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It was coming out of the synagogue; it was passing under the gate of the Mellah; it was approaching the Sok el Foki. The Rabbis walked in front of it. At its tail came four Moors with shamefaced looks. They were the soldiers and muleteers whom Israel had hired when he set out on his pilgrimage to that enemy of all Kaids and Bashas, Mohammed of Mequinez.
She beat her hands together and bade the slave girl who answered her to summon her wazeer Ayoub, and bid a litter be prepared for her. "We'll to the sok, O Marzak, and see these slaves of his. Who knows but that something may be done by means of them! Guile will serve us better than mere strength against that misbegotten son of shame." "May his house be destroyed!" said Marzak.
It was worth the journey out from home to see this sok an open space crawling with brown-and-white, cloaked and hooded humanity, mixed up with four-legged beasts, also brown, and the whole more like a magnified ant-hill on the flat than anything human.
She came to it straight enough on that uncompromising summons. She pointed to Rosamund. "It concerns that slave," said she. "I sent my wazeer to the sok to-day with orders to purchase her for me." "So I had supposed," he said. "But it seems that she caught thy fancy, and the fool suffered himself to be outbidden." "Well?" "Thou'lt relinquish her to me at the price she cost thee?"
I fear they had a troubled night, for though the "Sons of Lions" did not trouble us, a short, sharp shower came with the small hours and woke the poor fellows, who asked for extra money in the morning by way of consolation for their broken rest. By five o'clock we were astir, and soon after we were on the road again, bound for the village of Hanchen, where a small Sok Thalata is held.
The day before we left our white garden-house, S`lam and some mesdames, as in his best French he always spoke to us of his ragged countrywomen, carried them into the sok, as they were, on their backs; and they were sold to the highest bidder among the market-goers.
In the shops in the sôk, or market-place, prices are sometimes more moderate, and there you may discover some of the more distinctively Moorish articles, which are brought in from the country; nor can there be purchased a more interesting memento than a flint-lock, a pistol, or a carved dagger, all more or less elaborately decorated, such as are carried by town or country Moor, the former satisfied with a dagger in its chased sheath, except at the time of "powder-play," when flint-locks are in evidence everywhere.
I was away from the Kasbah when that pig Tsamanni returned thither from the sok; but when at last I learnt that he had failed to purchase her as I commanded, I could have wept for very grief. I feared at first that some merchant from the Sus might have bought her and departed; but when I heard blessed be Allah! that thou wert the buyer, I was comforted again.
Did she go with Ali into the streets, she knew the Mellah gate from the gate of the town, and the narrow lanes from the open Sok. Did she pass the lofty mosque in the market-place, she knew it from the low shops that nestled under and behind and around.
From this point I saw the German captain and had aimed my rifle at him when he blew his whistle for the Germans to stop firing. I saw Corporal York, who called out to us, and when we all joined him, I saw seven Americans beside myself. These were Corp. York, Privates Beardsley, Donohue, Wills, Sok, Johnson and Konatski." From the affidavit by Private Percy Beardsley: "I was at first near Corp.
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