Chapter VIII.
Nash stopped for brunch on his way to the sultan's without much gastronomic success. His throat was still too sore for him to enjoy solid food, and between the nippings of his conscience in the matter of the message, and uneasiness over his coming battle of wits with Arslan, he did not have much appetite. Common sense told him that he would need physical fortification, wherefore he doggedly forced a pint of milk into his queasy stomach.
The sultan's demesne was impossible to miss: it occupied a whole block around which ran a moat and a formidable wall. Flags bearing a black crescent on a yellow field flapped at the corners. Over the wall could be seen the top of a great cluster of pastel-shaded domes and spikes, like a colossal piece of costume jewelry.
The drawbridge was down and guarded by a couple of Moorish-looking individuals like the sextet Nash had fought on his first day on the astral plane.
The act had better be good, thought Nash. To be convincing he should combine the arrogance of a cavalier with the leisurely assurance of a high-ranking bureaucrat. When he got to know Arslan he could gradually drop this uncongenial role and be his amiable self.
With a final twirl to the spikes of his mustache he clattered over the drawbridge and dismounted just as the guards began to lower their pikes. He tossed the reins to one, not even bothering to see whether they were caught, and told the other in a coldly impersonal tone: "Inform the sultan that de Nêche of the Comptroller's Office is here, please."
It worked. In five minutes he was being conducted into an oriental fairy tale of a palace whose contours stirred memories; something from boyhood or early adolescence, but he could not quite locate the source—
"You wish to see the wazir, effendi?" said a gold-spangled flunky."If you will graciously condescend to wait—"
"Not the wazir, the sultan," Nash corrected.
"But the wazir handles all financial transactions—"
"The sultan, Arslan Bey," repeated Nash firmly.
"His magnificence is at lunch," said gold-leaf."If you will accompany me, I will inform him of your desire." The person led Nash to a gorgeous but chairless anteroom and left him standing there.
Nash walked slowly about the room, hands behind his back, plotting. A guard in the doorway stared woodenly at an invisible point straight in front of his eyes.
Nash's feet began to complain; he must have been pacing for an hour. These birds probably sat cross-legged on pillows, and it would be doubtful etiquette to demand a chair—
There was the sound of motion, and the guard moved aside. Instead of the sultan there entered a bejeweled eunuch and a pair of half-naked fellows Carrying an open chest slung from a pair of poles. The chest was full of gems that flashed until they swam before the eyes.
The fat eunuch bowed to Nash and squeaked: "Ah, M. de Nêche, but a short while and his magnificence will grant you audience, as a most gracious condescension on his part. These"—he waved a deprecating hand at the chest—"are a few of our lord's jewels, which have become soiled through wear. He has ordered them thrown away, wherefore I am on my way outside to scatter them where the poor can find them. Allah be with you, effendi." And out went the procession.
When Nash recovered from his astonishment, it occurred to him that this was nothing but a transparent gag to impress him. What if he had cried: "Hey, how about giving me some—" But no, that would have spoiled the impression that he in his turn was trying to build up.
This business of making him stand and wait by the hour was probably cut from the same cloth. Well, the answer was: "I wish a chair, you!"
The guard withdrew in his turn. Instead of a chair he brought back the spangled usher. This glittering being said: "Will you accompany me to the audience chamber, sir? His magnificence will join you as soon as he finishes his siesta."
At one side of the chamber was a raised section of flooring on which stood a large sofa. On the rest of the floor several hassocks were scattered. The idea, thought Nash, was that even though the ruler sprawled in oriental indolence on the sofa, he would still be higher than his interviewers. In the West you stood up, or used to, in a ruler's presence; in the East you sat or groveled. Two methods of putting a feeling of inferiority into hoi polloi; the Eastern, being aimed at the psyche rather than at the feet, was subtler.
Nash became uncomfortably aware of the fixed regard of this room's guard.
As he returned the stare with a puzzled frown, the guard strode toward him and burst out: "I know you, dog of a Frank! You are the panty-waist who slew two of us on the water front yesterday!" The guard's arm flashed up and back, and hurled his pike straight at Nash's throat.
Nash had just enough warning to twist sideways and down. The pike whizzed over his shoulder, struck the onyx wall behind him, and clattered to the floor. The guard's scimitar had just cleared its scabbard when Nash's rapier ran him through the body.
Nash held his breath, listening. Gosh, wasn't there any way to get along on this plane without killing people, which he loathed? What would he do with the body? Yes, there were footsteps, growing louder—
His horrified glance returned to the corpse—or at least to its recent site. The body itself had disappeared, leaving a pile of white garments and a steel helmet with fine chain mail attached to its brim. The footsteps came closer.
Nash wiped and sheathed his blade, scooped up the late guard's costume, and stuffed it down behind the royal settee. He tiptoed over to the pike and leaned it in a corner, and was strolling about with an innocent expression when his magnificence, Sultan Arslan Bey, arrived amidst a herd of eunuchs.
The sultan answered Nash's cavalier bow with a minute nod. When Nash straightened up and got a good look at the tyrant, he almost fell over.
Despite his more powerful build—that was to be expected—and the little black beard, shaped like the head of a battle-ax with its edge down, there was no doubt that Arslan Bey was the astral body of Nash's mundane friend Robert S. Lanby, ascetically inclined Y. M. C. A. clerk.
As the full implications struck him, Nash forgot about his latest homicide in the necessity of keeping a straight face. Pious, mousy little Bob Lanby really imagining himself a rip-snorting, infidel, polygamous despot! And the nervously withdrawn Alice Woodson, with her fear of the hairy and snorting male, planning to marry R. S. Lanby.
The sultan settled himself on the sofa; a dark boy took up a lace beside the sofa and waved a long-handled fan, though the room was, if anything, cool.
"We greet you, M. de Nêche," growled Arslan."Do we infer correctly that you come to see about... ha!" The sultan eyed Nash's rapier, then switched to the gold-speckled usher, who turned from mahogany to walnut.
"This," said the sultan heavily, "is the second time yon Nasr has admitted a guest without doing him the courtesy of relieving him of his weapon."
"I... I forgot, your magnificence—"
"Off with his head!" thundered the sultan. The eunuchs opened out, and a pair of huge bare-chested blacks pounced on the usher. One spread a small dark-red rug and forced the victim to kneel on it; the other hefted a two-handed curved sword.
"Wait!" said the sultan, "We do not wish to offend the sensibilities of our guest. The screen!"
A screen was brought and set up between Nash and the sultan on one hand and the cast of the execution on the other.
"Now," said Arslan cheerfully, "we can proceed with more agreeable matters—if you will hand your sword to Salah here, who replaces Nasr as usher. Be seated, m'sieur. Fetch coffee, knaves!"
Nash avoided a shudder as the executioner's blade swung high over the edge of the screen, then down with a chug. When the screen was removed the body of Nasr was already gone, leaving his glittering robe behind.