Chapter XVII: An Encounter with Fanatics

It was long after sunrise when we awoke next morning; the raft was still tied up and the men showed no signs of moving.

"Hi!" shouted X to Hassan through the felt wall, "why haven't we started?"

"The Mudir has not arrived yet, Effendi."

We waited another ten minutes.

"Hi! Hassan, has the Mudir come?"

"No, Effendi, he will come soon."

We turned over and had another doze.

"Hi! Hassan, if the Mudir has not come we shall go without him. Send Ali to say we must start now."

"Yes, Effendi, he will go."

Turkish acquiescence, especially when very polite, is suspicious. I got out of bed and peeped through the door. Ali was sitting on the bank chatting with a local Zaptieh.

"Hi! Hassan, send Ali at once."

"Yes, yes, Effendi, this minute he goes."

From my point of observation I reported that neither Hassan nor Ali were making any move in the matter, so we decided to dress and become strenuous about it.

I relieved my feelings at intervals by trying to express in my best Turkish to Hassan, through the wall, what I thought of the Mudir who dared to keep great English Pashas waiting beyond the accustomed two hours which one concedes to Eastern ideas of punctuality.

Before we had finished dressing a sudden rocking of the raft and general bustle outside announced our departure. Through the window I took a last look at Tekreet and thanked my lucky stars that departure from it meant also deliverance from the Evil One.

"Do you think the Mudir will be angry with us for leaving him behind?" I said.

"Let us hope not," said X, as we emerged from the hut for breakfast; "we owe him something for ridding us of the Evil One."

The words were hardly out of my mouth before we became aware of the Evil One himself, sitting between the oars in his usual place. He greeted us with a bland smile. Beside him, instead of Jedan, sat a grinning boy.

We turned on Ali for an explanation.

"Ach, Effendi, he is good now; he will not speak: he will not say a word; he is changed: he is now a good kalekji. The ladies can now sleep at night."

The Evil One nodded affably at us and put his finger on his sealed lips. The grinning boy understood Turkish. "I am a good kalekji, Effendi; I do not talk, I never say a word."

We had become sufficiently Oriental to reconcile ourselves to the dictates of Destiny; there was no getting rid of him now, so we had to be content with threats of no baksheesh if a word was uttered on the way to Baghdad.

We caught sight of a stranger in the men's hut.

"Who is that?" I said.

"The Mudir, Effendi."

"How long has he been there?"

"Since sunrise, Effendi."

"Why did you say he had not come?"

"Ach, Effendi, the kalekjis' bread was not ready; they could not go without bread."

So all this time the local magnate had been sitting listening to our abuse of his person. There is only one way to live in the East, and that is to accept it. Its ways are stronger than your ways, especially when you come out freshly armed with the ardour of the West. Your best reasoning is worsted by gracious irrelevancy; your protesting attacks are turned by acquiescing politeness; and the East moves on its smiling, unalterable way.

The country below Tekreet began to have a more civilised look; there were plantations of cucumbers and melons on the banks and roughly constructed windlasses for raising the water in skins into irrigating channels. We passed several ruined villages, and caught sight in the distance of the remains of an old castle.

At noon, after floating about three or four miles, we arrived within sight of Samarah, a town which was made conspicuous by the huge blue dome of its mosque and which, we learnt later on, was a place of pilgrimage for Mahomedans of the Shieah sect. We drew up opposite it to land the Mudir, and Hassan announced his intention of landing also to replenish the store of charcoal.

"Then I'll get off too," said X, "I want to see inside that mosque."

X had a mania for looking at mosques; we had seen inside hundreds and she never seemed to get tired of them. I connected the process chiefly with having to unlace your boots, a proceeding I detest, and dawdle over cold floors in your stocking feet. Then you had to remember to cross your hands in front; if you put them behind your back or in your pockets you were a marked infidel.

The raft was run along the shore and we walked up to the town. It was enclosed by a high mud wall which was defended by towers and bastions. We entered through a large gateway and found ourselves amongst a collection of falling mud houses lining the usual dirty, narrow streets. Hassan went in search of charcoal, and we, accompanied by Ali Chous, strolled on to the mosque. We were followed by the usual crowd of curious-minded inhabitants, but being by this time quite used to these attentions, we did not notice them particularly. X was in front, and advanced towards the low line of chains which barred the entrance to the building; she was in the act of stepping over the chains when an excited-looking fanatic rushed at her and hurled her across the street with what appeared to be effusive execrations. In one moment we were hemmed in by an angry, buzzing mob; there was no mistaking the glaring menaces of their expressions and the significant handling of the long knives worn by all natives in their belts. We realised in a flash that we had unwittingly aroused the dangerous side of Eastern fanaticism. Resistance was out of the question; a sign of fear would have been fatal. All day-dreams were at an end: I recalled the vague forebodings the storm had first aroused in me. Was it only the day before that X had said she felt like floating to Eternity and I had maintained that we should be hurled into Oblivion? Were we only joking then? Now we were face to face with grim reality. Hassan's words rang in my ears, "Kim bilior? Allah bilior!" (Who knows? God knows!) We stopped and looked over the crowd. Ali Chous, our only protector, stood beside us white and trembling, appealing to some of the leading men, who hesitated and glared at us in wavering suspicion. Hassan was nowhere in sight.

"Let's stroll on as far as the end of the street," said X.

"Yes," I answered, "that seems a good idea."

"Don't let's hurry," she said.

"No," I replied, "we have plenty of time."

The crowd made way for us as we turned from the mosque, and we walked on beyond it up through the bazaars. The men had begun to fight and wrangle amongst themselves, the narrow street was tightly packed, and the crowd surged up behind us as we walked on. We were in the covered part of the bazaars; the usual bright-coloured keffiyehs hung outside; gaudy cotton coats of Eastern make lay on the top of bales of Manchester prints and flannelettes; there was the leather stall, with gorgeous beaded bridles and handsomely embroidered native saddles; and next it was the boot bazaar, with none of our blackness about it, but a mass of red and yellow sandals. We had seen it all, just the same, in a score of similar villages, but I took it all in this time as I had never taken it in before.

"What a funny baby's garment that is," said X.

The crowd behind were beginning to push.

"Yes," I said, "I wonder how it gets outside the baby."

An angry buzz arose just behind us; were they going to stick us in the back? We both disdained to turn our heads to see.

"I hope Hassan will think of getting some spinach," I said, "there was some in the vegetable bazaar."

"He knows you like it," X answered, "he is sure to get it."

We had come to the end of the row of stalls; we slowly turned and faced the mob.

"This is the obvious moment for annihilation," I thought to myself, "I wonder why I'm not afraid."

I was waiting in momentary expectation of death, but at the same time I could not realise that we were going to be killed. I did not seem to be able to take in what being killed was--I felt very indifferent, and noticed that I had lost a button off my coat. But the crowd made way for us and we sauntered back. Further down we met Hassan.

"What is all this crowd about?" he said.

X told him; he made no answer and we walked on together.

We got outside the gates of the town but were still a few minutes' walk from the river.

"I'm tired," said X; "let's rest here a minute," and she lay down on the ground.

I looked round. There was still a noisy crowd at the gates of the town, and we were being followed out by some of the rowdier members. I had a vague idea that it would have been more comfortable to lie down on the raft, but there was no accounting for tastes, and it was all in the day's work. I sat down beside X. There was a white stone a few yards away, larger than the others which lay about; I picked up a handful of the smaller stones.

"Best out of ten," I said to myself; "if I hit we get off, if I don't hit we are done for. There is no current about this, it's all chance," and I started lazily throwing at the large stone. Hassan stood by smoking. I missed the first, and the second, and the third. Ali Chous looked uneasily at the crowd beginning to straggle out towards us. The fourth hit, and the fifth; the sixth missed. Two more misses and we should be done for. Ali Chous begged us to come on. The seventh and the eighth hit, the ninth missed. The next throw would settle the question.

Two men had come up and stood looking at us.

"Let's come on now," said X, sitting up.

"One minute," I said, and I carefully picked out a nice round pebble. It hit.

"What a baby you are!" said X.

We boarded the raft and pushed off. It was a lovely calm evening. The current was straight enough for us to glide quietly along with no assistance from the oars; the last traces of the setting sun slowly disappeared, and gradually the stars reflected twinkling points of silver in the black water, dancing brightly in the moving current. A silence as of death reigned over everything; the blackness of death peered out of the deep waters; the slow but surely moving current was drifting us on relentlessly towards an uncertainty suggesting death. And with it there was a tremendous sense of stillness and peace.

I was sitting very near the edge looking into the dark waters.

"I don't want to die yet," I said.

"You are such a time taking things in," said X, "that you would not be aware that you were dead until so long after the event that it would hardly matter to you. You weren't afraid, were you?"

"No," I answered. We were silent for a while, then Hassan spoke.

"If you had crossed the chain," he said, "there would have been no more Pashas for me to travel with. Inside is the tomb of the last Imam of the race of Ali, and no Christian may look upon it and live." I looked again into the deep waters and began to take it all in--what I had seen in the men's faces, and how they would have done it. Hassan put a rug over me; I had shivered. I wasn't cold. It was all over, we were safe; but I was knowing what it was to be afraid.