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While he sat thus between great hope and fear, a face looked in upon him out of the sunlight, and a youthful voice exclaimed:

“May thy day be happy, O my master. How fares the beloved?”

It was Shibli, his favorite pupil and the bridegroom designate of Alia.

“Enter, O my son, and welcome,” said Shems-ud-dìn; and he straight described to his disciple all the happenings since sunrise, from the departure of the city physician to the advice so strangely proffered by a simple camel driver. At the end, Shibli cried:

“It is the best advice. Let us go to El Cûds. Apart from the virtue of a pilgrimage to the Dome of the Rock, I thirst to behold so famous a city. My father will grant me leave to travel with thee. O happy day!”

Shems-ud-dìn smiled upon the boy’s excitement. To rebuke it, he said:

“Allah knows it is not for pastime that I go.”

But Shibli’s delight in the prospect made it bright for him also.

Presently, giving his disciple charge of the shop, Shems-ud-dìn issued forth into the sunlight and started to climb a steep and stony path, like the bed of a torrent, which led to his dwelling. Women, gossiping at their doors, blessed him by name as he passed, and inquired tenderly concerning the health of his dear one. The sun, sinking down upon the hilltop, dazzled his eyes. Hope, renewed, opened the gates of his mind, even as his despondency had shut them fast, to things around him. He noticed the lizard basking in the sunshine, the tuft of hyssop growing between the stones.