“Pleasant enough for those who prefer the pen and the carpet to the lance and the desert,” replied Hassan.
“There is a time for all,” answered the nazir. “Your respected predecessor found it so; he was fond of both; he and I were great friends.” He laid much stress upon the last two words, which did not raise him much in the estimation of Hassan, who had already discovered among his papers not a few proofs of his predecessor’s dishonesty. While assuming a careless air, he resolved to watch the man more narrowly.
“Doubtless,” he said, “those who serve the same chief should be friends together.”
This observation, which was merely general, misled the nazir into a belief that he was understood and met half-way.
“What a good chief he is to serve,” said the nazir, with his sneering smile. “Open hands and eyes closed, never looks into an account, that is the kind of master I like.”
“Yes,” replied Hassan; “I believe he trusts a great deal to his agents without looking after his own affairs.”
“Wallàhi! that he does,” said the nazir; “and as he has plenty, why should not others also eat bread? Do you know,” he added, lowering his voice, while his eyes, apparently directed towards the door, were fixed upon Hassan—“do you know how much your predecessor had for his share out of our village last year?”
“No, I know not,” replied our hero; “I have not looked through the accounts.”
The nazir smiled at his companion’s simplicity as he said, “Accounts, indeed! Oh, they are all right and signed by me, while mine are signed by the Sheik-el-Beled.[[80]] We must all three be friends, you understand. The village is rated to pay Delì Pasha two hundred purses a-year [£1000], but we easily raise a great deal more, and that we divide amongst us for our trouble. Last year we got each of us fifty purses, and, Inshallah! by your good fortune, we have as much this year.”
“You must explain more to me,” said Hassan, dissembling his indignation under a semblance of simplicity. “I do not understand all the details of your village affairs. I had understood that in the new measurement of the lands which the Viceroy ordered to be made throughout Egypt a few years ago, far heavier demands were made on the fellah than under the old measurement: how comes it, then, that your village produces so much more than is written against it in the books of the Defterdar?”[[81]]