But the camel she had loved and petted had died a few weeks before, and she had nothing else.
“Do not grieve,” her mother said when she saw tears in the big almond eyes and asked the reason they were there. “The law of giving does not apply to children, and the sheik Ben Nedi, who is as wise as he is powerful, knows that sometimes empty hands give most of all. The blessing comes of having the great desire, not through the treasure that is offered.”
But Zuleika did grieve, and the world seemed very dark. And after she went to bed she thought about it until she grew so restless she could not lie quietly. So she crept outside and sat on the ground.
It was midnight, and Abi Ben Ahmed and the stranger slept in the tent. The slaves, both men and women, were sleeping too, and nothing broke the stillness of the desert night save an occasional breeze that shifted the loose sand, or a stirring among the animals just beyond. She sat there for a minute, then stole out across the waste. Past the camel keep she went, hurrying through the silver of the moonlight until she came to a rock that rose out of the desert like a grizzled head facing westward. It was her favorite spot, for her mother had told her that a lovely houri (fairy) once made her haunt there, and she hoped she might come back and do wonderful things for her as she was said to have done in the long ago. So she climbed up and looked across the desert.
Away to the west, glowing more brightly than any other in the sky, was the star that according to Arab teaching shines always over Mecca, the city of the Prophet. The sight of it made her grieve more than ever over the thought of her empty hands, and she began to cry.
Then, with a sound of wonderful music, a white creature rose out of the sands. Her beauty was more radiant than any of which Zuleika had ever dreamed, and jewels of many colors glistened in her hair. Her smile was wonderfully sweet, and the girl knew it must be the good fairy returned to her old haunt.
“Why do you weep?” she asked.
Zuleika answered with a low salaam, “The prophet comes tomorrow, and I have nothing to offer him because the baby camel I would have given is dead.”
“But you have a gift more precious than the others,” the fairy spoke.
The little girl was amazed.