The long, roofed bazaar, from which others just like it branched to right and left, was already busy with people going to their day’s work. A coolness of the empty night still hung in its shadow, but that shadow was no longer grey and thin, but blue and deep, telling of a young sun reddening the roofs above. It was early yet to think of selling his horse; so Saïd rode forward at his ease, bent on viewing the city, taking this turning or that as fancy prompted.
Stalls were opening everywhere in the shady markets. Shutters were opened, bars removed, goods displayed. Merchants were settling themselves in dim nooks like caverns behind their wares. The ways were choked with a humming, gaily-coloured crowd. Cries of “Oäh! Oäh! Look out on your right—on your left!” came in shrill tones or hoarse, as men with asses or mules forced a way through the press. Sweet, languorous odours, wafted from the shop of a vendor of perfumes, a whiff of musk from the shroud of some passing woman, the fragrance of tobacco, a dewy breath of the gardens from a mule’s panniers crammed with vegetables—little puffs of sweetness were alternate in Saïd’s nostrils with the reek of dirty garments and ever-perspiring humanity, with vile stenches from dark entries, where all that is foulest of death and decay was flung to glut the scavenger dogs that slept, full-gorged, by dozens in every archway and along every wall. Saïd inhaled sweet and foul alike with a relish as part of the city’s enchantment.
He looked about him as he rode with wondering delight, shouting always “Oäh! Oäh!” as a warning to the multitude whose din drowned the clatter of hoofs. The greatness and the glory of it surpassed his dreams. Here was a whole bazaar wide, long and lofty, possessed exclusively by the workers in precious metals; another by the sweetmeat sellers; a third by those who inlay wood with mother-of-pearl; a fourth by those who sell rugs—rich carpets of all the hues of the garden, of every make, from Bukhra and Khorassan, from Mecca and Baghdad and El Ajem. In one street he caught glimpses, through mean doorways, of precious stuffs, fine silks embossed and embroidered, the work of a lifetime. In the next there was nothing but the noise of grinding, chiselling and planing as the joiners squatted at their work, with the breath of the crowd in their faces.
He passed out of the shade of the covered bazaars and came at length to a place where the sun shone blinding on the ornate gateway of a mosque. Doves wheeled overhead about a tall and graceful minaret, which tapered dazzling white upon the dazzling blue, pointing to the heart of the great sapphire dome, to the throne of Allah himself. Through the archway he could see a flock of them strutting and pecking on the mosaic pavement of a cloistered court. Their cooing brought the inner stillness to him in spite of the noisy crowd, like a voice in a bubble of silence.
He rode on, rejoicing in the fierce sunlight and the peaceful shadows, in all the busy throng around him.
It began to be very hot, and he had been long riding. The cry of a certain vendor of iced drinks, who was elbowing his way through the crowd, clasping a huge bottle of greenish-yellow fluid and clinking two cups together as cymbals, was like the voice of an angel calling him.
“O snow of the mountain! How pure art thou, and how cold! O juice of the lemon! how refreshing when mingled cunningly with sugar as in my bottle! O drink of paradise, who could refuse thee? May Allah have pity on him who drinks not of this cup!”
Saïd drank of it and smacked his lips afterwards. In truth it was refreshing. He paid the smallest of coins—it was all the ministering angel asked for his elixir—into the dirtiest of hands, and received the parting blessing.
“May Allah have mercy on thy belly!”
Then he bethought him that it was time he took some steps toward selling his horse. He had been quite happy till then, drifting with the tide of inclination, having no aim beyond sightseeing. But the moment he came to harbour a definite purpose he felt crestfallen and ill at ease. The multitude, with which he had but now mingled lovingly as a brother, seemed to fall back from him of a sudden, becoming heartless and indifferent. He felt bewildered as his eyes strayed over numberless eager faces, seeking some person not too busy to answer a question. All at once, even as he drew rein irresolute, his hand was seized and kissed, and a man’s voice hailed him with cheerful deference.
“May thy day be happy, O my master!”
“May thy day be happy and blessed!” returned Saïd, graciously.
It was Selìm, the muleteer who had been his guide to the khan. The encounter was timely. Saïd straightway questioned him as to the best place for a man to go who was wishful to sell a horse to the best advantage. Selìm had the whole day on his hands. On his head, he was at Saïd’s service. He would lead him to a place which had not its like in all the world for horse-selling; it was the lord of all such places, by Allah! He would not conduct the effendi to
