Blue-black night surrounded the Arab encampment. Here and there a red
watch-fire punctuated the darkness.
Although well past midnight, a light burnt in the Sultan's tent. It
came from a heavy silver lamp slung from the bar joining the two main
supporting poles.
The light flickered on the couch where Pansy still lay, limp and white
among the silken cushions, her curls making a halo about her pain-drawn
face. She was no longer clad in her muslin frock, but in a silk
nightgown with her namesakes embroidered upon it. A light silk rug
covered her up to her waist; on it her hands lay, weak and helpless.
On discovering there was a spark of life left in his prisoner, the
Sultan had sent post-haste to an adjacent tent for Edouard.
When the doctor arrived, Le Breton stood silent whilst the patient was
examined, in an agony of tortured love awaiting the verdict.
"There's no hope unless I can get the bullet out," the doctor had
remarked at the end of the examination. "It escaped her heart by about
half an inch; but it means constant haemorrhage if it's left in the
lungs."
"And if it's removed?" the Sultan asked hoarsely.
Edouard shrugged his shoulders in a non-committal manner.
"It'll be touch and go, even then. But she might pull through with
care and attention. She's young and healthy. But if she survives,
she'll feel the effects of that bullet for some time to come."
With that Edouard left to fetch his instruments, leaving the Sultan
gazing down at the result of his own mad desire for vengeance--a red,
oozing wound on a girl's white breast.
When the doctor returned, whilst he probed after the bullet Le Breton
held Pansy with firm, careful strength, lest, in pain, she should move
and send the instrument into the heart Cameron's shot had just missed.
But she was unconscious through it all. Although the probing brought a
further gush of blood, Edouard managed to locate the bullet and extract
it.
After the wound was dressed, and Pansy bound and bandaged up, the
doctor left.
With his departure the Sultan sent for Pansy's belongings, which his
soldiers had brought up as plunder from the raid.
There was no woman among his following, so he sent one of the guards to
inquire if there was one among the captives.
Presently Pansy's mulatto maid was brought to him.
Alice was a pretty brown girl of about seventeen, clad in a blue cotton
slip, and she wore a yellow silk handkerchief tied around her black
curls. With awe she gazed about the sumptuous tent; with admiration at
her handsome, kingly captor.
He, however, had nothing to say to her, beyond giving her instructions
to serve her mistress and warning her to use the utmost care.
When Alice set about her task he went from the tent to interview
Edouard.
Pansy's condition had upset his plans. Even if the girl recovered, she
could not be moved for a week at least, no matter how carefully her
litter was carried. And a force as large as his could not stay a week
in the neighbourhood without the fact becoming known.
When Le Breton returned he dismissed Alice, and he seated himself by
the couch and stayed there watching the unconscious girl.
Evening shadows crept into the tent, bringing a deft-handed, silent
servant, who lighted the heavy silver lamp and withdrew as silently as
he had come. Dinner appeared; a sumptuous meal that the Sultan waved
aside impatiently.
Then Edouard came again, to see how the patient was faring; to give an
injection and go, after a curious glance at the big, impassive figure
of his patron sitting silent and brooding at his captive's side.
Gradually the noises of the camp died down, until outside there was
only the sough of the forest, the whisper of the wind in the tree-tops,
the occasional stamp of a horse's hoof, the hoot of an owl in the
glade, and, every now and again in the distance, the mocking laugh of
hyenas. Mocking at him, it seemed to Le Breton; at a man whose own
doings had brought his beloved to death's door.
Within the tent there was no longer silence. Faint little moans
whispered through it occasionally, mingling with the rustle of silken
curtains and the sparking of the lamp. And every now and again there
were weak bouts of coughing; coughs that brought an ominous red stain
to Pansy's lips; stains the Sultan dabbed off carefully with a
handkerchief, his strong hand shaking slightly, his arrogant face
working strangely, for he knew he was responsible for the life-blood
upon her lips.
Every hour Edouard came to give the injection which held the soul back
from the grim, bony hands of death that groped after it. Once or twice
Pansy's eyes opened, but they closed almost instantly, as if she had
not strength enough to hold them open.
But before daybreak her coughs had ceased. An hour passed, then two,
without that ominous red stain coming to her lips. Edouard nodded to
himself in a satisfied way as he left the tent. A little of the
strained look left the Sultan's face.
The haemorrhage had stopped; youth and health were winning the battle.
Just as the first pink streak of dawn entered the tent Pansy's eyes
opened again and stayed open, purple wells of pain that rested on the
Sultan's with a puzzled expression.
Into the misty world of suffering and weakness in which she moved it
seemed to her that Raoul Le Breton had come, looking at her as he had
once looked, with love and tenderness in his glowing eyes.
She could not make out where she was or how he came to be there. She
had no recollection of the horde who had broken into the guardroom
where she and Cameron had been. She was too full of suffering to give
any thought to the problem. Raoul Le Breton was with her, that was
enough.
A wan smile of recognition trembled for a moment on her lips.
"Raoul," she said faintly.
It was more a sigh than a word. But his name whispered so feebly
brought him kneeling beside her couch, bending over her eagerly.
"My darling, forgive me," he whispered passionately.
He bent his head still lower, with infinite tenderness kissing the
white lips that had breathed his name so faintly.
Pansy's eyes closed again. A look of contentment came to mingle with
the suffering on her face.
Outside the hyenas still laughed mockingly: derisive echoes from a
distance. But Le Breton did not hear them. Despite his treatment of
her, Pansy had smiled upon him. For the first time in his wild life he
felt humility and gratitude, both new sensations.
When Edouard came again he pronounced the girl sleeping, not
unconscious.
"With care and attention she'll pull through," he said.
"Thank God!" his patron exclaimed, with unfeigned relief and joy.
Edouard glanced at his master speculatively.
He had heard nothing about Pansy's existence until he had been
hurriedly summoned to attend her, and he wondered why his friend and
patron had made no mention of the girl.
"You never told me Barclay had a daughter," he commented.
"I did not know myself until quite recently," the Sultan replied.
"Is she to share her father's fate?" the doctor asked drily.
Tenderly the Sultan gazed at the small white face on the cushions.
"She's not my enemy," he said in a caressing tone.
With a feeling of relief, Edouard left the tent.
It was most evident that the Sultan had fallen in love with his
beautiful captive. If the girl played her cards well, she would be
able to save her father, and prevent his patron doling out death to a
British official, thus embroiling himself still further with the
English Government.
After the doctor had left, Le Breton sat on Pansy's couch. Yet he had
not learnt his lesson.
Although he loved the daughter, he hated the father as intensely as
ever. Now he was making other plans; plans that would enable him to
keep both love and vengeance. Plans, too, that might make the girl
forget his colour and give him the love he now craved for so wildly.