Halil the Pedlar: A Tale of Old Stambul, Mór Jókai [i love reading .txt] 📗

of an ague with apprehension, and the Grand Vizier was praying, not for himself indeed, but for the Sultan. At last even the Kapudan was sorry for the Sultan who was so much distressed on their account.

"Why dost thou keep waking us so often, oh, my master?" said he, "we are still alive as thou seest. Go and sleep in thy harem and trouble not thy soul about us any more, it is only the rebels who have to do with us now. Allah Kerim! Look upon us as already sleeping the sleep of eternity. At the trump of the Angel of the Resurrection we also shall arise like the rest."

And Achmed listened to the words of the Kapudan, and at dawn of day vanished from amongst them. When they sought him in the early morning he had not yet come forth from his harem.

The four dignitaries knew very well what that signified.

Early in the morning, when the dawn was still red, Sulali Effendi and Ispirizade came for the Chief Mufti, and invited him to say the morning prayer with them.

The Ulemas were already all assembled together, and at the sight of them Abdullah burst into tears[Pg 165] and sobs, and said to them in the midst of his lamentations:

"Behold, I have brought my grey beard hither, and if it pleases you not that it has grown white in all pure and upright dealing, take it now and wash it in my blood; and if ye think that the few days Allah hath given me to be too many, then take me and put an end to them."

Then all the Ulemas stood up and, raising their hands, exclaimed:

"Allah preserve thee from this evil thing!"

Then they threw themselves down on their faces to pray, and when they had made an end of praying, they assembled in the kiosk of Erivan in the inner garden where the Grand Vizier already awaited them. Not long afterwards arrived the Kiaja and the Kapudan Pasha also, last of all came the sick Damadzadi and the Cadi of Medina, Mustafa Effendi, and Segban Pasha.

"Ye see a dead man before you," said the Grand Vizier, Damad Ibrahim, to the freshly arrived dignitaries. "I am lost. We are the four victims. The Chief Mufti perhaps may save his life, but we three others shall not see the dawn of another day. It cannot be otherwise. The Sultan must be saved, and saved he only can be at the price of our lives."

"I said that long ago," observed the Kapudan[Pg 166] Pasha. "Our corpses ought to have been delivered up to the rebels yesterday, I fear it is already too late, I fear me that the Sultan is lost anyhow. The Banner of Affliction ought never to have been exposed at all, we should have been slain there and then."

"You three withdraw into the Chamber of the Executioners," said the Grand Vizier to his colleagues, "but wait for me till the Kizlar-Aga arrives to demand from me the seals of office, till then I must perform my official duties."

The three ministers then took leave of Damad Ibrahim, embraced each other, and were removed in the custody of the bostanjis.

It was now the duty of the Grand Vizier to elect a new Chief Mufti from among the Ulemas. The Ulemas, first of all, chose Damadzadi, but he declining the dignity on the plea of illness, they chose in his stead the Cadi of Medina, and for want of a white mantle invested him with a green one.

After that they elected from amongst themselves Seid Mohammed and Damadzadi, to receive the secret message of the Sultan from the Kizlar-Aga and deliver it to Halil Patrona.

Damad Ibrahim was well aware of the nature of this secret message, and thanked Allah for setting a term to the life of man.

[Pg 167]

Meanwhile Sultan Achmed was sitting in the Hall of Delectation with the beautiful Adsalis by his side, and in front of him were the four tulips which Abdi Pasha had presented to him the day before.

The four tulips were now in full bloom.

Adsalis had thrown her arms round the Sultan's neck, and was kissing his forehead as if she would charm away from his soul the thoughts which suffered him not to rest, or rejoice, or to love.

He had an eye for nothing but the tulips before him, which he could not protect or cherish sufficiently. He scarce noticed that Elhaj Beshir, the Kizlar-Aga, was standing before him with a long MS. parchment stretched out in his hand.

"Master," cried the Kizlar-Aga, "deign to read the answer which the Ulemas are sending to Halil Patrona, and if it be according to thy will give it the confirmation of thy signature."

"What do they require?" asked the Sultan softly, withdrawing, as he spoke, a tiny knife from his girdle, with the point of which he began picking away at the earth all round the tulips in order to make it looser and softer.

"The rebels demand a full assurance that they will not be persecuted in the future for what they have done in the past."

"Be it so!"[Pg 168]

"Next they demand that the Kiaja Aga be handed over to them."

The Sultan cut off one of the tulips with his knife and handed it to the Kizlar-Aga.

"There, take it!" said he.

The Aga was astonished, but presently he understood and took the tulip.

"Then they want the Kapudan Pasha."

The Sultan cut off the handsomest of the tulips.

"There you have it," said he.

"They further demand the banishment of the Chief Mufti."

The Sultan tore up the third tulip by the roots and cast it from him.

"There it is."

"And the Grand Vizier they want also."

The last tulip Achmed threw violently to the ground, pot and all, and then he covered his face.

"Ask no more, thou seest I have surrendered everything."

Then he gave him his signet-ring in which his name was engraved, and the Kizlar-Aga stamped the document therewith, and then handed back the signet-ring to the Sultan.

The Grand Vizier, meanwhile, was walking backwards and forwards in the garden of the Seraglio. The Kizlar-Aga came there in search of him, and[Pg 169] with him were the envoys of Halil Patrona, Suleiman, whom he had made Reis-Effendi, Orli, and Sulali. Elhaj Beshir approached him in their presence, and kissing the document signed by the Sultan, handed it to him.

Damad Ibrahim pressed the writing to his forehead and his lips, and, after carefully reading it through, handed it back again, and taking from his finger the great seal of the Empire gave it to the Kizlar-Aga.

"May he who comes after me be wiser and happier than I have been," said he. "Greet the Sultan from me once more. And as for you, tell Halil Patrona that you have seen the door of the Hall of the Executioners close behind the back of Damad Ibrahim."

With that the Grand Vizier looked about him in search of someone to escort him thither, when suddenly a kajkji leaped to his side and begged that he might be allowed to lead the Grand Vizier to the Hall of Execution.

This sailor-man had just such a long grey beard as the Grand Vizier himself.

"How dost thou come to know me?" inquired Damad Ibrahim of the old man.

"Why we fought together, sir, beneath Belgrade, when both of us were young fellows together."[Pg 170]

"What is thy name?

"Manoli."

"I remember thee not."

"But I remember thee, for thou didst release me from captivity, and didst cherish me when I was wounded."

"And therefore thou wouldst lead me to the executioner? I thank thee, Manoli!"

All this was spoken while they were passing through the garden on their way to the fatal chamber into which Manoli disappeared with the Grand Vizier.

The Kizlar-Aga and the messengers of the insurgents waited till Manoli came forth again. He came out, covering his face with his hands, no doubt he was weeping. The Grand Vizier remained inside.

"To-morrow you shall see his dead body," said the Kizlar-Aga to the new Reis-Effendi, and with that he sent him and his comrade back to Halil.

"We would rather have had them alive," said the ex-ciaus, so suddenly become one of the chief dignitaries of the state.

That same evening Halil sent back Sulali with the message that the Chief Mufti might go free.

The old man quitted his comrades about midnight, and day had scarce dawned when he was summoned once more to the presence of the Grand Seignior.

All night long the Kizlar-Aga tormented Achmed[Pg 171] with the saying of the Reis-Effendi: "We would rather have them alive!"

"No, no," said the Sultan, "we will not have them delivered up alive. It shall not be in the power of the people to torture and tear them to pieces. Rather let them die in my palace, an easy, instantaneous death, without fear and scarce a pang of pain, wept and mourned for by their friends."

"Then hasten on their deaths, dread sir, lest the morning come and they be demanded while still alive."

"Tarry a while, I say, wait but for the morning. You would not surely kill them at night! At night the gates of Heaven are shut. At night the phantoms of darkness are let loose. You would not slay any living creature at night! Wait till the day dawns."

The first ray of light had scarce appeared on the horizon when the Kizlar-Aga once more stood before the Sultan.

"Master, the day is breaking."

"Call hither the mufti and Sulali!"

Both of them speedily appeared.

"Convey death to those who are already doomed."

Sulali and the mufti fell down on their knees.

"Wherefore this haste, O my master?" cried the aged mufti, bitterly weeping as he kissed the Sultan's feet.[Pg 172]

"Because the rebels wish them to be surrendered alive."

"So it is," observed the Kizlar-Aga by way of corroboration, "the whole space in front of the kiosk is filled with the insurgents."

The Sultan almost collapsed with horror.

"Hasten, hasten! lest they fall into their hands alive."

"Oh, sir," implored Sulali, "let me first go down with the Imam of the Aja Sophia to see whether the street really is filled with rebels or not!"

The Sultan signified that they might go.

Sulali, Hassan, and Ispirizade thereupon hastened through the gate of the Seraglio down to the open space before the kiosk, but not a living soul did they find there. Not satisfied with merely looking about them, they wished to persuade themselves that the insurgents were approaching the Seraglio from some other direction by a circuitous way.

Meanwhile the Sultan was counting the moments and growing impatient at the prolonged absence of his messengers.

"They have had time enough to cover the distance to the kiosk and back twice over," remarked the Kizlar-Aga. "No doubt they have fallen into the hands of the rebels who are holding them fast so that they may not be able to bring any tidings back."[Pg 173]

The Sultan was in despair.

"Hasten, hasten then!" said he to the Kizlar-Aga, and with that he fled away into his inner apartments.

Ten minutes later Sulali and the Iman returned, and announced that there was not a soul to be seen anywhere and no sign of anyone threatening the Seraglio.

Then the Kizlar-Aga led them down to the gate. A cart drawn by two oxen was standing there, and the top of it was covered with a mat of rushes. He drew aside a corner of this mat, and by the uncertain light of dawn they saw before them three corpses, the Kiaja's, the Kapudan's, and the Grand Vizier's.

Happy Gül-Bejáze sits in Halil's lap and dreamily allows herself to be cradled in his arms. Through the windows of the splendid palace penetrate the shouts of triumph which hail Halil as Lord, for the moment, of the city of Stambul and the whole Ottoman Empire.

Gül-Bejáze tremulously whispers in Halil's ear how much she would prefer to dwell in a simple, lonely little hut in Anatolia instead of there in that splendid palace.

Halil smooths away the luxuriant locks from his wife's forehead, and makes her tell him once more[Pg 174] the full tale of all those revolting incidents which befell her in the Seraglio, in the captivity of the Kapudan's house, and in the dungeon for dishonourable women. Why should he keep on arousing hatred and vengeance?

The woman told him everything with a shudder. At her husband's feet, right in front of them, stood three baskets full of flowers. Halil had given them to her as a present.

But at the bottom of the baskets were still more precious gifts.

He draws forward the first basket and sweeps away the flowers. A bloody head is at the bottom of the