FullReads

………………….

Day was breaking over Mandakan, and all the city was a tender pink. Tower and minaret were like inverted cups of ruddy gold, and the streets all velvet dust, as Pango Dooni, guided by Cushnan Di, halted at the wood of wild peaches, and a great thicket near to the Aqueduct of the Failing Fountain, and looked out towards the Palace of the Dakoon. It was the time of peach blossoms, and all through the city the pink and white petals fell like the gay crystals of a dissolving sunrise. Yet there rose from the midst of it a long, rumbling, intermittent murmur, and here and there marched columns of men in good order, while again disorderly bands ran hither and hither with krises waving in the sun, and the red turban of war wound round their heads.

They could not see the front of the Palace, nor yet the Residency Square, but, even as they looked, a cannonade began, and the smoke of the guns curled through the showering peach-trees. Hoarse shoutings and cries came rolling over the pink roofs, and Cumner’s Son could hear through all the bugle-call of the artillery.

A moment later Cushnan Di was leading them through a copse of pawpaw trees to a secluded garden by the Aqueduct, overgrown with vines and ancient rose trees, and cherry shrubs. After an hour’s labour with spades, while pickets guarded all approach, an opening was disclosed beneath the great flag-stones of a ruined building. Here was a wide natural corridor overhung with stalactites, and it led on into an artificial passage which inclined gradually upwards till it came into a mound above the level by which they entered. Against this mound was backed a little temple in the rear of the Palace. A dozen men had remained behind to cover up the entrance again. When these heard Pango Dooni and the others in the Palace yard they were to ride straight for a gate which should be opened to them.

There was delay in opening the stone door which led into the temple, but at last they forced their way. The place was empty, and they rode through the Palace yard, pouring out like a stream of spectral horsemen from the altar of the temple. Not a word was spoken as Pango Dooni and his company galloped towards the front of the Palace. Hundreds of the Dakoon’s soldiers and terrified people who had taken refuge in the great court-yard, ran screaming into corners, or threw themselves in terror upon the ground. The walls were lined with soldiers, but not one raised his hand to strike–so sudden was the coming of the dreaded hillsman. They knew him by the black flag and the yellow sunburst upon it.

Presently Pango Dooni gave the wild battle-call of his tribe, and every one of his seven hundred answered him as they rode impetuously to the Palace front. Two thousand soldiers of the Dakoon, under command of his nephew, Gis-yo-Bahim, were gathered there. They were making ready to march out and defend the Palace. When they saw the flag and heard the battle-cry there was a movement backward, as though this handful of men were an overwhelming army coming at them. Scattered and disorderly groups of men swayed here and there, and just before the entrance of the Palace was a wailing group, by which stood two priests with their yellow robes and bare shoulders, speaking to them. From the walls the soldiers paused from resisting the swarming herds without.

“The Dakoon is dead!” cried Tang-a-Dahit.

As if in response came the wailing death-cry of the women of the Palace through the lattice windows, and it was taken up by the discomfited crowd before the Palace door.

“The Lord of all the Earth, the great Dakoon, is dead.”

Pango Dooni rode straight upon the group, who fled at his approach, and, driving the priests indoors, he called aloud:

“The Dakoon is living. Fear not!”