anger immediately divested himself of his slippers and upper
kaftan, unwound his turban, removed his red fez from his head, and
proceeded to perform his ablutions also in the self-same manner.

When he had finished he kissed the hand of the dervish, and when the
latter drew from his girdle a long manuscript reaching to the very
ground, and began, from its eighty sections, to laud and magnify the
eighty properties of Allah, the stranger repeated them after him with
great unction, and, at the end of each one of them, intoned with him
twice over the verse, "La illah, il Allah, Muhammad roszul Allah!"--in
the chanting of which he was as practised as any muezzin.

All these pious practices were accomplished with the utmost devotion;
but when the new-comer arose from his place, the expression of
lowliness vanished from his features and he reassumed his former
commanding look, while the dervish now humbly bowed down before him to
the very earth and murmured:

"What are my lord's commands to his servant?"

The stranger let him lie there and slowly raised his sword.

"Art thou," cried he, "that dervish of Erdbuhar[2] to whom I
despatched a fakir of the Nimetullahitas, who dwelleth in Janina?"

[Footnote 2: The orders of Erdbuhar and Nimetullahita are the severest
of all the Turkish religious fraternities: the former fast so
rigorously twice a week that they do not even swallow their saliva;
the latter observe the fast only during their year of probation, after
which they are free to return to the joys of this world.]

"Thy servant is that man."

The stranger thereupon, with his right hand, drew a dagger from his
girdle, and with his left hand a purse.

"Dost thou see this dagger and this purse?" said he. "In the purse are
a thousand sequins; on the blade of this sword is the blood of at
least as many murdered men. I ask thee not--Dost thou recognize me? or
dost thou know my name? Maybe thou dost know--for thou knowest all
things--and, if so, thou dost also know that none hath ever betrayed
me on whom I have not wreaked my vengeance. If, therefore, thou dost
want a reward, listen; but if chastisement, speak!"

The dervish raised his hand to his ear to signify that he would prefer
to listen.

"Arise, then! take my horse's bridle, and lead me to that cavern where
dwelleth the _dzhin_ of prophecy. Dost thou know him?"

"I know him, my master, but go to him I will not, for he is wroth with
me. He loves not the dervishes