CHAPTER VI. THE LION IN THE NET
IT was the next night, not long before daybreak, that the King ofGranada abruptly summoned to his council Jusef, his vizier. The old manfound Boabdil in great disorder and excitement; but he almost deemedhis sovereign mad, when he received from him the order to seize upon theperson of Muza Ben Abil Gazan, and to lodge him in the strongest dungeonof the Vermilion Tower. Presuming upon Boabdil's natural mildness, thevizier ventured to remonstrate,--to suggest the danger of laying violenthands upon a chief so beloved,--and to inquire what cause should beassigned for the outrage.
The veins swelled like cords upon Boabdil's brow, as he listened to thevizier; and his answer was short and peremptory.
"Am I yet a king, that I should fear a subject, or excuse my will? Thouhast my orders; there are my signet and the firman: obedience or thebow-string!"
Never before had Boabdil so resembled his dread father in speech andair; the vizier trembled to the soles of his feet, and withdrew insilence. Boabdil watched him depart; and then, clasping his hands ingreat emotion, exclaimed, "O lips of the dead! ye have warned me; and toyou I sacrifice the friend of my youth."
On quitting Boabdil the vizier, taking with him some of those foreignslaves of a seraglio, who know no sympathy with human passion outsideits walls, bent his way to the palace of Muza, sorely puzzled andperplexed. He did not, however, like to venture upon the hazard of thealarm it might occasion throughout the neighbourhood, if he endeavoured,at so unseasonable an hour, to force an entrance. He resolved, rather,with his train to wait at a little distance, till, with the growingdawn, the gates should be unclosed, and the inmates of the palace astir.
Accordingly, cursing his stars, and wondering at his mission, Jusef, andhis silent and ominous attendants, concealed themselves in a small copseadjoining the palace, until the daylight fairly broke over the awakenedcity. He then passed into the palace; and was conducted to a hall, wherehe found the renowned Moslem already astir, and conferring with someZegri captains upon the tactics of a sortie designed for that day.
It was with so evident a reluctance and apprehension that Jusefapproached the prince, that the fierce and quick-sighted Zegrisinstantly suspected some evil intention in his visit; and when Muza, insurprise, yielded to the prayer of the vizier for a private audience,it was with scowling brows and sparkling eyes that the Moorish warriorsleft the darling of the nobles alone with the messenger of their king.
"By the tomb of the prophet!" said one of the Zegris, as he quitted thehall, "the timid Boabdil suspects our Ben Abil Gazan. I learned of thisbefore."
"Hush!" said another of the band; "let us watch. If the king touch ahair of Muza's head, Allah have mercy on his sins!"
Meanwhile, the vizier, in silence, showed to Muza the firman and thesignet; and then, without venturing to announce the place to which hewas commissioned to conduct the prince, besought him to follow at once.Muza changed colour, but not with fear.
"Alas!" said he, in a tone of deep sorrow, "can it be that I have fallenunder my royal kinsman's suspicion or displeasure? But no matter; proudto set to Granada an example of valour in her defence, be it mine toset, also, an example of obedience to her king. Go on--I will followthee. Yet stay, you will have no need of guards; let us depart by aprivate egress: the Zegris might misgive, did they see me leavethe palace with you at the very time the army are assembling in theVivarrambla, and awaiting my presence. This way."
Thus saying, Muza, who, fierce as he was, obeyed every impulse that theoriental loyalty dictated from a subject to a king, passed from the hallto a small door that admitted into the garden, and in thoughtful silenceaccompanied the vizier towards the Alhambra. As they passed the copse inwhich Muza, two nights before, had met with Almamen, the Moor, liftinghis head suddenly, beheld fixed upon him the dark eyes of the magician,as he emerged from the trees. Muza thought there was in those eyes amalign and hostile exultation; but Almamen, gravely saluting him, passedon through the grove: the prince did not deign to look back, or he mightonce more have encountered that withering gaze.
"Proud heathen!" muttered Almamen to himself, "thy father filled histreasuries from the gold of many a tortured Hebrew; and even thou, toohaughty to be the miser, hast been savage enough to play the bigot. Thyname is a curse in Israel; yet dost thou lust after the daughter of ourdespised race, and, could defeated passion sting thee, I were avenged.Ay, sweep on, with thy stately step and lofty crest-thou goest tochains, perhaps to death."
As Almamen thus vented his bitter spirit, the last gleam of the whiterobes of Muza vanished from his gaze. He paused a moment, turned awayabruptly, and said, half aloud, "Vengeance, not on one man only, but awhole race! Now for the Nazarene."
BOOK. II.