“Shan, Shan darling! You have terrified us all! Wherever have you been? Whose car is this?”
“It is his car, dearest,” I replied. “Quick! get in. It’s important that nobody should see us.”
“His car?”
As I half lifted her in onto the cushions she grasped my arm and looked up with startled eyes at me. The chauffeur already was back at the wheel.
“Shan dear, whatever do you mean? Sir Denis got in touch with police headquarters half an hour ago. And Uncle is simply raving. Dr. Petrie has asked everybody he knows in the hotel if you were seen to leave.”
I held her close as the car moved off, but she began to tremble violently.
“Shan!—my dear, my dear!” she cried, and pulled my head down, trying to search my eyes in that semidarkness. “For God’s sake, where are we going?”
“We are going to him,” I replied.
“My God! He’s mad!”
The words were barely audible—a mere whisper. Thrusting both hands against my breast, Rima tried to push me away— to free herself. Already we had passed the Continental.
“You don’t understand, darling....”
“God help me, Shan, I do! Make him stop! Make him stop, I tell you!”
An English policeman was on duty at the comer, and as we raced past him, I saw him raise his arm. Rima, wrenching free, leaned from the window, and:
“Help!” she screamed.
But I drew her forcibly back, putting my hand over her mouth before she could utter another word.
“My darling!” I said, holding her very close. “You will spoil everything! You will spoil everything!”
She relaxed and lay very still in my arms....
The way was practically deserted, now, and we passed few lighted patches, but I could see her big, upcast eyes fixed upon me with an intensity of expression which puzzled me. I could see, too, that she had grown very pale. She did not speak again, but continued to watch me in that strange manner.
She seemed to be communicating some silent message and to be changing my mood, cooling that feverish exaltation.
What had she asked? Where we were going? Yes, that was it....And where were we going? Mental turmoil like a physical pain claimed me again as I tried to grapple with that question....
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIRST
“HE WILL BE CROWNED IN DAMASCUS”
I have related what really happened on that night in Cairo in the proper order of those events—but in their order as I knew it later. As a matter of fact, quite a long interval elapsed, as will presently appear, before I was able to recall anything whatever from the time when I set out in pursuit of Madame Ingomar to that when I acted as a decoy in the abduction of Rima.
A master player had used me as a pawn. The very seat of reason had been shaken by a drug not to be discovered in any pharmacopoeia. These events and those which immediately followed I was to recover later. I must return now to the conclusion of a phase in my life which I still consider the most remarkable any man has known....
* * *
“Shan dear, I know you are very sleepy, but it’s getting cold, and very late....”
I stirred dreamily, opening my eyes. I was pillowed on a warm ivory shoulder, a bare arm encircled my neck, and the silvery voice which had awakened me was tenderly caressing. I hugged my fragrant pillow and felt no desire to move.
A long jade earring touched me coldly. Soothing fingers stroked my hair, and the silvery voice whispered:
“Truly, Shan, you must wake up! I’m sorry, dear, but you must.”
Reluctantly I raised my head, looking into brilliant green eyes regarding me under half lowered lashes. Their glance was a caress as soothing as that of the slender fingers.
Fah Lo Suee, I mused languidly, conscious of nothing but a dreamy contentment, and thinking what perfect lips she had, when, smiling, she bent and whispered in my ear:
“Love dreams are so bitter-sweet because we know we are dreaming.”
But yet I was reluctant to move. I could see a long reach of the Nile, touched to magic by the moon. Dahabeahs were moored against the left bank, their slender, graceful masts forming harmonious lines against a background of grouped palms and straggling white buildings. Of course! I was in Fah Lo Suee’s car; her arms were about me. I turned my head, looking over a silken shoulder to where a bridge spanned the Nile. It must be very late, I mused, later than I had supposed;
the Kasr el-Nil bridge was deserted.
Memory began to return—or what I thought then to be memory—from the moment when I determined to follow Fah Lo Suee from the garden ofShepheard’s....I had been uncertain of her identity until she had removed the gold mask....
“I think someone has been watching, Shan, and I am positively shivering. I am going to drive you back now.”
I sat bolt upright, one hand raised to my head, as Fah Lo Suee bent slightly and started the car. With never another glance aside, she drove on, presently to turn, right, into the maze of Cairo’s empty streets.
Furtively I watched the clear profile of the driver. It was beautiful, and strangely like that of the mystery queen, Nefertiti, whose cold loveliness has caused so much controversy. The small chin was delicately but firmly modelled, the straight nose from a strictly classical standpoint was perhaps too large, but very characteristic. I exulted in the knowledge that this brilliant and alluring woman had selected me— Shan Greville—from the rest of mankind.
Cairo’s streets were depopulated as the streets of sleeping Thebes; and at the corner of Sharia el-Maghriabi, which I recognized with a start of awakening, Fah Lo Suee pulled up.
I did not know then, but I knew later, the real character of a kind of wave of remorse which swept over me. It was, of course, my true self fighting against this strange abandonment, partly drug-induced and partly hypnotic, which held me voluptuously....
Rima! How could I ever face Rima? What explanation could I offer which she would accept? And Sir Denis! Oddly enough, it was his grim brown face which appeared most vividly before me in that odd moment of clarity: the chief and Dr. Petrie were mere shadows in a mist background....
I had held a link of a deathly conspiracy in my hand. I could have snapped it; my duty was plain. Instead, I had passed the hours in dalliance with Fah Lo Suee! I clutched my head, trying to recall where we had gone. I could not believe that I had spent the night like some callow undergraduate on a petting party; but:
“You must walk from here, Shan,” said Fah Lo Suee. “I dare not drive you any farther.”
She linked her arms about me and crushed her lips against mine, her long, narrow eyes closed. And in the complete surrender of that parting embrace I experienced a mad triumph which no other conquest could have given me. Rima, Nayland Smith, the chief—all were forgotten!
“Good-night, dear! And remember me until we meet again.
»
I stood on the pavement struggling with the most conflicting emotions, as the car swept around in the empty Sharia el-Maghrabi and disappeared in the direction of Ismailia. The perfume of that parting kiss still lingered on my lips. As a man marooned, condemned, forgotten, I stood there—I cannot say for how long. But at last I turned and stared about me.
Cairo was asleep. What did it matter? I laughed aloud— and began to walk back to Shepheard’s.
I met never a soul in the Sharia Kamel, until just before reaching the terrace. At this point, where there are a number of shops lying back from the street, a hideous object, a belated beggar man, suddenly emerged from the shadows.