Part 45 (1/2)

”Look here,” Daniel broke out at last, ”I don't know what you feel about it, but for my own part I rather object to this silence.”

”I have nothing to say to you,” she replied.

”That doesn't matter,” he said. ”I will do the talking. I shall choose a subject and talk about it: you can listen if you want to.”

Therewith he gave her an account of the Bedouin tribes of this part of the desert, how they had come to settle there, how he had recovered a part of their history from the old tales and ballads which he had recorded; and he told her something of their curious laws and customs.

Muriel's face did not betray any interest whatsoever, but Daniel persevered courageously until the meal was finished.

”You can stay in this room and read a book if you like,” he said to her, as they rose from the table.

Muriel looked at him coldly. ”Thank you,” she replied, with an emphasis which she hoped was withering, ”I prefer to go to my room. Good-night!”

And with that she took her departure.

The day had seemed intolerably long to her, and her smouldering anger had flamed up within her at frequent intervals. She realized that Daniel was playing the schoolmaster to her, and she was determined not to knuckle under to him. If he had decided to keep her a prisoner here for the full fortnight, she would do her best to make him thoroughly uncomfortable. His cool, impersonal att.i.tude annoyed her; she was amazed that a man who but yesterday was branding her with his burning kisses could be today so entirely detached from emotion, and she flushed at the insult of it.

Her only consolation lay in the thought that he was injuring himself by his behaviour. She would now never be even so much as a sister to him-not even so much as a friend. When she had escaped from this horrible place she would go to England, and soon, no doubt, she would marry a nice, ordinary man, with sleek hair and a tooth-brush moustache and long, thin legs; and as she came out of the church after the marriage ceremony she would catch sight of Daniel in the crowd and would smile contemptuously at him....

She was very tired, and many minutes had not pa.s.sed before she abandoned the pretence of reading the anthology of English verse which Daniel had placed in her room on the previous evening, nor was it long before she fell into a deep and dreamless sleep which held her as it were entombed until Hussein caused her resurrection by bringing in the bath-water in the morning.

The cool breeze and the sparkling air brought a certain feeling of well-being into her heart; but the meeting with Daniel at the breakfast table was a wretched business, and was made all the more distasteful by his evident good health and the morning freshness of his mind.

”I hope you are feeling fit,” he said to her. ”We have a busy morning before us.”

That he was not speaking in jest was proved by the event. Soon after breakfast he took her down to the house of Sheikh Ali, and introduced her to the old man and his son Ibrahim. Thereafter the four of them walked over to the open ground outside the mosque, where a large number of men and camels were gathered, while on the outskirts of the area many women and children stood in the shade of the palms. Daniel explained to her that a large number of the chief men of the El Hamran were setting out upon the long journey to the far-off Oasis of El Khargeh, where there was to be a great gathering of the tribes. Sheikh Ali himself was too old and too feeble to go with the caravan, and his eldest son, Ibrahim, was remaining with him; but his younger sons and most of his male relatives and adherents were going.

She watched the animated scene with interest, and the hubbub came to her ears with the wonder of novelty-the women uttering their strange, whinnying cries in token of their grief at parting with their husbands; the white-bearded old Sheikh embracing his sons, like a Biblical picture come to life; the diversely robed figures steering their camels in circles and firing their rifles in the air; the barking of innumerable dogs skulking amongst the palms; and over all the brilliant suns.h.i.+ne and the deep blue of the sky.

She and Daniel shook hands with a very large number of men, and, as she walked homewards after the caravan had departed, she had a confused memory of smiling bearded faces, dark eyes, and many-coloured robes fluttering in the wind.

After sundown he took her down to the village, armed with pots of ointment, to help him to doctor the eyes of two little grandchildren of the Sheikh, who were suffering from ophthalmia, and whose sight his daily ministrations were saving. And in the evening he continued his writing, leaving her to read a book until, with many yawns, she betook herself to her room.

This day was typical of all the others in that surprising fortnight.

Quietly and impersonally he led her through her duties, obliging her to make herself useful in a score of different ways. Now he set her to the task of cla.s.sifying his photographs and notes; now he sent her down to the animals' hospital to doctor the camels' sores; now he asked her to ma.s.sage the sprained ankle of a small girl who had been brought to the house for treatment; now he made her grace with her presence a village wedding festival; and now he dispatched her with milk and eggs to the hovel of a blind old woman who lived on her neighbours' charity.

In the afternoons he would take her for painfully long tramps over the desert, for the good of her health as he told her; and when the silence became oppressive he would talk to her, whether she listened or no, about the nature of the birds they saw or whose footprints were marked upon the sand, about the geological formation of the country, about the jackals and their habits, and so forth. During their meals together he attempted, cold-bloodedly, to enlighten her on many subjects, and sometimes he would talk philosophy to her, endeavouring to give her a new standpoint on certain age-old themes, but ”You do like preaching, don't you?” was the kind of response he received.

Sitting opposite to him at the table, it seemed to him that she carried herself with great dignity; and he had to admit that, under the circ.u.mstances, she was a great deal more self-possessed and high-mettled than he had expected her to be. She stood up to him, so to speak, and there were times at which he had the feeling, though he did not show it, that he was behaving like a boor.

On one occasion in particular he was conscious of having been put to rights by her. He had been talking about the sincerity of Islam, and had said how wise the Prophet was to refuse to organize a priesthood, preferring to leave the faith in the hands of the laity.

”It is so different from the empty ceremonials of our own religion,” he said. ”It seems to me that the Church's idea of the imitation of Christ is generally a burlesque in bad taste.”

”In every walk of life,” she replied, ”there are men who make an outward hash of their inner ideals. You, for example, have great ideas as to what women should be; but in actual fact you make a terrible mess of your dealings with them.”

”I wonder,” he mused. It was as though he had been chastised.