in comfort in our house.'

CHAPTER XXIX

CONCERNING CRIME AND PUNISHMENT

If we wished to stay in any place for more than a day or two, Rashid,
upon arrival, wandered through the markets and inquired what dwellings
were to let, while I sat down and waited in some coffee-house. Within
an hour he would return with tidings of a decent lodging, whither we
at once repaired with our belongings, stabling our horses at the
nearest khan.

My servant was an expert in the art of borrowing, so much so that no
sound of disputation on that subject reached my ears. It seemed as if
the neighbours came, delighted, of their own accord to lend us pots
and pans and other necessaries. He also did the cooking and the
marketing without a hitch, giving a taste of home to the small
whitewashed chamber, which we had rented for a week, it might be, or a
month at most.

When obliged to go out upon any errand, Rashid was always worried
about leaving me alone, regarding me as careless of my property and so
untrusty from the point of view of one who idolised it.

'If your Honour should be seized with a desire to smell the air when I
am absent,' he would say, 'do not forget to lock the door and place
the key in the appointed hiding-place where I can find it. There are
wicked people in the world. And while you sit alone, keep our revolver
handy.'

He told me that in cities robberies of private dwellings are oftener
committed at high noon, when many houses are left empty, than at
night, when they are full of snoring folk. I did not doubt the truth
of this assertion, but differed from him in believing that we
harboured nothing likely to attract a thief.

'I would not lose the buckle of a strap, a single grain of sesame, by
such foul means,' he would reply with vehemence.

One morning--it was in Damascus--he went out, after imploring me as
usual to take care of everything. The room we occupied was at the end
of a blind alley, up a flight of nine stone steps. The alley led into
a crowded, narrow street, bordered with shops of many-coloured wares,
which at that point was partly shaded by a fine old ilex tree. From
where I sprawled upon a bed of borrowed cushions in the room, reading
a chap-book I had lately purchased--_The Rare Things of Abu Nawwas_--I
saw the colour and the movement of that street as at the far end of a
dark kaleidoscope, for all the space between was in deep shadow.

When a man turned up our alley--a most rare occurre