"It pleases me to follow him. Inshallah, I may help him in case of sickness."
"You are a hakim?"
I admitted that, although secretly pitying any poor devil who might pin faith to the claim.
"Ali Higg—the real one, who is known as the Lion of Petra—believes in Indian hakims, like all these Arabs who have no use for European doctors. And this big man on my left, who is he?"
"My servant."
"An Afghan?"
"A Pathan."
She turned that over in her mind, too, for several minutes.
"And how does Ayisha come to be with you?" she asked at last.
At that Narayan Singh broke silence, and although he denied it afterward I know that his only motive was to get a little preliminary vengeance on Ayisha for the names she had called him. He maintains that he was "casting a stone, as it were, into a pond to see which way the ripples went."