Mrs. East, leaning beside me on the rail, was burning with thoughts inspired by Alexandria. She had "Plutarch"s Lives" under her arm, and "Hypatia" in her hand. Of course, she dropped them both, one after the other, and I picked them up.
"Do you know, Lord Ernest," she said, in the low, rich voice she is cultivating, "I don"t mind telling you that I felt as if I were coming home, after a long absence. Monny wanted to see Egypt; I was dying to.
That"s the difference between us."
"It"s natural," I answered, sympathetically.
"Yes--considering everything. Yet we"re both afraid. She in one way, I in another. I haven"t told her. She hasn"t told me. But I know. She has the same impression I have, that something"s going to _happen_ --something very great, to change the whole of life--in Egypt: "Khem," it seems to me I can remember calling it. You know it was Khem, until the Arabs came and named it Misr. Do you believe in impressions like that?"
"I don"t disbelieve," I said. "Some people are more sensitive than others."
"Yes. Or else they"re older souls. But it may be the same thing. I can"t fancy Monny an old soul, can you?--yet she may be, for she"s very intelligent, although so self-willed. I think what she"s afraid of is getting interested in some wonderful man with Turkish or Egyptian blood, a magnificent creature like you read of in books, you know; then you have to give them up in the last chapter, and send them away broken-hearted. I suppose there _are_ such men in real life?"
"I doubt if there are such romantic figures as the books make out," I tried to rea.s.sure her. "There might be a prince or two, handsome and cultivated, educated in England, perhaps, for some of the "swells" are sent from Egypt to Oxford and Cambridge, just as they are in India. But even if Miss Gilder should meet a man of that sort, I should say she was too sensible and clear-headed--"
"Oh, she is, almost too much so for a young girl, and she has a detestation for any one with a drop of dark blood, in America. She doesn"t even like Jews; and that makes friction between us, if we ever happen to argue, for--maybe you don"t know?--my mother was a Jewess.
I"m proud of her memory. But that"s just _why_, if you can understand, Monny"s _afraid_ in Egypt. Some girls would like to have a tiny flirtation with a gorgeous Eastern creature (of course, he must be a bey, or prince or something, otherwise it would be _infra dig_), but Monny would hate herself for being attracted. Yet I know she dreads it happening, because of the way I"ve heard her rave against the heroines of novels, saying she has no patience with them; they ought to have more strength of mind, even if it broke their hearts."
I wondered if Biddy, too, suspected some such fear in the mind of her adored girl, and if that were one reason why she had turned matchmaker for my benefit. Since the first day out she had used strategems to throw us together: and it seemed that, years ago, when she used to teach the little girl French, Monny"s favourite stories had been of Castle Killeena, and my boyish exploits birds"-nesting on the crags.
(Biddy said that this was a splendid beginning, if I had the sense to follow it up.)
"And you?" I went on to Mrs. East. "What do you feel is going to happen to you in the land of Khem?"
"Oh, I don"t know," she sighed. "I wish I did! And "afraid" isn"t exactly the word. I just know that something will happen. I wonder if history does repeat itself? I should hate to be bitten by an asp----"
"Asps are out of fashion," I comforted her. "I doubt if you could find one in all of Egypt, though I remember my Egyptian nurse used to say there were cobras in the desert in summer. Anyhow, we"ll be away before summer."
"I suppose so," she agreed. "Yet--who knows what will become of any of us? Madame Rechid Bey will be staying, of course. I don"t know whether to be sorry for her or not. The Bey"s good-looking. He has brown eyes, and is as white as you or I. Probably it"s true that she"s been too seasick to leave her room for the last ten days, though Monny and Mrs.
O"Bri--I mean, Mrs. Jones--think she"s shut up because men stared, and because Mr. Sheridan talked to her. As for me, there"s always that question asking itself in my mind: _"What_ is going to happen?" And I hear it twice as loud as before, in sight of Alexandria. Rakoti, we Lagidae used to call the city." As she spoke, the long, oriental eyes glanced at me sidewise, but my trustworthy Celtic features showed a grave, intelligent interest in her statements.
"It must be," she went on, encouraged, "that I"m the reincarnation of Cleopatra, otherwise how _could_ I have the sensation of remembering everything? There"s no other way to account for it! And you know my modern name, Clara, does begin with "C." Sayda must be right. She"s told lots of women the most extraordinary things. You really ought to consult her, Lord Ernest, if you ever go to New York."
I did not say, as Neill Sheridan might, that a frothy course of Egyptian historical novels would account for anything. I simply looked as diplomatic training can teach any one to look.
Evidently it was the right look in the right place, for Cleopatra continued more courageously, recalling the great Pharos of white marble which used to be one of the world"s wonders in her day; the Museum, and the marvellous Library which took fire while Julius Caesar burned the fleet, nearby in the harbour.
"Think of the philosophers who deserted the College of Heliopolis for Alexandria!" she said. "Antony was more of a soldier than a student, but even he grieved for the Library. You know he tried to console Cleopatra by making her a present of two hundred thousand MSS. from the library of the King of Pergamus. It was a generous thought--like Antony!"
"Does the harbour looked changed?" I hastened to inquire.
"Not from a distance, though landing may be a shock: they tell me it"s all so Italian now. It was Greek in old days. I"ve read that there isn"t a stone left of my--of the lovely place on Lochias Point, except the foundations they found in the seventies. But I must go to see what"s left of the Baths, even though there"s only a bit of mosaic and the remains of a room. Monny"s anxious to get on to Cairo, but we shall come back to Alexandria later. Lord Ernest, when I shut my eyes, I really do seem to picture the Mareotic Lake, and the buildings that made Alexandria the glory of the world. Do you remember what Strabo said about Deinchares, the architect who laid out the plan of the city in the shape of a Macedonian mantle, to please Alexander?"
"I"m not as well up in history as you are," I said, "though I"ve studied a bit, because I was born in Egypt. Poor Alexander didn"t live long in his fine city, did he? I wonder what he"d think of it now? And I wonder if his palace was handsomer than the Khedive"s? That huge white building with the pillars and domes. I seem to remember----"
"What, you remember, too? You _ought_ to consult Sayda!"
"I didn"t mean exactly what you mean," I explained, humbly. "Still, why shouldn"t I have lived in Egypt long ago? The learned ones say you"re always drawn back where you"ve been in other states of existence----"
"That"s true, I"m sure!"
"Well, then, why shouldn"t I have the same sort of right to Egypt you have, if you were Cleopatra?--I believe you must have been, because you look as she ought to have looked, you know. Why shouldn"t I have been a friend of Marc Antony, coming from Rome to give him good advice and trying to persuade----"
"Oh, _not_ that he ought to give me up!"
"No, indeed: to urge him to leave the island where he hid even from you (didn"t they call it Timoneum?). Why couldn"t Antony play his cards so as to keep Cleopatra and the world, too? She"d have liked him better, wouldn"t she? My friend Antoun Effendi--I mean Anthony Fenton,"--I stopped short: for the less said about Fenton the better, at present.
But Cleopatra caught me up.
"What--have you really a friend Antony? Where does he live? and what"s he like?"
I hesitated; and glancing round for inspiration (in other words for some harmless, necessary fib) I saw that Brigit and Monny had arrived on the scene. They had been pacing the deck, arm in arm; and now, arrested by Mrs. East"s question, they hovered near, awaiting my answer with vague curiosity. A twinkle in Biddy"s eyes, which I caught, rattled me completely. I missed all the easiest fibs and could catch hold of nothing but the bare truth. There are moments like that, when, do what you will, you must be truthful or silent; and silence fires suspicion.
"What is he?" I echoed feebly. "Oh, Captain Fenton. He"s in the Gyppy Army stationed up at Khartum, hundreds of miles beyond where Cook"s boats go. You wouldn"t be interested in Anthony, because he spells his name with an "H", and he"s dark and thin, not a bit like _your_ Antony, who was a big, stout fellow, I"ve always heard, and fair." "Big, but _not_ stout," Cleopatra corrected me. "And--and if he"s incarnated again, he may be dark for a change. As for the "H", that"s not important. I wonder if we shall meet your Anthony? We think of going to Khartum, don"t we, Monny?"
"Yes," said the girl, shortly. She was always rather short in her manner at that time when in her opinion her aunt was being "silly."
I gathered from a vexed flash in the gray eyes that there had never been any hint of an impending Antony.
"Is your friend in Khartum now?" Biddy ventured, in her creamiest voice. The twinkle was carefully turned off like the light of a dark lantern, but I knew well that "Mrs. Jones" was recalling a certain conversation, in which I had refused to satisfy her curiosity. Brigit"s quick, Irish mind has a way of matching mental jigsaw puzzles, even when vital bits appear to be missing; and if she could make a cat"s paw of Cleopatra, the witch would not be above doing it. I bore her no grudge--who could bear soft-eyed, laughing, yet tragic Biddy a grudge?
--but I wished that she and Monny were at the other end of the deck.
"I--er--really, I don"t know where my friend is just now," I answered, with more or less foundation of truth.
"I wonder if I didn"t read in the papers about a Captain Fenton who took advantage of leave he"d got, to make a rush for the Balkans, and see the fighting from the lines of the Allies?" Biddy murmured with dreadful intelligence. "Can he be your Captain Fenton? I fancy he"d been stationed in the Sudan; and he was officially supposed to have gone home to spend his leave in England. Anyhow, there was a row of some sort after he and another man dropped down on to the Turks out of a Greek aeroplane. Or was it a Servian one? Anyhow, I know he oughtn"t to have been in it; and "Paterfamilias" and "Patriot" wrote letters to the _Times_ about British officers who didn"t mind their own business.
Why, I saw the papers on board this ship! They were old ones. Papers on ships always are. But I think they came on at Algiers or somewhere."
"Probably "somewhere,"" I witheringly replied. "_I_ didn"t come on at Algiers, so I don"t know anything about it."
"Diplomatists never do know anything official, do they, Duffer dear?"
smiled Biddy. "I"ll wager your friend is interesting, even if he does spell himself with an "H", and weighs two stone less than his namesake from Rome. Mrs. East believes in reincarnation, and I"m not sure I don"t, though Monny"s so young she doesn"t believe in anything. Just suppose your friend is a reincarnation of Antony without an "H"? And suppose, too, by some strange trick of fate he should meet you in Alexandria or Cairo? You"d introduce him to us, wouldn"t you?"
"It"s the most unlikely thing in the world. And he"d be no good to you.
He"s a man"s man. He thinks he doesn"t like women."
"Doesn"t like women!" echoed Monny Gilder. "He must be a curmudgeon. Or has he been jilted?"
"Rather not!" Too impulsively I defended the absent. "Girls go mad about him. He has to keep them off with a stick. He"s got other things to think of than girls, things he believes are more important--though, of course, he"s mistaken. He"ll find that out some day, when he has more time. So far, he"s been hunting other game, often in wild places.
A book might be written on his adventures."
"What kind of adventures? Tell us about them," said Biddy, "up to the Balkan one, which you deny having heard of."
"You wouldn"t care about his sort of adventures. There aren"t any women in them," said I. "Women want love stories. It"s only the heroines they care for, not the heroes, and I don"t somehow see the right heroine for Fenton"s story."
I noticed an expression dawning on Cleopatra"s face, as I thus bereft her of a possible Antony (with an "H"). There was a softening of the long eyes, and the glimmer of a smile which said "Am I Cleopatra for nothing?"
Never had she looked handsomer. Never before had I thought of her as really dangerous. I"d been inclined to poke fun at the lady for her superst.i.tion and her cartouche, and Cleopatra-hood in general. But suddenly I realized that her make-up was no more exaggerated than that of many a beauty of the stage and of society: and that nowadays, women who are--well, forty-ish--can be formidable rivals for younger and simpler sisters. Not that I feared much for Anthony from Cleopatra or any other female thing, for I"d come to consider him practically woman-proof; still, I saw danger that the lady might make a dead set at him, if she got the chance, and all through my stupidity in giving away his name. "Antony" was a thrilling pa.s.sword to that mysterious "something"
which she expected to happen in Egypt: and already she regarded my friend as a ram caught in the bushes, for a sacrifice on her altar.
Instead of screening him I had dragged him in front of the footlights.
But fortunately there was still time to jerk down the curtain.
I threw a glance at Brigit and Monny, and was relieved to find that their attention was distracted by a new arrival: Miss Rachel Guest from Salem, Ma.s.sachusetts: a pale, thin, lanky copy of our Rose, with the beauty and bloom left out; but a pair of eyes to redeem the colourless face--oh, yes, a pair of eyes! Strange, hungry, waiting eyes.