"
"Our dancing and singing maidens are like a flame of Paradise. Their
enchantments make the heart of man glad with perpetual springtime.
Choose, O Frank, two handmaids for thyself and for each of thy men,
and let them be yours to go with you to your own country and to be
your chattels and your sweet delights!"
The eyes of "Captain Alden" narrowed with sudden, painful emotion as
she peered at the Master. With some smattering of Arabic, she may have
caught something of the sense of this offer. But the Master, unmoved
by this second offer of Olema's, merely shook his head again, saying:
"No, Bara Miyan. Though thy women be fair as the dawn over the Sea of
Oman, and soft-eyed as the gazelles in the oasis of the _Wady el
Ward_ (Vale of Flowers), not for us are they. We seek other rewards.
Therefore will I ask thee still another question."
"Thy question shall be answered, O Frank!"
"Is it true that the Caliph el Walid, in Hegira 88, sent forty
camel-loads of cut jewels to Mecca?"
"That is true."
"And that, later, all those jewels were brought hither?"
"Even so! It is also true that two Franks in Hegira 550, digged a
tunnel into the Meccan treasury from a house they had hired in the
guise of Egyptian _Hujjaj_.
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