"Trouble with one of the horses. Will you come? It may interest you."
They went out together, leaving her alone, and she slipped away to the
inner room. In half-an-hour they came back, and for a few minutes
longer stayed chatting, then the Vicomte yawned and held out his watch
with a laugh. The Sheik went with him to his tent and sat down on the
side of his guest's camp-bed. Saint Hubert dismissed the waiting Henri
with a nod and started to undress silently. The flow of talk and ready
laugh seemed to have deserted him, and he frowned as he wrenched his
things off with nervous irritability.
The Sheik watched him for a while, and then took the cigarette out of
his mouth with a faint smile. "Eh, bien! Raoul, say it," he said
quietly.
Saint Hubert swung round. "You might have spared her," he cried.
"What?"
"What? Good God, man! Me!"
The Sheik flicked the ash from his cigarette with a gesture of
indifference. "Your courier was delayed, he only came this morning. It
was too late then to make other arrangements."
Saint Hubert took a hasty turn up and down the tent and stopped in
front of the Sheik with his hands thrust deep in his pockets and his
shoulders hunched up about his ears. "It is abominable," he burst out.
"You go too far, Ahmed."
The Sheik laughed cynically. "What do you expect of a savage? When an
Arab sees a woman that he wants he takes her. I only follow the customs
of my people."
Saint Hubert clicked his tongue impatiently. "Your people!--which
people?" he asked in a low voice.
The Sheik sprang to his feet with flashing eyes, his hand dropping
heavily on Saint Hubert's shoulder.
"Stop, Raoul! Not even from you----!" he cried passionately, and then
broke off abruptly, and the anger died out of his face. He sat down
again quietly, with a little amused laugh. "Why this sudden access of
morality, mon ami? You know me and the life I lead. You have
seen women in my camp before now."
Saint Hubert dismissed the remark with a contemptuous wave of the hand.
"There is to comparison. You know it as well as I," he said succinctly.
He moved over slowly to the camp table, where his toilet things had
been laid out, and began removing the links from the cuffs of his
shirt. "She is English, surely that is reason enough," he flung over
his shoulder.