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Perhaps, again, it was the hairpins. Off to town on donkey back the three Americans rode slowly, a native escort filing after, and there in town the bazaars yielded a long pongee dust coat and a straw hat and a white veil, "to escape detection," Arlee gaily said, and a satchel which she filled with mysterious purchases, and then, clad once more in the semblance of her traveling world, safe and sound and undiscovered, she stood upon the station platform, awaiting the train to Luxor.
He didn't particularly mind risking his neck, but he liked to do it in accredited ways, in polo, for instance, or climbing Swiss peaks, or swimming dangerous currents.... But he was young and he had red hair. And he remembered Arlee Beecher. These three days had not been happy ones for him, even sustained as he was by righteous indignation.
The Evershams were friends of theirs and were stopping at the same hotel, and since my friends were called back very suddenly, the Evershams asked me to go on to Egypt with them. It was very nice of them, for I'm a dreadful bother," said Arlee, dimpling. "But you speak of leaving them?" he said. "Oh, yes, I may do that as soon as some other friends of mine, the Maynards, reach here.
With a heart beating to suffocation he flung open the door and rushed into that room. Candles flared on the table but not a figure greeted his eye. The room was deathly still; nothing stirred but the long draperies fluttering in the wind. "Arlee!" he whispered in a voice strained with excitement. "Arlee Beecher, are you here?... Arlee!" No voice answered. No motion revealed her.
Suddenly her voice rose in a passion of angry phrases that were indistinguishable to the girl, and then she broke off as suddenly and flung herself down upon a couch. From behind her the old woman came shuffling forth and put a hand on Arlee's arm, and Arlee felt the muscles of that hand as strong and rigid as a man's.
They had paused, to finish this colloquy, a few feet away from the ladies, who were regarding with dark suspicion this interchange of lowered tones. Suddenly Arlee raised her eyes and gave Billy a quick look, questioning, shyly serious. "I shall be here and you can call on me," she promised, and bade him farewell. She left him deliriously, inexplicably, foolishly in spirits.
I cannot escort you in the car it is not en règle but I will come to the house and present you and then depart, that you ladies may exchange the confidences.... Does that programme please you?" "I I don't know your sister's name," said Arlee. He smiled. "Nechedil Azade Seniha she is the widow of Tewfik Pasha. But say Madame simply to her that will suffice. Shall I, then, telephone her?"
Did you leave it open?" The other girl reached quickly and caught her arm, as Arlee turned toward the bed. "No, no, if it goes shut we cannot open it inside," she warned. "It does not open this side unless you have the key. It opens from without. But he will not come in now he is at the Khedive's palace. We are all right." "But I want to get away," cried Arlee.
Through his rocking mind darted a memory of her earlier speech to him. "You said you didn't want words. Arlee will you?" She flung back her head and looked up at him, her face a flower, her eyes like stars tangled in the bright mist of her hair. "Billy, what's your middle name?" "Bunker.... I can't help it, dear. They wished it on me and asked me not to let it go. But Bunker Hill !"
His face showed his disappointment and a certain surprise. "But not before?" "Why, I go to-morrow morning, you know," said Arlee. "And " "It would be better because of the invitation," he said slowly, hesitantly, with the air of one who does not wish to importune. "My sister would like to ask for one who is known personally to herself.
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