"Then by Our Lady of Antwerp three swords will keep heaven farther away than two! Know, De St. Julien, that to my mind nothing stirs in the camp for the next two weeks. I grow sluggish as a cow, listening to Raymond's and Bohemond's wranglings. Renard will spread in the camp that I have led a foray southward, and let men miss me if they will. Enough to know my arm and wits can do more for once at Aleppo than at Antioch."
"Yet this is utter rashness," urged Richard, in last protest; "to ease my own conscience, turn back—for my sake do it!"
"For your sake," was the smiling answer, "I will keep my Marchegai neck to neck with Rollo. I am not so old a knight that I have forgotten the sniff of an adventure. When I put on the chieftain, I could not put off the cavalier."
Richard did not reply. To shake off Godfrey was impossible. Presently the Norman in his own turn laughed.
"On, then, to Aleppo! To Aleppo, be it for life or death!" cried Musa; and Richard added: "Tremble, Iftikhar,—the three best swords in the wide earth seek you!" Then each gave his horse the head.
CHAPTER XXXIV
HOW MUSA PRACTISED MAGIC
In the city of Aleppo, close by the great Mosque Jami' el-Umawi, there stood a warehouse that was more than commonly busy on a certain spring morning. This warehouse was of two stories, built of coarse brown rubble, and only entered from the narrow, dirty street by a plainly arched passageway. Once within, however, the newcomer beheld a large court, surrounded on the lower floor by little shops; and on the upper floor, the whole length of the four sides of the court, ran a wooden gallery, behind which were storerooms and lodgings for the wayfaring merchants, who made this spot a sort of hostelry and rendezvous. The shops below were humming with busy traffic. Here on one side lay the sook of the jewellers, and on the opposite were arrayed the tiny stalls of the dealers in copper wares. The court was crammed with braying donkeys, bright-robed Syrians, and the ubiquitous sakkas, the water-bearers, who for a trifle poured a draught from the camel-skin sacks on their backs, to any who wished. The sakkas were jostled by the sellers of orange-flower water; these in turn by the tall, black eunuchs who were clearing the way for a closely veiled lady intent on visiting the jewellers; while through the midst of men and beasts swept a stately, venerable sheik from the college at the mosque, who rained down a curse, devoting to Hawiyat, the seventh and nethermost hell, the luckless donkey-boy that had brushed a dirty hand upon the doctor's red silk scarf over his shoulders.
The worthy jeweller Asad, whose shop was on the right side of the court, had long since spread out his array of gemmed rings, silver cups, tiring pins, and Indian necklaces, and sat back in his little niche nodding sleepily, now and then opening one eye to see if the lady who followed the eunuchs was coming to visit him. But the wares of his rival Ibrahīm kept her busy, and Asad contentedly closed his eye, and nodded once more, saying: "Leave to Ibrahīm her trade. To-day his, to-morrow mine. So Allah will prosper us both!" And, despite the fact that one of the serving-lads who followed the sheik was casting a covetous glance upon the handy treasures, the good Asad nearly fell asleep on the mat-covered seat. Presently a question roused him.