The Book of Khalid by Ameen Rihani

From the house of law the dervish Khalid wends his way to that of science, and from the house of science he passes on to that of metaphysics. His staff in hand, his wallet hung on his shoulder, his silver cigarette case in his pocket, patient, confident, content, he makes his way from one place to another. Unlike his brother dervishes, he is clean and proud of it, too. He knocks at this or that door, makes his wish known to the servant or the mistress, takes the crumbs given him, and not infrequently gives his prod to the dogs. In the vestibule of one of the houses of spiritism, he tarries a spell and parleys with the servant. The Mistress, a fair-looking, fair-spoken dame of seven lustrums or more, issues suddenly from her studio, in a curiously designed black velvet dressing-gown; she is drawn to the door by the accent of the foreigner's speech and the peculiar cadence of his voice. They meet: and magnetic currents from his dark eyes and her eyes of blue, flow and fuse. They speak: and the lady asks the stranger if he would not serve instead of begging. And he protests, "I am a Dervish at the door of Allah. " "And I am a Spirit in Allah's house," she rejoins. They enter: and the parley in the vestibule is followed by a tête-à-tête in the parlour and another in the dining-room. They agree: and the stranger is made a member of the Spiritual Household, which now consists of her and him, the Medium and the Dervish.

Now, this fair-spoken dame, who dotes on the occult and exotic, delights in the aroma of Khalid's cigarettes and Khalid's fancy. And that he might feel at ease, she begins by assuring him that they have met and communed many times ere now, that they have been friends under a preceding and long vanished embodiment. Which vagary Khalid seems to countenance by referring to the infinite power of Allah, in the compass of which nothing is impossible. And with these mystical circumlocutions of ceremony, they plunge into an intimacy which is bordered by the metaphysical on one side, and the physical on the other. For though the Medium is at the threshold of her climacteric, Khalid afterwards tells Shakib that there be something in her eyes and limbs which always seem to be waxing young. And of a truth, the American woman, of all others, knows best how to preserve her beauty from the ravages of sorrow and the years. That is why, we presume, in calling him, "child," she does not permit him to call her, "mother. " Indeed, the Medium and the Dervish often jest, and somewhiles mix the frivolous with the mysterious.