a
man."

"And the treacherous servant?"

"About him I know nothing. My tale is told."

V. THE BLUE DIAMONDS

TOLD BY THE FAKIR

"You have certainly improved on the moral of my story," said the
astrologer, addressing the merchant, silent now after the telling of his
tale. "If it is for God alone to pronounce the censure on mankind, then
assuredly it is for God also to award the praise. As the story of Sheikh
Ahmed and his jewelled harp well shows, deeds may be done openly by the
hand, but the motives for their doing lie secretly in the heart. And the
heart is the innermost temple where none but the high priest, the
individual soul, holds communion with his God, the supreme Deity of the
universe."

"So that a man's life is an unsolvable riddle to all but himself,"
concurred the hakeem.

"And not to be solved even by himself," remarked the Afghan with a
laugh, half of bitterness, half of bravado. "We may know in our secret
heart the motive that prompts to a deed, but we cannot tell the
consequences of that deed as affecting even ourselves who wrought it.
Take this very story of the Sheikh; when recovering his precious harp he
was but digging his own grave. So with all of us; we imagine we are
marching bravely to accomplish some preconceived plan, when all the time
we are merely groping with blinded eyes along the path of destiny,
avoiding the mud holes, it may be, but failing to see the tiger,
crouched for his spring, a few paces further along."

"Shabash!" cried the fakir, in a shrill tone of approval that drew all
eyes to the lean and naked and ash-besprinkled figure seated at the foot
of the veranda steps. "Shabash! shabash!" he cried, again and yet again.

"And your story?" asked the Rajput, with a nod of inquiry and
encouragement.

"Is one that shows how a man may keep on running all his life yet never
reach the goal he has in sight," replied the ascetic. And with the
sturdy independence of his calling he beat a peremptory tattoo with
finger-tips on wooden begging-bowl to command attention to his tale.

* * * * *

"Behold in me a man who possesses nothing in this world excepting a
begging-bowl and a loin cloth. Yet was I at one time the owner of lands
and of cattle, of a home bountifully stored for comfort and for
sustenance, of wives who wore rich jewels, necklets of pearls, armlets
of gold, and bangles of silver, with maid-servants to minister to their
needs an