"Brother, what meanest thou?" the host asked. "I am faithful, as thou must know. No man in this great city has been more faithful than I and I hate the infidel with the hatred of the Prophet!" At the word "hate," Ben Emeal's strong hand had dropped to the sword hilt at his side.

The old man again brought his face close to the other's and the words came whistling from his toothless mouth. "Yes, thou, oh, Ben Emeal, art faithful, but watch thou thy household! Watch thou thy household! Watch! I shall be at the crossing of the Sidar Ways; for three days only I shall be there. Watch and come to me for help. I have delivered my message; now I go!"

As the last words fell from his lips and he turned towards the courtyard, all the proud fearlessness left his face; the expression as of one doomed returned; and with his hands raised above his head, the old man staggered from the court, crying, "Night is coming! The wildness of desolation is upon us! Oh, Allah, Allah, hear the cry of the faithful!"

The younger man, left alone, sank upon the cushions of the guest room and seemed lost in thought. What meant this strange warning?

His women were faithful, Ben Emeal knew, for they had not the brains nor the courage nor, indeed, the opportunity to listen to the preaching of any faith but that of their master and lord. His servants--they really mattered not to him--but he knew that they were faithful, too, as he had but recently taken them to account on the subject as a true follower of the Prophet should. His children----? They were too young, all--but---- He did not even repeat the name to himself, for from the first word of accusation his mind had guessed the one involved, but his heart had st.u.r.dily driven his mind to seek in every other direction before it should turn to the one being in all the world whom Ben Emeal loved, but no less the one being in all his household who, he knew, would dare to question or oppose the established order of things. This was a serious charge and no one realized the seriousness of it, coming from one of the wise men of the Faith, more than did Ben Emeal; yet his love for his only son and his confidence in his own ability to deal with such a subject in connection with that son, led him to have little anxiety, in spite of the warning.

It was not possible that Ahmed could have met the infidel! Where could he even have heard of anything different from the doctrine of his father's Faith? It was absurd! Of late Ben Emeal had noticed a tendency in his son to question him upon subjects of life and religion; and, too, he had seen the boy several times sitting quiet as if in deep thought, an unusual att.i.tude for a healthy, hearty youth; but he had supposed these things only the pa.s.sing freaks of young manhood. For some time past Ahmed had sought to avoid marriage and he had never seemed to care for the pleasures of the harem; these things, too, were unusual, but Ben Emeal recognized in his idolized son the beginnings of an unusual man and was proud of him accordingly.

A merry voice just beyond the purdah suddenly interrupted the father's thoughts and the curtain was lifted to admit a young man about eighteen years of age, of striking build and comeliness. With a gay and winning greeting the young fellow dropped upon the cushions beside the older man and soon Ben Emeal had forgotten his doubts in a lively discussion of the approaching durbar and the ceremonies attendant upon that function.

But, after a pleasant hour together, just as they were about to separate for a brief siesta, Ahmed turned to his father with a slight frown and said:

"Just before I came in this afternoon I met out here in the street before our house the strangest old man! He wore that dress that you call Arabian, I think, and he had on the green of our Prophet's kin, but he was staggering along the street muttering, 'The night is coming! Desolation is coming upon us!' or something like that. I went up to him to see if I could help him, and, also, to see if a kin of our Prophet could really have been drinking of the accursed cup; but I found no signs of intoxication about him, only signs of intense fear as he cowered against the wall, repeating his cry of desolation. Adjed, the silversmith, came up just then and took him in charge or I should have found out more about him. Strange, wasn't it? It really gave me an uncanny feeling as if it were a premonition of some danger," and the young man shook himself as if to shake off a lingering feeling of fear.

Ben Emeal's face, as his son spoke, resumed the troubled expression which had been driven away by Ahmed's former lively conversation and he said to the lad very solemnly as they both rose and he put a hand on the youth's shoulder:

"My son, you never forget, do you, that first of all in this world you are a follower of the true Prophet and that your first business in life is to convert or destroy the infidel?"

The son did not reply except with another question. "Father, can I not go to the university at Aligarh to learn more of our Faith?"

"I will see; I will see, my son," replied the father genially and his face cleared as if the question had put his fears at rest.

"I will see, my son," he said again as he turned to the door leading to his own apartment where he would take a few pulls at the hookah before he should give himself up to his afternoon rest.

Ahmed went to his mother's chamber where with his head upon her knee, her proud eyes gazing down upon the handsome face of her son, the dearest possession of an Indian woman's life, and her loving fingers smoothing his rich, dark hair back from his brow, he fell very soon into the refreshing sleep of youth.

When Ahmed awoke from his restful sleep, he found his mother still supporting his head and still gazing fondly down into his face. For a few moments he lay, returning her smiles. Suddenly his face clouded.

"Mother, why is it that you can never leave this house, this walled-in courtyard; why is it that you cannot ride out with me in the open and look upon the trees and the gra.s.s and the blue sky? It does not seem right that I should be allowed to look upon all these things and you not."

"Hush, my son!" answered his mother. "It is the law of the Prophet.

What he commands must be right. But, see, there is the blue sky, and here are my green tree and my gra.s.s and sometimes I even may ride out in an ekka and peep through the curtains, and once, my son, many years ago, I rode on a railway train and saw through the shutters miles and miles of green gra.s.s and flowers and so many, many beautiful things that I shall always be happy because of that sight."

Ahmed looked from the beautiful but sad face of his mother up at the patch of sky bounded by the four gray, brick walls; he looked at the lone, gray-green tree trying to grow in a foot or two of garden in the middle of the paved courtyard, and at the gra.s.s, already giving up its struggle for life, about its roots, and his heart ached for this lonely woman. For he knew that although she was his father's only wife at present, because she had borne him, Ahmed, to Ben Emeal, he knew that she saw little of his father, for there were many concubines in the home who not only usurped her place in her husband's life but who, also, in many, many ways made her life far from happy in the home. He knew that really he himself was her only joy and comfort and he rebelled. Ahmed had been taught that a woman has no soul. Did he doubt the words of his teachers as he gazed into his mother's eyes?

"Mother, why are you called 'Ahmed's mother' instead of your own name when the people of the household speak to you? Why are you so 'blest in' me as they say?"

"Because, my son--surely you must know by this time that a woman is no better than a beast; 'a cow' the Prophet calls her; and that she can only enjoy life through the son that she bears. Ah, how rich I am in you! But suppose you had not come to me, Ahmed, my son!" and her face became drawn with the thought. "Suppose I had been as my sister who has no son!"

The youth could not bear to add to his mother's unhappiness by having her dwell upon such thoughts and so he playfully pulled down her face and kissed her and teased her to show him the wedding garments which she was embroidering for him.

"When is it to be?" he asked.

"After the month of fasting, my son."

"Is she beautiful?"

"I know not, my son. But surely she must be for such a handsome man as thou art."

"Dost thou want me to have a wife, mother?"

The mother's face was crossed with a spasm of pain at the question, for when his wedding came, she felt that she would have lost her son, her only joy in life. She knew that she had such a son as few mothers in all India and she knew that their loving relationship and companionship was very unusual. But he must marry and as a woman she must not show grief; in fact, being a woman, she had no grief. So she mastered her pain in a second and replied, but not so quickly that it deceived Ahmed:

"Yes, my son, as every true follower of the Prophet must, so must thou marry and beget sons. But thou canst still love thy mother a little," she added shyly.

"That I will," affirmed the son blithely. "But," he went on crossly, "I don't want to marry and be bothered with a wife. Mother, I'll tell you what I really want to do. I want to go to our university at Aligarh where I can learn all about our Faith and about everything else, mother. I want to be a great man."

"Not a great man, my son, but a great follower of the Prophet! Why, the sky has clouded and there comes some rain!"

"Oh, ho! I must get me up and away, for I promised a friend I would come and read with him for a time."

"Is it The Book, my son?"

"No, mother, it is something new which some one gave him one time on the train. We have been reading it together for months now. It is very beautiful, all about Jesus who is coming at the end of the world, you know."

"Yes, I know, my son, for I have read The Book----"

"It is strange, mother, that you can read, for Elid's mother cannot, nor can any woman in Ajar's household, he says, nor can any other woman in this," interrupted the son. "And besides, mother, the other young men I know never seem to spend any time with their mothers at all or talk to them or even love them, it seems to me."

"Yes, my son, it is strange, for ours is not the ordinary life, nor has my lot been the ordinary lot of woman here. My father taught me to read when I was a little child, for he became blind and then I could read to him, for I was quicker and more willing to do it than the boys. My father was a great scholar and I know The Book by heart, but little joy has come to me since my marriage for my knowledge," she sighed. "Your father respects me no more than he does his latest concubine. I have respect here only because of you, my son," and her eyes feasted upon his fair countenance. "Go now, my son, to thy friend, but beware of new things, for what is new often offends the Faith." With these words she left Ahmed as he lifted the purdah, having followed him as far as her woman's feet were permitted to go.

But Ahmed trod on through the narrow streets, although the rain was pouring, for he did not want to miss the reading which was giving him such a different outlook upon life. Why, really, it was a "blasphemous thought," but this new book seemed to him to be greater than the Koran. It had given him such a new vision. Never had he thought much about his mother's life and position before reading this book, but now his mind was quickened to understand her condition. This book said, "Honour thy father and thy mother," and it did not seem to exclude woman from any joys, even those of Paradise. He was so eager to know more, especially since the conversation with his mother that afternoon, that he wondered if his friend would let him take the book home with him to study by himself.

As Ahmed went on in the rain his thoughts turned from the new book to a man whom he had met several times the past year outside the walls of Hyderabad on the big bridge. The man's peculiar bearing of kindness towards any one in trouble and his happy face had attracted the youth. They had talked together once or twice and the man whom Ahmed supposed to be a Hindu had told him that he was a Hindu no longer, but a follower of the "Jesus Doctrine." The boy had wondered what it could mean, for never had he been so drawn to a stranger as he had to that man whose whole thought had seemed to be how he could help some one else. One day Ahmed saw this man actually help a woman place her water jar on her head and a moment later get down in the dust of the road and help a coolie pile up again a ma.s.s of fuel dung-cakes which had been knocked over by a pa.s.sing cart; and yet this man was a scholar, as Ahmed knew by his conversation, and no outcast. The boy wondered as he thought it over now if the new book which he had been reading could have any connection with what this man had called the "Jesus Doctrine." The more he thought about it the more it seemed to him that that man's actions had been the carrying out of the precepts of the new book.

Ahmed had not paid much heed to his steps as he had splashed along in the rain, trying as far as possible to keep under the protection of the buildings from the rain which seemed to be coming in torrents from the south. He was wrapped in his thoughts.

But suddenly his steps were stayed, for he heard a weird, awful cry, and in a corner of the porch of the house that he was pa.s.sing he saw a figure on its knees in prayer. The att.i.tude was conventional and in no way terrifying, but the words and voice had startled him.

"Night is coming! The wildness of desolation will soon be upon us!

Oh, Allah, Allah, hear the cry of the faithful!"

The voice was that of one whose soul was in mortal agony, and as Ahmed stooped to look more closely, he recognized the old man whose voice he had heard a few hours before in front of his own door. He recognized, too, that the place where he was standing was the crossing of the Sidar Ways, a place a long distance from the road he had thought he was taking.

He wondered what could have alarmed the old man, but, really frightened at the repet.i.tion of the awful words and the tone of the agonized voice, the young fellow did not go to the man's side, but hastened to find a return way to his friend's, whose home he had missed in the rain and the preoccupation of his thoughts. As he turned, for the first time he noticed that another man was standing close behind him. In the semi-darkness, he did not recognize him, but gave him the greeting of the Faith and hurried on. As he reached his friend's door, it gave the boy a queer, uncomfortable feeling to perceive that this same man was still behind him.

An hour or so later Ahmed emerged from the house with the precious book concealed in his clothing, for his friend had warned him that he feared that a good Mohammedan would not read it and that he believed that it was the book of another faith. As such his friend had decided that he would read it no more. But Ahmed had said that it mattered not to him what faith it was, he thought it beautiful and he wanted to read it still more. So instead of permitting his friend to burn it as he had wanted to do, Ahmed had insisted upon taking it to his home for further study.

He did not notice as he left Elid's house that a man slipped out from the shadows and followed him to his own door. Nor did he know that this man turned as soon as he had entered the house and made haste back to the crossing of the Sidar Ways where he aroused the strange old man from his paroxysm of fear and talked earnestly with him for some time.

Within his mother's room by the light of the oil lamp Ahmed read and read, while his mother watched him and sewed on the wedding garments. Too engrossed to read aloud or even talk about what he was reading, he read on and on. Long after his mother had given up her vain efforts to get him to go to rest and had rolled herself in her blanket, he still bent over the book. He read until sleep finally blurred his mind and closed his eyes and the lamp burned out at his side.

But Ahmed had noticed before he slept a name on the first page of the book, "Mission Press, Bangalore, India." It must be that those people could explain to him what this book meant. If he could only go to them! Never had words written or spoken stirred his heart as it had been stirred by this book. It must be of Allah and yet in all he had read he had found no mention of the Prophet. Since Elid's warning Ahmed seemed to feel that perhaps in reading this book and thinking these thoughts he was betraying the Faith, and yet, if all this he had been reading were true, it was better than the Faith and he could no longer believe as he had before.