Oriental Encounters | Page 5

its weight.
'Wallahi!' he cried out in admiration. 'I believe thou wouldst have smashed my head with
it. All for the sake of a poor man of no account, whom thou employest for a week, and
after that wilt see no more. Efendim, take me as thy servant always!' Of a sudden he
spoke very earnestly. 'Pay the money to release me from the army. It is a largeish
sum--five Turkish pounds. And Allah knows I will repay it to thee by my service. For the
love of righteousness accept me, for my soul is thine.'
I ridiculed the notion. He persisted. When the muleteer and I set forth again, he rode
beside us, mounted on another donkey this time--'borrowed,' as he put it--which showed
he was a person of resource. 'By Allah, I can shoe a horse and cook a fowl; I can mend
garments with a thread and shoot a bird upon the wing,' he told me. 'I would take care of
the stable and the house. I would do everything your Honour wanted. My nickname is
Rashîd the Fair; my garrison is Karameyn, just two days' journey from the city. Come in
a day or two and buy me out. No matter for the wages. Only try me!'
At the khan, a pretty rough one, where we spent the night, he waited on me deftly and

enforced respect, making me really wish for such a servant. On the morrow, after an
hour's riding, our ways parted.
'In sh'Allah, I shall see thee before many days,' he murmured. 'My nickname is Rashîd the
Fair, forget not. I shall tell our captain thou art coming with the money.'
I said that I might think about it possibly.
'Come,' he entreated. 'Thou wouldst never shame a man who puts his trust in thee. I say
that I shall tell our captain thou art coming. Ah, shame me not before the Commandant
and all my comrades! Thou thinkest me a thief, a lawbreaker, because I took that fellow's
knife?' he asked, with an indulgent smile. 'Let me tell thee, O my lord, that I was in my
right and duty as a soldier of the Sultan in this province. It is that muleteer who, truly
speaking, breaks the law by carrying the knife without a permit. And thou, hast thou a
passport for that fine revolver? At the place where we had luncheon yesterday were other
soldiers. By merely calling on them to support me I could have had his knife and thy
revolver with ease and honesty in strict accordance with the law. Why did I not do so?
Because I love thee! Say thou wilt come to Karameyn and buy me out.'
I watched him jogging on his donkey towards a gulley of the hills along which lay the
bridle-path to Karameyn. On all the evidence he was a rogue, and yet my intimate
conviction was that he was honest. All the Europeans in the land would lift up hands of
horror and exclaim: 'Beware!' on hearing such a story. Yet, as I rode across the parched
brown land towards the city of green trees and rushing waters, I knew that I should go to
Karameyn.
CHAPTER II
A MOUNTAIN GARRISON
The long day's ride was uneventful, but not so the night. I spent it in a village of the
mountains at a very curious hostelry, kept by a fat native Christian, named Elias, who laid
claim, upon the signboard, to furnish food and lodging 'alafranga'--that is, in the modern
European manner. There was one large guest-room, and an adjoining bedroom of the
same dimensions, for some thirty travellers. I had to find a stable for my horse elsewhere.
A dining-table was provided, and we sat on chairs around it; but the food was no wise
European, and the cooking was degraded Greek. A knife, fork, and spoon were laid for
every guest but several cast these on the floor and used their fingers. In the long bedroom
were a dozen beds on bedsteads. By offering a trifle extra I secured one to myself. In
others there were two, three, even four together. An elderly Armenian gentleman who
had a wife with him, stood guard with pistols over her all night. He was so foolish as to
threaten loudly anyone who dared approach her. After he had done so several times a
man arose from the bed next to mine and strolling to him seized him by the throat.
'O man,' he chided. 'Art thou mad or what, thus to arouse our passions by thy talk of
women? Be silent, or we honest men here present will wring thy neck and take thy
woman from thee. Dost thou understand?' He shook that jealous husband as a terrier

would shake a rat.