In this Baharestan prose tale, the feared governor Hajjaj becomes separated from his troops during a hunt and, stripped of the retinue that normally announces his power, meets a Bedouin who owes him no deference. The Bedouin curses the shining stranger, returns an anti-greeting to Hajjaj's salaam, grants water only with contempt, and when asked who the best of people is names the Prophet 'in spite of you.' The concept a learner draws out is that genuine dignity and moral candor are independent of worldly rank: in the desert the tyrant's authority is exposed as mere costume, and unflinching honest speech confronts power without fear.