Page:Alien Souls by Achmed Abdullah (1922).djvu/74

salute their cousin there were open sneers, and finally a loud, insulting question from Jehan Hydar who asked Yar Khan, pointing at his peach-colored Cairene waistcoat, if he had ever considered what a pig could do with a rose-bottle.

Yar Khan flushed an angry purple. This—he thought—was the fair measure of honor which he had expected, this the home-coming—and he had traveled the many weary miles, he had bought presents for them purchased with the bitter gold of exile, he had given them of his best in loyalty and desire and free-handed generosity!

He was silent. He felt Kumar Jan's eyes resting upon him, wonderingly, expectantly—and what could she expect? He had gone to the hills in search of freedom, and now he was forfeit to the customs of the hills. He had gathered the swords of humiliation under his armpits, and the feeling of it was bitter and vain.

He looked up. Jehan Hydar was still standing in front of him, a mocking smile playing about his thin lips and in his oblique eyes a light like a high-eddying flame.

"Cousin," he drawled, and the simple word held the soft thud of a hidden, deadly insult, "cousin to me, to all of us! Yet do I declare by the teeth of Allah," here his eyes sought those of Kumar Jan, who stood close by, her whole attitude one of tense expectancy, "yes! I declare by mine own honor that thou seemest more like an Egyptian, a foreigner, an eater of fish from the South—of stinking fish, belike," he added as an insulting afterthought; and there was mocking laughter all around, high-pitched, cruel,