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Touch not the body." Her entrance was not more than half observed, for Kassim at that moment was questioning the Afghan, who stood, a man on either side of him, and two behind. He was just answering a question from the Commander and was saying: "I left your Chief with the Peace of Allah upon both our heads, for he gripped my hand in fellowship, and said that we were two men.
"I am he, Caliph," answered Abdul; "permit me to express my thanks for the palace with which you have endowed your most humble servant." "I have heard much good of you," said the Caliph, when he had ordered his suite to retire; "and pray you to show me the magic jewels that help you to such power and wisdom." "Of which jewels are you speaking?" asked Abdul Kassim, amazed.
He related at length all about the magic stones. The Caliph listened attentively, dismissed the barber, and sent a message to the Grand Vizier to come at once. The Vizier came and confirmed the barber's tale. "Abdul Kassim," he said, "knows everything that goes on in the world, and whenever he has a wish, all he has to do to fulfil it is to rub the diamond and say what he wants."
There came a knock at the door, and Micha ben Jahzeel, the Jew, who had lent him money a month or two ago, walked in. Micha looked grave and said, "Abdul Kassim, times are bad, and ready money gets scarcer and scarcer.
"You are right, Chief Kassim," Barlow declared; "even if you cut in with the winning side, especially Sindhia, he would turn on you and devour you and your people." "Yes, Sahib. The trade of a Pindari, if I may call it so, has been that of loot in this land that has always been a land of strife for possession.
"It is all," Kassim said quietly. "I would make speech for a little with the Captain." As each officer passed toward the door he held out a hand and gripped the hand of the Englishman.
He searched every street and alley; he interviewed the Bekjees, who stamp along the streets, pounding the pavement with their iron-shod clubs; he tramped out to the Taksim, and down again to Galata tower, plunging into the dark alleys about the Oriental Bank, skirting lower Pera to the Austrian embassy, and climbing up the narrow path between tall houses, till he was once more in the Grande Rue; crossing to the filthy quarters of Kassim Paschá and emerging at the German Lutheran church, crossing, recrossing, stumbling over gutters and up dirty back lanes, silent and determined still, addressing only the sturdy Kurd by his side to ask if there were any streets still unexplored, and entering every new by-path with new hope.
Kassim was deposed, after a reign of a few months, amid burning villages and their slaughtered inhabitants; and, as the Porte was resolved not to try another Shehaab, and the Great Powers were resolved not to trust the Porte, diplomacy was obliged again to interfere, and undertake to provide Lebanon with a government.
The Porte, warned at that time by the too easy invasion of Syria and the imminent peril which it had escaped, wished itself to assume the government of Lebanon, and to garrison the passes with its troops; but the Christian Powers would not consent to this proposition, and therefore Kassim Shehaab was called to the Chief Emirate.
"I am a Sahib," Barlow answered; "a Captain in the British service, and came to your Chief with a written message of friendship." Kassim pointed to the blood on the floor: "Thou wert a good messenger, infidel; thou hast slain a follower of the Prophet."
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