s you know, was the holy month Radjab, in which, as
in the month of Ramadhan, throughout all El Hejaz, life should be
held sacred, and no act of violence committed. Can you believe it
when I tell you that the prophet's men have attacked more than one
caravan of quiet traders and pilgrims upon their way to or from
Mecca? Such a sacrilege seems unpardonable in Arab eyes, but,
forsooth, the prophet has been favored with another revelation
justifying him in what he has done.

This, more than aught else, makes me wonder. You, Yusuf, know what a
lover of peace I have been; how it has ever grieved me to see even a
butterfly fluttering along the ground with a crushed wing. Judge,
then, of my horror, when I went out to the scene of the pillage and
saw men lying, some dead, with ghastly faces glaring up at the hot
sun, others with gaping wounds, and others moaning pitifully on the
road-way, with sand on their faces and in their hair. Yusuf, it made
me sick to see it. Had they been slain in fair battle I could have
borne it better. Yet I was enabled to give the poor wounded
creatures some water, all warm as it was from being carried so long
a distance; and some of them I had conveyed to my house, so that
every bed-chamber has been turned into a sick-room, and your friend
Amzi has been suddenly metamorphosed into a sick-nurse. Does that
astonish you?

Yet, Yusuf, though I get little sleep any night, and have to be on
my feet much during the day, I can assure you that I was never so
happy in my life before. The constant occupation, and the sense of
being able to render the poor creatures a little ease, is just what
I need at present to keep me from growing moody.

The other day I saw some one who knows of you--Uzza, the Oman Arab.
How or why he has come here I know not; but he is one of Mohammed's
most devoted followers. For your sake, I hope you may not meet him
in Medina.

I knew him, years ago, at Oman, and had letters from him for a time
after he went to Persia. Perhaps that will read you the riddle as to
how I knew so much of your past history, my priest. Recognizing your
name, and noting your priestly bearing, it was an easy matter to
connect you with the Guebre Yusuf, of whom I had heard.

I am convinced that you are looking after my Meccan affairs as
closely as possible, yet