Диана Джонс - Wizard's Castle - Omnibus

“Of course, it does, O lily among mackerel,” the stranger retorted. “Why else should I stand here?”

Abdullah reluctantly parted the curtains and ushered the man inside his booth. There he turned up the lamp which hung from the center pole but, upon sniffing, decided that he was not going to waste incense on this person. The interior smelled quite strongly enough of yesterday’s scents. “What magnificence have you to unroll before my unworthy eyes?” he asked dubiously.

“This, buyer of bargains!” the man said, and with a deft thrust of one arm, he caused the carpet to unroll across the floor.

Abdullah could do this, too. A carpet merchant learned these things. He was not impressed. He stuck his hands in his sleeves in a primly servile attitude and surveyed the merchandise. The carpet was not large. Unrolled, it was even dingier than he had thought—although the pattern was unusual, or it would have been if most of it had not been worn away. What was left was dirty, and its edges were frayed.

“Alas, this poor salesman can only stretch to three copper coins for this most ornamental of rugs,” he observed. “It is the limit of my slender purse. Times are hard, O captain of many camels. Is the price acceptable in any way?”

“I’ll take FIVE HUNDRED,” said the stranger.

“ What ?” said Abdullah.

“GOLD coins,” added the stranger.

“The king of all desert bandits is surely pleased to jest?” said Abdullah. “Or maybe, having found my small booth lacking in anything but the smell of frying squid, he wishes to leave and try a richer merchant?”

“Not particularly,” said the stranger. “Although I will leave if you are not interested, O neighbor of kippers. It is, of course, a magic carpet.”

Abdullah had heard that one before. He bowed over his tucked-up hands. “Many and various are the virtues said to reside in carpets,” he agreed. “Which one does the poet of the sands claim for this? Does it welcome a man home to his tent? Does it bring peace to the hearth? Or maybe,” he said, poking the frayed edge suggestively with one toe, “it is said never to wear out?”

“It flies,” said the stranger. “It flies wherever the owner commands, O smallest of small minds.”

Abdullah looked up into the man’s somber face, where the desert had entrenched deep lines down each cheek. A sneer made those lines deeper still. Abdullah found he disliked this person almost as much as he disliked his father’s first wife’s uncle’s son. “You must convince this unbeliever,” he said. “If the carpet can be put through its paces, O monarch of mendacity, then some bargain might be struck.”

“Willingly,” said the tall man, and stepped upon the carpet.

At this moment one of the regular upsets happened at the fried food stall next door. Probably some street boys had tried to steal some squid. At any rate, Jamal’s dog burst out barking; various people, Jamal included, began yelling, and both sounds were nearly drowned by the clash of saucepans and the hissing of hot fat.

Cheating was a way of life in Zanzib. Abdullah did not allow his attention to be distracted for one instant from the stranger and his carpet. It was quite possible the man had bribed Jamal to cause a distraction. He had mentioned Jamal rather often, as if Jamal were on his mind. Abdullah kept his eyes sternly on the tall figure of the man and particularly on the dirty feet planted on the carpet. But he spared a corner of one eye for the man’s face, and he saw the man’s lips move. His alert ears even caught the words two feet upward despite the din from next door. And he looked even more carefully when the carpet rose smoothly from the floor and hovered about level with Abdullah’s knees, so that the stranger’s tattered headgear was not quite brushing the roof of the booth. Abdullah looked for rods underneath. He searched for wires that might have been deftly hooked to the roof. He took hold of the lamp and tipped it about, so that its light played both over and under the carpet.

The stranger stood with his arms folded and the sneer entrenched on his face while Abdullah performed these tests. “See?” he said. “Is the most desperate of doubters now convinced? Am I standing in the air, or am I not?” He had to shout. The noise was still deafening from next door.

Abdullah was forced to admit that the carpet did appear to be up in the air without any means of support that he could find. “Very nearly,” he shouted back. “The next part of the demonstration is for you to dismount and for me to ride that carpet.”

The man frowned. “Why so? What have your other senses to add to the evidence of your eyes, 0 dragon of dubiety?”

“It could be a one-man carpet,” Abdullah bawled, “as some dogs are.” Jamal’s dog was still bellowing away outside, so it was natural to think of this. Jamal’s dog bit anyone who touched it except Jamal.

The stranger sighed. “Down,” he said, and the carpet sank gently to the floor. The stranger stepped off and bowed Abdullah toward it. “It is yours to test, O sheikh of shrewdness.”

With considerable excitement, Abdullah stepped onto the carpet. “Go up two feet,” he said to it—or, rather, yelled. It sounded as if the constables of the City Watch had arrived at Jamal’s stall now. They were clashing weapons and bawling to be told what had happened.

And the carpet obeyed Abdullah. It rose two feet in a smooth surge which left Abdullah’s stomach behind it. He sat down rather hastily. The carpet was perfectly comfortable to sit on. It felt like a very tight hammock. “This woefully sluggish intellect is becoming convinced,” he confessed to the stranger. “What was your price again, O paragon of generosity? Two hundred silver?”

“Five hundred GOLD,” said the stranger. “Tell the carpet to descend, and we will discuss the matter.”

Abdullah told the carpet, “Down, and land on the floor,” and it did so, thus removing a slight nagging doubt in Abdullah’s mind that the stranger had said something extra when Abdullah first stepped on it which had been drowned in the din from next door. He bounced to his feet, and the bargaining commenced. “The utmost of my purse is one hundred and fifty gold,” he explained, “and that is when I shake it out and feel all around the seams.”

“Then you must fetch out your other purse or even feel under your mattress,” the stranger rejoined. “For the limit of my generosity is four hundred and ninety-five gold, and I would not sell at all but for the most pressing need.”

“I might squeeze another forty-five gold from the sole of my left shoe,” Abdullah replied. “That I keep for emergencies, and it is my pitiful all.”

“Examine your right shoe,” the stranger answered. “Four-fifty.”

And so it went on. An hour later the stranger departed from the booth with 210 gold pieces, leaving Abdullah the delighted owner of what seemed to be a genuine—if threadbare—magic carpet. He was still mistrustful. He did not believe that anyone, even a desert wanderer with few needs, would part with a real flying carpet—albeit nearly worn out—for less than 400 gold pieces. It was too useful—better than a camel, because it did not need to eat—and a good camel cost at least 450 in gold.

There had to be a catch. And there was one trick Abdullah had heard of. It was usually worked with horses or dogs. A man would come and sell a trusting farmer or hunter a truly superb animal for a surprisingly small price, saying that it was all that stood between himself and starvation. The delighted farmer (or hunter) would put the horse in a stall (or the dog in a kennel) for the night. In the morning it would be gone, being trained to slip its halter (or collar) and return to its owner in the night. It seemed to Abdullah that a suitably obedient carpet could be trained to do the same. So, before he left his booth, he very carefully wrapped the magic carpet around one of the poles that supported the roof and bound it there, around and around, with a whole reel of twine, which he then tied to one of the iron stakes at the base of the wall.