So I roused Salam, and together we drew the creaking bolts, bringing the kaid to his feet with a jump.  There was plenty of time for explanation, because he always carried his gun, at best a harmless weapon, in the old flannel case secured by half a dozen pieces of string, with knots that defied haste.  He warned us not to go out, since the djinoon were always abroad in the streets before daylight; but, seeing our minds set, he bolted the door upon us, as though to keep them from the Dar al Kasdir, and probably returned to his slumbers.

[Illustration:  A BLIND BEGGAR]

Beyond the house, in a faint glow that was already paling the stars, the African city, well-nigh a thousand years old, assumed its most mysterious aspect.  The high walls on either side of the roads, innocent of casements as of glass, seemed, in the uncertain light, to be tinted with violet amid their dull grey.  The silence was complete and weird.  Never a cry from man or beast removed the first impression that this was a city of the dead.  The entrances of the bazaars in the Kaisariyah, to which we turned, were barred and bolted, their guardians sat motionless, covered in white djellabas, that looked like shrouds.  The city’s seven gates were fast closed, though doubtless there were long files of camels and market men waiting patiently without.  The great mansions of the wazeers and the green-tiled palace of Mulai Abd-el-Aziz—­Our Victorious Master the Sultan—­seemed unsubstantial as one of those cities that the mirage had set before us in the heart of the R’hamna plains.  Salam, the untutored man from the far Riff country, felt the spell of the silent morning hour.  It was a primitive appeal, to which he responded instantly, moving quietly by my side without a word.

“O my masters, give charity; Allah helps helpers!” A blind beggar, sitting by the gate, like Bartimaeus of old, thrust his withered hand before me.  Lightly though we had walked, his keen ear had known the difference in sound between the native slipper and the European boot.  It had roused him from his slumbers, and he had calculated the distance so nicely that the hand, suddenly shot out, was well within reach of mine.  Salam, my almoner, gave him a handful of the copper money, called floos, of which a score may be worth a penny, and he sank back in his uneasy seat with voluble thanks, not to us, but to Allah the One, who had been pleased to move us to work his will.  To me no thanks were due.  I was no more than Allah’s unworthy medium, condemned to burn in fires seven times heated, for unbelief.

From their home on the flat house-tops two storks rose suddenly, as though to herald the dawn; the sun became visible above the city’s time-worn walls, and turned their colouring from violet to gold.  We heard the guards drawing the bars of the gate that is called Bab al Khamees, and knew that the daily life of Marrakesh had begun.  The great birds might have given the signal that woke the town to activity.