Part 8 (1/2)

As the day wore on, however, his spirits fell, for on every hand was suspicion, unrest, and opposition, and his native a.s.sistants went sluggishly about their work. It was pathetic and disheartening to see people refusing to be protected, the sick refusing to be relieved, all stricken with fear, yet inviting death by disobeying the Inglesi.

Kalamoun was hopeless; yet twenty-four hours earlier Fielding had fancied there was a little light in the darkness. That night Fielding's music gave him but two hours' sleep, and he had to begin the day on a brandy-and-soda. Wherever he went open resistance blocked his way, hisses and mutterings followed him, the sick were hid in all sorts of places, and two of his a.s.sistants deserted before noon. Things looked ominous enough, and at five o'clock he made up his mind that Egypt would be overrun with cholera, and that he should probably have to defend himself and the Amenhotep from rioters, for the native police would be useless.

But at five o'clock d.i.c.ky Donovan came in a boat, and with him Mustapha Kali under a native guard of four men. The Mudir's sense of humour had been touched, and this sense of humour probably saved the Mudir from trouble, for it played d.i.c.ky's game for him.

Mustapha Kali had been sentenced to serve in the Cholera Hospital of Kalamoun, that he might be cured of his unbelief. At first he had taken his fate hardly, but d.i.c.ky had taunted him and then had suggested that a man whose conscience was clear and convictions good would carry a high head in trouble. d.i.c.ky challenged him to prove his libels by probing the business to the bottom, like a true scientist. All the way from Abdallah d.i.c.ky talked to him so, and at last the only answer Mustapha Kali would make was, ”Malaish no matter!”

Mustapha Kali p.r.i.c.ked up his ears with hope as he saw the sullen crowds from Kalamoun gathering on the sh.o.r.e to watch his deportation to the Cholera Hospital; and, as he stepped from the khia.s.sa, he called out loudly:

”They are all dogs and sons of dogs, and dogs were their grandsires. No good is in a dog the offspring of a dog. Whenever these dogs scratch the ground the dust of poison is in the air, and we die.”

”You are impolite, Mustapha Kali,” said d.i.c.ky coolly, and offered him a cigarette.

The next three days were the darkest in d.i.c.ky Donovan's career. On the first day there came word that Norman, overwrought, had shot himself. On the next, Mustapha Kali in a fit of anger threw a native policeman into the river, and when his head appeared struck it with a barge-pole, and the man sank to rise no more. The three remaining policemen, two of whom were Soudanese, and true to d.i.c.ky, bound him and shut him up in a hut.

When that evening Fielding refused to play, d.i.c.ky knew that Norman's fate had taken hold of him, and that he must watch his friend every minute--that awful vigilance which kills the watcher in the end. d.i.c.ky said to himself more than once that day:

”Christ save us all from a death like this, On the reef of Norman's woe!”

But it was not d.i.c.ky who saved Fielding. On the third day the long-deferred riot broke out. The Copt and the Arab had spread the report that Fielding brought death to the villages by moving the little flags on his map. The populace rose.

Fielding was busy with the map at the dreaded moment that hundreds of the villagers appeared upon the bank and rushed the Amenhotep. Fielding and d.i.c.ky were both armed, but Fielding would not fire until he saw that his own crew had joined the rioters on the bank. Then, amid a shower of missiles, he shot the Arab who had first spread the report about the map and the flags.

Now d.i.c.ky and he were joined by Holgate, the Yorks.h.i.+re engineer of the Amenhotep, and together the three tried to hold the boat. Every native had left them. They were obliged to retreat aft to the deckcabin.

Placing their backs against it, they prepared to die hard. No one could reach them from behind, at least.

It was an unequal fight. All three had received slight wounds, but the blood-letting did them all good. Fielding was once more himself; nervous anxiety, unrest, had gone from him. He was as cool as a cuc.u.mber. He would not go s.h.i.+pwreck now ”on the reef of Norman's woe.” Here was a better sort of death. No men ever faced it with quieter minds than did the three. Every instant brought it nearer.

All at once there was a cry and a stampede in the rear of the attacking natives. The crowd suddenly parted like two waves, and retreated; and Mustapha Kali, almost naked, and supported by a stolid Soudanese, stood before the three. He was pallid, his hands and brow were dripping sweat, and there was a look of death in his eyes.

”I have cholera, effendi!” he cried. ”Take me to Abdallah to die, that I may be buried with my people and from mine own house.”

”Is it not poison?” asked Fielding grimly, yet seeing now a ray of hope in the sickening business.

”It is cholera, effendi. Take me home to die.”

”Very well. Tell the people so, and I will take you home, and I will bury you with your fathers,” said Fielding.

Mustapha Kali turned slowly. ”I am sick of cholera,” he said as loudly as he could to the awe-stricken crowd. ”May G.o.d not cool my resting-place if it be not so!”

”Tell the people to go to their homes and obey us,” said d.i.c.ky, putting away his pistol.

”These be good men, I have seen with mine own eyes,” said Mustapha hoa.r.s.ely to the crowd. ”It is for your good they do all. Have I not seen? Let G.o.d fill both my hands with dust if it be not so! G.o.d hath stricken me, and behold I give myself into the hands of the Inglesi, for I believe!”

He would have fallen to the ground, but d.i.c.ky and the Soudanese caught him and carried him down to the bank, while the crowd scuttled from the boat, and Fielding made ready to bear the dying man to Abdallah--a race against death.

Fielding brought Mustapha Kali to Abdallah in time to die there, and buried him with his fathers; and d.i.c.ky stayed behind to cleanse Kalamoun with perchloride and limewash.

The story went abroad and travelled fast, and the words of Mustapha Kali, oft repeated, became as the speech of a holy man; and the people no longer hid their dead, but brought them to the Amenhotep.

This was the beginning of better things; the disease was stayed.