“What has the man done, that you should bring him bound in that cruel
way?”
“’Tis Ben Serraq!” was the answer he received from the quartette of
voices.
“Ah, Ben Serraq! A professional robber belonging to the Sefhha, is he
not?”
“The very same!” said the Coryphæus of the associated plaintiffs.
“Yes, sure enough; ’tis I, Ben Serraq,” growled the prisoner, in a
voice which reminded you of a wild beast roaring at night.
“But I was informed that he had amended his mode of life, and that
lately he has been living at peace with his neighbours?”
“I have always lived at peace with my neighbours. I am a good
Mussulman, fearing Allah and the law. I am calumniated.”
“Hold your tongue,” said the court, “and do not speak till you are
spoken to.”
“It is true,” explained plaintiff number one, “that, for some time
past, he has let us be quiet, and only committed distant robberies; but
a few days since, he stole one of our bullocks.”
“Sidi Bou Krari!” roared the savage. “How dare they slander a poor
innocent creature like me in that way?”
“But is the fact clearly proved?” the president inquired. “How did it
occur?”
“It is as plain as can be,” stated plaintiff number two. “There is not
the least doubt about the matter.”
“That’s what you get by serving the French!” muttered Ben Serraq, with
the air of a Cato. “What ingratitude, gracious Allah, Lord of the
universe!”
At this juncture, Djilali received orders to prevent the accused, by
any means whatever, from making lengthy interruptions to the recital
of the plaintiffs’ wrongs. As to short exclamations that will break
forth, the chaouch might allow them to burst from their safety-valve,
seeing the material impossibility of confining them within the lips of
a subject like the present defendant.
“Come, then,” said the court, decidedly, “one of you explain the
business.”
“Don’t mind what they say,” Ben Serraq roared out. “They are liars.
Besides, they have a spite against me.”
“As I said just now,” the complainant stated, “the case is plain.
Our herds were grazing in the neighbourhood of Ben Serraq’s tent. On
driving them home in the evening we discovered that a bullock was
missing. My brethren and myself immediately took the field, to discover
some trace of the robbery, but we could discover nothing. At last,
after several days of fruitless search, it entered into our heads to
have a look at Ben Serraq’s tent. We had suspected him, in consequence
of what had happened some months previously.”
“Barbarians!” yelled the untamed innocent; “to violate the tent of an
honest Mussulman!”
“But we had no need to enter it; which, moreover, we should not have
done without the kaïd’s authorisation.”
“Quite right,” said the magistrate, approvingly.
“We met his wife, as she was coming from the water.”
“What an abomination!” howled the biped brute; “to stop a woman on the
road!”
“And who, for the promise of a trifling reward, told us the whole
affair.”
“A capital witness!--a she-beggar, who betrays me!”
“She explained that it was her husband who stole our bullock, in order
to provide himself with a store of salt meat.”
“Sidi Bou Krari! That a woman should lie like that!”
“She then showed us several goat-skins filled with the meat.”
“As if a Mussulman were not allowed to keep salted meat in his tent!”
“And, to remove all doubt as to where the meat came from, she showed us
the bullock’s head lying in one corner of the tent, still in a state
sufficiently preserved to enable us to recognise the animal.”
“What a horrible she-vagabond! But her evidence is good for nothing; I
had given her a beating not two days before.”
“Our only thought then was to seize the wild-boar who is now before
you. There was the difficulty; for this son of Satan is as strong as no
one else, and can knock down a camel with a blow of his fist.”
“What a joke! I am as mild as a sheep.”
“Twenty of us met in company, and at dawn of day, informed by his
wife--”
“What a pity I did not strangle her, as I meant to!”
“Informed by his wife that he was still asleep, we rushed down upon
him; and, after a hard struggle, contrived to bind him in the way you
see, as he lay on his mat.”
“Sidi Abd-Allah! What treachery! To attack a good Mussulman as he lay
asleep!”
“And a good thing it was that we did attack him in that way; for,
although he was hardly awake, he managed, while he was wrestling with
us, to break one of Oulid Sekrad’s legs, and to put out one of Ali Oud
Ama’s eyes. He smashed in five or six of poor Bou Senan’s teeth, and
bit Otsman Oud Messassit’s back savagely.”
“Justice of the Master of the World! is it possible to lie in this way?
On the contrary, I have been half killed by you. Don’t you see my face
is covered with blood?”
“Son of a dog! you well know the blood is from poor Oud Messassit’s
body.”
“Sidi Abd-Allah!” exclaimed Ben Serraq. But it was of no use invoking
the saints. Djilali called for a towel and a basin of water, and with
them washed Ben Serraq’s face. The experiment established the fact that
that interesting individual had not received the slightest scratch, and
that the bite on the unfortunate Oud Messassit’s back must have been
the only source of the stains.
“Well, Ben Serraq,” said the president; “although I cannot entertain
any reasonable doubt of your guilt, you are, nevertheless, at liberty
to speak--let us hear what you have to say in justification.”
“Ah! I am allowed to explain! Well; you will soon see! In the first
place, my wife is a she-vagabond--everybody knows it--don’t they,
Djilali?”
But Djilali, who was particularly anxious to conceal all cognisance
of the defendant’s affairs, only replied,--“May your tent catch fire!
Pray, what connection have I ever had with you, that I should know how
your wife employs herself?”
“Very well; ’tis of no consequence. But the fact is notorious and
incontestable--the she-dog betrays my honour.”
“I will take your word for it,” said the court; “and then?--”
“She has taken a fancy to Oud Raï, whose people’s shepherds have
treated me so shamefully. I have often said to her, ‘Fatma, my
darling, things cannot go on in this manner; your improper conduct
sets everybody talking, and a modest and virtuous man, like myself,
will soon be the laughing-stock of the whole country, and that on your
account. Mind what you are about, else I shall be obliged to beat you;
and you are aware, my beloved, that, when I do hit, I hit rather hard.’”
“But I do not see what reference your matrimonial tribulations can have
to the business now before us.”
“I beg your pardon--you will see directly. I admonished her, therefore,
with the utmost gentleness, in accordance with my natural disposition.
But it was a waste of time and breath. She persevered in her infamous
conduct till I was obliged, as a gentleman, to administer to her and to
Oud Raï one day, a considerable number of kicks and thumps.”
“But, again I ask, what have these details to do with the theft of
which you stand accused? Explain yourself, more clearly.”
“What! cannot a man of your great genius see, now, how things have been
managed?”
“I have an idea I can; but probably not in the same light as you do.”
“What! don’t you see that Oud Raï and my wretch of a wife, to be
avenged of the beating I gave them, have subtracted the bullock in
question without my knowledge, and have cut it up in my tent, in
order to compromise me with the authorities? Sidi Bou Krari! it is as
clear as the sun, that. Don’t you see that I am a virtuous husband
calumniated by a criminal wife?”
A subdued murmur, mingled with stifled laughter arose in the assembly
at the victim air which Ben Serraq tried hard to assume, and also at
listening to the singular pleading which he had improvised.
“Ben Serraq,” said the magistrate, in a sceptical tone, “your case must
be a very bad one, to compel you to employ such poor arguments for its
defence. How could your wife play you such a trick as you describe
without your knowledge, since your accusers found your tent filled with
the animal’s remains, the head particularly being so conspicuous and
recognisable an object?”
“What is there extraordinary in that?” asked Ben Serraq, not in the
slightest degree disconcerted. “My wife is so artful, and I am so
simple and innocent, that she could easily contrive to conceal the
matter.”
“Come; these are wretched arguments. For a man like you, who has had
so many transactions with the authorities, it is not a clever way of
getting out of the scrape.”
“I invoke Allah and his justice!” screamed Ben Serraq with the
throat of a wild boar. “I am a poor persecuted innocent; there is
nothing proved against me, absolutely nothing. The case at least is
doubtful,--that is incontestable,--and in cases of doubt the law
requires me to take an oath. Put me on my oath; I will swear on the
Koran, on Sidi Bou Krari, on whatever book you please, I am as innocent
as a suckling.”
“No doubt. You will take a hundred oaths as readily as one. But,
unfortunately for you, I have not forgotten your previous character,
and must consider the charge as completely established.”
“Allah! Lord of the Universe! Justice is not to be had in this country.”
“Honest men will say the contrary, when they hear you are caught, and
especially when they see you transported to France: whither I intend
requesting you to be sent.”
“That’s the reward people get for serving the French!” swaggered Ben
Serraq, as Coriolanus might have done when banished by ungrateful Rome.
“Not bad, by my faith! You doubtless consider you are rendering people
a service by easing them of their purses.”
“I have been of service to you in time of warfare, by marching
constantly at the head of your columns.”
“True; you have sometimes marched at the head of our columns as a
guide; but most assuredly you insisted upon heavy wages, as far as I
can recollect. Besides, that is no reason why you should be allowed,
in recompense, to plunder the whole human race. You ought to have
reformed, as you promised you would, and then we should have forgotten
the past.”
“I am slandered! I am a victim!”
“Retain that idea for your consolation, and hold your tongue. Djilali,
take some of the men on guard and lead this fellow to prison.”
“Sidi, Sidi!” pleaded Ben Serraq, “can you not deliver me from these
bonds, which give me horrible pain?”
“Very well; I will. Djilali, unfasten the ropes, which, in fact, are
a little too tight. It is impossible for him to make his escape now;
only, take some of the cavalry with you, and keep a sharp eye on him on
the way to prison.”
“O, Sidi! such precautions are unnecessary. I am as gentle as a
lamb.” And Ben Serraq made his exit escorted by a numerous suite of
mekrazenis, at the head of whom was Djilali, and who, feeling the
greatness of his responsibility, marched as if he were carrying the
world. But an Arab chief in alliance with the French, named Ben Safi,
whispered to the president as soon as the prisoner had disappeared,
“Perhaps you were wrong to let his arms be untied.”
“That is rather too good,” the magistrate replied. “How, do you
suppose, can he contrive to escape from the custody of ten soldiers,
and in the midst of the town?”
“I have seen him escape,” Ben Safi explained, “under circumstances
that would make one believe there was something diabolical in his
composition. One night, when he had the impudence to come and rob in
my own smala, we contrived to seize him by killing the horse he had
stolen from us, and under which it chanced that he was caught as it
fell. I had his hands tied behind his back, and I ordered one of my men
to kill him like a dog, from behind, with a pistol-shot. The shot was
fired; but my gentleman, instead of dropping down dead, as he ought to
have done, jumped up as lively as a grasshopper, and disappeared as if
a flash of lightning had carried him off. The bullet had only cut the
cords which bound him, and had been flattened on the palm of his hand.
We were stupefied with astonishment.”
“And well you might be!” said the official head of the Arab bureau,
beginning to feel a little fidgety. “I now believe I should have acted
more prudently if I had forbidden his being unpinioned till he was
safely lodged in prison.”
“I am sure you would;” interposed Ben Tekrouide, a second friendly
chief. “I have always been told that this fellow is a perfect demon, in
human shape. At the market of Kremis, he once robbed a man of his ass,
without his being aware of the theft, although he was sitting on its
back at the time.”
“Indeed!” said the magistrate, in a fidget. “I should be very glad to
know that he was definitely in custody under lock and key.”
“He has the strength of twenty men,” observed Ben Maoudj, a third
philo-Gallic chieftain. “He once stole a camel laden with wheat from
a caravan proceeding to the south; and, as the animal was unable to
travel over the rocky road by which he wanted to pass, he took it on
his back, wheat and all, and carried it in that way for half-a-night’s
march.”
“That must be a slight exaggeration,” remarked the president, now
feeling horribly uncomfortable. “Nevertheless, I should like to be
quite sure that he had reached the inside of the prison walls. They are
very long about it; they ought to be back by this time.”
“Do you wish that I should go and see?” asked Ben Safi, pitying his
friend’s uneasiness.
“I shall be much obliged to you.”
At the moment when Ben Safi was leaving the court, a distant clamour
was heard from without, followed by several successive gunshots.
A sound of many footsteps was audible, as if a crowd of men were
approaching. The doors were thrown open violently, and Djilali made his
appearance. His clothes were torn and soiled with dirt, and his right
eye seemed to have suffered severely.
“Ouf!” he puffed out, “my back is broken! May Sidi Abd-Allah burn me,
if he is a man.”
“Explain yourself. Tell me!” said the court, on thorns. “Ben Serraq?--”
“Ben Serraq, indeed? If ever you contrive to get him into prison, I
will consent to be roasted alive.”
“He has escaped, then?”
“How should it be otherwise: he is the devil in person?”
“Have the goodness to tell me how you could have been so stupid as to
let a single man break away from ten of you.”
“The thing was very simple, and he was not long about it. When we
got to the prison, at the instant when they opened the door, he
unceremoniously seized the sentinel’s gun; he twisted it round like the
sails of a windmill, and threw down three-fourths of our number flat on
our backs. I immediately rushed upon him; together with the rest who
were still on their legs, and you see”--here he exhibited his exterior,
including his black and swollen eye--“what I got by it. After having
nearly felled me by putting his doubled fist into my eye, he seized me
by the skin, and threw me, like a bundle of old clothes, on the top of
my comrades. We were all left rolling pell-mell together; and, when I
got up, I saw that demon already landed on the other side of the river.
The guard came out and fired more than thirty musket-shots at him while
he was climbing up the bank; but, bless me! they might just as well
have dusted his back with pepper and salt. The bullets were flattened
without hurting him.”
“The thing is prodigious!”
“After he got to the other side of the river, no one knows what
became of him. Some say that he burrowed into the ground, whilst
others declare that he took flight with a couple of great black wings
that suddenly grew out of his sides and unfolded wide. The soldiers
belonging to the guard will have it that he laid hold of a horse that
was grazing there, that he jumped on its back, and set off at full
gallop.”