consequences?" said the Basha.

"Worse consequences than you expect or dream," said the Mahdi.

"What consequences?" said the Basha again.

"No matter," said the Mahdi. "You are walking in darkness, and do not
know where you are going."

"What consequences?" the Basha cried once more.

"That is God's secret," said the Mahdi.

Ben Aboo began to laugh. "Light the infidel out of the Kasbah," he
shouted to his people.

"Enough!" cried the Mahdi. "I have delivered my message. Now woe to you,
Ben Aboo! A second time I have come to you as a witness, but I will come
no more. Fill up the measure of your iniquity. Keep the girl in prison.
Give her to the Sultan. But know that for all these things your reward
awaits you. Your time is near. You will die with a pale face. The sword
will reach to your soul."

Then taking yet another step nearer, until he stood over the Basha where
he lay on the ground, he cried with sudden passion, "This is the last
word that will pass between you and me. So part we now for ever, Ben
Aboo--I to the work that waits for me, and you to shame and contempt,
and death and hell."

Saying this, he made a downward sweep of his open hand over the place
where the Basha lay, and Ben Aboo shrank under it as a worm shrinks
under a blow. Then with head erect he went out unhindered.

But he was not yet done. In the garden of the palace, as he passed
through it to the street, he stood a moment in the darkness under the
stars before the chamber where he knew the Sultan lay, and cried, "Abd
er-Rahman! Abd er-Rahman! slave of the Merciful! Listen: I hear the
sound of the trumpet and the alarum of war. My heart makes a noise in me
for my country, but the day of her tribulation is near. Woe to you, Abd
er-Rahman! You have filled up the measure of your fathers. Woe to you,
slave of the Compassionate!"

The Sultan heard him, and so did the Ministers of State; the women of
the hareem heard him, and so did the civil guards and the soldiers. But
his voice and his message came over them with the terror of a ghostly
thing, and no man raised a hand to stop him.

"The Mahdi," they whispered with awe, and fell back when he approached.

The streets were quiet as he left the Kasbah. The rabble of mountaineers
of Aissawa were gone. Hooded Talebs, with prayer-mats under their arms,
were picking their way in the gloom from the various mosques; and from
these there came out into the streets the plash of water in the portic