The city was astir, sleepily astir. In the blind tortuous alleys where the hot May sun struggled in vain to shine, shut out on every side by the high tenement houses hiving swarms of men, women and children, rumour spread like mushroom spawn in the dark; spread aimlessly, idly, sending its filaments at random, here, there, everywhere, ready at a moment's notice to shoot up into some fantastic mushroom growth. Even in Agra itself, connected with Fatehpur Sikri by that twenty-mile-long ribbon of shop-edged road, the talk was all of what was about to happen in Akbar's City of Victory. The King had accepted the appeal of JamÂl-ud-din Syed concerning his marriage, and had appointed the next Friday audience for the hearing of proof concerning the same; so much was certain. But would he really go back on his own order? Could a King possibly own himself in the wrong? If he did, what became of his claim to divine guidance, and how could folk in the future live content on his judgment? Had a body ever heard of the Learned-in-the-Law eating their own words? No! they stuck to them; in that way lay safety, confidence, authority.

And what was this still more vague rumour concerning the King's Luck, the diamond which had of a surety been his talisman these many years? Was it really to be given to the foreigner to hack and hew?

This was a question which disturbed more than the populace, which brought anxiety to the most highly cultured mind in Fatehpur Sikri.

"If it be true," said the Right Reverend Vicar of Christ, Father Ricci, head of the Portuguese Mission in Goa, who had come up to Agra on one of his periodical visits to the little colony of Christians to whom Akbar gave patronage and protection, "if indeed this diamond, whose worth is the ransom of a world, be given into these Englishmen's hands, it is time we bestirred ourselves, son Rudolfo; and thou must press the King yet once again for some speedy answer on his politics."

PÂdrÉ Rudolfo, the Jesuit who for long years had lived at court, hoping against hope for the King's definite conversion to Christianity, spending himself body and soul in good works, good example, sighed uneasily.

"Sure, my father, the grace of God must work in the end--and Akbar is so close to the Kingdom! In tolerance alone----"

Father Ricci interrupted him sharply:

"It is anathema! He tolerates all faiths, all things, even these new Englishmen who at best are heretics."

"One at least is good Catholic," interrupted PÂdrÉ Rudolfo mildly. "He was at the Mass in the Palace Chapel this morning."

The Superior of his order frowned. "See you, then, that he remains within the influence of Holy Church. These Englishmen must gain no foothold here. As for the King, I will write from Goa threatening your removal--for surely he hath great regard for you, as you for him. Yet I say to you that despite his good qualities, his justice, his forgiveness until seventy times seven, Akbar is a stumbling block in our way. Prince SalÎm might serve our purpose better--our purpose, which is Christ's," he added hastily as if to rectify any possible confusion of meaning. Yet the meaning was confused, for the world holds few stories more strangely complex than the tale of the Jesuits' struggle between greed of gold and greed of souls, which for close on a century found arena in the court of the Great Moguls. Tragic it is at times, at others comic, yet pathetic throughout in the certainty that greed of gold must eventually prevail against the greed of souls.

PÂdrÉ Rudolfo sighed again. Long living within reach of Akbar's atmosphere had made him in his turn tolerant and there was always hope; hope that his prayers, his penances, his sleepless nights might at last count for righteousness in the King's long record of hesitation. And yet in his heart of hearts Rudolfo Acquaviva knew that there was no hope, was conscious even of a vague content that there was none; for in the Father's house were there not many mansions, and what was man that he should dictate to God what gave the right of entry to them?

So from the highest to the lowest the passing days brought a sense of strain. To Âtma Devi, however, in her secluded sun-saturated roof, the general unrest did not penetrate to add to the dull distress of her own disturbed mind.

For the joy which had come to her from even the half-jesting recognition of her hereditary claim, had passed before the slow assurance that, as woman, she was helpless to support her rÔle of champion, before the certainty which grew with the passing days, that the King had no need of her.

She had discarded her poppy-petal red petticoat for the white robe of the ChÂran, and with the silver hauberk fitting loosely to her tall slenderness, her long hair unbound circled with a silver fillet, would stand for hours, her hands clasped over the silver-hilted sword, looking out over the low parapet wall across the blue distance. That limited vision of hers held all her world; for the years had obliterated memory of the far-off Central Indian home whence she had been brought while still almost an infant by her father. But one or two scenes of that childish life which had been passed beyond her present outlook remained with her, clear yet dreamlike. The most distinct of these being her surpassing affection for SiyÂla, who was now Siyah Yamin. As she thought of this a dull vague wonder possessed her as to what purpose Fate could have had in making their two lives so dissimilar--the one sexless by virtue of her widowhood, the other sexual beyond even womanhood.

Âtma's was a limited mind: her soul groped blindly in the dark, yet found what it sought and held fast to it.

So she waited as patiently as she could, hoping for some means of vindicating her claim to the ChÂran's place, forgetting not one jot or tittle of the many ceremonials of her race. Even if nothing else came of the King's grace save the permission to challenge the world on his behalf from her secluded silence, that in itself was gain. In one heart, surely, his honour would be held sacred utterly.

She had a quaint companion in her solitude, the rebeck player's child ZarÎfa. For on the morning after Âtma had taken Birbal to see the musician asleep, with the young girl's flower-face upon his bosom, he had appeared in Âtma Devi's roof, bearing the light burden of the crippled child in his arms, and begged asylum for her during the space of an hour while he went on an errand. But days had passed without his return; so the child had stayed on. Helpless utterly, sustaining life apparently by a mere sup of milk, a mouthful or two of fruit, and sleeping away all the hours of fierce daylight, at dawn and at dusk the soul hidden in the racked, deformed body seemed to be set free from its bonds, and the child would lie with wide-open soft lustrous eyes, smiling and singing to herself. And Âtma Devi as she sate listening would feel peace and content steal over her restlessness, so that as often as not, as the shadows crept over the roof, and the daylight died, the rising moon would find both the child and the woman asleep; ZarÎfa in the dark shelter of the slip of a room--whence she seldom stirred since the light seemed to scourge her--Âtma crouching in the corner beside the little lamp which burned ever before the death-dagger of her race.

Birbal, coming at dawn in search, once more, of the rebeck player, roused Âtma from such a sleep, and entering while--after unbarring the door at his password "From the King"--she stood rubbing her eyes, was met by such a strong perfume of roses that he turned quickly on her:

"So he is here!" he cried; then looked curiously at her, at the little slip of room. "Within, I suppose," he added, passing to its entrance. But Âtma barred the way.

"It is the child, my lord," she said quickly, "the musician left her with me when he went away. And she is so timid, the very face of a strange man is like a strong light upon her--it scorches and shrivels."

Birbal laughed shortly. He was of the world and knew its evil ways. "So does love," he replied mockingly. "Nay! I find no fault with thee, widow, but call him out--I would see him."

Âtma flushed darkly. "My lord cannot see him; he is not here."

"Nor the child neither? Am I not even to have sight of her pretty face to attest truth?" asked Birbal.

The woman met his jeering smile with a peremptory gesture. "Let my lord sit silent yonder on the parapet," she said, in a voice of command, "and from the darkness he shall hear."

So, closing the door behind her, she called softly, "Sing to me, my bird," and stood listening.

Birbal, idly kicking his heels as he sate, looked over the wall down the sheer drop of a hundred feet or more which ended in the red rock. Just below him, brimming up to the very wall lay the tank which Akbar had lately made as a reservoir for the lower part of the town. Half-hidden in morning mist it reflected the morning sky here and there as the vapour, parting, left its surface clear. And behind the rising mist? Did it reflect nothing but the shifting gray curves above it, or did the cool depths of rock below have their chance to shine mirrored on the water?

Bah! who could tell!

The little roof lay still in the first sunlight. A few pigeons wheeling about overhead sent shifting shadows to chase each other on the purple bricks of wall and floor, and in the topmost branch of the peepul tree whose roots throve beside the tank below, a white-throat was singing its little limited song. So, suddenly, there rose on the cool air of dawn another limited little voice.

Birbal, artist to his finger tips shivered slightly; Âtma, standing, her hands clasped over the old silver-hilted sword, gave a soft sigh. To both of them the creeping step of the Dark that will last for Eternity, seemed to invade the present, claiming all things.

All things save Love, that essence of the Rose of Life.

"Only the dust of the rose-leaf remains to the heart of the seller of perfumes."

The mystical meaning of the Sufi saying came home for once to Birbal. As usual, he resented the intrusion and stood up ready to go, prepared to jest.

"Farewell, then, widow! God send thee a lover if thou hast not one, since even ChÂranship to Kings is not sufficient for a woman! Now, wert thou but man thou mightst be true.----"

It was as if the dam of the lake below had suddenly given way, letting loose a flood over the land, and he raised his arm in unconscious self-defence as, like a tornado, Âtma swept upon him, flourishing the sword.

"Lo! Maheshwar Rao, Brahmin, BhÂt-bandi!" she cried, giving him all his racial titles, "have a care what thou sayest! Yea! since the long-dead day when Shiv-jee created us from the sweat-drops of his godly brow, and jealous Parvati his wife--womanhood incarnate--exiled us from Paradise because we sang his praises overloud--ever since then we ChÂrans have been true, whether God makes us man or woman! Dost deny it? Then by the long discipleship of thy upstart race--formed by Parvati to sing her trivial worth--to mine, I do command thee to remember that I am champion to the King. Dost hear, Maheshwar Rao? Does Akbar need aught? Stands his honour firm? Lo! if thou speakest not, I die!"

The sword's point clattered on the brick roof, she snatched the death dagger of her race from its altar and stood ready to strike.

"Nay! sister," replied Birbal coolly, for the very heat of her harangue had given him time for calm. "There is no need to die--yet." Here, in a flash, a sudden thought came to him and he settled himself back on the parapet with a faint laugh. Set a thief to catch a thief, a woman to catch a woman! The intensity on this one's face might be useful to him. Having long since constituted himself the eyes and ears, as it were, of Akbar's empire, he had countless emissaries, endless spies, everywhere; but he had not yet employed a woman. It could do no harm to try one where all the cunning of man had failed.

"Sit thee down, sister," he said, after a moment's thought, "and I will tell thee wherein thou canst serve the King's need. Thou knowest Siyah Yamin----"

"What! hath the King need of her?" asked Âtma incredulously.

Birbal laughed shortly. "Nay, no one hath need of her; so she must die."

The face opposite his paled. "Wherefore?" she asked briefly.

"Because she may be the undoing of empire," he replied. "Hearken, so thou mayest understand."

"Siyah Yamin," she echoed in a puzzled voice when he had told her of the Syed's appeal and the certainty that the courtesan would swear to having read the Kalma and thus prove the legality of her marriage. "Nay! she cannot swear!"

"Not if a bowstring find her throat first," retorted Birbal viciously; "naught else will stop a woman's tongue, especially if marriage be the subject. Therefore she must be found and--and--lost again! She is in the city; that we know. Where, no one can compass. If thou couldst find out----"

"There is no need," said Âtma slowly; "she--she will not swear!"

Birbal was on his feet with a laugh. "A woman will swear anything for one she loves or hates, and Siyah Yamin hates the King. Whether she love JamÂl-ud-din is another matter. So fare thee well, Âtma Devi championess of Kings. Lo! I have given thee thy ChÂran chance. As for the rebeck player--I shall find him yet!"

After Birbal left, Âtma sate thinking. There was something which she remembered about SiyÂla, which little SiyÂla, the darling of the Gods, must remember also.

Or would she pretend to forget it? If she did, then she, Âtma, must speak, must protest, if needs be die to witness to it.

Then, if she died it would be death to Siyah Yamin who was SiyÂla, sister of the veil.

Âtma roused herself and stood listening. A faint sound of slumbering breath drawn evenly met her ear as she paused at the door of the slip of a room where ZarÎfa lay hidden. The child was asleep and could be left for an hour or two at any rate.

Hastily discarding her ChÂran's dress she put on the poppy-petalled red skirt and veil of the mad singer, so catching up her hourglass drum passed into the street. Her cry,

"May the Gods pity us, dreamers who dream of their Godhead"

echoing out into the closed courtyards as she hurried down the narrow alley.

"List! that is Âtma back again," yawned a woman sleepily sitting down to the mill-wheel beside the piled basket of wheat which was to serve for the family breakfast. "I deemed she had been dead these days past. But I will get her to tell me my fortune. What she told Gobind SÂhÂi's wife hath come true. She hath twin sons, and praise be to the gods! her husband is not suspicious."

The last item of information was evidently more racy than the first, and the women's voices gossiped over it rising above the hum of the mill wheel.

Âtma meanwhile had made her way straight to the bazaar. Here and there a figure huddled in a white shawl showed wandering outward, water-pot in hand, a seller of milk or two, a woman bearing a heaped basket of green-stuff passed inward, but for the most part the cavernous shops stood closed or empty, for it was yet early hours. A woman blew loudly at a pile of dried leaves under a toasting pan. The little spark left in the charcoal below showed red, then white, amid the gray ashes, and with a roaring crackle the flame leapt upward. A man guiltless of all clothing save a rag, pared his nails solemnly into the gutter. But in the house where Âtma entered all was silent. A medley of musical instruments lay piled on the floor, and in a corner, his head resting on his drum, snored Deena the drum-banger. Âtma passed over to him swiftly and woke him by a touch. The old man started to his feet with commendable activity; then was on the ground again in profuse salaam.

"Now am I saved from sin, mistress most chaste," he began vociferously. "Lo! since I ceased drumming to the deeds of dead kings, I have been a lost soul utterly. I have damned myself by giving time to profligate steps. I have sung lewd songs. But what will ye? A drum ever keeps bad company; being in sooth naught but the devil of a noise that groweth worse instead of better by being whacked----"

"Peace, fool!" said Âtma sternly, "I have need of thee. Where hast been of late?"

Deena sate down and began drumming softly with one finger, an insistent, devilish sort of drumming that seemed created to conceal something. Then he winked a wicked old eye.

"Hal-lal-lal-la-la!" he said gaily. "So old Deena is best gossip-maker to the town. Truly he hears much; for, see you, there is something that brings confidence to scandal in the continuous burring of a drum. It seems to cover all, so folk speak free; and an old ear listens. What dost desire to know, mistress most chaste?"

"Hast heard ought of Siyah Yamin?" asked Âtma readily.

Deena chuckled. "Other folks ask that, my lord Birbal to wit. Hol-lah! The whole town is agog to know news of God knows what--Siyah Yamin, the King's Luck----"

"What of the King's Luck?" interrupted Âtma Devi with a frown.

"Only that he hath given it away as a present to the Queen from over the Black Water of whom the new infidels talk," replied Deena with a yawn, for he had had a night of it at the Lord High Chamberlain's.

The frown deepened. "It is a lie!" she said peremptorily. "The King is no fool; his luck is with him ever. But see--take up thy drum and follow. To-day I will sing of dead kings and listen for the sake of a living one; so I need thy banging."

Deena rose with alacrity. "And my drum needs thee, mistress. 'Tis an evil instrument. But for its hindrance I could sing hymns"--he began one dolorously, then paused shaking his head. "Lo! it hath no discrimination--a holy psalm is even the same to it as a ribald rhyme. Yea! yea! I follow. I will drum to the herald of a live king and forget my sins."

So that day Âtma Devi, the mad singer, reappeared in the city, flitting hither and thither, chanting of dead kings, listening for the sake of a live one.

But she heard nothing; yet as the day drew down she realised that the need of news was urgent; for the whole town talked of Siyah Yamin and the King's Luck.

As she sate in the moonlight on her roof that night she told herself yet once again that if the worst came to the worst she could but die to attest the truth of what she remembered. But then the burden of disproof would be laid on the courtesan, and if she failed she too must die.

Poor little SiyÂla! Better far if she could be warned; be persuaded not to affirm this marriage.

"At the tank steps at dawn to-morrow," said Âtma briefly, as late in the evening she parted with Deena at the foot of the stairs. She would do her utmost. ZarÎfa could be put to sleep with a pellet of the Dream-compeller; so she would be free to spend every hour in search of Siyah Yamin.