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Updated: May 14, 2025
In the market-place was the little hotel, newly built; the only French thing in Oued Tolga, except the military barracks, the Bureau Arabe, and a gurgling artesian well which a French officer had lately completed. But before Stephen could reach the market-place and the hotel, he had to pass through the quarter of the dancing-girls.
"I began to think you were not very desirous to hear my news," replied Stephen, "as I have been compelled to wait so long that my friends in Oued Tolga will be wondering what detains me in the Zaouïa, or whether any accident has befallen me." "As thou wert doubtless informed, I am not well, and was not prepared to receive guests.
Appoint as a meeting place the Bordj of Toudja, one day's march from the town of Oued Tolga. When my men have the child in their keeping, thou wilt be free to go in peace with the girl and thy friend." "I should be glad if thou wouldst send for her, and let me talk with her here," Stephen suggested. "No, that cannot be," the marabout answered decidedly.
She feared that, if she had not come to Oued Tolga, by this time Saidee would have gone away, or tried to go away, with Captain Sabine; and though, since the night of her arrival, when Saidee had opened her heart, they had been on terms of closest affection, there was a dreadful doubt in Victoria's mind that the confidences were half repented.
They had not made a hurried march from the desert city, for Stephen and Sabine had calculated the hour at which Nevill might have received the summons, and the time he would take on the return journey. It was possible, Lady MacGregor being what she was, that she might have rewired the telegram to a certain bordj, the only telegraph station between Touggourt and Oued Tolga.
His procession was watched by women on many roofs with reverent interest by some; with joy by one woman who was his wife; with fear and despair by another, who had counted on his absence for a few days longer. And Victoria stood beside her sister, looking out over the golden silence towards the desert city of Oued Tolga, with a pair of modern field-glasses sent to her by Si Maïeddine.
They had only the one bassour; that in which Saidee and Victoria had come to Toudja from Oued Tolga, but Nevill was delirious more often than not, and had no idea that a sacrifice was being made for him.
It was very still in the Zaouïa of Oued Tolga. The only sound was the droning of the boys' voices, which came faintly from behind iron window-gratings below, and that monotonous murmur emphasized the silence, as the humming of bees in a hive makes the stillness of a garden in summer more heavy and hot.
Only it's still more sure that your Englishman won't be able to do us any good. Not that he could, anyhow." "But Si Maïeddine's been very ill since he came back, M'Barka says. Mr. Knight will ask for the marabout." "Maïeddine will hear of him. Not five Europeans in five years come to Oued Tolga. If only Maïeddine hadn't got back! This man may have been following him, from Algiers.
Noura had smuggled him into the Zaouïa, and she herself had trained him by giving him food that he liked, though his home was at Oued Tolga, the town. The birds from the mosque had waited for their second supply, for the same programme had been carried out many times before, and they had learned to expect it.
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