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Accustomed as they were to the work, in half an hour they had erected an arbour. Fatma was then assisted into it, with the other women of the harem. The sergeant gave orders, to the sentries, that no one was to be allowed to interfere in any way with them; and then Gregory took his leave, saying that he would return, later on.
I have never been false to an oath." "Nor need you be now," Fatma said earnestly. "You swore to slay any unbeliever that fell into your hands. This man has not fallen into your hands. I have a previous claim to him. He is under my protection.
They spoke no more until two figures rose out of the darkness in front of them, at the very feet of their camels, and Abou Fatma cried in a low voice: "Instanna!" They halted their camels and made them kneel. "The new camels are here?" asked Abou Fatma, and two of the men disappeared for a few minutes and brought four camels up.
When the heat grew less, as the day was declining, once more the Fatma crept slowly on her way. She drew ever towards the south with the deliberation of a water-insect which yet had a purpose that kept it on its journey. She rounded a bend of the Nile. She disappeared. And all along the Nile the sakeeyahs lifted up their old and melancholy song.
For he sent Hassan away, and sat alone on the upper deck alone save for the Reis, who, like a statue, stood behind him holding the mighty helm. The Fatma travelled slowly, crept upon the greenish-brown water almost with the deliberation of some monstrous water-insect. For she journeyed against the tide, and as yet there was little wind, though what there was blew from the north.
Fear had him in its grip on that morning three days after he had left Abou Fatma at the wells, when coming over a slope he first saw the sand stretched like a lagoon up to the dark brown walls of the town, and the overshadowing foliage of the big date palms rising on the Nile bank beyond. Within those walls were the crowded Dervishes.
He looked to the north, then turned and looked to the south, comparing the two distances that lay between him and his own boat, between him and the Loulia. His mind had said, "If I'm nearer to the Fatma I'll go back; if I'm nearer to the Loulia I'll go on." His eyes, keenly judging the distances, told him he was nearer to the Loulia than to his own boat. The die was cast. He went on.
I shall probably spend some hours in the temple." "Him very fine temple." "Yes. I shall go alone and on foot." A few minutes later he set out. He gained the temple, and stayed in it a long time. When he returned to the Fatma, the afternoon was waning. In the ethereal distance the Loulia still lay motionless. "We goin' now?" asked Hassan. Isaacson shook his head. "We goin' to-night?"
How could he have remained sunk in a chair for hours and hours, staring at the moving water and at the monotonous banks of the Nile? Close to the Fatma two shadûf men were singing and bending, singing and bending. And had the shadûf songs lulled him? Had they pushed him towards his dream? Now, as he listened to the brown men singing, he heard nothing but violence in their voices.
A small Arab girl, dressed like a little woman in flowing cotton or muslin, with clinking bracelets and anklets, charms on her thin bosom and scarlet and yellow silk handkerchiefs on her braided hair, was also perpetually about the house and the courtyard. Neither Charmian nor Claude ever quite understood what had first led little Fatma there.
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