In the afternoons he would take her for painfully long tramps over the desert, for the good of her health as he told her; and when the silence became oppressive he would talk to her, whether she listened or no, about the nature of the birds they saw or whose footprints were marked upon the sand, about the geological formation of the country, about the jackals and their habits, and so forth. During their meals together he attempted, cold-bloodedly, to enlighten her on many subjects, and sometimes he would talk philosophy to her, endeavouring to give her a new standpoint on certain age-old themes, but “You do like preaching, don’t you?” was the kind of response he received.
Sitting opposite to him at the table, it seemed to him that she carried herself with great dignity; and he had to admit that, under the circumstances, she was a great deal more self-possessed and high-mettled than he had expected her to be. She stood up to him, so to speak, and there were times at which he had the feeling, though he did not show it, that he was behaving like a boor.
On one occasion in particular he was conscious of having been put to rights by her. He had been talking about the sincerity of Islâm, and had said how wise the Prophet was to refuse to organize a priesthood, preferring to leave the faith in the hands of the laity.
“It is so different from the empty ceremonials of our own religion,” he said. “It seems to me that the Church’s idea of the imitation of Christ is generally a burlesque in bad taste.”
“In every walk of life,” she replied, “there are men who make an outward hash of their inner ideals. You, for example, have great ideas as to what women should be; but in actual fact you make a terrible mess of your dealings with them.”
“I wonder,” he mused. It was as though he had been chastised.
She did not continue the argument. That was, to Daniel, the baffling thing about her: she was growing so quiet now that she was in his power. She performed the tasks he set her almost in silence, and he could never tell whether she were learning her lesson or whether she were treating him with contempt as a man who lacked sympathetic understanding.
In her silence he seemed to find the quiet suggestion that she knew already all he wished to teach her; and there were moments when he felt that he had estranged himself needlessly from her. At such times he was obliged to remind himself that she had deliberately treated his love as a romantic adventure, and such treatment had had to be dealt with drastically. It was better that it should die outright than live to bring misery to them both; and with this thought he steeled his heart.
Thus the days passed by – days of brilliant sunshine and warm, mysterious nights, of active toil and healthy sleep; days meant for love and companionship, but turned down, one after the other, in cold antagonism and frigid reticence. Sometimes in the evening, after she had gone to her room, he would sit with his head buried in his hands, calling himself a fool and loathing his rôle of schoolmaster; and more than once there was a black hour of despair when, had she come to him, she would have been astonished to see his huge arms spread out across the table and his head sunk upon his mighty breast.
CHAPTER XXIX – IN THE PRESENCE OF DEATH
By the middle of March Muriel’s enforced residence at El Hamrân was drawing to a close. Already she had been with Daniel for eleven or twelve days, and he had kept her so busy that the time had passed rapidly. These days had been like a fantastic dream to her, and she could hardly believe in the reality of her actions. The whole situation was absurd; and yet, notwithstanding her artificial outward stiffness and her actual inward rebellion, she was conscious that her experience had not been unprofitable.
In spite of Daniel’s hectoring and churlish manners – for so she thought them – she felt that she had seen something of life as it is lived under primitive conditions which otherwise she would never have known. She had even experienced, latterly, a pleasant sense of calm while she had been carrying out her duties: it was almost as though being under orders were a satisfactory condition – now and then. And as to her physical health, she was obliged to admit that she had never before felt so thoroughly fit.
Her attitude to her monitor was one of unbending hostility, but now no longer of furious anger. She was not afraid of him, but very decidedly she did not feel the contempt for him which she endeavoured to show. She regarded him as a man of difficult and contrary character, but she now realized that she had greatly misjudged his outlook upon life. She had thought that in regard to women he was a prurient savage: she now knew that he was a high-principled and rather fastidious celibate.
Undoubtedly he had taught her the lesson of her life, but she was certainly not going to grasp his hand and thank him kindly on that account. He had built up a barrier between them which would remain a fixture for all time, and, though her heart often ached, she was far too estranged from him to think of any future intimacy whatsoever between them.
Only in one respect, in these days of their life together, did she feel drawn towards him. He had an indefinably benevolent and humorous attitude towards life, of which she was daily more conscious. It was something which could not be described, but on more than one occasion it nearly served to break down the wall of ice within in which she had enclosed herself. Sometimes it would be merely that he stopped in his walk to make an absurd remark to a passing cow or to a wandering goat; sometimes it would be the way in which he played with his dogs; or sometimes it was his manner to the native children which would cause her to unbend towards him. It was as though he had a private joke with every living creature. It was too quiet to be termed joviality: it was in no wise rollicking. It was a subtle droll and whimsical good-nature; it seemed almost as if, conscious of his own great strength, he were saying “Bless your little heart!” to all things weaker than he.
One morning, just as they were finishing a silent breakfast, Hussein entered the room, and delivered himself of a few rapid words in the Arabic tongue, which so much upset Daniel that he rose to his feet and paced up and down the floor in great perturbation.
“Anything wrong?” asked Muriel, temporarily unfreezing.
“Yes; very bad news,” he replied. “Old Sheikh Ali is very ill. It sounds like pneumonia. I must go down to him at once.”
He snatched up his hat, and, without taking any further notice of Muriel, hurried out of the room. Sheikh Ali was a man whom he loved and respected, and the possible death of his friend was so great a sorrow to him that his mind was filled full of darkness, like a room in which the blinds have suddenly been pulled down. And the condition in which he found the old man confirmed his worst fears; and presently, in deep anxiety, he hastened back to the house to procure the necessaries for his proper nursing.
“Will you come with me,” he said to Muriel, “and help me to look after him?”
She hesitated. “I am not much good as a nurse,” she demurred, “but I’ll do what I can.”
“Thank you,” he replied, and the words were uttered with genuine gratitude.
Daniel knew something of the rudiments of medical science, and he was aware that there was very little to be done in a case of pneumonia except to keep the patient warm and to maintain his strength. When he returned, therefore, to the Sheikh’s house with Muriel, he was carrying with him a small oil stove with which to warm the sick-room at night, and a pillow in its clean white cover was thrust under his arm, while Muriel held a basket containing a number of articles from the store-cupboard and medicine-chest.
The house, a whitewashed building of two storeys, stood amongst the palms, not more than three or four hundred yards distant from the monastery. As they approached it they heard the sound of wailing in the women’s quarters, and at this Daniel uttered an exclamation of disgust.
“Oh, these women!” he muttered. “We mustn’t let them do that. Wait a minute.”
He went to the side door and knocked upon it. An old negress, a servant of the house, opened the door, her eyes red with weeping, and her withered breast bare.
“The Sheikh is dying, the Sheikh is dying!” she wailed, as Daniel questioned her.
He put his hand on her shoulder. “Go and tell them,” he said, “that if I hear another sound of weeping I shall send somebody to beat you all with a stick. Do you not know the saying of the Prophet: ‘Trust in God, but tether the camel’? If God has decreed that your camel shall run away it will certainly run away, but nevertheless you must do your part in preventing it. If the Sheikh is going to die he will die; but until he is dead you must do all you can to tether him to life. Let me hear no more sounds of mourning until the breath has left his body. In my country we say ‘While there is life there is hope.’ Go now and hope – hope in silence.”
He pushed her back into the house and returned to Muriel.
They found the Sheikh lying upon a couch in the whitewashed upper room, into which the sun struck through the open casements. He was propped up upon the hard square pillows taken from an ordinary native divan, and his laboured breathing sounded ominously in their ears. His son Ibrahîm, a grave, black-bearded man of middle age, stood by his side, drumming the fist of one hand into the palm of the other in his great distress.
“See,” said Daniel, speaking to the patient in Arabic, “I have brought her Excellency to nurse you. Let me put this soft pillow under your head; and, look, here is a stove to keep off the chill of night. In two or three days, my father, we shall bring you back to health.”
The old man shook his head. “No, my dear,” he whispered, “I am going to my God. God has said, ‘I am a hidden treasure. I have made man that he might find Me!’ I go now to find Him.”
Daniel knelt down by his side, and, taking the thin hand in his, remained silent for some moments, his eyes shut, his brows knitted. Muriel watched him in surprise. It was evident that he was praying; and she had never before seen anybody pray, though in church she had known people go through the correct postures and outward formalities of prayer.
Presently he rose to his feet, and at once became businesslike and practical. He took the patient’s temperature; dexterously pinned the native shawl about him; arranged the pillows under his head; opened a bottle of meat-extract and administered a little of its contents; and, sending for milk and eggs, made Muriel go out on the rickety landing to beat up the eggs into the milk.
When she returned with the beverage she found that he and Ibrahîm had fastened grass matting across the windows to check the glare of the sun, and now were standing in the subdued light talking in quiet cheerful tones to the sick man.
Presently Daniel turned to her. “I think the best thing you can do,” he said, “is to sit beside him and fan away the flies when you see them bothering him.”
He handed her a fly-whisk, and placed a small stool beside the couch; and here she sat herself, while her patient closed his eyes and drowsed in some degree of comfort.
They went back to the house for luncheon, and during the meal Daniel told her of the troubles which might ensue in the Oasis if the Sheikh were to die. He spoke of the feud between the sick man’s family and that of their rivals; and he explained how Sheikh Ali desired to be succeeded in his office as headman by his son Ibrahîm, and that there was a danger of the other party taking advantage of the absence of so many of the Sheikh’s adherents, who had gone to El Khargeh.
“If Sheikh Ali dies,” he pointed out, “the other faction may carry out a coup, and establish their candidate in power while all these men are away. That would be a disaster; for the man they wish to set up is a crook, if ever there was one. He would be just the sort of fellow to play into Benifett Bindane’s hands and sell himself to the Company.”
“But,” said Muriel in surprise, “aren’t you in favour of this Company?”
“No,” he answered. “I have come to the conclusion that it is not in the best interests of the natives. They are happier as they are, for their products are sufficient to their needs, and are pretty evenly distributed. I don’t trust these Stock Exchange fellows: they’ll exploit the Oasis to fill their own pockets. That’s what I’m going to tell your father when I get back to Cairo.”
“Poor Mr. Bindane!” Muriel smiled. “He has set his heart on this business.”
In the afternoon they returned to the sick-room, where she made herself very useful, and showed a remarkable aptitude for nursing; and the sun was setting before they came back to the house once more. Muriel was very tired by now, and as soon as the evening meal was over Daniel advised her to go to bed.
“What about yourself?” she asked.
“Oh, I’ll go back to him for a bit,” he answered, but he would not accept her proffered help.
She therefore went early to her room and soon fell asleep, nor did she awake again until Hussein aroused her at sunrise with his clattering preparations for her bath.
She found herself alone at breakfast, and it was explained to her by signs that Daniel was with Sheikh Ali. Presently, therefore, she went down to the sick man’s house, a little ashamed of herself for not having risen earlier.
As she entered the upper room she caught sight of Daniel’s face, and its expression of weary sorrow checked her. He was seated beside the couch, his hand on the patient’s pulse, his eyes fixed upon the old man, who lay panting for breath, the beads of perspiration upon his wrinkled forehead.
“Is there anything I can do?” she whispered.
He raised his head and gazed at her: she had never seen him look so haggard before. “No,” he answered, “he is beyond human aid. It’s only a question of minutes now.”
“I ought to have come to help you sooner,” she said. “How long have you been here?”
“All night,” he replied. “I couldn’t leave myfriend, could I?” There was something in the inflection of his voice which very much touched her.
The Sheikh turned his head slightly, and Daniel bent forward to catch the laboured words.
“Ibrahîm,” he whispered.
Muriel understood, and, at a nod from Daniel, went out of the room to find the dying man’s son, whom she had seen at the doorway of the house, on her arrival, kneeling upon the praying-carpet, his hands extended towards the East. He had just risen to his feet as she came now to him, and she made signs to him to go upstairs.
When she entered the sick room once more she saw the younger man kneeling beside his father’s couch. Daniel was holding the feeble old hand, so that it rested upon Ibrahîm’s turbaned head. She heard and seemed almost to understand the whispered words of the old man’s blessing, and presently, to her surprise, she observed the tears start from Daniel’s eyes, and their quick brushing away, with the back of his hand. She had not thought him capable of tears.
Then suddenly she saw the dying man raise himself; she saw Daniel and Ibrahîm leaning forward to support him. She heard the rattling of his breath, and she recognized the words that he uttered as those of the Moslem formula which Daniel had more than once repeated to her: “I testify that there is no God but God…” They came rolling now from his lips with passionate energy: it was as though the sum of his whole life were being expressed in these guttural, rhyming sounds. But the declaration remained unfinished. The voice ceased upon the name of Allah, the mouth dropped open, and the patriarchal head fell back.
Muriel had only once before stood at a deathbed; and later, as she walked back to the monastery, she compared the scene of her mother’s death with that from which she had just come.
In the one case there had been the big four-poster bed, with its hangings of embroidered velvet; the sombre room, lit by a shaded bedside lamp and by the flickering of the fire in the wide Tudor grate; the tapestried walls with their designs of dim huntsmen pursuing phantom deer through the time-worn twilight of forgotten forests; the faded Jacobean painting upon the ceiling, representing the fat back-view of a reclining Venus and the fat front-view of naked Cupid. There had been the pompous family doctor and the frigid specialist in their black frock coats, and in the bed, between the embroidered sheets, her mother had lain inert, her dyed hair, tidy to the end, framing her carefully powdered face.
“Come here, my dear,” she had whispered to Muriel. “Tell me, do you believe in a God?”
“Yes, I think I do,” she had replied.
“Well, I don’t,” was her mother’s reply; and those were almost her last words.
And, in contrast, there was this patriarchal scene in the bare, whitewashed room, the sun beating upon the grass matting, the palms rustling outside, and the flies droning: the old, saintly face of the dying man, his withered hand laid upon the head of his beloved son, and the fervent affirmation of his faith in God upon his lips.
Muriel was in a very subdued and reflective mood when she returned, and as she stood at the window of the living-room, listening to the wailing of the mourners in the distance, she wondered how best she could show her sympathy with Daniel in his loss, without in other respects unbending to him. He relieved her of the difficulty, however, when he came in; for he showed no outward signs of his grief, and seemed in no wise to be asking for her condolence. He spoke of the beauty of the Sheikh’s life, and of the serenity of his death; and when Muriel made some remark in regard to the sadness of the event he quietly corrected her.
“Death,” he said, “is not a calamity when a man has reached old age. It is like the ripeness of corn, as Marcus Aurelius says, when the soul drops out of the husk almost of its own accord. It is a natural action, just as birth is. It is only we who are left behind who are unhappy – because we have lost a friend; and as for that, why, I am not going to let my loss make me wretched.”
“That sounds extremely selfish,” she remarked, coldly.
“No,” he answered, “sorrow is selfish, not happiness. There’s never any use in pulling a long face.”
CHAPTER XXX – THE REVOLT
The funeral took place next morning, as is the native custom, and it was during the great gathering of the Sheikh’s friends that the adherents of the opposing faction made their feared coup. The event, and its serious consequences for Muriel and Daniel, was upon them so quickly that there was no time for preparation or retreat.
Muriel had not gone to the funeral, and she was sitting quietly writing in the living-room when Daniel flung open the door.
“Quick!” he said. “Get ready to start at once. Leave your dressing-case: you just want your water-bottle and a tin or two of food from the cupboard. We’ve got to ride like the wind. I’m just going to get the camels.”
She stared at him in amazement as he hastened away, and thought how extremely inconsiderate he was; but the realization that her extraordinary fortnight with him was now at an end led her to obey his instructions with alacrity. She was soon ready, but for some time she waited impatiently for his reappearance.
At last he came in, this time slowly and with careful serenity.
“I’m afraid the journey’s off,” he said.
Muriel was angry, and she tapped her foot sharply on the floor. “Oh, you’re impossible!” she exclaimed. “I’m all ready to start, and now you say you’re not going.”
He looked at her gravely and steadily for a moment, and then very calmly he told her what had occurred. While Ibrahîm and those of his adherents who had not gone to El Khargeh were attending the funeral, the rival faction had seized every camel and donkey in the Oasis, for of the former more than half the number owned by the inhabitants had gone with the caravan. They had disarmed the village ghaffirs, or guards, they had proclaimed their own chief as Sheikh of the Oasis, and they had picketed every track leading out into the desert and to the lands beyond.
Daniel had found his and Muriel’s camel gone from the stable, and he had encountered a group of “enemy” leaders who had informed him that he would not be permitted to communicate with the outside world for several days.
“Their idea,” he explained, lighting his pipe, “is to get their man firmly established in power before the police hear of it, and then it will be a fait accompli. It is to be a peaceful revolution, without bloodshed if possible; but I don’t suppose they will hesitate to shoot anybody who tries to get away. So, you see, we’re caught.”
Muriel received the news calmly. According to the time-table the Bindanes would return to El Homra tomorrow or the next day, and then, if she had not made her reappearance, they would probably send her dragoman and a trooper or two to fetch her. But Daniel pointed out that three days might elapse before these men arrived, and two weeks before the authorities in Egypt could give instructions. Moreover, their coming might lead to an awkward situation for himself and her.
“You see, they know that I will support Ibrahîm’s claim,” he said, puffing quietly at his pipe, “for I promised his father I would do so; and if an unfortunate accident could account for you and me, it would be all the better for them. Supposing, for example, you and I were found to have gone out hunting, and to have lost our way, and to have fallen over a cliff or something of that kind, there would be nobody much to uphold Ibrahîm against a rival already established in office.”
Daniel did not take his eyes from hers as he put this aspect of the matter before her. It was as though he were testing her nerve; or perhaps it was that he thought candour best in regard to a contingency the possibility of which would doubtless occur to her.
“It seems to me,” she said presently, “that human nature is much the same all the world over. You were rather intolerant of the intrigues of Cairo; but rivalries and disputes evidently go on in the desert too. I’m very disappointed.”
“So am I,” he replied, with disarming candour. “The only thing to be said for it is that it has been done pretty openly and boldly.”
“What do you intend to do?” she asked. She was remarkably calm.
“I’m going to slip away after dark,” he replied, with a smile, “and walk to El Homra.”
“It’s thirty miles,” she said. “And supposing you get shot or caught…?”
“You can come too, if you like,” he replied. He might have added that this actually was his intention.
She remained silent for some moments, her face a little flushed, her fingers drumming on the table. In spite of her self-control he could see that she realized the danger. “Yes,” she said at length, “I’ll come too.”
He smiled broadly. She caught sight of his strong white teeth, in which the stem of his pipe was gripped.
“I don’t see anything to smile about,” she remarked.
He did not answer. In his mind there was an astonishing sense of exultation. He had had no idea that she would show such quiet pluck: he had hardly dared to think, as he put the graver possibilities of their situation before her, that she would receive the news without a tremor. But now, suddenly, his heart was crying out within him: “This is my mate; this is the woman who will dare all with me”; and he laughed to think of their present absurd relationship. He did not realize how deep was their estrangement.
After the midday meal he sent her to her room to rest, and, pocketing his revolver, went down into the village. Here all was quiet, but he observed that small groups of the revolters were moving to and fro, some of them carrying their antiquated firearms. Ibrahîm, he was told, was more or less a prisoner in his own house, and he thought it politic to make no attempt to visit him.
“Time will show,” he said to an adherent of the usurper, “whether your master is worthy to be Sheikh”; and that was as far as he would commit himself.
At tea-time he returned to the monastery, and now he gave full instructions to Hussein. The latter was to go to bed as usual that night, and was to take no part in the events of the darkness. He was to call his master an hour after sunrise, and if it chanced that he failed to find him, he was to take what steps he chose to report the disappearance and exonerate himself from blame.
It was not until after nightfall that any outward signs of their dangerous situation were to be observed. Daniel found then that three armed natives were loitering outside the ruined walls, and, in answer to his enquiries as to their business, they told him amiably that they were there to prevent him leaving the Oasis.
“But how can I leave it without a camel?” he asked. “In the morning you must tell your master that the two camels must be brought back to me. They must be here before midday.” His voice was peremptory, and the natives salaamed respectfully.
It was at about an hour before midnight that, from the top of his tower, he took a final survey of his surroundings. There was a young moon in the heavens, and by its pale light he observed the figure of one of the guards reclining on the sand, his back against the wall, directly beneath the window of Muriel’s room. The other two, as he had previously noticed, were seated in a more or less comatose state at the entrance of the monastery, at which point they no doubt presumed that reason required them to remain.
He descended stealthily from the tower, and, feeling his way through the dark refectory, found Muriel seated, ready, upon her bed. In silence she rose to her feet, and thereupon Daniel gathered up the bedclothes in his arms and crept with them to the window. She did not know what he was about to do, but presently she saw him crouching upon the sill, his figure silhouetted against the sky.
Suddenly, with a flutter of the blankets, he disappeared, and from outside she heard a series of muffled sounds. Darting to the window, she saw him struggling with what appeared to be a furiously animated bundle of bedclothes from which two kicking brown legs protruded; and, a moment later, this bundle was lifted from the ground.
“Quick!” he whispered, looking up at her, and thereupon she crawled through the window and jumped on to the soft sand outside.
Daniel, clasping his burden, with the head pressed against his breast, told her to pick up the man’s rifle and to put it through the window on to her bed. When she had done so he at once set off at a run towards the open desert, and Muriel followed him, her heart wildly beating. A distance of not more than fifty yards separated them from some clusters of rock which would shelter them from sight, and soon they were scrambling over the rough ground in temporary immunity from detection.
Here Daniel paused to rearrange his struggling captive, who was in grave danger of suffocation, and, having warned him that a single sound would mean instant death, he lifted him across his shoulder, with the blankets more loosely thrown over his head, and again broke into a jog-trot.
When about a quarter of a mile had been covered they descended into a shallow ravine, with which Daniel was well acquainted; and here, being screened from the Oasis, he set down his burden, cautiously removing the bedclothes from the perspiring and anxious face. The man’s eyes were wide with fear as he found himself looking into the muzzle of a revolver; but his captor smilingly reassured him, promising him that no harm would come to him if he but walked ahead in complete silence.
“I am afraid,” he said in Arabic, “that you are about to have a somewhat lengthy walk.”
“Where are we going?” the man asked.
“To El Homra,” Daniel replied casually.
“Ya salaam!” exclaimed the man, in an awed whisper. In our language the expression may be rendered “Oh, lor’!”
The ravine led them to the northwest, and they must have covered nearly two miles before Daniel deemed it safe to bear off more to the north, over the higher ground. The going was easy, for the surface of the rocks was smooth, and the light of the moon sufficient to prevent stumbling; and an hour’s walking brought them to a point at which they could without risk move to the east, so as to pick up the track leading to El Homra. This they found at length without any difficulty, and they now judged themselves to be beyond the pickets, being already two or three miles distant from the near end of the Oasis.
The first danger was now past, and Daniel therefore began to discuss with Muriel their chances of success.
“We must have come six or seven miles,” he said. “I suppose you are pretty tired?”
“No,” she answered, “I can keep up for some time yet. You’ve taken me for some pretty long walks during the last fortnight: it was good training.”
“Well, say when you’re done,” he said, “and I’ll carry you.”
“Thanks,” she replied stiffly, “I’m not a child.”
They walked on in silence, three ghostly figures stalking through the dim light of a dream.
“I suppose,” said Daniel presently, “that they’ll not miss us until well after sunrise, if then; so I think our chances are fairly rosy. It all depends on your feet, my girl.”
With the extra mileage due to their detour, the distance to the half-way pool would be about eighteen miles or so; and it was obvious to Daniel that Muriel would not be able to stand more than twelve or fourteen. He therefore glanced anxiously at her every now and then as they pushed forward across the great open plain which lay between the two oases; and at length he noticed that she was limping.
It was nearly four o’clock in the morning, and they were still some four or five miles distant from the pool, when Daniel suddenly took hold of her arm.
“Now I’m going to carry you,” he said.
She did not protest. For some time she had been hobbling forward in a kind of nightmare, her feet sore and burning, her knees feeble, and her brain fevered. The moon had now set, but the stars gave sufficient light for them to see the straight track beneath them. She hardly realized what he was doing as he lifted her from the ground, putting one of his great arms about her shoulders and the other under her knees. In a confused manner she was aware of a feeling of annoyance at her weakness; but presently, nevertheless, her head dropped upon his shoulder. She did not sleep, but she was certainly not awake.