It Happened in Egypt by C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson (page 7)

“But this is _serious_,” she reproached me.

“So is–“

“Please listen. There isn’t much time. I heard this only last night, or I’d have spoken before, and asked you what you thought. Do you happen to know whether Captain Fenton wrote a note to Monny, asking her to wait for him in the inner sanctuary of the temple till after the people had gone, as he wanted to see her alone about something of great importance?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Anthony hasn’t mentioned Miss Gilder’s name to me since Philae. As a matter of fact he’s been particularly taciturn.”

“You haven’t quarrelled, surely?”

“Anthony and I! Thank goodness, no. But I’m afraid he misunderstands, and is a bit annoyed. Miss Gilder of course told him we’d overheard a certain conversation, and he’s never given me a chance to explain. After Khartum it will be all right, if not before, but meanwhile–“

“I see. Then let me tell you quickly what’s happened. When we came back on board the boat, after climbing about the fort of Kasr Ibrim, Monny found on the table in her cabin a note in French, typewritten on _Enchantress Isis_ paper. It had no beginning or signature, only an urgent request to grant the writer five minutes just after sunrise, in the sanctuary at Abu Simbel, _as soon as every one was out of the way_. There’s only one typewriter on board, isn’t there?”

“Yes, Kruger’s.”

“And nobody but you and he and Captain Fenton ever use it, I suppose?”

“Nobody else, so far as I know.”

“Captain Fenton didn’t land with us to see the fort, but came up later, just as we were ready to go down. Well, for all these reasons and the note being in French Monny thinks it was written by Antoun Effendi. It was only in chatting last night about the sunrise expedition that she mentioned finding the letter. I begged her to make certain it _was_ from him, before doing what it asked; because, you see, I’m still afraid of anything that seems queer or mysterious. But she laughed and said, ‘What nonsense! Who else could have written it except Lord Ernest, unless you think Mr. Kruger’s in a plot.’ And she refused to question Antoun, because if he’d wanted the thing to be talked over, he’d have spoken instead of writing. As for doing what he asked, she pretended not to have made up her mind. She said she’d ‘see what mood she was in,’ after the others had finished with the sanctuary. Well, what I want, is for you and me to stay in the place ourselves when the others have gone.”

“With the greatest of pleasure on earth!” said I.

“Don’t be foolish. You aren’t to torment me there.”

“That depends on what you call ‘tormenting.’ If I’m to be made a spoil-sport for Fenton and Miss Gilder, a kind of live scarecrow, I mean to get something out of it for myself.”

There was no time for more. We had arrived at the foot of the long flight of stone steps which lead up to the rocky plateau of the Great Temple. In the east, a golden fire below the horizon was sending up premonitory flames, and the procession must bestir itself, or be too late. The whole object of arriving at this unearthly hour would be defeated, if, before the sun’s forefinger touched the faces of the altar statues, we were not in the sanctuary. No time to study the features of the Colossi, or to search for the grave of Major Tidwell. These things must wait. The dark-faced guardian examined our tickets, and let us file through the rock-hewn doorway, whose iron _grille_ he had just opened. As we passed into the cavernous hall of roughly carved Osiride columns, the huge figures attached to them loomed vaguely out of purple gloom. There was an impression of sculptured rock walls, with splashes of colour here and there; of columns in a chamber beyond, and still a third chamber, whence three rooms opened off, the side doorways mere blocks of ebony in the dimness. But already the sun’s first ray groped for its goal, like the wandering finger of a blind man. We had only time to hurry through the faintly lit middle doorway, and plaster ourselves round the rock walls of the sanctuary, when the golden digit touched the altar and found the four sculptured forms above: Harmachis, Rameses, Amen and Ptah. Night lingered in the temple, a black, brooding vulture. But suddenly the bird’s dark breast was struck by a golden bullet and from the wound a magic radiance grew. The effect, carefully calculated by priests and builders thousands of years ago, was as thrilling to-day as on the morning when the sun first poured gold upon the altar. The sightless faces of the statues were given eyes of an unearthly brilliance to stare into ours, and search our souls. But with most of the party, to be thrilled for a minute was enough. As the sun’s finger began to move, they found it time to move also. There was the whole temple to be seen, and then the walk back to the boat before dressing for breakfast.

Soon Biddy and I had–or seemed to have–the sanctuary to ourselves. Even the sun’s ray had left us, mounting higher and passing above the doorway of the inner shrine. The momentarily disturbed shadows folded round us again, with only a faint glimmer on the wall over the altar to show that day was born.

“Did you notice that Monny wasn’t with the others?” asked Brigit, in a low voice. “She lingered behind, I think, and never came near us. I wasn’t sure till I watched the rest filing out of this room. Then I saw she wasn’t among them. Neither was Captain Fenton.”

“If they’re together, it’s all right,” I assured her.

“Yes, but are they? That affair of the typewritten note has worried me.”

“You’re very nervous, darling. But no wonder!”

“You mustn’t call me ‘darling.'”

“Why not? It’s no worse than Duffer. I like your calling me that.”

“I wonder if we ought to go, as she never came–or stay and wait?”

“If we go, we shall be playing into Miss Gilder’s hands. If we stay, we shall be playing into mine. Which do you prefer?”

“Oh, I suppose we’d better stay–for fear of something. But you must be good.”

Then abruptly I attacked her with a change of weapons. I had fenced lightly, knowing that Biddy liked a man who could laugh. But now I threw away my rapier and snatched a club. I told her I would stand no more of this. Did she want to spoil my life and break my heart? She was the one thing I needed. Now she would have to say whether she’d put me off because she didn’t love me and never could, or because of that trash about not wanting to involve me in her troubles. No use prevaricating! I should know whether she lied or told the truth by the sound of her voice. But I might as well confess before she began, that I’d rather be loved by her and refused, than _not_ loved and refused. Women seemed to think the unselfish thing was to pretend not to care, if a man had to be sent away; because in the end that made it easier for him. But in real life, with a real man, it was the other way round.

“I think you’re right, Duffer,” Biddy said softly. “That’s why I wouldn’t answer you for good and all, that night at Philae. I felt then it might be kinder to tell you I could never care. But I’ve thought of nothing else since–except a little about Monny–and I decided that if it were _me_, I’d rather be loved, whatever happened. Men can’t be so very different where their hearts are concerned. So I’m going to tell you I _do_ love you. It was hard to give you to Monny. But I thought it would be for your happiness. I nearly died of love for you when I was a little girl. I kept every tiniest thing you ever gave me. I was in love with your memory when you went up to Oxford. And it was then Richard O’Brien came. He swept me off my feet, and made me think my heart was caught in the rebound. When it was too late, I realised that it hadn’t been caught at all. Only hypnotized for a while. I’ve loved you always, Duffer dear. The thought of you was my one comfort, often, although I hardly expected to see you again: or maybe, for that very reason. No, don’t touch me! please let me go on now, or I’ll not tell you any more. I wonder if you never guessed what I had in that chamois-skin bag you’re so worried about?”

“Why, yes, I did guess, Biddy, right or wrong.”

“And I’ll _bet_ you it was wrong! What did you think, when I wouldn’t understand any of your hints to tell what I wore over my heart?”

“I thought then,” I answered after a moment’s deliberation, “that you kept–compromising documents which might be of interest to the organization you and I have talked about. Now I think differently. I think you kept a lock of my childish hair, or my first tooth.”

“You conceited Duffer!–not so bad as that, because I had never a chance of getting either. Once I _did_ keep in that bag just what you said: compromising documents, that the organization would have given thousands of dollars to get. And my life wouldn’t have stood in their way for a minute, I’m sure. But that was before Richard died. He was afraid–I mean, I thought it would be better and less suspicious if _I_ had charge of the papers. And if the Society had ever got hold of him, he believed the letters and lists of names I had, might have bought back his safety, if I played my hand well. He’d told me just what to do. But when he was ill, he had a nurse whom I began to suspect as a spy. Once when I was called into Richard’s room suddenly, half dressed, the chamois-skin bag showed, as my wrapper fell open at the breast. I caught her looking at it with an eager look; and that very night I had it locked up in a bank. It was only a few days later that Richard died; and with him gone, I felt there was no more need to keep papers which might cost the lives or liberty of men. Richard had wronged his friends, and I wanted none of them to come to harm through me, though they’d made me suffer with him. I burned every scrap of paper I had, every single one! And it wasn’t till there was an attempt to kidnap Esmé that I asked myself if I’d been right. Still, even now, I am not sorry. I wouldn’t hurt a hair of their heads. For a while the bag was empty; but coming away from America and feeling a bit lonesome, I thought it would do me good to look now and then at the only love-letter you ever wrote me. It was on my ninth birthday–but I don’t believe you could write a better one now. There was a photograph, too, of my lord when he was seventeen. I stole that, but it was all the dearer. At this very minute, the letter and the picture are lying on my heart. So now you know whether I care for you or not; and you can understand why I wouldn’t put the bag into a bank.”

“Oh, Biddy darling,” I said, “you’ve made me the happiest man in the world.”

“Well, I’m glad,” she snapped, twisting away from me, “that it takes so little to make you happy.”

“So little, when I’m going to have you for my wife?”

“But you’re not. You said you’d rather be loved and refused–“

“I would, if I had to choose between the two. That’s not the case with me, for I shall marry you, now I know the truth, in spite of fifty, or fifty thousand, refusals, or any other little obstacles like that.”

“Never, Duffer! Not for all the world would I be your wife, loving you as I do, unless the organization would forget or forgive Esmé and me. And that I can’t fancy they’ll ever do, till the millenium. I shall be past the marrying age then! Oh, Duffer, I _almost_ wish you had fallen in love with Monny as I wanted you to do–‘

“Honest Injun, you really wanted that to happen?”

“Well, I tried to want it, for your sake; and in a way for my own, too. If I’d seen you caring for Monny, I should have found some medicine to cure my heartache. Oh, it would have been a very good thing all around, except for your friend, Anthony Fenton.”

“And I was half afraid he was in love with you! I can tell you I’ve had my trials, Biddy. It’s my turn to be happy now, and yours, too. Just think, nearly everybody in the world is engaged, but us–or next door to being engaged. Miss Gilder and Anthony–who’s the only man on earth to keep her in order: and Rachel Guest and Bailey; and Enid Biddell and Harry Snell; and even your stepdaughter, Esmé O’Brien–“

“Duffer, she’s _married_!”

“What, to young Halloran? How did they manage it?”

“I don’t know yet. I’ve had only a telegram. It came to Assuan too late, and Sir Marcus Lark brought it to the boat. I found it that night when we got back from Philae. But I haven’t told, because I dared not be with you alone long enough to speak of private affairs, till I could decide whether to let you know I loved you, or make believe I didn’t care a scrap.”

“As if I could have believed your tongue, unless you had shut your eyes! So Esmé is married, and off your hands?”

“Not off my hands, I’m afraid. This may be visited on me. They must have known of her meeting Tom Halloran at St. Martin Vesubie, last summer. They find out everything, sooner or later. Probably they thought I’d whisked her off to Egypt with me (helped by my rich friend Miss Gilder, for whom they took Rachel Guest) in order to let her meet Tom Halloran again, and marry him secretly. Well, she has _married_ him secretly. When they discover what’s happened, they’re sure to put the blame on poor me. And indeed, it is a shocking thing for the son of that man in prison, and the daughter of the man who sent him there, to be husband and wife.”

“I don’t see that at all,” I argued. “Why shouldn’t their love end the feud?”

“It can’t, for strong as it may be, it won’t release prisoners, or bring back to life those who are dead.”

“Anyhow, don’t borrow trouble,” said I. “If Esmé’s married the more reason for us to follow her example. After Khartum, when Miss Gilder–“

“Who’s taking my name in vain?” inquired the owner of it, at the sanctuary door.

“Oh, then you _have_ come, Monny!” Brigit exclaimed. “I–I’d given you up.”

“I haven’t come for the reason you thought,” returned the girl promptly. “I was sure you meant to head me off. And I’ve learned without asking, that Antoun Effendi didn’t write that note.”

“I told you so! Who did?”

“He’s trying to find out. Probably it was a silly practical joke some one wanted to play on me. There are _lots_ quite capable of it, on board! Antoun Effendi said the sunrise was much finer really, from on top of the great sandhill, so we climbed up. And it came out that he hadn’t asked me to meet him here. If any one not on the boat wrote the letter, some steward must have been bribed to sell a bit of writing-paper, and allow a stranger to come on board, while we were away at Kasr Ibrim. There was a steam dahabeah moored not far off, if you remember, with Oriental decorations; so we fancied it must belong to an Egyptian or a Turk.”

“It could easily have been hired at Assuan,” Biddy exclaimed. “And it could have beaten us. We’ve stopped at such heaps of temples where other boats only touch coming back.”

“If there were a plot, as you are always imagining, the dahabeah would have to be near here, too,” Monny laughed incredulously.

“And so it may be. We haven’t seen round the corner of the Great Temple yet.”

“One would think to hear you talk, that you’d expected this poor little sanctuary to be stuffed with murderers, or at the least, kidnappers.”

“Ugh, don’t speak of it!” Biddy shuddered, “Let’s go out into the sunlight again, as quick as ever we can!”

CHAPTER XXVIII

WORTH PAYING FOR

When Anthony says that he will find out things he seldom fails. Perhaps nobody but a green-turbaned Hadji could so speedily have screwed information out of secretive Arabs, paid to be silent. And he had to fit deductions into spaces of the puzzle left empty by fibs and glib self-excusings. What he did learn was this: a dragoman had come, in a small boat, from a steam dahabeah to the _Enchantress Isis_ while we were away at Kasr Ibrim. He presented credentials written out for him in Cairo by Miss Rachel Guest, and dated a few weeks ago. Inquiring for her, he seemed sorry to hear that she had gone on the excursion. The dragoman refused to disturb Antoun Effendi, on hearing that the Hadji was writing in his cabin. His errand was not of enough importance to trouble so illustrious a man. All he wanted was permission to type one or two letters for his employers on the neighbouring dahabeah, which possessed no machine. In the absence of Mr. Kruger, who had gone on shore for exercise, the dragoman was given this privilege. Possibly he had taken some of the boat’s letter-paper. Who could be certain of these trifles? Possibly, also, he had walked about with one of the cabin stewards, to see the luxurious appointments of the _Enchantress Isis_. As for paying money for these small favours, who could tell? And nobody knew if the steam dahabeah had hurried on before us, to anchor out of sight round the oblique façade of Abu Simbel. In any case, when we went to look for the suspicious craft seen near Kasr Ibrim, she was not among the two or three small private dahabeahs of artists and others, moored within a mile of the Great Temple. Notwithstanding her absence, however, Anthony and I (suddenly confidential friends again) thought it likely that the shadows in the Sanctuary had not been its only tenants when we entered there. The invaluable Bedr knew enough of the Nile Temples to know that the sun’s first light strikes only the altar and the statues over it, in Abu Simbel’s inner shrine: that the four corners of the small cavern-room remain pitch black, unless the place is artificially illuminated: and that this is never done at sunrise. The dragoman and one or both of his employers would have had no difficulty in getting into the temple before the first streak of dawn, if they had warned its guardian the night before. So far, our deductions were simple, after learning how the trick of the typewritten note had been managed: but it was not so easy to guess the object of the plot. Was Monny Gilder to have been murdered in the dark Sanctuary, or was she to have been kidnapped? Either seemed an impossible undertaking, unless the plotters were willing to face certain detection and arrest.

As it was, we had no more tangible proof against the man than we had before, at the House of the Crocodile, in the desert near Medinet, at Asiut, and at Luxor. With a sly cleverness which did Bedr, or those employing him, much credit, they had screened themselves behind others. Even if we had the names of the “tourists” Bedr had served as dragoman, and if we could lay our hands on their shoulders, we had not enough evidence of what they had done to obtain a warrant of arrest: and this of course they knew. Our best chance, Anthony thought, lay in springing a surprise on them, as they had vainly (so far) tried to do with us; and when we got them somehow at our mercy, force out the truth.

It was almost certain that a steam dahabeah could not unseen have passed the _Enchantress Isis_ at Abu Simbel in broad daylight, going back toward Assuan. Therefore, since it was not moored near the temple, if it had been in the neighbourhood at all it must have dashed on ahead of us in the direction of Wady Haifa. With pleasure would we have given immediate chase, had not the _Enchantress_ been pledged to remain at Abu Simbel till afternoon. Even as it was, I expected to catch up with a boat so much smaller than our own; but Anthony damped my hopes, explaining the difficulties of navigation between Abu Simbel and Wady Haifa. There were, he said, great shifting sandbanks in the water which looked so transparently green, so treacherously clear. Without the most prudent piloting the river was actually dangerous, as new sandbanks had a habit of forming the minute you shut your eyes or turned your back. The _Enchantress_ would have to pick her way slowly through the silver sands of the Nile, which mingled with the spilt gold-dust of the desert shore. All the same, these impudent rascals would find it hard to hide from us at Wady Haifa, especially if we stopped the boat and wired from the next telegraph station to have them watched on the arrival of their dahabeah.

“Perhaps, as they’re so clever they’ll be clever enough not to arrive at all,” was my suggestion. And Anthony could only shrug his shoulders. “Wait and see” had to be our policy.

Happily the Set wandered in and out of the two temples, big and little, all the morning, ignorant of our worries which, even to us, seemed small under the benign gaze of the great Colossi. The three stone Rameses who had faces, wore expressions no one could ever forget; and there was a sense of loss in turning away from them.

A crocodile swam past the _Enchantress_ as she steamed up river; a long, dark, prehistoric shape. He seemed an anachronism, but so did Bedr, with his plottings; yet both were real, real as this Nile-dream of dark rocks, of conical black mountains shaped like ruined pyramids, and yellow sandhills whose dazzling reflections turned the blue-green river to gold.

The next day at noon, we came to Wady Halfa; and the _Enchantress Isis_ who had brought us eight hundred miles from Cairo, was now to be deserted by those with Khartum in view. All save three of the party were going on through this gate of the Sudan, where the river way ended and the desert-way began. Neill Sheridan was turning back immediately, in a government steamer; and a bride and groom who cared not where they were, if with each other, would wait on board the _Enchantress_ until the band of passengers should return from Khartum.

These things had to be thought of. But I meant to let Kruger do most of the thinking, when we landed at the neat, colourful town of Halfa, which lies (as Assuan lies) all pink and blue and green along the river bank, sentinelled with trees. From a distance Anthony and I caught sight of the steam dahabeah seen near Kasr Ibrim, and we could hardly wait to get on shore. The camp was but a mile and a half away, and I had wired in Lark’s name, to an officer whom he was sure to know, asking as a great favour to have the passengers on board a boat of that description watched; and requesting him if possible to meet the _Enchantress_ on her arrival. “There he is!” said Fenton, standing at the rail. “I mustn’t seem to recognise him, of course. Can’t give myself away! But you–” “Good Lord, there’s Bedr!” I broke in, hardly believing my eyes. And there Bedr was, looking as if butter would by no means melt in his mouth: Bedr, smiling from the pier, evidently there for the special purpose of meeting us. His ugly squat figure, and the tall, khaki-clad form of the officer, were conspicuous among squatting blacks, male and female, in gay turbans, veils, and mantles, muffled babies in arms, and children dressed in exceedingly brief fringes.

“I’ll attend to him, while you powwow with Ireton,” said Anthony, ready for the unexpected situation. And while the indispensable if humble Kruger showed the passengers how to get to the desert train, superintended the landing of the luggage, and made himself perspiringly useful, I thanked Major Ireton in Sir Marcus Lark’s and my own name.

His news was astonishing. There were no passengers on board the steam dahabeah _Mamoudieh_. She had arrived with none save her crew, and the dragoman now talking with that good-looking Hadji there. As I murmured “Yes,” and “No,” and “Indeed–Really!” to the officer, who had kindly worked on our behalf, I was saying to myself, “My _dear_ Duffer, what an ass you were not to think of that!” For of course the men had remained at Abu Simbel, hiding till we should be out of the way, and sending their boat on to put us off the track. A Cook steamer and a Hamburgh-American boat were due to stop at the temple. We had passed both on the river. By this time the two men were doubtless on their way north, making for Cairo and safety.

Still, here was Bedr, looking like a fat fly who had deliberately come to pay a call on the lean and hungry spider. I was impatient for the moment when the need for genuine gratitude and “faked” explanations was over, and Major Ireton had gone about other business.

Then I could follow the Hadji and the Armenian, who had mounted the steps leading up from river-level to the town. Not far off I could see the blue-windowed, white-painted desert train, round which, on the station platform, buzzed and scolded the Set, demanding their hand-luggage and their compartments. But Anthony and his victim (or was it by chance vice versa?) were keeping out of eyeshot and earshot of the late passengers of the _Enchantress_. Brigit and Monny, who must have seen Bedr, were too tactful to hover near: also they knew “Antoun Effendi” too well to think it necessary.

Bedr gave me no time to speak. He rushed forward to greet me with effusion, as if I were a long-lost and well-loved patron. “I bin so glad see you again after these days, milord. Sure!” he began. “Antoun Effendi, he tell you I come here on purpose to do you good. I find out those genlemens very wicked men, so I leave them quick. They want to pay me for go back with them, but no money big enough now I know they try to do harm to my nice young lady. She wasn’t so good to me as the other nice young lady, but that makes no matter. I not stand for any hurt to her, sure I will not, milord.”

“The meaning of this rigmarole,” Anthony cut him short, speaking in German (which he knew I understood and trusted Bedr didn’t) “is, that the fellow wants us to buy information from him. He pretends to have broken with his employers on our account (though his explanation of getting here to Halfa on their dahabeah is ridiculous) and that, having come for our benefit against their wishes, he’s without pay, penniless, and stranded.”

“A lie of course,” I took for granted, also in German.

“The part about being broke–certainly. But it’s certain, too, that he must know some things we’d like to know.”

“Could we trust a word he says?”

“No, as far as his moral sense is concerned. But my idea is to bargain with him. We to pay according to value received. That might be bait for a fish worth hooking.”

“Yes, that’s our line. We haven’t much time to hear and digest his story, though. The train will start in less than an hour.”

“We shan’t waste a minute. Without waiting for you, I began to bargain on the line I’ve just suggested.”

“How far did you get?”

“A good way, for I was able to scare him a bit. You see, he earns his living in Cairo, and I’ve persuaded him that I have some influence there, in quarters that can make or break him. He hasn’t much more time to spare than we have, if it’s true that he wants to start back on the government boat. You know they take natives, third class. My suggestion, subject to your approval, is this: in any case we give a thousand piasters, ten pounds. But if what he can tell us is of real use or even interest, we rise to the extent of ten times that sum.”

“It’s a good deal for a beastly baboon like him.”

“Remember, he has been doing services lately for which he probably got high pay.”

“All right, whatever you say, goes,” I agreed.

“I trust to your honours, my genlemens,” remarked the beastly baboon in question, in a manner so apropos that I guessed him not entirely ignorant of German, after all.

“Thanks for the compliment,” I responded gratefully.

“We shall have to talk here. There’s no time to find a more convenient place,” said Fenton, returning to Arabic as a medium of communication. “Fire away, Bedr. But don’t start your story in the middle. Begin where you took service with these Irish-American gentlemen.”

“Was the genlemens Irish? I never know that,” purred the guileless Bedr; but Fenton brought him to his bearings. All questions were to be from us to him. So Bedr “fired away”: and there, within a stone’s throw of the train getting up steam for Khartum, we listened to a strange tale–as strange, and as great an anachronism as that dark crocodile-shape we had seen–except in the Nile country, where live crocodiles and many other dark things can easily happen any day.

Blount’s name, according to Bedr, was not Blount, but something else, well-known in America. It was a name already associated with that of O’Brien, which inclined us to hope for some grains of truth in the chaff of lies we expected. Bedr said that in New York, years ago, he had known the man “Blount.” He was related to the American family who took Bedr from Cairo. Later, when the Armenians had returned to Egypt, “Blount” had come with him, for a “rest cure.” He had engaged Bedr as dragoman, and on leaving had asked for Bedr’s card. That was years ago, and nothing had been heard from him since: but before the _Laconia_ was due to arrive, Bedr had received a telegram from Blount instructing him to meet the ship, and wire to Paris whether Miss Gilder of New York and a “Mrs. Jones” were on board, with a party. “Blount” knew that Bedr had seen Miss Gilder as a child, and might now be able to recognize her. On the day in New York when a block in traffic had given a glimpse of the little girl in a motor-car with her father, Bedr and “Blount” had been together.

As soon as possible after Bedr’s reply, “Blount” and another man, who called himself Hanna, had arrived in Cairo. Bedr knew that they had a fixed theory in regard to the young lady who passed as Miss Gilder. Who they supposed her to be, he could not tell; but once he had “happened” to be near, when they were not aware of his presence, and had heard one of them mention a woman’s name, which sounded like “Esny.” They accepted his word that he had been able to identify the so-called Miss Guest as Rosamond Gilder, and in her they appeared to take no further interest. Their attention was concentrated on Mrs. Jones and on the lady who, according to their belief, was but posing as Miss Gilder. Apparently they imagined her to be quite another person, one whom they had taken a great deal of trouble to reach. Also they had an idea that Mrs. Jones possessed something of which they were anxious to get hold. It was a thing which ought to be theirs, and they had been after it for years; but she had contrived to hide herself and it, until lately.

Why he had been told to guide the two younger ladies to the House of the Crocodile, Bedr pretended not to know. Perhaps–only perhaps –Blount and his companion, Hanna, wished to kidnap the one we called Miss Gilder, and they called “Esney.” But good, kind Bedr had never dreamed that they meant any real harm. There had been a plan of some sort for that night. Blount and Hanna were to arrive at the House of the Crocodile for a close look at the young ladies, when the latter had gone to sleep under the influence of the hasheesh they intended to smoke. But the two gentlemen had not kept the appointment. At first, Bedr had not understood why, and had not known what to do. Afterward, of course, when he had heard of the row in the street, which had caused the closing of the house for many tedious hours, he had guessed. And later when he learned that poor Mr. Blount lay wounded in a hospital, it had all become clear. Mr. Hanna, who seemed to work under Mr. Blount’s orders, had not been able to act alone.

Then, as to all the travelling up the Nile, Bedr had never been told why “his genlemen” made the journey. Every one who came to Egypt went up the Nile. Only, he had been instructed to find out, always, where we were, and told to arrange their arrival at about the same time. At Medinet they had not camped, or gone to an hotel, but had stayed in the house of a friend of Bedr’s. It was convenient, though not as comfortable as he could wish for his clients. The advantage was, that from the roof it was possible to see into our camp. Bedr had made friends with one of the camel-boys who went to market to buy the black lamb: and while we were away, had found out which was the tent where Mrs. Jones and Miss Gilder (or “Esney”) slept. What happened in the night he could not say. He had stayed at his friend’s house, while the two gentlemen went out. He had done nothing at all for them in Medinet, except to discover the ladies’ tent, and also to buy a bottle of olive oil. When the gentlemen came home in the middle of the night, they were angry with him because they said he had shown them the wrong tent. But that was unjust. It was the only time they had been unkind. Except for that, they had been good, and had given him plenty of money for a while. At Asiut and Luxor they had been pleased with him. All they wanted at Rechid Bey’s house, was to get the thing Mrs. Jones had, which ought to be theirs. They had not told him this, but he heard them talk sometimes. He knew more languages than they thought. If they wanted to steal the young lady, they had never said so. When the plan failed, they did not blame Bedr. It was not his fault. They saw that.

The _Mamoudieh_ had been engaged as long ago as just after Medinet, when the thing the gentlemen wanted to do there could not be done. But Bedr thought that, if the Luxor plan had been a success, the steam dahabeah would have gone north from there instead of south. It was because of that failure the boat had followed us up the Nile. At Abu Simbel Bedr had quarrelled with the gentlemen, because he began to suspect they meant harm to the ladies, or to one of them. He had been clever, and got on board the _Enchantress_ as they told him to do. He had obtained writing-paper, and typed a copy of a letter. In America, he had learned to do typing. Often he could make better money in an engagement now, because he knew how to use a machine. And when the steward showed him over the boat, he left the letter in the stateroom which the Arab boy said was Miss Gilder’s. In spite of all these good services, which no other dragoman in Egypt could have given, those gentlemen would not listen to a word of advice. Bedr heard them speak with the guardian of the temple, about going in before any one else came to see the sunrise: and afterward they talked of hiding in the Sanctuary. First, they had asked him if it were always dark there, as the guide-books said. After hearing this he had put two and two together: and when he remembered what was in the note he typed for Miss Gilder, Bedr feared for her and Mrs. Jones. He begged the gentlemen not to do anything rash, and they were so angry at his interference that they sent him off with no more pay–nothing at all since Luxor.

Oh, no, they were not afraid of him, and what he could tell, because they said nobody would believe a dragoman’s word, against rich white gentlemen. People would say he lied, for spite. But Bedr thought maybe we should believe, because we knew already that something strange had been going on. The gentlemen paid off the men on the _Mamoudieh_ and ordered her to go on to Wady Halfa. They did not know that Bedr had slipped on board, and hidden there, on purpose to find us, and tell his story.

A part of this tale carried truth on its face. But Anthony and I agreed that there was a queer discrepancy at the end. If Bedr spoke the truth, Blount and his comrade must have had a reason for wishing to get rid of the fellow, or for not caring what became of him, a reason unconnected with a quarrel. And it was certain that, if there had been a quarrel, it was not because of virtuous plain-speaking from Bedr. It seemed impossible that he could have got on board their hired boat to follow us, without his employers’ knowledge. Was his appearance at Wady Halfa, and his apparent betrayal of his clients, all a part of their plan?

We could not decide this question in our minds, or by cross-questioning Bedr, while the train waited, for only time could prove. But what we had heard was interesting enough to be worth the promised thousand piasters, and the fare north on the government boat just starting. To make sure that Bedr did start, we called Kruger, put the whole sum into his hands, asking him to help the dragoman by buying his ticket and getting the notes changed into gold and silver. This little manoeuvre left the Armenian so calm, however, that we fancied his wish must really be to depart on the government boat. Such inquiries as we had time to make concerning the _Mamoudieh_ seemed to show that she must remain at Halfa for slight repairs to her engine, and instructions from her owner, who was staying at Assuan. It was just at the last minute of grace, with the station-master adjuring, and the Set reproaching us, that Anthony and I jumped on board the train.

* * * * *

Strange that two rows of blue glass windows should have power to turn the whole world topsy-turvy, or to create a new one, of an entirely original colour-scheme! But so it was. Those people seated in their grand, travelling “bed-sitting rooms,” had only a superficial resemblance to the passengers of the _Enchantress Isis_. Monny, for instance, had pale green hair, with immense purple eyes; and showed every sign of rapid transformation into a mermaid. Cleopatra’s auburn waves had turned to a vivid magenta: Biddy’s black tresses had a blue, grapey bloom on them: and Anthony’s dark eyes were a sinister green, with red lights. Ghostly, mother o’ pearl faces with opal shadows, peered through the violet glass at an unreal landscape, which would instantly cease to exist if the windows were opened. But the windows could not be opened, or a rain of sand would pour in; so we gazed out on an impossible fairy land consisting of golden sea, with mountainous shores carved from amethyst, through which shone the glow of pulsing fires. Always we carried with us an immense shadow, like a trailing purple banner, unfurling as we moved. Men and women and animals seen at the numbered white stations in the sand, were but fantastic figures in a camera obscura. The shadow of the train was torn with fiery streaks: and when the sun had burned to death on a red funeral-pyre, the moon stole out to mourn for him. Her coming was sudden. She seemed abruptly to draw aside a hyacinth curtain, and hold up a lamp over the desert, when the sun’s fire had died. And the lamp gave forth an unearthly light, which poured over the endless sands a sheet of primrose-yellow flame. The warm sun-shadow was chilled from purple to gray, and flowed over the magic primrose fields like a river of molten silver.

At Number Six Station, where we stopped for water after dinner, a hyena came galumping over the sand like a humpbacked dog, to stare at us, as we strolled in couples away from the train into the desert. Next morning, every one was up early to see the gray hornets’ nest huts which were Sudanese villages, and the villagers themselves, who urged us to buy straw rugs, baskets, fans, oranges, dried beans, live birds, and milk in wooden bowls, whenever the train stopped: respectable old ladies, dressed in short fringes, and small, full-stomached boys dressed in nothing at all.

I had not told Biddy about our bargain with Sir Marcus: Anthony’s and my services in exchange for the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid. Why should she be forced to share our suspense? For she would share it, if she knew, even though she didn’t yet yield to me, in the matter of a united future. I wanted to wait before telling her the story, until Fenton and I had made sure if there were anything golden about the mountain, except its name. If we were doomed to disappointment I could then give the tale a humorous turn, easier to do in retrospect than anticipation. Now, when in blinding light of noon we pointed out, in an impersonal manner, to all who cared to see, the pyramid-field of Meröe, it seemed strange to think that no heart but Anthony’s and mine beat the faster. The sun was so hot that most people, blinking dazedly, retired behind their screens of blue glass almost as soon as the train stopped, close to Garstang’s camp. I had informed the Set, casually, that wonderful things were being found here in the rocky desert: that the few neat white tents sheltered men who were going to make of Meröe a world’s wonder: that not only had the army of stunted black pyramids visible from the train, yielded up treasures, but three tiers of palaces were being unearthed, or rather, unsanded. I said nothing, however, of the more distant dark shapes, like the pyramids yet unlike them. Among those low, conical mountains which perhaps gave inspiration to the pyramid builders, was our mountain. And I was not sorry when the burning sun smote curiosity from eyes and brains, and sent nearly all my flock back to their places, while the train had still some minutes at the station.

Cleopatra had not come out. She had frankly lost interest in scenic history, and did not want to be intelligent: but as Anthony and I stepped off the train, we saw that Brigit and Monny stood arm in arm in the doorway.

“Would you like to jump down?” I asked, reluctantly. For the first time I did not wish Biddy O’Brien to give me her society. I hoped she would say “No, thank you,” for I wanted Fenton to point out our mountain (which he had told me could be seen): and it would be inconvenient to answer questions.

“Yes, we should like it,” they both replied together: so Anthony and I had to look delighted. It really was a pleasure to help them down: but even that we could have waited for till our arrival at Khartum. And the first remark that Biddy made was too intelligent. “What are those weird things off there in the distance, that look exactly like ruined pyramids–sort of mudpie pyramids?”

“Mountains,” said Fenton.

“What, didn’t anybody _make_ them?”

“The legend is, that Djinns, or evil spirits, created them to use as tombs for themselves.”

“But they’re almost precisely like the made pyramids, only a little more tumbledown. Have they names?”

“Some have, I believe,” Anthony returned, with his well-put-on air of indifference. “That blackest and most ruined looking one of all, for instance, between two which are taller–there, away to the left, I mean–that is called the ‘Mountain of the Golden Pyramid.'”

Our eyes met over the girls’ veiled hats. After all, he had found an opportunity of telling me what I wanted to know.

“What a fascinating name!” said Monny. “It sounds as if there were some special story connected with it. Is there?”

“Ye–es,” Anthony was obliged to admit. “There is a legend that it was used as a tomb by the first Queen Candace, who lived about two hundred years B.C. after Ptolemy Philadelphus. She used to reign over what they called the “Island of Meröe.” It was this once fertile kingdom, between the Atbara River over there, and the Blue Nile. They say she wished to be buried with all her jewels and treasure, and was afraid of her tomb being robbed, so she wouldn’t trust to a man-made pyramid. She ordered a secret place to be hollowed out in the heart of a mountain; and that’s the one they pretend it is.”

“What a lovely legend! But I suppose there’s nothing in it, really, or clever people like those who’re digging here now would have found the tomb and the treasure long ago,” said Monny.

“I don’t know,” I left Anthony to answer; wondering what he would say. “Only a very few have ever put enough faith in the story to search, and they have never been able to discover traces of an entrance into that mountain or any other. Of course, in trying to enter the great pyramid of Ghizeh, they looked a long time before they succeeded. But that was different. There was never any doubt of there being something worth seeing, inside, whereas this black lump may be solid rock, and nothing more. It’s many years since anybody has tried to get at the secret.”

“I beg your pardon,” politely said (in French) an elderly man, in a pith helmet, blue spectacles, and khaki clothes, who stood near. “I couldn’t help hearing your conversation; and it may interest you and these ladies to learn that at this very moment work is going on at the so-called Mountain of the Golden Pyramid.”

I envied Anthony the brown stain on his face, for I felt the blood rushing to mine.

“Indeed!” I ejaculated in English. “We are very much interested. Work –actually going on!”

“Yes, it was begun about four or five weeks ago, by an agent of Sir Marcus Lark, the well-known financier, who got the concession which some other party was said to be trying for. I am here,” went on the helmeted man, gazing benevolently through his blue spectacles at the two pretty women, “I am here with my son, who is one of Garstang’s men. We have nothing to do with the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid. Luckily for Sir Marcus, it was adjudged to be off our ‘pitch.’ Still, we are interested. They are keeping their work very secret, but–these things are in the air. The talk here is that they’re on the point of making, if they haven’t made already, some very startling discovery.”

“All aboard, _if_ you please!” shouted the Greek guard.

CHAPTER XXIX

EXIT ANTOUN

If there had been no Brigit and no Monny in the world we should have let that train go on without us, and–hang the Set and its feelings! But there was a Brigit; there was a Monny; and they were more to us than all the treasure Sir Marcus was apparently stealing while we slaved.

What fools we had been to trust in such a man! And I had actually wasted pity on the fellow. Now, as we were borne away from Meröe, we saw our hopes, which had begun to seem certainties, dissolving into air. They were like the mirage of the desert which lured us with siren enchantment and mystery in this Never-Never-land which thousands of brave men had died to win: shimmering blue lakes, that mirrored green trees and low purple mountains, and the gold of sand-dunes, so real, so near, it seemed we might walk to them in a few moments: only mocking dreams, like our belief in a famous financier’s loyalty; like our hopes of fortune. For if Sir Marcus Lark had secretly begun work at the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid, it meant that he intended to steal everything best worth having, for himself.

It was maddening to realize that we might be too late to thwart him, but we had to risk this, or risk losing something dearer than the jewels of a Queen Candace. Anthony was staking the happiness of his future on the events of the following night. Now that the small cloud of misunderstanding had passed from the clear sky of our friendship, we were one again in confidence, as we had been before the Philae eavesdropping: and I knew the plan he meant to carry out at the Sirdar’s ball. It was rather a melodramatic plan, perhaps, but somehow it fitted into the circumstances of his queer courtship, and I could see why Anthony preferred it to any other more conventional. As for me, I too counted on Khartum to give me a present of happiness. Bedr’s story, largely false as it might be, must have a basis of truth. I’d ceased to argue with Biddy. “We’ll leave the subject of the future alone till we get to Khartum,” I had said. She thought, maybe, that she had half convinced me of her worldly wisdom. But this was far from being the case. I was only waiting to see whether my theory were right or wrong. I couldn’t know until Khartum: and nothing on earth, or hidden under earth, would have induced me to put off the moment of finding out.

North Khartum was standing in a mirage as we approached. And Fenton and I were superstitious enough to wonder if it were a bad omen, that lovely lake which was not there, reflecting clearly each white and ochre-coloured house of the city in the sand. Only the blue glitter of the Nile was real, as the train crossed the river on a high bridge, and landed us in the surprising garden of beauty which is Khartum itself. Wide streets, bordered with flowering trees, rose-pink acacias and coral pendants of pepper-berries; lawns green as velvet; big, verandaed houses of silver-gray or ruddy stone; roses climbing over hedge and wall; scent of lilies and magnolias floating in an air clear as crystal; droning sakkeyehs spraying pearls over the warm bodies of slow-moving oxen; white sails like butterflies’ wings dotting the Blue Nile: this was the new city created as if by magic, in sixteen years, upon the sad ruins of Gordon’s stronghold.

On the wide veranda of the Grand Hotel, where pretty girls were giving tea to young officers in khaki, Fenton came up to Brigit and Monny, who were questioning me about letters. The look on his face struck the girl into silence.

“What is it?” she asked, almost sharply.

“Don’t let me interrupt you,” he said. “I can wait a few minutes.”

“No,” Monny insisted. “Please speak. I know it’s something important.”

“Important only to myself, perhaps,” he answered, with a smile that was rather wistful. “I have to say good-bye now.”

“Good-bye?” echoed Monny, surprised and even frightened, more by his look and tone than the words themselves.

“My engagement with Sir Marcus Lark ended when our train stopped at Khartum. I have other business to attend to here. I’ve just made my adieux with everybody else. I saved you till the last.”

Monny was pale. Even the fresh young rose that was her mouth had blanched. Otherwise she controlled herself perfectly. Was this part of Anthony’s plan? I wondered. He had told me what he intended to do at the Palace ball to-morrow night; but he had said nothing about this preliminary scene. I understood, however, why he had not manoeuvred to get Monny to himself, in a deserted corner of this big ground-floor balcony of the hotel. Even when with the Set it was a question of getting their tea, or looking at their rooms, eyes were always ready to observe Miss Gilder, especially since it was “in the air” that she really _was_ Miss Gilder–“_the_ Miss Gilder.” He did not want Miss Hassett-Bean and Mrs. Harlow to be saying: “Look, my dear, at the tragic, private farewell Antoun Effendi and our American Beauty are having!” Since Philae, there would have been no use in trying to conceal his feelings for Monny from Brigit or me. Therefore we made useful chaperons, and could be regarded as dummies.

“You never told me you were leaving us at Khartum,” the girl stammered. “I thought–” But, though we knew what she thought, she could go no further before an audience.

“My business prevents me from staying at the hotel,” Anthony explained. “And–though I shall see you, never again will you see poor Ahmed Antoun.”

“I don’t understand,” Monny said.

“I know. But that was what we agreed upon. You promised to trust me without understanding. To-morrow night, at the Sirdar’s ball, you will understand. I’ve arranged with Lord Ernest that you and Mrs. Jones and Mrs. East and he shall write your names in the book at the Palace. Then you will all receive invitations for the ball; you four only, of the party.”

“And you will be there?”

“I’ve just told you,” Anthony repeated, “that Antoun is saying good-bye to you forever.”

“Yet you told me, too, that after Khartum I should be hap–” She cut herself short, and shut her lips closely. I was angry with Fenton for what seemed cruelty to one who had very nobly confessed her love for him. Biddy’s eyes protested, too; but the man and the girl cared no more for us or our criticism, at that moment, than if we had been harmless, necessary chairs for them to sit upon.

“There are many paths to happiness,” Fenton answered. “I shall see you to-morrow night, and I shall know whether you are happy. Meanwhile I say again–trust me. And good-bye.”

He held out his strong, nervous hand, so browned by the sun that it needed little staining for the part he had played–and was to play no more. As if mechanically, Monny Gilder laid her hand in it. They looked into each other’s eyes, which were almost on a level, so tall was she. Then Antoun Effendi turned abruptly away, forgetting apparently that he had not taken leave of Brigit or me.

“Let’s go upstairs at once, dear, and see our rooms,” Biddy said quickly.

An instant later, I stood alone on the veranda. But I knew well enough where to find Captain Anthony Fenton when I wanted him, although the death knell of Antoun was sounding. I was not in the least melancholy, and despite the tense emotion of that short scene, I had never felt less sentimental in my life. My whole being concentrated itself in a desire to visit the post-office, and to bash Sir Marcus Lark’s head.

When Anthony came up for his farewell I had been asking Brigit and Monny if they expected letters at the Poste Restante. Both said no, but advised by me, they gave me their cards, armed with which I could ask for letters and obtain them if there were any. “It’s very unlikely any one will address me there,” Biddy had assured me. “The only letter I’m hoping for will come to the hotel.”

I was not jealous: because I was sure the said letter was from Esmé O’Brien, now for weal or woe Mrs. Halloran. The letter I hoped for would be from a very different person, though if it materialized it would certainly mention the runaway bride. And if such a letter came to Khartum, the place to look for it, I thought, would be the Poste Restante. The writer not being a personal friend of Mrs. O’Brien, and presumably not knowing Khartum, could not be certain at which hotel she would stop.

I was hurrying away, a few minutes later, to prove once and for all whether I were a budding Sherlock Holmes or merely an imaginative fool, when a servant came out from the hotel and handed me a telegram.

“_Lark!_” I read the signature at the end with a snort of rage. “I wonder he has the cheek to–” But by that time I was getting at the meat of the message. “What the dev–by Jove! Here’s a complication!” I heard myself mutter a running accompaniment to Marcus Lark’s words–

This is what he had to say on two sheets of paper:

LORD ERNEST BORROW, Grand Hotel, Khartum:

In train leaving Assuan met man from Meröe told me work begun at our place strange news don’t understand but sure you two haven’t gone ahead of bargain must be foul play or else mistake but thought matter too serious go on north left train returned Assuan caught government steamer for Halfa just arrived too late for train de luxe but will proceed by ordinary train to camp better meet me there soon as possible leaving boat people take care of themselves. Wire Kabushîa Lark.

His loyalty to us shamed me. We had not given him the benefit of the doubt, but had at once believed the worst. He, though “not a gentleman” in the opinion of Colonel Corkran and some others, was chivalrously sure that we had “not gone ahead of the bargain!” A revulsion of feeling gave me a spasm of something like affection for the big fellow whom his adored Cleopatra sneered at as “common.”

I longed to show the telegram to Anthony; but he would now be at the Palace, reporting to the Sirdar. Later he would be at his own quarters, transforming himself from a pale brown Hadji in a green turban into a sunburned young British officer in uniform. Meantime I would go to the Poste Restante, and then (whatever the result of the visit) I would return, collect Brigit and Monny, and take them to the Palace to write their names in the book.

I dare not think what my blood pressure must have been as I waited for a post-office official to look through a bundle of letters.

“Mrs. B. Jones,” he murmured. “No, nothing for B. Jones–unless it’s O’Brien Jones. Here’s a letter addressed to Mrs. O’Brien Jones.”

“That’s it,” said I, swallowing heavily, “Mrs. O’Brien Jones. I think the letter must be postmarked Assuan.”

Without further hesitation the post-office man handed me the envelope, on the strength of Mrs. B. Jones’ visiting card.

Going out of the office, I walked on air. “Sherlock Holmes it is!” I congratulated myself. And I ventured to be wildly happy, because it seemed to me that a letter sent to Mrs. O’Brien Jones, from Assuan, could mean only one thing; a justification of my theory.

I went straight to Biddy’s door and knocked. There was no answer, and I stood fuming with impatience on the upstairs balcony, upon which each bedroom opens. It seemed impossible to live another minute without putting that letter into Biddy’s hand. And not for the world would I have let it come to her from any one else. I was tempted to tear open the envelope, but before I had time to test my character, Biddy appeared on the balcony, coming round the corner from Monny’s room.

“Why, Duffer! You look as if the sky had fallen!” she exclaimed.

“It has,” I returned. “It’s lying all over the place. There’s a bit of it in this letter. A bit of heaven, maybe.”

“A letter for me?”

“Yes. And if you aren’t quick about opening it I’ll commit hari kari.”

She was quick about opening it.

As she read, almost literally my eyes were glued to her face. It went white, then pink. “Thank heaven!” I said within myself. If she had been pink first and white afterward, I should have been alarmed. For a woman’s colour to blossom warmly from a snowfield, means good news.

“Duffer!” she breathed. “Do you–know–what’s in this?”

“I–thought it would come.” My voice sounded rather queer. I’d fancied I had more self-control. “That’s why I–wanted your card–for the Poste Restante.”

“Read this,” she said, and gave me the open letter.

It was written on paper of a hotel at Assuan, near the railway station, and was as follows:

MADAM: Let me explain frankly before I go further, that my name is Thomas Macmahan. You may remember it. If you do, you will not think it strange that I–as a private person, as well as a member of a Society–whose name it is not necessary to mention–wanted certain papers you were supposed to possess. For a long time I, and others almost equally interested, tried to trace you, after learning that you had the documents, or in any case knew where they were. Naturally we were prepared to go far in order to make you give them up. We believed that your step-daughter was with you. As the need was pressing, and we had failed more than once, we would, if necessary, have worked upon your feelings through her. Had we questioned you, and you had replied that we were mistaken concerning the young lady and the papers, we should have been incredulous. But accident enabled us to hear from your own lips, details which we could not disbelieve. As a woman we wish you no harm, therefore we rejoice in this turn of events, for your sake. Your step-daughter must now be _one of us_, through her husband. She has nothing further to fear, much as we regret her marriage into a family so deeply injured by her father. As for you, Madam, you may be at rest where we are concerned. You said to Lord Ernest Borrow in the Temple of Abu Simbel, that you could never be happy, until the Organization Richard O’Brien betrayed, “forgot and forgave his daughter and yourself.” Through me, the Organisation now formally both forgets and forgives.

Wishing you well in future, Yours truly,

T. MACMAHAN (alias Blount).

P. S. Kindly acknowledge receipt of this letter in care of Bedr el Gemály whose address you have at Cairo. Not hearing from you, we shall try to communicate this news in some other way. The present method has occurred to us, as you may find it useful to know the state of affairs without delay.

“Oh, Biddy, _do_ you find it useful?” I asked.

She held out her hands to me. There was no one on the veranda just then and I kissed her.

“Mine!” I said. “What a gorgeous place Khartum would be, to be married in!”

* * * * *

Monny was very brave next day. She went to Omdurman with the rest of us. And it was the chance of a lifetime, because (through Anthony) Slatin Pasha himself took us to the place of his captivity: Slatin Pasha, slim, soldierly, young, vital and brilliant. It was scarcely possible to believe that this man, who looked no more than thirty-five, and radiated energy, could have passed eleven years in slavery terrible beyond description. He spoke of those experiences almost lightly, as if telling the story of some one else, and it was “all in the day’s work” that he should have triumphed over his persecutors in a way more complete, more dramatic than any author of romance would dare invent for his hero.

He took us, from the river-steps in front of his own big, verandaed house, down the Blue Nile in a fast steam launch. It was a Nile as blue as turquoise; and after the low island of Tuli had been left behind it was strange to see the junction of the Blue and the White Niles, in a quarrelsome swirl of sharply divided colours. Landing on the shore at Omdurman, we met carts loaded with elephant-tusks, and wagons piled with hides. Giant men, like ebony statues, walked beside pacing camels white as milk. The vegetable market was a town of little booths: the grain markets had gathered riches of green and orange-gold. Farther on, in the brown shadows of the roughly roofed labyrinth of bazaars, were stores of sandalwood, and spices smelling like Araby the blest; open-fronted shops showing splendid leopard skins, crocodile heads bristling with knives, carved tusks of elephants, shields, armour said to have been captured from crusaders; Abyssinian spears, swords and strange headgear used by the Mahdi’s and Khalifa’s men. The bazaars of Cairo and even Assuan seemed tame and sophisticated compared to this wild market of the Sudan, where half the men, and all the bread-selling women who were old enough, had been the Khalifa’s slaves.

With Slatin Pasha we went to the Khalifa’s “palace” to gaze at the “saint’s” carriage, the skeleton of Gordon’s piano, and scores of ancient guns which had cut short the lives of Christian men. Slatin’s house we saw, too, and the gate whence he had escaped: the Mahdi’s shattered tomb, and the famous open-air Mosque.

Then we had a run up the Blue Nile, as far as “Gordon’s Tree,” and lunched on board the launch. In the afternoon, back at Khartum again, there was still time to group round the statue of Gordon on his camel, holding the short stick that was his only weapon, and gazing over the desert. The Set were allowed to walk through the Palace gardens, to behold the spot at the head of the grand staircase, where Gordon fell, and to have a glimpse, in the Sirdar’s library, of the Khalifa’s photograph, taken after death. This was a special favour, and as they knew nothing about the four invitations to the ball, they were satisfied with their day.

Dinner was in the illuminated garden of the hotel: and when it was over, I smuggled Brigit and Monny and Cleopatra inconspicuously away. No one suspected; and if the lovely dresses worn by Mrs. East and Miss Gilder were commented upon, doubtless aunt and niece were merely supposed to be “showing off.”

Never, I think, had Monny come so near to being a great beauty. In her dress of softly folding silver cloth she was a tall white lily. She wore no jewels except a string of pearls, and there was no colour about her anywhere, except the deep violet her hazel eyes took on at night, and the brown-gold of her hair. Even her lips were pale as they had been when Antoun bade her good-bye. Hers was no gay, dancing mood. She was going to the ball because Antoun Effendi had ordered, rather than asked, her to go. But she was like some fair, tragic creature on trial for her life, waiting to hear what the verdict of the jury might be.

CHAPTER XXX

THE SIRDAR’S BALL

Biddy, radiating joy, walked beside me with wide-open, eager eyes, taking in every detail of the historic house. She admired the immense hall, whose archways opened into dim, fragrant gardens. She was entranced with the Sudanese band, ink-black giants uniformed in white, playing wild native music in the moonlight. She wanted to stop and make friends with the Shoebill, a super-stork, apparently carved in shining metal, with a bill like an enormous slipper, eyes like the hundredth- part-of-a-second stop in a Kodak, and feet that tested each new tuft of grass on the lawn, as if it were a specimen of some hitherto undiscovered thing.

No question but she was happy! I was proud of her, and proud of myself because my love had power to give her happiness. What matter now if I were being robbed at the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid, by some unknown thief? Neither he nor any one could steal Biddy.

Even Cleopatra seemed pleased to be coming to the Sirdar’s ball, though gloom lay heavy upon her. She wanted to look her best. She wanted to be admired by the officers she was to meet, and to have as many partners as she could split dances for. To be admired by some one was essential to her just now, a soothing medicine to heal the smart of hurt vanity. Monny, I felt, had made herself look beautiful only because she thought that Antoun, unseen, would see her. As we entered the ballroom, her eyes were wistful, searching, yet not expecting to find. He had said that she would never see Antoun again.

I found friends in the ballroom: men I knew at home, and a few pretty women I had met in England or abroad: but there was no more than time to be received by the Aide-de-Camp, and to introduce a few officers to my three ladies, when the moment came for the formal entry of our host and hostess, the soldier-Sirdar and his graceful wife, the Royalties of the Sudan. We were presented: and I guessed at once that the Sirdar had been prepared in advance to take a special interest in Rosamond Gilder.

“Anthony has told him the whole thing, and asked his help,” was my thought. From the instant of his kindly greeting for the girl, I found myself suddenly, excitedly assuming the attitude of a spectator in a theatre, on the night of a new play. I knew the plot of the play, but not how it would be presented, nor how it would work out. I saw that the Sirdar had made up his mind to a certain line of action where Monny was concerned. And by and by, when he had time to spare from his general duties as host, I heard him ask if she would like to go on the roof, where Gordon used to stand watching for the English soldiers to come.

“I will take you,” he said. “And if you like to stay longer than I can stop away from our guests, I’ll give you another guide.”

He turned to Biddy and me. (Cleopatra was dancing with Baron Rudolph von Slatin Pasha, gorgeous in medals and stars: Brigit and I had just stopped.)

“Would you like to come, too?” the Sirdar asked.

I answered for Biddy, knowing what she would want me to say. And still the sense of being a spectator in a wonderful theatre was dreamily upon me. Stronger and stronger the impression grew, as the Sirdar led us out onto a wide loggia white with moonlight, and up a flight of stairs to a flat roof. Overhead a sky of milk was spangled with flashing stars. Beneath our eyes lay the palace gardens, where the torches of the Sudanese band glowed like transfixed fireflies, in the pale moon-rays. Palms and acacias and jewelled flower-beds, were cut out sharply in vivid colour by the lights which streamed from open windows. Beyond –past the zone of violet shadow so like a stage background–was the sheen of the river, bright as spilt mercury under the moon. And beyond again, on the other side of the Nile, the tawny flame of that desert across which came the Khalifa’s fierce army. “This is where Gordon used to stand,” the Sirdar stopped us near the parapet. “Only the roof was one story lower then. He climbed up here every day, till the last, to look out across the desert, saying: ‘The English _will_ come!’ There’s a black gardener I have, who thinks he meets him now, on moonlight nights like this, walking in the garden. It wasn’t much of a garden in his day; only palms and orange trees: but a rose-bush he planted and loved is alive still. I’ve just asked one of my officers –one whom I particularly want you to meet, Miss Gilder–to pluck a rose from Gordon’s bush and bring it to you here. He knows where to find us; and when he comes, I must go back to the ballroom and leave you–all three–to his guidance. Lord Ernest and he used to be friends as boys, I believe. Perhaps you’ve heard him speak of Captain Anthony Fenton?”

“Perhaps. I don’t remember,” Monny answered, apologetically. She, so self-confident and self-possessed, was charmingly shy with this great soldier who had made history in the Sudan.

“If you don’t remember, Lord Ernest can’t have done justice to the subject. Fenton’s one of the finest young officers in Egypt, or indeed, in the service. We’re rather proud of him. Lately he’s been employed on a special mission, which he has carried out extremely well. Few others could have done it, for a man of great audacity and self-restraint was needed: a combination hard to find. He has been in the Balkans. And since, has had a particularly delicate task intrusted to him, to be conducted with absolute secrecy. No ‘kudos’ to be got out of it in case of success. And failure would almost certainly have cost his life. It was a question of disguise, and getting at the native heart.”

“It sounds like something in a story book,” said Monny, while Brigit and I kept mum, drinking in gulps of moonlight.

“Yes,” the Sirdar agreed, “or the autobiography of Sir Richard Burton. Fenton has the same extraordinary gift of language and dialect that Burton had: the art of ‘make-up,’ too; and he’s been to Mecca; a great adventure I believe he had. Perhaps you can get him to talk of it: though he’s not fond of talking about himself. Altogether he’s what I sometimes hear the ladies call ‘a romantic figure.’ His father was a famous soldier. If you were English you would have heard of him. He broke off a brilliant career in Egypt by running away with a beautiful princess. She was practically all Greek and Italian, though her father called himself a Turk: no Egyptian blood whatever. But there was a great row, of course, and Charles Fenton left the Army. Now Anthony Fenton’s grandfather, who lives in Constantinople, would like to adopt his grandson: but the young man is in every sense of the word an Englishman, devoted to his career, and doesn’t want a fortune or a Turkish title.”

“Why, that sounds–” Monny faltered.

“Like a man of character, and a born soldier, doesn’t it? Here he comes now.”

There was a sound of quick, light footsteps on the stairs. In silence we turned to see a tall young officer in uniform walk out upon the flat roof. The moon shone straight into a face grave, yet eager, so deeply sunburned as to be brown even in that pale light: long eyebrows sketched sharply as if in ink–the black lines running down toward the temples; large, sad eyes; a slight upward hitch of the mouth on one side; clear cut Roman nose; aggressive chin.

“Miss Gilder, let me introduce Captain Anthony Fenton,” the Sirdar said.

“I’ve brought you a rose,” said Anthony.

They stood looking at one another for a long moment, the sun-browned British officer, and the pale girl. We, Biddy and I, stared at them both from our distance; and when the spell of the instant had broken, we saw that the Sirdar had gone.

We, too, would have gone, though the man and the girl were between us and the stairway, and we should have had to push past them. But Anthony, seeing our hesitation, spoke quietly. “Don’t go,” he said. “I may want you.”

Never until to-night had Monny Gilder heard him speak English.

“You see,” he said to her, “why I told you yesterday you would never see Antoun again. I had to tell you that, to make sure you would trust me–fully, through everything. You _have_ trusted me, and so you’ve made it possible for me to keep my vow–a wrong and stupid vow, but it had to be kept. When I was angry because you treated me like a servant, I swore that never, no matter how I might be tempted, would I tell you with my own lips who I was–or let Borrow tell. I was going to make myself of importance in your life as Ahmed Antoun, if I could, not as Anthony Fenton. But long before that night at Philae I was ashamed. I –but you said then, you would forgive me. Now, when you understand what you didn’t understand then, can you still say the same?”

“I–hardly know what to say,” she answered. “I don’t know how I feel –about anything.”

“Well, I know, you goose!” exclaimed Biddy, rushing to the rescue, where angels who haven’t learned to think with their hearts might have feared to tread. “You feel so happy you’re afraid you’re going to howl. Why, it’s all perfectly wonderful! And only the silliest, earliest Victorian girls would sulk because they’d been ‘deceived.’ If anybody deceived you, you deceived _yourself_. _I_ knew who he was from the first! So did your Aunt Clara. We’d kept our ears open, and heard the Duffer talk about his friend Anthony Fenton who was coming to meet us. _You_ were mooning I suppose, and didn’t listen. We didn’t give him away partly because it wasn’t our business, and partly because each of us was up to another game, never mind what. Captain Fenton never tried to play you a trick. You threw yourself at his head, you know you did, from Shepheard’s terrace. He had his _mission_ to think of, and you’d be _very_ conceited if you thought he ought to have let you interfere with it. As it happened, you worked in quite well with the mission at first. Then Fate stepped in, and made the band play a different dance tune; no military march, but a love-waltz. That wasn’t his fault. And I have to remind you of all this, because you’re glaring at Captain Fenton now as if he’d done something wrong instead of fine, and he can’t praise himself.”

As she finished, out of breath, having dashed on without a single comma, the giant black musicians in the garden began to sing a strange African love song, in deep rich voices, their instruments, which had played with precision European airs, suddenly pouring out their primitive, passionate souls.

“Biddy dear,” said the girl in a small, meek voice, “thank you very much, and you’re just sweet. But I _didn’t_ need even you to defend him to me. I was only just stopping to breathe, for fear my heart would burst, because I was _dizzy_ with too much joy. I _worship_ him! And –and you can both go away now, please. We don’t want you.”

We went. Biddy would have fallen downstairs, if I hadn’t caught her round the waist. Needless to say, I didn’t look back; but Biddy did, and should by rights have been turned into a pillar of salt.

“My gracious, but they’re beautiful!” she gasped. “For goodness’ sake, let’s dash as fast as we can, down into the garden, and do the same thing!”

“What?” I floundered.

“Why, you _duffer_, kiss each other like mad!”

* * * * *

Boiling with excitement, when I met Cleopatra later in the ballroom, I told her what was going on above, in the moonlight, on the roof.

“At last your niece knows what I think you have guessed all along, but so wisely kept to yourself,” I said. “About Fenton, I mean. It’s all right between those two now. They will come downstairs engaged.”

“Everybody is engaged!” Cleopatra stormily retorted.

“That’s exactly what I remarked to Brigit, before I could persuade her to follow the general example. ‘Everybody in the world is engaged except ourselves,’ are the words I used.”

“And except me,” added Mrs. East. “You forgot me, didn’t you?”

“Never!” I insisted. “You could be engaged to a dozen men any moment, if you wanted to.”

“I think you’re exaggerating a little, Lord Ernest,” Cleopatra replied modestly and unsmilingly. But her countenance brightened faintly. “Of course there are a few men–there were some in New York–“

“You don’t need to tell me that,” I assured her.

“I feel as if I’d like to tell you something else,” she went on, “if you can spare a few minutes.”

“Will you sit out the next dance?” I asked. “It isn’t a Bunny Hug or Tango, or anything distracting for lookers-on.”

“Aren’t you dancing with Brigit?”

“No such luck–I mean, fortunately not. She has grabbed Slatin Pasha, and forgotten that I exist. By jove, there come Miss Gilder and Fenton. What a couple! They’re rather gorgeous, waltzing together–what?”

“Very nice,” said Cleopatra, trying with all her over-amuleted heart, not to be acid. “But oh, Lord Ernest, that _settles_ it! I _must_ be engaged myself, _before_ Monny brings him to show me, like a cat with a mouse it’s caught. Otherwise I couldn’t _stand_ it; and afterward would be too late.”

Hastily I rushed her out into the garden, where the Shoebill regarded her with one eye of prehistoric wisdom. If she really were a reincarnation, I’m sure he knew it: and had probably belonged to her in Alexandria, when she was Queen.

“There’s a Mr. Talmadge in New York,” she went on, wildly. “He said he would come to me from across the world, at a moment’s notice, if I wired. Only it would be awkward if I announced our engagement to-night, and then found he’d changed his mind. Besides, he’d be a _last_ resort: and Sayda Sabri said I ought–“

“Why not wire _Sir Marcus_?” I ventured. (If his telegram had not come yesterday, I would as soon have advised Cleopatra to adopt an asp.)

“Oh! well–I _was_ thinking of it. That’s one thing I wanted to ask your advice about. I believe he does love me.”

“Idolizes is the word.”

“And now and then in the night I’ve had a feeling, it was almost like wasting something _Providential_, to refuse a Marcus Antonius. Sayda Sabri warned me to wait for a man named Antony, whom I should meet in Egypt. That’s why I–but no matter now. The ‘Lark’ is a dreadful obstacle, though. How could I live with a lark?”

“Lady Lark has quite a musical lilt.”

“Do you think so? There’s one thing, even if you’re the wife of a marquis or an earl, you can only be called ‘Lady’ This or That. You might be _anything_. He’s taller than Antoun–I mean, Captain Fenton. And his eyes are just as nice–in their way. They quite haunt me, since Philae. But Lord Ernest, he has some horrid, common little tricks! He scratches his hair when he’s worried. If you look up his coat sleeves you catch glimpses of gray Jaeger, a thing I always felt I could _never_ marry. And worst of all, when he finishes a meal and goes away from the table, he walks off _eating!_”

“I don’t suppose,” said I, “that your first Marcus Antonius ever went away from a table at all–on his feet; anyhow, while you were doing him so well in Egypt. He had to be carried. _I_ call Sir Marcus (and I stole the Sirdar’s epithet for the other Anthony) a Romantic Figure! His adoration for you is a–a sonnet. There’s no ‘h’ in his name to bother you. And he fell in love at first sight, like a real sport–I mean, like the hero of a book. If he has ways you don’t approve, you can cure them; redecorate and remodel him with the latest American improvements. Why, I believe he’d go so far as to give his Lark a tail if you asked him to spell it with an ‘e’.”

“Well–I suppose you’re right about what I’d better do,” she sighed. “A bird in the hand–oh, I’m not making a silly pun about a lark–is worth two in New York! Please tell _every one_ you see I’m engaged to Sir Marcus, for he is my bird in the hand: and I’ll send off a telegram the first thing to-morrow morning, for fear he hears the news that he’s engaged to me, prematurely. Where is he–do you know?”

“By to-morrow he’ll be at Meröe Camp,” I said: But I did not add: “So shall we!”

CHAPTER XXXI

THE MOUNTAIN OF THE GOLDEN PYRAMID

There was not much room in our hearts for mountains or gold just then: yet somehow, before we left the Palace, Anthony and I had told Brigit and Monny the secret which had been the romance of our lives, until they came into it to paint dead gold with the living rose of love.

Victorian women would have been grieved or angry with men who could leave them at such a time; but these two, instead of reproaching us, urged us on. Naturally, they wanted to go with us. They said, if there were danger, they wished to share it. And if there were to be a “find,” they wished to be among the first to see what no eyes had seen for two thousand years. But when Anthony explained that there wasn’t time to get tents together and make a decent camp for ladies, even if we were sure not to tumble into trouble, they said no more. This was surprising in Monny, if not in Brigit. I supposed, however, that she was being on her best behaviour, as a kind of thank-offering to Providence for its unexpected gift of legitimate happiness.

Our secret was to be kept. Only the Sirdar knew–and gave Fenton leave of absence for a few days. The Set did not suspect the existence of a mountain at Meröe more important than its neighbours. They did not even know what had become of Antoun Effendi after he bade them farewell, and “good luck.” From the first, he had given it out that he must leave the party at Khartum. The object of returning to Meröe was to “meet Sir Marcus;” and I promised to be back in plenty of time to organize the return trip to Cairo. My departure, therefore, was all in the day’s work: and the great sensation was Mrs. East’s engagement. Even though, for obvious reasons, Monny’s love affair was kept dark, Cleopatra could not resist parading hers, the minute her wire to Sir Marcus had been safely sent. I got an invitation for all the members of the Set to a tennis party in the Palace gardens, at which the Sultan of Dafur and a bodyguard armed with battle axes would be the chief attraction. Also I induced the landlord of our hotel to promise special illuminations, music, and an impromptu dance for the evening. This was to make sure that none of our friends should find time to see me off at the train. Anthony was to join me there, in mufti, and might be recognised by sharp eyes on the lookout for mysteries. Once we got away, that danger would be past: unless Cleopatra told. But I was certain that she would not to any one ever again mention the name of Antoun.

It was a full train that night, but no one in it who knew Antoun. Many people who had been visiting friends or staying at an hotel for weeks, were saying good-bye. The narrow corridors of the sleeping-cars had African spears piled up on the floor against the wall, very long and inconvenient. Ladies struggled in, with rainbow-coloured baskets almost too big for their compartments. Seats were littered with snake-skins like immense, decayed apple parings; fearsome, crescent-shaped knives; leopard rugs in embryo; and strange headgear in many varieties. Stuffed crocodiles fell down from racks and got underfoot: men walked about with elephant tusks under their arms; dragomans solicited a last tip; a six-foot seven Dinka, black as ink and splendid as a Greek statue, brought flowers from the Palace for some departing acquaintance of the Sirdar and his wife. Officers in evening dress dashed up through the sand, on donkey-back, to see the last of friends, their mess jackets making vivid spots of colour in the electric light. All the fragrant blossoms of Khartum seemed to be sending farewell messages of perfume on the cool evening air. No more fantastic scene at a railway-station could be imagined. If the world and its doings is but a moving picture for the gods on Olympus they must enjoy the film of “a train departing from Khartum.”

Anthony did not join me until just as the train was crawling out of the station, for we had asked Brigit and Monny not to see us off, and they had been startlingly acquiescent. We had a two-berthed compartment together, and talked most of the night, in low voices; of the mountain; of the legends concerning it, and the papers of the dead Egyptologist Ferlini, which indirectly had brought Fenton into Monny Gilder’s life, and given Brigit back to me. There was the out-of-doors breakfast party, too, on the terrace at Shepheard’s. Had it not been for this incident Antoun, the green-turbaned Hadji, would never have been selected by Miss Gilder, in words she might now like to forget. “I’ll have _that_!” But, had not a distressed artist called on me one morning in Rome, months ago, with an old notebook to sell, I should not have come to Egypt for my sick-leave; and none of us would have met. I had visited the artist’s studio to please a friend, and bought a picture to please him (not myself); therefore he regarded me as a charitable dilettante, likely to buy anything if properly approached. Bad luck had come to him; he wanted to try pastures new, and needed money at short notice: therefore he wished to dispose of a secret which might be the key to fortune. Why didn’t he use the key himself? was the obvious question; which he answered by saying that a poor man would not be able to find the lock to fit it.

The notebook he had to sell had been the property of a distinguished distant relative, long since dead; the Italian, Ferlini, who about 1834 ransacked the ruins of Meröe in the kingdom of Candace. Ferlini had given treasure in gold, scarabs, and jewels to Berlin, all of which he had discovered in a secret _cache_ in the masonry of a pyramid, in the so-called “pyramid field” of Meröe. But he had been blamed for unscientific work, and in some quarters it was not believed that he had found the hoard at Meröe. This jealousy and injustice had prevented Ferlini’s obtaining a grant for further explorations he wished to make. He claimed to have proof that in a certain mountain not far from the Meröe pyramids, and much resembling them in shape, was hidden the tomb of a Candace who lived two hundred years earlier than the queen of that name mentioned in the New Testament, mistress of the eunuch baptized by St. Philip. In the notebook which had come down with other belongings of Ferlini the Egyptologist, to Ferlini the artist, was a copy of certain Demotic writing, of a peculiar and little known form. The original had existed, according to the dead Ferlini’s notes, on the wall of an antechapel in one of the most ruinous pyramids at Meröe, decorated in a peculiarly barbaric Ethiopian style. The wall-writing described the making of the mountain tomb, ordered by Candace in fear that her body might be disturbed, according to a prophecy which predicted the destruction of the kingdom if the jewels of the dead were found.

Ferlini, a student of the Demotic writings which had superseded hieroglyphics, doubted not that he had translated the revelation aright, though he admitted supplying many missing words in accordance with his own deductions. He was in disfavour at the time he tried to organize an expedition in search of the queen’s hoard, and though legends of the mountain confirmed the writings which Ferlini was the first to translate, the Italian could induce no one to finance his scheme. The one person he succeeded in interesting had a relative, already excavating in Egypt: but eventually addressed on the subject, this young man replied that the antechapel in question had fallen completely into ruin. It would be impossible, therefore, to find the wall-writing, “if indeed it ever existed.”

This verdict had put an end to Ferlini’s hopes, and nothing remained of them save the translated copy of the writing in his notebook (the missing words inserted) and the legends of the negroes who, generation after generation since forgotten times, had told the story of the “Mountain of the Golden Pyramid.” Nobody, within the memory of man, had ever searched for the problematical tomb: and as tales of more or less the same character are common in Egypt, I did not place much faith in the enthusiastic jottings of Ferlini. However, my love of the unknown, the mysterious and romantic, made me feel that the possession of the notebook was worth the price asked: two thousand lire. When I had brooded over it myself, I posted it to Fenton at Khartum; and his opinion had brought me to Egypt. Thinking of the matter in this way, it seemed that we owed our love stories to the impecunious artist, who had probably spent his eighty pounds and forgotten me by this time. In a few hours, or a few days, we might owe him even more.

Anthony, acquainted with Meröe, its pyramids and pyramidal mountains, since his first coming to the Sudan, had been able to plan out our campaign almost at an hour’s notice. He knew where to wire for camels [to take us to our destination, eighteen miles from Kabushîa], also for trained excavators. And he knew one who, if the white men were in ignorance, could tell us all the most hidden happenings of the desert for fifty miles around. This was the great character of the neighbourhood, among the blacks, the Wise Man of the Meröitic desert, who claimed to be over a hundred years old, had a tribe of sons and grandsons, and practically ruled the village of Bakarawiya. For countless generations his forbears had lived under the shadow of the ruined pyramids. Family tradition made them the descendants of those Egyptian warriors who revolted in the time of King Psammetichus, migrating from Elephantine Island to Ethiopia. There they were well received by the sovereign, given lands in Upper Nubia, and the title of Autolomi, or Asmack, meaning “Those who stand on the left side of the King.” Anthony’s friend and instructor in the lore of legends rejoiced in the name of “Asmack,” which, he proudly said, had been bestowed on the eldest son in his family, since time immemorial.

Asmack the old and wise was to meet us at Kabushîa Station, with camels, one for each, and one for Sir Marcus, in case he had arrived and wished to ride to the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid.

It was orange-red afternoon when our white train slowed down, to pause for a moment at Kabushîa Station, and the first face we saw was that of Sir Marcus Antonius–a radiant face whose beaming smile was, I knew, not so much a welcome for us as a sign that he had received the telegram from Cleopatra. He hurried along the platform to the steps of our sleeping car; and Anthony, ready to swing himself down before the train stopped, pointed out Asmack not far off,–a thin old black man who must once have been a stately giant, but bent forward now as if searching the earth for his own grave. He had got to his feet, from a squatting position in the coal-stained, alluvial clay of this strange desert, and was gazing toward us, his few rags fluttering in the warm wind. Beside him stood a mere youth of fifty or so, and two or three young men, with several sulky camels.

Sir Marcus began to shake hands almost before we were on the platform; and so did he engross himself in us and absorb our attention that none of us quite knew when the train went out.

“My dear boys!” he addressed us, nearly breaking our finger bones. “Lord, Fenton, you’re even better looking as a true Britisher than a false Arab! But never mind that now. Borrow, you’re a trump. I believe I owe everything to you. I mean, in the matter of Mrs. East–_Clara_. It always was my favourite name. Fenton knows? Thanks for the congratulations. Thanks to you both. You must be my best men. What? Can’t have but one? Well, it must be Borrow, then, I suppose. Oh, about the mountain? Why, of course you’re anxious. Don’t think I have not been busy. I have. Got here by special train. Cost me a lot of money. But who cares? It’s worth it. I want to hurry things up, and get to Khartum. What your blessed mountain is to you, that is a certain lady to me.”

“What have you found out?” I managed at last to cut short his rhapsodies.

“Why, not much, I’m bound to confess. But I’ve had only a few hours. Some one–heaven knows who–came here, it seems, with Arabs he’d engaged heaven knows where, and pretended to be my agent, empowered by me to work at the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid, where it was well known I’d got the right to excavate. Well, the chap was armed with credentials, and had a contract signed by me, so the authorities thought he was all right of course, and let him go on. This was more than a month ago. He pitched his camp out by the mountain, and nobody disturbed him. Fact is, from what I hear, I don’t believe the excavating men from the Liverpool School of Archeology or whatever you call it, thought much of his chances of success. A case of looking for Captain Kidd’s treasure! He and his men were excavating round the mountain, and he’d engaged some more fellows from the neighbourhood to make the work go faster. But a few days ago–not yet a week–he discharged the lot, paid them up and sent them off saying he’d abandoned hope of finding any entrance to an alleged tomb. The Arabs departed by train; but the fellows from hereabouts gossiped a bit, it seemed, and the story was started that they’d been got rid of because the Boss had hit on something, and wanted to be left to himself.

“You haven’t told us yet the name of the man,” Anthony reminded him.

“By Jove, no more I haven’t! I’m so excited about everything. You won’t know it, but Borrow will. Colonel Corkran.”

Anthony gave me a look. “I do know the name,” he said. “It’s the man of my dream.”

“The man of your dream? Corkran a _dream_?”

“A dream which has kept repeating itself until I grew superstitious about it. A red-faced man with a purplish sort of moustache, I saw coming between you and us, or looking at me out of a dark recess, something like a deep doorway. Borrow said when I told him, I was describing your man, Corkran, whose place he took on your yacht _Candace_.”

“Well, I’m hanged! If that’s not the rummiest go! I only hope he’s not in that recess or deep doorway now, if it leads into your mountain. You remember, Borrow, my telling you he’d been alone for a while in the sitting-room I use as an office at the Semiramis Hotel, and had had a good chance if he wanted to browse among my papers? Well, I didn’t mention this to you at the time, but an unsigned contract with you for your services, in return for all my rights in the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid, was lying on the desk. (As for the contract he’s been showing here, it could only have been for the trip; but it showed him to be my agent right enough.) And there were two confidential letters on my desk: one from a man I’d written to, an Egyptologist chap, saying in his opinion there _might_ be a tomb in the mountain; the other, an answer, not finished, telling him I meant to run the risk, and had secured the rights. You know how queer I thought it, Corkran should throw up his job, which was paying him pretty well? But it wasn’t my business, and I was jolly glad to be rid of him as it happened. Well, here we have the mystery explained.”

“Not quite yet! I wish we had,” I said, thinking of the sly old poacher on our preserves, who had perhaps by this time skimmed the cream off the secret. It was easy to guess why he had sent away his workers if, indeed, he had imagined himself on the eve of a discovery. Rights to dig are given on the understanding that the Egyptian government shall have half of anything found, worth the taking. Corkran’s scheming to be alone must mean that he intended annexing what treasure he could carry off, and then getting out of the bad business. Already six days had passed since the Arabs and Nubians had left him alone in his camp; and though it was lucky that we had learned what was going on, it might be too late to profit by the information. Even if we caught Corkran red-handed, he might have hidden his spoil where none but he, or some messenger, could ever find it.

“You’ll go out with us to the mountain, Sir Marcus?” I went on. “We’ll be ready to start–“

But Sir Marcus had suddenly become deaf. He had turned as if to gaze after the long ago departed train. Instead of answering me, he was stalking off toward a group of people at the far end of the platform: three ladies and two men in khaki. For a second I felt an impulse of indignation. Cheek of him to march away like that, not caring much that we had been robbed, largely through his carelessness, and by one of his own men!

But the indignation turned to surprise, sheer incredulous amazement. I glanced at Anthony to learn whether he had seen; but he was beckoning the old wise man of the desert. “Fenton,” said I, “it seems we weren’t the only passengers to get off here. There are three people we know, talking to two we don’t.”

Anthony looked. “Great Scott!” said he. And in another instant we were following Sir Marcus hastily along the platform to greet–or scold (we weren’t sure which it ought to be) the big hatted, green-veiled, khaki-dressed but easily recognised figures of Brigit O’Brien, Monny Gilder, and Mrs. East.

“We couldn’t help it,” Monny cried in self-defence to Anthony, before he had time to reach the group. “We knew you wouldn’t let us come, so we came–because we _had_ to be in this with you. Even Biddy wanted to –and she’s so _wise_. As, for Aunt Clara, I believe she’d have started without us, if we hadn’t been wild for the journey. So you _see_ how it was!”

We did see. And we couldn’t help rejoicing in their pluck, as well as in the sight of them, though it was all against our common sense.

“We’ve ordered our own camels, and a tent, and things to eat and drink, so we shan’t be any bother to you,” Monny went on, as Anthony rather gravely shook hands, his eager brows lifted, his eyes smiling in spite of himself. “We couldn’t have done it, if it hadn’t been for Slatin Pasha. We first went and confided _everything_ to him, because we knew he loved adventures and would be sure to sympathize. These gentlemen from the camp are his friends, and they’ve organized our little expedition at his request. More than one person can use the telegraph, you know! And oh, won’t it be lovely going with you out into the desert!”

* * * * *
It was not yet evening when we set forth; but it was the birth of another day when we arrived within sight of Corkran’s camp. The tents glimmered pale in the light which comes up out of the desert before dawn, as light rises from the sea; and so deep was the stillness that it might have been a ghost camp. There was not even the howling of a dog; and this silence was more eerie than the silence of sleep in a lonely place; because of the tale a grandson of Asmack’s had brought to the village. He was one of the Nubian men Corkran had engaged to help his Arab workmen from the north; and when the whole gang had been discharged he, suspecting that some secret thing was on foot, hid in the desert-scrub that he might return by night to spy. He had wished his brothers to stay with him, but they, fearing the djinns who haunt the mountain and have power at night, refused, and begged him to come away lest he be struck by a terrible death. The legend was that Queen Candace, the queen who ordered the making of the tomb–had been a witch. When she died, by her magic arts learned from the lost Book of Thoth, she had turned all those aware of the tomb’s existence, into djinns, to guard the secret dwelling of her soul. Even the great men of the court who by her wish hid in the mountain her body and jewels and treasure, became djinns the moment they had closed and concealed the entrance to the tomb. They could never impart the secret to mortals; and because of the knowledge which burned within their hearts, and the anguish of being parted forever from those they loved, the tortured spirits in prison grew malevolent. While the sun (still worshipped by them as Rã) was above the horizon they had no power over men, but the moment that Rã? “died his red death” the djinns could destroy those who ventured within such distance of the mountain as its shadow might reach: and if any man ventured nearer in the darkness of night, he heard the wailing of the spirits. Camp had been pitched beyond the shadow’s furthest reach; but the night after the workmen were discharged, Asmack’s one brave grandson had been led by curiosity to approach the haunted mountain. When he had crept within the trench most lately dug, he had heard the wicked voice of the djinns raging and quarrelling together. There had been a threatening cry when they knew how a man had defied their power, and the Nubian had escaped a fate too horrible to put in words, only by running, running, until his breath gave out, and the sun rose.

This story gave the silent desert power even over European minds, as we came where the small camp glimmered, just outside the Shadow’s wicked circle.

Not one of Asmack’s men would go with us to the tent, which was evidently that of the leader. He might be lying there dead, struck by the djinns, they said, and all those who looked upon the body would be accursed. The three women would not have gone to Corkran’s tent, even had we allowed them to do so; and Sir Marcus, already a slave, though a willing one, stayed with his adored lady and her friends, inside the ring which the Nubians proceeded to make with the camels. Carrying a lighted lantern Anthony and I walked alone to the tent.

The flap was down, but not fastened, and the canvas moved slightly as if trembling fingers tried to hold it taut.

“Colonel Corkran!” I called out, sharply. But there was no answer.

CHAPTER XXXII

THE SECRET

Anthony lifted the flap, holding up the lantern, and we both looked in.

No one was there–but the tent had the look of recent occupation. It was neatly arranged, as the tent of an old soldier should be: but on the table stood a half-used candle stuck in a bottle; and beside it a book lay open, face downward. Entering the tent the first thing I did was to glance at the title of this book. It was a learned archeological treatise. Here and there a paragraph was marked, and leaves dog’s-eared. Three other volumes of the same sort were piled one upon the other. Anthony and I had read all four during the last few months, since our minds had concentrated on the subject of pyramids and rock tombs.

“What do you think has become of Corkran?” I said to Anthony.

“I think the djinns have got him,” he answered, gravely.

“You mean–“

“I don’t quite know what I mean. But–he must have hit upon something, and then–have been prevented from coming back.”

“Why should he have had such luck, after a few weeks’ work, an unscientific fellow like him, if the secret of the mountain has been inviolate for over two thousand years?”

“Wait and see what’s happened to him before you call it ‘luck,’ Duffer. But you must remember that nobody except Ferlini and a few superstitious blacks ever believed that the mountain had a secret. Incredulity has protected it. And Corkran had to work like a thousand devils if he hoped to get hold of anything before he was found out. I believe he has got hold of something, and–that it then got hold of him. But we shall see.”

“Yes, we shall see,” I repeated. “And before long if we too have luck.”

“I hope it won’t be the same kind as his. But come along out of this. We must get to work before sunrise, and try for a result of some sort before the worst of the heat. If _he’s_ found anything, we ought pretty quickly to profit by his weeks of frantic labour. That, maybe, will be our revenge.”

We had to tell the party what we had found in the tent, and what we meant to do next. Sir Marcus was now excused by Mrs. East; but until summoned by us the ladies were to remain where they were, under shelter of the tent which the camel-boys were getting into shape. When exhorted to be patient, they received the advice in sweet silence; but we did not until later attach much importance to this unusual mood. Perhaps at the moment we were too preoccupied to notice expressions, even in the eyes we loved best.

We took with us two men whom Asmack had provided as diggers, and in five minutes we were at the base of the little dark, conical mountain which for weeks had been the object of our dreams. Now, standing face to face with it, the glamour faded. The Mountain of the Golden Pyramid was exactly like a dozen other tumbled shapes of black rock, grouped or scattered over the dull clay desert which many centuries ago had been the fertile realm of Candace. Why should a queen have selected it from among its lumpish fellows, to do it secret honour? But Corkran had had faith. Here were traces of what Fenton called his “frantic labours.”

A parallel trench had been dug with the evident object of unearthing a buried entrance into the mountain. Down it went through hardened sand and clay, to a depth of eight or ten feet; and descending, we found as we expected to do, several low tunnels driven at right angles toward the mountain itself. One after another we entered, crawling on hands and knees, only to come up against a solid wall of rock at the end. Each of these burrows represented just so much toil and disappointment. But Corkran, whose undertaking could be justified even to his own mind only by success, had not been discouraged. The trench went round three sides of the mountain, as we soon discovered; and the corner of the fourth façade not having yet been turned, it seemed a sign that Corkran had, as Anthony said, “hit upon something,” or thought that he had done so. Otherwise he would not have discharged his men before the fourth gallery was begun. We had started from the south because our camp faced the long trench on that side, and it was quicker to jump into it than to walk round and examine the excavations from ground-level. On the east, the plan of the work was the same as on the south, except that the tunnels leading mountainward were driven at different distances, relatively to each other; and each of these also ended in a _cul de sac_. Now remained the trench on the north side of the mountain, which was the most promising direction for a “find”: and as we turned the corner which brought us into this third trench the sun rose, making the sky blossom like the primrose fields of heaven.

On this side, sand driven by the northerly wind which never rests had banked itself high against the mountain, and the excavation had been a more serious task. There were only two tunnels, and into both sand had fallen. One was nearly blocked up, and impossible to enter without reopening; but we took it for granted hopefully that the second had been made later. This ran toward the mountain with a northeasterly slant; and though it was partly choked by sand, it was possible to crawl in. Anthony insisted on going first. I followed, at the pace of my early ancestor the worm, and Sir Marcus comfortably waited outside. He wanted to be a pioneer only in financial paths; and after all, this was _our_ mountain now. It wasn’t worth his while to be killed in it. Besides, as he pointed out, if anything happened to us there must be some one to organize a rescue, and break the news to the ladies.

Anthony had a small electric torch, and I a lantern, but going on hands and knees, we could use the lights only now and then. When we had crept ahead (descending always) for twelve or fifteen feet, Anthony stopped. “Hullo!” I heard him call, in a muffled, reverberating voice. “Here’s the reason why Corkran sent his Arabs away!”

“What is it?” I yelled, my heart jumping.

“The rock’s been cut back, by the hands of men.”

“His men, perhaps.”

“No, it isn’t done like that nowadays. The tunnel turns here, dips down, and goes on along this flat wall. I bet Corkran always kept ahead of the men. When he saw this, he discharged his workers–And yet, it may be nothing of importance after all. Only a flat surface for some old wall-inscription such as Romans and even Egyptian soldiers made constantly, on the march.”

The rumbling voice ceased, as Anthony crawled round the turn of the passage. I followed, literally close on his heels, the burrow descending like a rabbit-hole. Suddenly Anthony stopped again. “I’ve come into a sort of chamber Corkran’s scooped out,” I heard him say. “It’s high enough to sit up in–no, to stand up in. This is the end of the passage, I think. By Jove, look out!” He had disappeared in the darkness behind a higher arch in the roof of the gallery. As he cried out, I slipped through after him, slid down a steep, abrupt slope, and by the light of my agitated lantern saw Anthony standing waist-deep in