They
then called two of the soldiers to their assistance, and bound him
hand and foot. This done, they threw the old man contemptuously down
upon his divan, and proceeded to ransack every part of the house in
search of Masa, their master's runaway slave.
There lay the sheik, bound and helpless, groaning and lamenting: "I
am mad! I hear that which is not. I hear voices say that which
cannot be. No, I am mad! It is impossible that Masa, the daughter of
the Sheik of Praousta, is the slave of the stranger Turk! Impossible
that I can have heard such a thing! Death or even madness is
approaching me. It creeps stealthily toward me and stares at me
wildly. O Masa, my daughter, come save your father!"
About him all was still, but in the rooms above was an uproar. He
heard the heavy footsteps in the upper apartments, into which, until
now, no man save the father had ever entered. They are going from
room to room, throwing the daughter's things about, ransacking her
bedchamber, overthrowing furniture, and looking under carpets and
mattresses, searching everywhere for the only daughter of the poor
sheik. Then they go to the yard, to the stables. Masa is sought
everywhere. But, Allah be praised, she cannot be found!
Without, before the door, stand the men and women of the village in
a wide circle, gazing with dismay upon the eunuchs and the twelve
soldiers, who now come out of the door, fall in line before the
house, and demand of the people to tell them where Masa, the sheik's
daughter, is.
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