"A. E. Merritt - Dwellers in the mirage" - читать интересную книгу автора (Merritt A. E)

I reached the old priest. The line of horsemen ahead of us parted. We
two rode through the gap, side by side. The lesser priests fell in
behind us. The nobles followed them. A long thin line upon each side of
the cavalcade, the Uighur horsemen trotted--with the Uighur trumpets
blaring, the Uighur kettle-drums and long-drums beating, the Uighur
cymbals crashing, in wild triumphal rhythms.

"The King returns--"

I would to that something had sent me then straight upon the Uighur
spears!

We trotted through the green of the oasis. We crossed a wide bridge
which had spanned the little stream when it had been a mighty river. We
set our horses' feet upon the ancient road that led straight to the
mountain's doorway a mile or more away. The heady exultation grew
within me. I looked back at my company. And suddenly I remembered the
repairs and patches on my breeches and my blouse. And my following was
touched with the same shabbiness. It made me feel less a king, but it
also made me pitiful. I saw them as men and women driven by hungry



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ghosts in their thinned blood, ghosts of strong ancestors growing weak
as the ancient blood weakened, starving at it weakened, but still
strong enough to clamour against extinction, still strong enough to
command their brains and wills and drive them toward something the
ghosts believed would feed their hunger, make them strong again.

Yes, I pitied them. It was nonsense to think I could appease the hunger
of their ghosts, but there was one thing I could do for them. I could
give them a damned good show! I went over in my mind the ritual the old
priest had taught me, rehearsed each gesture.

I looked up to find we were at the threshold of the mountain door. It
was wide enough for twenty horsemen to ride through abreast. The
squat columns I had seen, under the touch of the old priest's hands,
lay shattered beside it. I felt no repulsion, no revolt against
entering, as I then had. I was eager to be in and to be done with it.

The spearsmen trotted up, and formed a guard beside the opening. I
dismounted, and handed one of them the stallion's rein. The old priest
beside me, the lesser ones behind us, we passed over the threshold of
the mined doorway, and into the mountain. The passage, or vestibule,
was lighted by wall cressets in which burned the dear, white flame. A
hundred paces from the entrance, another passage opened, piercing
inward at an angle of about fifteen degrees to the wider one. Into this