The Shaving of Shagpat, George Meredith [popular e readers TXT] 📗

amber and saffron and grey, bridal-robes of many-lighted silks, plum-coloured, peach-coloured, of the colour of musk mixed with pale gold, together with bridal ornaments and veils of the bride, and a jewelled circlet for the brow. When this was done, Noorna went with Luloo to her chamber, attended by slave-girls, and arrayed herself in the first dress of blue, and swayed herself before the mirror, and rattled the gold pieces in her hair and on her neck with laughter. And Luloo was bewildered, and forgot her tears to watch the gaiety of her mistress; and lo! Noorna made her women take off one set of ornaments with every dress, and with every dress she put on another set; and after she had gone the round of the different dresses, she went to the bathroom with Luloo, and at her bidding Luloo entered the bath beside Noorna, and the twain dipped and shouldered in the blue water, and were as when a single star is by the full moon on a bright midnight pouring lustre about. And Noorna splashed Luloo, and said, “This night we shall not sleep together, O Luloo, nor lie close, thy bosom on mine.”

Thereat, Luloo wept afresh, and cried, “Ah, cruel! and ’tis a sweet thought for thee, and thou’lt have no mind for me, tossing on my hateful lonely couch.”

Tenderly Noorna eyed Luloo, and the sprinkles of the bath fell with the tears of both, and they clung together, and were like the lily and its bud on one stalk in a shower. Then, when Noorna had spent her affection, she said, “O thou of the long downward lashes, thy love was constant when I stood under a curse and was an old woman⁠—a hag! Carest thou so little to learn the name of him that claimeth me?”

Luloo replied, “I thought of no one save myself and my loss, O my lost pearl; happy is he, a youth of favour. Oh, how I shall hate him that taketh thee from me. Tell me now his name, O sovereign of hearts!”

So Noorna smoothed the curves and corners of her mouth and calmed her countenance, crying in a deep tone and a voice as of reverence, “Shagpat!”

Now, at that name Luloo drank in her breath and was awed, and sank in herself, and had just words to ask, “Hath he demanded thee again in marriage, O my mistress?”

Said Noorna, “Even so.”

Luloo muttered, “Great is the Dispenser of our fates!”

And she spake no further, but sighed and took napkins and summoned the slave-girls, and arrayed Noorna silently in the robe of blue and bridal ornaments. Then Noorna said to them that thronged about her, “Put on, each of ye, a robe of white, ye that are maidens, and a fillet of blue, and a sash of saffron, and abide my coming.”

And she said to Luloo, “Array thyself in a robe of blue, even as mine, and let trinkets lurk in thy tresses, and abide my coming.”

Then went she forth from them, and veiled her head and swathed her figure in raiment of a coarse white stuff, and was as the moon going behind a hill of dusky snow; and she left the house, and passed along the streets and by the palaces, till she came to the palace of her father, now filled by Shagpat. Before the palace grouped a great concourse and a multitude of all ages and either sex in that city, despite the blaze and the heat. Like roaring of a sea beyond the mountains was the noise that issued from them, and their eyes were a fire of beams against the portal of the palace. Now, she saw in the crowd one Shafrac, a shoemaker, and addressed him, saying, “O Shafrac, the shoemaker, what’s this assembly and how got together? for the poet says:

“ ‘Ye string not such assemblies in the street,
Save when some high Event should be complete.’ ”

He answered, “ ’Tis an Event complete. Wullahy! the deputation from Shiraz to Shagpat, and the submission of that vain city to the might of Shagpat.” And he asked her, jestingly, “Art thou a witch, to guess that, O veiled and virtuous one?”

Quoth she, “I read the thing that cometh ere ’tis come, and I read danger to Shagpat in this deputation from Shiraz, and this dish of pomegranate grain.”

So Shafrac cried, “By the beard of my fathers and that of Shagpat! let’s speak of this to Zeel, the garlic-seller.”

He broadened to one that was by him, and said, “O Zeel, what’s thy mind? Here’s a woman, a wise woman, a witch, and she sees danger to Shagpat in this deputation from Shiraz and this dish of pomegranate grain.”

Now, Zeel screwed his visage and gazed up into his forehead, and said, “ ’Twere best to consult with Bootlbac, the drum-beater.”

The two then called to Bootlbac, the drum-beater, and told him the matter, and Bootlbac pondered, and tapped his brow and beat on his stomach, and said, “Krooz el Krazawik, the carrier, is good in such a case.”

Now, from Krooz el Krazawik, the carrier, they went to Dob, the confectioner; and from Dob, the confectioner, to Azawool, the builder; and from Azawool, the builder, to Tcheik, the collector of taxes; and each referred to some other, till perplexity triumphed and was a cloud over them, and the words, “Danger to Shagpat,” went about like bees, and were canvassing, when suddenly a shrill voice rose from the midst, dominating other voices, and it was that of Kadza, and she cried, “Who talks here of danger to Shagpat, and what wretch is it?”

Now, Tcheik pointed out Azawool, and Azawool Dob, and Dob Krooz el Krazawik, and he Bootlbac, and the drum-beater shrugged his shoulder at Zeel, and Zeel stood away from Shafrac, and Shafrac seized Noorna and shouted, “ ’Tis she, this woman, the witch!”

Kadza fronted Noorna, and called to her, “O thing of infamy, what’s this talk of thine concerning danger to our glory, Shagpat?”

Then Noorna replied, “I say it,