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Updated: June 5, 2025
Israel overheard him and smiled. It seemed as if he laughed a little also. "It will soon be true," he muttered under his breath, that came so quick. And hardly had he spoken when a low deep sound came from the distance. It was the funeral wail of Israel ben Oliel. Nearer and nearer it came, and clearer and more clear. First a mighty bass voice: "Allah Akbar!"
"And pray what is this I hear of your fine charities, master Israel?" said Ben Aboo. "Ah, do not look surprised. There are little birds enough to twitter of such follies. So you are throwing away silver like bones to the dogs! Pity you've got too much of it, Israel ben Oliel; pity you've got too much of it, I say."
That night the place under the narrow window in the dark lane was occupied by a group of Jews. "Sister," they whispered, "sister of our people, listen. The Basha is a hard man. This day he has robbed us of all we had that he may pay for the Sultan's visit. Listen! We have heard something. We want Israel ben Oliel back among us. He was our father, he was our brother.
Seeing Ben Aboo down, the black soldiers fell upon Ali. The brave lad died with a shout of triumph. "Israel ben Oliel," he cried, as if he thought that name enough to save his soul and damn the soul of Ben Aboo. But Ben Aboo was not yet done with his own. The blow that had been aimed at his heart had no more than grazed his shoulder.
And when one day another prisoner came from Tetuan with further tales of the Basha's tyranny, and of the people's shame at thought of how they had dealt by Israel, the prisoners led the man back to where Israel was standing in the accustomed act of dispensing bounty, that he might tell his story into the rightful ears. "They're always crying for you," said the Tetawani; "'Israel ben Oliel!
Israel ben Oliel! that's what you hear in the mosques and the streets everywhere. Shame on us for casting him out, shame on us! He was our father! Jews and Muslimeen, they're all saying so." It was useless. The glad tidings could not find their way. That black page of Israel's life which told of the people's ingratitude was sealed in the book of memory. Israel laughed.
Ransoms, promissory notes, bonds, false judgments what did I know of such things? Who changed the silver dollars at nine ducats apiece? And who bought up the debts of the people that murmured against such robbery? Allah! Allah! Whose crafty head did all this? Why, yours yours Israel ben Oliel! By the beard of the Prophet, I swear it!"
"Where is the daughter of Ben Oliel?" said the Mahdi. With a gesture of protestation the Basha waved one of the hands on which his dusky muzzle had rested. "Ah, do not lie to me," cried the Mahdi. "I know where she is she is in prison. And for what? For no fault but love of her father, and no crime but fidelity to her faith. She has sacrificed the one and abandoned the other.
Travelling through the night, Naomi laughing and singing snatches in her new-found joy, and the Mahdi looking back at intervals at the huge outline of Tetuan against the blackness of the sky, they came to the hut by Semsa before dawn of the following day. But they had come too late. Israel ben Oliel was not, after all, to set out for England. He was going on a longer journey.
But one day the woman Rebecca met him again at the street-corner by his own house, and she lifted her gaunt finger into his face, and cried, "Israel ben Oliel, the judgment of the Lord is upon you, and will not suffer you to raise up children to be a reproach and a curse among your people!"
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