By the last train leaving Alexandria for Ramleh, the next evening,
Gregorio sought to escape his pursuers. He had heard from Ahmed on
the platform, just before starting, that Xantippe’s body had been
discovered, and that already the police were on his track. He sat in
a corner of a third-class carriage closely muffled, and eyeing his
neighbours suspiciously. He sighed with relief as the train moved out
of the station and began to pass by the sand-hills and white villas,
showing ghost-like in the damp mist.
When he reached St. Antonio he saw the lights of the casino blazing
cheerfully, and the pure clear desert air invigorated him. Fascinated
by the glare, he strolled toward the casino and decided, in spite of
the risk, to enter. He watched from a corner the players, and greedily
coveted the masses of gold and silver piled in pyramids behind the
croupiers. He heard the violins playing Suppe’s overture, and the
remembrance came vividly to him of the Paradiso and the fair girl with
whom the Englishman talked. The exciting events following that evening
passed before him--a lurid panorama.
An hour fled quickly away; then he sought the solitude of the desert,
and, having collected into a bag as much food and as many eggs as he
could carry, he walked away over the sands.
Under the stars he dug holes wherein to bury the eggs, and marked the
spots with stones; then, wrapping himself in his cloak, lay down to
sleep. All next day he loitered idly about, shunning the gaze of every
wandering Arab. When evening came he drew near to the palace to seek for
food. To his horror, the box had not been refilled. At first he hardly
realised how awful was his plight. Then the truth dawned upon him. Ahmed
and Madam Marx must have been arrested. He drew near to the casino and
stood under the open windows listening. A cold shudder ran down his
back, his face grew pale, and his lips trembled, for he heard two men
discussing the murder and the capture of his friends. An involuntary
smile lighted up the gloom of his features for a moment as one remarked
that the chief offender, the woman’s husband, had eluded pursuit. Then
he crept back into the desert and waited for the dawn.
The sun rose, fiery and relentless, glittering on the waters of Aboukir,
and the cloudless heaven blazed like a prairie on fire. At midday, when
its rays fell straight upon him, his thirst became intense, and with
feverish fingers he dug up an egg. It was empty. He tossed it away and
dragged himself to another hole. The second egg was empty. In turn
he dug up all his eggs, and all alike were empty. Improperly sealed,
scantily covered by the sand, the water had evaporated. A great despair
seized him; he called on God in his anguish, and the silence of the
desert terrified him. In a fit of desolate anger he pulled off his cap,
and summoned all the saints, Christ, and God Himself, to enter it, and
then trampled on it, laughing wildly. Then he flung himself upon the
sand, his head still left bare to the pitiless sun. He knew the end had
come, but there was not any regret in his heart for his crimes, only
an impotent dismay and anger at his solitary condition. The thirst
increased every minute, and he gripped the sand with his fingers in his
agony. His last word was an oath.
At sunset he was dead.
Two days later Madam Marx left Alexandria by train for Ramleh. There was
no evidence against her, and she had soon been released. Her own trouble
scarcely disconcerted her; she had feared only for the Greek in the
desert. The thought of his agony, his hunger, goaded her nearly to
madness; but she was a little comforted when she remembered the eggs.
There was enough water in them to last him two or three days. It was the
hour of sunset when she arrived, and she instantly set out desertward,
carrying a basket containing wine and food. She had determined to live
at the hotel until the days of persecution were past. The heavy sand
made it hard to proceed rapidly, but she struggled on bravely, and when
far enough from civilisation called aloud the signal-word agreed on.
But no one answered. All through the night she wandered, searching,
till within an hour of sunrise; then she gave way and sat weeping on the
sand. With daylight she rose to her feet, determined to find her lover,
but had scarcely gone twenty yards before, with a low cry of grief, she
knelt beside the body of a dead man. In the half-eaten, decayed features
she recognised Gregorio and knew she had come too late. Undeterred by
the hideous spectacle, she kissed him tenderly and lay beside him.
The sun mounted slowly in the heavens.
The living figure lay as lifeless as the dead. But after a while the
woman rose and dug with her hands a hollow in the sand. She heeded not
the heat, nor the flight of time, and by evening her work was done.
Raising the body in her arms, she carried it to the hollow and laid it
gently down, then tearfully shovelled back the sand till it was hidden.
So Gregorio found a tomb. Nor did it remain unconsecrated, for beside
it Madam Marx knelt and spoke with faltering lips the remnants of the
prayers she had learned when a child. As she prayed she watched vaguely
a steamer disappear behind the horizon.
The khedival mail-boat _Ramses_ sped swiftly over the unruffled surface
of the sea. At the stern a tall fair Englishman sat looking on the level
shores of Egypt and the minarets of Alexandria. With a sad smile he
turned to the child who called to him by his name. They were a strange
pair, for the boy was dark, and foreign-looking, and there was something
of cunning in his restless black eyes. The man’s large hand rested
softly on the raven curls of the youngster as he muttered to himself:
“For her sake I will watch over you, and you shall grow up to be a true
man.”
So Xantippe’s life had not been lived in vain, for she had loved and
been loved, and her memory was sweet to her lover. Moreover, Gregorio’s
dreams of wealth for his son were to find fulfilment, and the sand of
the desert, maybe, lies lightly on him.