H. Rider Haggard

“ Sometimes something waves a magic wand over his being, and from the recesses of his soul dim things arise and walk. At unexpected moments they come, and he grows aware of the issues of his mysterious life, and his heart shakes and shivers like a lightning-shattered tree. In that drear light all earthly things seem far, and all unseen things draw near and take shape and awe him, and he knows not what is true and what is false, neither can he trace the edge that marks off the Spirit from the Life. Then it is that the footsteps echo, and the ghostly footprints will not be stamped out. ”

“ Ah! those footsteps of one dead that will echo through our lives, those woman’s footprints on the marble flooring which will not be stamped out. Most of us have heard and seen them at some time or other, and I hear and see them very plainly to-night. Poor dead wife, I wonder if there are any doors in the land where you have gone through which you can creep out to look at me to-night? I hope that there are none. Death must indeed be a hell if the dead can see and feel and take measure of the forgetful faithlessness of their beloved. ”

“ Upwards or downwards, such is the law of the universe in which nothing can stand still. Up from the earth which Barbara had left came the spirit shape of all that lived and could die, even to that of the flower. But down to the earth it seemed that much of it was whirled again, to ascend once more in an age to come, since though the stream of life pulses continually forward, it has its backwash and its eddies. ”

“ Yet, O Imba, I will say this—that I believe your law to be higher and better than my law. Has it not been shown to-day, since of all that were gathered on the rock yonder I alone was struck down and in the hour of my victory? The strongest law must be the best law, is it not so? Tell me, Little Flower, would it please you if I died a Christian?”
“Yes, very much,” said Tabitha, fixing upon this point at once and by instinct avoiding all the other very doubtful disputations. “I will bring my father.” ”

“ Smith found himself very wide awake indeed. Never in all his life did he remember being more so, not even in the hour of its great catastrophe, or when his godfather, Ebenezer, after much hesitation, had promised him a clerkship in the bank of which he was a director. His nerves seemed strung tight as harp-strings, and his every sense was painfully acute. Thus he could even smell the odour of mummies that floated down from the upper galleries and the earthy scent of the boat which had been buried for thousands of years in sand at the foot of the pyramid of one of the fifth dynasty kings. ”

“ Seizing a shovel, he began to dig at the doorway of the tomb, whilst the jackals howled louder than ever in astonishment. They were not used to such a sight. For thousands of years, as the old moon above could have told, no man, or at least no solitary man, had dared to rob tombs at such an unnatural hour.
When Smith had been digging for about twenty minutes something tinkled on his shovel with a noise which sounded loud in that silence.
“A stone which may come in handy for the jackals,” he thought to himself, shaking the sand slowly off the spade until it appeared. ”

“ As they approached they heard swelling from within those cracked and melancholy walls the sound of a fierce, defiant chant which Thomas guessed must be some ancient Zulu war-song, as indeed it was. It was a very impressive song, chanted by many people, which informed the listeners that those who sung it were the King’s oxen, born to kill the King’s enemies, and to be killed for the King, and so forth; a deep-noted, savage song that thrilled the blood, at the first sound of which the accordion gave a feeble wail and metaphorically expired. ”

“ Barbara went apart into a wilderness where thorns grew and there endured the agony of temptation. On the one hand lay the pure life of joy which, like the difficult path that had been shown to her, led upwards, ever upwards to yet greater joy, shared with those she loved. On the other hand lay the seething hell of Earth, to be once more endured through many mortal years and—a soul to save alive. None might counsel her, none might direct her. She must choose and choose alone. ”

“ O Imba! I give my people into your hand; now let your hand bend the twig as you would have it grow. Make them Christian if you will, or leave them heathen if you will; I care nothing. They are yours to drive upon whatever path you choose to set their feet, yours, O Imba, not Tombool’s. Also, I, who lack heirs, give you my cattle, all of them. Ivana, make known my words, and with them the curse of Menzi, the King’s child, the Umazisi, the Seer, on any who dare to disobey. Say to those of my House and to my people that henceforth the Maiden Imba is their lady and their mother. ”

“ Life was a door, a gateway. The door dreadful, the gate perilous, if you will, but beyond it lay no dream, no empty blackness. Beyond it stretched the Promised Land peopled with the lost who soon would be the found.
Barbara’s last illness was rapid. When she began to go she went swiftly.
“Can’t you save her?” asked her son of one of the doctors.
“The disease has gone too far,” he answered. “Moreover, it is impossible to save one who seeks to die.”
“Why does she seek to die?” blurted Anthony, glaring at him. ”

“ She was tall and somewhat fair-complexioned, with slumbrous, dark eyes, and on her face gleamed the mystic smile he loved. She wore a robe of simple white and a purple-broidered apron, a crown of golden uraei with turquoise eyes was set upon her dark hair as in her statue, and on her breast and arms were the very necklace and bracelets that he had taken from her tomb. She appeared to be somewhat moody, or rather thoughtful, for she leaned by herself against a balustrade, watching the throng without much interest.
Presently a Pharaoh, a black-browed, vigorous man with thick lips, drew near. ”

“ To-morrow the sands will have swept as level as ever, and the little boys will have to begin again. It is like that with our youthful love affairs, is it not? The tide of time comes up and sweeps them away, fortunately for ourselves. Now in your case, for instance, it is, I think, a happy thing for both of you that your sandhouse did not last. Is it not?”
Madeline sighed softly. “Yes, I suppose so,” she answered.
Bottles, behind the curtains, rapidly reviewed the past, and came to a different conclusion.
“Well, that is all done with,” said Sir Eustace cheerfully. ”

“ Thomas hesitated, then, being bold by nature, determined that he would see the thing through. After all, Menzi was an impostor and nothing else, and could work no more magic than he could himself. Here was a providential opportunity to expose him. So followed by the others he advanced into the crowd, which made way for him.
In an open space in its centre, sat Menzi wearing all his witch-doctor’s trappings, bladders in his hair, snakeskins tied about him, and the rest, but even in this grotesque attire still managing to look dignified. ”

“ Let the soul of that priest who first violated the tomb of the royal Ma-Mee be hunted down and given to the jaws of the Destroyer, that he may know the last depths of Death, if so the gods declare. But let this man go from among us unharmed, since what he did he did in reverent ignorance and because Hathor, Goddess of Love, guided him from of old. Love rules this world wherein we meet to-night, with all the worlds whence we have gathered or whither we still must go. Who can defy its power? ”

“ But on this one night of the year, that of the feast of him whom we call Osiris, but whom other nations have known and know by different names, it is given to us once more to be mortal for an hour, and, though we be but shadows, to renew the loves and hates of our long-perished flesh. Here for an hour we strut in our forgotten pomp; the crowns that were ours still adorn our brows, and once more we seem to listen to our people’s praise. Our hopes are the hopes of mortal life, our foes are the foes we feared, our gods grow real again, and our lovers whisper in our ears. ”

“ Before Thomas could answer, out from the ruined doorway of the Church issued a band of men—there might have been a hundred of them—clad in all the magnificent panoply of old-time Zulu warriors, with tall plumes upon their heads, large shields upon their arms, kilts about their middles, and fringes of oxtails hanging from their knees and elbows. They formed into a double line and advanced, waving broad-bladed assegais. Then at a signal they halted by the wagon and uttered a deep-throated salute. ”

“ Just so, reflected Smith, had their forefathers sung when, millenniums ago, they dragged that very sarcophagus from the quarries to the Nile, and from the Nile to the tomb whence it reappeared to-day, or when they slid the casing blocks of the pyramids up the great causeway and smooth slope of sand, and laid them in their dizzy resting-places. Only then each line of the immemorial chant of toil ended with an invocation to Amen, now transformed to Allah. ”

“ On he went, mummies to his right, mummies to his left, of every style and period, till he began to feel as though he never wished to see another dried remnant of mortality. He peeped into the room where lay the relics of Iouiya and Touiyou, the father and mother of the great Queen Taia. Cloths had been drawn over these, and really they looked worse and more suggestive thus draped than in their frigid and unadorned blackness. He came to the coffins of the priest-kings of the twentieth dynasty, formidable painted coffins with human faces. ”

“ But Ma-Mee did not wait. She raised her hand so swiftly that the bracelets jingled on her wrists, and spoke out with boldness.
“Royal Khaemuas, prince and magician,” she said, “hearken to one who, like you, was Egypt’s heir centuries before you were born, one also who ruled over the Two Lands, and not so ill—which, Prince, never was your lot. Answer me! Is all wisdom centred in your breast? Answer me! Do you alone know the mysteries of Life and Death? Answer me! Did your god Amen teach you that vengeance went before mercy? Answer me! Did he teach you that men should be judged unheard? ”

“ Suddenly the old Zulu, Menzi, became rather terrible; he drew himself up; he seemed to swell in size; his thin face grew set and fierce.
“Out of the path, White-man!” he said, “or by Chaka’s head I will kill you,” and from somewhere he produced a long, thin-bladed knife of native iron fixed on a buck’s horn.
“Kill on, Wizard,” shouted Thomas. “Kill if you can.”
“Listen,” said Dorcas. “If our daughter dies because of you, then I have done with you. We part for ever. Do you understand?” ”

“ He rose as they came, saluted Thomas and smiled at Dorcas and Tabitha, very sweetly at the latter.
“O Teacher,” he said, “my ears hear that you say that I am a liar and a cheat who have no wonders at my command; to whom the Spirits never speak and who deceives the people. Now, Teacher, I have come here that it may be seen whether you are right or I am right. If your magic is greater than mine, then I can do nothing and I will eat the dust before you. ”

“ Before him, rank upon rank of them, stood the kings and queens of Egypt. As though at a given signal, they bowed themselves to the Osiris, and ere the tinkling of their ornaments had died away, lo! Osiris was gone. But in his place stood another, Isis, the Mother of Mystery, her deep eyes looking forth from beneath the jewelled vulture-cap. Again the congregation bowed, and, lo! she was gone. But in her place stood yet another, a radiant, lovely being, who held in her hand the Sign of Life, and wore upon her head the symbol of the shining disc—Hathor, Goddess of Love. ”

“ In a very comfortable arm-chair in front of a warm fire (for the month is November) sits the Bottles of old days—bigger, uglier, shyer than ever, and in addition, disfigured by an assegai wound through the cheek. Opposite to him, and peering at him occasionally with fond curiosity through an eyeglass, is his brother, a very different stamp of man. Sir Eustace Peritt is a well-preserved, London-looking gentleman, of apparently any age between thirty and fifty. His eye is so bright, his figure so well preserved, that to judge from appearances alone you would put him down to the former age. ”

“ Where the sun had vanished long bars of purple lay above the horizon; to his excited fancy they looked like the gateway of another and a better world, set, as the old Egyptians dreamed, above the uttermost pylons of the West. What lay there beyond the sun? Oh! what lay beyond the sun? Perhaps, even now, Barbara knew!
A figure appeared standing upon a sand dune between the pathway and the sea. Septimus was short-sighted and could not tell who it was, but in this place at this hour doubtless it must be a parishioner, perhaps one waiting to see him upon some important matter. ”

“ On this occasion he was engaged in denouncing the vices and pettiness of modern woman—upper-class modern woman—of whom he knew nothing at all, a topic that appealed to an East End congregation. He showed how worthless was this luxurious stamp of females, what a deal they thought of dress and of other more evil delights. He compared them to the Florentines whom Savonarola (in his heart Thomas saw resemblances between himself and that great if narrow man) scourged till they wept in repentance and piled up their jewels and fripperies to be burned.
What do they do with their lives, he asked. ”

“ When first I saw this landscape it was suffused with a sweet and pearly light, that came not from sun or moon or stars, but from a luminous body in shape like a folded fan, of which the handle rested on the earth. By degrees this fan began to open; I suppose that it was the hour of dawn. Its ribs of gorgeous light spread themselves from one side of heaven to the other and were joined together by webs of a thousand colours, of such stuff as the rainbow, only a hundred times more beautiful. ”

“ Oh! happy was her life with Anthony, for there, though now sex as we know it had ceased to be, spirit grew ever closer to spirit, and as below they dreamed and hoped, their union had indeed become an altar on which Love’s perfect fire flamed an offering to Heaven. Happy, too, was her communion with those other souls that had been mingled in her lot, and with many more whom she had known aforetime and elsewhere and long forgotten. For Barbara learned that life is an ancient story of which we spell out the chapters one by one. ”

“ It sped towards them through the air, a great dark object. Men ran this way and that, so that it fell upon the rock where none stood. It fell; it flew to pieces like an exploding shell, and its fragments hurtled over them with a screaming sound. Yet as it chanced the tongue or clapper of it took a lower course, perhaps because it was heavier, and rushing onwards like a thrown spear, struck Menzi full upon the chest, crushing in his breast bone. ”

“ Look at her,” and he pointed to Tabitha, who notwithstanding the venom sucking and the grass tied round her blackened finger, sat huddled-up, shivering and half comatose.
“Let me pass, White-man, that I may save her if I can,” he went on.
“Get back,” said Thomas, “I will have none of your black magic practised on my daughter. If she is to live God will save her.”
“What medicines have you, White-man?” asked Menzi.
“None, at least not here. Faith is my medicine.”
Dorcas looked at Tabitha. She was turning blue and her teeth were chattering. ”