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The mere thought of never seeing the little white house with its cupolas and its flat roof again sent a sharp pang through her. Pierre, with his arched eyebrows and upraised, upturned palm, "La Grande Jeanne," Bibi, little Fatma, they had become almost a dear part of her life.
"If he refuses, if these men are killed, I also swear that, as my life is due to them, I myself will perish by my own hands, if they die for saving it!" "It needs not that, Fatma. You think that I am ungrateful, that I do not feel that these men have acted nobly, thus to risk their lives to save a strange woman whose face they have never seen. It is my oath that lies heavily upon me.
Here and there on a woman's grave was a hand of Fatma, or a pair of the Prophet's slippers; and on those of a few men were turbans carved in marble, to tell that the dead had made pilgrimage to Mecca.
Again the crew got out their poles. Two men stripped, went overboard with a rope, and, running along the shore, towed the Fatma up stream against the tide till she came to a lonely place where two men were vehemently working a shadûf. There they tied up for the night. The gold was fading. Less brilliant, but deeper now, was the dream of river and shore, of the groves of palms and the mountains.
Perhaps she had forgotten, or had not known how the trains ran from Assouan. However that was, Doctor Hartley arrived many hours before the time mentioned by Mrs. Armine for a consultation, and was in full possession of the case and in command of the patient while Isaacson was still on the Fatma. Isaacson had not slept all night.
It was but three paces to the entrance of the tent, and his guards made no objection. The entrance was closed as the slave entered, but half a minute later it was opened an inch or two, and, without showing herself, Fatma said: "Listen to me." "I am listening," Gregory replied. "I am in great fear for you. You are in much danger.
No wonder, for, in the simplicity of a pure white dress, and with her fair curls streaming down her cheeks, unadorned save by one little blush rose, she looked like an ethereal spirit dropped into the midst of the garish party. Fatma got up suddenly and whispered to her mother.
At the end of seven days they came to Shof-el-Ain, a tiny well set in a barren valley between featureless ridges, and by the side of that well they camped. They were in the country of the Amrab Arabs, and had come to an end of their peril. "We are safe," cried Abou Fatma. "God is good. Northwards to Assouan, westwards to Wadi Halfa, we are safe!"
Armine guessed to be charms, a mus-haf, or copy of the Koran, enclosed in a silver case which hung from a string of yellow silk; one or two small scrolls and bits of paper covered with Arab writing; two tooth-sticks in a wooden tube, open at one end; a child's shoe tied with string, to which were attached bits of coral and withered flowers; several tassels of shells mingled with bright blue and white beads; a glass bottle of blessed storax; and a quantity of Fatma hands, some very large and made of silver gilt, set with stones and lumps of a red material that looked like sealing-wax, others of silver and brass, small and practically worthless.
Gregory had, on his arrival with the brigade the day before, gone into the town; and engaged a small house, in its outskirts, as the abode of Fatma and her two attendants, purchased suitable provisions, and made what arrangements he could for her comfort. Late in the evening he had escorted her there, and left Zaki to sleep in an outhouse attached to it, to secure them from all intrusion.
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