowned
with the crown the Padishah set upon her sweet low brows, with the lamps
of great jewels lighting the dimples of her cheeks as they swung beside
them, have most surely seen perfection. He who sat upon the Peacock
Throne, where the outspread tail of massed gems is centred by that great
ruby, “The Eye of the Peacock, the Tribute of the World,” valued it not
so much as one Jock of the dark and perfumed tresses that rolled to her
feet. Less to him the twelve throne columns set close with pearls than
the little pearls she showed in her sweet laughter. For if this lady was
all beauty, so too she was all goodness; and from the Shah-in-Shah to
the poorest, all hearts of the world knelt in adoration, before the
Chosen of the Palace. She was, indeed, an extraordinary beauty, in that
she had the soul of a child, and she alone remained unconscious of her
power; and so she walked, crowned and clothed with humility.
Cold, haughty, and silent was the Shah-in-Shah before she blessed his
arms--flattered, envied, but loved by none. But the gift this Lady
brought with her was love; and this, shining like the sun upon ice,
melted his coldness, and he became indeed the kingly centre of a kingly
court May the Peace be upon her!
Now it was the dawn of a sorrowful day when the pains of the Lady
Arjemand came strong and terrible, and she travailed in agony. The
hakims (physicians) stroked their beards and reasoned one with another;
the wise women surrounded her, and remedies many and great were tried;
and still her anguish grew, and in the hall without sat the Shah-in-Shah
upon his divan, in anguish of spirit yet greater. The sweat ran on his
brows, the knotted veins were thick on his temples, and his eyes, sunk
in their caves, showed as those of a maddened man. He crouched on his
cushions and stared at the purdah that divided him from the Lady; and
all day the people came and went about him, and there was silence from
the voice he longed to hear; for she would not moan, lest the sound
should slay the Emperor. Her women besought her, fearing that her strong
silence would break her heart; but still she lay, her hands clenched in
one another, enduring; and the Emperor endured without. The Day of the
Smiting!
So, as the time of the evening prayer drew nigh, a child was born,
and the Empress, having done with pain, began to sink slowly into
that profound sleep that is the shadow cast by the Last. May Allah the
Upholder have mercy on our weakness! And the women, white with fear
and watching, looked upon her, and whispered one to another, “It is the
end.”
And the aged mother of Abdul Mirza, standing at her head, said, “She
heeds not the cry of the child. She cannot stay.” And the newly wed
wife of Saif Khan, standing at her feet, said, “The voice of the beloved
husband is as the Call of the Angel. Let the Padishah be summoned.”
So, the evening prayer being over (but the Emperor had not prayed), the
wisest of the hakims, Kazim Sharif, went before him and spoke:--
“Inhallah! May the will of the Issuer of Decrees in all things be done!
Ascribe unto the Creator glory, bowing before his Throne.”
And he remained silent; but the Padishah, haggard in his jewels, with
his face hidden, answered thickly, “The truth! For Allah has forgotten
his slave.”
And Kazim Sharif, bowing at his feet and veiling his face with his
hands, replied:
“The voice of the child cannot reach her, and the Lady of Delight
departs. He who would speak with her must speak quickly.”
Then the Emperor rose to his feet unsteadily, like a man drunk with
the forbidden juice; and when Kazim Sharif would have supported him, he
flung aside his hands, and he stumbled, a man wounded to death, as it
were, to the marble chamber where she lay.
In that white chamber it was dusk, and they had lit the little cressets
so that a very faint light fell upon her face. A slender fountain a
little cooled the hot, still air with its thin music and its sprinkled
diamonds, and outside, the summer lightnings were playing wide and blue
on the river; but so still was it that the dragging footsteps of the
Emperor raised the hair on the flesh of those who heard, So the women
who should, veiled themselves, and the others remained like pillars of
stone.
Now, when those steps were heard, a faint colour rose in the cheek of
the Lady Arjemand; but she did not raise the heavy lashes, or move her
hand. And he came up beside her, and the Shadow of God, who should kneel
to none, knelt, and his head fell forward upon her breast; and in the
hush the women glided out like ghosts, leaving the husband with the wife
excepting only that her foster-nurse stood far off, with eyes averted.
So the minutes drifted by, falling audibly one by one into eternity, and
at the long last she slowly opened her eyes and, as from the depths of
a dream, beheld the Emperor; and in a voice faint as the fall of a
rose-leaf she said the one word, “Beloved!”
And he from between his clenched teeth, answered, “Speak, wife.”
So she, who in all things had loved and served him,--she, Light of
all hearts, dispeller of all gloom,--gathered her dying breath for
consolation, and raised one hand slowly; and it fell across his, and so
remained.
Now, her beauty had been broken in the anguish like a rose in storm; but
it returned to her, doubtless that the Padishah might take comfort in
its memory; and she looked like a houri of Paradise who, kneeling beside
the Zemzem Well, beholds the Waters of Peace. Not Fatmeh herself, the
daughter of the Prophet of God, shone more sweetly. She repeated the
word, “Beloved”; and after a pause she whispered on with lips that
scarcely stirred, “King of the Age, this is the end.”
But still he was like a dead man, nor lifted his face.
“Surely all things pass. And though I go, in your heart I abide, and
nothing can sever us. Take comfort.”
But there was no answer.
“Nothing but Love’s own hand can slay Love. Therefore, remember me, and
I shall live.”
And he answered from the darkness of her bosom, “The whole world shall
remember. But when shall I be united to thee? O Allah, how long wilt
thou leave me to waste in this separation?”
And she: “Beloved, what is time? We sleep and the night is gone. Now put
your arms about me, for I sink into rest. What words are needed between
us? Love is enough.”
So, making not the Profession of Faith,--and what need, since all her
life was worship,--the Lady Arjemand turned into his arms like a child.
And the night deepened.
Morning, with its arrows of golden light that struck the river to
splendour! Morning, with its pure breath, its sunshine of joy, and the
koels fluting in the Palace gardens! Morning, divine and new from
the hand of the Maker! And in the innermost chamber of marble a white
silence; and the Lady, the Mirror of Goodness, lying in the Compassion
of Allah, and a broken man stretched on the ground beside her. For all
flesh, from the camel-driver to the Shah-in-Shah, is as one in the Day
of the Smiting.