Shooshan the barber went to Shep the maker of teeth to discuss the
state of England. They agreed that it was time to send for Ali.
So Shooshan stepped late that night from the little shop near Fleet
Street and made his way back again to his house in the ends of London
and sent at once the message that brought Ali.
And Ali came, mostly on foot, from the country of Persia, and it took
him a year to come; but when he came he was welcome.
And Shep told Ali what was the matter with England and Shooshan swore
that it was so, and Ali looking out of the window of the little shop
near Fleet Street beheld the ways of London and audibly blessed King
Solomon and his seal.
When Shep and Shooshan heard the names of King Solomon and his seal
both asked, as they had scarcely dared before, if Ali had it. Ali
patted a little bundle of silks that he drew from his inner raiment.
It was there.
Now concerning the movements and courses of the stars and the
influence on them of spirits of Earth and devils this age has been
rightly named by some The Second Age of Ignorance. But Ali knew. And
by watching nightly, for seven nights in Bagdad, the way of certain
stars he had found out the dwelling place of Him they Needed.
Guided by Ali all three set forth for the Midlands. And by the
reverence that was manifest in the faces of Shep and Shooshan towards
the person of Ali, some knew what Ali carried, while others said that
it was the tablets of the Law, others the name of God, and others that
he must have a lot of money about him. So they passed Slod and Apton.
And at last they came to the town for which Ali sought, that spot over
which he had seen the shy stars wheel and swerve away from their
orbits, being troubled. Verily when they came there were no stars,
though it was midnight. And Ali said that it was the appointed place.
In harems in Persia in the evening when the tales go round it is still
told how Ali and Shep and Shooshan came to the Black country.
When it was dawn they looked upon the country and saw how it was
without doubt the appointed place, even as Ali had said, for the earth
had been taken out of pits and burned and left lying in heaps, and
there were many factories, and they stood over the town and as it were
rejoiced. And with one voice Shep and Shooshan gave praise to Ali.
And Ali said that the great ones of the place must needs be gathered
together, and to this end Shep and Shooshan went into the town and
there spoke craftily. For they said that Ali had of his wisdom
contrived as it were a patent and a novelty which should greatly
benefit England. And when they heard how he sought nothing for his
novelty save only to benefit mankind they consented to speak with Ali
and see his novelty. And they came forth and met Ali.
And Ali spake and said unto them: "O lords of this place; in the book
that all men know it is written how that a fisherman casting his net
into the sea drew up a bottle of brass, and when he took the stopper
from the bottle a dreadful genie of horrible aspect rose from the
bottle, as it were like a smoke, even to darkening the sky, whereat
the fisherman..." And the great ones of that place said: "We have
heard the story." And Ali said: "What became of that genie after he
was safely thrown back into the sea is not properly spoken of by any
save those that pursue the study of demons and not with certainty by
any man, but that the stopper that bore the ineffable seal and bears
it to this day became separate from the bottle is among those things
that man may know." And when there was doubt among the great ones Ali
drew forth his bundle and one by one removed those many silks till the
seal stood revealed; and some of them knew it for the seal and others
knew it not.
And they looked curiously at it and listened to Ali, and Ali said:
"Having heard how evil is the case of England, how a smoke has
darkened the country, and in places (as men say) the grass is black,
and how even yet your factories multiply, and haste and noise have
become such that men have no time for song, I have therefore come at
the bidding of my good friend Shooshan, barber of London, and of Shep,
a maker of teeth, to make things well with you."