hem were
packed with such things as they must take, the rest having been
handed over to her keeping.

Presently the door opened, and a young man stood before them
clothed in the rough camel-hair garment, or burnous, which is
common in the East.

"What do you want?" asked Godwin.

"I want you, brothers Peter and John," was the reply, and they
saw that the slim young man was Masouda. "What! you English
innocents, do you not know a woman through a camel-hair cloak?"
she added as she led the way to the stable. "Well, so much the
better, for it shows that my disguise is good. Henceforth be
pleased to forget the widow Masouda and, until we reach the land
of Al-je-bal, to remember that I am your servant, a halfbreed
from Jaffa named David, of no religion--or of all."

In the stable the horses stood saddled, and near to them
another--a good Arab--and two laden Cyprian mules, but no
attendant was to be seen. They brought them out and mounted,
Masouda riding like a man and leading the mules, of which the
head of one was tied to the tail of the other. Five minutes later
they were clear of Beirut, and through the solemn twilight hush,
followed the road whereon they had tried the horses, towards the
Dog River, three leagues away, which Masouda said they would
reach by moonrise.

Soon it grew very dark, and she rode alongside of them to show
them the path, but they did not talk much. Wulf asked her who
would take care of the inn while she was absent, to which she
answered sharply that the inn would take care of itself, and no
more. Picking their way along the stony road at a slow amble,
they crossed the bed of two streams then almost dry, till at
length they heard running water sounding above that of the slow
wash of the sea to their left, and Masouda bade them halt. So
they waited, until presently the moon rose in a clear sky,
revealing a wide river in front, the pale ocean a hundred feet
beneath them to the left, and to the right great mountains, along
the face of which their path was cut. So bright was it that
Godwin could see strange shapes carven on the sheer face of the
rock, and beneath them writing which he could not read.

"What are these?" he asked Masouda.

"The tablets of kings," she answered, "whose names are written in
your holy book, who ruled Syria and Egypt thousands of years ago.
They were great in their day when they took this land, greater
even than Salah-ed-din, and now these seals which they set upon