investment of
the kind. I called on him one afternoon in the city, and handed him my
cheque, explaining how the matter stood.

'You do me a bad turn. Unlucky day!' he sighed as he received it. 'My
little fortune was more safe with him than in a bank, and every year
it brought me in a pretty income. Where can I find another such
investment.'

With groans he wrote out the receipt, which in due time I carried to
the chief, who thanked me and assured me that the house was mine and
should be made so formally.

I then rode over to the house again, and with Rashid planned out the
changes we desired to make, the Sheykh Huseyn following us about
gloomily, and his cheerful son bestowing on us his advice in broken
French. They knew their tenancy was at an end. The Sheykh, resigned at
length to the inevitable, sought to establish good relations with me;
and he also gave us counsel, which Rashid, who viewed him as our
deadly foe, at once rejected. Under these rebuffs the old man became
quite obsequious.

His son exclaimed excitedly: 'Mon bere est heureux, tu vois. If feut
bas quitter. Il feut rester afec toi comme chef de serfice.'

CHAPTER XXVIII

A DISAPPOINTMENT

Considering that I had bought a house and land exactly to my taste,
and likely, as Rashid declared, to raise our honour in the country, I
felt that I had earned the right to take a holiday. Whenever I have
done anything decisive it is my instinct to withdraw myself a little
from the scene of action and inure myself by contemplation to the new
position of affairs. Accordingly, having surveyed the house and land
as owner, I set off with Rashid upon a ten days' journey beyond the
reach of telegrams and letters.

At the end of the ten days we rode into Beyrout, and put up at a
little hostelry, which we frequented, built out on piers above the
sea. There I found two letters waiting for me, one from the great
Druze chief who sold to me my house and land.

'Never,' he wrote, 'have I had to endure such disrespect and
ignominy. It is not at all what I expected from your friendship. In
obedience to the Consul's order, I wrote express to the Khawajah ----,
my creditor, informing him that there had been some error and
entreating him to send your cheque in to the British Consulate. I hope
to God you have received it safely before this. My health has suffered
from this huge indignity. I shall not long survive this cruel shame.'

The second letter was from Her Br