Every Man for Himself

III – THE MINSTREL

Salim Awad, poet, was the son of Tanous – that orator. Having now lost at love, he lay disconsolate on his pallet in the tenement overlooking the soap factory. He would not answer any voice; nor would he heed the gentle tap and call of old Khalil Khayyat, the tutor of his muse; nor would he yield his sorrow to the music of Nageeb Fiani, called the greatest player in all the world. For three hours Fiani, in the wail and sigh of his violin, had expressed the woe of love through the key-hole; but Salim Awad was not moved. No; the poet continued in desolation through the darkness of that night, and through the slow, grimy, unfeeling hours of day. He dwelt upon Haleema, Khouri’s daughter – she (as he thought) of the tresses of night, the beautiful one. Salim was in despair because this Haleema had chosen to wed Jimmie Brady, the truckman. She loved strength more than the uplifted spirit; and this maidens may do, as Salim knew, without reproach or injury.

When the dusk of the second day was gathered in his room, Salim looked up, eased by the tender obscurity. In the cobble-stoned street below the clatter of traffic had subsided; there were the shuffle and patter of feet of the low-born of his people, the murmur of voices, soft laughter, the plaintive cries of children – the dolorous medley of a summer night. Beyond the fire-escape, far past the roof of the soap factory, lifted high above the restless Western world, was the starlit sky; and Salim Awad, searching its uttermost depths, remembered the words of Antar, crying in his heart: “I pass the night regarding the stars of night in my distraction. Ask the night of me, and it will tell thee that I am the ally of sorrow and of anguish. I live desolate; there is no one like me. I am the friend of grief and of desire.”

The band was playing in Battery Park; the weird music of it, harsh, incomprehensible, an alien love-song —

drifted in at the open window with a breeze from the sea. But by this unmeaning tumult the soul of Salim Awad, being far removed, was not troubled; he remembered, again, the words of Antar, addressed to his beloved, repeating: “In thy forehead is my guide to truth; and in the night of thy tresses I wander astray. Thy bosom is created as an enchantment. O may God protect it ever in that perfection! Will fortune ever, O daughter of Malik, ever bless me with thy embrace? That would cure my heart of the sorrows of love.”

And again the music of the band in Battery Park drifted up the murmuring street,

and came in at the open window with the idle breeze; and Salim heard nothing of the noise, but was grateful for the cool fingers of the wind softly lifting the hair from his damp brow.

It must be told – and herein is a mystery – that this same Salim, who had lost at love, now from the darkness of his tenement room contemplating the familiar stars, wise, remote, set in the uttermost heights of heaven beyond the soap factory, was by the magic of this great passion inspired to extol the graces of his beloved Haleema, Khouri’s daughter, star of the world, and to celebrate his own despair, the love-woe of Salim, the noble-born, the poet, the lover, the brokenhearted. Without meditation, as he has said, without brooding or design, as should occur, but rather, taking from the starlit infinitude beyond the soap factory, seizing from the mist of his vision and from the blood of agony dripping from his lacerated heart, he fashioned a love-song so exquisite and frail, so shy of contact with unfeeling souls, that he trembled in the presence of this beauty, for the moment forgetting his desolation, and conceived himself an instrument made of men, wrought of mortal hands, unworthy, which the fingers of angels had touched in alleviation of the sorrows of love.

Thereupon Salim Awad arose, and he made haste to Khalil Khayyat to tell him of this thing…

This same Khalil Khayyat, lover of children, that poet and mighty editor, the tutor of the young muse of this Salim – this patient gardener of the souls of men, wherein he sowed seeds of the flowers of the spirit – this same Khalil, poet, whose delight was in the tender bloom of sorrow and despair – this old Khayyat, friend of Salim, the youth, the noble-born, sat alone in the little back room of Nageeb Fiani, the pastry-cook and greatest player in all the world. And his narghile was glowing; the coal was live and red, showing as yet no gray ash, and the water bubbled by fits and starts, and the alien room, tawdry in its imitation of the Eastern splendor, dirty, flaring and sputtering with gas, was clouded with the sweet-smelling smoke. To the coffee, perfume rising with the steam from the delicate vessel, nor to the rattle of dice and boisterous shouts from the outer room, was this Khalil attending; for he had the evening dejection to nurse. He leaned over the green baize table, one long, lean brown hand lying upon Kawkab Elhorriah of that day, as if in affectionate pity, and his lean brown face was lifted in a rapture of anguish to the grimy ceiling; for the dream of the writing had failed, as all visions of beauty must fail in the reality of them, and there had been no divine spark in the labor of the day to set the world aflame against Abdul-Hamid, Sultan, slaughterer.

To him, then, at this moment of inevitable reaction, the love-lorn Salim, entering in haste.

“Once more, Salim,” said Khalil Khayyat, sadly, “I have failed.”

Salim softly closed the door.

“I am yet young, Salim,” the editor added, with an absent smile, in which was no bitterness at all, but the sweetness of long suffering. “I am yet young,” he repeated, “for in the beginning of my labor I hope.”

Salim turned the key.

“I am but a child,” Khalil Khayyat declared, his voice, now lifted, betraying despair. “I dream in letters of fire: I write in shadows. In my heart is a flame: from the point of my pen flows darkness. I proclaim a revolution: I hear loud laughter and the noise of dice. Salim,” he cried, “I am but a little child: when night falls upon the labor of my day I remember the morning!”

“Khalil!”

Khalil Khayyat was thrilled by the quality of this invocation.

“Khalil of the exalted mission, friend, poet, teacher of the aspiring,” Salim Awad whispered, leaning close to the ear of Khalil Khayyat, “a great thing has come to pass.”

Khayyat commanded his ecstatic perturbation.

“Hist!” Salim ejaculated. “Is there not one listening at the door?”

“There is no one, Salim; it is the feet of Nageeb the coffee-boy, passing to the table of Abosamara, the merchant.”

Salim hearkened.

“There is no one, Salim.”

“There is a breathing at the key-hole, Khalil,” Salim protested. “This great thing must not be known.”

“There is no one, Salim,” said Khalil Khayyat. “I have heard Abosamara call these seven times. Being rich, he is brutal to such as serve. The sound is of the feet of the little Intelligent One. He bears coffee to the impatient merchant. His feet are soft, by my training; they pass like a whisper… Salim, what is this great thing?”

“Nay, but, Khalil, I hesitate: the thing must not be heard.”

“Even so,” said Khalil Khayyat, contemptuously, being still a poet; “the people are of the muck of the world; they are common, they are not of our blood and learning. How shall they understand that which they hear?”

“Khalil,” Salim Awad answered, reassured, “I have known a great moment!”

“A great moment?” said Khalil Khayyat, being both old and wise. “Then it is because of agony. There has issued from this great pain,” said he, edging, in his artistic excitement, toward the victim of the muse, “a divine poem of love?”

Salim Awad sighed.

“Is it not so, Salim?”

Salim Awad flung himself upon the green baize table; and so great was his despair that the coffee-cup of Khalil Khayyat jumped in its saucer. “I have suffered: I have lost at love,” he answered. “I have been wounded; I bleed copiously. I lie alone in a desert. My passion is hunger and thirst and a gaping wound. From fever and the night I cry out. Whence is my healing and satisfaction? Nay, but, Khalil, devoted friend,” he groaned, looking up, “I have known the ultimate sorrow. Haleema!” cried he, rising, hands clasped and uplifted, eyes looking far beyond the alien, cobwebbed, blackened ceiling of the little back room of Nageeb Fiani, the pastry-cook and greatest player in all the world. “Haleema!” he cried, as it may meanly be translated. “Haleema – my sleep and waking, night and day of my desiring soul, my thought and heart-throb! Haleema – gone forever from me, the poet, the unworthy, fled to the arms of the strong, the knowing, the manager of horses, the one powerful and controlling! Haleema – beautiful one, fashioned of God, star of the night of the sons of men, glory of the universe, appealing, of the soft arms, of the bosom of sleep! Haleema – of the finger-tips of healing, of the warm touch of solace, of the bed of rest! Haleema, beautiful one, beloved, lost to me!.. Haleema!.. Haleema!..”

“God!” Khalil Khayyat ejaculated; “but this is indeed great poetry!”

Salim Awad collapsed.

“And from this,” asked Khalil Khayyat, cruel servant of art, being hopeful concerning the issue, “there has come a great poem? There must,” he muttered, “have come a love-song, a heart’s cry in comfort of such as have lost at love.”

Salim Awad looked up from the table.

“A cry of patient anguish,” said Khalil Khayyat.

“Khalil,” said Salim Awad, solemnly, “the strings of my soul have been touched by the hand of the Spirit.”

“By the Spirit?”

“The fingers of Infinite Woe.”

To this Khalil Khayyat made no reply, nor moved one muscle – save that his hand trembled a little, and his eyes, which had been steadfastly averted, suddenly searched the soul of Salim Awad. It was very still in the little back room. There was the sputtering of the gas, the tread of soft feet passing in haste to the kitchen, the clamor from the outer room, where common folk were gathered for their pleasure, but no sound, not so much as the drawing of breath, in the little room where these poets sat, and continued in this silence, until presently Khalil Khayyat drew very close to Salim Awad.

“Salim,” he whispered, “reveal this poem.”

“It cannot be uttered,” said Salim Awad.

Khalil Khayyat was by this amazed. “Is it then so great?” he asked. “Then, Salim,” said he, “let it be as a jewel held in common by us of all the world.”

“I am tempted!”

“I plead, Salim – I, Khalil Khayyat, the poet, the philosopher – I plead!”

“I may not share this great poem, Khalil,” said Salim Awad, commanding himself, “save with such as have suffered as I have suffered.”

“Then,” answered Khalil Khayyat, triumphantly, “the half is mine!”

“Is yours, Khalil?”

“The very half, Salim, is the inheritance of my woe!”

“Khalil,” answered Salim Awad, rising, “attend!” He smiled, in the way of youth upon the aged, and put an affectionate hand on the old man’s shoulder. “My song,” said he, passionately, “may not be uttered; for in all the world – since of these accidents God first made grief – there has been no love-sorrow like my despair!”

Then, indeed, Khalil Khayyat knew that this same Salim Awad was a worthy poet. And he was content; for he had known a young man to take of the woe from his own heart and fashion a love-song too sublime for revelation to the unfeeling world – which was surely poetry sufficient to the day. He asked no more concerning the song, but took counsel with Salim Awad upon his journey to Newfoundland, whither the young poet was going, there in trade and travel to ease the sorrows of love. And he told him many things about money and a pack, and how that, though engaged in trade, a man might still journey with poetry; the one being of place and time and necessity, and the other of the free and infinite soul. Concerning the words spoken that night in farewell by these poets, not so much as one word is known, though many men have greatly desired to know, believing the moment to have been propitious for high speaking; but not a word is to be written, not so much as a sigh to be described, for the door was closed, and, as it strangely chanced, there was no ear at the key-hole. But Nageeb Fiani, the greatest player in all the world, entering upon the departure of Salim Awad, was addressed by Khalil Khayyat.

“Nageeb,” said this great poet, “I have seen a minstrel go forth upon his wandering.”

“Upon what journey does the singer go, Khalil?”

“To the north, Nageeb.”

“What song, Khalil, does the man sing by the way?”

“The song is in his heart,“ said Khalil Khayyat.

Abosamara, the merchant, being only rich, had intruded from his own province. “Come!” cried he, in the way of the rich who are only rich. “Come!” cried he, “how shall a man sing with his heart?”

Khalil Khayyat was indignant.

“Come!” Abosamara demanded, “how shall this folly be accomplished?”

“How shall the deaf understand these things?” answered Khalil Khayyat.

And this became a saying…

Hapless Harbor, of the Newfoundland French shore, gray, dispirited, chilled to its ribs of rock – circumscribed by black sea and impenetrable walls of mist. There was a raw wind swaggering out of the northeast upon it: a mean, cold, wet wind – swaggering down the complaining sea through the fog. It had the grounds in a frothy turmoil, the shore rocks smothered in broken water, the spruce of the heads shivering, the world of bleak hill and wooded valley all clammy to the touch; and – chiefest triumph of its heartlessness – it had the little children of the place driven into the kitchens to restore their blue noses and warm their cracked hands. Hapless Harbor, then, in a nor’east blow, and a dirty day – uncivil weather; an ugly sea, a high wind, fog as thick as cheese, and, to top off with, a scowling glass. Still early spring – snow in the gullies, dripping in rivulets to the harbor water; ice at sea, driving with the variable, evil-spirited winds; perilous sailing and a wretched voyage of it upon that coast. A mean season, a dirty day – a time to be in harbor. A time most foul in feeling and intention, an hour to lie snug in the lee of some great rock.

The punt of Salim Awad, double-reefed in unwilling deference to the weather, had rounded Greedy Head soon after dawn, blown like a brown leaf, Salim being bound in from Catch-as-Catch-Can with the favoring wind. It was the third year of his wandering in quest of that ease of the sorrows of love; and as he came into quiet water from the toss and spray of the open, rather than a hymn in praise of the Almighty who had delivered him from the grasping reach of the sea, from its cold fingers, its green, dark, swaying grave – rather than this weakness – rather than this Newfoundland habit of worship, he muttered, as Antar, that great lover and warrior, had long ago cried from his soul: “Under thy veil is the rosebud of my life, and thine eyes are guarded with a multitude of arrows; round thy tent is a lion-warrior, the sword’s edge, and the spear’s point” – which had nothing to do, indeed, with a nor’east gale and the flying, biting, salty spray of a northern sea. But this Salim had come in, having put out from Catch-as-Catch-Can when gray light first broke upon the black, tumultuous world, being anxious to make Hapless Harbor as soon as might be, as he had promised a child in the fall of the year.

This Salim, poet, maker of the song that could not be uttered, tied up at the stage-head of Sam Swuth, who knew the sail of that small craft, and had lumbered down the hill to meet him.

“Pup of a day,” says Sam Swuth.

By this vulgarity Salim was appalled.

“Eh?” says Sam Swuth.

Salim’s pack, stowed amidships, was neatly and efficiently bound with tarpaulin, the infinite mystery of which he had mastered; but his punt, from stem to stern, swam deeply with water gathered on the way from Catch-as-Catch-Can.

“Pup of a day,” says Sam Swuth.

“Oh my, no!” cried Salim Awad, shocked by this inharmony with his mood. “Ver’ bad weather.”

“Pup of a day,” Sam Swuth insisted.

“Ver’ bad day,” said Salim Awad. “Ver’ beeg wind for thee punt.”

The pack was hoisted from the boat.

“An the glass don’t lie,” Sam Swuth promised, “they’s a sight dirtier comin’.”

Salim lifted the pack to his back. “Ver’ beeg sea,” said he. “Ver’ bad blow.”

“Ghost Rock breakin’?”

“Ver’ bad in thee Parlor of thee Devil,” Salim answered. “Ver’ long, black hands thee sea have. Ver’ white finger-nail,” he laughed. “Eh? Ver’ hong-ree hands. They reach for thee punt. But I am have escape,” he added, with a proud little grin. “I am have escape. I – Salim! Ver’ good sailor. Thee sea have not cotch me, you bet!”

“Ye’ll be lyin’ the night in Hapless?”

“Oh my, no! Ver’ poor business. I am mus’ go to thee Chain Teekle.”

Salim Awad went the round of mean white houses, exerting himself in trade, according to the cure prescribed for the mortal malady of which he suffered; but as he passed from door to door, light-hearted, dreaming of Haleema, she of the tresses of night, wherein the souls of men wandered astray, he still kept sharp lookout for Jamie Tuft, the young son of Skipper Jim, whom he had come through the wind to serve. Salim was shy – shy as a child; more shy than ever when bent upon some gentle deed; and Jamie was shy, shy as lads are shy; thus no meeting chanced until, when in the afternoon the wind had freshened, these two blundered together in the lee of Bishop’s Rock, where Jamie was hiding his humiliation, grief, and small body, but devoutly hoping, all the while, to be discovered and relieved. It was dry in that place, and sheltered from the wind; but between the Tickle heads, whence the harbor opened to the sea, the gale was to be observed at work upon the run.

Salim stopped dead. Jamie grinned painfully and kicked at the road.

“Hello!” cried Salim.

“’Lo, Joe!” growled Jamie.

Salim sighed. He wondered concerning the amount Jamie had managed to gather. Would it be sufficient to ease his conscience through the transaction? The sum was fixed. Jamie must have the money or go wanting. Salim feared to ask the question.

“I isn’t got it, Joe,” said Jamie.

“Oh my! Too bad!” Salim groaned.

“Not all of un,” added Jamie.

Salim took heart; he leaned close, whispering, in suspense: “How much have you thee got?”

“Two twenty – an’ a penny.”

“Ver’ good!” cried Salim Awad, radiant. “Ver’, ver’ good! Look!” said he: “you have wait three year for thee watch. Ver’ much you have want thee watch. ‘Ha!’ I theenk; ’ver’ good boy, this – I mus’ geeve thee watch to heem. No, no!’ I theenk; ’ver’ bad for thee boy. I mus’ not spoil thee ver’ good boy. Make thee mon-ee,’ I say; ’catch thee feesh, catch thee swile, then thee watch have be to you!’ Ver’ good. What happen? Second year, I have ask about the mon-ee. Ver’ good. ‘I have got one eighteen,’ you say. Oh my – no good! The watch have be three dollar. Oh my! Then I theenk: ‘I have geeve the good boy thee watch for one eighteen. Oh no, I mus’ not!’ I theenk; ‘ver’ bad for thee boy, an’ mos’ ver’ awful bad trade.’ Then I say, ‘I keep thee watch for one year more.’ Ver’ good. Thee third year I am have come. Ver’ good. What you say?‘ ‘I have thee two twenty-one,’ you say. Ver’, ver’ good. Thee price of thee watch have be three dollar? No! Not this year. Thee price have not be three dollar.”

Jamie looked up in hope.

“Why not?” Salim Awad continued, in delight. “Have thee watch be spoil? No, thee watch have be ver’ good watch. Have thee price go down? No; thee price have not.”

Jamie waited in intense anxiety, while Salim paused to enjoy the mystery.

“Have I then become to spoil thee boy?” Salim demanded. “No? Ver’ good. How then can thee price of thee watch have be two twenty?”

Jamie could not answer.

“Ver’ good!” cried the delighted Salim. “Ver’, ver’ good! I am have tell you. Hist!” he whispered.

Jamie cocked his ear.

“Hist!” said Salim Awad again.

They were alone – upon a bleak hill-side, in a wet, driving wind.

“I have be to New York,” Salim whispered, in a vast excitement of secrecy and delight. “I am theenk: ‘Thee boy want thee watch. How thee boy have thee watch? Thee good boy mus’ have thee watch. Oh, mygod! how?’ I theenk. I theenk, an’ I theenk, an’ I theenk. Thee boy mus’ pay fair price for thee watch. Ha! Thee Salim ver’ clever. He feex thee price of thee watch, you bet! Eh! Ver’ good. How?”

Jamie was tapped on the breast; he looked into the Syrian’s wide, delighted, mocking brown eyes – but could not fathom the mystery.

“How?” cried Salim. “Eh? How can the price come down?”

Jamie shook his head.

“I have smuggle thee watch!” Salim whispered.

“Whew!” Jamie whistled. “That’s sinful!”

“Thee watch it have be to you,” answered Salim, gently. “Thee sin,” he added, bowing courteously, a hand on his heart, “it have be all my own!”

For a long time after Salim Awad’s departure, Jamie Tuft sat in the lee of Bishop’s Rock – until indeed, the dark alien’s punt had fluttered out to sea on the perilous run to Chain Tickle. It began to rain in great drops; the sullen mood of the day was about to break in some wrathful outrage upon the coast. Gusts of wind swung in and down upon the boy – a cold rain, a bitter, rising wind. But Jamie still sat oblivious in the lee of the rock. It was hard for him, unused to gifts, through all his days unknown to favorable changes of fortune, to overcome his astonishment – to enter into the reality of this possession. The like had never happened before: never before had joy followed all in a flash upon months of mournful expectation. He sat as still as the passionless rock lifted behind him. It was a tragedy of delight. Two dirty, cracked, toil-distorted hands – two young hands, aged and stained and malformed by labor beyond their measure of strength and years to do – two hands and the shining treasure within them: to these his world was, for the time, reduced – the rest, the harsh world of rock and rising sea and harsher toil and deprivation, was turned to mist; it was like a circle of fog.

Jamie looked up.

“By damn!” he thought, savagely, “’tis – ’tis —mine!”

The character of the exclamation is to be condoned; this sense of ownership had come like a vision.

“Why, I got she!” thought Jamie.

Herein was expressed more of agonized dread, more of the terror that accompanies great possessions, than of delight.

“Ecod!” he muttered, ecstatically; “she’s mine – she’s mine!”

The watch was clutched in a capable fist. It was not to be dropped, you may be sure! Jamie looked up and down the road. There was no highwayman, no menacing apparition of any sort, but the fear of some ghostly ravager had been real enough. Presently the boy laughed, arose, moved into the path, stood close to the verge of the steep, which fell abruptly to the harbor water.

“I got t’ tell mamma,” he thought.

On the way to Jamie’s pocket went the watch.

“She’ll be that glad,” the boy thought, gleefully, “that she – she – she’ll jus’ fair cry!”

There was some difficulty with the pocket.

“Yes, sir,” thought Jamie, grinning; “mamma’ll jus’ cry!”

The watch slipped from Jamie’s overcautious hand, struck the rock at his feet, bounded down the steep, splashed into the harbor water, and vanished forever…

A bad time at sea: a rising wind, spray on the wing, sheets of cold rain – and the gray light of day departing. Salim Awad looked back upon the coast; he saw no waste of restless water between, no weight and frown of cloud above, but only the great black gates of Hapless Harbor, beyond which, by the favor of God, he had been privileged to leave a pearl of delight. With the wind abeam he ran on through the sudsy sea, muttering, within his heart, as that great Antar long ago had cried: “Were I to say thy face is like the full moon of heaven, wherein that full moon is the eye of the antelope? Were I to say thy shape is like the branch of the erak tree, oh, thou shamest it in the grace of thy form! In thy forehead is my guide to truth, and in the night of thy tresses I wander astray!”