Part 55 (1/2)
”My G.o.d!” he said inaudibly. ”It can't be that, it can't be that!”
To his naked eye the crescent and the star on the waving flag were still invisible, but he could see its vivid red, and he could see other objects--white patches, like a collection of saints' tombs.
”Abdul,” he said--his voice was miserably broken and spent--”what are those white things?”
”Tents, Effendi.”
”Government tents?”
”_Aiwah_, Effendi.”
”What are they doing near the hills?”
”Must Abdul speak the words which will cause his master pain? Will the Effendi not wait until we draw nearer? It is not wise to antic.i.p.ate evil.”
A horrible suspicion devastated Michael's brain. He could brook no uncertainty. Abdul's lengthy manner of getting to the point irritated him as it had never done before.
”Out with it, Abdul! Having said so much, you must say more.” Michael was compelling his servant to give utterance to the suspicion which had become almost a certainty in his mind.
”_Aiwah_, Effendi. The treasure has already been discovered.”
”Good G.o.d! Do you think it is that, Abdul?”
”_Aiwah_, Effendi.” Abdul's voice was contrite.
Michael felt as if all movement in the world had suddenly been arrested. Then his mind began scrambling amid the ruins of his dreams for some lucid thought, for some reason which would explain why he was seated high up on a camel's back in the eastern desert.
He had never dreamed of such an ending to his dreams. In his most despondent moods he had contemplated no greater misfortune than the stealing of the jewels and the gold, the looting of its portable treasures by native _antika_ hunters. His super-man had never seriously contemplated even that misfortune; his faith was unshaken, his optimism complete.
The shock he had received affected his physical as well as his mental condition. An overwhelming desire came to him to get off his high seat and throw himself down on the sand and go to sleep for ever and ever.
That hateful flag, those smiling tents! whose whiteness had brought a vision of Millicent's tent floating before his eyes.
”There are three tents, Effendi. Shall we journey towards them?”
Abdul's voice sounded far away. What was he talking about? Michael tried to concentrate his thoughts.
”Oh yes, of course!” His voice was listless. ”We must go on. You may be wrong.” He struggled for mind-control.
He urged his camel to a quicker pace. They rode on in silence. Abdul was now convinced that the harlot--or, in other words, Mohammed Ali's ”golden lady”--had wreaked her vengeance on his master. He had taken into his camp the fever-stricken saint; she had slipped away in the night and discovered the treasure. With a comprehensiveness which would have astounded the impurest of Western ears, he cursed Millicent and her vile offspring into the third and fourth generations.
CHAPTER XI
As Michael got off his kneeling camel, a young Englishman left a tent, the outer one of the three which formed the excavation-camp, the white tents which Michael had seen from his high seat, and came quickly forward. It was obvious that strangers might come thus far and no further. In a voice of official authority, yet by no means ungraciously, he said to Michael:
”Can I do anything for you? What do you want? I'm afraid you can't come any nearer.”
Michael looked blankly into the thin, intelligent face, a sunburnt face, which any woman would have described as attractively ugly. For a moment or two neither man spoke. There was an unpleasant silence. It was significant of the atmosphere of the meeting. It expressed to the excavator strain, rather than shyness, on the traveller's part. He had told Michael that he might come no further; he had asked him if he wanted anything.
At both remarks Michael almost laughed hysterically. He was not allowed to come any closer to his own treasure, to the gift of Akhnaton, to the legacy of the Pharaoh, which had been divinely revealed to him! This interloper had asked him if he wanted anything!