“Khadja,” the merchant said, “this is the Christian slave I purchased today.  You have for a long time desired one, but not until now have I found one who would, I thought, satisfy your expectations.  What think you of him?”

“He is a noble looking youth truly, Isaac, with his fair, wavy hair, his grey eyes, and white skin; truly, all my neighbours will envy me such a possession.  I have often seen Christian slaves before, but they have always been broken down and dejected looking creatures; this one bears himself like a warrior rather than a slave.”

“He is a warrior; he is one of those terrible knights of Rhodes whose very name is a terror to the Turks, and whose galleys are feared even by our boldest corsairs.  He must be of approved valour, for he was commander of one of these galleys.”

The girls looked with amazement at Gervaise.  They had often heard tales of the capture of ships that had sailed from Tripoli, by the galleys of the Christian knights, and had pictured those fierce warriors as of almost supernatural strength and valour.  That this youth, whose upper lip was but shaded with a slight moustache, should be one of them, struck them as being almost incredible.

“He does not look ferocious, father,” one of them said.  “He looks pleasant and good tempered, as if he could injure no one.”

“And yet this morning, daughter, he braved, unarmed, the anger of Hassan the corsair, on the deck of his own ship; and when the pirate called upon his men to seize him he threw one overboard, struck two more on to the deck, and it needed eight men to overpower him.”

“I hope he won’t get angry with us!” the younger girl exclaimed.  Gervaise could not suppress a laugh, and then, turning to the merchant, said in Turkish, “I must ask your pardon for having concealed from you my knowledge of your tongue.  I kept the secret from all on board the corsair, and meant to have done the same here, deeming that if none knew that I spoke the language it would greatly aid me should I ever see an opportunity of making my escape; but, Ben Ibyn, you have behaved so kindly to me that I feel it would not be honourable to keep it a secret from you, and to allow you and the ladies to talk freely before me, thinking that I was altogether ignorant of what you were saying.”

“You have acted well and honourably,” Ben Ibyn said, putting a hand on his shoulder kindly.  “We have heard much of the character of the Order, and that though valiant in battle, your knights are courteous and chivalrous, deeming a deceitful action to be unworthy of them, and binding themselves by their vows to succour the distressed and to be pitiful to the weak.  We have heard that our wounded are tended by them in your hospitals with as much care as men of their own race and religion, and that in many things the knights were to be admired even by those who were their foes.  I see now that these reports were true, and that although, as you say, it might be of advantage to you that none should know you speak Arabic, yet it is from a spirit of honourable courtesy you have now told us that you do so.