The Dervishes ran ahead crying the new name in frantic tones, while a company of grave-looking men walked on either side of Ishmael, chanting the first Surah: "Praise be to God, the Lord of all creatures," and the muezzins in the minarets of the mosques (blind men nearly all, who could see nothing of the boiling, bubbling, gorgeous scene below) chanted the profession of faith: "There is no god but God! God is Most Great! God is Most Great!" Men shouted with delight, women lu-lu-ed with joy, and the thousands of voices that clashed through the air sounded like bells ringing a joyful peal.
Nothing could have exceeded the savage grandeur of Ishmael's return to Cairo; but Ishmael himself, the white figure sitting sideways on an ass, continued to move along with a humbled and chastened soul. He was a sad man, with his own secret sorrow; a bereaved man, a betrayed man, with a heart that was torn and bleeding.
When he remembered that in spite of his betrayal, his predictions were being fulfilled, he told himself that that was by God's doing only, not by his in any way. When he heard the divine name by which the people greeted him he felt as if he were being burned to the very marrow. He was crushed by their mistaken worship. He knew himself now for a poor, weak, blind, deceived, and self-deluded man, whom the Almighty had smitten and brought low. Therefore he made no response to the frantic acclamations. Every step of the road as he passed along was like a purgatorial procession, and his suffering was written in lines of fire on his downcast face.
"O Father, spare me, spare me," he prayed as the people shouted by his side.
Once he made an effort to dismount, but Zogal, thinking the Master's strength was failing, put an arm about him and held him in his seat.
It took the whole morning for the procession to pass through the city. Unconsciously, as the blood flows back to the heart, it went up through the Mousky to El Azhar. All the gates of the University, which had been so long closed, were standing open. Who had opened them no one seemed to know. The people crowded into the courtyard, and in a little while the vast place was full. A platform had been raised at the further side, and on this Ishmael was placed with the chief of the Ulema beside him.
By one of those accidents which always attach themselves to great events it chanced that the day of Ishmael's return to Cairo was also the first of the Mouled-en-Naby—the nine days of rejoicing for the birthday of the Prophet. This fact was quickly seized upon as a means for uniting to the beautiful Moslem custom for "attaining the holy satisfaction" the opportunity of celebrating the victory for Islam which Ishmael was thought to have attained. Therefore the Sheikh Seyid-el-Bakri, descendant of the Prophet, and head of the Moslem confraternities, determined to receive his congregations in El Azhar, where Ishmael might share in their homage. They came in thousands, carrying their gilded banners which were written over with lines from the Koran, ranged themselves, company after company, in half-circles before the dais, salaamed to those who sat on it, chanted words to the glory of God and His Prophet, and then stepped up to kiss the hands and sometimes the feet of their chief and his companions.
Ishmael tried to avoid their homage, but could not do so. Mechanically he uttered the usual response, "May God repeat upon you this feast in happiness and benediction," and then fell back upon his own reflections.
Notwithstanding the blaze and blare of the scene about him, his mind was returning to Helena. Where was she? What fate had befallen her? At length, unable to bear any longer the burden of his thoughts, and the purgatory of his position, he got up and stole away through the corridors at the back of the mosque.
When darkness fell, the native quarters of Cairo were illuminated. Lamps were hung from the poles which project from the minarets of the mosques. Ropes were swung from minaret to minaret, and from these, also, lamps were suspended. In the poorer streets people were going about with open flares in iron grills, and in the better avenues rich men were walking behind their lantern-bearers. Blind beggars in the cafés were reciting the genealogy of the Prophet, and at the end of every passage other blind beggars were crying, "La ilaha illa-llah!"