Karim used to go back several times a year to spend a week or two with Abdullah and Nana. They were always delighted to see him and to hear of his new life, and much pleased with the presents he brought.

On one of these visits Nana asked him whether he did not wish to become betrothed. Karim at once felt very bashful, but at last told his mother whom he was thinking of, and she promised to speak to Abdullah about it. She did so that very afternoon.

"Master," she said, "you know that your son is now fifteen years old, and ought to be betrothed. He told me this morning that he wishes us to ask Shahbaz if he will not let him marry his daughter Kadija."

"K'choo!" sneezed Dada, and then blinked at the sun, for good luck. Both waited quietly for a minute, and then Nana exclaimed,

"AwÝ! What bad luck! God has shown us that we should not ask for Kadija."

"There are other girls," said Dada, and after a long talk that evening with Karim they decided to ask Suleiman for his daughter.

Next morning Dada started out to ask Mashaddi to tell his mother to see Suleiman about this. On the way he greeted Husain.

"Peace be to you."

"May you have peace," replied Husain. "Where are you going?"

"What luck!" muttered Dada, and went back home again.

"Why have you come back so soon?" asked Grandmother in surprise.

"That fool Husain asked me a question that brings bad luck," said Dada, "so of course I came back to start out over again. A person cannot be too careful at a time like this."

"We seem to be having bad luck about it all," replied Grandmother. "I had hoped that Kadija was the right girl, but of course, since you sneezed only once, she—"

"K'chee! K'choo!" broke in Nana.

"Praise be to God!" exclaimed Grandmother. "We were talking of Kadija, and Nana sneezed twice. You know that means the best of luck. Let us ask for her."

Shahbaz was much pleased when Mashaddi's mother told him what Abdullah was hoping for. When Abdullah learned this he sent rice and meat and butter to Shahbaz' house, and later came himself with Mashaddi and a few other friends, carrying as presents, among other things, a ring and a pair of shoes, and a large tray covered with candy, with a red handkerchief spread over the top.

"Peace be to you, my brothers," said Shahbaz.

"May you have peace," replied Abdullah. "I have come to ask whether you are willing to marry the light of your eyes, your daughter Kadija, to my son Karim."

"You show me so much more honour than I can possibly deserve in asking this," said Shahbaz, politely, "that I am too much overcome to trust myself to answer you. I must ask my mother and my brother about it."

He went in to ask them, and came back in fifteen minutes, all smiles.

"My daughter is like a pair of shoes to your son," he said.

"Praise be to God!" exclaimed Abdullah, and sent the ring in to Kadija, who of course was keeping out of sight of the men.

Her grandmother put it upon the girl's finger, thus showing that she was now betrothed to Karim. Then the men all sat down to a dinner cooked from the food Abdullah had sent.

After this Abdullah was careful to send a present to Shahbaz once in a while—a chicken, or a lamb, or a toman or two. It would have been more improper than ever for Karim to visit Kadija, now that they were betrothed. As she did not know how to read he could not send her notes, but had to trust that Nana or Grandmother would tell Kadija what he wished her to know. This was very hard to bear whenever he was at home on a visit, but there was no help for it.

One day the mirza said, "Karim, you know about that dog of a Kurd, Sheikh Tahar, who captured the governor's soldiers among the mountains, coming on them while they were asleep, and who robbed the village of Dizza. Now he has sent a letter to the governor in which he asks that some one be sent to talk with him and make peace. The governor is going to send Abbas Khan. He wants a mirza to go with him. I have taught you to compose and write well. I am old; why should I trot about among the mountains to please that dog of a Kurd? The work will be an honour to you. Let me recommend you."

So it came about that a few days later Karim was riding over the plain towards the mountain pass with Abbas Khan and his forty horsemen. Each man carried a breech-loading gun, with a pistol at the pommel and a dagger in his belt.

The road passed over the flat plain, by a river, now running quietly below high banks in its wide and stony bed, for it was late in the summer. In the spring, after the rains, the bed was filled from bank to bank with an angry torrent of muddy water. Crossing a bridge, with arches of red brick, and small towers at either end, built by a rich man as a good deed, to help him enter heaven when he died, they entered the village where they were to stop for the night.

The kedkhoda and village white beards met them with many bows.

Almost every house had one or more guests that night. Karim and the major who commanded the forty horsemen were together in a room that had a rude framework of poles along one side. From its top stretched downwards a long line of woollen threads of different colours. On the little stools in front, the women of the house sat while hour after hour for days at a time they patiently wove in and out the coloured wool thread that slowly built up a beautiful Persian carpet. None of these women had ever read a book telling how to weave, or had ever seen a pattern of the bright figures they wove into the rug. They had learned the patterns by practice under the direction of their mothers. Their mothers had learned them in the same way. And now the girls were sitting before the loom and learning by practice to weave the same patterns.

A small boy told them some interesting news.

"People say," he said, "that the king of the fleas lives in this village with half the fleas of the plain. We don't mind them, but many travellers can't sleep."

Karim laughed at this. He had never bothered himself much about such little things, but before morning he was quite ready to believe the boy.