Meanwhile Fadrique, following the enchanting voice, had reached agallery in the midst of which, the floor having fallen in, there wasa fearful abyss of flames, though the pillars on each side were stillstanding. Opposite to him the youth perceived the longed-for maiden,clinging with one hand to a pillar, while with the other she wasthreatening back some Spanish soldiers, who seemed ready at any momentto seize her, and her delicate foot was already hovering over the edgeof the glowing ruins. For Fadrique to go to her was impossible; thebreadth of the opening rendered even a desperate leap unavailing.Trembling lest his call might make the maiden precipitate herself intothe abyss, either in terror or despairing anger, he only softly raisedhis voice and whispered as with a breath over the flaming gulf, "Oh,Zelinda, Zelinda! do not give way to such frightful thoughts! Yourpreserver is here!" The maiden turned her queenly head, and whenFadrique saw her calm and composed demeanor, he cried to the soldiers onthe other side, with all the thunder of his warrior's voice, "Back, yeinsolent plunderers! Whoever advances but one step to the lady shallfeel the vengeance of my arm!" They started and seemed on the point ofwithdrawing, when one of their number said, "The knight cannot touchus, the gulf between us is too broad for that. And as for the lady'sthrowing herself down--it almost looks as if the young knight wereher lover, and whoever has a lover is not likely to be so hasty aboutthrowing herself down." All laughed at this and again advanced. Zelindatottered at the edge of the abyss. But with the courage of a lionFadrique had torn his target from his arm, and hurling it with his righthand he flung it at the soldiers with such a sure aim that the rashleader, struck on the head, fell senseless to the ground. The rest againstood still. "Away with you!" cried Fadrique authoritatively, "or mydagger shall strike the next as surely, and then I swear I will neverrest till I have found out your whole gang and appeased my rage." Thedagger gleamed in the youth's hand, but yet more fearfully gleamed thefury in his eyes, and the soldiers fled. Then Zelinda bowed gratefullyto her preserver, took up a roll of palm-leaves which lay at her feet,and which must have previously slipped from her hand, and then vanishedhastily through a side-door of the gallery. Henceforth Fadrique soughther in vain in the burning palace.
CHAPTER VIII.
The great Alba held a council with his chief officers in an open placein the middle of the conquered city, and, by means of interpreters, sentquestion after question to the Turkish prisoners as to the fate of thebeautiful woman who had been seen animating them on the ramparts, andwho was certainly the most exquisite enchantress that had ever visitedthe earth. Nothing very distinct was to be gained from the answers, foralthough the interrogated all knew of the the beautiful Zelinda as anoble lady versed in magic lore, and acknowledged by the whole people,they were utterly unable to state from whence she had come to Tunisand whither she had now fled. When at last they began to threaten theprisoners as obstinate, an old Dervish, hitherto unnoticed, pressedforward and said, with a gloomy smile, "Whoever has a desire to seekthe lady may set out when he chooses; I will conceal nothing from him ofwhat I know of her direction, and I know something. But I must first ofall receive the promise that I shall not be compelled to accompany asguide. My lips otherwise will remain sealed forever, and you may do withme as you will."
He looked like one who intended to keep his word, and Alba, pleased withthe firmness of the man, which harmonized well with his own mind, gavehim the desired assurance, and the Dervish began his relation. Hewas once, he said, wandering in the almost infinite desert of Sahara,impelled perhaps by rash curiosity, perhaps by higher motives; he hadlost his way there, and had at last, wearied to death, reached one ofthose fertile islands of that sea of sand which are called oases.Then followed, sparkling with oriental vivacity, a description of thewonderful things seen there, now filling the hearts of his hearerswith sweet longing, and then again making their hair stand on end withhorror, though from the strange pronunciation of the speaker and theflowing rapidity of his words the half was scarcely understood. The endof all this at length was that Zelinda dwelt on that oasis, in the midstof the pathless sand-plains of the desert, surrounded by magic horrors;and also, as the Dervish knew for certain, that she had left about halfan hour ago on her way thither. The almost contemptuous words with whichhe concluded his narration plainly showed that he desired nothing moreearnestly than to seduce some Christians to undertake a journey whichmust terminate inevitably in their destruction. At the same time headded a solemn oath that everything was truly as he had stated it, andhe did this in a firm and grave manner, as a man who knows that heis speaking the most indubitable truth. Surprised and thoughtful, thecircle of officers held their council round him.
Then Heimbert stepped forward with an air as if of request; he hadjust received a summons to leave the burning palace, where he had beenseeking his friend, and had been appointed to the place of councilbecause it was necessary to arrange the troops here in readiness forany possible rising in the conquered city. "What do you wish, my younghero?" said Alba, recognizing him as he appeared. "I know your smiling,blooming countenance well. You were but lately sheltering me like aprotecting angel. I am so sure that you make no request but what ishonorable and knightly that anything you may possibly desire is grantedbeforehand." "My great Duke," replied Heimbert, with cheeks glowingwith pleasure, "if I may then venture to ask a favor, will you grantme permission to follow the beautiful Zelinda at once in the directionwhich this wonderful Dervish has pointed out?" The great general bowedin assent, and added, "So noble an adventure could not be consigned to amore noble knight!"
"I do not know that!" said an angry voice from the throng. "But well doI know that to me above all others this adventure belongs, even were itassigned as a reward for the capture of Tunis. For who was the first onthe height and within the city?" "That was Don Fadrique Mendez," saidHeimbert, taking the speaker by the hand and leading him before thegeneral. "If I now for his sake must forfeit my promised reward, I mustpatiently submit; for he has rendered better service than I have done tothe emperor and the army."
"Neither of you shall forfeit his reward," said the great Alba. "Eachhas permission from this moment to seek the maiden in whatever way itseems to him most advisable."
And swift as lightning the two young captains quitted the circle ofofficers in opposite directions.
CHAPTER IX.
A sea of sand, stretching out in the distant horizon, without one objectto mark its extensive surface, white and desolate in its vastness--suchis the scene which proclaims the fearful desert of Sahara to the eye ofthe wanderer who has lost himself in these frightful regions. In thisalso it resembles the sea, that it casts up waves, and often a mistyvapor bangs over its surface. But there is not the soft play of waveswhich unite all the coasts of the earth; each wave as it rolls inbringing a message from the remotest and fairest island kingdoms, andagain rolling back as it were with an answer, in a sort of love-flowingdance. No; there is here only the melancholy sporting of the hot windwith the faithless dust which ever falls back again into its joylessbasin, and never reaches the rest of the solid land with its happy humandwellings. There is here none of the sweet cool sea-breeze in whichkindly fairies seem carrying on their graceful sport, forming bloominggardens and pillared palaces--there is only a suffocating vapor,rebelliously given back to the glowing sun from the unfruitful sands.
Hither the two youths arrived at the same time, and paused, gazing withdismay at the pathless chaos before them. Zelinda's track, which was noteasily hidden or lost, had hitherto obliged them almost always to remaintogether, dissatisfied as Fadrique was at the circumstance, and angry aswere the glances he cast at his unwelcome companion. Each had hoped toovertake Zelinda before she had reached the desert, feeling how almostimpossible it would be to find her once she had entered it. That hopewas now at an end; and although in answer to the inquiries they made inthe Barbary villages on the frontier, they heard that a wanderer goingsouthward in the desert and guiding his course by the stars would,according to tradition, arrive at length at a wonde
rfully fertile oasis,the abode of a divinely beautiful enchantress, yet everything appearedhighly uncertain and dispiriting, and was rendered still more so by theavalanches of dust before the travellers' view.
The youths looked sadly at the prospect before them, and their horsessnorted and started back at the horrible plain, as though it were someinsidious quicksand, and even the riders themselves were seized withdoubt and dismay. Suddenly they sprung from their saddles, as at someword of command, unbridled their horses, loosened their girths, andturned them loose on the desert, that they might find their way backto some happier dwelling place. Then, taking some provision from theirsaddle-bags, they placed it on their shoulders, and casting aside theirheavy riding boots they plunged like two courageous swimmers into thetrackless waste.
CHAPTER X.
With no other guide than the sun by day, and by night the host of stars,the two captains soon lost sight of each other, and all the sooner, asFadrique avoided intentionally the object of his aversion. Heimbert, onthe other hand, had no thought but the attainment of his aim; and, fullof joyful confidence in God's assistance, he pursued his course in asoutherly direction.
Many nights and many days had passed, when one evening, as the twilightwas coming on, Heimbert was standing alone in the endless desert, unableto descry a single object all round on which his eye could rest. Hislight flask was empty, and the evening brought with it, instead orthe hoped-for coolness, a suffocating whirlwind of sand, so that theexhausted wanderer was obliged to press his burning face to the burningsoil in order to escape in some measure the fatal cloud. Now and then heheard something passing him, or rustling over him as with the sound ofa sweeping mantle, and he would raise himself in anxious haste; but heonly saw what he had already too often seen in the daytime--the wildbeasts of the wilderness roaming at liberty through the desertwaste. Sometimes it was an ugly camel, then it was a long-necked anddisproportioned giraffe, and then again a long-legged ostrich hasteningaway with its wings outspread. They all appeared to scorn him, and hehad already taken his resolve to open his eyes no more, and to givehimself up to his fate, without allowing these horrible and strangecreatures to disturb his mind in the hour of death.
Presently it seemed to him as if he heard the hoofs and neighing of ahorse, and suddenly something halted close beside him, and he thought hecaught the sound of a man's voice. Half unwilling, he could not resistraising himself wearily, and he saw before him a rider in an Arab'sdress mounted on a slender Arabian horse. Overcome with joy at findinghimself within reach of human help, he exclaimed, "Welcome, oh, man,in this fearful solitude! If thou canst, succor me, thy fellow-man, whomust otherwise perish with thirst!" Then remembering that the tonesof his dear German mother tongue were not intelligible in this joylessregion, he repeated the same words in the mixed dialect, generallycalled the Lingua Romana, universally used by heathens, Mohammedans, andChristians in those parts of the world where they have most intercoursewith each other.
The Arab still remained silent, and looked as if scornfully laughing athis strange discovery. At length he replied, in the same dialect, "I wasalso in Barbarossa's fight; and if, Sir Knight, our overthrow bitterlyenraged me then, I find no small compensation for it in the fact ofseeing one of the conquerors lying so pitifully before me." "Pitifully!"exclaimed Heimbert angrily, and his wounded sense of honor giving himback for a moment all his strength, he seized his sword and stood readyfor an encounter. "Oho!" laughed the Arab, "does the Christian viperstill hiss so strongly? Then it only behooves me to put spurs to myhorse and leave thee to perish here, thou lost creeping worm!" "Rideto the devil, thou dog of a heathen!" retorted Heimbert; "rather thanentreat a crumb of thee I will die here, unless the good God sends memanna in the wilderness."
And the Arab spurred forward his swift steed and galloped away a coupleof hundred paces, laughing with scorn. Then he paused, and looking roundto Heimbert he trotted back and said, "Thou seemest too good, methinks,to perish here of hunger and thirst. Beware! my good sabre shall touchthee."
Heimbert, who had again stretched himself hopelessly on the burningsand, was quickly roused to his feet by these words, and seized hissword; and sudden as was the spring with which the Arab's horse flewtoward him, the stout German warrior stood ready to parry the blow,and the thrust which the Arab aimed at him in the Mohammedan manner hewarded off with certainty and skill.
Again and again the Arab sprung; similarly here and there, vainly hopingto give his antagonist a death-blow. At last, overcome by impatience, heapproached so boldly that Heimbert, warding off the threateningweapon, had time to seize the Arab by the girdle and drag him from thefast-galloping horse. The violence of the movement threw Heimbert alsoon the ground, but he lay above his opponent, and holding close beforehis eyes a dagger, which he had dexterously drawn from his girdle, heexclaimed, "Wilt thou have mercy or death?" The Arab, trembling, castdown his eyes before the gleaming and murderous weapon, and said, "Showmercy to me, mighty warrior; I surrender to thee." Heimbert then orderedhim to throw away the sabre he still held in his right hand. He did so,and both combatants rose, and again sunk down upon the sand, for thevictor was far more weary than the vanquished.
The Arab's good horse meanwhile had trotted toward them, according tothe habit of those noble animals, who never forsake their fallen master.It now stood behind the two men, stretching out its long slender neckaffectionately toward them. "Arab," said Heimbert with exhausted voice,"take from thy horse what provision thou hast with thee and place itbefore me." The vanquished man humbly did as he was commanded, nowjust as much submitting to the will of the conqueror as he had beforeexhibited his animosity in anger and revenge. After a few draughtsof palm-wine from the skin, Heimbert looked at the youth under a newaspect; he then partook of some fruits, drank more of the palm-wine,and at length said, "You are going to ride still farther to-night, youngman?" "Yes, indeed," replied the Arab sadly; "on a distant oasis theredwells my aged father and my blooming bride. Now--even if you set me atfull liberty--I must perish in the heat of this barren desert, for wantof sustenance, before I can reach my lovely home."
"Is it, perhaps," asked Heimbert, "the oasis on which the mightyenchantress, Zelinda, dwells?"
"Allah protect me!" cried the Arab, clasping his hands. "Zelinda'swondrous isle offers no hospitable shelter to any but magicians. It liesfar away in the scorching south, while our friendly oasis is toward thecooler west."
"I only asked in case we might be travelling companions," saidHeimbert courteously. "If that cannot be, we must certainly divide theprovisions; for I would not have so brave a warrior as you perish, withhunger and thirst."
So saying, the young captain began to arrange the provisions in twoportions, placing the larger on his left and the smaller at hisright; he then desired the Arab to take the former, and added, to hisastonished companion, "See, good sir, I have either not much fartherto travel or I shall perish in the desert; I feel that it will be so.Besides, I cannot carry half so much on foot as you can on horse-back."
"Knight! victorious knight!" cried the amazed Mussulman, "am I then tokeep my horse?"
"It were a sin and shame indeed," said Heimbert, smiling, "to separatesuch a faithful steed from such a skilful rider. Ride on, in God's name,and get safely to your people."
He then helped him to mount, and the Arab was on the point of uttering afew words of gratitude, when he suddenly exclaimed, "The magic maiden!"and, swift as the wind, he flew over the dusty plain. Heimbert, however,turning round, saw close beside him in the now bright moonlight ashining figure, which he at once perceived to be Zelinda.
CHAPTER XI.
The maiden looked fixedly at the young soldier, and seemed consideringwith what words to address him, while he, after his long search and nowunexpected success, was equally at a loss. At last she said in Spanish,"Thou wonderful enigma, I have been witness of all that has passedbetween thee and the Arab; and these affairs confuse my head like awhirlwind. Speak, therefore, plainly, that I may know whether thou art
amadman or an angel?"
"I am neither, dear lady," replied Heimbert, with his wontedfriendliness. "I am only a poor wanderer, who has just been putting intopractice one of the commands of his Master, Jesus Christ."
"Sit down," said Zelinda, "and tell me of thy Master; he must be himselfunprecedented to have such a servant. The night is cool and still, andat my side thou hast no cause to fear the dangers of the desert."
"Lady," replied Heimbert, smiling, "I am not of a fearful nature, andwhen I am speaking of my dear Saviour my mind is perfectly free from allalarm."
Thus saying, they both sat down on the now cooled sand and began awondrous conversation, while the full moon shone upon them from thedeep-blue heavens above like a magic lamp.
Heimbert's words, full of divine love, truth, and simplicity sank likesoft sunbeams, gently and surely, into Zelinda's, heart, driving awaythe mysterious magic power which dwelt there, and wrestling for thedominion of the noble territory of her soul. When morning began to dawnshe said, "Thou wouldst not be called an angel last evening, but thouart truly one. For what else are angels than messengers of the Most HighGod?" "In that sense," rejoined Heimbert, "I am well satisfied with thename, for I certainly hope that I am the bearer of my Master's message.Yes, if he bestows on me further grace and strength, it may even bethat you also may become my companion in the pious work." "It is notimpossible," said Zelinda thoughtfully. "Thou must, however, come withme to my island, and there thou shalt be regaled as is befitting suchan ambassador, far better than here on the desolate sand, with themiserable palm-wine that thou hast so laboriously obtained."