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I was not the only one in Rustum Khan's debt; it was likely his brilliant effort at the critical moment had saved our whole fighting line. Besides, I saw the Turk grinning to himself with satisfaction at the rift in our good will. "Suppose we refer this dispute to Monty," I proposed, reasoning that if it should ever get as far as Monty, tempers would have died away meanwhile.
"All this," I said, "is exceedingly clear, and, although ingenious, still simple and explicit. When you left the Bishop's Hotel, what then?" "Why, having carefully taken the bearings of the tree, I turned homewards. The instant that I left 'the devil's seat, however, the circular rift vanished; nor could I get a glimpse of it afterwards, turn as I would.
Right in front of him the cliff yawned in just such a rift as the one in which he had awakened to find himself, only not on anything like such a large scale. Eagerly Laurence plunged into this. Here might be a way to the outer world to safety. He pressed onward in the semi-gloom. The rocks darkened overhead, forming, in effect, a cave.
In geological times it had been the channel of the Jordan; now it is called the Wadi el-Araba. It was this rift which brought wealth to Edom; through it passed the highroad of commerce which connected Syria with the harbours at the head of the gulf.
Then every rock had its occupants in the shape of silvery-grey, golden-green, or black and orange lizards, some looking as if they were bearded, others bearing a singular frill, while again others were dotted with hideous spikes and prickles, all being given to turn defiantly upon the intruders to their domain, and menacingly open their gaping mouths, lined with orange, yellow, or rich blue; but ready to take flight all the same and plunge into the rock rift or hole which made their home.
Then he followed till they were both quite a hundred feet below the shelf, and the part of the rift they had first entered, and were able to creep right out till they were level with the side of the canyon, and able to look down to the river.
At the lower end of the cave the roof dipped sharply down, and the sides closed in, forming a tunnel about six feet high and five feet wide. This tunnel was three or four yards long, and then it opened out again into a second cave of fair size. The second cave was dimly lighted from a rift in the rock, forty feet above their heads.
"You can see nothing but excursionists; whichever way you look, you see their backs." These backs, looming out of the mist, or discovered in a rift, seemed to enrage him. At length something actually happened.
Then a gust of wind sweeps down a side gulch and, making a rift in the clouds, reveals the blue heavens, and a stream of sunlight pours in. Then the clouds drift away into the distance, and hang around crags and peaks and pinnacles and towers and walls, and cover them with a mantle that lifts from time to time and sets them all in sharp relief.
The sun was going to set in glory beyond the blue misty line of the mountains; the June evening light was falling, in freshness and sweetness, on every leaf and blade of grass; and the harmony I had wanted I had got again. Molly's words had made the first rift in my cloud; the first sunshine had reached me that I had seen for many a long day.
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