The Weavers: a tale of England and Egypt of fifty years ago - Complete. Gilbert Parker

much to him as the turtle’s shell to the turtle? I’ll have no

       upstart spilling his chemicals here, or devilling the stars from a

       seat on my roof.” “Last autumn,” said I, “David Claridge was housed

       here. Thy palace was a prison then.” “I know well of that.

       Haven’t I found his records here? And do you think his makeshift

       lordship did not remind me?” “Records? What records, Soolsby?”

       asked I, most curious. “Writings of his thoughts which he forgot—

       food for mind and body left in the cupboard.” “Give them to me upon

       this instant, Soolsby,” said I. “All but one,” said he, “and that

       is my own, for it was his mind upon Soolsby the drunken chair-maker.

       God save him from the heathen sword that slew his uncle. Two better

       men never sat upon a chair!” He placed the papers in my hand, all

       save that one which spoke of him. Ah, David, what with the flute

       and the pen, banishment was no pain to thee! … He placed the

       papers, save that one, in my hands, and I, womanlike, asked again

       for all. “Some day,” said he, “come, and I will read it to you.

       Nay, I will give you a taste of it now,” he added, as he brought

       forth the writing. “Thus it reads.”

       Here are thy words, Davy. What think thee of them now?

       “As I dwell in this house I know Soolsby as I never knew him when he

       lived, and though, up here, I spent many an hour with him. Men

       leave their impressions on all around them. The walls which have

       felt their look and their breath, the floor which has taken their

       footsteps, the chairs in which they have sat, have something of

       their presence. I feel Soolsby here at times so sharply that it

       would seem he came again and was in this room, though he is dead and

       gone. I ask him how it came he lived here alone; how it came that

       he made chairs, he, with brains enough to build great houses or

       great bridges; how it was that drink and he were such friends; and

       how he, a Catholic, lived here among us Quakers, so singular,

       uncompanionable, and severe. I think it true, and sadly true, that

       a man with a vice which he is able to satisfy easily and habitually,

       even as another satisfies a virtue, may give up the wider actions of

       the world and the possibilities of his life for the pleasure which

       his one vice gives him, and neither miss nor desire those greater

       chances of virtue or ambition which he has lost. The simplicity of

       a vice may be as real as the simplicity of a virtue.”

       Ah, David, David, I know not what to think of those strange words;

       but old Soolsby seemed well to understand thee, and he called thee

       “a first-best gentleman.” Is my story long? Well, it was so

       strange, and it fixed itself upon my mind so deeply, and thy

       writings at the hut have been so much in my hands and in my mind,

       that I have put it all down here. When I asked Soolsby how it came

       he had been rumoured dead, he said that he himself had been the

       cause of it; but for what purpose he would not say, save that he was

       going a long voyage, and had made up his mind to return no more. “I

       had a friend,” he said, “and I was set to go and see that friend

       again. … But the years go on, and friends have an end. Life

       spills faster than the years,” he said. And he would say no more,

       but would walk with me even to my father’s door. “May the Blessed

       Virgin and all the Saints be with you,” he said at parting, “if you

       will have a blessing from them. And tell him who is beyond and away

       in Egypt that old Soolsby’s busy making a chair for him to sit in

       when the scarlet cloth is spread, and the East and West come to

       salaam before him. Tell him the old man says his fluting will be

       heard.”

       And now, David, I have told thee all, nearly. Remains to say that

       thy one letter did our hearts good. My father reads it over and

       over, and shakes his head sadly, for, truth is, he has a fear that

       the world may lay its hand upon thee. One thing I do observe, his

       heart is hard set against Lord Eglington. In degree it has ever

       been so; but now it is like a constant frown upon his forehead. I

       see him at his window looking out towards the Cloistered House; and

       if our neighbour comes forth, perhaps upon his hunter, or now in his

       cart, or again with his dogs, he draws his hat down upon his eyes

       and whispers to himself. I think he is ever setting thee off

       against Lord Eglington; and that is foolish, for Eglington is but a

       man of the earth earthy. His is the soul of the adventurer.

       Now what more to be set down? I must ask thee how is thy friend Ebn

       Ezra Bey? I am glad thee did find all he said was true, and that in

       Damascus thee was able to set a mark by my uncle’s grave. But that

       the Prince Pasha of Egypt has set up a claim against my uncle’s

       property is evil news; though, thanks be to God, as my father says,

       we have enough to keep us fed and clothed and housed. But do thee

       keep enough of thy inheritance to bring thee safe home again to

       those who love thee. England is ever grey, Davy, but without thee

       it is grizzled—all one “Quaker drab,” as says the Philistine. But

       it is a comely and a good land, and here we wait for thee.

       In love and remembrance.

       I am thy mother’s sister, thy most loving friend.

       FAITH.

      David received this letter as he was mounting a huge white Syrian donkey to ride to the Mokattam Hills, which rise sharply behind Cairo, burning and lonely and large. The cities of the dead Khalifas and Mamelukes separated them from the living city where the fellah toiled, and Arab, Bedouin, Copt strove together to intercept the fruits of his toiling, as it passed in the form of taxes to the Palace of the Prince Pasha; while in the dark corners crouched, waiting, the cormorant usurers—Greeks, Armenians, and Syrians, a hideous salvage corps, who saved the house of a man that they might at last walk off with his shirt and the cloth under which he was carried to his grave. In a thousand narrow streets and lanes, in the warm glow of the bazaars, in earth-damp huts, by blistering quays, on the myriad ghiassas on the river, from long before sunrise till the sunset-gun boomed from the citadel rising beside the great mosque whose pinnacles seem to touch the blue, the slaves of the city of Prince Kaid ground out their lives like corn between the millstones.

      David had been long enough