Al-Hamazani used to say that in Jorajan the man from Khorasan must open thrice his purse: first, to pay for the rent; second, for the food; and third, for his coffin. And so, in Khalid’s case, at least, is Bohemia. For though the purse be not his own, he was paying dear, and even in advance, in what is dearer than gold, for his experience. “O, that the Devil did not take such interest in the marginal work of our life! Why should we write it then, and for whom? And how will it fare with us when, chapfallen in the end and mortified, we stand before the great Taskmaster like delinquent school boys with a blank text in our hands?” (Thus Shakib, who has caught the moralising evil from his Master.) And that we must stand, and fall, for thus standing, he is quite certain. At least, Khalid is. For he would not return to the Text to make up for the blank pages therein, if he were not.
“When he returned from his last sojourn in Bohemia,” writes our Scribe, “Khalid was pitiful to behold. Even Sindbad, had he seen him, would have been struck with wonder. The tears rushed to my eyes when we embraced; for instead of Khalid I had in my arms a phantom. And I could not but repeat the lines of al-Mutanabbi,
“So phantom-like I am, and though so near,
If I spoke not, thou wouldst not know I’m here.”
“No more voyages, I trust, O thou Sindbad.” And he replied, “Yes, one more; but to our dear native land this time.” In fact, I, too, was beginning to suffer from nostalgia, and was much desirous of returning home. But Shakib is in such a business tangle that he could not extricate himself in a day. So, they tarry another year in New York, the one meanwhile unravelling his affairs, settling with his creditors and collecting what few debts he had, the other brooding over the few blank pages in his Text.
One day he receives a letter from a fellow traveller, a distinguished citizen of Tammany Land, whom he had met and befriended in Bohemia, relating to an enterprise of great pith and moment. It was election time, we learn, and the high post of political canvasser of the Syrian District was offered to Khalid for a consideration of—but the letter which Shakib happily preserved, we give in full.
“Dear Khalid:
“I have succeeded in getting Mr. O’Donohue to appoint you a canvasser of the Syrian District. You must stir yourself, therefore, and try to do some good work, among the Syrian voters, for Democracy’s Candidate this campaign. Here is a chance which, with a little hustling on your part, will materialise. And I see no reason why you should not try to cash your influence among your people. This is no mean position, mind you. And if you will come up to the Wigwam tomorrow, I’ll give you a few suggestions on the business of manipulating votes.
And the said Mr. Hoolihan, the letter shows, is Secretary to Mr. O’Donohue, who is first henchman to the Boss. Such a letter, if luckily misunderstood, will fire for a while the youthful imagination. No; not his Shamrag Majesty’s Tammany Agent to Syria, this Canvassership, you poor phantom-like zany! A high post, indeed, you fond and pitiful dreamer, on which you must hang the higher aspirations of your soul, together with your theory of immanent morality. You would not know this at first. You would still kiss the official notification of Mr. Hoolihan, and hug it fondly to your breast. Very well. At last—and the gods will not damn thee for musing—you will stand in the bandwagon before the corner groggery and be the object of the admiration of your fellow citizens—perhaps of missiles, too. Very well, Khalid; but you must shear that noddle of thine, and straightway, for the poets are potted in Tammany Land. We say this for your sake.
The orator-dream of youth, ye gods, shall it be realised in this heaven of a dray-cart with its kerosene torch and its drum, smelling and sounding rather of Jahannam? Surely, from the Table of Bohemia to the Stump in Tammany Land, is a far cry. But believe us, O Khalid, you will wish you were again in the gardens of Proserpine, when the silence and darkness extinguish the torch and the drum and the echoes of the shouting crowds. The headaches are certain to follow this inebriation. You did not believe Shakib; you would not be admonished; you would go to the Wigwam for your portfolio. “High post,” “political canvasser,” “manipulation of votes,” you will know the exact meaning of these esoteric terms, when, alas, you meet Mr. Hoolihan. For you must know that not everyone you meet in Bohemia is not a Philistine. Indeed, many helots are there, who come from Philistia to spy out the Land.
We read in the Histoire Intime of Shakib that Khalid did become a Tammany citizen, that is to say, a Tammany dray-horse; that he was much esteemed by the Honourable Henchmen, and once in the Wigwam he was particularly noticed by his Shamrag Majesty Boss O’Graft; that he was Tammany’s Agent to the Editors of the Syrian newspapers of New York, whom he enrolled in the service of the Noble Cause for a consideration which no eloquence or shrewdness could reduce to a minimum; that he also took to the stump and dispensed to his fellow citizens, with rhetorical gestures at least, of the cut-and-dried logic which the Committee of Buncombe on such occasions furnishes its squad of talented spouters; and that—the most important this—he was subject in the end to the ignominy of waiting in the lobby with tuft-hunters and political stockjobbers, until it pleased the Committee
