by the halter-rope, as if I was taking him to water. I never saw my friend 'Abd-erRahman nor any of his household again.

My best hope was now to get away unnoticed to the outer town-gate, and then to mount and ride for it; but this was not an easy thing to do, now that the approaching evening had filled the streets with busy or loitering inhabitants. In fact as I turned a corner, with my horse following me, I came right on half-a-dozen of my old Mardeen acquaintances, men of my own condition in life, sitting on wicker stools in front of a large kaḥwah, chatting and smoking. When they

saw me they hailed me with a simultaneous welcome. To avoid suspicion I acknowledged it, and led my horse near the circle.

"Whence come? and whither away ?' was asked by all. My answer was ready: I had brought a letter,-to say thus much truth cannot

hurt, thought I,-from my master, Ak-Arslan Beg, to an Agha in the town; had received, -this was certainly untrue,-the answer; and was now away back for Diar-Bekr. I added that my duty required speed. This very night, I must, so ran my orders, reach the village of Sheykhan, a long twenty miles distant on the return road; hence, I must, for want of time decline the coffee and nargheelah which their friendliness pressed upon me, or I should be too late on the road.

"A few moments of polite expostulation on their part followed my announcement. Seeing that I would not be persuaded, 'Boy,' called out one of them to an attendant youngster loitering at the door of the kahwah, 'go to such and such a khan, and fetch my horse, along with that of 'Alee the Seroojee;—or stay, I will go myself.' Then, addressing himself to me, 'Ahmed Agha, wait here

till I return,' he said; 'I will be back again

in an instant; 'Alee and I will mount and accompany you a bit of the way. Never mind about watering your horse here in the town; we shall cross the mill-stream just outside the walls; and the water there is warm and good.'

Compelled to comply by the dread of seeming unreasonable if I declined the proposal made me, I sat down, the end of my horse's halter in my hand, wishing my courteous friends and the honour of their company at the bottom of the mill-stream, or the Tigris. To augment, if possible, my uneasiness, the conversation now turned on a man, a Koorde they said, found dead that noon, shot through the body, near a village some miles distant. The villagers had just brought the news, and the governor of the town would, no doubt, order search to be

made after the murderer.

I am

my colour did not change; I was

sure that

now past But I

that; I even took part in the talk. thought that Bedr,-such was the name of my friend who had gone for the horses,would never have reappeared. My lips spoke, but my mind was absent, and my eyes fixed on the street, watching every passer-by.

"As I sat thus, more uneasy than if the wicker-stool beneath me had been of red-hot iron, a well-dressed negro came hurriedly up; his face was glistening with perspiration, and his half-wild eyes almost starting out of his head. He neared me, and I recognised Aman the Sowaḥilee1 an ex-servant, an exfellow slave indeed, of mine, once like myself in the service of poor Kara-Mustapha Oghloo, the Pasha of Bagdad. With scarce a word

1

A generic name for blacks from the Zanzibar coast.

of greeting he leant over my shoulder, whispered hastily into my ear the words, 'For your life, escape;' thrust into my hand something on which he forcibly closed my fingers with his own; and was gone.

'Every one present stared, and asked what this could mean. But before there had been time for answer, and while I could just, only just, restrain myself from rushing away, springing on my horse all unbridled as he was, and galloping wherever he might carry me, Bedr returned with the beasts. I crammed what the negro had given me (a glance had sufficed to show me that it was the letter which I myself had brought for Zenkee Agha, but open, crumpled and torn) Within the

into my breast fold, and rose.

an eye but was

kaḥwah and without, not an eye

now directed on me, and many were the

questions and the conjectures even in that