“O Mâs, speak to me; I am afraid. Tell me, O kind Mâs, a story to beguile the way.”
“I know no story.”
“Sing then. For the love of Allah, sing a little.”
“I will not; for the jân love music. When the day comes, then perhaps I will sing.”
Fatmeh appealed to Allah against such hardness of heart. She looked up at the stars for comfort. But the folds of her veil obscured the view of them, and when she looked down again the darkness seemed alive. Save the clap of her donkey’s hoofs, there was no sound audible upon those unseen hills. The ray from the lantern danced on ahead like an evil spirit. All at once, to her horror, the dark earth yawned before her, spinning dizzily to a shape, like clay upon the potter’s wheel. In a trice there was a vast black bowl, in whose depths glowed fire, small specks that grew and joined, dwindled, and grew again till all else vanished. She lurched forward, groping for Mâs; but in the gloom her hands missed him, and she fell to the ground.
When she came to herself again, she was dazzled by the light of the lantern shining full in her eyes. Mâs bent over her, his black face burnished in the light.
“Y’ Allah! What ails thee? Come, arise, I say.”
She moaned: “Woe on us! The fires! The fires of punishment!”
“Ah!” smiled Mâs, as seeing light at last. “There is a camp down there in that wady—whether of the Bedû or the gypsies, Allah knows. Now come, since thou art not dead.”
Again he lifted her on to the broad saddle. Again an impenetrable darkness closed about them. But she was no more afraid. Having passed the extreme of horror, whole by a miracle, all else that might befall seemed light to bear.