“Now you must repeat after me the word which restores me to godhead,” the young man said. “For it is past time for me to go.”
“What is the word?” the youngest camel asked, and the other replied:—
“Pernod.”
“What does it mean? What does per—” the little camel began, curiously, but Mohammed’s son interrupted him:—
“Don’t say it or I’ll disappear at once and then I won’t be able to tell you! Pe stands for ‘power eternal’ just as before, and rnod stands for ‘reign near our dreams.’ I never liked the word ‘reign’ much, but my father thought it added dignity to the formula so we let him have his way. So now repeat it after me—P-e-r-n-o-d.”
“Oh, please let me thank you again,” the little camel said, “and, please, wouldn’t it be possible for you to let my mother know that I’m—”
“Good gracious,” said the young man, “you mustn’t think about yourself all the time the way you do! I have so much work to do I really haven’t the time to rush around with personal messages to camels’ mothers—”
“I’m sorry,” said the youngest camel, and this time when Mohammed’s son smiled at him and said the word he repeated it at once: “Pernod!”
As soon as the syllables had passed his lips, the handsome youth waved his hand in farewell and vanished from sight. Without wasting another instant, the little camel turned his head towards the sun and, his heart singing with hope in him, began to run as fast as he possibly could across the stretches of white desert in the direction of Aqsu.
