The Sheik

"You mean that you will treat me as you treated the colt this

afternoon?" she whispered, her eyes drawn back irresistibly to his in

spite of all her efforts.

"I mean that you must realise that my will is law."

"And if I do not?" He guessed rather than heard the words.

"Then I will teach you, and I think that you will learn--soon."

She quivered in his hands. It was a threat, but how much of it he meant

to be taken literally she did not know. Again every ghastly detail of

the afternoon passed with lightning speed through her mind. When he

punished he punished mercilessly. To what lengths would he go? The Arab

standards were not those of the men amongst whom she had lived. The

position of a woman in the desert was a very precarious one. There were

times when she forgot altogether that he was an Arab until some chance,

as now, drove the hard fact home indisputably. He was an Arab, and as a

woman she need expect no mercy at his hands. His hands! She looked down

for a second sideways at the fingers gripping her shoulder and she saw

them again stained with blood, saw them clenched round the dripping

thong. She knew already by bitter experience the iron grip of his lean

fingers and the compelling strength of his arms. Her quick imagination

leaped ahead. What she had already suffered would be nothing compared

with what would be. The remembrance of the stained, huddled figure of

the servant he had chastised rose before her. And as she battled with

herself, still torn in her passionate desire to make her strong will

and courageous spirit triumph over her coward woman's body that shrank

instinctively from physical torture, his arm tightened around her and

she felt the hard muscles pressing against her shoulders and soft, bare

neck, a suggestion of the force lying dormant beside her. She looked up

at him slowly.

His expression was unchanged, his forehead was still drawn together in

the heavy frown and there was no softening in his eyes. The cruel lines

about his mouth were accentuated and the tiger-look in his face was

more marked than ever. He was not threatening idly; he meant what he

said.

"You had better kill me," she said drearily.

"That would be to admit my own defeat," he replied coolly. "I do not

kill a horse until I have proved beyond all possible doubt that I

cannot tame it. With you I have no such proof. I can tame you and I

will. But it is for you to choose and to choose to-night if you will

obey me willingly or if I must make you. I have been very patient--for

me," he added, with an odd smile flitting across his face, "but my

patience is exhausted. Choose quickly." Insensibly he drew her closer

to him till his arm felt like an inflexible steel band about her, and

she thought with a shudder of the coils of a great serpent closing

round its victim. She made a final effort to conquer herself, but

between her and the broad chest so close to her she seemed to see a

horse's head held low in agony, blood and foam dripping from his

lacerated mouth, and a horse's flanks heaving piteously, torn with the

cruel punishment he had undergone. A sudden nausea came over her,

everything seemed to swim before her eyes, and she swayed against the

man who was holding her. Her bodily fear overruled her mind. She could

not bear any more.