“Ya Amaimi, weigh and judge, for gold cannot lie,” cajoled the gold seller. Sheikh Zaid drew a touchstone from the folds of his bisht and lightly rubbed the necklace against the stone.

“It is by testing that we discern fine gold—and more than gold. As is the mold, so will the cast be,” Zaid explained to Nick. “Behold, it is as you say,” he said to the gold seller.

A battered, colorfully painted Chevrolet rumbled down the dusty street, scattering goats and chickens.

“Devil machines!” muttered the gold seller.

“Soon these foreign machines will drown out the cry of the falcon in the desert,” Zaid said, his face troubled.

The gold seller clapped his hands and ordered cups of sweet hot shay from a passing vendor. It was as the two men sipped and haggled over the price that the news swept the souk, like the breath of hot wind which warns of a coming sandstorm. Sheikh Zaid was thunderstruck. It was inconceivable that Arabs, even the slavish Egyptian fellahin, could be swept out of Sinai in only a few days by the lightning attack of the Jews.

“They have won a battle, not the war. Some day we will push them back into the sea,” Zaid said.

“What—and pollute the sea?” the gold seller laughed.

On the ride back to their camp Nick pulled his camel alongside Sheikh Zaid and they discussed it.

“Are we to hate the Jews?” Nick asked.

Sheikh Zaid frowned. The world was changing in ways that were difficult to understand. For a time his gaze was lost in the distant burning plain.

“That gold seller was wrong to curse them so,” Zaid said at last. “The sons of Isaac and the sons of Ishmael are both the sons of Father Ibrahim. Ours is a family quarrel. But they are wrong to steal the dira of the Falastin. Without his dira, how can a man live? Until they return the land, there can be no peace.”

“They are good fighters, though,” Nick said.

“It must be admitted. The Jews are exceedingly difficult to get rid of,” Zaid said with a rueful smile, urging his camel on.

They stopped for the night in a vast sandy plain. As the sun set in a brilliant slash of red, Zaid performed the maghrib. They ate pita bread and dried meat, and brewed coffee over a fire made of camel chips. The night was cool and clear and a crescent moon hung like a silver pendant in the starry sky. Zaid, troubled by what had happened, spoke of the Jews in a quiet voice, as they reclined around the glowing embers.