his eyes,
he took stock of the face beside him, the face of the strange being
that was his father--the broad, moist, unmarked brow; the large eyes,
heavy-lidded, serene; the full-fleshed cheeks from which the beard
sprang soft and rank, and against which a hyacinth, pendent over the
ear, showed with a startling purity of pallor; and the mobile,
deep-coloured, humid lips--the lips of the voluptuary, the eyes of the
dreamer, the brow of the man of never-troubled faith.

"Am I like that?" And then, "What can that one be to me?"

As if in answer, bel-Kalfate's gaze came to his son.

"I love thee," he said, and he kissed Habib's temple with his lips.
"Thou art my son," he went on, "and my eyes were thirsty to drink of
the sight of thee. It is _el jammaa_." [Friday, the Mohammedan
Sabbath.] "It is time we should go to the prayer. We shall go with
Hadji Daoud to-day, for afterward, there at the mosque, I have
rendezvous with his friends, in the matter of the dowry. It is the
day, thou rememberest, that he appointed."

Habib wanted to stop. He wanted to think. He wanted time. But the
serene, warm pressure of his father's hand carried him on.

Stammering words fell from his mouth.

"My mother--I remember--my mother, it is true, said something--but I
did not altogether comprehend--and--Oh! my sire ----"

"Thou shalt be content. Thou art a man now. The days of thy learning
are accomplished. Thou hast suffered exile; now is thy reward
prepared. And the daughter of the notary, thy betrothed, is as lovely
as a palm tree in the morning and as mild as sweet milk, beauteous as
a pearl, Habib, a milk-white pearl. See!"

Drawing from his burnoose a sack of Moroccan lambskin, he opened it
and lifted out a pearl. His fingers, even at rest, seemed to caress
it. They slid back among the treasure in the sack, the bargaining
price for the first wife of the only son of a man blessed by God. And
now they brought forth also a red stone, cut in the fashion of Tunis.

"A milk-white sea pearl, look thou; to wed in a jewel with the
blood-red ruby that is the son of my breast. Ah, Habib, my Habib, but
thou shalt be content!"

They stood in the sunlight before the green door of a mosque. As the
hand of the city had reached out for Habib through the city gate, so
now the prayer, throbbing like a tide across the pillared mystery of
the court, reached out through the doorway in the blaze.... And he
heard his own voice, strange in his mouth, sha