The Mercy of Allah

by Hilaire Belloc

Having so expressed himself the worthy merchant resumed the thread of his tale:

“I had, I say, started forward in high spirits to the sound of the coins jingling in my pouch, when my steps happened to take to the water-side, where I found a ship about to sail for the Persian Gulf. ‘Here,’ said I to myself, ‘is an excellent opportunity for travelling and for seeing the world.’

“The heat of the day was rising. No one was about but two watermen, who lay dozing upon the bank. I nimbly stepped aboard and hid myself behind one of the bales of goods with which the deck was packed. When the sun declined and work was resumed, the sailors tramped aboard, the sail was hoisted, and we started upon our journey.

“Befriended by the darkness of night I crept out quietly from my hiding-place and found a man watching over the prow, where he was deputed to try the depth of the water from time to time with a long pole. I affected an air of authority, and told him that the Captain had sent me forward to deliver his commands, which were that he should give me a flask of wine, some fruit, and a cake (for I guessed that like all sailors he had in his possession things both lawful and unlawful). These I told him I would take to my relative the Captain. He left me with the pole for a moment and soon returned with the provisions, with which I crept back to my hiding-place, and there heartily consumed them.

“During the whole of the next day I lay sleeping behind the bales of goods. With the fall of the second night I needed a second meal. I dared not repeat my first experiment, and lay musing till, hunger having sharpened my wits, I hit upon a plan with which surely Providence itself must have inspired a poor lonely lad thrown in his unaided weakness upon a cruel world.

“I bethought me that the watchman of either board would have some provision for the night. I remembered a sort of gangway between the high bales upon the main deck, which corridor led back far under the poop into the stern sheets. It has been so designed for the convenience of stowing and unloading, affording a passage for the workmen as they handled the cargo. I put these two things together in my mind (but to God be the glory) and formed of them a plan for immediate execution.

“I crept from my hiding-place and sauntered along the dark deck until I came upon the watchman, squatting by the rail, and contemplating the stars in the moonless sky. He had, as I had suspected, a platter the white of which I could just see glimmering against the deck beside him. I thought I also discerned a gourd of wine. I approached him as one of the crew (for they were chance strangers taken on at the wharf). We talked in low tones of the girls of Bagdad, of the police, of opportunities for theft, and of such other topics as are common to the poor, till, naturally, we came to wine. He cursed the poor quality of his own, in the gourd beside him. I, after some mystery, confided to him that I had a stock of excellent wine, and, as my friendship for him increased, I made a clean breast of it and told him it was in the stern sheets, far under the poop deck along the narrow passage between the high bales. I offered to go with him and fetch it, allowing him, in his eagerness, to go first. When he was well engaged in groping aft I turned, crept forward again silently and rapidly, picked up the loaf and cheese which I found on his platter, as also the gourd, and vanished into my hiding-hole.

“I ate my fill—though somewhat too hurriedly, and remarked how long a time my shipmate was spending at searching that empty place. As I heard him creeping back at last cursing violently in whispers, I was aware of faint dawn in the East, and determined that my cruise must end.

“We were already in the neighbourhood of the sea, as I discovered by tasting the water over the side in the darkness and discovering it to be brackish. I bethought me that my poor comrade had now an excellent reason for ferretting me out, that the Captain also would soon hear of me and that, with daylight, I should certainly be visited with a bastinado or put into chains and sold. I therefore slipped over the side (for I was an excellent swimmer) and made for the shore. There I lay on a warm beach and watched through the reeds the great sail of the ship as it slipped down-stream further and further away in the growing light.

“When the sun rose the vessel was out of sight, and looking about me I discovered a little village not far from the shore inhabited by simple fishermen, but containing several houses of some pretension, the residences of wealthy merchants who came here from Bosra in their moments of leisure to relax themselves from the catch-as-catch-can of commerce in that neighbouring city.