Part 24 (1/2)
”As I was thine of old!” he answered with crafty wistfulness ”Wilt thou not put to sea with us to-morrow, O Asad? There is none like thee in all Islam, and what a joy were it not to stand beside thee on the prow as of old e grapple with the Spaniard”
Asad considered hie this?” quoth he
”Have others urged it?” The s, were cutting deeply and swiftly into this ed it more fervently than I, for none knows so well as I the joy of battle against the infidel under thy coht Come, then, my lord, upon this enterprise, and be thyself thine own son's preceptor since 'tis the highest honour thou canst bestow upon hi white beard, his eagle eyes growing narrow ”Thou temptest me, by Allah!”
”Let me do more”
”Nay, more thou canst not I am old and worn, and I aazelle? Peace, peace! The sun has set upon hters I have raised up keep that which lory of the Faith upon the seas” He leaned upon Sakr-el-Bahr's shoulder and sighed, his eyes wistfully dreaood truth But noI a hiain”
”I should not return myself else,” was the answer ”But ”
Upon that he departed, dissee and the coaleasse, equipping it with carronades, three hundred slaves to row it, and three hundred fighting men
Asad-el-Din returned to that darkened roo the courtyard, where Fenzileh and Marzak still lingered He went to tell theo forth to prove himself upon this expedition
But where he had left impatience he found thinly veiled wrath
”O sun that war experience he knew that thewere her epithets the ht with thee, are they but as the dust upon thy shoes?”
”Less,” said Asad, provoked out of his habitual indulgence of her licences of speech
”That is the truth, indeed!” she cried, bowing her head, whilst behind her the handsoreed ”At dawn, Marzak, thou settest forth upon the galeasse of Sakr-el-Bahr to take the seas under his tutelage and to emulate the skill and valour that have rendered him the stoutest bulwark of Islam, the very javelin of Allah”
But Marzak felt that in this matter his mother was to be supported, whilst his detestation of this adventurer who threatened to usurp the place that should rightly be his own spurred hi
”When I take the seas with that dog-descended Nasrani,” he answered hoarsely, ”he shall be where rightly he belongs--at the rowers' bench”
”How?” It was a bellow of rage Upon the word Asad swung to confront his son, and his face, suddenly inflamed, was so cruel and evil in its expression that it terrified that intriguing pair ”By the beard of the Prophet! ords are these to me?” He advanced upon Marzak until Fenzileh in sudden terror stepped between and faced hi to defend her cub But the Basha, enraged now by this want of subainst that son and the ht her in his sinewy old hands, and flung her furiously aside, so that she stu heap amid the cushi+ons of her divan
”The curse of Allah upon thee!” he screamed, and Marzak recoiled before hiht thee to stand before my face, to tell me what thou wilt and wilt not do? By the Koran!
too long have I endured her evil foreign ways, and now it seeht thee how to tread them after her and how to beard thy very father! To-morrow thou'lt take the sea with Sakr-el-Bahr, I have said it Another word and thou'lt go aboard his galeasse even as thou saidst should be the case with him--at the rowers' bench, to learn submission under the slave master's whip”
Terrified, Marzak stood nu to draw breath
Never in all his life had he seen his father in a rage so royal Yet it seeenital shrehose tongue not even the threat of rods or hooks could silence
”I shall pray Allah to restore sight to thy soul, O father of Marzak,”
she panted, ”to teach thee to discriminate between those that love thee and the self-seekers that abuse thy trust”
”How!” he roared at her ”Art not yet done?”
”Nor ever shall be until I areat love, O light of these poor eyes of mine”
”Maintain this tone,” he said, with concentrated anger, ”and that will soon befall”