Part 19 (2/2)
The Basha checked in his stride, and turned upon her angrily
”May thy tongue rot, thou mother of lies!”
”I am as the dust beneath thy feet, O er calls hteous to hear one whoainst the breast of the unbeliever, who carries the scourge of Allah against the infidel Frankish pigs, so ood thy words, and pay the liar's price if thou shouldst fail”
”And should I fear the test?” she countered, nothing daunted ”I tell thee, O father of Marzak, that I should hail it gladly Why, hear me now Thou settest store by deeds, not words Tell me, then, is it the deed of a True-Believer to waste substance upon infidel slaves, to purchase them that he may set them free?”
Asad moved on in silence That erstwhile habit of Sakr-el-Bahr's was one not easy to condone It had occasioned him his moments of uneasiness, and more than once had he taxed his lieutenant with the practice ever to receive the same answer, the anshich he now made to Fenzileh ”For every slave that he so e”
”Perforce, else would he be called to account 'Twas sointo the face of true Musli fondness for the infidel country whence he springs Is there room for that in the heart of a true meuish for the Sicilian shore froht of thee the life of a single Sicilian infidel in all these years that I have lived to serve thee? Such longings are betrayed, I say, by such a practice, and such longings could have no place in one who had uprooted infidelity froe of his beyond the seas--risking a vessel that he captured from the arch-enemy of Islam, which is not his to risk but thine in whose naether with it he imperils the lives of two hundred True-Believers To what end? To bear hiain upon the unhallowed land that gave him birth So Biskaine reported And what if he should founder on the way?”
”Thou at least wouldst be content, thou fount of rowled Asad
”Call me harsh names, O sun that warms me! Am I not thine to use and abuse at thy sweet pleasure? Pour salt upon the heart thou woundest; since it is thy hand I'll never murmur a complaint But heed me--heed my words; or since words are of no account with thee, then heed his deeds which I a to thy tardy notice Heed theive me to be whipped or slain for ue is like the clapper of a bell with the devil swinging froht else, since thou dost butthy love from thy fond slave”
”The praise to Allah, then,” said he ”Come, it is the hour of prayer!”
But he praised Allah too soon Woh she protested she had done, she had scarce begun as yet
”There is thy son, O father of Marzak”
”There is, O mother of Marzak”
”And a man's son should be the partner of his soul Yet is Marzak passed over for this foreign upstart; yet does this Nasrani of yesterday hold the place in thy heart and at thy side that should be Marzak's”
”Could Marzak fill that place,” he asked ”Could that beardless boy lead ainst the foes of Islalory of the Prophet's Holy Law upon the earth?”
”If Sakr-el-Bahr does this, he does it by thy favour, O h he be Sakr-el-Bahr is but what thou hast , indeed, O mother of error Sakr-el-Bahr is what Allah hath made him He is what Allah wills He shall become what Allah wills Hast yet to learn that Allah has bound the fate of each lory suffused the deep sapphire of the sky heralding the setting of the sun and made an end of that altercation, conducted by her with a daring as singular as the patience that had endured it He quickened his steps in the direction of the courtyard That golden glow paled as swiftly as it had spread, and night fell as suddenly as if a curtain had been dropped
In the purple glooloith a faintly luminous pearliness Dark forarden followed by Fenzileh, her head now veiled in a thin blue silken gauze She flashed across the quadrangle and vanished through one of the archways, even as the distant voice of a Mueddin broke plaintively upon the brooding stillness reciting the Shehad--
”La illaha, illa Allah! Wa Muhammad er Rasool Allah!”
A slave spread a carpet, a second held a great silver bowl, into which a third poured water The Basha, having washed, turned his face towards Mecca, and testified to the unity of Allah, the Co over the city from minaret to minaret
As he rose from his devotions, there came a quick sound of steps without, and a sharp suuard, invisible alare those who came
Frolea tiny clay lamps in which burned a wick that was nourished byto learn who ca steps, whilst froht to suffuse the courtyard and set the
A dozen Nubian javelin-ht stepped the iure of Asad's wazeer, Tsaure in lis upon thee, O
”And peace upon thee, Tsamanni,” was the answer ”Art the bearer of news?”