He showed infinite cunning in his advance. His sheltered life dropped from him like a discarded garment. Fortified by his long experience of vagabond days he displayed the cunning of the young animal that knows that older animals are stronger and more savage, and must be kept off by stealth and not by strength.
Keeping close to the deep shadow of the city wall, he watched carefully the ground in front of his feet so that he should not fall over sleeping men. In summer it was not rare for men to sleep along this sandy stretch where the camel caravans passed; and if there were soldiers posted here that was what they would certainly be doing.
South of him lay the broad city moat, a noisome antediluvian defence. This he knew he could not cross save by the stone bridges at the city gates, for it was full of a black terrible slime. Once in his childhood he had been nearly choked by falling into it, and he still cherished a wholesome dread of its nature.
He went on slowly thinking of all sorts of things as he stole forward. Down here, with the great barrier of the city wall cutting him off, the rifle-fire round the foreign quarter sounded faint—as if it were miles away. He seemed to have left far behind him all the troubles and the interests of many chequered days; what was real and absorbing to him was to keep tally of the outjutting buttresses, so that he might carefully hide himself before the stone bridge was reached.
Some hovels, built by beggars, loomed up unexpectedly after he had gone half-a-mile or so. He threw himself on the ground, and listened long and carefully before he advanced any further. He knew well that if there were soldiers about they would have certainly taken these shelters and driven the owners away. He lay so long and so still on the ground that he dozed a little; when he opened his eyes the waning moon was coming slowly and majestically over the horizon, making the obscurity of the mighty city wall seem more funereal than ever.
He watched the moon curiously and lazily as if it had some special message for him. In a stately manner it lifted itself higher and higher until it was far above the earthline. Now it threw over the scene a great silver light in which the hovels stood out like black islands.
Not a sound from them—not a movement. Reassured he scuttled forward until he was in their shadow. He was sure they were empty. There was no sound of breathing. Yet to be quite sure he did not stir for minutes.
How queer! As he crept on he saw in the moonlight beyond the hovels a single old beggar sleeping—a very old man with a white beard, who lay on his back, with his knees pulled up sharply, and one arm sticking up as if it did not belong to him. The figure fascinated the boy. He watched it for a long time. He was quite sure that any one sleeping here now must know perfectly where the soldiers were posted, and what sort of men they were—and their numbers, too. Yielding to an impulse he crawled right up to the sleeper and tapped on the arm which fell at once.
"Ta-ko (elder brother)" he said in an undertone, using a polite phrase of the people to be sure of a polite reception. "I have strayed far from my home and am hungry and frightened. I could manage a bowl of something warm if I knew where to get it."
No answer.