“Got you now, scrofulous serpent! You’ll not escape. You’ll rue the day I lay hands on you.” Baksheesh, flailing his arms and shaking his fists, broke into a furious but circular dance that brought him no closer to the accused donkey-robber.

With Shira beside me, I ran to the intruder, who gave no indication of trying to escape or do anything else but stand observing us.

“Seize him, O Stern Chastiser of Evil-doers!” Baksheesh yelled. “Hold him down. He’ll have me to deal with.”

“Your friend appears upset,” remarked the stranger: a short, stumpy man with features as sun-blackened and wrinkled as a Serrano raisin. Most of his head was bald and blistered, the rest of it fringed with grizzled hair floating in all directions. He turned a pair of twinkling gray eyes on me and nodded courteously.

“My name is Salamon,” he offered. “Is this your donkey, messire? I assure you I had no intention of stealing this fine fellow. I was only admiring him. I’ve never met such a remarkable creature.”

Baksheesh, meantime, had ventured to step closer. “A likely story. You dare claim you never saw a donkey before?”

“My goodness, thousands of them,” Salamon replied. “But never this particular donkey. Look closely, each is different. This fellow’s ears alone, for example. See the length of them? I must make a note of that. Amazing!”

Baksheesh snorted. “Well, Mirza Salamalek or whatever you say your name is, I’ve seen my own share of donkeys. I’d hardly call them amazing.”

“How not?” said Salamon. “I find everything amazing. Sometimes amazingly good, sometimes amazingly bad. But amazing, nonetheless.

“You have camels, as well,” he went on. “Alas, they are extremely unhappy.”

“I suppose you talked to them,” Baksheesh muttered, “and they told you.”

“No need,” said Salamon. “Look in their eyes. They are long-suffering creatures. Given a choice, they would prefer a different line of work.

“And this horse. A splendid steed in spite of her pitiful condition. She is of the bloodline of those famous Horses of the Wind. A marvelous animal. Stolen, of course.”

Shira gave a laugh of surprise. “She is. What made you think so?”

“First, dushizéh,” Salamon said, glancing kindly at Shira, “I don’t reproach any of you. No, no, not in the slightest way. Your reasons, I’m sure, were excellent and no doubt of extreme urgency.

“However, my observations lead me to conclude the only way she came into your hands was by stealing. Since none of you could afford—”

“Wrong!” Baksheesh broke in, ignoring my motions for him to keep his mouth shut. “My master is an oasis of affluence.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that.” Salamon’s face wrinkled. “What a burden it must be for him.”

“And your observations, as you call them,” declared Baksheesh, “are far off the mark.”

“Do you think so?” Salamon said. He looked Baksheesh up and down. “You are sometimes a thief, frequently a liar. The list goes on and on. But you have a tender heart.”

Baksheesh scornfully puffed out his cheeks. Salamon added: “Oh, yes. Your clothes, if you ever took them off, would stand up by themselves. But underneath them is a tender heart and loving nature. Whether you like it or not.”

He glanced again at Shira. “You, dushizéh, know much, but there is one thing you turn away from knowing.

“And you? Easiest of all,” he said to me. “You are searching for something.”

That made me catch my breath. Baksheesh squinted suspiciously at him. “What’s the trick?”

“Perfectly simple,” replied Salamon, “if you call simplicity a trick. It’s plain to see that you with so many—shall we say dubious—qualities must have at least one to make up for them.”

He cast a shrewd eye on me. “And you, messire? Has ever there been a young man who was not seeking something?”

To Shira, he added: “Young women, and old, all know many things. And a few they wish they did not know.

“So, there is no mystery to it. Forgive me if I alarmed you,” he said to me. “To demonstrate my good intentions, allow me to care for your animals. I can put that wonderful horse in the fine condition she deserves.”

“A fair exchange,” said Baksheesh. “I urge you to start immediately.”

I thanked Salamon for his offer. I named each of us to him, asked if he was staying at the khan, and if he would take supper with us.

“As I eat little,” he said, “the pleasure of your company will be sufficient refreshment. Yes, for the moment, I am stopping at the khan. I choose to occupy the stable. Sleep is such a boring waste of time, I seldom indulge in it. I find the company of animals calming and restful, which cannot be said for some of their owners.”

Shira and Baksheesh went to arrange our evening meal. Baksheesh was still irked by the stranger’s comments. “How dare he call me tenderhearted?” he muttered. “The old buzzard is clearly an idiot.”

Curious, I stayed behind with Salamon. Although dressed in the usual traveler’s garb, he carried no tulwar, dagger, nor any weapons I could see. Nor, for that matter, did he wear any boots.

“Nature is the best shoemaker,” he said, noticing my puzzled glance. He balanced on one leg and, nimble as a boy, cocked up the other. He tapped the sole of his foot. I saw it to be thicker than a Magenta cobbler’s toughest leather.

“This will last every bit as long as I do. Even longer,” he said. “And it fits me perfectly.”

There was something else I had in mind. We had been speaking trade-lingo; he had addressed me not as “mirza” but “messire,” in what I heard as something of a Campanian accent. I inquired if Campania was his homeland and if he had been born there.

“Possibly,” he said. “That far-from-momentous event took place so long ago, I have quite forgotten. Since then, I have been to more lands than I can count.”

“You’re obviously not one of them,” I said, “but my uncle claims there are a great many fools in Campania.”

“He is correct,” Salamon answered. “An astonishing amount. More astonishing, it is exactly the same number as everywhere else. I would be hard-pressed to tell the difference between the fools of one country and the fools of another. Folly is our common bond.”

Twilight was gathering. We walked to the khan. Thanks to Shira’s professional advice, our landlord had laid out an excellent supper. However, Salamon hardly touched his food. Baksheesh did him the kindness of finishing all he left.

“Here, Salamanca, I’ll show you tenderhearted,” he said between mouthfuls. “How’s this for a loving nature?”

For all his lack of appetite and absence of footwear, Salamon turned out to be the happiest of table companions. Despite his good nature, I guessed him to be a scholar, possibly once a schoolmaster; or, in any case, a person of high education. When I ventured to ask him about this, he chuckled.

“Good gracious, no,” he said. “I’ve spent half my life learning whatever nonsense I was taught, and the other half trying to forget it.”

In his turn, he inquired with keen interest what had brought me to Marakand. I was careful to tell only selected and harmless events: being dismissed from my uncle’s establishment; the voyage to Sidya and my spectacular seasickness; that first encounter with Rabbit—in fact, the lovely dushizéh Shira. Salamon kept murmuring “Astonishing!” and “I shall make a note of that.”

So, for casual table talk, I thought I was giving a fairly entertaining account—until Baksheesh broke in. “O Golden Tongue of Eloquence, allow me to mention: You’re leaving out the best parts. My devoted diligence and invaluable assistance. And the treasure we’re seeking.”

I winced. With Baksheesh babbling on, I might as well have hired the Magenta town crier to spread the word.

“You search for treasure?” Salamon gave me a sorrowful look. “What a shame if you should find it.

“Your quest would be over,” he said. “And then what? As if a fortune could make up for the bother of gaining it. No, no, my lad: The journey is the treasure.”

He would have liked to know more; but Shira, seeing me squirm, turned the subject to his own destination.

“Eastward,” he said. “Simply eastward.”

At this, she bent closer, looking at him with keen interest. “I’ve heard travelers tell that secret wisdom can be discovered in the East.”

“Did they find any?”

Shira laughed lightly. “None that I could notice.”

“Of course not,” said Salamon. “My dear dushizéh, I doubt there’s greater wisdom in the East than anywhere else. Only people looking at the same things in a different way.”

“Then, mirza,” Shira said, “what do you seek?”

“Beyond Cathai,” he answered, “some say there are vast oceans. Some say there may be islands, peninsulas, archipelagoes, whole continents. Some say there is nothing at all, and we end where we began.”

“And you?” she said. “What do you expect?”

“I have no idea,” Salamon said. “I only hope to find out for myself.

“Oh, yes,” he added, “I shall definitely press on to the sea. As do we all, in our own fashion.”

“Press away to your heart’s content, Salmagundi,” Baksheesh said. “I won’t go a step farther than I have to.”