Chapter XV: Oeconomic Reflections of the Old Man of Musse

Jehane, called Gulzareen, the Golden Rose, had borne three children to the Old Man of Musse. She was suckling the third, and teaching her eldest, the young Fulke of Anjou, his Creed, or as much of it as she could remember, when there came up a herald from Tortosa who bore upon his tabard the three leopards of England. He delivered a sealed letter thus superscribed--

'La très-haulte et ma très chère dame, Madame Jehane, Comtesse d'Anjou, de la part le Roy Richard. Hastez tousjours.'

The letter was brought to the Old Man as he sat in his white hail among his mutes.

'Fulness of Light,' said the Vizier, after prostrations, 'here is come a letter from the Melek Richard, sealed, for her Highness the Golden Rose.'

'Give it to me, Vizier,' said the Old Man, and broke the seal, and read--

'Madame, most dear lady, in a very little while I shall be free from my desperate nets; and then you shall be freed from yours. Keep a great heart. After five years of endeavour at last I come quickly.--Richard of Anjou.'

The Old Man sat stroking his fine beard for some time after he had dismissed his Vizier. Looking straight before him down the length of his hail, no sound broke the immense quiet under which he accomplished his meditations of life and death. The Assassins dreaming by the walls breathed freely through their noses.

As a small voice heard from far off in these dreams of theirs, the voice of one calling from a distant height, came his words, 'Cogia ibn Hassan ibn Alnouk, come and hearken.' A slim young man rose, ran forward and fell upon his face before the throne. Once more the faint far cry came floating, 'Bohadin son of Falmy of Balsora, come and hearken'; and another white-robed youth followed Cogia.

'My sons,' said the Old Man, 'the word is upon you. Go to the West for forty days. In the country of the Franks, in the south parts thereof, but north of the great mountains, you shall find the Melek Richard, admirable man, whom Allah longs for. Strike, my sons, but from afar (for not otherwise shall ye dare him), and gain the gates of Paradise and the soft-bosomed women of your dreams. Go quickly, prepare yourselves.' The two young men crawled to kiss his foot; then they went out, and silence folded the hail of audience once more like a wrapping.

Later in the day a slave-girl told Jehane that her master was waiting for her. The baby was asleep in the cradle under a muslin veil; she kissed Fulke, a fine tall boy, six and a half years old, and followed the messenger.

The Old Man embraced her very affectionately, kissed her forehead and raised her from her knees. 'Come and sit with me, beautiful and pious wife, mother of my sons,' said he. 'I have many things to say to you.'

When they were close together on the cushions of the window, Sinan put his arm round her waist, and said, 'For a good and happy marriage, my Gulzareen, it is well that the woman should not love her husband too much, but rather be meek, show obedience to his desires, and alacrity, and give courtesy. The man must love her, and honour that in her which makes her worth, her beauty, to wit, the bounty of her fruitfulness, and her discretion. But for her it is enough that she suffer herself to be loved, and give him her duty in return. The love that seeds in her she shall bestow upon her children. That is how peace of mind grows in the world, and happiness, for without the first there can never be the second. You, my child, have a peaceful mind: is it not so?'

'My lord,' Jehane replied, with no sign of the old discontent upon her red mouth, 'I am at peace. For I have your affection; you tell me that I deserve it. And I give my children love.'

'And you are happy, Jehane?'

She sighed, ever so lightly. 'I should be happy, my lord. But sometimes, even now, I think of King Richard, and pray for him.'

'I believe that you do,' said the Old Man. 'And because I desire your happiness in all things, I desire you to see him again.'

A bright blush flooded Jehane, whose breath also became a trouble. By a quick movement she drew her veil about her, lest he should see her unquiet breast. So the mother of Proserpine might have been startled into new maidenhood when, in her wanderings, some herd had claimed her in love. Her husband watched her keenly, not unkindly. Jehane's trouble increased; he left her alone to fight it. So at last she did; then touched his hand, looking deeply into his face. He, loving her greatly, held her close.

'Well, Joy of my Joy?'

'Lord,' she said, speaking hurriedly and low, 'let me not see him, ask it not of me. It is more than I dare. It is more than would be right; I ask it for his sake, not for mine. For he has a great heart, the greatest heart that ever man had in the world; also he is sudden to change, as I know very well; and the sight of me denied him might move him to a desperate act, as once before it did.' She lowered her head lest he should see all she had to show. He smiled gravely, stroking her hand and playing with it, up and down.

'No, child, no,' he said, 'it will do you no harm now. The harm, I take it, has been done: soon it will be ended. You shall hear from his own lips that he will not hurt you.'

Jehane looked at him in wonder, startled out of confusion of face.

'Do you know more of him than I do, sire?' she asked, with a quick heart.

'I believe that I do,' replied the Old Man; 'and take my word for it, dear child, that I wish him no ill. I wish him,' he continued very deliberately, 'less ill than he has sought to do himself. I wish him most heartily well. And you, my girl, whom I have grown wisely and tenderly to love; you, my Golden Rose, Moon of the Caliph, my stem, my vine, my holy vase, my garden of endless delight--for you I wish, above all things, rest after labour, refreshment and peace. Well, I believe that I shall gain them for you. Go, therefore, since I bid you, and take with you your son Fulke, that his father may see and bless him, and (if he think fit) provide for him after the custom of his own country. And when you have learned, as learn you will, from his mouth what I am sure he will tell you, come back to me, my Pleasant Joy, and rest upon my heart.'

Jehane sighed, and wrought with her fingers in her lap. 'If it must be, sire--'

'Why, of course it must be,' said the Old Man briskly.

He sent her away to the harem with a kiss on her mouth, and had in Cogia, and Bohadin son of Falmy of Balsora. To these two rapt Assassins he gave careful instructions, which there was no mistaking. The Golden Rose, properly attended, would accompany them as far as Marseilles. She would journey on to Pampluna and abide in the court of the King of Navarre (who loved Arabians, as his father before him) until such time as word was brought her by one of them, the survivor, that they had found King Richard, and that he would see her. Then she would set out, attended by the Vizier, the chief of the eunuchs, and the Mother of Flowers, and act as she saw proper.

Very soon after this the galley left the marble quay of Tortosa upon a prosperous voyage through blue water. Jehane, her son Fulke of Anjou, and the other persons named, were in a great green pavilion on the poop. But she saw nothing, and knew nothing, of Cogia ibn Hassan ibn Alnouk or of Bohadin son of Falmy of Balsora.