MICHAEL was held before the Emir's throne, at the foot
of the terrace, his hands bound behind his back.
His mother overcome at last by mental and physical torture,
had sunk to the ground, daring neither to look nor listen.
"Look while you may," exclaimed Feofar-Kahn, stretching his arm
towards Michael in a threatening manner. Doubtless Ivan Ogareff,
being well acquainted with Tartar customs, had taken in the full meaning
of these words, for his lips curled for an instant in a cruel smile;
he then took his place by Feofar-Khan.
A trumpet call was heard. This was the signal for the amusements
to begin. "Here comes the ballet," said Alcide to Blount;
"but, contrary to our customs, these barbarians give it
before the drama."
Michael had been commanded to look at everything. He looked.
A troop of dancers poured into the open space before the Emir's tent.
Different Tartar instruments, the "doutare," a long-handled guitar,
the "kobize," a kind of violoncello, the "tschibyzga," a long
reed flute; wind instruments, tom-toms, tambourines, united with
the deep voices of the singers, formed a strange harmony.
Added to this were the strains of an aerial orchestra, composed of
a dozen kites, which, fastened by strings to their centers,
resounded in the breeze like AEolian harps.
Then the dancers began. The performers were all of Persian origin;
they were no longer slaves, but exercised their profession at liberty.
Formerly they figured officially in the ceremonies at the court
of Teheran, but since the accession of the reigning family,
banished or treated with contempt, they had been compelled to seek
their fortune elsewhere. They wore the national costume, and were
adorned with a profusion of jewels. Little triangles of gold,
studded with jewels, glittered in their ears. Circles of silver,
marked with black, surrounded their necks and legs.
These performers gracefully executed various dances, sometimes alone,
sometimes in groups. Their faces were uncovered, but from time
to time they threw a light veil over their heads, and a gauze
cloud passed over their bright eyes as smoke over a starry sky.
Some of these Persians wore leathern belts embroidered
with pearls, from which hung little triangular bags.
From these bags, embroidered with golden filigree, they drew
long narrow bands of scarlet silk, on which were braided verses
of the Koran. These bands, which they held between them,
formed a belt under which the other dancers darted; and, as they
passed each verse, following the precept it contained, they either
prostrated themselves on the earth or lightly bounded upwards,
as though to take a place among the houris of Mohammed's heaven.
But what was remarkable, and what struck Alcide,
was that the Persians appeared rather indolent than fiery.
Their passion had deserted them, and, by the kind of dances
as well as by their execution, they recalled rather the calm
and self-possessed nauch girls of India than the impassioned
dancers of Egypt.
When this was over, a stern voice was heard saying:
"Look while you may!"
The man who repeated the Emir's words--a tall spare Tartar--
was he who carried out the sentences of Feofar-Khan against offenders.
He had taken his place behind Michael, holding in his hand a broad
curved saber, one of those Damascene blades which are forged
by the celebrated armorers of Karschi or Hissar.
Behind him guards were carrying a tripod supporting a chafing-dish
filled with live coals. No smoke arose from this, but a light
vapor surrounded it, due to the incineration of a certain aromatic
and resinous substance which he had thrown on the surface.
The Persians were succeeded by another party of dancers,
whom Michael recognized. The journalists also appeared to
recognize them, for Blount said to his companion, "These are
the Tsiganes of Nijni-Novgorod."
"No doubt of it," cried Alcide. "Their eyes, I imagine,
bring more money to these spies than their legs."
In putting them down as agents in the Emir's service, Alcide Jolivet was,
by all accounts, not mistaken.
In the first rank of the Tsiganes, Sangarre appeared,
superb in her strange and picturesque costume, which set off
still further her remarkable beauty.
Sangarre did not dance, but she stood as a statue in the midst
of the performers, whose style of dancing was a combination
of that of all those countries through which their race
had passed--Turkey, Bohemia, Egypt, Italy, and Spain. They were
enlivened by the sound of cymbals, which clashed on their arms,
and by the hollow sounds of the "daires"--a sort of tambourine
played with the fingers.
Sangarre, holding one of those daires, which she played between
her hands, encouraged this troupe of veritable corybantes.
A young Tsigane, of about fifteen years of age, then advanced.
He held in his hand a "doutare," strings of which he made
to vibrate by a simple movement of the nails. He sung.
During the singing of each couplet, of very peculiar rhythm,
a dancer took her position by him and remained there immovable,
listening to him, but each time that the burden came from the lips
of the young singer, she resumed her dance, dinning in his ears
with her daire, and deafening him with the clashing of her cymbals.
Then, after the last chorus, the remainder surrounded the Tsigane
in the windings of their dance.
At that moment a shower of gold fell from the hands of the Emir and
his train, and from the hands of his officers of all ranks; to the noise
which the pieces made as they struck the cymbals of the dancers,
being added the last murmurs of the doutares and tambourines.
"Lavish as robbers," said Alcide in the ear of his companion.
And in fact it was the result of plunder which was falling;
for, with the Tartar tomans and sequins, rained also Russian
ducats and roubles.
Then silence followed for an instant, and the voice of the executioner,
who laid his hand on Michael's shoulder, once more pronounced the words,
which this repetition rendered more and more sinister:
"Look while you may"
But this time Alcide observed that the executioner no longer held
the saber bare in his hand.
Meanwhile the sun had sunk behind the horizon. A semi-obscurity began
to envelop the plain. The mass of cedars and pines became blacker
and blacker, and the waters of the Tom, totally obscured in the distance,
mingled with the approaching shadows.
But at that instant several hundreds of slaves, bearing lighted
torches, entered the square. Led by Sangarre, Tsiganes and
Persians reappeared before the Emir's throne, and showed off,
by the contrast, their dances of styles so different.
The instruments of the Tartar orchestra sounded forth in harmony
still more savage, accompanied by the guttural cries of the singers.
The kites, which had fallen to the ground, once more winged
their way into the sky, each bearing a parti-colored lantern,
and under a fresher breeze their harps vibrated with intenser
sound in the midst of the aerial illumination.
Then a squadron of Tartars, in their brilliant uniforms,
mingled in the dances, whose wild fury was increasing rapidly,
and then began a performance which produced a very strange effect.
Soldiers came on the ground, armed with bare sabers and
long pistols, and, as they executed dances, they made the air
re-echo with the sudden detonations of their firearms,
which immediately set going the rumbling of the tambourines,
and grumblings of the daires, and the gnashing of doutares.
Their arms, covered with a colored powder of some metallic ingredient,
after the Chinese fashion, threw long jets--red, green, and blue--
so that the groups of dancers seemed to be in the midst of fireworks.
In some respects, this performance recalled the military dance
of the ancients, in the midst of naked swords; but this Tartar dance
was rendered yet more fantastic by the colored fire, which wound,
serpent-like, above the dancers, whose dresses seemed to be embroidered
with fiery hems. It was like a kaleidoscope of sparks, whose infinite
combinations varied at each movement of the dancers.
Though it may be thought that a Parisian reporter would be perfectly
hardened to any scenic effect, which our modern ideas have carried so far,
yet Alcide Jolivet could not restrain a slight movement of the head,
which at home, between the Boulevard Montmartre and La Madeleine would
have said--"Very fair, very fair."
Then, suddenly, at a signal, all the lights of the fantasia
were extinguished, the dances ceased, and the performers disappeared.
The ceremony was over, and the torches alone lighted up the plateau,
which a few instants before had been so brilliantly illuminated.
On a sign from the Emir, Michael was led into the middle of the square.
"Blount," said Alcide to his companion, "are you going to see
the end of all this?"
"No, that I am not," replied Blount.
"The readers of the Daily Telegraph are, I hope, not very eager
for the details of an execution a la mode Tartare?"
"No more than your cousin!"
"Poor fellow!" added Alcide, as he watched Michael. "That valiant
soldier should have fallen on the field of battle!"
"Can we do nothing to save him?" said Blount.
"Nothing!"
The reporters recalled Michael's generous conduct towards them;
they knew now through what trials he must have passed,
ever obedient to his duty; and in the midst of these Tartars,
to whom pity is unknown, they could do nothing for him.
Having little desire to be present at the torture reserved
for the unfortunate man, they returned to the town.
An hour later, they were on the road to Irkutsk, for it was among
the Russians that they intended to follow what Alcide called,
by anticipation, "the campaign of revenge."
Meantime, Michael was standing ready, his eyes returning the Emir's
haughty glance, while his countenance assumed an expression of intense
scorn whenever he cast his looks on Ivan Ogareff. He was prepared to die,
yet not a single sign of weakness escaped him.
The spectators, waiting around the square, as well as Feofar-Khan's
body-guard, to whom this execution was only one of the attractions,
were eagerly expecting it. Then, their curiosity satisfied,
they would rush off to enjoy the pleasures of intoxication.
The Emir made a sign. Michael was thrust forward by his
guards to the foot of the terrace, and Feofar said to him,
"You came to see our goings out and comings in, Russian spy.
You have seen for the last time. In an instant your eyes
will be forever shut to the day."
Michael's fate was to be not death, but blindness;
loss of sight, more terrible perhaps than loss of life.
The unhappy man was condemned to be blinded.
However, on hearing the Emir's sentence Michael's heart did not
grow faint. He remained unmoved, his eyes wide open, as though
he wished to concentrate his whole life into one last look.
To entreat pity from these savage men would be useless, besides,
it would be unworthy of him. He did not even think of it.
His thoughts were condensed on his mission, which had apparently
so completely failed; on his mother, on Nadia, whom he should never
more see! But he let no sign appear of the emotion he felt.
Then, a feeling of vengeance to be accomplished came over him.
"Ivan," said he, in a stern voice, "Ivan the Traitor, the last
menace of my eyes shall be for you!"
Ivan Ogareff shrugged his shoulders.
But Michael was not to be looking at Ivan when his eyes were put out.
Marfa Strogoff stood before him.
"My mother!" cried he. "Yes! yes! my last glance shall be
for you, and not for this wretch! Stay there, before me!
Now I see once more your well-beloved face! Now shall my eyes
close as they rest upon it . . . !"
The old woman, without uttering a word, advanced.
"Take that woman away!" said Ivan.
Two soldiers were about to seize her, but she stepped back and remained
standing a few paces from Michael.
The executioner appeared. This time, he held his saber
bare in his hand, and this saber he had just drawn from
the chafing-dish, where he had brought it to a white heat.
Michael was going to be blinded in the Tartar fashion,
with a hot blade passed before his eyes!
Michael did not attempt to resist. Nothing existed before
his eyes but his mother, whom his eyes seemed to devour.
All his life was in that last look.
Marfa Strogoff, her eyes open wide, her arms extended towards
where he stood, was gazing at him. The incandescent blade passed
before Michael's eyes.
A despairing cry was heard. His aged mother fell senseless
to the ground. Michael Strogoff was blind.
His orders executed, the Emir retired with his train.
There remained in the square only Ivan Ogareff and the torch bearers.
Did the wretch intend to insult his victim yet further,
and yet to give him a parting blow?
Ivan Ogareff slowly approached Michael, who, feeling him coming,
drew himself up. Ivan drew from his pocket the Imperial letter,
he opened it, and with supreme irony he held it up before
the sightless eyes of the Czar's courier, saying, "Read, now,
Michael Strogoff, read, and go and repeat at Irkutsk what you have read.
The true Courier of the Czar is Ivan Ogareff."
This said, the traitor thrust the letter into his breast.
Then, without looking round he left the square, followed
by the torch-bearers.
Michael was left alone, at a few paces from his mother, lying lifeless,
perhaps dead. He heard in the distance cries and songs, the varied
noises of a wild debauch. Tomsk, illuminated, glittered and gleamed.
Michael listened. The square was silent and deserted. He went,
groping his way, towards the place where his mother had fallen.
He found her with his hand, he bent over her, he put his face
close to hers, he listened for the beating of her heart.
Then he murmured a few words.
Did Marfa still live, and did she hear her son's words?
Whether she did so or not, she made not the slightest movement.
Michael kissed her forehead and her white locks. He then
raised himself, and, groping with his foot, trying to stretch
out his hand to guide himself, he walked by degrees to the edge
of the square.
Suddenly Nadia appeared. She walked straight to her companion.
A knife in her hand cut the cords which bound Michael's arms.
The blind man knew not who had freed him, for Nadia had not
spoken a word.
But this done: "Brother!" said she.
"Nadia!" murmured Michael, "Nadia!"
"Come, brother," replied Nadia, "use my eyes whilst yours sleep.
I will lead you to Irkutsk."
