Burning Sands Part 9

"I've told them to meet us with the horses on the other side of the water," he said. "We'll go across in the launch, which will save a long round by the bridge."

After a hasty cup of tea, therefore, they walked through the garden to the landing-steps, and were soon speeding over the river in the glare of the afternoon sun, the cloudless heavens above them and the swift-flowing waters of the ancient Nile shining beneath.

They landed amidst the cool shade of the palms on the opposite bank, near a road along which many native carriages and English dogcarts were pa.s.sing to and fro, this being the fashionable hour for taking the air; and many curious eyes were turned upon the immaculate couple as they mounted their horses, for the white launch with its little Union Jack at the stern, and the scarlet livery of the native attendants, revealed their ident.i.ty, and Lady Muriel's charms had already become a topic of general conversation.

"Which way would you like to go?" asked Rupert. "By the native roads across the fields, or straight along the main road out to Mena House?"

Muriel looked quickly at him. "Mena House?" she said. "Isn't that on the edge of the desert, where Mr. Lane said he was starting from?"

Her companion nodded. "Yes," he answered. "We would probably run into him. Shall we go the other way?"

Muriel drew rein for a moment. She would like to take her first view over that garden wall of which Daniel Lane had spoken, and it might be interesting to watch him ride away towards the setting sun. She might even have an opportunity of firing a parting shot at him-something about his rumoured harim of Bedouin women to whom he seemed so anxious to return. She would like to hurt him.

"No, let's go to Mena House," she answered at length, and she gave as her reason her anxiety to see the Pyramids which stand on the edge of the desert, dominating the well-known Mena House Hotel.

Rupert looked at his watch. "It's nearly five," he remarked, without any particular reason. He was not thinking of the hour of Daniel Lane's departure.

But Muriel was thinking of it, and, for answer, she urged her horse forward.

"I enjoy a good long gallop, don't you?" she said, as they turned into the avenue of acacias which runs in a fine straight line out to the desert, flanked by a riding-track of soft earth.

"It's a bit hot for anything strenuous, isn't it?" he suggested. He wanted to ride quietly and talk to her as they went.

For some distance they trotted in silence, but at length Muriel shortened her rein. "Come in!" she laughed, and therewith she gave her restless Arab a touch with her heel, and instantly was off and away in a cloud of dust, as though she and her horse had been discharged in one piece from some monstrous gun.

Rupert swore peevishly, and followed in her wake, presently overtaking her and galloping by her side. The tree-trunks on either hand seemed to whirl past them, and the foliage, which met overhead, formed a sort of tunnel pierced at one side by stabbing shafts of dazzling sunlight. The effect was blinding, and soon Rupert, an excellent horseman, began to feel as though he were the maddened villain of some flickering film of the Wild West, whose career had soon to end in a frightful tumble.

"Isn't it lovely?" shouted Muriel, ecstatically. Her blood seemed to be boiling in her veins; she glowed like a fiery immortal being, full of tremendous excitement and enthusiasm. This was life!-this was youth! She dragged her hat over her eyes, regardless of her own appearance, regardless of the hat's. She felt entirely crazy, and presumably her horse felt the same, for not for a moment did he slacken his thundering speed. The warm wind whistled in her ears; occasional roadside villas appeared to whirl past almost as soon as they were sighted; an automobile, full of gesticulating Egyptians, raced them and had difficulty in beating them; the electric tram from the Pyramids to Cairo appeared to leap past them with wildly clanging bell; she caught sudden glimpses of peasant carts and an occasional smart carriage, astonished brown faces and smiling white ones. Her hair began to come down.

At last her horse had had enough, and his gallop decreased to a trot, his trot to a walk. Her companion turned a laughing red face to her. He had caught the infection of her spirits, and, like her, was conscious of a burning sense of youth and strength. The perspiration was streaming down his cheeks.

"Phew!" he exclaimed, and recklessly mopped his forehead with a coloured silk handkerchief intended only for a breast-pocket ornament. "D'you often get taken like that?"

Muriel laughed excitedly, and, twisting the reins around her arm, pulled off her hat, thereby letting loose a tumbling ma.s.s of brown hair, which fell about her shoulders. Then, handing the hat to Rupert to hold, she raised her hands and coiled up the hair on to her head again, fastening it with the few remaining hairpins.

Rupert uttered an ordinary, vulgar whistle. He, too, had been galloped into naturalness. "By Jove!" he cried. "You have got glorious hair!"

Muriel settled her hat upon her head once more, and picked up her reins.

"I'll let it down properly for you some day," she said. At that moment she would have stood on her head, had anybody dared her to do so. A law should be pa.s.sed prohibiting women from galloping.

"I'll kiss you if you do," replied Rupert. The law should, perhaps, include young men as well.

He was startled at his audacity; but Muriel was not in a mental condition to do otherwise than laugh.

Thus they arrived, like two flushed children, at the end of the road, the hotel on their right, the mighty Pyramids rising up like hand-made mountains on their left, backed by the descending sun. In front of them stretched the desert-a ridge of white and yellow shelving rocks, and great shadowed slopes of sand mounting to the clear sky. Southwards, at the foot of the hills, stood a native village, the cl.u.s.tered white houses and dignified groups of palms reflected in the still waters of the inundation which, at this time of the year, cover the surrounding fields.

Outside the hotel several Bedouin dragomans sauntered about or sat smoking and chatting; and a few camels and donkeys, saddled in readiness for hire, stood tethered near by.

Muriel hardly glanced at the Pyramids: they had been visible to her through the trees during most of the ride, and they were just as she had pictured them. But the Bedouin in their flowing silks, the beta.s.selled camels, and the background of the desert made a picture which delighted her eyes.

"What's the time?" she asked. "I wonder if he has gone."

It was some seconds before Rupert took her meaning: he had forgotten about Daniel Lane. He looked at his watch: it was half-past five.

"I'll ask some of these fellows if they've seen him," he said, perhaps a little put out. A shadow had fallen upon the gay opening scene of his romance.

He rode forward, and soon elicited the information that "the Englishman who came in from the desert" had but a few minutes ago gone up the hill to the rocky plateau above, where his camels were awaiting him.

"We've missed him," he said, returning to her. "He's just gone."

"Well, let's ride after him," she answered, and without further remark she trotted up the short, winding road which led on to the higher ground. Rupert followed her, musing upon the inscrutable ways of women.

The road lay in the shadow of the hillside, but as they reached the summit they came into the full glare of the setting sun which was now nearing the distant horizon. On their left the Pyramids towered up into the blazing sky, but before them the rock-strewn plateau lay open and vast, and over it the wind blew warm and mysterious.

Muriel arched her hand above her eyes and looked about her.

"There he is!" she cried at length, directing her companion to a little group in a sandy hollow about a hundred yards distant, and therewith they both trotted forward.

Daniel Lane was about to mount his camel as they approached. Muriel waved her hand to him, whereat he pulled off his well-worn hat and laughed aloud.

"That's odd!" he said. "I had a sort of feeling you'd come."

Muriel stared at him, and her responding smile died upon her lips.

"We rode in this direction quite at random," said she, coldly. "I don't yet know one way from another."

"Well, you've found your way to the desert quickly enough," he replied.

"You know there are some people who seem to be drawn towards it at once."

Muriel glanced about her. "I think it looks a horrid place," she said, which was entirely untruthful. "I don't feel at all drawn to it."

She turned to Rupert Helsingham. He was slowly riding round the four camels which crouched, grunting, on the sand, in charge of two lean and wild-looking men of the desert, whose appearance was strikingly different from that of the Bedouin of the Pyramids, grown prosperous in their profession as guides and dragomans to the sightseers. Three of the camels were saddled, the seat in each case being covered by a rough sheepskin, and having on either side a coa.r.s.ely embroidered bag containing food, while a rifle and two water-bottles were slung across the back. The fourth camel, which was to be led by one of the riders, was lightly laden with stores and various purchases made in Cairo, and two small water-skins depended at its sides.

"I travel light, you see," said Daniel, as Rupert returned to them.

"Yes, you couldn't otherwise have come in at the pace you did," he answered. "Are you going back at the same rate?"

Daniel laughed. "Oh, no," he said. "I shall travel in easy stages, taking five or six days probably-as long as the food lasts, in fact. We can pick up water at the wells, and if we shoot anything we can take it still slower."

Muriel looked curiously at him. "Then why were you in such a hurry to be off?" she asked.

"One night in a Cairo hotel is enough for me," he answered. "I'm starting now so as to get ten or fifteen miles away by bedtime, where I can sleep peacefully on the clean sand, away from mosquitoes and bad smells and noise. And then we can just saunter. So long as we plan to reach a water-hole every two days, there's nothing to hurry us."

He turned towards the sunset and breathed in the pure air with evident satisfaction. "It's splendid to think there's all that empty s.p.a.ce in front of one!" he exclaimed. "In a few minutes now I shall be swallowed up in it! Gee! I'll think of you tonight, my girl, in your stuffy bedroom; and you can envy me lying under G.o.d's heaven, talking with my two good friends here about cities and slavery and civilization and things, till we yawn ourselves to sleep."

Muriel's interest in him began to revive. "It sounds wonderful," she said, doubtfully.