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But first he determined, as I learned, to make one more attempt and to demand the hand of Nyleptha in the open Court after the formal annual ceremony of the signing of the laws that had been proclaimed by the Queens during the year.
Of this astounding fact Nyleptha heard with simulated nonchalance, and with a little trembling of the voice herself informed us of it as we sat at supper on the night preceding the great ceremony of the law-giving.
Sir Henry bit his lip, and do what he could to prevent it plainly showed his agitation.
“And what answer will the Queen be pleased to give to the great Lord?” asked I, in a jesting manner.
“Answer, Macumazahn” (for we had elected to pass by our Zulu names in Zu-Vendis), she said, with a pretty shrug of her ivory shoulder. “Nay, I know not; what is a poor woman to do, when the wooer has thirty thousand swords wherewith to urge his love?” And from under her long lashes she glanced at Curtis.
Just then we rose from the table to adjourn into another room. “Quatermain, a word, quick,” said Sir Henry to me. “Listen. I have never spoken about it, but surely you have guessed: I love Nyleptha. What am I to do?”
Fortunately, I had more or less already taken the question into consideration, and was therefore able to give such answer as seemed the wisest to me.
“You must speak to Nyleptha tonight,” I said. “Now is your time, now or never. Listen. In the sitting-chamber get near to her, and whisper to her to meet you at midnight by the Rademas statue at the end of the great hall. I will keep watch for you there. Now or never, Curtis.”
We passed on into the other room. Nyleptha was sitting, her hands before her, and a sad anxious look upon her lovely face. A little way off was Sorais talking to Good in her slow measured tones.
The time went on; in another quarter of an hour I knew that, according to their habit, the Queens would retire. As yet, Sir Henry had had no chance of saying a word in private: indeed, though we saw much of the royal sisters, it was by no means easy to see them alone. I racked my brains, and at last an idea came to me.
“Will the Queen be pleased,” I said, bowing low before Sorais, “to sing to her servants? Our hearts are heavy this night; sing to us, oh Lady of the Night” (Sorais’ favourite name among the people).
“My songs, Macumazahn, are not such as to lighten the heavy heart, yet will I sing if it pleases thee,” she answered; and she rose and went a few paces to a table whereon lay an instrument not unlike a zither, and struck a few wandering chords.
Then suddenly, like the notes of some deep-throated bird, her rounded voice rang out in song so wildly sweet, and yet with so eerie and sad a refrain, that it made the very blood stand still. Up, up soared the golden notes, that seemed to melt far away, and then to grow again and travel on, laden with all the sorrow of the world and all the despair of the lost. It was a marvellous song, but I had not time to listen to it properly. However, I got the words of it afterwards, and here is a translation of its burden, so far as it admits of being translated at all.
SORAIS’ SONG
As a desolate bird that through darkness its lost way is winging,
As a hand that is helplessly raised when Death’s sickle is swinging,
So is life! ay, the life that lends passion and breath to my singing.
As the nightingale’s song that is full of a sweetness unspoken,
As a spirit unbarring the gates of the skies for a token,
So is love! ay, the love that shall fall when his pinion is broken.
As the tramp of the legions when trumpets their challenge are sending,
As the shout of the Storm-god when lightnings the black sky are rending,
So is power! ay, the power that shall lie in the dust at its ending.
So short is our life; yet with space for all things to forsake us,
A bitter delusion, a dream from which nought can awake us,
Till Death’s dogging footsteps at morn or at eve shall o’ertake us.
Refrain
Oh, the world is fair at the dawning—dawning—dawning,
But the red sun sinks in blood—the red sun sinks in blood.
I only wish that I could write down the music too.
“Now, Curtis, now,” I whispered, when she began the second verse, and turned my back.
“Nyleptha,” he said—for my nerves were so much on the stretch that I could hear every word, low as it was spoken, even through Sorais’ divine notes—“Nyleptha, I must speak with thee this night, upon my life I must. Say me not nay; oh, say me not nay!”
“How can I speak with thee?” she answered, looking fixedly before her; “Queens are not like other people. I am surrounded and watched.”
“Listen, Nyleptha, thus. I will be before the statue of Rademas in the great hall at midnight. I have the countersign and can pass in. Macumazahn will be there to keep guard, and with him the Zulu. Oh come, my Queen, deny me not.”
“It is not seemly,” she murmured, “and tomorrow—”
Just then the music began to die in the last wail of the refrain, and Sorais slowly turned her round.
“I will be there,” said Nyleptha, hurriedly; “on thy life see that thou fail me not.”
BEFORE THE STATUE
It was night—dead night—and the silence lay on the Frowning City like a cloud.
Secretly, as evildoers, Sir Henry Curtis, Umslopogaas, and myself threaded our way through the passages towards a by-entrance to the great Throne Chamber. Once we were met by the fierce rattling challenge of the sentry. I gave the countersign, and the man grounded his spear and let us pass. Also we were officers of the Queens’ bodyguard, and in that capacity had a right to come and go unquestioned.
We gained the hall in safety. So empty and so still was it, that even when we had passed the sound of our footsteps yet echoed up the lofty walls, vibrating faintly and still more faintly against the carven roof, like ghosts of the footsteps of dead men haunting the place that once they trod.
It was an eerie spot, and it oppressed me. The moon was full, and threw great pencils and patches of light through the high windowless openings in the walls, that lay pure and beautiful upon the blackness of the marble floor, like white flowers on a coffin. One of these silver arrows fell upon the statue of the sleeping Rademas, and of the angel form bent over him, illumining it, and a small circle round it, with a soft clear light, reminding me of that with which Catholics illumine the altars of their cathedrals.
Here by the statue we took our stand, and waited. Sir Henry and I close together, Umslopogaas some paces off in the darkness, so that I could only just make out his towering outline leaning on the outline of an axe.
So long did we wait that I almost fell asleep resting against the cold marble, but was suddenly aroused by hearing Curtis give a quick catching breath. Then from far away there came a little sound as though the statues that lined the walls were whispering to each other some message of the ages.
It was the faint sweep of a lady’s dress. Nearer it grew, and nearer yet. We could see a figure steal from patch to patch of moonlight, and even hear the soft fall of sandalled feet. Another second and I saw the black silhouette of the old Zulu raise its arm in mute salute, and Nyleptha was before us.
Oh, how beautiful she looked as she paused a moment just within the circle of the moonlight! Her hand was pressed upon her heart, and her white bosom heaved beneath it. Round her head a broidered scarf was loosely thrown, partially shadowing the perfect face, and thus rendering it even more lovely; for beauty, dependent as it is to a certain extent upon the imagination, is never so beautiful as when it is half hid. There she stood radiant but half doubting, stately and yet so sweet. It was but a moment, but I then and there fell in love with her myself, and have remained so to this hour; for, indeed, she looked more like an angel out of heaven than a loving, passionate, mortal woman. Low we bowed before her, and then she spoke.
“I have come,” she whispered, “but it was at great risk. Ye know not how I am watched. The priests watch me. Sorais watches me with those great eyes of hers. My very guards are spies upon me. Nasta watches me too. Oh, let him be careful!” and she stamped her foot. “Let him be careful; I am a woman, and therefore hard to drive. Ay, and I am a Queen, too, and can still avenge. Let him be careful, I say, lest in place of giving him my hand I take his head,” and she ended the outburst with a little sob, and then smiled up at us bewitchingly and laughed.
“Thou didst bid me come hither, my Lord Incubu” (Curtis had taught her to call him so). “Doubtless it is about business of the State, for I know that thou art ever full of great ideas and plans for my welfare and my people’s. So even as a Queen should I have come, though I greatly fear the dark alone,” and again she laughed and gave him a glance from her grey eyes.
At this point I thought it wise to move a little, since secrets “of the State” should not be made public property; but she would not let me go far, peremptorily stopping me within five yards or so, saying that she feared surprise. So it came to pass that, however unwillingly, I heard all that passed.
“Thou knowest, Nyleptha,” said Sir Henry, “that it was for none of these things that I asked thee to meet me at this lonely place. Nyleptha, waste not the time in pleasantry, but listen to me, for—I love thee.”
As he said the words I saw her face break up, as it were, and change. The coquetry went out of it, and in its place there shone a great light of love which seemed to glorify it, and make it like that of the marble angel overhead. I could not help thinking that it must have been a touch of prophetic instinct which made the long dead Rademas limn, in the features of the angel of his inspiring vision, so strange a likeness of his own descendant. Sir Henry, also, must have observed and been struck by the likeness, for, catching the look upon Nyleptha’s face, he glanced quickly from it to the moonlit statue, and then back again at his beloved.
“Thou sayest thou dost love me,” she said in a low voice, “and thy voice rings true, but how am I to know that thou dost speak the truth?”
“Though,” she went on with proud humility, and in the stately third person which is so largely used by the Zu-Vendi, “I be as nothing in the eyes of my lord,” and she curtseyed towards him, “who comes from among a wonderful people, to whom my people are but children, yet here am I a queen and
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