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Why he had acted otherwise he was not certain: perhaps to avoid a horrible sensation at the Dosah and the outcry of the newspapers of Europe; perhaps to have him assassinated privately; perhaps, after all, to pardon him. Yet this last alternative was not reasonable, save from the stand-point that Ismail had no religion at all.
"At sunset after prayers, Highness," answered Dicky, and was instantly lost in the throng which now crowded upon the tent to see the Sheikh of the Dosah arrive to make obeisance to Ismail. That night at sunset, Dicky, once more clothed and shaven and well appointed, but bronzed and weatherbeaten, was shown into the presence of the Khedive, whose face showed neither pleasure nor displeasure.
The superstitious Dervishes fell back before this pair of demons; for their madness was like the madness of those who at the Dosah throw themselves beneath the feet of the Sheikh's horse by the mosque of El Hassan in Cairo. The bobtailed Arab's lips were drawn back over his assaulting teeth in a horrible grin. Seti grinned too, the grin of fury and of death.
If he escaped from the iron hoofs of the Sheikh's horse, if the weight did not crush the life out of his small body, there was a fair chance; for to escape unhurt from the Dosah is to prove yourself for ever a good Mussulman, who has undergone the final test and is saved evermore by the promise of the Prophet.
"At sunset after prayers, Highness," answered Dicky, and was instantly lost in the throng which now crowded upon the tent to see the Sheikh of the Dosah arrive to make obeisance to Ismail. That night at sunset, Dicky, once more clothed and shaven and well appointed, but bronzed and weatherbeaten, was shown into the presence of the Khedive, whose face showed neither pleasure nor displeasure.
Ismail's ferret eye fastened on him, and a quick fear as of assassination crossed his face as the small dervish ran forward with the other three to the lane of human flesh, where there was still a gap to be filled, and the cry rose up that the Sheikh of the Dosah had left his tent and was about to begin his direful ride.
He braced himself and drew his breast close to the ground. He could hear now the heavy breathing of the Sheikh of the Dosah, who, to strengthen himself for his ride, had taken a heavy dose of hashish.
Why he had acted otherwise he was not certain: perhaps to avoid a horrible sensation at the Dosah and the outcry of the newspapers of Europe; perhaps to have him assassinated privately; perhaps, after all, to pardon him. Yet this last alternative was not reasonable, save from the stand-point that Ismail had no religion at all.
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