Long before we caught sight of the water again, through a ragged
gap between high limestone rocks, I could smell a village. The
guide approached it cautiously, stopping every minute or so to
listen. When we came on it at last it was down below us in
abysmal darkness, one light shining through a window two feet
square in proof we were not hesitating on the verge of the
infinite pit.

The donkeys knew the way. They trod daintily, like little
ladies, along a circling track that goats made and men had
certainly done nothing to improve. We made an almost complete
ellipse around and down, and rode at last over dry dung at the
bottom, into which the donkeys' feet sank as into a three-pile
carpet. You could see the stars overhead, but nothing, where we
were, except that window and a shaft of yellow light with
hundreds of moths dazzled in it.

We must have made some noise in spite of the donkeys' vetvet
foot-fall. As we crossed the shaft of light a door opened within
six feet of the window. A man in Arab deshabille with a red
tarboosh awry, thrust out his head and drew it in again quickly.

"Is that the American?" he asked. He held the door so that he
could slam it in our faces if required.

The guide made no answer. I gave my name. The man opened the
door wider.

"Lailtak sa'idi, effendi! Hishkur Allah! Come in, mister!" The