The Bandit

“I just need to meet up with the next caravan and everything will be fine,” I told the stranger.  I just hoped she was really buying the story I had been attacked by a thief instead of being the thief myself. 

“But the Bandit!  He has been up and down this road.  He might come back.”  She looked over her shoulder as if he was going to sneak up on us in the middle of the desert. 

How was I going to get away from this woman?  With any luck, a sandstorm would suddenly sweep across the barren desert and I could make a run for it.  There were some small hills the locals called mountains that I could get lost in.  As I looked over the woman’s shoulder, I sighed with relief as I saw the dust trail of an oncoming caravan. 

“Look, look.  A caravan.  I can fall in with them.  I won’t be lost any longer.  No more need to wander.”  I thanked the stranger as I stood up.  When she looked over her shoulder, I slipped the poison into her small canteen.  I couldn’t risk her talking about me later.  I couldn’t be recognized as being anywhere on the Silk Road.  She threatened my safety and my livelihood.  My passage now safe, I had to turn my focus back to the riches that were slowly plodding toward me.  After I joined up with the caravan I would have to alter the map.  The map of the Bandit.  The thief of the Silk Road.  No one could know it was me.