The Shaving of Shagpat - George Meredith (bookreader TXT) 📗

to it he beheld the black-eyed Queen gathered up, folded temptingly, like a swaying fruit; she with the gold circlet on her head, and she was fair as blossom of the almond in a breeze of the wafted rose-leaf. Sweetly was she gathered up, folded temptingly, and Shibli Bagarag refrained from using the Lily, thinking, “ ’Tis like the great things foretold of me, this having of Queens within the very grasp, swinging to and fro as if to taunt backwardness!” Then he thought, “ ’Tis an enchantress! I will yet try her.” So he made a motion of flourishing the Lily once or twice, but forbore, fascinated, for she had on her fair face the softness of sleep, her lips closed in dimples, and the wicked fire shut from beneath her lids. Mastering his mind, the youth at last held the Lily to her, and saw a sight to blacken the world and all bright things with its hideousness. Scarce had he time to thrust the Lily in his robes, when the Queen started up and clapped her hands, crying hurriedly, “Abarak! Abarak!” and the little man appeared in a moment at the door by which Shibli Bagarag had entered the orchard. So, she cried still, “Abarak!” and he moved toward her. Then she said, “How came this youth here, prying in my private walks, my bowers? Speak!”

He answered, “By the aid of Garraveen only, O Queen! and there is no force resisteth the bar so wielded.”

Rabesqurat looked under her brows at Shibli Bagarag and saw the horror on his face, and she cried out to Abarak in an agony, “Fetch me the mirror!” Then Abarak ran, and returned ere the Queen had drawn seven impatient breaths, and in one hand he bore a sack, in the other a tray: so he emptied the contents of the sack on the surface of the tray; surely they were human eyes! and the Queen flung aside her tresses, and stood over them. The youth saw her smile at them, and assume tender and taunting manners before them, and imperious manners, killing glances, till in each of the eyes there was a sparkle. Then she flung back her head as one that feedeth on a mighty triumph, exclaiming, “Yet am I Rabesqurat! wide is my sovereignty.” Sideways then she regarded Shibli Bagarag, and it seemed she was urging Abarak to do a deed beyond his powers, he frowning and pointing to the right wrist of the youth. So she clenched her hands an instant with that feeling which knocketh a nail in the coffin of a desire not dead, and controlled herself, and went to the youth, breaking into beams of beauty; and an enchanting sumptuousness breathed round her, so that in spite of himself he suffered her to take him by the hand and lead him from that orchard through the shivered door and into the palace and the hall of the jasper pillars. Strange thrills went up his arm from the touch of that Queen, and they were as little snakes twisting and darting up, biting poison-bites of irritating blissfulness.

Now, the hall was spread for a feast, and it was hung with lamps of silver, strewn with great golden goblets, and viands, coloured meats, and ordered fruits on shining platters. Then said she to Shibli Bagarag, “O youth! there shall be no deceit, no guile between us. Thou art but my guest, I no bride to thee, so take the place of the guest beside me.”

He took his seat beside her, Abarak standing by, and she helped the youth to this dish and that dish, from the serving of slaves, caressing him with flattering looks to starve aversion and nourish tender fellowship. And he was like one that slideth down a hill and can arrest his descent with a foot, yet faileth that free-will. When he had eaten and drunk with her, the Queen said, “O youth, no other than my guest! art thou not a prince in the country thou comest from?”

In a moment the pride of the barber forsook him, and he equivocated, saying, “O Queen! there is among the stars somewhere, as was divined by the readers of planets, a crown hanging for me, and I search a point of Earth to intercept its fall.”

She marked him beguiled by vanity, and put sweetmeats to his mouth, exclaiming, “Thy manners be those of a prince!” Then she sang to him of the loneliness of her life, and of one with whom she wished to share her state⁠—such as he. And at her signal came troops of damsels that stood in rings and luted sweetly on the same theme⁠—the Queen’s loneliness, her love. And he said to the Queen, “Is this so?”

She answered, “Too truly so!”

Now, he thought, “She shall at least speak the thing that is, if she look it not.” So he took the goblet, and contrived to drop a drop from the phial of Paravid therein without her observing him; and he handed her the goblet, she him; and they drank. Surely, the change that came over the Queen was an enchantment, and her eyes shot lustre, her tongue was loosed, and she laughed like one intoxicated, lolling in her seat, lost to majesty and the sway of her magic, crying, “O Abarak! Abarak! little man, long my slave and my tool; ugly little man! And O Shibli Bagarag! nephew of the barber! weak youth! small prince of the tackle! have I not nigh fascinated thee? And thou wilt forfeit those two silly eyes of thine to the sack. And, O Abarak, Abarak! little man, have I flattered thee? So fetter I the strong with my allurements! and I stay the arrow in its flight! and I blunt the barb of high intents! Wah! I have drunk a potent stuff; I talk! Wullahy! I know there is a danger menacing Shagpat, and the eyes of all genii are fixed on him. And if he be shaved,