of the message which disturbed him. For, while he himself had sent Koom Khan to the rebel camp to spread there the seeds of mistrust and dissension, he had never imagined that the man would elaborate his instructions so as to cause Abderrahman Yahiah Khan to commit murder.
Murder! Deliberate, cold-blooded murder!
No, no! It went against his grain, and he said so to the others:
“I won't have it. It can't be done.”
“Thou art a saheb!” grumbled the old nurse. “Thou art a soft man …”
“And it is the sahebs' softness,” smilingly cut in Hector, “which is their strength. Their softness is the rope by which they dangle the world to their fancy.”
And he sent the messenger back to Koom Khan with the words:
“Al Nakia sends many salaams, and the following explicit instructions: there is no worth in blood; blood forever demands to be wiped out by darkening blood, making the red chain endless. Thus, do not let the buffalo redden his horns with the lean saheb's gore.”
