Iskender, having roused his dear Emîr, went out to inspect the train. It was then some half-hour later than the time appointed; yet neither mules nor man were in sight, only the horse of the Emîr, with its neat leather saddle and bridle, was being led up and down before the hotel by a bare-legged boy. In a rage Iskender hastened to the khan whence at the recommendation of Elias he had hired his muleteer. There his reproaches caused extreme amazement. The man, he was told, had received his order as for the following day. He was not on the premises, and his house was some way off.
An idle witness of the youth's despair volunteered to go and fetch the defaulter; he set off at a run, but was gone for more than an hour. Iskender tired of waiting, and strode back angrily to the hotel. Tidings of his dilemma having gone abroad, he was escorted by a little crowd of the curious, among them some muleteers who were loud in their offers of service. From a distance he beheld the missionary, with back towards him, conversing with his patron at the door, and quickened step; but before he could come up the dialogue, whatever it concerned, was ended, and his enemy had moved on.
"Not about you this time," his beloved laughed; "though he declares that you are none of you to be trusted out of sight. He has just been warning me against our friend Elias, who, he says, once played a trick upon some tourists—bribed the Bedouins to take them prisoner, and let him rescue them. I assured him that Elias was not going with us; but he seemed to doubt my word, and I shall begin to doubt it myself unless those mules turn up. What has become of them?"
"The man bretends I told him for to-morrow. That is a lie, because I sboke as blain as anythin'. I think it some trick of that Elias to detain us here."
By that time all the unemployed muleteers in the town had joined the growing crowd that watched their conference. One man had gone so far as to bring a good-looking mule ready saddled with him, as a sample of what he could provide. Iskender paid no heed to the prayers of all these suppliants, whispered confidentially by those in front, shouted with fierce gesticulations from those behind, any more than he gave ear to the counsel of the sons of Mûsa that he should employ one of them. He still had hopes of the person he had first engaged, who appeared at length, but without any mules, and in a state of indignation even greater than Iskender's.
The clash of words when they met electrified the whole street; the mouths of the rival muleteers, now mere onlookers, grinned all together, showing milk-white teeth. Accused of laziness, of breach of contract, the delinquent hurled back the accusations in Iskender's face. He said he knew his business, and was not going to start without proper orders. The Khawâjah Elias, the responsible dragoman, was away, and might Allah end his life immediately if he set forth without him at the call of a beardless boy.
So the truth was out. Iskender reported to his patron that the man was a mere creature of Elias.
"There's nothing for it," said the Emîr with a shrug. "We must engage another man."
"But I baid this one already some money."
"Never mind. It will cost us more than that if we wait for Elias!"
So that muleteer was dismissed and retired, conscientiously objecting in terms abusive and obscene; while the man who had had the wit to bring a mule already saddled was promptly engaged in his place. This individual had attracted the Frank from the first by his cheerful looks, and the way he kept aloof from the group that pestered, only smiling now and then to the Englishman and patting his mule significantly. He now showed great alacrity, kissing first the Emîr's hand, then Iskender's, asking where the tent and other baggage might be found, and promising by the cloak of the Prophet, to have all in perfect readiness within an hour. The other candidates then fell away, one or two volunteering to help the winner with his preparations, the majority sitting down on their heels in the shadows of neighbouring walls to watch the outcome of it all, the actual start.
The new muleteer was punctual to his word. But by the time the laden mules came up, luncheon was ready, and the sons of Mûsa insisted on the Frank's partaking of the meal. An invitation, the first he had ever received, to join them at their private table, reconciled Iskender to this new delay. He told the muleteer to go on in advance, indicating the road he was to take and naming a good place for that night's encampment; and saw the mules start off with jangling bells, leaving behind the horse he was to ride, which was tethered in the yard of the hotel.
After the meal the Frank was lazy with repletion, and asked to rest awhile; so that the afternoon was far advanced before they got on horseback. The Frank was then for a gallop; but Iskender warned him that that pace was not for travel, and kept him down to the walk. Passing the house of Mîtri, he looked for the girl Nesîbeh, hoping she would see him riding at his lord's right hand, but in vain.
After an hour's journey, having left the orange-gardens far behind, they forsook the highway and followed a bridle-path through fields. Big scarlet tulips shone among the green cornstems. Here and there upon the fertile plain stood forth a grove of olives, their foliage looking nearly white by contrast with its own dark shadow; a village of mud-houses set upon a knoll and plumed with palms, with attendant barns and ovens shaped like beehives; a man with oxen ploughing or a camel browsing in the custody of a small child. The breeze grew fresher as the sun declined. The colours of a dove's breast played upon the barren heights which walled the land to eastward. The sun sank lower and lower; shadows grew upon the plain; the sea-coast sandhills became clearly outlined; soon rays went up like fire from off the sea, and the whole rampart of the eastern heights became empurpled; then a shadow rose, a cold breeze roughed the corn, and presently the evening star shone out in a soft sky.
It was dark when they reached the appointed halting-place, in a wady of the foothills, close to a village which possessed a spring of water. They found their tent well-pitched, a good fire burning in the shelter of a cunning wind-screen, and the kettle boiling. They had tea at once, and afterwards Iskender went to cook the supper. His lord soon followed with desire to help.
"It's splendid fun!" he cried. "You are a trump, Iskender!"
Iskender answered nothing, but gave praise to Allah.
About the third hour of a cloudless day Elias Abdul Messîh crossed the sandhills from the northward, traversed the gardens, and approached the town. He was riding a showy horse, which he caused to prance whenever any one was looking; and had assumed the panoply of the fashionable dragoman. His slim but manly figure well became a tight and many-buttoned vest of murrey velvet, a zouave jacket of blue silky cloth, and baggy trousers of the same material, whose superfluous lengths were tucked away in riding-boots of undressed leather. A scarlet dust-cloak streamed from off his shoulders. The tassel of his fez, worn far back on the head and dinted knowingly fluttered on the breeze; the tassels on his bridle led a dance.
In his wake followed two fat, middle-aged men, set one behind the other on a donkey's back, of whom the hindmost held a rope which led four mules laden with all the requisites of Frankish travel.
Elias flourished in his hand the silver-mounted whip of rhinoceros-hide which he had long ago reclaimed from the Emîr. The pride of a leader of men informed his bearing as he brought his train at last through the crowded market, shouting loftily to clear a way.
Arrived at the khan where he was accustomed to hire beasts of burden, he was preparing to dismount, when a man ran out and, stooping, kissed his stirrup. It was the muleteer who had been first retained by Iskender.
"May Allah keep thee, O my dear!" exclaimed Elias, cheered by such worship in a public place. "What news in the town to-day?"
The muleteer raised hands and eyes to heaven.
"Grave news, O my lord Elias. They sent me about my business, and are gone without thee."
"Merciful Allah!" cried Elias, stupefied. "Gone, sayest thou? They are gone, the miscreants?… But it is impossible. Gone, sayest thou? When and how did they go?"
In vain did he strive to discredit the muleteer's story, throwing doubt on every point as it arose; it was only to remove all ground for doubt concerning it.
"Merciful Allah!" he exclaimed again, in tones of horror. "May their fathers be destroyed, their mothers ravished. Wait till I catch thee, O thou pig Iskender! The good Emîr will perish of discomfort; for that treacherous boy is ignorant of all things that pertain to travel. Y' Allah! Let us make all speed to overtake those wretched ones!"
But his companions, Aflatûn the cook and Fâris the waiter, were in no such hurry. They were hungry from much riding on an empty stomach, and flatly refused to proceed another step until replenished. Cursing their greed, Elias was forced to resign himself. He indulged in eating, as he told himself, to pass the time; but afterwards, when it came to coffee and narghîlehs, he squandered more than an hour in boasting with what speed he would catch up the fugitives, how suddenly and effectually he would repay the beast Iskender. It was Aflatûn the cook who reminded him at length that time wore on. Once on horseback, his eagerness again became active, and, in a measure, practical. He knew the direction Iskender had proposed to take, and, stopping before the hotel for a minute, he learnt from the sons of Mûsa the name of the first halting-place.
Amused by his indignation at the start without him, those old friends mocked him, crying:
"They have fled from thee. Sooner than endure thy converse any longer, they have thrown themselves on the mercy of Allah. They would rather face wild beasts and savage warriors than have thy sweet voice always at their ears."
Cursing the ancestry of such heartless jokers, Elias rowelled his horse's flanks with the sharp corners of his stirrups, and went off at a furious gallop. Through the orange-gardens, out on to the plain, he sped like the wind, until his steed gave signs of fainting and he had to stop. Looking back along the way he had come, he could not see his companions and their string of mules, though the ground was open and the air quite clear. Evidently they had not yet left the gardens. With horrid malediction of their religion and parentage he rode on at a foot's pace.
At the third hour after noon he reached the spot where Iskender and the Frank had passed the night, and stood staring at the ashes of their fire with teeth and hands tightly clenched. A fellâh from the neighbouring village told him they had set out very early that morning with the avowed intention of making a long day's march.
These tidings sent Elias raging mad. They were fleeing towards the valley full of gold, of which Iskender, alone of all men, knew the whereabouts; and he, Elias, their predestined chief, was left behind! His fiery spirit craved to mount at once and gallop day and night till he rejoined those treasure-seekers; but the frailty of his horse precluded any such transports, and the snail-like pace of his adherents bound him down. At present he was obliged to wait for Aflatûn and Fâris and the baggage animals, while conscious of the fugitives receding rapidly, sucked in irresistibly to a whirlpool of living light, his mind's image of the object of desire.
Having procured some barley and chopped straw for his horse, he left the beast in charge of some of the villagers, and climbed alone to the summit of a rock hard by, which commanded the plain. His retinue appeared, a great way off, mere dots upon a certain cornfield. The sun was high when he first descried them; it had touched the sea before they came in hail.
"Make haste, accursed sluggards! Yallah! Onward! They fly before us! We must march all night," he cried in anguish.
But they said:
"Wait a little! All the beasts are tired. We will not march through the night. In truth we are minded to have done with this mad business, which is the same as hunting the shadow of a flying bird. Allah alone knows whether we shall catch those people; but we ourselves are able to perceive that we are tired and hungry."
"May Allah shorten your days!" roared Elias furiously. "Would you fail me now and betray me, O treacherous dogs?"
They still refused to travel through the night; and when he persisted in requiring it of them, took umbrage, and vowed that they would leave him then and there. For hours he remonstrated with them, but they only ate and drank and smoked, then slept, unheeding. He lay down by their side, but could not sleep.
At the first breath of dawn they were still snoring, when Elias rose, prepared his horse, and rode away. After all he felt well rid of such unsoulful hogs. He could travel much more quickly by himself; and the fewer reached the Valley of the Kings the better, for some are thieves, and gold corrupts true men. So he rode on, pushing his mount to the utmost, in and out among the stony hills, inquiring at every village and of all he met in the way for tidings of the Frank and his companion. In the heat of the day he paused for an hour, to bait and water his horse, which, nevertheless, was quite worn out ere sunset. Elias was forced to dismount and lead him slowly.
The mountain slopes were hung with vineyards, fields and gardens. Sauntering groups appeared upon the path, which now began to assume the aspect of a proper road. Rounding a shoulder of the terraced hill, Elias had a view of the chief town of the region, clothing half the mountainside, beneath its famous mosque. He determined to enter the place and make inquiries, though the Muslim mob, he knew, was fierce and dangerous.
Going straight to the house of a Christian of his own Church, he asked for hospitality, which was granted to him in Allah's name. Having cared for the horse, he went indoors and told his errand, seeking tidings of the chase; and presently his host went out to make inquiries. He returned to declare, upon authority of an officer of the watch, that no party resembling that described had entered the town.
Now Iskender had named this city many times as lying in the direct road to the seat of treasure. His avoidance of it, therefore, must have been of purpose to elude Elias—his best, his truest friend! The outraged dragoman called God to witness. It was evident that Iskender meant to be the only one to find the golden valley. Having used his money as the means to get there, he would doubtless make away with the Emîr. Elias wept at picture of the cruel fate which awaited that unsuspecting nobleman. However, he himself was not yet beaten. He still had hopes that, by minute inquiry, he might come upon their tracks and overtake them.
But when the morrow came his horse was useless. Having money, he went out to hire another. But while he was about the business, soldiers came to him and asked to be shown the permission by which he travelled. He produced a document, but it was out of date. They told him so. In some alarm, he swore by Allah he was in the service of an English prince as mighty as the Sultan. They straightway asked to see the prince in question; and Elias had to own that he was not forthcoming. Then they laughed him to scorn—the dragoman without a tourist. One took a fancy to the knife that decked his waist-band. Another admired his whip, and promptly took it. His pistol too was gone. In vain he looked for help or sympathy; the crowd of fierce-eyed, turbaned Muslims only jeered at his despair. At a threat to put him in prison, he flung them all the money he possessed, then cast himself upon the ground with face buried in his arms. Seeing he was finished, his tormentors left him thus; and the crowd, when they were gone, advised him friendly, bidding him look to Allah for redress.
Scared in his very soul, Elias rose at last and crept back to the house of his co-religionist. There he sat and moaned through all that day, refusing food and every other comfort. Disarmed and penniless, he could proceed no further in that lawless region. It was all Iskender's fault—the cunning devil! The valley of the gold seemed now his legal birthright, of which he had been defrauded by a wicked malefactor, who, not content with that, was leading out the good Emîr to kill him in the desert. Iskender had bribed Aflatûn and Fâris; Iskender had lamed his horse; Iskender had set on the soldiers to despoil him. By the time he started on his homeward way, the world was poisoned by Iskender's wickedness; he could not look at rock, or myrtle-bush, or wayside flower without groans and gnashing of teeth; and wherever he reposed at noon, or spent the night, he told his wrongs. The story ran before him through the countryside. When he came at last to his own door, it was to find a crowd awaiting him, anxious to know the truth of strange reports. Several of the dragomans were there, including Abdullah, uncle of Iskender, who questioned Elias in no peaceful tone.
Awed by the sternness of so respectable a man, Elias dissembled his rage, and spoke in sorrow:
"Alas! it is too true. Allah knows, it grieves my soul to relate it. Iskender, whom I loved as my own eyes, has led the good Emîr into the wilderness, meaning to rob him there and take his life."
"It is a lie!" cried Abdullah furiously. "Take back those words this instant, or thy blood shall pay for it. Allah knows thou wast ever the chief of liars."
"That is true," agreed the bystanders.
"That is true, perhaps," Elias owned; "yet in this case I speak the truth. Those two had learnt the hiding-place of a great treasure, and Iskender means to have the whole of it. I had secret warning of his wicked purpose, and went to bring good honest men to defeat it. But he, suspecting what I was about, persuaded the Emîr to start without me. Moreover, he dismissed the muleteer whom I had chosen, engaging in his stead a murderous ruffian. My soul died within me when I heard of their departure. Allah witness how I strove to overtake them. But the rogue had set every one upon the road against me. I was delayed at every turn, flouted and finally robbed of my weapons and all my money." He exhibited his empty belt. "So I returned, despairing. May God have mercy on that kind Emîr, and let his soul find peace."
These words, and still more the heart-broken manner of their utterance, made a profound impression upon all who heard them. They were received as true by every one there except Abdullah, who talked of hiring ruffians to assassinate the wicked slanderer. He swore at once to clear his nephew's honour. But his excitement was regarded with mere pity, as natural to a man afflicted in so near a relative.
Abdullah's furious indignation with Elias was complicated by a strain of keen anxiety upon his own account. Though most of the story seemed absurd to his intelligence, there remained enough of possible and even probable to justify dismay in so respectable a man. It seemed more than likely that his nephew, that unlucky boy, had led a British subject into lawless regions quite unknown to him; if harm ensued there would be trouble with the consul; and the power called Cook was so careful for its dragomans that the mere relationship to one whose face was blackened might involve dismissal. The bare idea of this contingency swamped Abdullah's intellect in pure amazement, for since his vision of the Blessed Virgin years ago he had believed that the breath of scandal could not come near him. He crossed himself repeatedly and muttered prayers. But these misgivings were secreted from the world, before which he appeared as the intrepid champion of his absent nephew, prepared to refute the story in its entirety.
His first thought was to make Elias eat his words either by bribes or violence; but a little reflection sufficed to show it worthless. For, once pronounced, those words were all men's utterance; the town, the countryside, was now ablaze, and Elias but a fuse that had done its work. Abdullah demanded on behalf of Iskender that all who professed any knowledge of the matter should be called and questioned in the hearing of the group of dragomans. The proprietor and servants of the khan, who had beheld Iskender's mad excitement on the morning of the start, the discarded muleteer, Aflatûn and Fâris, who still lingered in the town in hopes to recover their expenses from Elias, with others quite unknown, bore witness to the suspicious manner of the young man's flight, and the dance he had led each and all of them. Abdullah gnawed his heavy grey moustache, with eyes downcast, when Elias turned towards him with expressive hands.
From the scene of this inquiry, which was the tavern in the ruined cloister, looking through shadowed arches on the purple sea, a professional errand led Abdullah to the hotel of Mûsa el Barûdi. The sons of Mûsa sat on stools before the door, as did also the priest Mîtri, taking coffee with them. "What news?" they asked. Abdullah hid his face. Could it be that they had not yet heard those wicked lies about Iskender? He enlightened them forthwith with fervent crossings of himself and prayers to Allah; and confessed that he was at his wits' end, since all the evidence obtainable tended strongly to confirm the insane story. The laughter of his hearers did him good. They ridiculed the very notion of Iskender's guile; and they were men of position, respectable men, whose opinion was worth having, while the rest were riff-raff. Abdullah went home greatly comforted.
But the story spread and grew in all the land, with variations and most wonderful additions. People came to Abdullah for the rights of it, and were visibly disappointed and incredulous at receiving a flat denial. They wanted the true story to replace the false, and Abdullah knew no more than that Elias was a liar. He sat still in his house for hours together, gnawing his thick moustache and staring at the ground. Then he bethought him to call on the mother of Iskender, who might have knowledge of her son's true purpose in this mad excursion. If he had abstained from visiting her till now, it was in the hope to keep from her a scandal which was sure to wound her. Now the time had come to try her value as a witness. Though the weather was bad, he could not wait for sunshine, but, taking his umbrella, walked out on to the sandhills through the pelting rain. His boots were caked with mud when he reached the little house; he would not enter therefore, but spoke from the doorway, sheltered by his umbrella. It seemed she had nothing to tell him. It was only from the voice of common rumour that she knew that her precious son had left the town, and since then reports had reached her which made her wash her hands of him for ever. When those reports came to the ears of the missionaries, as they were sure to do, it would ruin his mother in their eyes for ever.
"Take no thought for him, O Abdullah!" she cried furiously. "He is no son of mine, but a changeling of the children of the Jânn. Doubtless my true son, whom I loved and nursed, is with the devils somewhere in the Jebel Kâf. Allah knows he was too good for me; my pride in him was too great! And so they took him, and put a miscreant, a devil, in his place. They say he has a mighty treasure written in his name, so that none but he can free it from the spell that guards it; that shows us what he really is, for who but a jinni, a vile changeling, would hide so glad a secret from his loving mother? Thou sayest, Has he killed the good Emîr? He may have done so, for I say he is no child of mine; he is a devil. Tell all the world my son is lost to me, carried off to the Jebel Kâf or some lone ruin; and a jinni masquerades in his likeness, doing evil."
She screamed her parrot-scream; she could not talk. It was one of her black days when the world was turned to madness. Abdullah retired from the vain attempt to get some sense from her with hopelessness increased instead of lessened.
That same evening, as he sat in his house, enjoying a ray of pallid sunshine sent through the branches of a leafless fig-tree which stretched its gnarled, grey twisted arms before his door, Yuhanna Mahbûb came to him with an angry brow.
"What is this I hear about Iskender?" he inquired. "Within this hour I have returned with my party from El Cuds. He has gone with the Emîr to find a treasure; is it true? I came at once to thee, his near relation. For know that he swore to me by the Blessed Sacrament, in the presence of witnesses, that he knew nothing of any treasure, nor was his trip with the Emîr concerned with aught save pleasure. This I tell thee that thou blame me not hereafter if I take dire vengeance on the perjured dog."
"Wait a little, O 'Hanna," said Abdullah pacifically, "thou wilt learn, in sh' Allah, that he did not swear falsely. All this scandal is the produce of Elias, whom all men know for the very father of lies. Wait, I tell thee, and the poor lad's innocence will be seen."
"Aye, wait I must perforce, for he is absent. Were he here among us, I should not have had recourse to thee unless as bearer of his dead body. He swore, I tell thee, by the Blessed Sacrament! Shall such a wretch live on, to practise sacrilege?"
"May Allah, of his mercy, show the truth to us," replied Abdullah, while Yuhanna went off, breathing threats against the perjurer. He prayed to God that his nephew might not have sworn falsely and so incurred the punishment of everlasting fire. Yet there was much treasure lying undiscovered in the land, and it might be that his nephew had got wind of some of it. He knew not what to think, but spent most of the night in prayer, prostrate before that tiny picture of the Mother of God which he had set up to commemorate his radiant vision.
In the morning came the finishing blow. He stood in the doorway, watching his chickens pecking amid the wet litter of refuse round the trunk of the fig-tree, when the sound of a horse's hoof-beats reached his ears, and presently from a narrow opening in the neighbouring wall emerged a Frank in black clothes, black, leaf-shaped hat and yellow riding-boots—the Father of Ice in person. The missionary dismounted, tied his horse by the head-rope to a loose stone of the wall, and came forward, stooping to escape the branches of the fig-tree.
"Welcome, sir!" exclaimed Abdullah, smiling and bowing, though his mind misgave him. "My house a boor one, sir, but at your service."
"Good day to you," replied the missionary coldly, and passed in before him.
"I have come about this shocking business of your nephew," he observed, declining to sit down, though Abdullah brought forth cushions. "The news reached me only yesterday, and I have been this morning to see that man Elias. His story seems quite clear, in spite of all the nonsense about buried treasure. The young Englishman doubtless took a considerable sum of money with him, and Iskender has beguiled him by the story of the treasure, meaning to rob him, if not worse."
"Oh, sir, it's all a lie, by God!" exclaimed Abdullah; but the Father of Ice paid no attention to him.
"I grieve to think of that misguided boy. He was like a child of our own at the Mission, till bad companions led him into evil ways. Of course, now he must pay the penalty of his transgression. You natives must be taught once more that the life and property of British subjects are not to be lightly made away with. I wrote to the consul last night, directly I had news of this atrocious affair. Iskender, poor misguided boy, will bear the punishment. But in my opinion, and in the sight of God, there are others more to blame than he in the matter. I mean those who led him astray, who first suggested to him a life of fraud and peculation." The missionary looked straight into Abdullah's eyes with the sternness of a righteous judge. "It is of no use to deny your own part in it, for I have spoken with the mother of the wretched lad, and she has told me how you were the first to propose that he should attach himself to this young English visitor with a view to making money, how you egged him on and taught him all the tricks of the trade. Are you not ashamed of yourself, an old man, with death close before you? But all you natives are alike conscienceless, blind to the truth as if a curse from God was on you. Be sure that I, for one, am not blind to your guilt in this affair, and that I shall mention it to Cook's agent at the first opportunity. You have led the boy to renounce his faith, and now to crime! I hope you are proud of your handiwork! Good-day!"
Abdullah found not a word. He stood staring at his feet, stunned and trembling. The whole structure of his pride caved in on him. He, the Sheykh of the Dragomans, the respectable of respectables, made so by especial favour of the Blessed Virgin, to hear such words from one of those very English whose esteem upheld him! He soiled his face with mud and camel's dung and sat in his house, lamenting, refusing every comfort that his wife or the sympathising neighbours could devise to offer. Some two hours after noon there came a storm with terrifying flashes. The thunder shook the house, the solid earth. At one moment the gnarled and twisted branches of the fig-tree were seen black against a sharp illumination, the next smoke-grey and weird amid the inky gloom. They seemed like snakes approaching stealthily, and then like loathsome arms intent to seize his soul. The storm gave place to steady rain; the world was lightened somewhat, but without relief. Abdullah, though a prey to all the horrors, sat there quite still till evening, when suddenly the force of life returned to him. He rushed out to the nearest tavern, called for arac, and drank heavily. The honour which had resulted from his vision now seemed torn from him; and since She withdrew her favour, he was free to break his vow. That night, returning home, he snatched the sacred picture from its shelf and trod it under foot, to his wife's terror.
Southward and eastward rode Iskender with his loved Emîr. Crags succeeded crags; the sky was turquoise. At noon the very gorges held no shade; but in the morning and the evening there were halls of coolness, while the sunlight made the heights as bright as flower-beds. Wild-flowers shone everywhere among the rocks; and in the open places blew wide fields of them. Whenever they came to a village, and pitched their tent beside the well, the inhabitants bustled out to do them service in return for stale scraps of news from the outer world; and Iskender told them of the greatness and the power of his Emîr, till they esteemed it a rich reward merely to peep through the hangings of the tent at such a potentate. Even supposing that they never found the Valley of the Kings, this ramble together through delightful solitudes was worth the money spent, it seemed to him. The valley full of gold was a pretext only, giving the taste of purpose to their doings and clothing them in the glamour of romance. And his patron seemed to view it in the same reasonable light, for he evinced no hurry, but when they reached some pleasant spot, would waste a day there, prowling among the gullies with his gun, while Iskender sketched. If the worst came to the worst, Iskender considered, he could always declare in anguished tones that he had lost the way—a matter of no wonder in the pathless desert. And he still trusted that Allah, of His boundless mercy, would lead them straight to the gold.
But one night there came a sudden storm of wind and rain when they were encamped upon the summit of a rocky mound at the junction-place of two wild gorges. Their tent was blown away, and they were drenched to the skin. It was found impossible to raise the tent again because of the strong wind hurtling through the ravines. The rain soon ceased, however; they managed to protect the fire, and sat close round it, trying to make a joke of the disaster. But in the morning the Emîr's face had changed its colour, he kept shivering till his teeth chattered, and was very cross. Happily they had with them a supply of quinine. Iskender, who knew something of the ways of English people, administered a dose at once. He was for going back, seeing that the theatre of these misfortunes was a place remote from any dwelling; he warned his friend that they would find no village in the waste before them—nothing but scattered wells, and chance encampments of the Bedû, who might or might not prove friendly. But the Emîr announced his fixed intention to go on, whatever happened; and when Iskender ventured to remonstrate, told him angrily to hold his tongue. Was it likely he was going to turn back now, having come so far? He drank some whisky neat, and then felt strong enough to mount his horse.
They went forward miserably in the chill, wet morning. The sky was nowhere seen; damp mists obscured every feature of the landscape. The muleteer, with head wrapped up in a shawl, intoned a kind of dirge, pausing sometimes to ask Allah to improve his plight. The Emîr's teeth chattered and he cursed at intervals. But most hapless of all three was Iskender, who now knew that his lord was bent on finding the gold, and valued the pleasant days already spent, their adventures by the way, their friendly converse, solely as conducing to that end.
About the fourth hour the sun made itself felt; the mists began to disperse, and depths of blue appeared. The afternoon was fine and, in the sunshine, the Emîr recovered cheerfulness. He apologised for his ill temper of the morning to Iskender, who strove to regard the stern resolve he had expressed to see the Valley of the Kings as likewise part of the attack of fever; but his mind misgave him.
That evening, after supper, the Emîr remarked that they had come an eight days' journey at the lowest estimate, so, by the guide's own showing, must be near the place. He spread out his map between them, and asked Iskender to point out its exact position. Forced to decide that instant, or arouse his friend's distrust, the poor youth breathed a heart-felt prayer to Allah for direction and, after some show of examining the chart, laid finger firmly on a certain spot. The Emîr then marked the place in pencil with a tiny cross, and reckoned up the distance by the scale provided.
"It is quite near," he cried. "We ought to be there to-morrow before midday."
He talked of nothing else till sleeptime. Iskender listened with an anxiety that was physical pain. He wished to Allah that Elias had been there to assure him that the place had real existence. Lying on the ground, wrapped in his coverlet, he spent the night in prayer. Allah is all-powerful; at His mercy all things are and are not; even if the valley lay not where Iskender had placed it, Allah could convey it thither in the twinkling of an eye; even if no such place existed in the world, Allah could create it as easily as a man can yawn. By dwelling thus in imagination on that Boundless Power, he gained at length a certain comfort in dependence such as the baser sort of slaves enjoy.
This mood of resignation was still upon him when he rose at daybreak. There remained nothing possible for him to do; and in the fresh morning, when the rocks in sight presented each its separate mass of living colour, he could not believe that the Emîr would quarrel with him, even if he knew the worst. The Emîr was a rich man; what did he want with gold? And had not Iskender proved himself his faithful servant? Surely the great one felt some love for him, sufficient to condone a little fiction which had been kept up simply for his Honour's pleasure.
But the Frank had his map before him in the saddle, and he more than once dismounted to consult the compass on his watch-chain.
After three hours they reached a plain of alternating sand and rocks, where nothing grew except some prickly shrub. On one side, not far off, a lake was seen, with many palm-trees mirrored in its tranquil waters. The Frank stared at it in amazement, remarking that it was not in the map. Iskender guessed it was mirage, and was soon confirmed in that opinion by the gradual disappearance of both lake and palm-trees. But the vision tended to reassure him, seeming a word from the Most High. If Allah, he thought, could thus imprint a perfect likeness of trees and water on the hot, still air, He would have no difficulty in painting a few rocks golden.
The sun was fierce. For miles they saw no shade, but only strange rock-ledges rising no higher than a doorstep above the sand, which grew low, prickly shrubs. A range of hills before them seemed hopelessly remote. Near the middle of this waste, the Emîr drew rein.
"The valley should be here," he said with finger on the map; and Iskender in the tension of his nerves was going to shout out "Praise to Allah," for the sand just there was full of shining particles; when the next words came and froze him to the marrow: "There's no valley; nothing but this beastly plain. Are you a liar?"
A trace of kindness or dry humour in his tone would have compelled Iskender to confess the truth, with self-accusal. As it was, he cried:
"Haf batience! Wait a minute! I had counted wrong. See, there are mountains! Surely the wady will be there among them." Inwardly he prayed Allah to make good his words, to save him from the scorn of one he loved so truly.
"Well, come on!" said the Emîr, with a shrug; and they toiled in silence towards the range of hills.
"You, who know the way, point out this valley," said the Emîr as to a dog, when they were near enough to observe the configuration of those heights.
Iskender pointed to what seemed an opening; but knew that his gesture carried no conviction. The Frank's cold looks askance at him deprived him of the power to play his part.
"We shall see," said the Emîr, urging his horse forward. At the entrance to the wady he dismounted, and Iskender, who was then some way behind, could hear derisive laughter. It was no valley at all. The shadow of a big projecting rock had been mistaken in the distance for an opening. The Frank was sitting calmly in that shadow when his friend came up.
"I can see no gold here," he observed politely; "but you have better eyes. Look well about you!"
Three parts unconscious, the unhappy youth obeyed. Alighting off his horse, he scanned the heights above, the ground at his feet, the sandy plain on which their mules were seen at a great distance.
"No gold! no gold!" he murmured idiotically.
"Give up this acting!" cried the Frank with vehemence. "Confess it was all a lie! Say why you brought me here. We are man to man just now, and may as well arrange our business before your friend the muleteer comes up. That missionary told me to look out for villainy."
Iskender bit the dust and wept aloud, calling on Allah to attest his innocence. To be accused of acting, when his heart was broken; to be suspected of a purpose hostile to his patron, when he would have shed his blood to bring a smile to that beloved face!
"Confess!" the Emîr repeated; and, hearing the voice of the Father of Ice, Iskender lied, as he had always lied, through fear, to that stern, upright man.
"No, it is true, sir, but we went wrong somehow. My God, it is true, sir; Elias said so too!"
"Elias is a liar.… Confess now that you never knew the way, and that your father never in his life saw any valley such as that you've so often described to me."
But Iskender would not admit that he had lied at all; to do so would have been to justify his patron's cruel scorn. Indeed, the fiction of the gold had grown so natural that he believed, even now, that it was partly true.
"You never knew the way; your father never left you any paper. It is pretty certain that he couldn't read or write. What a fool I was not to think of that before! If there were such a paper you would have it with you. Show it me!" the Emîr insisted.
Iskender appealed to Heaven against his lord's unreason. Was it likely that his mother, to whom it of right belonged, would let so important a document out of her own keeping? He had read it through and copied it, but lost the copy yesterday, he knew not how. It was owing to that loss that he had missed the way. His memory had played some devil's trick to shame him. The sand at his feet, the plain, the rocks beside him seemed all flame, reminding him poignantly of his vision of the place of gold. The air upon his face and hands was the breath of an oven, the sky a blackness overhead.
The Emîr rose and walked towards his horse. The contemptuous movement stung Iskender like a lash in the face. He clutched at his patron's raiment, sobbing and blubbering, imploring forgiveness for his one mistake. The Emîr beat him off with his whip, and, springing into the saddle, rode off slowly. Leading his own horse by the bridle, Iskender followed after him, with piteous appeals. Nothing mattered save their mutual affection. What was truthfulness as compared with human love? Appalled by the prospect of life, if deprived of his lord's regard, he put forward his limitless devotion as a claim for kindness, and fancied that his friend was listening, not unmoved. It was with disappointment that he heard again, in icy tones:
"You knew from the first that it was all a lie."
Nay, he protested, how could he be certain? He had not been alone in declaring that the gold was there; Elias had said so too. Why should he alone be made responsible?
The Emîr deigned not so much as to look on his despair.
Returning thus across the plain, they met the mules. The driver's mouth fell open at the Frank's command to turn back, just when they were near the limit of that arid waste and all the beasts were tired. It was some time before this man, Mahmûd, had mind for aught beyond his own complaints; but when at length he realised that Iskender, his good friend, was in disgrace, he also made entreaty for his pardon. The Emîr, with him on one side and Iskender on the other, took alarm. He laid his hand on the revolver at his belt, and commanded both to keep their distance.
Mahmûd with a shrug dropped behind, calling out to Iskender that it was the sun, and asking Allah to restore the poor khawâjah; but Iskender still adhered to his beloved lord, wishing that he would carry out his threat and shoot him dead. Then perchance his righteous anger would be turned to sorrow; he would regret the blind devotion of his willing slave.
A sudden shout from the muleteer made them both look round.
A swarm of mounted Arabs, shadows in the sun-haze, was careering towards them, leaving a dust-cloud trailing on the distant plain. Their lance-points glittered. They were nearing rapidly. Iskender stood gaping, awestruck at the sight, when a whip-lash scored his face.
"You infernal scoundrel!" snarled the Emîr through his clenched teeth. "So this is why you've brought me all this way. They made it worth your while, no doubt. I might have guessed. That missionary warned me plain enough."
Iskender nursed his wounded face, and writhed with pain. For the moment he could neither hear nor think nor see.
The wild horsemen galloped in a herd to within a hundred yards of the travellers, when they fanned out neatly and surrounded them. The Frank had plucked out his revolver.
"Don't do that, sir, for God-sake!" Iskender shrieked. "You make them cross."
Still with hands pressed to his wounded face he blessed the assailants loudly, and asked how they did. For answer they told him to make his companion drop the pistol; which, when the order was conveyed to him, the Amir did sullenly. The Arabs then rode near, and stared in the faces of their captives.
They were a ragged-looking troop, clad every one in armour, were it but of leather. Queer helmets showed beneath their dirty head-shawls, and a few wore tattered coats of mail of high antiquity. Only their fierce bold eyes, strong spears, and clean-limbed horses kept the laugh from them. Their husky speech was full of words and phrases strange to Iskender.
When all had satisfied their curiosity, the throng rode off, leaving a sufficient guard to follow with the prisoners. Iskender learnt that they were surprised to find so small a company. Having heard of the approach of a great prince of the English, their chief expected to receive a visit from his Highness, with supplication in due form for leave to journey through his territory. When he learnt that the Emîr had entered his realm without so much as a salâm aleykum, he resolved to make the mannerless cub his guest by force. For this purpose he had sent forth all his braves in war trim, supposing that the English chief had power to match his insolence, only to surprise a train which a blind man could have taken single-handed!
Bitterly did Iskender curse his own vain-glory which had led him to boast at every village of his patron's greatness, and the absolute power which he wielded in the land of his birth. He was separated now from his dear one in the cavalcade, catching only an occasional glimpse of his back, which had a sullen hunch. He forgot the pain of his own face in fears for him.
At the end of an hour's slow riding, the barren waste gave place to slopes of coarse grass, where a number of camels, sheep, and goats were feeding peacefully. The camp of the Bedû appeared—a little town of black tents in a hollow, from which shouts, neighs, and much barking of dogs proceeded. Once there, Iskender lost sight of his Emîr, who, as the prisoner of importance, was taken straight to the chief's tent. He himself was left standing with Mahmûd among the tent ropes, in some peril from the heels of tethered stallions. A smell of hairy beasts defiled the air. Dark-skinned women and children came to stare at them. The girls expressed compassion for Iskender's wounded face, and cried shame on the man who had disfigured it, supposing him to be one of their own people. The muleteer, a Muslim, made profession of his faith, attesting the Unity of God and the Mission of Muhammad loudly, in the evident persuasion that his hour had come.
Iskender wondered what his lord was undergoing, and then as the day grew cooler, gave up thinking altogether, happy to lie down and rest. The women told him he was free to walk about, but for long he felt no call to use the privilege. At last, however, seeing his horse was tethered close at hand, he went and took from the saddle-bags his book and paint-box, and began to make a likeness of the scene; the women gathered round and cried: "Ma sh' Allah!" They took the lines and spots for magic writing, and gathered shyly round them, half expecting apparitions.
He was in this employment when men came in haste and dragged him to the chief's tent. He managed to stow the paint-box in his trousers, but the book was lost.
"Allah have mercy on thee, O Iskender!" groaned Mahmûd, as he was led away. "They have slain the khawâjah; now they come for thee. Well I am a Muslim, and resign my cause to God!"
In the tabernacle of the chief, superior only in size to the rest of the tents, the elders of the tribe were set in council, the Emîr before them. At the moment of Iskender's entrance there was a puzzled look upon each bearded face, directed towards the Frank in perfect courtesy. The arrival of an interpreter was hailed with exclamations of relief.
Iskender, having made obeisance, was invited to take a place in the circle. From the join of two camel's hair curtains screening an inner tent, he fancied he could see bright eyes of women peeping.
"Is this the great Emîr, of whom report has reached us?" he was asked. "And if so, how comes he to travel with so small a retinue?"
The Frank's eyes dwelt upon Iskender's face with an intensity of distrust that neighboured actual hatred. He still believed his friend in league with the marauders.
"It is true; he is an Emîr of the noblest, O my lords," Iskender answered; "but, may it please your Honours, he has not that wealth to which his rank entitles him. Indeed, for one in his position, he is poor."
The chieftains of the Bedû nodded comprehension, for poor Emîrs were not unknown among them. They murmured of compassion saying:
"May Allah make him very rich and powerful!"
But one objected:
"Why then does he travel? The rich among the Franks come hither for adventure and to rest their stomachs after too much feasting; their learned come to find out ancient ruins, and study the writings of the idolaters which are found here and there among the rocks. But why should this poor noble youth have wandered hither?"
"Aye, answer us that, O Nazarene! Why, why, and for what reason?" came the chorus.
Iskender found himself at a loss, being loth to revive his lord's anger by naming the valley of the gold in his hearing; he was looking up and down in the vain search for inspiration, when the Emîr himself came unexpectedly to his relief. With an ironical glance at the interpreter, the Englishman mustered all his Arabic and, turning to a sheykh who was his neighbour, asked:
"Is there a wady named Wady 'l Mulûk?"
"Wady 'l Mulûk!" cried all the elders in surprise; and then, in the twinkling of an eye, their foreheads cleared from all bewilderment. Wady 'l Mulûk! Ah to be sure! The vale in which lay scattered all the treasure of the ancient kings. So that was what his Honour came to seek!
Iskender was no less perplexed than was his lord by all this outcry, when the chief of all the tribe leaned towards him, saying:
"I understand. He seeks the Valley of the Kings," and touched his forehead meaningly. "May Allah heal him! The Lord forbid that we should plunder such a one, or detain him beyond his pleasure. All such are favoured of Allah! Be our guests from now."
And he gave his orders for a feast to be prepared.
All the old men fell to petting and caressing the Emîr, grieving to think that one so young and comely was spoilt for the commerce of life by a deranged intelligence. Iskender, too, they treated as a friend. Their original intention, they confessed, had been to hold his Honour up to ransom; but now they offered gifts instead of claiming them.
Iskender, the moment he could do so with politeness, went out and searched the camp till he regained his sketch-book. Mahmûd, the muleteer, called to him from the mouth of a tent where he was feasting as the guest of a tall Bedawi. He proclaimed the safety of their lives a miracle, attributable solely to the fact that he himself had not ceased to assert the Unity of God from the moment he was taken captive till men came and blessed him. All gave praise to Allah.