Tales of Destiny | Page 7

* * * * *
There was silence for a time, broken at last by the voice of the
ash-besprinkled devotee:
"Allahu akbar! God is great! Over many things he gives his servants
power."

II. THE HOLLOW COLUMN
TOLD BY THE TAX-COLLECTOR
"Every man's fate is fore-ordained," said the tax-collector, reflectively
stroking his beard. "Although we may not understand it at the moment
each particular event that happens is simply a means prepared for some
destined end that may be many years remote in time. Vishnu the
Preserver saved the life of the little maid of Jhalnagor so that her
father's life might later on be saved. But none can read the future, so
that we are all blindly doing the things of to-day without knowing their
real bearing on the things of a far-away to-morrow. And one man can
make or mar the happiness of another man, even though their lives be
separated by hundreds of leagues in space or hundreds of years in
time."
"In your mind doubtless is some tale to illustrate the truth of what you
teach," remarked the astrologer, with a shrewd uplifting of his
eyebrows. "The stars can help us to read the future, as I can prove to
you by a story of actual experience. But before I proceed to my
narrative, pray, friend, let us hear from you."
"Gladly," assented the tax-collector. "The story of this noble Rajput has

brought to memory an incident in my own life many years ago,
likewise serving to show that the gods prepare long years ahead for the
working out of each particular man's destiny. Listen:
* * * * *
"As a youth I was a keeper of accounts in the service of a rich zemindar,
whose estate lay in the Country of the Five Rivers. He was a usurer as
well as a landowner, as had been his fathers before him for many
generations. So in his castle was an accumulation of great stores of
wealth--gold and silver and precious stones, cloth of gold, silks,
brocades, and muslins, ivory and amber, camphor, spices, dye stuffs,
and other merchandise of divers kinds."
The Afghan general stirred, and the scabbard of his sword rattled on the
floor as, raising himself from his elbow that rested on a cushion, he sat
up and assumed an attitude of keen attention.
"Where is this place?" he asked, a wolfish gleam in his eyes, and his
lips curved to a smile that revealed, under the black, curled moustache,
the white gleam of sharp-pointed teeth.
The story-teller also smiled, knowingly, and raised a deprecatory hand.
"Nay, friend, this zemindar, my first master, was not fated to be
relieved of his treasure, as my story will tell, even though a skilful plot
had been laid for his spoliation. Which is the very point of my tale,
although I may seem to come to it by a roundabout way of telling."
The Afghan sank back on his cushion, but his gaze remained riveted on
his narrator's face.
"One day I was seated in my home, casting up my books of account, for
I had only that morning completed the taking of taxes from the crops of
the rayats, the tenants of my lord. All of a sudden a white-robed figure
entered the doorway and threw himself prostrate before me. When at
last the face was raised I recognized the dhobi of the village that nestled
under the hill on which was perched the castle of the zemindar.

"'O thou washer of clothes,' I asked, 'what is thy plaint?'
"'Protector of the poor,' replied my visitor, 'behold my bandaged feet,
beaten with rods until they are swollen and torn.'
"I looked, as requested, and saw the blood-stains soaked through the
wrappings of linen.
"'Thou art an honest and a peaceful man, Bhagwan. Why this cruel
punishment?'
"'I know not, indeed. But I have come to thee, because I have endured
the wrong at the hands of thy master.'
"'Tell me thy story.'
"'As you have said, O my protector,' began the dhobi, assuming a
sitting posture and spreading the folds of his loose-flowing cotton
garment over his bandaged feet, 'I am an honest man. And it is for that
very reason I have suffered. Yesterday, among the apparel I received
from the home of the zemindar to be made clean and white was the
bodice of a woman, and tied in one corner of this piece of raiment was
a ring set with bright red stones that gleamed as if they were aflame.
Straightway I returned to the palace of the zemindar, and, entering the
audience chamber where, as is his wont at that particular hour each day,
he was seated receiving the complaints of the oppressed, did my
humble obeisance, and then placed in