Risk waited upon me the next day, and let me know from whom the favour came; on which we all thought this was a hint for a present; and accordingly, as I had other business with the Bey, I had prepared a very handsome one.
But I was exceedingly astonished when desiring to know the time when it was to be offered; it was not only refused, but some few trifles were sent as a present from the secretary with this message: “That, when I had reposed, he would visit me, desire to see me make use of these instruments; and, in the mean time, that I might rest confident, that nobody durst any way molest me while in Cairo, for I was under the immediate protection of the Bey.” He added also, “That if I wanted any thing I should send my Armenian servant, Arab Keer, to him, without troubling myself to communicate my necessities to the French, or trust my concerns to their Dragomen.”
Although I had lived for many years in friendship and in constant good understanding with both Turks and Moors, there was something more polite and considerate in this than I could account for.
I had not seen the Bey, it was not therefore any particular address, or any prepossession in my favour, with which these people are very apt to be taken at first sight, that could account for this; I was an absolute stranger; I therefore opened myself entirely to my landlord, Mr Bertran.
I told him my apprehension of too much fair weather in the beginning, which, in these climates, generally leads to a storm in the end; on which account, I suspected some design; Mr Bertran kindly promised to sound Risk for me.
At the same time, he cautioned me equally against offending him, or trusting myself in his hands, as being a man capable of the blackest designs, and merciless in the execution of them.
It was not long before Risk’s curiosity gave him a fair opportunity. He inquired of Bertran as to my knowledge of the stars; and my friend, who then saw perfectly the drift of all his conduct, so prepossessed him in favour of my superior science, that he communicated to him in the instant the great expectations he had formed, to be enabled by me, to foresee the destiny of the Bey; the success of the war; and, in particular, whether or not he should make himself master of Mecca; to conquer which place, he was about to dispatch his slave and son-in-law, Mahomet Bey Abou Dahab, at the head of an army conducting the pilgrims.