Part 9

About the third week of my imprisonment, when I had almost recovered from my wounds, but was like to fall ill from the irksomeness of my confinement and distress for my separation from Dolores, the keeper of the prison began to question me upon the subject of my arrest, and to ask me if I could suspect either the cause or my accuser? Having heard my father, when he was alone with me, talking upon the wiles of the Inquisitors, and bethinking me that the keeper would have far greater cause to assist his masters than to take pity upon me, I answered very guardedly, though with seeming ingenuousness, that I was entirely ignorant of both the one and the other. Upon this he urged me to confess anything that I could think of, and to petition the Holy Fathers for a day of hearing, in order that my case might be disposed of. But knowing somewhat of their tricks, and of how they ensnare the unwary, I replied that I was at their disposal, for them to do with me as they pleased. At this reply he could not conceal his displeasure, and it was not until fourteen days afterwards that I was cited before the Consistory. They then spoke to me as though I was merely before them to discharge a _pro-forma_ accusation, and bade me tell them all I knew, in order that they might send me back to my own house. This they did, hoping that I might unawares confess to some fault, or accuse some other, perhaps my father; and they earnestly charged me therefore to disburden my conscience, as they called it, persuading me that they went about nought else but to do me good for the very love and mere compassion which they had for me. When I humbly replied that I could think of no reasonable cause why anyone should denounce me to them, they answered that they could mete out sharp justice to the contumacious, and so sent me back to my cell. In the meanwhile they sent an officer to me called the ‘tutor,’ whom they appoint, as they pretend, to advise with the prisoner how he may best defend his case, but who in reality is only a spy who betrays many, and even the innocent, to his masters. I merely repeated to him what I had said before, and although he urged me to put my trust in him for that he was appointed to defend me, which he could not do unless I would deal candidly with him, yet I knew better, even had I been guilty, than to trust him. On the third day I was called before the Inquisitors again, who demanded of me if I was now resolved to make a clean breast of the affair, with an earnest request of me to do so for my own welfare, after their accustomed manner. If I would not, they threatened to use extremity towards me of what they could do by law, by which they mean extreme tormenting and mangling of men, but finding that I had nothing to confess, or, as they would have it, that I would confess nothing, they remitted me again to prison, and upon some information of my intended escape, which I discovered from the keepers’ inquiries, I was now put into an underground dungeon, which was even worse than the one in which I had been hitherto confined. As the Inquisitors could get no confession out of me, and moreover had no witnesses against me save the Count de Villegas, whom they knew to bear a grudge against me, for the reasons known to you, and since they had heard of the duello between us, and therefore suspected his testimony the more, they forbore to put me to the question, as they call it, that is to the rack and other tortures, though they rehearsed all the several torments to me as terribly as they could; and, indeed, I had almost fainted at their description, and the sight thereof. The place is a deep dungeon beneath the earth, with many doors to pass through ere we came to it, in order that those who are put to it should not be heard to shriek or cry. On the one side are raised seats with a canopy, where the Inquisitors are seated with their clerks, and the links being lighted in their sockets on the walls, they take their seats, and the prisoners are brought forth. Here he sees, as I did, in that dim and flickering light, the Inquisitors sitting in their red robes on the one side, flanked by their familiars in their gowns of white, with hoods which cover their faces, making them to resemble so many spirits or devils come to enjoy his tortures. The executioner, a brawny knave, stands hard by his instrument, which is in the midst of the apartment, clad all over in a close-fitting garment of black canvas, with a long black hood which reaches over so as to cover his face. The chief Inquisitor then urges him to speak the truth freely and voluntarily, otherwise it will be at his own peril. For if his arm or leg be broken in the rack, or if he receive other injuries so that he die thereof (for they mean not to deal gently with him), let him blame no one but himself; and so they think to salve their consciences. Then is he stripped to the skin, and his hands bound with a cord which passes over a pulley, so that he may be hoisted up. His feet likewise are weighted with heavy weights, and in this plight is he again summoned to tell them all he knows, which nevertheless does not satisfy them, but they sign to the executioner to hoist the poor wretch, and while he thus hangs, they fall to their persuasions once again, commanding the executioner to hoist him to the very beam till his head touch the pulley. Then, if he will not accuse both himself and all his acquaintance, they command to let him down again, and twice the weight that was afore to be affixed to his feet, when he is again hoisted, and suffered to hang a good while, which seems every minute an age to him, such is his great and momentarily increasing agony; every sinew in his body being strained, until, as most often happens, he swoons for his intolerable pain. Then the leech who stands by, not to cure, indeed, as is their office in less holy places, but merely to prolong his capacity for suffering, the leech, I say, gives orders to lower him down again, and after sousing him with cold water, administers a cordial, and then is the wretch again questioned. In his then state, though he be innocent, yet racked and dazed as he is, if he be able to speak at all he will now say anything that they wish, and one of the familiars leaning over him repeats aloud after him the confession that he can scarce whisper. If he be rich and they merely require an excuse to plunder him of all his possessions, this will satisfy them; but if, as is more often the case, they hope through him to get others within their net, they again give orders to hoist him, and bid the executioners so to jog the ropes that every limb is disjointed: arms, shoulders, back, and legs torn from their sockets, and the afflicted parts then swelling, the weights tell with more excruciating force. Then they begin to rail upon him, calling him dog and heretic, that will stand so obstinately in concealing the truth; and in this pitiful plight, half dead and more, if he pray them to let him down, promising to tell them somewhat, after he has said what he can, he is worse handled than before, because they think that now only he begins to broach his matters. For as soon as his tale is at an end they begin afresh to exhort, to threat, and to rack him, giving charge to haul him up and let him down again as I have already described, until the leech signifies by a private sign that if he suffer any more now his spirit will presently depart, and so he will escape out of their hands; when they leave him and let him down for that time, demanding of the executioner (to fright him), whether his other instruments be ready? To which the executioner answers that they be ready, but that he has not brought them with him. ‘Then see,’ they say, ‘that they be ready by to-morrow, and look that nothing be wanting, for we shall try one way or another to get the truth from this heretic.’ Thereupon they rise and go their way, while the leech restores the sufferer’s limbs as best he may, putting his arms and legs in their right joints again (if the swelling permit) and so he is carried back into his cell.

After two or three days are past he is again put to the question, and finds all ready as before; when, being bound to the rack, they again straitly fall to persuade him to utter somewhat, wherein, if he answers nothing, they carry him back to prison, but if he says ought, then in the hopes of getting more from him they again put him to the rack, and while he hangs bind his thighs and mid-leg together tightly with small but very strong cord, and then drive in wedges betwixt until the cords are hidden in the flesh; a very extreme and terrible torment. In this plight the poor soul is left for some hours until his legs almost mortify and the pain is beyond endurance. Nevertheless, they cease not to persuade and to entreat him, but if he still prove obstinate they employ another device the name of which is ‘_Buriorum Aselli_,’ and the manner of it is this: he is laid upon his back upon a trough of massy timber, across which just below his shoulders is a bar, so that his back may not settle to the bottom and he may have the less ease. When he is laid thereon, his arms, legs, and thighs are bound with very stout small cords, which they afterwards strain with sticks so that they pierce the flesh almost to the bone, insomuch that the cords can no longer be seen. Then they take a piece of fine linen, large enough to cover both his mouth and nose, and pour upon it water in a thin stream which bears down the linen into his mouth and throat so as to suffocate him, and yet he cannot move, so that when they pluck it out from the bottom of his throat, as they do many times to see whether he will answer their questions, the cloth is dyed with his blood and he suffers death by this torment many times over. All this was shown and explained to me, and I was led back to my cell almost dead with fear.

Lying thus in my new cell, which, as I have said, was changed, for some suspicion of my jailors, from the attics to a deep underground dungeon, trembling for the fear of what I had seen which I had too much reason to dread might be my fate, with but the cold hard stone for my pillow, I had nought to sustain me but the memory of the moments I had passed with Dolores, tormenting myself with the doubt lest she might give way to the wishes of her father and the importunities of the Count de Villegas. I went over in my mind all her words, and still more her looks and involuntary signs of love, torturing myself with the idea that they were but signs of common politeness, and that, though she might like me, yet did she not care for me to that degree that she would sacrifice her peace for my sake. How long I lay thus I had lost count, but it was certainly night, for my jailor had long since brought me my evening meal of beans or chickpeas boiled in oil, and also my pipkin of water; when presently I heard, as it were beneath me, a sound as of a pick plied with regular blows. To be sure I had heard it for some time, but it had not arrested my attention until now when I began to wonder as it came nearer what it might portend. Then I heard a mighty blow upon a stone at my feet; my heart leapt to my mouth, for, indeed, the terrors I had gone through and my long imprisonment had somewhat wasted my mettle, and I had almost shrieked aloud when the stone without further warning disappeared, leaving merely a cavity where it had been. I gazed intently, waiting to see what might happen, but all was silent for a time, and then I thought that indeed my wits had left me, for the sufferings I had gone through, for I seemed to hear my father’s voice, and lo! his head appeared as if it were rising through the pavement. I think that it was the indescribable look of tender pity that his face bore which quieted me and drove away my fear; I began to think that I had died and that my father had come to deliver me from the persecutors of this earth and to bring me to heavenly bliss, but my senses left me, and I knew no more until I found myself in a little dark chamber hardly illumined by a solitary candle, which only served to show my father’s face bending over me. I closed my eyes again, and then I heard his voice bidding me to remain quiet, and assuring me that I was now in safety and with him. Then he held a cordial to my lips, which revived me so that I could sit up and partake of food which he had prepared for me. When I had finished, I begged him to tell me where I was, and he answered me as follows.

‘You know, my son, that I have long studied the secrets handed down to us by the Moors, who once were all-powerful in this country; secrets which, so learnedly and skilfully are the books of their philosophers written, only those who have themselves studied much can hope to decipher. The Sierras which we see so close to us are veined with gold and silver; but I sought less to find the old mines which were formerly worked there and which our unskilful forefathers left to be forgotten, than the hiding-places which I felt sure the Moors had digged about this town, and in which they must have left from time to time much treasure in gold and jewels, and still more in those priceless works of their philosophers, which they alone of all the nations of the world in those barbarous days encouraged and honoured. From the works of one Abucaçim, I was led to believe that our house together with the mint had at one time been one of the defences of the town, the prison on the opposite banks of the stream being another, and, if that were the case, there should be a secret passage beneath the river communicating between the two. By much study I fixed upon the point, found the passage and chamber in which we now are, but alas! no sign of books or treasure. However, as I began to suspect that a hiding-place in time of need might be useful, I studied the whole of these underground workings, and found that while on the one hand they communicate with the mint and your prison-house, on the other a longer branch goes to a cavern situated in the hill which, you know, lies to the south of our city; a cavern only known to a few goatherds who have never dared to penetrate its depths. In this place I stored a few necessaries, and when you were arrested I made it my business to inquire as to the plan of your prison; when, finding that the passage had formerly opened into what is now an underground dungeon, and hearing that the cell you were in was situated beneath the roof, I spread abroad rumours that there was a plan of escape prepared for you, and so procured your removal to the cell from which I rescued you. I then learned that it was resolved also to arrest me, and therefore retired at once to my hiding-place to which I have now happily brought you; it only remains for us to fly the country, for I need not remind you that henceforth we shall never be safe in Spain. Your cell shows no sign of having been entered, the stone is replaced and is well filled in beneath so that it will not yield a hollow sound. Probably your jailor will be suspected of having assisted you, and will be tortured; such men must learn that there is not always safety in evil-doing, and that he who serves the devil will be rewarded with hell.’

We lay there perdue in our hiding-place for some three weeks until the hue and cry after us was somewhat abated; and then stole forth in the disguise of peasants, hiding by day in the vineyards, and only faring on by night, and so made our way to Tortosa, where my father had a friend, a merchant, who traded with Marseilles. To our joy, we found that he had a vessel now in harbour upon the point of sailing, to which he conveyed us in the guise of factors, and we got safely away without being discovered by the familiars of the Inquisition. You may guess, however, that I did not depart without leaving a letter for Dolores, which I gave into the hands of a muleteer who was just starting for Segovia. The letter was couched in the following words: ‘One who was unjustly persecuted has now escaped, but in leaving thee, he leaves all behind him that makes life valuable in his eyes. Oh, grant that he may look forward to the time when in a secure asylum he may hope to hear from thee!’ I have not much more to tell you. We were scarcely out of sight of the coast of Spain, when we were attacked by a couple of Sallee pirates, and though we fought desperately, we proved to be no match for them and were overpowered. My father, alas! was among the slain, and I was sold for the slave you see before you.

* * * * *

This story amused me: indeed, it always gave me pleasure to hear the stories of the slaves who were my fellows in captivity, and this not only for the tale, though all men love to hear stories of adventure, but also they served to remind me how many Turks were daily sent out of the world in their fights, which could not but be pleasing in the sight of God and man. Also it served to show how few men there are in this world equal to me in the virtues of manhood--skill, bravery, and quickness of resource. Most of these tales, indeed, were nought; for most of the slaves had been taken in the pursuit of their daily bread, sordid churls, who had lived their mechanic lives like the cattle of the fields. Nevertheless there was one story related to me by a Kurd from Hakkarieh which was entertaining enough to remain fixed in my memory, and which I shall call after its narrator, the ‘Story of Yousef ibn Ali.’

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_THE STORY OF YOUSEF IBN ALI._

No man can escape his destiny, he began, and doubtlessly it was written upon my forehead that I should be cast down to the depths of misery from a position in which I enjoyed the most exquisite of delights and the choicest of the gifts of God. My father was the lieutenant of the chief of the Kurds, Ogloo Beg, who usually dwelt in his mountain fastness of Koursouf when not on one of his raiding expeditions. This castle was situated in a large and fertile valley, entirely surrounded by high and rugged mountains, well watered by several mountain streams, and only to be approached by two passes, both difficult and easily to be defended. Nominally he was subject to the Government of Bagdad, but practically, so long as he sent a small yearly tribute, he did as he pleased, and any complaints of the merchants concerning his robberies were disregarded or easily met by a present to the Turkish governor. Indeed the Turks would have thought twice before attacking him. His valley was large enough to support all his men, and they were numerous enough to keep any army out of so impregnable a place. None the less he acted wisely in sending the small tribute demanded of him, since there was always the possibility of treachery, even though his followers were devoted to him, and moreover he had to take into consideration that, were the Turks roused to energy, they might cut him off in one of his expeditions.

As for me, I was born on the last Wednesday in the month of Safar, a day which naturally gave my father much concern. A darweesh, a Persian, who was a man of much learning and attached to the court of Ogloo Beg, demanded an astrolabe and cast my horoscope, which he considered attentively for some time, and then raising his head he said: ‘Oh, Aga, the affairs of God are inscrutable, and what is fated is fated. When thy son arriveth at man’s estate, he will be sore tried and will return evil for good, attain the summit of happiness, and be cast down into the depths of misery.’ At this my father struck hand upon hand, but said nothing. Now he possessed a talisman, a jacinth, inscribed with many cabalistic characters, which he had obtained in this way. While commanding an expedition on the borders of Persia he had fallen upon a large and sumptuously appointed caravan, and after slaying the guard and plundering the merchants, the women were brought before him. One of these proved to be a Persian princess journeying with her slaves to the mountains for a summer residence; and since Ogloo Beg wisely sought to keep on good terms with those in power on both sides of the border, in case of need, instead of holding her and her handmaidens to ransom, my father treated her with all honour, and, giving her a guard of his own men, sent her on to her destination. In return she presented him with that jewel which she was wearing at the time, and which makes him who wears it prosperous and preserves from evil chance. This talisman my father now hung about my neck; and, had I not parted with it, I should have been preserved from the fate which overtook me.