The Sheik

"Oh, Gaston, my handkerchief!" and pointed to where the morsel of

cambric lay white against a rock. With a comical exclamation of dismay

he slipped to the ground and started to run across the sand.

She waited until he had got well on his way, sitting tense with shining

eyes and thumping heart, then, snatching off her helmet, she brought it

down with a resounding smack on the hindquarters of the servant's

horse, stampeding it in the direction of the camp, and, wheeling Silver

Star, headed for the north, deaf to Gaston's cries.

Wild with excitement and free to go his own pace at last her mount

galloped swiftly and the wind whistled past Diana's ears. To the

possible fate of the little Frenchman left on foot so far from the

encampment she gave no heed. For the moment she did not even think of

him, she had no thought for anybody but herself. Her ruse by its very

simplicity had succeeded. She was free and she did not care about

anything else. She had no plans or ideas what she should do or where

she should go beyond the fact that she would keep riding northward. She

had vague hopes that she might fall in with friendly Arabs who, for a

promised reward, would guide her to civilisation. Most of them could

speak a little French, and for the rest her small stock of Arabic must

do. She knew that she was mad to attempt to ride across the desert

alone, but she did not mind. She was free. She was too excited to think

coherently.

She laughed and shouted like a mad thing and her madness

communicated itself to the grey, who was going at racing speed. Diana

knew that he was out of control, that she could not stop him if she

tried, but she did not want to try, the faster the better. In time he

would tire himself, but until then let him go as he pleased. She was

fast putting miles between herself and the camp that had been a prison,

between herself and the brute who had dared to do what he had done. At

the thought of the Sheik a sick feeling of fear ran through her. If

anything should happen? If he should catch her again? She shuddered,

and a cry burst from her lips, but she gripped herself at once. She was

idiotic, contemptible; it was impossible. It would be hours, perhaps

even the next day, before the alarm was given; he would not know in

what direction she had gone. She would have miles of start on one of

the fleetest of his horses. She tried to put him out of her mind. She

had escaped from him and his cruelty, it was a nightmare that was over.

The effects would remain with her always, nothing would ever be the

same again, but the daily dread, the daily contamination would be gone,

the helpless tortured feeling, the shame of submission that had filled

her with an acute self-loathing that was as intense as her passionate

hatred of the man who had forced her to endure his will. The memory of

it would live with her for ever. He had made her a vile thing. Her

cheeks scorched with the thought and she shivered at the remembrance of

all that she had gone through. She had been down into the depths and

she would carry the scars all her life. The girl who had started out so

triumphantly from Biskra had become a woman through bitter knowledge

and humiliating experience.