It was mid-morning when they reached the house, and Daniel advised
Muriel to go at once to her room, whither Hussein presently brought
refreshments and cans of water for the bath.
"Send Mustafa to me," she said to him, but, understanding no English,
and grasping only the name of the dragoman, he pointed towards the
Oasis, indicating by signs that the man had not yet returned.
At this she went to the door of her room and called out sharply "Mr.
Lane!"
Daniel, who at the moment had just ducked his head in a pail of water,
came into the refectory drying his hair with a towel.
"What's the matter?" he asked. "Anything I can do for you?"
"Where's my dragoman?" she asked, suspiciously.
"_I_ don't know," he replied. "I haven't touched him."
Hussein volunteered the information that Mustafa had not yet returned,
and Daniel translated the statement into English.
"Well, when he comes," she said, "please send him to me at once."
"No," he replied, very decisively, "I'm going to send him straight off
to El Homra before he hears of our little trouble this morning. I can
trust Hussein to say nothing in the village, but Mustafa I don't know
very well."
She turned angrily to him. "You do like bullying women, don't you!" she
sneered.
He looked at her with steady, serene eyes, "You won't need a dragoman
for a fortnight," he remarked. "He may as well make himself useful to
the Bindanes."
With that he went back to his ablutions, and when, half an hour later,
Mustafa made his appearance, Daniel immediately sent him off on his long
journey, telling him to convey his compliments to Mr. and Mrs. Bindane
and to say that her Ladyship was in the best of health, and would come
back to them on the thirteenth day from now.
This done, he called Hussein to him and spoke to him somewhat after this
manner: "Her Excellency," he said, "desires to go back to her friends,
but I believe I shall be carrying out the wishes of her father by
obliging her to remain here. You will therefore take her camel and mine
into the village, so that she cannot get at them; and you will notify me
at once if she leaves the house. Otherwise you are to treat her with the
deference due to her high rank; and I think it will be best to make no
mention of what I have told you to your friends."
Hussein bowed, and at once went off to find a suitable stable for the
camels.
When luncheon was announced a couple of hours later Muriel came into the
living-room, carrying herself with dignity.
"Am I obliged to eat my meals with you?" she asked.
"It will be more convenient," he replied.
"I shall probably be sick," she muttered.
"You'll get used to it," he answered; and therewith they sat down at the
table.
The meal was eaten in a distressing silence, broken only by Daniel's
polite profferring of salt, pepper, and the like, and by his pressing
but vain invitations to her to eat a little more of this or that dish.
When at length they rose from the table, he advised her to go to her
room to rest. "You must be very tired," he said, "after getting up so
early, and all that excitement."
"I'll lie down," she replied, "but I don't suppose I shall sleep. The
very fact of being anywhere near you disgusts me too much to allow me to
go to sleep."
"You must try to master that feeling," he said, with perfect
seriousness. "It hurts nobody but yourself. I can quite understand your
being angry; but I think Al Ghazzali, the Muslim philosopher, put the
matter in a nutshell when he said: 'God loves those who swallow down
their anger, and not those who have no anger at all.' It only makes you
yourself miserable to be in a temper; but try to say to yourself that
you won't let me be of such importance in your life as to have the power
to upset you. You ought to say: 'Nothing that this fellow does can shake
my equanimity: he has absolutely no power over my inner self.' If you
can really say that to yourself you'll sleep all right. There'll be some
tea going at half-past four."
She stared at him freezingly and went out of the room, while Daniel
quietly settled down to his writing, refusing to allow himself any
further thoughts in regard to her.
At tea-time he told her that he wanted her to come down into the Oasis
with him. "It will take your thoughts off yourself," he said.
"Thank you," she replied. "I prefer to stay here in my prison. I wish
you'd realize that your society is obnoxious to me. I hate the sight of
you."
"I quite understand that," he said, "but, all the same, I want you to
come, please."
"If I refuse," she retorted, "I suppose you'll drag me down by the
hair?"
"No." he replied, "not by your hair: only by your hand."
She was too tired to put up any resistance, and soon they left the house
together, descending by the rough path down the cliffs to the lower
level, where the shadow lay deep.
Presently they entered the forest of palms, wherein, here and there
stood a mud-brick hut or cluster of huts, upon the flat roofs of which
the goats and chickens ran about, and sometimes a dog looked down at
them and barked.
The shadow of the cliffs extended for some distance, like a blue veil,
but further ahead the sun still struck down upon the Oasis, and the
mellow light, seen between the tree-trunks and foliage, was made so rich
by contrast with the cool tones of the shadowed foreground that Muriel
was constrained to remark on its beauty. Pigeons fluttered to and fro
amongst the trees, those close at hand being white as snow, but those in
the sunlit distance appearing to flash before the eyes like gilded birds
of a fairy tale.
Soon they passed out of the shadow, and now the sunlight was sprinkled
upon them from between the rustling palm-branches overhead, and the dust
of their footsteps was like a haze of powdered gold. Before them, in a
clearing, a number of rough buildings, some of them whitewashed,
encircled an open space of sun-baked ground wherein a number of natives
sauntered to and fro. Here there were a few stalls, sheltered by tenting
or tattered fragments of brown camel-cloth: grain being on sale at one
of them; at another, basket-work; at another, pottery.
The loiterers and salesmen greeted Daniel with polite salaams, and to
some of them he spoke a few words; but they were too well-mannered, or
perhaps too indifferent, to show any particular interest in Muriel, and
even when she paused to pat the shaven head of a little naked urchin,
and to give him a piastre, there were few curious eyes upon her. The
villagers seemed to be dawdling through a peaceful dream, unruffled by
the ardours and eagerness to which the Westerner is accustomed; and
Muriel had the feeling that she had come into a lull in the breeze of
life, as when a sailing boat is becalmed and the sails flap idly. Even
the tempest in her heart was quietened, and the warmth of the evening
caused her to feel a languor that was temporarily almost serene.
Daniel led her across the open ground to a lane between the ramshackle
buildings on the far side. Here, at a crazy-looking door, he paused.
"I want you just to shake hands with an old man," he said. "He acted as
guide years ago to one of your father's predecessors."
"There's no need to say who I am, is there?" she asked, a little
anxiously.
He smiled. "Your dragoman will have spread the news already."
"I told him not to," she answered.
Daniel made a gesture of impatience. "We must try to correct that," he
said. "Secrecy is very unpleasant, though it is sometimes necessary.
You'll find it always best to be frank when you can."
In response to his knocking the door was opened by a small, smirking
boy, and they entered a little yard, wherein a clean cow, several
emaciated hens, and a couple of goats wandered about in front of a
two-roomed house, the rear wall of which appeared to be about to
collapse. Here a dim-eyed old man sat upon a native bedstead of split
palm-branches, engaged in hunting for fleas in his cloak, and, as his
gnarled old fingers plucked at the folds, his grey-bearded mouth was
pursed and pushed forward in the manner of a monkey.
He rose, creaking, to his feet as he caught sight of his visitors, and,
tottering forward, grasped Daniel's extended hand, who then introduced
him to Muriel.
Daniel spoke to him in Arabic, and presently, turning to his companion,
asked her to say something to the old man.
"What shall I say?" Muriel enquired.
"He is very old," Daniel replied. "Wish that God's face may shine upon
him. Say you hope the evening of his life may be full of peace and
blessedness."
"Yes, tell him that," she answered.
"Anything else?" he asked.
"Oh, make up something for me," she replied.
"No," he answered, severely. "Please take your thoughts from yourself,
and concentrate them on this old fellow. Think what is the best thing
you can wish him. Think hard."
Muriel glanced at him in surprise, while her host turned his fading eyes
to Daniel, asking what she was saying.
"She is trying to think what is the most blessed wish she can make for
you," he replied, speaking in Arabic; and the old man beamed upon her.
Muriel made an effort, and, taking his horny hand in hers, told him that
she hoped he would keep his health and that his affairs would prosper.
With an eye on his cloak, she wanted to add that she hoped he would have
good hunting, but she restrained herself.
Daniel translated the words into the native tongue, and, after a brief
conversation, they took their departure.
As they walked down the lane Muriel asked him, freezingly, why he had so
particularly wished her to make herself polite to the old man.
"I had no reason," he answered, "except that I wanted you to think of
him and not of yourself."
"Why?" she asked with increasing ill-humor. "Am I usually selfish?"
"You have been trained to think first of yourself," he answered, with
disconcerting candour, "though by nature you are not really selfish at
all. During this fortnight I want you to think mostly of other people."
She had no time to reply before Daniel stopped at another and larger
door, which he pushed open without a preliminary knock. Here, in a shed,
two camels and a donkey stood feeding from a trough.
"This," he told her, "is my hospital for sick animals. Both these camels
have saddle-sores, as you see, and the old moke foaled the other day,
but the youngster died. She is very depressed about it."
Muriel was interested, and patted the donkey affectionately, while
Daniel, stepping on to an inverted box, examined the camels' sores.
"Just hand me that bottle over there," he said. "It's my patent mixture
of carbolic and lamp-oil. It keeps the flies off, and heals up the sores
mighty quick."
Muriel haughtily gave him the bottle, and watched him as he poured a few
drops on to the wounds. Her attention was presently attracted by a board
nailed to the wall, upon which an inscription was written in large,
flowing Arabic characters.
"What does that say?" she asked, forgetting for the moment that she was
not really desirous of holding any communication with him.
"It is a quotation from the Koran," he told her. "I wrote it and stuck
it up for a lesson to these people. It reads 'The _Prophet_ has written:
There is no _beast_ on earth, nor bird that flieth, but the same is a
people like unto you, and unto God shall they return.'"
"I like that," she said.
He fetched a broom from the corner of the shed and held it out to her.
"Would you mind just sweeping the ground a bit while I clean up the
troughs?" he asked. "The native attendant is off duty today."
He busied himself with his work, and Muriel, making a grimace, did as
she was bid. It was less awkward than standing still, and the cause was
good though the job unpleasant.
They walked home in silence through the gathering dusk. Daniel offered
her his hand to help her up the steep path which ascended the cliff to
his house, but she frigidly refused it; and when, presently, she
stumbled and nearly fell, she scrambled to her feet once more in
surprisingly quick time, as though to avoid his proffered aid.
Later she sat down to the evening meal without uttering a word, and the
silence was extremely oppressive.
"Look here," Daniel broke out at last, "I don't know what you feel about
it, but for my own part I rather object to this silence."
"I have nothing to say to you," she replied.
"That doesn't matter," he said. "I will do the talking. I shall choose a
subject and talk about it: you can listen if you want to."
Therewith he gave her an account of the Bedouin tribes of this part of
the desert, how they had come to settle there, how he had recovered a
part of their history from the old tales and ballads which he had
recorded; and he told her something of their curious laws and customs.
Muriel's face did not betray any interest whatsoever, but Daniel
persevered courageously until the meal was finished.
"You can stay in this room and read a book if you like," he said to her,
as they rose from the table.
Muriel looked at him coldly. "Thank you," she replied, with an emphasis
which she hoped was withering, "I prefer to go to my room. Good-night!"
And with that she took her departure.
The day had seemed intolerably long to her, and her smouldering anger
had flamed up within her at frequent intervals. She realized that Daniel
was playing the schoolmaster to her, and she was determined not to
knuckle under to him. If he had decided to keep her a prisoner here for
the full fortnight, she would do her best to make him thoroughly
uncomfortable. His cool, impersonal attitude annoyed her; she was amazed
that a man who but yesterday was branding her with his burning kisses
could be today so entirely detached from emotion, and she flushed at the
insult of it.
Her only consolation lay in the thought that he was injuring himself by
his behaviour. She would now never be even so much as a sister to
him--not even so much as a friend. When she had escaped from this
horrible place she would go to England, and soon, no doubt, she would
marry a nice, ordinary man, with sleek hair and a tooth-brush moustache
and long, thin legs; and as she came out of the church after the
marriage ceremony she would catch sight of Daniel in the crowd and would
smile contemptuously at him....
She was very tired, and many minutes had not passed before she abandoned
the pretence of reading the anthology of English verse which Daniel had
placed in her room on the previous evening, nor was it long before she
fell into a deep and dreamless sleep which held her as it were entombed
until Hussein caused her resurrection by bringing in the bath-water in
the morning.
The cool breeze and the sparkling air brought a certain feeling of
well-being into her heart; but the meeting with Daniel at the breakfast
table was a wretched business, and was made all the more distasteful by
his evident good health and the morning freshness of his mind.
"I hope you are feeling fit," he said to her. "We have a busy morning
before us."
That he was not speaking in jest was proved by the event. Soon after
breakfast he took her down to the house of Sheikh Ali, and introduced
her to the old man and his son Ibrahim. Thereafter the four of them
walked over to the open ground outside the mosque, where a large number
of men and camels were gathered, while on the outskirts of the area many
women and children stood in the shade of the palms. Daniel explained to
her that a large number of the chief men of the El Hamran were setting
out upon the long journey to the far-off Oasis of El Khargeh, where
there was to be a great gathering of the tribes. Sheikh Ali himself was
too old and too feeble to go with the caravan, and his eldest son,
Ibrahim, was remaining with him; but his younger sons and most of his
male relatives and adherents were going.
She watched the animated scene with interest, and the hubbub came to her
ears with the wonder of novelty--the women uttering their strange,
whinnying cries in token of their grief at parting with their husbands;
the white-bearded old Sheikh embracing his sons, like a Biblical picture
come to life; the diversely robed figures steering their camels in
circles and firing their rifles in the air; the barking of innumerable
dogs skulking amongst the palms; and over all the brilliant sunshine and
the deep blue of the sky.
She and Daniel shook hands with a very large number of men, and, as she
walked homewards after the caravan had departed, she had a confused
memory of smiling bearded faces, dark eyes, and many-coloured robes
fluttering in the wind.
After sundown he took her down to the village, armed with pots of
ointment, to help him to doctor the eyes of two little grandchildren of
the Sheikh, who were suffering from ophthalmia, and whose sight his
daily ministrations were saving. And in the evening he continued his
writing, leaving her to read a book until, with many yawns, she betook
herself to her room.
This day was typical of all the others in that surprising fortnight.
Quietly and impersonally he led her through her duties, obliging her to
make herself useful in a score of different ways. Now he set her to the
task of classifying his photographs and notes; now he sent her down to
the animals' hospital to doctor the camels' sores; now he asked her to
massage the sprained ankle of a small girl who had been brought to the
house for treatment; now he made her grace with her presence a village
wedding festival; and now he dispatched her with milk and eggs to the
hovel of a blind old woman who lived on her neighbours' charity.
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 Islam, 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 role 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.