"You will soon be going a long journey with some one else," said X cheeringly.
Hassan shook his head.
"No, indeed," he said; "I should take care not to go with two ladies again, and I shall not go with a man, for no man would be so much of a fool as to wish to go such a mad journey."
The steamer gave vent to its first hideous whistle. We put our fingers to our ears.
"Good-bight, little Padishah," he said, as we clasped hands for the last time; "good-bight. Go home to your friend in England; he will be glad to see you looking so fat."
"Silly man," I said with a lump in my throat.
"Silliman yok," he answered.
The whistle blew again, we turned and went our different ways. If there had been a stone he would have thrown it after me; as it was, when I turned he made a face and shouted, "Istemen, istemen!"
And now, looking back on those days, there rises invariably before us the memory of this companion in our many adventures—the memory of a simple-minded, honourable man, a trusted friend, a pleasant companion, and a devoted servant, who, whether he was sharing the discomforts and dangers of winter travel in a wild and lawless country, or experiencing the joyous freedom of the roaming desert life we loved so well, or enduring the terrors of critical and carping civilisation, invariably put us in the foremost place, and, without swerving an inch from the traditions of his race, never offended the susceptibilities of ours.