Asif can live out his life in peace. Also his sons, and the sons which the future will bring him. Safe they are in God’s keeping because of their father’s madness!”
I drew him to one side, and whispered to him:
“What is the meaning of this? What—what—”
He interrupted me with a gesture, speaking close to my ear:
“Do as I bid you for the sake of our friendship; for it is said that the mind of a friend is the well of trust, and the stope of confidence sinks therein and is no more seen.” He was silent for a moment, then he continued in yet lower voice: “Hold him safe against my claiming? Assuredly him and his sons—and—” then suddenly, “O Allah, send me a man-child!”
And he strode down the hill into the purple dusk, while I, turning over his last words in my mind, said to myself that he was a soft man indeed; but that there is also the softness of forged steel, which bends to the strength of the sword-arm, and which kills on the rebound.
So, obeying my friend’s command, I went to the villages of the Moustaffa-Khel. I delivered Ebrahim Asif safe into the hands of the jirgahs, giving them the message with which Ali-Khan had entrusted me.
There was a little laughter, a little cutting banter hard to bear, and some talk of cowards, of city-bred Heratis turning the other cheek after the manner of the feringhees, of blind men wanting nothing but their eyes; but I kept my tongue safe between my teeth. For I remembered the softness of steel; I remembered Ali-Khan’s love for Bibi Halima; and thirdly I remembered that there is no love as deep as hate.
Four days later I knocked at the door of Ali-Khan’s house, and there was the moaning of women, and the ringing of the death-gong.
Ali-Khan was alone in his room, smoking opium.
“A son has been born me, praise Allah!” was his greeting.
“Praise Allah and the Prophet and the Prophet’s family, and peace and many blessings on them all!” I laid my left hand against his, palm to palm, and kissed him on both cheeks.
There was no need to ask after Bibi Halima, for still from the inner rooms came the moaning of women and the ringing of the death-gong. But another question was in my heart, and he must have read it. For he turned to me, smiling gently, and said:
“Heart speaks naked to heart, and the head answers for both. And I am an Herati and a soft man.”
There was peace in his eyes, at which I wondered, and he continued:
“Once I spoke to you of feud. I said that an unfinished feud is a useless thing, as useless as horns on a cat or flowers of air. For, if I kill my enemy, my enemy’s son, knowing my name and race, will kill me, and thus through the many generations. A life for a life, and yet again a life for a life. And where, then, is the balancing of lives? Where, then, is the profit to me and mine? So I have made peace between Ebrahim Asif and myself, cunningly, declaring him a madman, beloved by Allah, thus sacrosanct. And I shall sell my house here, and take my little son and go north to Bokhara. I shall sit under the shadow of Russia, and I shall prosper exceedingly; for I know Central Asia and the intrigues of Central Asia, and I shall sell my knowledge to the Russians. I shall be not without honor.”
“Do you, then, love the bear of the North that you are willing to serve him?”
“Love is of the mind and not of the heart,”—he flung out a bare palm—“unless it be the love of woman. And Bibi Halima is dead.”
“Then why serve Russia?” For be it remembered that in those days I served the Emir of Afghanistan, and that there was talk in the bazaars of a railway being built from Bokhara to Merv, within striking distance of Herat.
Again he smiled.
“Because I said that love is of the mind. What does me weal, that I love and serve. What does me harm, that I hate and fight. See? Years from now, if it be so written, my son, thanks to the honor which shall be mine under the shadow of Russia, will be a soldier of Russia in the north, in Bokhara. He will be trained after the manner of the North, and he will shoot as straight as a hawk’s flight. He will be the pride of the regiment, and he will wear the little silver medal on a green ribbon which is given to the best marksman in the army. And one day the young soldier, bearing a Russian name, even as will his father, will desert from his regiment for a week or a month, and the tale will be spread that he has gone north to Moscow because of his young blood’s desire to see new sights and kiss strange women. But he will not have gone north at all. No, by the teeth of God and mine own honor! He will have gone south, to these very hills, and there will be no desire in his heart but the desire to kill. He will kill Ebrahim Asif and his sons may he have as many as there are hairs in my beard! and also the women, at night, when they go to the brook to fetch water for the evening meal. He will kill from ambush, wasting no shots, being a soldier trained to war. Ahi! the carrion of the clan of Ebrahim Asif will feed the kites of the Salt Hills, and for many a day to come the jackals of the Nadakshi will not feel the belly-pinch of hunger. And the family of Ebrahim Asif shall be no more, and thus will the feud be stanched, if God be willing. And then my son will return to the north, to Bokhara. And tracking him will be like tracking the mists of dawn to their home. For what is one soldier more or less in the great land of Russia, where there are thousands and thousands and thousands of them? Also, will not the Government’s protection be his, since I, his father, too, will be serving Russia not without honor?”
He left the room and returned, a moment later, holding in his arms a little bundle of silk and linen.
“Look,” he said, baring carefully the head of the new-born infant. “See the eagle profile, the hooded brow, the creamy skin, the black, curly hair! An Afghan of Afghans! And see—he opens his right eye—has he not the eye of the killer?”
The child twisted and gave a little cry. Ali-Khan took a long, lean knife from the wall, offering its hilt to his son. The tiny hand gripped it, while the blade, point down, shone in the rays of the afternoon sun.
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