"Nay,--the Sun belongs to us," said the king calmly as he glanced to
where Yonder Kingdom blushed above the sea. She glanced, too, and a
softness crept into her eyes.
"No, no," she murmured as with hesitating pause she raised her eyes
above the sea, above the hill, up into the sky where the sun hung silent
and splendid. Its robes were heaven's blue, lined and broidered in
living flame, and its crown was one vast jewel, glistening in glittering
glory that made the sun's own face a blackness,--the blackness of utter
light. With blinded, tear-filled eyes she peered into that formless
black and burning face and sensed in its soft, sad gleam unfathomed
understanding. With sudden, wild abandon she stretched her arms toward
it appealing, beseeching, entreating, and lo!
"Niggers and dagoes," said the king of Yonder Kingdom, glancing
carelessly backward and lighting in his lips a carefully rolled wisp of
fragrant tobacco. She looked back, too, but in half-wondering terror,
for it seemed--
A beggar man was creeping across the swamp, shuffling through the dirt
and slime. He was little and bald and black, rough-clothed, sodden with
dirt, and bent with toil. Yet withal something she sensed about him and
it seemed,--
The king of Yonder Kingdom lounged more comfortably beside the silver
throne and let curl a tiny trail of light-blue smoke.
"I hate beggars," he said, "especially brown and black ones." And he
then pointed at the beggar's retinue and laughed,--an unpleasant laugh,
welded of contempt and amusement. The princess looked and shrank on her
throne. He, the beggar man, was--was what? But his retinue,--that
squalid, sordid, parti-colored band of vacant, dull-faced filth and
viciousness--was writhing over the land, and he and they seemed almost
crouching underneath the scorpion lash of one tall skeleton, that looked
like Death, and the twisted woman whom men called Pain. Yet they all
walked as one.
The King of Yonder Kingdom laughed, but the princess shrank on her
throne, and the king on seeing her thus took a gold-piece from out of
his purse and tossed it carelessly to the passing throng. She watched it
with fascinated eyes,--how it rose and sailed and whirled and struggled
in the air, then seemed to burst, and upward flew its light and sheen
and downward dropped its dross. She glanced at the king, but he was
lighting a match. She watched the dross wallow in the slime, but the
sunlight fell on the back of the beggar's neck, and he turned his head.
The beggar passing afar turned his head and the princess straightened
on her throne; he turned his head and she shivered forward on her
silver seat; he looked upon her full and slow and suddenly she saw
within that formless black and burning face the same soft, glad gleam of
utter understanding, seen so many times before. She saw the suffering of
endless years and endless love that softened it. She saw the burning
passion of the sun and with it the cold, unbending duty-deeds of upper
air. All she had seen and dreamed of seeing in the rising, blazing sun
she saw now again and with it myriads more of human tenderness, of
longing, and of love. So, then, she knew. She rose as to a dream come
true, with solemn face and waiting eyes.
With her rose the king of Yonder Kingdom, almost eagerly.
"You'll come?" he cried. "You'll come and see my gold?" And then in
sudden generosity, he added: "You'll have a golden throne,-up there-when
we marry."