_Fakredeen is Curious_
THE beautiful daughter of Besso, pensive and abstracted, played with her
beads in the pavilion of her grandfather. Two of her maidens, who had
attended her, in a corner of this inner compartment, accompanied the
wild murmur of their voices on a stringed instrument, which might in the
old days have been a psaltery. They sang the loves of Antar and of Ibla,
of Leila and of Mejnoun; the romance of the desert, tales of passion and
of plunder, of the rescue of women and the capture of camels, of heroes
with a lion heart, and heroines brighter and softer than the moon.
The beautiful daughter of Besso, pensive and abstracted, played with her
beads in the pavilion of her grandfather. Why is the beautiful daughter
of Besso pensive and abstracted? What thoughts are flitting over her
mind, silent and soft, like the shadows of birds over the sunshiny
earth?
Something that was neither silent nor soft disturbed the lady from
her reverie; the voice of the great Sheikh, in a tone of altitude and
harshness, with him most usual. He was in an adjacent apartment, vowing
that he would sooner eat the mother of some third person, who was
attempting to influence him, than adopt the suggestion offered. Then
there were softer and more persuasive tones from his companion, but
evidently ineffectual. Then the voices of both rose together in emulous
clamour--one roaring like a bull, the other shrieking like some wild
bird; one full of menace, and the other taunting and impertinent. All
this was followed by a dead silence, which continuing, Eva assumed that
the Sheikh and his companion had quitted his tent. While her mind was
recurring to those thoughts which occupied them previously to this
outbreak, the voice of Fakredeen was heard outside her tent, saying,
‘Rose of Sharon, let me come into the harem;’ and, scarcely waiting for
permission, the young Emir, flushed and excited, entered, and almost
breathless threw himself on the divan.
‘Who says I am a coward?’ he exclaimed, with a glance of devilish
mockery. ‘I may run away sometimes, but what of that? I have got moral
courage, the only thing worth having since the invention of gunpowder.
The beast is not killed, but I have looked into the den; ‘tis something.
Courage, my fragrant Rose, have faith in me at last. I may make an
imbroglio sometimes, but, for getting out of a scrape, I would back
myself against any picaroon in the Levant; and that is saying a good
deal.’
‘Another imbroglio?’
‘Oh, no! the same; part of the great blunder. You must have heard us
raging like a thousand Afrites. I never knew the great Sheikh so wild.’
‘And why?’
‘He should take a lesson from Mehemet Ali,’ continued the Emir. ‘Giving
up Syria, after the conquest, was a much greater sacrifice than giving
up plunder which he has not yet touched. And the great Pasha did it as
quietly as if he were marching into Stamboul instead, which he might
have done if he had been an Arab instead of a Turk. Everything comes
from Arabia, my dear Eva, at least everything that is worth anything. We
two ought to thank our stars every day that we were born Arabs.’
‘And the great Sheikh still harps upon this ransom?’ inquired Eva.
‘He does, and most unreasonably. For, after all, what do we ask him to
give up? a bagatelle.’
‘Hardly that,’ said Eva; ‘two millions of piastres can scarcely be
called a bagatelle.’
‘It is not two millions of piastres,’ said Fakre-deen; ‘there is your
fallacy, ‘tis the same as your grandfather’s. In the first place, he
would have taken one million; then half belonged to me, which reduces
his share to five hundred thousand; then I meant to have borrowed his
share of him.’
‘Borrowed his share!’ said Eva.
‘Of course I should have allowed him interest, good interest. What could
the great Sheikh want five hundred thousand piastres for? He has camels
enough; he has so many horses that he wants to change some with me for
arms at this moment. Is he to dig a hole in the sand by a well-side
to put his treasure in, like the treasure of Solomon; or to sew up
his bills of exchange in his turban? The thing is ridiculous, I never
contemplated, for a moment, that the great Sheikh should take any hard
piastres out of circulation, to lock them up in the wilderness. It might
disturb the currency of all Syria, upset the exchanges, and very much
injure your family, Eva, of whose interests I am never unmindful. I
meant the great Sheikh to invest his capital; he might have made a good
thing of it. I could have afforded to pay him thirty per cent, for his
share, and made as much by the transaction myself; for you see, as I am
paying sixty per cent, at Beiroot, Tripoli, Latakia, and every accursed
town of the coast at this moment. The thing is clear; and I wish you
would only get your father to view it in the same light, and we might do
immense things! Think of this, my Rose of Sharon, dear, dear Eva, think
of this; your father might make his fortune and mine too, if he would
only lend me money at thirty per cent.’
‘You frighten me always, Fakredeen, by these allusions to your affairs.
Can it be possible that they are so very bad!’
‘Good, Eva, you mean good. I should be incapable of anything, if it were
not for my debts. I am naturally so indolent, that if I did not remember
in the morning that I was ruined, I should never be able to distinguish
myself.’
‘You never will distinguish yourself,’ said Eva; ‘you never can, with
these dreadful embarrassments.’
‘Shall I not?’ said Fakredeen, triumphantly. ‘What are my debts to my
resources? That is the point. You cannot judge of a man by only knowing
what his debts are; you must be acquainted with his resources.’
‘But your estates are mortgaged, your crops sold, at least you tell me
so,’ said Eva, mournfully.
‘Estates! crops! A man may have an idea worth twenty estates, a
principle of action that will bring him in a greater harvest than all
Lebanon.’
‘A principle of action is indeed precious,’ said Eva; ‘but although you
certainly have ideas, and very ingenious ones, a principle of action is
exactly the thing which I have always thought you wanted.’
‘Well, I have got it at last,’ said Fakredeen; ‘everything comes if a
man will only wait.’
‘And what is your principle of action?’
‘Faith.’
‘In yourself? Surely in that respect you have not hitherto been
sceptical?’
‘No; in Mount Sinai.’
‘In Mount Sinai!’
‘You may well be astonished; but so it is. The English prince has been
to Mount Sinai, and he has seen an angel. What passed between them I
do not yet know; but one thing is certain, he is quite changed by the
interview. He is all for action: so far as I can form an opinion in the
present crude state of affairs, it is not at all impossible that he may
put himself at the head of the Asian movement. If you have faith, there
is nothing you may not do. One thing is quite settled, that he will
not at present return to Jerusalem, but, for change of air and other
reasons, make a visit with me to Canobia.’
‘He seems to have great purpose in him,’ said Eva, with an air of some
constraint.
‘By-the-bye,’ said Fakredeen, ‘how came you, Eva, never to tell me that
you were acquainted with him?’
‘Acquainted with him?’ said Eva.
‘Yes; he recognised you immediately when he recovered himself, and he
has admitted to me since that he has seen you before, though I could not
get much out of him about it. He will talk for ever about Arabia, faith,
war, and angels; but, if you touch on anything personal, I observe he
is always very shy. He has not my fatal frankness. Did you know him at
Jerusalem?’
‘I met him by hazard for a moment at Bethany. I neither asked then,
nor did he impart to me, his name. How then could I tell you we were
acquainted? or be aware that the stranger of my casual interview was
this young Englishman whom you have made a captive?’
‘Hush!’ said Fakredeen, with an air of real or affected alarm. ‘He
is going to be my guest at my principal castle. What do you mean by
captive? You mean whom I have saved from captivity, or am about to save?
‘Well, that would appear to be the real question to which you ought
to address yourself at this moment,’ said Eva. ‘Were I you, I should
postpone the great Asian movement until you had disembarrassed yourself
from your present position, rather an equivocal one both for a patriot
and a friend.’
‘Oh! I’ll manage the great Sheikh,’ said Fakredeen, carelessly. ‘There
is too much plunder in the future for Amalek to quarrel with me. When
he scents the possibility of the Bedouin cavalry being poured into Syria
and Asia Minor, we shall find him more manageable. The only thing now
is to heal the present disappointment by extenuating circumstances. If
I could screw up a few thousand piastres for backsheesh,’ and he looked
Eva in the face, ‘or could put anything in his way! What do you think,
Eva?’
Eva shook her head.
‘What an obstinate Jew dog he is!’ said Fakre-deen. ‘His rapacity is
revolting!’
‘An obstinate Jew dog!’ exclaimed Eva, rising, her eyes flashing, her
nostrils dilating with contemptuous rage. The manner of Fakredeen had
not pleased her this morning. His temper, was very uncertain, and, when
crossed, he was deficient in delicacy. Indeed, he was too selfish,
with all his sensibility and refined breeding, to be ever sufficiently
considerate of the feelings of others. He was piqued also that he had
not been informed of the previous acquaintance of Eva and Tancred. Her
reason for not apprising him of their interview at Bethany, though not
easily impugnable, was not as satisfactory to his understanding as to
his ear. Again, his mind and heart were so absorbed at this moment by
the image of Tancred, and he was so entirely under the influence of his
own idealised conceptions of his new and latest friend, that, according
to his custom, no other being could interest him. Although he was
himself the sole cause of all the difficult and annoying circumstances
in which he found himself involved, the moment that his passions and his
interests alike required that Tancred should be free and uninjured,
he acted, and indeed felt, as if Amalek alone were responsible for the
capture and the detention of Lord Montacute.
The young Emir indeed was, at this moment, in one of those moods which
had often marred his popularity, but in which he had never indulged
towards Eva before. She had, throughout his life, been the commanding
influence of his being. He adored and feared her, and knew that she
loved, and rather despised him. But Eva had ceased to be the commanding
influence over Fakredeen. At this moment Fakredeen would have sacrificed
the whole family of Besso to secure the devotion of Tancred; and the
coarse and rude exclamation to which he had given vent, indicated the
current of his feelings and the general tenor of his mind.
Eva knew him by heart. Her clear sagacious intellect, acting upon an
individual whom sympathy and circumstances had combined to make her
comprehend, analysed with marvellous facility his complicated motives,
and in general successfully penetrated his sovereign design.
‘An obstinate Jew dog!’ she exclaimed; ‘and who art thou, thou jackal of
this lion! who should dare to speak thus? Is it not enough that you have
involved us all in unspeakable difficulty and possible disgrace, that we
are to receive words of contumely from lips like yours? One would think
that you were the English Consul arrived here to make a representation
in favour of his countryman, instead of being the individual who planned
his plunder, occasioned his captivity, and endangered his life! It is
a pity that this young noble is not acquainted with your claims to his
confidence.’
The possibility that in a moment of irritation Eva might reveal his
secret, some rising remorse at what he had said, and the superstitious
reverence with which he still clung to her, all acting upon Fakredeen at
the same time, he felt that he had gone too far, and thereupon he sprang
from the divan, on which he had been insolently lolling, and threw
himself at the feet of his foster-sister, whimpering and kissing her
slippers, and calling her, between his sobs, a thousand fond names.
‘I am a villain,’ he said, ‘but you know it; you have always known it.
For God’s sake, stand by me now; ‘tis my only chance. You are the only
being I love in the world, except your family. You know how I respect
them. Is not Besso my father? And the great Sheikh, I honour the great
Sheikh. He is one of my allies. Even this accursed business proves it.
Besides, what do you mean, by words of contumely from my lips? Am I not
a Jew myself, or as good? Why should I insult them? I only wish we were
in the Land’ of Promise, instead of this infernal wilderness.’
‘Well, well, let us consult together,’ said Eva, ‘reproaches are
barren.’
‘Ah! Eva,’ said Fakredeen, ‘I am not reproaching you; but if, the
evening I was at Bethany, you had only told me that you had just parted
with this Englishman, all this would not have occurred.’
‘How do you know that I had then just parted with this Englishman?’ said
Eva, colouring and confused.
‘Because I marked him on the road. I little thought then that he had
been in your retreat. I took him for some Frank, looking after the tomb
of Lazarus.’
‘I found him in my garden,’ said Eva, not entirely at her ease, ‘and
sent my attendants to him.’
Fakredeen was walking up and down the tent, and seemed lost in thought.
Suddenly he stopped and said, ‘I see it all; I have a combination that
will put all right.’
‘Put all right?’
‘See, the day after to-morrow I have appointed to meet a friend of mine
at Gaza, who has a caravan that wants convoy through the desert to the
mountain. The Sheikh of Sheikhs shall have it. It will be as good as ten
thousand piastres. That will be honey in his mouth. He will forget the
past, and our English friend can return with you and me to El Khuds.’
‘I shall not return to El Khuds,’ said Eva. ‘The great Sheikh will
convoy me to Damascus, where I shall remain till I go to Aleppo.’
‘May you never reach Aleppo!’ said Fakredeen, with a clouded
countenance, for Eva in fact alluded to her approaching marriage with
her cousin.
‘But after all,’ resumed Eva, wishing to change the current of his
thoughts, ‘all these arrangements, so far as I am interested, depend
upon the success of my mission to the great Sheikh. If he will not
release my father’s charge, the spears of his people will never guard
me again. And I see little prospect of my success; nor do I think ten
thousand piastres, however honestly gained, will be more tempting than
the inclination to oblige our house.’
‘Ten thousand piastres is not much,’ said Fakredeen. ‘I give it every
three months for interest to a little Copt at Beiroot, whose property
I will confiscate the moment I have the government of the country in my
hands. But then I only add my ten thousand piastres to the amount of my
debt. Ten thousand piastres in coin are a very different affair. They
will jingle in the great Sheikh’s purse. His people will think he has
got the treasure of Solomon. It will do; he will give them all a gold
kaireen apiece, and they will braid them in their girls’ hair.’
‘It will scarcely buy camels for Sheikh Salem’s widow,’ said Eva.
‘I will manage that,’ said Fakredeen. ‘The great Sheikh has camels
enough, and I will give him arms in exchange.’
‘Arms at Canobia will not reach the stony wilderness.’
‘No; but I have got arms nearer at hand; that is, my friend, my friend
whom I am going to meet at Gaza, has some; enough, and to spare. By the
Holy Sepulchre, I see it!’ said Fakredeen. ‘I tell you how I will manage
the whole business. The great Sheikh wants arms; well, I will give
him five hundred muskets for the ransom, and he shall have the convoy
besides. He’ll take it. I know him. He thinks now all is lost, and, when
he finds that he is to have a jingling purse and English muskets enough
to conquer Tadmor, he will close.’
‘But how are we to get these arms?’ said Eva.
‘Why, Scheriff Effendi, to be sure. You know I am to meet him at Gaza
the day after to-morrow, and receive his five thousand muskets. Well,
five hundred for the great Sheikh will make them four thousand five
hundred; no great difference.’
‘Scheriff Effendi!’ said Eva, with some surprise. ‘I thought I had
obtained three months’ indulgence for you with Scheriff Effendi.’
‘Ah! yes--no,’ said Fakredeen, blushing. ‘The fact is, Eva, darling,
beloved Eva, it is no use telling any more lies. I only asked you to
speak to Scheriff Effendi to obtain time for me about payment to throw
you off the scent, as you so strongly disapproved of my buccaneering
project. But Scheriff Effendi is a camel. I was obliged to agree to meet
him at Gaza on the new moon, pay him his two hundred thousand piastres,
and receive the cargo. Well, I turn circumstances to account. The great
Sheikh will convey the muskets to the mountains.’
‘But who is to pay for them?’ inquired Eva.
‘Why, if men want to head the Asian movement, they must have muskets,’
said Fakredeen; ‘and, after all, as we are going to save the English
prince two millions of piastres, I do not think he can object to paying
Scheriff Effendi for his goods; particularly as he will have the muskets
for his money.’