THE DRIVER OF AN ARABEAH

"Thank God!" cried Biddy, as a slim figure in a loose white robe framed itself in the doorway.

With a sob, Mabel ran toward them, both hands held out, and in an instant she was being hugged and kissed and cooed over.

"You've found me—you've come!" she cried. "I never dared think you would, when he rushed me away from Asiut. He said he would keep me here all the rest of my life, to punish me for complaining to you."

"But how did he know?" Monny asked. "Did your sister-in-law tell him about the letter?"

"I don't think so, unless he has made her confess. It was like this: He was coming to his place here on business. I felt so thankful. It seemed providential he should be away then, just when you were starting up Nile. I was almost happy that morning, when suddenly he appeared again and I was ordered to put on a habberah and yashmak, and travel with him. Yeena, the woman who acts as my maid, had to get ready in a hurry, too. The chief eunuch, a hateful hypocritical wretch, followed. Some clothes have been sent to me since, but not many. At first I couldn't guess what had happened, and he was in such a fiendish temper I daren't ask questions. It wasn't till after we arrived that he explained. I'm sure he took pleasure in hurting me. He said that he left home early the morning he was going to Luxor, because he meant to stop and make a business call on the way to the depot, otherwise he wouldn't have been able to rush home and fetch me as he did, and still be in time to catch his train after the warning. It was some dragoman you employed in Cairo, he told me, who had seen us getting off the Laconia, and who ran after his carriage in the street, in Asiut. The wicked creature warned him that you were all there, and that he'd heard you say something which sounded as if there were a plot to get at me. Just at that minute, by the worst of luck, Mr. Sheridan passed. You know how foolish and cruel he was about Mr. Sheridan on the ship. Well, he hadn't forgotten. So he turned round and almost snatched me out of the house, rather than I should be left in Asiut with him away."

"This is exactly what we thought must have happened!" exclaimed Monny. "That beast, Bedr! And to think that Rachel and I wasted our time trying to convert him! How I wish I hadn't let Aunt Clara engage him at Alexandria! She thought he'd come from a man with her favourite name, Antony: but she wouldn't have insisted if I hadn't encouraged her. I feel as if this trouble were partly my fault. And if I hadn't been thoughtless enough at Asiut to blurt out your husband's name—."

"You're not to blame for anything, dearest," Biddy tried to comfort her. "It was your unfailing resolve to help, which has brought us here."

"You're both my good angels," said Mabel, "Oh, it's heavenly to see you. But I can't understand why I'm allowed to, after all the threats and punishments. I'm afraid I shall be made to pay somehow. He loves to torture me—and he knows how. I believe he hates me, now he's begun to realize that I'd give anything to leave him, that I don't consider myself his wife."

"If he hates you, why isn't he willing to let you go?" Monny questioned her.

"Partly because he's very vain, and it would humiliate him. Partly because he has no son yet, only that horrid little brown girl; and he's set his heart on a boy who's to possess all the qualities and strength of the West. No, he won't let me go!"

"Well, you'll do it in spite of him then," said Monny eagerly. "That's what we're here for. We shall take you with us. You must say to your servants that we've invited you to drive, and you've accepted. There's nothing in that to make them suspect. Lots of Turkish ladies go driving and motoring with European women, in Cairo. And you can have that fat black man sit on the box seat, with—with our coachman, if it would make things easier, taking him to guard you. He can be hustled or bribed or something, when the right time comes to get rid of him, never fear. Oh, it's going to be a glorious adventure, and at the end of it you'll be free! Nobody could blame you, as the man has another wife."

Mabella HÂnem shook her head. "You're splendid to plan this. But it's too late. It was too late from the moment that dragoman warned—my husband. Why you've been allowed to come into the house and talk with me, I can't think, unless he is watching and listening through a hidden spyhole. There's sure to be some secret reason in his head, anyhow—a reason that's for his good and not mine. And I shall not be able to get out, if you do."

"If we do!" echoed Biddy, a catch in her voice.

She glanced furtively at Monny. What had we all been dreaming of when we let this beautiful girl run into danger? I know Biddy well enough to be sure that her thought at that instant was for Monny Gilder, not Brigit O'Brien. But the fear in her heart was vague, until the next answer Mabel made—an answer that came almost with calmness; for Mabella HÂnem's whole being was concentrated upon herself, and her own imbroglio. Everything else, everybody else—even these friends who were risking much to help her—were secondary considerations.

"I don't suppose real harm will come to you. I don't see how he'd dare. And yet—there may be something on foot. Three men had come to-day, one who might be a dragoman, and two Europeans. They came together. I saw them. And I haven't seen them go away. They're in the men's part of the house—the selÂmlik. They must be with my husband. Perhaps there's only some business about the sugarcane. But—"

"Did you see the men distinctly?" Biddy asked, in a changed tone.

"Yes, quite distinctly, for they glanced up at the window where I was peeping out. Of course they couldn't see me, through the wooden lattice and the bougainvillia, but I had a good look at them. The dragoman seemed to have one blind eye. Oh! I hadn't thought of that before! Can it be the man who gave the warning?"

"What were the Europeans like?" Biddy questioned, without answering. "Were they wearing light tweed knickerbockers with big checks?"

"No, they were in dark clothes, not very noticeable."

"Had one a scar on his forehead?"

"Why, yes, I believe he had!"

The eyes of Brigit and Monny met: but there was none of that deadly fear in the girl's, which Biddy was trying to keep out of hers. Even now, it was hardly fear for herself. It was nearly all for Monny; but Monny must not know, lest she should lose her nerve when it was needed most. That idea of Brigit's, about Monny being mistaken for EsmÉ O'Brien by members of the Organization O'Brien betrayed, had seemed foolish and far fetched, although EsmÉ was hidden from her father's enemies near Monaco, and it was at Monaco that Miss Gilder and Rachel Guest and Mrs. East had joined Brigit on the Laconia. I had laughed at the suggestion, and Biddy had been half-ashamed to make it. But now, in this lonely house where she and the girl had been unexpectedly welcomed, in this house where the master watched, entertaining three strange men, the thought did not appear quite so foolish, quite so far fetched. Indeed, Biddy marvelled why it had occurred to none of us that one of the dangers to be run in rescuing Mabel might come through Bedr, the same danger which had perhaps threatened in the House of the Crocodile.

Too late to think of this now! The fact remained that we had not thought of it when there was time. Not even Biddy had felt certain that there was a secret motive for taking the girls to the hasheesh den, or that Bedr had been guilty of anything worse than indiscretion. His warning to Rechid Bey we had put down to a petty desire for revenge, to "pay us out" for his discharge. Though Biddy had never felt sure of his new employers' German origin, and though she had had qualms at sight of the party, following or arriving before us on our pilgrimage through the desert and up the Nile, she had never associated their possible designs with Rechid Bey's grudge against us. Yet how obvious that Bedr should take advantage of it for his clients' sake, if those two men were what she sometimes feared! Brigit had never spoken out to Monny what was in her mind about EsmÉ O'Brien. She had known that Monny would laugh, and perhaps say "What fun!" For the girl had invited Biddy to Egypt "because she attracted adventures," and because Monny badly needed a few, her life having been, up to the date of starting, a "kind of fruit and flower piece in a neat frame." Now, perhaps Monny wouldn't laugh; but it was not the time to speak of new dangers.

"Well, if your husband thinks that creatures like Bedr and his Germans are going to help him stop us from getting out, or taking you out, he's wrong," said Monny, stoutly. "Bedr's the most sickening coward, as Rachel Guest and I have reason to remember. But I'm glad we know what we have to expect, aren't you, Biddy?"

It was hard to answer, because the girl was in reality so far from knowing what she might have to expect. Brigit tried to smile her reply, as Monny began to tell Mabel something of their plan: about the friends ready to rally round them, once they were in the carriage waiting outside the gate; and about the motor coat and veiled hood which had been brought for Mabel to put on, at a safe distance from the house. "You'll have to start in your own things," the girl was saying, "otherwise your servants would think it odd. Ring now, dear, for your woman, and have her give you your habberah and yashmak."

"There are no bells," said Mabella HÂnem, with her soft air of obstinate hopelessness. "When I want Yeena, if she isn't in the room, I clap my hands as hard as I can. But I tell you, it is no use. It is too late." As she spoke, throwing up her arms and letting them fall with a gesture of helpless despair, both Brigit and Monny felt that Islam had already raised a barrier between them and this delicate creature it had taken into its keeping. In the white wool robe she wore—the kind of loose dressing gown affected by Turkish women—she looked more like a Circassian than an American girl. Always she had seemed to her would-be rescuers a charming doll, a feminine thing of exactly the type which would appeal to a Turk, weary of dark beauties: her hair was so very golden, her eyes so very big and blue, her lashes so very black, her mouth so very red and small: but now she had become an odalisque. Mabel's friends realized that she would do nothing to save herself. They must do all.

Hesitating no longer, Monny struck her hands loudly together. Yeena did not come. The girl clapped again, and yet again, till her palms smarted, but nothing happened.

"Yeena is in it—whatever they mean to do," said Mabel. "She's had her orders."

"Very well, then," Monny persisted, her eyes shining and her cheeks carnation, "you must go without your wraps. Come along. Don't be frightened. Isn't it better to risk something to get away than to stay here alone when we're gone?"

The pretty doll, with a little moan, gave herself up to her friends. Brigit as well as Monny realized that the moment had come. They must take her while she was in this mood.

"Let me go ahead," said Monny, in a low, firm voice. "You know why."

Brigit did know why. Monny had Anthony's Browning, and she alone understood the use of it. Yes, she must lead the way; yet Brigit longed to fling herself in front, to make of her body a shield for the tall white girl she had never so loved and admired. Biddy put Mabel in front of her, and behind Monny, keeping her between them with two cold but determined little hands on the shrinking shoulders, and so pushing her along, protected front and rear, in the piteous procession.

Of course, if the door leading toward the house entrance had been locked on the outside, there would have been the end of the endeavour, for the moment: but it opened to Monny's hand, and all three went on unchecked, until they came to the vestibule, where on the wall bench they had seen the koran of the fat negro, awaiting his return.

They had come tiptoeing, and had made no more sound than prowling kittens, yet he sat there facing the door, no longer heavy lidded, a black mountain of lazy flesh, but alert, beady eyed, as if he had been counting the minutes.

As they swept through the doorway, hoping to surprise him, the eunuch jumped to his feet as lightly as a man of half his weight, and smiling with pleasure in the excitement of an event to break monotony, he blocked with his great bulk the aperture between wall and projecting screen.

No wonder they had not needed to lock doors, with this giant for a jailer, and a big Sudanese knife conspicuously showing in a belt under his open galabeah! Rechid had perhaps wanted the white mouse in his trap to feel the thrill of hope, and then the shock of disappointment. He had counted completely on the guardian of his harem, but—though he had chosen an American wife, he had not counted on the courage of another type of American girl. The knife looked terrible; but it was sheathed and tucked into a belt. Anthony's Browning was in Monny's hand, and hidden only under her serge coat. Out it came, with a warning click of the trigger. And with an astonished, frightened gurgle in his throat the negro involuntarily fell back.

"Run!" Monny breathed, prisoning him where he stood, with the little bright eye of the Browning cocked up at his face. She had to be obeyed then, and they ran, the two of them, flashing past the black man, touching his clothes as they squeezed by, yet he dared not put out a detaining hand. When they were away—safe or not, she could not tell —Monny still kept the pistol in position, but began slowly to turn, that she too might pass the dragon, holding him at her mercy till the end. Not a word of Arabic could she recall, but the Browning spoke for her, a language understood without the trouble of learning, by all the sons of Adam.

When she had backed through the doorway, the girl still faced toward the inner vestibule, and it was well she did so, for scarcely was she out of his sight before the black giant was after her, taking the chance that she would have turned to run. But there was the resolute young face, with eyes defying his; and there was the weapon ready to blow out such brains as he had, if the hand on the knife moved. Again he fell back, and then Monny did run, making the best use she had ever made of those long limbs which gave her the air of a young Diana. She ran until she had caught up with the other two, flying toward the distant gate; for something told her that the negro would have hurried to tell his master of the trick the women had played—preferring the lash on his back perhaps, to a bullet through his head.

She was right, no doubt, to trust her instinct, for the eunuch did not pursue, though his tale of failure was not needed. Rechid Bey had been watching from a window of the selÂmlik, as Mabel his wife had watched when he received visitors. He did not wait for the negro's warning, but dashed out of the house, followed and then passed by several long-robed men in Arab dress. The faces of these were almost hidden by the loose hoods which desert men pull over their heads in a high wind, but had they been uncovered the women would not have seen them. The thing was to escape, not to take note of the pursuers; and it was only Biddy, looking over her shoulder for Monny, who even saw that they were followed. She cried out to her friend to hurry, that some one was coming, that they must get to the gate or all would be ended; then feeling Mabel falter, she held her more tightly and ran the faster.

Rechid and his companions were shouting, not to the women, but to the gatekeeper; and as the master's furious voice rang out, just in front of the fugitive (all three together now), appeared the big form of the man at the gate.

Monny did not know what to do; for in whichever direction she faced with the Browning, she could be captured from the other. She might kill the negro, and then turn to keep the pursuers back: but the thought of killing a man sickened her. She had meant only to threaten, not to take life. Suddenly she felt afraid of the Browning. She hesitated, in a wild second of confusion, hating herself for failing her friends, yet unable to decide or act: but hardly had the gatekeeper sprung in sight than he went down, flat on his face, struck in the back of the neck by the shabby fellow who had driven their carriage. "Go on!" the dirty-faced Arab said in French. "There's some one else to drive you. I'll follow. I'm armed."

The three sped by him, as he stood aside to let them pass, showing to Monny a pistol which matched the one he had lent her. This consoled the girl in obeying; for as "Antoun" had trusted her courage in this adventure, so did she trust his, and his strength and wit against four men or four dozen men, if need were.

There was the waiting arabeah, and there on the box was a much cleaner, more self-respecting Arab to drive it than the soiled figure which had left the horses and strayed into the garden. Afterwards they learned that the new man was the "sister's cousin's uncle" of the Hadji's cafÉ acquaintance. He had been engaged to stroll past in the road, stop, speak, offer the gatekeeper a cigarette, drift into conversation, and be ready to jump onto the box seat the instant Antoun left it. His instructions included furious driving with the three ladies (once they had bundled into the arabeah), to the Temple of MÛt.

Rechid Bey had every right, according to his own point of view, to resent the kidnapping of his wife, and to get her back in any way he could, even if blood had to be spilt. But his companions—they who were muffled in the cloaks and hoods to save their faces from the sharp wind—had perhaps not the same right or interest. In any case, when they saw that the women had a man, or men, to help them, and that so helped they had passed from the privacy of the garden to the publicity of the road, the three fell back. Publicity, it may be, did not please them: or else, thinking to have only women to deal with, they were not armed and did not like the look of the pistol. Rechid, evidently no coward, or past feeling fear in rage at the failure of his counterplot, ran on, wheezing slightly—he was fat for his age—toward the erect Arab and the prostrate negro.

"Beast! devil!" he panted breathlessly, and cried out other words of evil import in both Turkish and Arabic; threatening the silent man of the pistol with death and things even worse. But before he had gone far, the hooded men caught up with him, and surrounding, urged him back. What they said, Anthony could not hear, or what he said in return; but he thought they were proposing some plan which appealed to Rechid's reason, for he showed signs of yielding. There was now no longer anything to detain the protector of the ladies, for by this time, he hoped and believed that their arabeah must be far on its way toward the Temple of MÛt, the meeting-place agreed upon. Accordingly, he stepped over the unconscious gatekeeper, who lay with his nose in the grass, and backed calmly out of the garden. Not far off, an arabeah was crawling along the road, so slowly that one might have thought the driver half asleep. But this supposition would have done him an injustice. Dusk had fallen now, the purple dusk which drops like a curtain just after the pageant of sunset is finished, yet the driver was wide enough awake to pierce the purple with a pair of sharp eyes, and recognize a figure expected. He whipped up his horse, and the dirty Arab running to meet it, in a few seconds the latter was on the box beside the coachman. Then the arabeah turned, and dashed wildly off according to the custom of arabeahs, back in the direction whence it had been crawling.

The two dark-faced men in the vehicle talked rapidly in low voices, speaking the language not only of the country but the patois of Luxor itself. "Your brother passed you in his arabeah?"

"Yes, Hadji, he passed with the three European ladies you told me had been in secret to visit their friend."

Then Anthony knew that Brigit and Monny had been able already to carry out their plan of wrapping Mabella HÂnem in one of their own cloaks. This was well, and would save gossip, if the occupants of the arabeah were stared at by passers by. And at the temple also it would be well, for if possible the Set were to know nothing, now or later, of the adventure. But though Anthony was glad of the news he had got from this Arab ordered to meet him at the gate, he did not settle down comfortably and say to himself: "Thank goodness, the thing is over." Those men back there in the garden would not so easily have persuaded Rechid Bey to let his wife go unpursued, if they had not offered some alternative plan that could be carried out quickly.

Still, so far so good. Brigit and Monny had "won out," and secured the prize, as Anthony had prophesied that they would do. They were on their way to the temple, where I would be with the comfortable, commonplace crowd from the Enchantress Isis, and where the American Consul and his wife would just "happen" also to be wandering. Instead of driving straight there himself, Anthony went with a friend to an obscure, mud-built house in the village. When he came out of that house, his brown-stained face was no longer disfigured with dirt. It was as immaculate, as noble as the proudest Hadji's face should be, and above it was wound the green turban. Ahmed Antoun Effendi's own dignified, old-fashioned robes of the Egyptian gentleman flowed round his tall figure, when once more he took his place in the waiting arabeah—this time not on the box seat—and drove off at more furious speed than ever, toward the Temple of MÛt.