"M'almé, al khat aja" (the khat has come), said Rrisa.
He placed the tray on the table at his master's side, and was about to withdraw when the other stayed him with raised hand.
"Tell me, Rrisa," he commanded, still speaking in Arabic, "where wert thou born? Show thou me, on that map."
The Arab hesitated a moment, squinting by the dim light that now had faded to purple dusk. Then he advanced a thin forefinger, and laid it on a spot that might have indicated perhaps three hundred miles southeast of Mecca. No name was written on the map, there.
"How dost thou name that place, Rrisa?" demanded the Master.
"I cannot say, Master," answered the Arab, very gravely. As he stood there facing the western afterglow, the profound impassivity of his expression—a look that seemed to scorn all this infidel civilization of an upstart race—grew deeper.
To nothing of it all did he owe allegiance, save to the Master himself—the Master who had saved him in the thick of the Gallipoli inferno. Captured by the Turks there, certain death had awaited him and shameful death, as a rebel against the Sublime Porte. The Master had rescued him, and taken thereby a scar that would go with him to the grave; but that, now, does not concern our tale. Only we say again that Rrisa's life lay always in the hands of this man, to do with as he would.
None the less, Rrisa answered the question with a mere:
"Master, I cannot say."
"Thou knowest the name of the place where thou wast born?" demanded the Master, calmly, from where he sat by the table.