First the voice of the crier, "So shall it be done to every man who
is an enemy of the Kaid, and to every woman who is a play-actor and a
cheat."

Then the voice of the soldier, "Balak! Balak!"

After that a multitudinous din that seemed to break off sharply and then
to come muffled and dense as from the other side of the closed gate.

When Israel came to himself again he was walking on a barren heath that
was dotted over with clumps of the long aloe, and he was holding Naomi
by the hand.

CHAPTER XX

LIFE'S NEW LANGUAGE

Two days after they had been cast out of Tetuan, Israel and Naomi were
settled in a little house that stood a day's walk to the north of the
town, about midway between the village of Semsa and the fondak which
lies on the road to Tangier. From the hour wherein the gates had closed
behind them, everything had gone well with both. The country people who
lay encamped on the heath outside had gathered around and shown them
kindness. One old Arab woman, seeing Naomi's shame, had come behind
without a word and cast a blanket over her head and shoulders. Then
a girl of the Berber folk had brought slippers and drawn them on to
Naomi's feet. The woman wore no blanket herself, and the feet of the
girl were bare. Their own people were haggard and hollow-eyed and
hungry, but the hearts of all were melted towards the great man in his
dark hour. "Allah had written it," they muttered, but they were more
merciful than they thought their God.

Thus, amid silent pity and audible peace-blessings, with cheer of kind
words and comfort of food and drink, Israel and Naomi had wandered on
through the country from village to village, until in the evening, an
hour after sundown, they came upon the hut wherein they made their home.
It was a poor, mean place--neither a round tent, such as the mountain
Berbers build, nor a square cube of white stone, with its garden in a
court within, such as a Moorish farmer rears for his homestead, but an
oblong shed, roofed with rushes and palmetto leaves in the manner of an
Irish cabin. And, indeed, the cabin of an Irish renegade it had been,
who, escaping at Gibraltar from the ship that was taking him to Sidney,
had sailed in a Genoese trader to Ceuta, and made his way across the
land until he came to this lonesome spot near to Semsa. Unlike the
better part of his countrymen, he had been a man of solitary habit and
gloomy temper, and while he lived he had been shunned by his