“Don’t worry!” the guards replied, panting and sweating profusely. “You won’t have to suffer long. Now stop spreading yourself out, o son of sin, or we’ll stuff your knees into your stomach!”
Palace servants came running to the noise. Finally, after a long struggle, the guards managed to stuff Hodja Nasreddin in the sack, which they tied with a rope. The inside of the sack was cramped, dark, and smelly. Hodja Nasreddin’s soul became clouded in a black haze: it seemed there would be no salvation for him now. He called out to fate and to the all-powerful chance: “O fate, who has become my mother; o all-powerful chance, who has guarded me until now like a father – where are you now, why do you not hasten to Hodja Nasreddin’s aid? O fate, o all-powerful chance!”
Meanwhile the guards had already made it halfway. They switched carrying the sack every two hundred paces; Hodja Nasreddin counted these brief stops mournfully, determining how far they had traveled and how much was left.
He understood very well that fate and chance will never come to the aid of someone who complains and clamors instead of acting. Only the walking man will survive the road; let his legs grow weak and buckle along the way – he must crawl on his arms and knees, and then he will always see the bright flame of a fire in the distance and find a merchant caravan resting there, and the caravan will surely be headed in the same direction, and there will be a spare camel to carry the traveler where he needs to go… But the man sitting on the road and giving in to despair – no matter how much he weeps and laments – will not evoke compassion in the heartless rocks; he will die of thirst in the desert, his corpse will become the prey of foul-smelling hyenas, hot sand will bury his bones. How many people have died prematurely, for the sole reason that their will to live was not strong enough! Hodja Nasreddin considered such a death disgraceful.
“No!” he said to himself and, clenching his teeth, repeated fiercely:
“No! I will not die today! I do not wish to die!”
But what could he do, folded in three and stuffed into a cramped sack, where he could not move a muscle: his knees and elbows seemed stuck to his torso. Only Hodja Nasreddin’s tongue remained free.
“O valiant warriors,” he said from the sack. “Stop for a second, I wish to recite a prayer before dying, so the all-merciful Allah may admit my soul into his luminous abodes.”
The guards placed the sack on the ground.
“Recite it. But we will not let you out of the sack. Recite your prayer in the sack.”
“And where are we now?” Hodja Nasreddin asked. “I am asking so that you can turn me towards the nearest mosque.”
“We are near the Karshi gates. There are mosques all around, no matter which way we turn you, so recite your prayer quickly. We cannot delay for long.”
“Thank you, o valiant warriors,” Hodja Nasreddin replied from the sack in a mournful voice.
What was he planning? He barely knew it himself. “I will gain a few minutes. And then we’ll see. Maybe something will turn up…”
He began to pray loudly, listening to what the guards were saying.
“And how did we not guess that the new astrologer was Hodja Nasreddin himself?” the guards were lamenting. “If we had recognized and captured him, we would have received a large reward from the emir.”
The guards’ thoughts took their usual course, for greed was the essence of their lives.
Hodja Nasreddin took advantage of this. “I must try to make them leave the sack, if only for a short time… Perhaps I will be able to tear the rope, or maybe someone will come along and free me.”
“Hurry up and finish your prayer!” the guards said, prodding the sack with their feet. “Do you hear? We cannot wait any longer!”
“One moment, valiant warriors! I have one last request for Allah. O almighty, all-merciful Allah, please make it so that the man who finds the ten thousand tanga I buried takes at least one thousand tanga from this sum, brings it to a mosque, and gives it to a mullah, instructing him to pray for me for a whole year…”
Upon hearing of the ten thousand tanga, the guards grew quiet. Although Hodja Nasreddin could not see anything from his sack, he knew exactly how the guards’ faces looked at that moment: how they were exchanging glances and prodding each other with their elbows.
“Carry me on,” he said in a meek voice. “I surrender my spirit into the hands of Allah.” The guards dallied.
“We will rest a while longer,” one of them said insinuatingly. “O Hodja Nasreddin, do not think us to be heartless, evil men. Only our duty forces us to treat you in such a cruel manner; if we and our families could only survive without the emir’s wages, we would have immediately set you free…”
“What are you talking about?” the second guard whispered fearfully. “If we set him free, the emir will remove our heads.”
“Quiet!” the first hissed. “We just need to get the money.”
Hodja Nasreddin did not hear the whispers, but he knew that the guards were whispering, and he knew what they were whispering about.
“I bear no anger towards you, o warriors,” he said with a pious sigh. “I have sinned too much myself to judge others. If Allah grants me pardon in the next world, I promise to pray for you before his throne. You say that, were it not for the emir’s wages, you would have set me free? Think about what you are saying! You would be disobeying the will of the emir and therefore committing a grave sin. No! I do not want you to burden your souls with sin; take the sack and carry me to the pond. Let the will of Allah and the emir be done!”
The guards looked at each other in confusion, cursing the pious repentance that had – at a very bad time, they thought – taken hold of Hodja Nasreddin.
The third guard entered the conversation. Until now, he was silent, trying to think of a ruse.
“How difficult it is to see a man who has begun to repent his sins and delusions before death,” he began, winking at his comrades. “No, I am not like that! I have long since repented and now lead a pious life. But piety in word, unaccompanied by deeds that please Allah, is worthless,” the guard continued, while his comrades, who knew him to be an incorrigible gambler and debaucher, were clamping their own mouths with their hands so as not to burst out in laughter. “For instance, I am supplementing my pious life with a righteous and pious deed: namely, I am building a large mosque in my home village and, in order to raise money for this project, I even have to deny food to myself and my family.”
One of the guards could no longer bear it and, choking with laughter, went off into the darkness.
“I put aside every coin,” the pious guard continued, “but still the mosque is being built too slowly, which fills my heart with sorrow. A few days ago, I sold my cow. But even if I have to sell my own boots – I am content to go barefoot if I could only finish what I began.”
Hodja Nasreddin sniffled from inside the sack. The guards glanced at each other. Their plan was succeeding. They hurried along their resourceful comrade with their elbows.
“O, if only I could find a man who would agree to donate eight or ten thousand tanga to finish the mosque!” he exclaimed. “I would swear to him that for five years, or even ten years, his name would daily ascend, enrobed in the fragrant smoke of prayer, from beneath the roof of this mosque to Allah’s throne!” The first guard said:
“O my pious friend! I do not have ten thousand tanga, but perhaps you will agree to accept my last savings – five hundred tanga. Do not refuse my modest gift, for I, too, wish to participate in such a righteous deed.”
“Me too,” the second guard said, stuttering and shaking from laughter. “I have three hundred tanga…”