Page:Alien Souls by Achmed Abdullah (1922).djvu/67

in the past, people had called him Egyptian. There was that gray-haired Englishwoman who had come to his father's shop, year after year during the cool season. In search of scarabs and damaskeened brass; always had she addressed him as "my little Egyptian," and he had not minded It. But this was different, somehow. Rash, bitter words crowded on his lips, but he suppressed them. He was home—home!—and he would not mar the first day with the whish and crackle of naked steel. Better far to turn away ridicule with a clear, true word.

"I am not an Egyptian, Jehan Hydar," he replied, "but an Afghan and cousin to thee—cousin to all this!"—making a great gesture which cut through the still air like a dramatic shadow and which took in the frowning gray hills, the huddled squat houses, and the deep-cleft valley at his feet; and as the other grudgingly admitted the relationship, he swung his goatskin bag from his shoulders, opened it, and groped among the presents he had bought In the bazaars of Bokhara. For his heart seemed suddenly filled to overflowing with the fine, impulsive generosity of youth.

"Here, cousin mine," he laughed, "see what I have brought thee from—"

"Peace, peace!" interrupted the other, impatiently; "the night is for the sleep of the sleepers, not for the babble of the babblers," and, motioning Yar Khan to follow, he led him to a low stone hut and bade him enter.

In the middle of the room flickered a charcoal fire in an open brazier, and there was no furniture except a water jar and an earthen platform covered with coarse rugs and sheepskins. Jehan Hydar pointed to