The Sheik

"The man who was hurt first," she asked abruptly, with a touch of her

old hauteur in her voice, "is he dead?"

"Oh no, Madame. He has concussion but he will be all right. They have

hard heads, these Arabs."

"And Yusef?"

Gaston grinned. "Le petit Sheik has a broken collar-bone. It is

nothing. A few days' holiday to be petted in his harem, et

voila!"

"His harem?" echoed Diana in surprise. "Is he married?"

"Mais oui, Madame. He has two wives."

At Diana's exclamation he shrugged deprecatingly. "Que

voulez-vous? It is the custom of the country," he said tolerantly,

with the air of conceding a melancholy fact with the best grace

possible.

The customs of the country was dangerous ground, and Diana changed the

subject hastily. "Where did you learn to ride, Gaston?"

"In a racing-stable at Auteuil, Madame, when I was a boy. Then I was

five years in the French cavalry. After that I came to Monseigneur."

"And you have been with him--how long?"

"Fifteen years, Madame."

"Fifteen years," she repeated wonderingly. "Fifteen years here, in the

desert?"

"Here and elsewhere, Madame," he answered rather more shortly than

usual, and with a murmur of excuse left the tent.

Diana leaned back against the cushions with a little sigh. Gaston need

not have been afraid that she was trying to learn his master's secrets

from him. She had not fallen as low as that. The mystery of the man

whose path had crossed hers so terribly seemed to augment instead of

lessen as the time went on. What was the power in him that compelled

the devotion of his wild followers and the little French ex-cavalryman?

She knit her forehead in perplexity and was still puzzling over it when

he came back. Immaculate and well-groomed he was very different from

the dishevelled, bloodstained savage of half-an-hour before. She shot a

nervous glance at him, remembering her outburst, but he was not angry.

He looked grave, but his gravity seemed centred in himself as he passed

his lean fingers tenderly over his smooth chin. She had seen Aubrey do

similarly hundreds of times. Occidental or Oriental, men seemed very

alike. She waited for him to speak and waited vainly. One of the

taciturn fits to which she had grown accustomed had come over

him--hours sometimes in which he simply ignored her altogether. The

evening meal was silent. He spoke once to Gaston, but he spoke in

Arabic, and the servant replied only with a nod of compliance. And

after Gaston was gone he did not speak for a long time, but sat on the

divan, apparently absorbed in his thoughts.