re
with his own good fortune in Iskender's eyes.

One evening, on their return to the hotel, when two stable-boys were
leading off the tired horses, and Iskender, with Elias, stood waiting
to take leave of his kind lord, the negro brought a little card to the
Emir, who eyed it strangely.

"It is that missionary-man you hate so," he informed Iskender. "What
in the name of Moses made him call on me?"

"Ha, ha! 'Name of Moses!'" laughed Elias, who was daily adding to his
store of English idioms. "By gum, that's good!"

Iskender inwardly thanked Allah Most High for his mercy in directing
the Father of Ice to call while the Emir was out. He thought no more
of it. They rode again the next day and the next; his happiness went
on, unshadowed, till a certain morning when the Frank announced, with a
yawn, that he supposed he must return the visit of the missionary.
This he gave as a reason for not riding on that day. He would write
off arrears of letters in the morning, and in the afternoon would walk
out to the Mission.

Iskender's jaw fell. It had never occurred to him as even remotely
possible that his Emir would stoop to enter the abode of people he had
always mentioned with such fine contempt. The picture of his loved one
seated in the well-known drawing-room, an object of attention to the
ladies, hobnobbing with the Father of Ice--his Emir, whom he had come
to regard as the very counterblast of that house and all it stood
for--gave him a sense of being upside down. The Frank laughed at his
dismay, inquiring:

"Why so surprised? I must return the poor man's call in mere
politeness."

"They hate me very much there," said Iskender miserably. "I fear they
tell you things not true about me."

"I know the truth from you, don't I? Let them say what they like!"

Iskender went forth from his presence, pondering this reassurance,
which contained no comfort for him, since he had given his lord to
understand that he had received his education at the Mission as an
independent paying pupil, and had quite concealed the fact that his
mother was a washerwoman. The Emir, if he thought at all of the
matter, supposed him a youth of substance. How could he think
otherwise, when he heard Iskender offer to defray the cost of horses,
and saw him daily bring some present in his hand? Now he would learn
the truth.

Elias was standing in the doorway talking to Daud son of Musa when his
friend came out. He noticed his glu