Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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: '* •** "T"" - .PAQK TWO BARNWELL SENTINEL, BARNWELL, SOPTH CAROLINA U, , * T By TALBOT MUNDY / /ie Mosf Picturesque Romance of the Decade Copyrifht by The Bobbe-Merrill Company y-r i CHAPTER XIV—Continued. Rewa Gunga spoke ,truth. In Delhi when he assured King he should some day wonder at Yasmlnl’s dancing. She became joy and bravery and youth I She danced a story for them of the things they knew. She waR the dawn light, touching the distant-peaks. She was the wind that follows it, sweeping among thri Junipers and kiss ing each as she came. She was laugh ter, as the little children laugh when the cattle are loosed from the byres at last to feed In the valleys. She was the scent of spring uprising. She was, blossom. She was fruit! Very daugh ter of the sparkle of warm sun on snow, she was the "Heart of the Hulls’’ herself I Never was such dancing !*~-Never such an audience! Never such mad applause! She danced until the great rough guards had to run round the arena with clubbed butts and beat back trespassers’ who would ~lTa^e mobbed her. And every movement— every gracious wonder-curve and ste.p with which she told her tale was as purely Greek as the handle on King’s knife and the figures on the lamp-bowls and as the bracelets on her arm. Greek! , And she half-modern RnsRlan, ex- glrl-wlfe of a seml-civlllzed hill rajah! Who taught her? There is nothing new, even In Khlnjan,* In the "Hills !” And when the crowd defeated the arena guards ut lust and burst through the swinging butts to seize her and fling her high and worship her with mad barbaric rite, she ran toward the ahleld. The four men raised It shoul der high again. She went to It like a leaf in the wjnd—sprung on It as If wings had lifted her, scarce touching it ovlth naked toes—and leapt to the bridge with a laugh. She went over the bridge on tiptoes, like nothing else uuder heaven but Yasmlni at her bewitchlngest. And without pausing on the fur side she danced up the hewn stone stairs, dived into the dark hole and was gonq.1 "Come 1” yelled Ismail in King’s ear. He could have heard nothing less, for the cavern was like to burst apart from the tumult. "Whither?” the Afrldl shouted in disgust. “Does the wind ask whither? Come like the wind and see! **They will remember next that they have a bone to pick with thee! Come away 1” That seemed good enough advice. He followed as Must as Ismail could shoul der a way-out between the frantic Irill- -wen, deafened, stupefied, nUmbed, al most eo\ved by the ovation they were giving the "Heart of their Hills.” CHAPTER XV. As they disappeared after a scramble through the mouth of the same tun nel they had entered by, 'a roar went up behind them like the birth of earth quakes. Looking back over his shoul der, King saw Yasmlni come,back into the hole’s mouth, to, stand framed in It and bow acknowledgment. For the spt.ee of five minutes,she stood in the *iV ¥ \\ \ .X womb on fire and of hellions brewing w^th/iThe Btalactltes arid the hurry ing river multiplied the dancing lights Into a million, and the great roof hurled the din down again to make confusion with the new din coming up.' Ismail went like a rat dowri a rim, and it became ro dark "that King had to follow by ear. He Imagined they were running bayk * towafd the ledge under the wat'erfall; yet, when Ismail called a halt at last, panting, groped behind a great rock for a lamp and lit the wick with a common safety match, they were In a cave he had never seen before. "Where are we?” King asked. "Where none dnre seek us. Art thou afraid?" asked Ismail, holding the lamp to King’s,face. „“Kueh dar nahln hal!” he answered. “There Is no such thing as fearl” , Suddenly the Afrldl blew the lamp out, and then the darkness became solid. Thought itself left oft less than a ynrd away. “Ismnll!” he whispered. But Ismail did not answer him. He faced about, leaning against, the rock, with the flat of both hands pressed tight against It for the sake of Its company; and almost at once he saw a little bright red light glowing. In the distance. It might have been below him; It was perfectly Impossible to Judge, for the durkness was not measurable. “Flowers turn to the -light!” droned Ismail’s voice above sententlously, and turning, he thought he could see red eyes peering over the rock.-He jumped, and niade a grab for the flowing beard that surely must be below them, but he missed. , B "Little fish swim to the light!” droned Ismull. “Moths fly to the light! Who Is a man that he should know less than they?” He tyimed again and stared at the light. {Dimly, very vaguely he could make out that a causeway led down ward from almost where he stood. He was convinced that should he try too climb buck Ismail would merely reach out a hand and shove him down again, and there was no sense In bein£ put to that Indignity. He decided to go forward, for there was even less sense in standing still. So he stooped to feel the llobtf with his hand before deciding to go forward. There was no mistaking the finish given by the t.rend of countless feet. He was on a. higfiway, and there are not often, pit- falls where so many feet have been. For all that he went forward, as a ^•rtnin Agag once did, and it was many minutes before, he could see a certain glowing blood-red In the light behind two lamps, at the top of a flight of ten stone steps. When he went quite close he saw carpet down the middle of the steps, so ancient that the stope showed through irl places; all the pattern, supposing It ever had j any, was worn or faded atfay. Carpet and steps glowed red too. Ills own face, and the litinds he held in front of him were red-hot-poker color. Yet outside the little ellipse of light the darkness looked like a thing to. lean against; and the silence was so intense that he could hear the arteries, sing ing by fils ears. - /N/ lie saw the curtains move slightly^, apparently in a little ptiflDof wind that made the lamps waver. Then he walked up the steps and tit the top he stooped to examine the lamps. They were bronze, cqsf, polished and graved. All round Jiie circumference of each howl \\ efe figures in h:iif- rrlief, representing a woman d-nm-iiig. She was the ^yoman of the knife-hilt, and of thft/fantps in tin* arena ! But no two figures uf the dance Were alike. ; It' was tin 1 same woman dancing, but the artist had chosen twenty differ out poses-with- which to immortalize I his skill, ifnd hers. Both lamps burned -.1 - • f ... v,„ -V ' the clash of rings on a-rod. But he was beyond being startled. - He was not really sure he was In the world. He was not certain whether It was the twentieth century, or 55 B. O., or ear lier yet; or whether time had ceaked. The place where he was did not look like a cave, hut a palace chamber, for the rock Walls had-been tylmmed square and polished smooth; then they had been painted pure white, except fog a wide blue frieze,- with a line of gold leafarawn underneuth it And on the frieze, done in gold-leaf, ^oo, 'tfas the Grecian lady of the lamps, always dancing. There were fifty or sixty figures of her, no two alike., *: A dozen lamps were burning,, set In niches cut in the walls at measured Intervals. They were exactly like the two outside, except that their horn chimneys were stained yellow Instead of red, suffusing everything In a golden glow. •_ . ■ Opposite him was a curtain, rather like that through which he had en tered... Near to the curtain was a bed, whose great wooden posts were cracked with age. Iu spite of Its age it was spread with fine new.linen. King’s hari ay on her bosom [ She hero his hand a little tlgnvcr and « . — . . < • «I * ' • • ' . it • . * 1. — at VtAcrfr> I sweet oil with a wick, ami each had | i chimney of horn, hot at all unlike ; a. modern lamp chimney. The holm was-stained red. ~ As he. set the second lamp down he A- % fyACF>* . On It, Above tHfe Linen, a Man and a Woman Lay Hand in Hand. Richly embroidered, not very ancient Indian draperies hung down from’ it to the- -floor on either side. On it. above the JJn'en, u man and a woman lay hand in hhnd, and the woman was so exactly like Yasmlni, even to her clothing and her naked feet, that it was not possible for .a man to be* self- possessed. ■_ v - They both seemed asleep. It was minutes before he satisfied himself that the man’s breast did no’t rise and fall .under the, bronze Roman armor and that the’ Roman’s jeweled gauzy stuff was still. Imagination played such tricks,with him tilth in the still ness he imagined fie Heard breathing. After he was, sure they were", both dead, he went nearer, hut It was a minute yet before he knew the woman was not she. At first a '•wild - thought ^possessed him that she had killed her- sei •TheNmljTthing to show who he had lusiti- weiV* the letters S. B. Q. R. on a great piunu'd'heli.net. on a little table by the bed. Hut she was the woman of the lamp-bowls and the frieze. A life-size stone statue in y corner was so-lik.e.her, and-like Yasmini too, that it was difiicult to decide which of the two it represented. She had lived when he did, for her lingers were looked -in his. And lie lin’d lived two thousand years ago. Ue- cattsfi hl,s armor was about its old as that, and for proof that ho had died in it part of.his.breast had turned to powder inside the breastplate. The test of )iis body was whole and per fectly preserved. /—i_ hare another bracelet, ou the man's right wrist. Size for rifle, this was the. same ns the otte that had been stolen from himself. 1 Memory prompted him. He felt its outer edge with a finger nail. There was the little nick that he had made in the soft gold when he struck'it against the cell bars In the4ail at the Mir Khan pala<*?'! . He touched the gold. It. was warm. He repeated the test on the woman’s wrists. Hers was warm, too. Both bracelets had been worn by a living being within an hour— He muttered and frowned in thought, and then suddenly Jumped backward. ■ The leather curtain near the bed had moved on its bronze rod. “Aren’t, they dears?” a voice said in English behind him "Aren’t they sweet?” ’ ' / ^ Yasmini stood not two a ring’ lengths away, lovelier than the dead' woman because of the merry life in her,'young and warm, aglow, hut looking like the dead woman and the woman of the frieze—the woman of the lampfliowls— the statue—come to life, speaking to him in English more sweetly than if it had been her mother tongue. The English abuse their language. Yas mini caressed it and ma^e it do Its work twice over. Being dressed .ns a ’ native, he, salaamed low. Knowing him for what he was, she gave him the senna- stained tips of her warm fingers to kiss, and he thought she trembled when he touched them. But a second later she had snatched them away and wns treating him to raillery. "Mfin of plljs and blisters!” she said, “tell me how those bodies are pre^ served! Spill knowledge from that learped skull of thine!” He did not answer. He never shon in conversation at any time, hav made as many friends* as enenries/by saying nothing until the spirit utoves him. But she did not know that yet. “If t knew for certain \yfiy those two did not turn to worms./ she went pn, "almost I would choog<f to die now, while I am beautiful! What would they say. think you. King sahib, if they found* us two dead beside those two? Speak, man. speak! Has Khin- jan struck you dumb?” But he did not speak. lie was star ing^ at her arm, where two whitish * marks on the skin betrayed that brace lets had been. "Oh, those! They are theirs. I would not rob the dead, or the gods would turn on me. I robbed you,-In stead, while you .slept. Fie, King sa hib. while yomslept!” L V r n became aware of a subtle, interesting smell, apd memory took him hack at •fhee to Yrismini’s room in the (’handni Ohowk in ivllti where he had smelled* .it first, ft-wns the peculiar scent he hail been, told was Y asm ini's own.—a -blend of scents, like a chord" of music, in w-bleb mnsTTclIiT' iiof prethnnlnate. lie rook, three strides and pouched the curtains discovering .muv for the .first time (hat there wen* tw<rof them divided dowrrthe middle/ They were of leattjer, and though they looked old ;as the “Hills” themselves, lht> leather was supple as good cloth. “Hurram Khan hal!" he announced. Never Was Such Dancing. • ... great hole, smiling and watching the crowd below. Thep she-went. :ind the jgunrds began to loose random volleys But file echo was Hie only answer, at the roof and brought . down him- There was no sound beyond the~euH drqdweights of spliqtered stalactite. tains. Wjth.his heart in his mouth.he WlthimTi minute there were a.him- parted them with both hands,, startled dred men busy sweeping up the splIn-/by-the sharp-jangle of mefal rings on ters. Ip another minute twenty Zakka :Lfod. Khels had begun a sword dance, yell So he stood, with arms outstretched, lng like demons. A hundred joined i stariug—stuHpg—staripg—with eyes ltrs prieeless. thqm. In three mlnutek more the skilled swiftly fo take in details, but whole arena was a dinning whjrlpool, I with a brain that tried to explain and the river’s voice was drowned In shouting and th* stamping of naked feet on. stone. vvome!” urged Ismail and led the- way: .Klng’B TsVt impression was of earth’s formed a hundred wild suggestions— and then reeled, lie wns face to face with the unexplainable—the riddle of Khlnjan onves.- x - The leather curtains slipped through his Angers and closed behind him with ‘1^- ..>!/•! rji t Stern, htfndsome In t» ldgh-beaked Roman way, gray on the temples, firm: dipped, he lay-like tin emperor in har- tmss. But the pride and resolution on his face were -outdone by the serhnity of Iters. * )>ry surely those , two had been lovers., • •- Both 'tif them looked young and healthy—the woman young’or -thau' thirty—twenty-five at a guess—and the .man perhaps forty, perhaps forty* itive. Every Mitch of^he man’s cloth ing bird decayed, so that his armor rested on the naked skin, except for a dressed leather kilt afiout his middle. The leather was ns old ns the-curtains at the entrance, and as .well preserved But the woman’s silked eloflilhg" was as new as the bedding.^£et,.they both ^ lle put his. hand to his shirt/ died about the same time; or how coubr their fingers have been interlaced? And some of the jewelry on the wom an’s clothes was very ancient as well and o»* on. ,»v*s tkhen I found them! she said. "Now, think again!” He did think, of thirty thousand pos- dhlllties, arid ot one impossH»fe^Jdea that.stood up prominent among them all and insisted on seeming pie only likely ohe. -- ‘‘ / - ■ / "I saw the knife In your bosom last night,” she said, “and laughed so that I nearly wakened you/ 1 /—• v “Why didn't you take it with the bracelet?”. King asked [her, holding it out. “Take it now. Ildbn ? t want it." She accepted it and lnid„4t on the man’s bronze armory, Then, however, ’she resumed it uud played with it. "Look again!” shqsaid. “Think and look -again!” ■ ^ ’ . [ He looked, and he knew now., But he still preferred that she should tell him, and his lips shut tight. "Can you guess why I changed my mind about you—wjse man?” l She looked from him to the man on the bed and back to him again. Hav ing solved the riddle, King had leisure to be interested in her jeyes, and watched them analytically, like a jew eler appraising diamonds. They were strangely reminiscent, but much more changeable and colorful than any he hud ever seen. They hud the baffling trick of changing while he watched them. “Having sent « man to kill you, why did I cease ^to want to kill you? - In; stead of losing you on the way to Kbin- Jan, why did I run risks to protect you after you reached here? "Why did I save your' life in tlp/^Cavern of Earth’s Drink tonigl^L? You do not know yet? Then pwill tell you some thing else you^tHT not know. I was in Delhi wheii/you were! J wutched and listened while' yqp and Itewa Gfmgu talkqd in my ho,use! I was iq Itewa Gungri’-s carriage on the train that he took and you did not! I have learned at first hand that you are not a fool But that was hot enriugh! You had to be three tilings—cl/ver and brave and one other. The.ppe other you are! Brave you hn\V proved yourself to be! Clever yoju must be, to trick your way into" KJlinjan caves, 'even with Ismail at your elbow! That fs why I saved yriur lif^-because you are those t/o things and — and'—one other She' snatched a mirror from a little ivoyy table—a modern mirror—bad gjriss, bad art, bad workraunship, but /rilver warranted. “Look in it und then at him!" she ordered. But he did not need to look. The mft'n on the bed was not so much like himself as the woman was like her. but the resemblance seemed" to grow under his eyes. King was the taller and the younger by several years, hut the noses were the same, and the wrinkled foreheads; botfi men had the same firm mouth; both looked like Romans. . Buf*her steel did not strike on flintX^Athelstan. When the gods combine It was her eyes that flashed. He would have done better to have seemed ashamed, for then he might have fooled her, at least for a while. But having Judged himself, he did not care a fig for her judgment of him. She r’enjized that instantly and having found a tool that would not work, discarded it. for a better one. She grew confidential. “I borrow them,” she explained, “but I put them back. I take, them for so many days, .and when The day comes—the gods like us to lie exact! -You \\t*ro near death when I took the bracelet last night. The time was up. I would have stabbed you,if yuu-had tried to prevent me.,!” " Now he spoke, at last and gave her li first glimpsi/ofjin angle of Iris mind she had not suspected. , “Princess," iu* said. He used the word with tHe deference sonic men can combine with effrontery, so t! riKyery tenderness has barbs. “You nri&ht have find that thing hack if you had sent a messenger for it at-any time. A word by a servant would have been enough,”.* \ — “You could never have reached Jsririnjan then she retorted. Her eyes flashed again, hut Iris did not waver. “Princess," he said, “why speak of what you don’f’know?” lie thought she would strike-like a snake, "hut she smiled at him instead. And when Yasmini has smiled on a man he’ has never been just the same man afterward. He knows more, for one thing. lie has had a lesson in one of the .finer arts/ '“I will speak of what I do know,’ slu> said* “No, tfiere is no need. Look ! .JSpok if • x \ She pointed at the bed—at the mho on the bed-—fingers locked In those of u woman who looked sp like herself. He looked, knowing well there was something to lie understood, tjjiat stared him in the face. But for, the life of'him in* ertTfifl not 'determine question or answer. “What is ii\ your bosom?” she asked in in. He looked closet* at the fingers for breath. Under the -woman’s flimsy sleeve was a wrought gold bracelet, smaller than that one he himself had worn in Delhi and tip tiwCKhyher. lie raised the loose sleeve to look more closely at It, and the movement laid “Draw it out!” she said, as a teadiyr Grills aAdrild. He drew out the gold-hilted knife with the bronze lladp, with which a man had meant to rmmiefhiin. lie let it lie on the palm of his hand and signs of force and suddenly caught his-, looked from it to her and hack agaiP. The lrilt might have been a portrait'of Jjerjmqdeled from the life. “Here is'ltpother like it,” she said, pepping to the bedside./She drew back, the Wtunan’s dress \r thu bosom and showed a knife » - ■••Lv lik« tliut in pressed closer to him, - laughing softly. He sfood as if made of iron, and that oqly made her laugh the more., J * \“TuIes of the *Henrt| of the' Hills’ . have puzzled the raj. haven’t they, these many years? They s/‘nt me^to find the source of them. |pe 1 They T —/ CHAPTER XVI. "Athelstan f She pronounced his given name as if she loved the word, standing straight again and looking into his eyes. There were high lights in hers that out- gleamed the diamonds on her dress. “Your gods and mine have done this. they lay plans well indeed!” “I only know one God,” he answered simply, as a man speaks of the deep things in his heart. r ‘il know of many! They love me! They shall love you, too! Many are better than one! You shall learn to i - / • know "my gods, for we are Jo be part ners, yqn'and I !*’ She took his hand again, her eyes burning with excitement and mysti cism and ambition like a fever. She seemed to take more than physical pos session of him. “What brought them here? Tell me that!” she* demanded, pointing to the bed. “You think he brought her? I ■pc-Acro<\} ^Can You Guess Why I Changed My Mind About You—Wise Man?" Tell y.ou she was the spur that drove hand Is it a wonder that men called her tfie ‘He.art of the Hills?’ I* found them ten years ago and clothed her und put new linen on their bed, for the old was ail rugs and dust. There have always been hundreds—and sometimes thousands—who knew the secret of Khinjitn caves, but this has been a secret within a secret. Someone, who knew the secret before 1, sawed those 1> race Jets through and fitted" hinges and clasps. T*Ue men you saw In the ,(.’avefn of Earth's Drink have no doubt I am the "Heart of the ^lills come To life! They shall know thee as him within a little while 1” chose wCllt There xre not many like me! I have-found this one dend wom an who was like me. And in fen years, until you came, I have found no man; like him!” * / She trifed to look into his eyes, but lie frowned straight in front of him. His native costume and Kangar turban did not muke him seem any less a man. His 'owl, that was beginning to need shaving, was as grim and as sat- isfyirig as the . dead Roman’s. She stroked his left hand with soft fingers. "I used to think I knew how to dance!” she laughed. "For ten years I have taken those pictures of her fory my mbdel and have striven to learn what she Vnew. I have surpassed ijer 1 I used tc ‘.hink I knew how to ainuse myself with men’s drefffim—until I found this! Then I drained on my own account! My drerim was true, ray warrior! You hayPcome! Our hour has come!”. She tugged at his band. He wa» hers, sotff and harness, if outward sign^could prove it. * ^^Come!” she. said. “Is this my hos pitality? You are Weary and hungry. Come!" . She led him by the hand, for It’ 'w’ould have needed brute force to pry her fingers loose. She drew aside the leather curtain that hung on a bronze *v rod near the bed, led him Thromrh It, and let It clash to again behind them. • Now they were In the dark together, •and it Was not^ comprehended In her scheme of things to let circumstance lie fallow. She pressed his hand, and sighed, and then hurried; whispering tender words he could scarcely catch. When they burst together through a curtain at the other end of a passage ' - In the rock, his skin was red "under the tan arid for the first time her eyes » refused to meet his. —, .* “Why did they choose that cave to sleep in?” she asked him. “Is not this a better one? Who laid them there?” He stared about. They were In a great room far more splendid than the first. ’ There was a great fountain ii) the center splashing In the midst of flowers. They were qut flowers. The "Hills” must haVe been scoured for them within a day. There were great cushioned couches ’all about and two ;hrones made of ivory and gold. Between two couches t was a table, laden with golden plates and a golden jug. on pure white linen. There were two goblets of beaten gold and knives with golden handles and bronze blades. The whole room seemed to be drenched In the scent YasnrinT favored, and there was the same frieze running round all four walls, with the woman depicted on It dancing. “Come, we shall eat!’’ she said, lead ing hi in by the hand to a couch. She took the one fucing him, ami they lay like two Romans of the empire with the.tabie-in between. Sire struck a golden gong then, and a native woman came in; who stared at King as if she had seen him before and did not like him. Yasmini nodded to tlie servant, who clapped her hands. At once came a stream of hinirien, robed in white, who carried sherbet (n bottles cooled in snow and dishes fra- graut with hot food. He recognized his own prisoners from the Mir Khan Palace jail, ami nodded to tliem as they set the things down under the maid’s direction. \V'j*u they had fin ished eating Yasmin- drove the maid away with a sharp ’lord; he l>rought an ivory footstool and set it about a yard away from her tvaxen toes. And she, watching him with burning eyes, wound tresses of her hair* around the golden dagger handle, making her jew els glitter with euelr movement. “The gods of India; who are the only real gods, what do they think of it .all! 4-fc V J' l hey have been good to the English, .but they have had no thanks. They will stand aside now and watch a -*' .greater jihad than .the worjd.has e\>r seen! I love them, and fhey^lovojne— us yOy shall luve nie, too! If they did not Iqve both of us„ we would not both /be here! We must obey them!” \ None of the East's.amazing ways of x, -courtship, are ever tedious. Love springs into being on an instant and lives a thousand years inside an hour. Shq ieft iio doubt as to her meaning She a rut King were to love, as the East knows love, and then the"-world might have just what thej* two did not cur< to take from it. / Ilis only possible course as yet Wai the* defensive,-and there is*no defense like silence, lie was still. “The slrkar,” she went on, “the silly* -$lrkar fears that perhaps Turkey may* enter the war. Perhaps a jihad may be proclaimed. So much for fear! I know! 1 have known for a very Ion < tiine! And I have pot bet fear trouhl ■ me at all!” .. '.*•„ Her eyes Were on his steadily, am she Egad no fear in his, either, for non« was there. In fliers he sflw ambition-^, triumph already — excitement — tfo gambler’s love of all the hugest risks. Behind therif burned genius’and the devilry that would stop at nothing. A# the general bad told him in Peshawur, she would ditry open hades gate and ride the devU down the Khyber for the fun of it. " , »" (TO BE CONTINUED.) Crushed Possibilities. Jones, the cub reporter, was fat, but he looked as melantholy as a fat mar can when fie eutered the gity editor’* office. ’ , • ' , ’ X. “Why was my story killed?” h< asked gloomily. “An act of mercy,” said the edJt* “You fell down on it first.” 1 V :; A" * t- TT*r~