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Updated: October 24, 2025
"That boat is the Loulia," said Isaacson, impatiently, pointing up river. "Of course, I know that, my gentlemans." Hassan's voice sounded full of an almost contemptuous pity. "Well, I know the people on board of her. They one of them is a friend of mine. That'll do. You can go to the lower deck." Isaacson began to pace up and down.
When they were outside Baroudi bade them good-bye, and invited them to tea on the Loulia so his dahabeeyah was called on the following day. "In the evening I may start for Armant," he said. "Will it bore you to come, madame?" He spoke politely, but rather perfunctorily, and she answered with much the same tone. "Thanks, I shall be delighted. Good-night. The music was delicious."
"But we shall be warm and cosy in our tent, and we shall know nothing about it." And the Loulia was floating up the Nile into the heart of the gold! Her heart sank. But then she remembered her resolution in the villa. And her vanity, and that which a moment ago had seemed to be fighting against it, clasped hands in resistant friendship.
She felt dull, unexcited, almost sleepy, and as one who is dropping off to sleep sometimes aimlessly reiterates some thought, apparently unconnected with any other thought, unlinked with any habit of the mind, she found herself, in imagination, with dull eyes, seeing the Arabic characters above the doorway of the Loulia, dully and silently repeating the words Baroudi had chosen as the motto of the boat in which this thing Isaacson's departure to Nigel had happened: "The fate of every man have we bound about his neck."
Once again the Loulia lay there where she had lain when Baroudi was on board of her; once again from the bank of the Nile Mrs. Armine heard the song of Allah in the distance, as on that night when she heard it first, and it was a serenade to her. But how much had happened between then and now!
And he felt as if, as soon as the Fatma rounded the bend of the Nile and crept out of sight on her slow way southwards, the Loulia would untie and drop down towards the north. He felt it? He knew it as if he had seen it happen. "Hassan!" When Hassan answered, Isaacson bade him tell the Reis that he and his men could rest all the afternoon. "I'm going to Edfou again.
I may want you to do something for me later on." The two doctors did not talk much as they were rowed towards the Loulia. Both were preoccupied. As they drew near to her, however, Doctor Hartley began to fidget. His bodily restlessness betrayed his mental uneasiness. "I do hope she'll be reasonable," he said at length. "I think she will." "What makes you?" "She's a decidedly clever woman."
That altered face had had a great deal to do with Doctor Hartley's definite resolve to have a consultation. "Poor woman!" he added. "Upon my soul, I can't help pitying her. She knows it, too. But I expect they always do." "Probably. But you've come then to take me to the Loulia?" "I told her I really must insist." "How did you find the patient when he woke?"
"Do you happen to know what that Arabic writing means?" Isaacson asked of Hartley, as they were about to pass under the motto of the Loulia. "That yes; I asked. It's from the Koran." "Yes?" "It means the fate of every man have we bound about his neck." "Ah! Rather fatalistic! Does it appeal to you?" "I don't know. I haven't thought about it. I wonder how she'll receive us!"
Antique and drowsy, with a plaintive drowsiness, was their continual music, which very gradually takes possession of the lonely voyager's soul. The shadûf men, in their long lines leading the eyes towards the south, sang to the almost brazen sky. And heat reigned over all. Was this pursuit? Where was the Loulia? To what secret place had she crept against the repelling tide?
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