Oriental Encounters | Page 8

of our possessions, marking us as of rank above the common. He thrust it on me even when I went out walking; and he it was who, when we started from our mountain home at noon that day, had laid it reverently down upon the seat beside me before he climbed upon the box beside the driver. And now the whip was lost through my neglectfulness. Rash?d's dejection made me feel a worm.
'Allah! Allah!' he made moan, 'What can I do? The driver was a chance encounter. I do not know his dwelling, which may God destroy!'
The host remarked in comfortable tones that flesh is grass, all treasure perishable, and that it behoves a man to fix desire on higher things. Whereat Rash?d sprang up, as one past patience, and departed, darting through the cattle in the yard with almost supernatural agility. 'Let him eat his rage alone!' the host advised me, with a shrug.
Having ordered supper for the third hour of the night, I, too, went out to stretch my limbs, which were stiff and bruised from four hours' jolting in a springless carriage, always on the point of overturning. We should have done better to have come on horseback in the usual way; but Rash?d, having chanced upon the carriage, a great rarity, had decided on that way of going as more fashionable, forgetful of the fact that there was not a road.
The stars were out. In the few shops which still kept open lanterns hung, throwing streaks of yellow light on the uneven causeway, a gleam into the eyes of wayfarers and prowling dogs. Many of the people in the streets, too, carried lanterns whose swing made objects in their circle seem to leap and fall. I came at length into an open place where there was concourse--a kind of square which might be called the centre of the city.
The crowd there, as I noticed with surprise, was stationary, with all its faces turned in one direction. I heard a man's voice weeping and declaiming wildly.
'What is it?' I inquired, among the outskirts.
'A great misfortune!' someone answered. 'A poor servant has lost a whip worth fifty Turkish pounds, his master's property. It was stolen from him by a miscreant--a wicked cabman. His lord will kill him if he fails to find it.'
Seized with interest, I shouldered my way forward. There was Rash?d against the wall of a large mosque, beating himself against that wall with a most fearful outcry. A group of high-fezzed soldiers, the policemen of the city, hung round him in compassion, questioning. Happily, I wore a fez, and so was inconspicuous.
'Fifty Turkish pounds!' he yelled. 'A hundred would not buy its brother! My master, the tremendous Count of all the English--their chief prince, by Allah!--loves it as his soul. He will pluck out and devour my heart and liver. O High Protector! O Almighty Lord!'
'What like was this said cabman?' asked a sergeant of the watch.
Rash?d, with sobs and many pious interjections, described the cabman rather neatly as 'a one-eyed man, full-bearded, of a form as if inflated in the lower half. His name, he told me, was Hab?b; but Allah knows!'
'The man is known!' exclaimed the sergeant, eagerly. 'His dwelling is close by. Come, O thou poor, ill-used one. We will take the whip from him.'
At that Rash?d's grief ceased as if by magic. He took the sergeant's hand and fondled it, as they went off together. I followed with the crowd as far as to the cabman's door, a filthy entry in a narrow lane, where, wishing to avoid discovery, I broke away and walked back quickly to the khan.
I had been there in my private alcove some few minutes, when Rash?d arrived with a triumphant air, holding on high the famous whip. The sergeant came across the court with him. A score of soldiers waited in the gateway as I could see by the light of the great lantern hanging from the arch.
'Praise be to Allah, I have found it!' cried Rash?d.
'Praise be to Allah, we have been enabled to do a little service for your Highness,' cried the sergeant. Therewith he pounced upon my hand and kissed it. I made them both sit down and called for coffee. Between the two of them, I heard the story. The sergeant praised Rash?d's intelligence in going out and crying in a public place until the city and its whole police force had a share in his distress. Rash?d, on his side, said that all that would have been in vain but for the sergeant's knowledge of the cabman's house. The sergeant, with a chuckle, owned that that same knowledge would have been of no effect had not Rash?d once more displayed his keen intelligence. They had poured into the house--a single room,