The only thing I could think of was to go and see him quietly, saying that I was making a pilgrimage to Biara, to which place it was the fashion to journey now and then, calling the jaunt a pilgrimage. It took me some days to make up my mind to this course, for I did not want to hurry, nor to go sooner than was necessary; and meanwhile the days passed in idleness, attendance at the divans of Lady Adela and Tahir Beg, and walks with Mansur the Christian, in the late afternoon, to a garden just outside, where he would squat in the grass, and producing a little bottle from his pocket, consume his araq accompanied by nuts or melon seeds, as is the habit of drinking in Persia. His greatest efforts were to induce me to join him, asserting that it made him miserable to drink alone; but I did not wish to open any possible channel along which thoughts might flow detrimental to the excellence of my Islamic orthodoxy, and which might on occasion become words.
When I had mentioned to Hama that I was going to see the Shaikh ul Islam, he was somewhat astonished, and very much hurt because I would not tell him my business; for such a lack of confidence was unusual he said, between a master and his servant, and reflected upon the latter’s integrity. So I bound him to great secrecy, and told him that the Shaikh ul Islam owed me money and I was going to try and recover it, but did not want to wait till he came here, as he was a man of uncertain temper and contumacious nature, and might endeavour to injure me if he found his creditor suddenly installed, so to say, on his door-step. This was sound Kurd sense, and Hama extolled my reasoning, and advised the purchase of four loaves of sugar as a present for the Shaikh, for it is a fault to go and see such a person without something in the hand.
So one fine morning, having hired for the day for four krans (or one shilling and eightpence) a mule, we loaded it with the four sugar loaves in a saddle-bag, and set forth, having provided the usual bread and cigarettes for consumption on the way. The road lay east from Halabja, towards the great wall of Aoraman, and at the base of the hills south of Shahr-i-Zur. For half an hour we passed along a level road, looking out upon our left across the great depression, imagining what a sight this hill-girt basin of a plain must have been when Nushirwan the Just ruled the land, and gardens and towns covered its still fair face. To the north, in a blue distance soon to be dispelled by a fierce sun, lay the piled-up mountains of the Azmir, behind Sulaimania, whence faint wreaths of blue smoke from the burning grass ascended like the fume of an offering to the sun, as a vindication of the ancient religion of Zoroaster that had its fires upon these same mountain-tops, a votive duty forgotten by man and perpetuated by Nature.
As the road left the level we passed through the village of Anab, where, under a grove of willows, a group of Kurds smoked the morning cigarettes beside a great tank into which a brook bubbled. Here we were joined by an old man, who greeted us, asking where we were going. He spoke in Turkish, knowing no Kurdish, and said he was bound for Biara like ourselves, to visit the retreat of the Shaikh. He was a native of Roumania, and a Russian subject. On foot he had gone to Mecca, thence to Damascus and Bagdad. Now he had come to Kurdistan, and was visiting every one of its little shrines and holy places, after which he would walk to Roumania again. My name, which was one only encountered among the Persians—Ghulam Husain—gave him some difficulty, for he had never heard the first word of it, and so suited it to his own liking, and called me Husain Effendi. We climbed our way over a number of succeeding ridges till we came to a stream and a tree by it in the little valley. Here we halted awhile and shared our bread, making a frugal meal. The old man here became more friendly yet, and in return for a little cheese I had given him, presented myself and Hama with four little amulets, scraps of paper sewn in a triangular piece of cloth. These he had purchased in Sulaimania from a kind of hedge-priest with whom he had travelled, and he said he kept them, sometimes selling one to a villager, or giving in exchange for food or a night’s lodging.
A ROBBERY
Hama, whose edification at meeting so virtuous a man was considerable, accepted the amulets with a gratitude not quite free from a certain awkwardness noticeable about the simpler Kurd whenever he comes in contact with any of the stock-in-trade of religion.
After resting awhile we resumed our journey, drawing ever nearer to the great mountain wall, and crossing ridges that grew larger and larger as we progressed, the descents into some of the valleys being almost precipitous. It was upon a ridge that we met a little squad of people, four soldiers, a sergeant, and a muleteer. In the custom of suspicious Kurdistan they enquired where we were going, and betrayed themselves by their accent as Turkomans of Kirkuk. We passed after exchange of greetings, and each had descended to his separate valley, when a bullet whistled by, and we saw one of the soldiers running full speed after us. We ourselves possessed not one of the weapons of defence, nor could we escape the pursuer, for we were kept to the track by our mule, and he could scramble straight up the hill-side. So we stood, and he came up at a run, without a word seized my bridle, and with the other hand started to explore my pockets. All he discovered was a watch and twenty krans; not much, certainly, but enough to provoke an attempt at resistance on mine and Hama’s part. This infuriated the robber, or appeared to do so, for he drew his long dagger and stabbed me in the arm, making a nasty wound. Then he jabbed his rifle-butt with considerable force against Hama’s nose. Meanwhile, the old Roumanian was calling upon God. He then explored the saddle-bag, but was told by the old man that this was sugar ordered by the Shaikh of Biara, too influential a person for even a soldier to offend, so he left it and started to return. Hama had not seen him take the watch, and on hearing it from me, set out at a run after the soldier, who was now some distance away. Hearing him coming, the thief stopped, and Hama, with true Kurdish skill, made a swift leap and threw him, not, however, without encountering the knife, in the shoulder. I could not hear what he said, but he was remonstrating with the soldier, and after some time, having recovered the watch and the money, he started to come back, when the robber knelt and, taking careful aim, fired. The bullet passed just over the top of his head and carried away the little tassel on the peak of his high cap, but Hama did not hasten his pace, nor appear at all perturbed. The old man had taken advantage of the incident to escape over the brow of the hill, and was no longer visible, and as Hama came up we proceeded upon our way, the soldier watching us from the opposite side of the valley. Just over the ridge we came upon the old darvish, sitting behind a rock, very disturbed in mind, but overjoyed to see us with no worse wounds than the knife had inflicted. We now bound these up, and when Hama had to a degree stopped the flow of blood from his nose, we proceeded.
In another hour we came to where a sheer wall of mountain rose above us, to where we could see large fields of snow, and we turned to the right up a narrow, ascending valley, or trough, at the foot. This had a stream running down it, and the sides were thickly covered with gardens and fruit-trees. A little path ran among these, and we gradually ascended, the temperature dropping as we rose. As we went we made a good meal from the hanging mulberries, black and white, which were just ripening. Some miles up, a narrow ravine branched off, as if to go straight into the face of the Aoraman Mountain, and we turned into it. Here the trees were thicker, and the gardens, terraced upon the hill-sides, were divided by stone walls, the alleys between them being often brooks which rushed down to join the main stream. We struggled through the mud, and in places thick undergrowth, for an hour or so, then crossing a bridge of tree-trunks over the stream, came to a rambling stone house set in the hill-side.
BIARA
Above us the valley narrowed yet, a little village hung to its sides, and above, not a quarter of an hour away, it became but a furrow in the great mountain-side—and Persian territory. We could see nothing of the house but a thick stone wall above us, and had to clamour at a small door set in it. This was opened, and upon Hama proclaiming a visitor for the Shaikh ul Islam, we were allowed up the stone staircase upon which it gave. Ascending this we found ourselves upon a broad terrace, the retaining wall of which had stood above our heads a minute before. We crossed it and came to a cistern of rough marble set in the pavement, which was here of the same stone, and seeing that at its edge all shoes were removed, did likewise, and entered from it to a little room at the end of the house. From the far end of this yet a smaller apartment opened, and I was shown into it, and my greeting of “Salamun Alaikum” fell upon the ears of its occupant, the Shaikh ul Islam, who squatted beside a little unglazed window, smoking a cigarette. He returned my greeting, invited me to be seated, and then recognising me, exclaimed: