In the Mahdi's Grasp Part 43

"True!" said Frank.

"False!" cried the professor.

"No, true!" said Frank.

"I say false, sir, for from the time I lay down every night till you, being tired with your hard day's work, dropped off to sleep, I never hardly said a word."

"Well, now you mention it," said Frank, "I don't think you did, for I often used to think you had gone to sleep."

"Yes, and you used to ask me if I had. But I never had, eh?"

"Never once," said Frank quickly; "and I often used to feel ashamed of myself for being so drowsy and going off as I did."

"But look here," said the doctor, "what has this got to do with your patent plan for keeping Frank from betraying himself?"

"Everything," said the professor triumphantly. "That was my patent plan. I said to myself that sooner or later Frank would be letting--"

"Yes, yes, of course, betraying himself," said the doctor impatiently.

"But the plan, man--the plan?"

"Well, that's it, my dear Hakim," cried the professor, "I said to myself, that poor fellow cannot exist without talking; the words will swell up in him like so much gas. He must have a safety valve. Well, I provided it. I lay down beside him every night and let him talk till he fell asleep."

"I never thought it meant anything more than a friendly feeling," said Frank wonderingly. "Well, perhaps there is something in what you say."

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

A TRIUMPHAL ENTRY.

It was one bright evening, just about dusk, that, utterly exhausted by a long day's march, the head of the long line of horses, camels heavily laden, and marching men, came within sight of the city that was their goal, and in the glimpse the English party had of the place before night closed in it seemed to be one of the most desolate looking spots they had ever seen.

"But it is not fair to judge it," said the professor quietly. "We can see next to nothing; it is fully two miles away; and we are all weary and low-spirited with our long march. Wait till morning."

It had been expected that they would march in that night, but a halt was called in the midst of a great, dusty plain, and preparations for camping were at once begun.

Frank lay wakeful and restless for long enough. In his excited state sleep refused to come. Now that the goal had been reached it was hard to believe that they were there, and had succeeded in making their way to the neighbourhood of the far-famed cities of the Soudan with so little difficulty. Of physical effort there had been plenty, but he had antic.i.p.ated bitter struggles and disappointments; attempts to reach the prison of his brother in one direction, and being turned back, to attempt it again and again in others. Instead all had been straightforward, and their ruse had succeeded beyond all expectation.

But now that they were at one of the late Mahdi's strongholds on the Nile the question was, Would Harry Frere be there after all, or taken far to the south to the home of someone who held him as a slave?

Now for about the first time the adventurer fully realised the magnitude of the task he had taken in hand. The desert journey had impressed him by the vastness of the sandy plains and the utter desolation they had traversed; but that only appeared now to be the threshold of the place he had come to search. All the vast continent of Africa seemed to be before him, dim, shadowy, and mysterious, and as he sank at last into a feverish sleep, it was with his brother's despairing face gazing at him, the reproachful eyes sunken and strained and looking farewell before all was dark with the obscurity of the to-come.

"Hadn't you better rouse up now, sir?" said a familiar voice; but Frank, after his long and painful vigil, was unable to grasp the meaning of the words, far more to move.

"Mr Frank, sir--I mean, Ben--Ben Eddin. Humph! what an idiot I am!"

came softly out of the gloom. "It was bad enough to make such a slip out in the desert, where there were no next door neighbours; but to go and shout it out here, just beside this what-do-they-call-him's city was about the maddest thing I could have done. S'pose some one had heard me; it would have taken a great deal of lathering and sc.r.a.ping, more than ever a 'Rabian Night's barber ever got through, to make people believe I was the Hakim's slave.

"Mr--Bother! What's the matter with me this morning? I believe I'm half asleep, or else my brains are all shook up into a muddle by that brute of a camel. Here, Ben Eddin, rouse up and put on your best white soot. Here's the Sheikh been with a message to say that we're all going to form a procession and march through the town to camp in the groves on the other side. It's to be a triumphal what-do-they-call-it? and the Baggara chief is going to show off all his prisoners and plunder, and we're to make the princ.i.p.al part of the show. I say, Ben, do wake up; the coffee's nearly ready, and you ought to do a bit o' blacking, for the back of your neck where the jacket doesn't reach is getting quite grey with the sun burning it so much."

Procession--show--triumph--coffee--and the rest of it, made not the slightest impression upon Frank's torpid brain; but those words about the black stain and the bleaching caused by the scorching sun somehow suggested the risk he might run of being discovered, and that meant the frustration of his plans to rescue his brother. In a moment now his brain began to work.

"Is that you, Sam?" he cried hastily.

"I suppose so, sir, but there are times when I get pinching my leg to wake myself, expecting that I shall start up to find myself back in my pantry. But I don't, even when I make a bruise which turns blacker than your arms, and with a bit of blue touched up with yellow outside. I say, are you awake now?"

"Yes, yes, of course; but the sun is not up yet."

"No, he ain't as industrious as we are out in these parts, and doesn't get up so early. Now you understand about looking your best?"

"Yes, yes, I understand, Sam."

"But do you really, Ben? Don't deceive me, and go to sleep again. If you do I know how it will be."

"How it will be?" said Frank impatiently.

"You'll say that I didn't call you. Come, now, recollect where you are, and what we've got to do. Mr Abraham--"

"Ibrahim, man! I've told you so half a dozen times before."

"Then it's all right, Ben Eddin. You are wide awake."

"Yes, yes, of course. But what about the Sheikh?"

"He says we are to go to the Emir's palace."

"Emir's palace? What Emir--what palace?"

"That fierce old chap as had such a bad arm. He's an Emir. Mr Imbrahim says he's just heard, and that an Emir's a great gun out here.

Sort of prince and general all in one, I suppose. He told me his name, but I forget what it is. It's very foreign, though, and there's a good lot of it. He's a great friend, and a sort of half brother of the other fellow."

"Other fellow? What other fellow?" said Frank, half angrily.

"Oh, you know, sir, the other big man that followed the Mahdi in taking the Soudan."

"You mean the Khalifa?"

"That's right, sir. I'm not good at all over these Egyptian chaps.

I've one name for them all--the bad lot, and that's enough for me. Now, sir--bah! Ben Eddin, I mean; breakfast will be ready in ten minutes, so look sharp. I like to see you have a good meal in the morning, just as I like one for myself. It's something to keep you going all day. It makes a deal of difference if you start fair."

"I'll be there," said Frank.

"Recollect you're to put on your clean white cotton jacket. Mr Ibbrahim says his chaps have been seeing to the camels so that they shall look their best, and that it's very important that the Hakim should be dressed out well, and he will."

Frank's toilet in those days was very simple, and within the time he was at the door of the Hakim's tent, to find him dressed and waiting to begin his morning meal, the professor coming from the tent directly after, ready to greet both and enjoy the excellent repast that was waiting, the Emir having kept up his attentions in that direction to the doctor who had saved his arm from mortification, and consequently himself from death.

There was the loud hum of voices right away through the camp, from which the fragrant smoke of many fires arose through the grey dawn, and an unwonted stir indicating great excitement prevailed and rapidly increased with the coming light, for the orange and gold streamers announcing the rising of the sun were beginning to flush in the eastern sky, illumining the far-spreading city, and turning the sands where it was built into sparkling gold.

As the sun rose higher the three Englishmen gazed wonderingly at the city which lay stretching to right and left--the place into which they were to make their triumphal entry that morning, as soon as the Emir's little force, which seemed to have grown unaccountably during the night, was marshalled; and the professor pretty well expressed the feelings of his two friends as he stood and gazed at the place, their eyes dwelling longest upon a white dome-like structure that towered up, and which they learned was the Mahdi's tomb.