“Anni mush ariff,” said the man, puffing away at his pipe, and deliberately settling himself among his cozy cushions, as if for a long and dreamy nap.
Kitty, of course, did not understand Arabic, and the words, which really signified, “I don’t understand,” sounded to her unpracticed ears like “I am a sheriff!” a word which was always associated in the little runaway’s mind with policemen, a class of persons who were to Kitty objects of tyranny and terror.
“Oh, dear,” whispered Kitty, “if he is a sheriff, may be he’ll arrest me and lock me up.” So saying she fled from the presence of the astonished merchant, and darted round a corner through a motley crowd of donkeys, camels, and beggars blind and maimed. And now, her momentary fright over, she entered a still more narrow way, where were stalls of glittering diamonds set in every imaginable form, and gems of all sorts and sizes, arranged in brilliant order. Kitty forgot everything in her admiration. “I mean to buy a diamond pin. I just do!” she exclaimed, and, accosting the man, asked the price of a huge crescent of gems.
“Allah!” cried the man, rousing from his languor. And then, in his own language, he said to Kitty: “Little lady, where are you going? Are your papa and mamma gone?”
Kitty looked silently and wonderingly at the kind-hearted merchant a moment, and then her little mind began to realize that she was among a strange people who could not understand a word that she might say. The tears began to come in the gray eyes, and turning, she said, “I will go home.” But which way? Her little head grew bewildered, and, to crown all, an immense camel stalking along with silent tread nearly stepped on her little foot. She cried in earnest now, and the merchant kindly lifted her up beside him on a soft, Turkish rug, right in the midst of the flashing gems.
Quite a crowd had gathered now, listening eagerly while the man pictured in earnest language the position of the lost child. But none knew little Kitty; not a soul could speak to her in all that motley crowd of camel drivers, donkey boys, beggars, milkmen with their goats, merchants and dark-eyed women wrapped in their mantles and veils. There was none to help her. Suddenly, out from the crowd came a young Arab boy, one of those little fellows who carry about with them a vest full of snakes, exhibiting them for a living in front of hotels and other public places.
“Me know she!” he cried, as his eyes fell on the little girl sitting there on the rich Turkish carpet, her soft, golden hair floating around her, more beautiful than all the merchant’s gold and jewels.
The boy rapidly addressed the merchant, Kitty catching at the words, and trying in vain to understand them. They seemed to satisfy the merchant, however, and then the boy, pushing down a restless snake into its retreat, advanced to the troubled child.
“You Americano,” he said. “Me see you in New Hotel. You want see papa? Me tek you.”
Kitty, started up delighted; but at the sight of that inquisitive snake making its re-appearance from the boy’s pocket, she retreated and sat down again amid the jewels. The merchant laughed. “She likes my diamonds, Mahomet, better than your ugly reptiles.” Then, taking a little gold ring set with a small blue turquoise, he placed it on Kitty’s first finger and lifted her off the carpet, calling as he did so to a passing donkey boy, and giving him some hurried instructions. Kitty smiled her thanks for her pretty ring, and seeing the snake boy looking fiercely at the donkey boy, who had lifted her into the saddle, “Come, too,” she said, “you can talk, and this boy can’t.” So the two boys ran alongside of the donkey, watching carefully lest the little rider should fall; and very soon they emerged from the bazaar and were galloping along the Mouski.