Alien Souls/The Logical Tale of the Four Camels

Sidi-el-Abas it was spring, white spring, and the pale peace of perfumed dawn.

We were smoking and dreaming, too indolent to speak, each waiting for his neighbor to open the trickling stream of soft, lazy conversation. At last, Ibrahim Fadlallah, the Egyptian, turned to the young Englishman and said:

"Soon, oh my dear, you will return to your own country, so listen to the moral tale I am about to tell, so that you can take back to your own people one lesson, one small lesson which will teach you how to use the manly virtues of honor, self-restraint, and piety—all accomplishments in which you unbelievers are sadly deficient. Give me a cigarette, oh my beloved. Ah, thanks; and now listen to what happened in Ouadi-Halfa between Ayesha Zemzem, the Sheik Seif Ed-din, and Hasaballah Abdelkader, a young Bedouin gentleman, who is very close to my heart.

"The Sheik was a most venerable man, deeply versed in the winding paths of sectarian theology—he had even studied the Sunna—and of a transcendent wisdom which his disciples declared to be greater than that of all the other Sheiks.

"But even in your own country it may be that sanctity of the mind and grace of the dust created body do not always match. Indeed, the Sheik's beard was scanty and of a mottled color; he was not over-clean, especially when you consider that as a most holy man he was supposed to be most rigorous in his daily ablutions. He had grown fat and bulky with years of good living; for tell me, should not a holy man live well so that he may reach a ripe old age, and that many growing generations of disciples may drink the clear drops of honeyed piety which fall from his lips?

"Besides, to compensate for the many piastres he spent on himself, he tightened the strings of his purse when it came to paying for the wants of his large household. He said it was his duty to train his sons and the mothers of his sons in the shining virtue of abstemiousness, asking them to repeat daily the words in the book of the Koran: Over-indulgence is a most vile abomination in the yes of Allah.

"His first two wives had grown gray, and, his old heart yearning for the untaught shyness of youth, he had taken as the third, Ayesha Zemzem, the daughter of the morning. My dear, do not ask me to describe her many charms. My chaste vocabulary could never do her justice. Besides, do you not know that our women go decently veiled before strangers? Thus who am I to know what I am not allowed to see?

"Suffice it to say that she was a precious casket filled with the arts of coquetry, that she was tall and slender as the free cypress, that her forehead was as the moon on the seventh day and her black eyes taverns of sweetest wine. But the heart of woman acknowledges no law, respects no master except the one she appoints herself, and so it was that Ayesha had no love for the Sheik in spite of his white sanctity, and though he knew the Koran and all the commentaries by heart.

"And then one day she saw Hasaballah, and her veil dropping by chance, he saw her.

"Hasaballah had but lately returned from that famed asylum of learning and splendor, that abode of the Commander of the Faithful, the noble town of Stamboul. He had come back dressed in robes of state, and when he donned his peach-colored coat embroidered with cunning Persian designs in silver and gold, the men in the bazaar looked up from their work and exclaimed: 'Look at him who with his splendor shames the light of the mid-day sun.' "He was indeed a true Osmanli for all his Bedouin blood, and the soft fall of his large Turkish trousers, which met at the ankle, the majestic lines of his silken, the bold cut of his famed peach-colored coat, were the despair of all the leading tailors in Ouadi-Halfa and the envy of all the young bloods. His speech was a string of pearls on a thread of gold. He walked lithely, with a jaunty step, swaying from side to side. He was like a fresh-sprung hyacinth and the master of many hearts.

"I said that Ayesha saw him and her veil was lowered; and you, oh my dear, you know the heart of man, and you also know what many women shall always desire. You will not be shocked when I tell you that on the very same night you could have seen Hasaballah leaning against the wall in the shadow of the screened balcony which protruded from the Sheik's harem; and there he warbled certain appropriate lines which I had taught him. Indeed, I had used them myself with great effect on a former occasion.

"Claptrap! Oh, I don't know. You should have heard Hasaballah's own effort. He was going to address her as 'blood of my soul,' but I thought it altogether too extravagant. The time to woo a woman is when you first see her, and the way to woo her is the old-fashioned way. Flatteries never grow old, and I always use the time-honored similes.

"I tell her that she is as beautiful as the pale moon, that her walk is the walk of the king-goose, that the corners of her mouth touch her pink ears, that she has the waist of a lion, and that her voice is sweeter than the song of the Kokila-bird.

"But permit me to continue my tale.

"Two hours later Hasaballah and Ayesha knocked at my gate, and, touching my knee, asked me for hospitality and protection, which I granted them, having always been known as the friend of the oppressed and the persecuted. And early the following morning the Sheik came to my house, and I received him with open arms as the honored guest of my divan.

"After partaking of coffee and pipe he said:

"'Ibrahim, last night when I went to the women's quarter to join my female household in their midnight prayer, the weeping slaves told me that Ayesha had run away. Great was my grief and fervent my prayers, and when sleep at last closed my swollen eyelids I saw in my dreams the angels Gabriel and Michael descend from heaven. They took me on their shining wings into the seventh hall of Paradise, and there I saw the Messenger Mohammed (on whom be praises) sitting on a throne of pearls and emeralds, and judging men and jinn.

"'And the Prophet (peace on him) said to me: "Go thou in the morning to the house of my beloved and obedient servant Ibrahim Fadlallah, where thou shalt find Ayesha, and with her a certain good-for-nought young scoundrel, whom thou shouldst carry before the Kadi and have punished with many lashes." Thus, O Ibrahim, obeying the commands of the blessed Prophet (on whom peace), I ask you to give up to me Ayesha and Hasaballah, that I may kill the woman and have the man much beaten, according to the wise and merciful law of the Koran.' "And I replied: 'O most pious Sheik, your tale is strange indeed, though amply corroborated by what I am about to relate. For last night, after the fugitives had asked me for protection, I also prayed fervently to Allah (indeed He has no equal), and in my dreams the angels Gabriel and Michael carried me on widespread wings into the seventh hall of Paradise, even into the presence of the Messenger Mohammed (on whom be benedictions).'

"And the Prophet (deep peace on him) turned to me and said:

"'Ibrahim, the pious and learned Sheik Seif Ed-din has just left the abode of the righteous to return to his earthly home. I gave him certain orders, but after he left I reconsidered my decision. When he visits you in the morning, tell him it is my wish that he should leave Hasaballah undisturbed in the possession of the woman he has stolen, and should accept two camels in payment of her.'

"The Sheik pondered awhile, and replied:

"'Verily it says in the most holy book of the Koran that Allah loveth those who observe justice, and that the wicked who turn their backs on the decisions of the Prophet (on whom peace) are infidels who shall hereafter be boiled in large cauldrons of very hot oil.' Now tell me, Ibrahim, are you sure that last night the Prophet (peace on him) did not say that I should accept four camels, and not two, in payment of the bitter loss inflicted on my honor and dignity? Indeed, for four camels Hasaballah may keep the woman, provided the animals be swift-footed and of a fair pedigree. Upon those two points I must insist.'

"Then, oh my eyes! I thought that bargaining is the habit of Jews and Armenians, and I sent word to Hasaballah to give four camels to the Sheik. And everybody was happy, everybody's honor was satisfied, and there was but little scandal and no foul-mouthed gossip to hurt the woman's reputation.

"I have told you how we Moslems, being the wisest of mankind, settle affairs of honor and love. Tell me, do you not think that our way is better than your crude Christian method of airing such matters in a public court of law, and of announcing to a jeering world the little details of harem life and of love misplaced?"

After a moment's reflection the Englishman replied:

"I must say, since you ask me, that I consider yours a disgraceful way of bargaining for a few camels where the shame of a misled woman and the honor of an outraged husband are in the balance. In my country, as you say, the whole affair would have been aired in court and considered from every possible point of view, thus giving the respondent, the petitioner, and the co-respondent equally fair chances. The judge finally, according to our strict though humane law, would have pronounced a divorce decree in favor of the Sheik, and would have sentenced Hasaballah to pay to the Sheik a heavy fine—a fine of many hundreds of pounds."

And Ibrahim interrupted quickly:

"But, beloved one, you have no camels in your country."