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

uncombed buffalo, the plumaged cock, but soon will he be like nothing else save the wrinkled kernel of a shaggy fruit. Lo, now, the Sword! it leapeth to be at him, and ’twill be as the keen icicle of winter to that perishing foliage, that doomed crop! So doth the destined minute destroy with a flash the hoarded arrogance of ages; and the destined hand doeth what creation failed to perform; and ’tis by order, destiny, and preordainment, that the works of this world come to pass. This know I, and I witness thereto that am of a surety ordained to the Shaving of Shagpat!”

Then he stood apart and gazed from Shagpat to the city that now began to move with the morning; elephants and coursers saddled by the gates of the King’s palace were visible, and camels blocking the narrow streets, and the markets bustling. Surely, though the sun illumined that city, it was as a darkness behind Shagpat singled by the beams of Aklis.

The Plot

Now, while Shibli Bagarag gazed on Shagpat kindled by the beams of Aklis, lo, the genii Karavejis and Veejravoosh circling each other in swift circles like two sapphire rings toward him, and they whirled to a point above his head, and fell and prostrated themselves at his feet: so he cried, “O ye slaves of the Sword, my servitors! how of the whereabout of Karaz?”

They answered, “O Master of the Event, we found him after many circlings far off, and ’twas by the borders of the Putrid Sea. We came not close on him, for he is stronger than we without the Sword, but it seemed he was distilling drops of an oil from certain substances, large thickened drops that dropped into a phial.”

Then Shibli Bagarag said, “The season of weakness with me is over, and they that confide in my strength, my cunning, my watchfulness, my wielding of the Sword, have nought to fear for themselves. Now, this is my plot, O Feshnavat⁠—that part of it in which thou art to have a share. ’Tis that thou depart forthwith to the City yonder, and enter thy palace by a back entrance, and I will see that thou art joined within an hour of thy arrival there by Baba Mustapha, my uncle, the gabbler. He is there, as I guess by signs; I have had warnings of him. Discover him speedily. Thy task is then to induce him to make an attempt on the head of Shagpat in all wiliness, as he and thou think well to devise. He will fail, as I know, but what is that saying of the poet?

“ ‘Persist, if thou wouldst truly reach thine ends,
For failures oft are but advising friends.’

“And he says:

“ ‘Every failure is a step advanced,
To him who will consider how it chanced.’

“Wherefore, will I that this attempt be made, keeping the counsel that is mine. Thou must tell Baba Mustapha I wait without the city to reward him by my powers of reward with all that he best loveth. So, when he has failed in his attempt on Shagpat, and blows fall plenteously upon him, and he is regaled with the accustomed thwacking, as I have tasted it in this undertaking, do thou waste no further word on him, for his part is over, and as is said:

“ ‘Waste not a word in enterprise!
Against⁠—or for⁠—the minute flies.’

“ ’Tis then for thee, O Feshnavat, to speed to the presence of the King in his majesty, and thou wilt find means of coming to him by a disguise. Once in the Hall of Council, challenge the tongue of contradiction to affirm Shagpat other than a baldpate bewigged. This is for thee to do.”

Quoth Feshnavat plaintively, after thought, “And what becometh of me, O thou Master of the Event?”

Shibli Bagarag said, “The clutch of the executioner will be upon thee, O Feshnavat, and a clamouring multitude around; short breathing-time given thee, O father of Noorna, ere the time of breathing is commanded to cease. Now, in that respite the thing that will occur, ’tis for thee to see and mark; sure, never will reverse of things be more complete, and the other side of the picture more rapidly exhibited, if all go as I conceive and plot, and the trap be not premature nor too perfect for the trappers; as the poet has declared:

“ ‘Ye that intrigue, to thy slaves proper portions adapt;
Perfectest plots burst too often, for all are not apt.’

“And I witness likewise to the excellence of his saying:

“ ‘To master an Event,
Study men!
The minutes are well spent
Only then.’

“Also ’tis he that says:

“ ‘The man of men who knoweth men, the Man of men is he!
His army is the human race, and every foe must flee.’

“So have I apportioned to thee thy work, to Baba Mustapha his; reserving to myself the work that is mine!”

Thereat Feshnavat exclaimed, “O Master of the Event, may I be thy sacrifice! on my head be it! and for thee to command is for me to obey! but surely, this Sword of thine that is in thy girdle, the marvellous blade⁠—’tis alone equal to the project and the shave; and the matter might be consummated, the great thing done, even from this point whence we behold Shagpat visible, as ’twere brought forward toward us by the beams! And this Sword swayed by thee, and with thy skill and strength and the hardihood of hand that is thine, wullahy! ’twould shear him now, this moment, taking the light of Aklis for a lather.”

Shibli Bagarag knotted the brows of impatience, crying, “Hast thou forgotten Karaz in thy calculations? I know of a surety what this Sword will do, and I wot the oil he distilleth strengtheneth Shagpat but against common blades. Yet shall it not be spoken of me, Shibli Bagarag, that I was tripped by my own conceit; the poet counselleth:

“ ‘When for any mighty end thou hast the aid of heaven,
Mount until thy strength shall