“I have good news for my lord,” he said eagerly; and to me his manner seemed to be full of sneering triumph.
“Well, what is it?” I said huskily.
“The holy man has gone?”
“To prison!” I exclaimed involuntarily, for that was my first thought.
“Oh no, my lord; away upon his long journey.”
“Dead!” I ejaculated.
Salaman looked at me wonderingly.
“Oh no, my Lord; that kind of old man very seldom dies. They live on and on and on, they are so hard and strange. I have seen many fakirs so thin and dry that they hardly seemed to be alive, but they were, and they went on living. I never saw a fakir die.”
“Then you mean that he has gone away on his travels—pilgrimage, we call it?”
“Yes, my lord, and he will not be here to curse you again.”