A DISAPPOINTMENT AND A DRAGOMAN
It was a blow not to see Anthony on the quay. And other blows rained
thick and fast. My two consolations were that I was actually in Egypt;
and that in the confusion Rechid Bey with the veiled figure of his
silent bride had slipped away without further incidents. Their
disappearance was regretted by no one save Monny, unless it was Neill
Sheridan, and he was discreet enough to keep his feelings to himself.
The girl was not. She protested on principle, although she had the
Asiut address. But where all men, black and brown and white, were
yelling with the whole force of their lungs, and pitching and tossing
luggage (mostly the wrong luggage) with all the force of their arms,
nobody heard or cared what she said. For once Monny Gilder was
disregarded by a crowd of men. This could happen only at the departure
of a boat train! But if I was not thinking about her, I was thinking
about her fifteen trunks, and Cleopatra's sixteen and Biddy's and Miss
Guest's two. The maids were worse than useless, and I had no valet. I
have never had a valet. I clawed, I fought, I wrestled in an arena
where it was impossible to tell the wild beasts from the martyrs. I
rescued small bags from under big boxes, and dashed off with a few
samples to the train, in order to secure places. All other able-bodied
men, including Sheridan and the artist sculptor Bailey, were engaged in
the same pursuit, and our plan was to "bag" a whole compartment between
us in the boat-special for Cairo. But we never met again till we
reached our destination. One expects Egypt to warm the heart with its
weather, but the cold was bitter; so was the disappointment about
Anthony. Both cut through me like knives. Darkness had fallen before I
was ready to join the ladies--if I could. In passing earlier, I had
shouted to the maids where to find the places, grabbed with difficulty,
for their mistresses. Whether they had found them, or whether any of
the party still existed, was the next question; and it was settled only
as the train began to move. The compartment I had selected was boiling
over with a South American president and his effects; but as I stood
transfixed by this transformation scene, Cleopatra's maid hailed me
from the end of the corridor. _Les quatres dames_ were in the
restaurant car. Why? Ah, it was the Arab they had engaged as dragoman,
who had advised the change in milord's absence. He said it would be
better, as of course they would want dinner. He himself was looking
after the small _baggages_, except the little sacks of the hand which
the maids kept.
What, the ladies had engaged a dragoman! And they had trusted him--a
stranger--with luggage? Then it was as good as gone! But no, mildly
ventured Cleopatra's handmaiden. The dragoman came recommended. He had
a letter from a friend of milord.
My thoughts jumped, of course, to Anthony. Yet how could he have known
that I was travelling with ladies? And if by some Marconian miracle he
had heard, why should he, who prided himself on "not bothering" with
women, trouble to provide a dragoman at Alexandria?
I hurried to the dining car, and found Monny with her satellites seated
at a table, three of them looking as calmly innocent as if they had not
upset my well-laid scheme for their comfort. Biddy alone had a guilty
air, because, perhaps, I was more important in her eyes than in the
eyes of the others. "Oh, dear Duffer," she began to wheedle me: "We
hope you don't mind our coming here? We thought it a good idea, for
we're starving, although we're perfectly happy because we're in Egypt,
and because it's such a _quaint_ train, so different and Eastern. The
dragoman who----"
"I think he came from your friend Anthony with an 'H,'" Cleopatra broke
in. "He seemed providential. And he speaks English. The only objection
is, he's not as good-looking as Monny and I wanted our dragoman to be.
We did hope to get one who would be _becoming_ to us, you see, and give
the right sort of Eastern background. But I suppose one can't have
_everything!_ And it was I who said your friend Anthony's messenger
must be engaged even if his face is--is--rather like an _accident!_"
"It's like a catastrophe," remarked Monny, looking as if she blamed me.
"Where _is_ it?" I wanted to know.
"It's waiting in a vestibule outside where the cook's cooking," Biddy
explained ungrammatically. "I told it you'd want to see it. And it's
got a letter for you from some one." "Did the fellow say the letter was
from Fenton?" I inquired.
"No. He only said, from a friend who'd expected to meet you; and Mrs.
East was sure it must be from the one you were talking about."
Wasting no more words, I marched off to the fountainhead for
information. Near the open door of the infinitesimal kitchen stood a
fat little dark man with a broken nose, and one white eye. The other
eye, as if to make up, was singularly, repellently intelligent. It
fixed itself upon me, as I approached, with eager questioning which
melted into ingratiating politeness. Instinct warned the fellow that I
was the person he awaited. At the same moment, instinct was busily
whispering to me that there was something fishy about him, despite the
alleged letter. He did not look the type of man Fenton would recommend.
And though his face was of an unwholesome olive tint, and he wore a
tarbush, and a galabeah as long as a dressing-gown, under his short
European coat, I was sure he was not of Arab or Egyptian blood.
"Milord Borrow?" he began, displaying large white teeth, of which he
was evidently proud.
I assented.
"My name is Bedr el Gemály," he introduced himself. "I have a letter
for milord."
"Who gave it to you?" I challenged him.
The ingratiating smile seemed to flicker like a candle flame in a
sudden puff of wind. "A friend of my, a dragoman. He could not come to
bring it. So he give it to me. The gentleman's name was Fenton. My
friend, he was sent from him at Cairo." As the fellow spoke, in fairly
good English, he took from a pocket of the short coat which spoiled his
costume, a colourful silk handkerchief. Unwrapping this, he produced an
envelope. It was addressed to me in the handwriting of Fenton, but
before opening it I went on with my catechism.
"Then the letter doesn't introduce you, but your friend?"
The smile was practically dead now. "I think it do not introduce any
ones. It is only a letter. My friend Abdullah engaged to carry it. But
he got sick too soon to come to the ship."
"I see," said I. "You seem to have used the letter, however, to get
yourself taken on as dragoman by the ladies of my party. How the devil
did you find out that they were travelling with me, eh?" I shot the
question at him and tried to imitate gimlets with my eyes. But he was
ready with his answer. No doubt he had prepared it.
"I see you all together, from a distant place, before I come there. A
gentleman off the ship, he pointed you out when I ask where I find
Milord Borrow. I see you, and those ladies. When I come, you was away
already, so I speak to them, and say if I could help, I be very
pleased. When I tell one of the ladies I was from a friend of milord's
with a letter, she say, is the friend's name Captain Fenton, and I say
'yes, madame, Captain Fenton, that is the name; and I am a dragoman to
show Egypt to the strangers. I know it all very well, from Alexandria
way up Nile.' Then the lady say very quick she will take me for her
dragoman. I am pleased, for I was not engaged for season, and she say
if I satisfy her she keep me in Cairo and on from there." "H'm," I
grunted, still screwing in the gimlets. "I see you're not an Egyptian.
You have selected the name of an Armenian famous in history. Are you
Armenian?"
"I am the same thing as Egyptian, I bin here for dragoman so many
years. I am Mussulman in faith. But I was born Armenian," he admitted.
"You speak English with an American accent," I went on. "Have you lived
in America?"
"One time a family take me to New York and I stay a year or two. Then I
get homesick and come to Egypt again. But I learn to talk maybe some
like American peoples while I am over there."
It sounded plausible enough, the whole story. And if Mrs. East had
snapped the dragoman up under the impression that he came from a man
she had determined to meet, the fellow might be no more to blame than
any other boaster, touting in his own interest. Still, I had an uneasy
feeling that something lay hidden under Armenian plausibility. Bedr el
Gemály was perhaps a thief who had courted a chance for a big haul of
jewellery. Yet if that were all, why hadn't he hopped off the tram, as
it began to move, with the ladies' hand luggage? He might easily have
got away, and disappeared into space, before we could wire the police
of Alexandria to look out for him. He had not done that, but had
waited, and risked facing my suspicions. And he must have realized,
while in charge of Monny's and Cleopatra's attractive dressing bags,
that he was missing an opportunity such as might never come to him
again. This conduct suggested an honest desire to be a good dragoman.
Yet--well, I resolved not to let the gimlets rust until Bedr el Gemály
had been got rid of. If Mrs. East had really promised him a permanent
engagement, she could salve his disappointment by giving him a day's
pay. I would take the responsibility of sending him about his business.
Without further parley I opened the letter. It was short, evidently
written in a hurry. Anthony had scribbled:
Horribly sorry, dear old Duffer, but I'm wanted by the Powers that Be
in Cairo. No other reason could have kept me from Alexandria. I was
afraid a wire wouldn't reach you, so I sent a decent old chap by the
train I meant to take. He's pledged to find you on the quay, and he
will--unless some one makes him drunk. This seems unlikely to happen,
as he won't be paid till he gets back, and having no friends on earth,
nobody will stand him drinks. Beastly luck, but I shan't be able to see
you to-night even in Cairo. Tell you all to-morrow--and there's a lot
to tell, about many things.
Yours ever,
A.F.
The messenger had "no friend on earth," according to Fenton. Then the
friendship stated to exist between him and Bedr el Gemály must have
come readymade from heaven, or--its opposite. I guessed the nature of
the "decent old chap's" illness. But I should have been glad to know
whether it had been produced by design or accident.
When I went back to the ladies, Bedr went with me, at my firm
suggestion, and gave them their handbags to use as footstools. Dinner
was ready, and a seat had been kept for me at a table just across the
aisle, but before beginning, I explained the real circumstances
governing the dragoman's arrival. "Whatever else he may be, he's a
shark," I said, "or he wouldn't have traded on a misunderstanding to
grab an engagement. You owe him nothing really, but if you choose, give
him a sovereign when we get to Cairo, and I'll tell him that I have a
dragoman in view for the party. He'll then have two days' pay,
according to the guide-books."
With this, I slipped into my seat, thinking the matter settled. But
between courses, Monny leaned across from her table (she and I had end
seats) and said that she and her aunt had been talking about that poor
dragoman. "Aunt Clara raised his hopes," the girl went on, "and now
Rachel Guest and I think it would be mean to send him away, just
because he's hideous."
"That won't be the reason!" said I. "It will be because we don't know
anything about him, and because in his sharpness he's over-reached
himself."
"But we do know things about him. He showed Aunt Clara letters from
people who'd employed him, lots of Americans whose names we've heard,
and some we're acquainted with. The tragic thing is, that he finds
difficulty in getting engaged because of his face. I've felt guilty
ever since I called it a catastrophe. Of course it _is_; but I said it
to be funny, which was cruel. And we deserve to punish ourselves by
keeping the poor wretch a few days, or more, if he's good."
"I thought you wanted a becoming dragoman?" I reminded her.
"Oh, that was just our silliness. I _do_ like good-looking people, I
must say. But what _does_ it matter whether a brown person is handsome
or homely, when you come to think of it? Besides, we can have another
dragoman, too, for ornament, if we run across a very picturesque one."
I laughed. "But you can't go up the Nile on a boat with a drove of
private dragomans, you know!"
"I _don't_ know, Lord Ernest. And why don't you call them dragomen? You
make them sound as if they were some kind of animal."
"Dragomans is the plural," I persisted.
"Well, I shall call them dragomen. And if this poor thing can't get any
one else to drag, he _shall_ drag us up the Nile, if he's as
intelligent in his ways as he is in that one eye, which is so like a
hard-boiled egg. You see, Lord Ernest, we're going to have a boat of
our own. A steam dahabeah is what we want, so we won't be at the mercy
of the wind. And we can have all the dragomen we choose, can't we?"
"I suppose you can fill up your cabins with them," I agreed, because I
felt that the Gilded Rose wished me to argue the point, and that if I
did I should be worsted. As I should not be on board the dahabeah in
question, it would not matter to me personally if the boat were
entirely manned by dragomans. Except that there would in that case
probably be a collision, and I should not be near to save Biddy--and
incidentally the girl Biddy wished me to marry.
After that, we went on eating our dinner and talking of Egypt, Miss
Guest doing all the listening, as usual. When we had finished, we kept
our places because we had no others. Cleopatra was curious about my
friend's failure to arrive, but I put her off with vaguenesses; and
said to myself that, for Anthony's sake, it was well that mysterious
business had kept him in Cairo. Still, I wondered what the business
was: why he would be unable to see me that night: and what were the
"many things" he had to tell.