Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1902-11-05
ON THE ROAD
TO MECCAH
By EDGAR. n. BACON


TINS is the tale that Al Sheriff
told as we sat under the tama-
rind tree in the garden of Josef
Wali7el-Din, the dealer in girls at
Shiraz:
1t was after the fast of Ramazan,
that makes all men weak and thin,
and the suns heat at midsummer
was like fire to waste the substance
of mans body. That is why the
sand of the desert was red as blood
to my eyes and my head swayed from
side to side as l rode.
dared not say to anyone that the
fever was upon me, for one does not
pray to have his body Amounted
and to be left on the sand for the
jackals to finish when the. caravan
has gone by.
Sheyck Sulyman, my neighbor,
prated night and day of Utaiba rob-
bers-a plague to him-and l knew
that he feared for the safety of the
pearls that were hidden in the folds
of his turban; yes, l knew that his,
daughter had been the price of them;
yet he broke off his lamentations to
reclte the prayers when we halted.
When l bowed / could not remember
prayer, and the sound of the peo-
pie and the beasts was afar off
Also, when the rest had completed
their prayers, I forgot to raise my
head from my mat.
AT last some one took me by the
shoulders, shaking me till I awoke
l heard a woman's voice in saluta-
ton: Mailman" I tried to answer:
"As'salem alaykum," but my tongue
was too thick for speech, and my will
was weak.
Then an arm as strong and gentle
as my mothers lifted me. Slowly I
opened my eyes, though at first L
distinguished nothing but the motion
of all about me, but at last under
stood that the host was astir and
passing by.
My mare stood near, and the wom-
an helped me to mount, but, as I
turned to bless her, I saw that she
was daughter of the Wahhabis,
whom my SCUM loathes; so my heart
was hardened against her.
Fleet as an antelope. she ran to-
wards the company of her own peo-
pie, and | lost sight of her; neverthe-
less, could not forget, my heart be-
ing sore because I had been helped
by one of that tribe.
The night was not dark This
Syrian moon is a softer daylight, and
L saw that 1 was among a party of
AleXandrian pilgrims, haii, and
dervishes from the Upper Nile But
the fever had hold of me again, and
the things that moved around me
faded. l rode like a drunken man.
with my hands buried in the shaggy
hair of my horse. for the hot wind on
my cheek was famed by the wing of
Azrael, the Angel of Death.
l lay upon my good mares neck,
now dreaming thirstily of the Wady
Laymun-the valley of lime trees
where the water falls with tinkling
sound between the stones and the
bittern dips his wing into the pools;
now burning with shame that a wom-
an of the Wahhabis had helped me-
Then 1 forgot my hate and heard
only the tinkling that sometimes T
knew to be the bell of my neighbours
camel. but more often I thought was
the stream in the Wady
They were lifting me from nv
mare. Who? 1 knew nothing at all,
cared for nothing except that they
had destroyed my rest in the valley
OF lines, and that the spreading
wings of Azrael darkened the sky
where the dawn should have been.
Then the stupor floated away for
little while, as mist is blown. 90
ing and returning, drifting, always
drifting
1t seemed that there are two of
me, one that looked down upon the
other and pitied. / saw how thew
poured upon the wasted body of that
other the drops of precious oil and
wrapped it in the shroud that /. like
all pilgrims to Meccah, had provided
before setting out. It had been
sprinkled with holy water from the
prophets well of Zemzem, against
that day.
They laid nae in the sand. cover
ing my limbs with the shroud and