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Page 90
He sat silent, with his eyes upon her hands, waiting for Fate to point
out his path.
Little by little, bit by bit, her surroundings began to affect her. The
blood came slowly back to her cheeks so that they glowed like the wild
rose in the hedgerow; and her eyes began to lose that set stare which
hides the perturbed mind, and to soften behind the heavy fringe of
lashes, and her hands to cease their nervous plucking at her dress.
She lifted her eyes to the strangely-painted tent side, looked at the
silvery spear and tilted her head back until her throat gleamed like an
ivory pillar, to look up at the ceiling with the painted vultures--the
emblem of maternity.
The man looked up, then looked down upon this woman of his mother's race
whom he loved, and longed with all the intense passion of his father's
race that he might see his first-born upon her breast.
She was trying to find words, and they came to her when she clasped her
hands upon the jewelled brooch in the shape of the Hawk of Egypt.
She looked at him suddenly and a little shiver swept her at the strange
beauty of this silent man; and he as suddenly turned his hands palm
upwards in an uncontrollable gesture of Eastern prayer to Fate who had so
much to give him, or, perhaps, so little!
"You said you--you would help me if--I came to you--in trouble." She
tripped and stumbled over the words. "I have come to--to------"
"Ask my help."
The words were as cold as stones dropped in the beggar's hand, but
Damaris leant back quickly when she looked into the man's eyes and saw in
them the reflection of the fire she had kindled.
"What is the help you need of me? I know nothing of the ways of women,
but I do know that it has been the storm which has swept you from your
safe harbour out towards a shore upon which are piled the wrecks of many
souls."
She twisted the brooch between her fingers.
"My wedding gift," said Hugh Carden Ali softly, then watched the crimson
dye the white neck and surge across her face. "You come--to--_me_--for
help." He repeated the words slowly. "Then you, of course, are--are
free--ah!" He leant forward and caught her hands. "You have run
away--from what? No, do not speak, I can read your answer in your face.
You have been hurt." He lifted the little ringless left hand, then
pressed it against the other between his own, whilst a great light flamed
in his eyes. "You have come to me, and there is but one meaning for me
in that you have come to _me_. Is it------" His voice dropped to the
softest whisper as he crushed her hands down upon the wooden couch so
that she swayed towards him. "Is it that I may fasten my own wedding
gift into the bridal robe of the woman I love and will take to wife--_is_
it?"
Damaris bowed her head so that the curls danced and glistened in the
light, as the torrent of his words, in the Egyptian tongue, swept about
her like a flood.
"Hast thou come to me in love, thou dove from the nest? Nay, what
knowest thou of love? I ask it not of thee--yet--but the seed I shall
plant within thee shall grow in the passing of the days and the nights
and the months and the years, until it is as a grove of perfumed flowers
which shall change to golden fruit ready to the plucking of my hand."
He pressed her little hands back against her breast so that the light
fell full upon her face, and held her thus-wise, watching the colour rise
and fade.
"Allah!" he whispered. "Allah! God of all, what have I done to deserve
such signs of Thy great goodness? Wilt love me?" He laughed gently.
"Canst thou look into mine eyes and shake thy golden head which shall be
pillowed upon my heart--my wife--the mother of my children? Look at me!
Look at me! Ah! thine eyes, which were as the pools of Lebanon at night,
are as a sun-kissed sea of love. Thou know'st it not, but love is within
thee--for me, thy master."
And was there not truth in what he said? May there not have been love in
the heart of the girl?
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