"For never galloping away into the sun."
"Oh!--yes, I do remember."
"Well, I am going to obey you. I am going to make a journey."
"Into the desert?"
"Three hundred kilometers on horseback. I start to-morrow."
She looked up at him with a new interest. He saw it and laughed, almost like a boy.
"Ah, your contempt for me is dying!"
"How can you speak of contempt?"
"But you were full of it." He turned to Androvsky. "Miss Enfilden thought I could not sit a horse, Monsieur, unlike you. Forgive me for saying that you are almost more dare-devil than the Arabs themselves. I saw you the other day set your stallion at the bank of the river bed. I did not think any horse could have done it, but you knew better."
"I did not know at all," said Androvsky. "I had not ridden for over twenty years until that day."
He spoke with a blunt determination which made Domini remember their recent conversation on truth-telling.
"Dio mio!" said the Count, slowly, and looking at him with undisguised wonder. "You must have a will and a frame of iron."
"I am pretty strong."
He spoke rather roughly. Since the Count had joined them Domini noticed that Androvsky had become a different man. Once more he was on the defensive. The Count did not seem to notice it. Perhaps he was too radiant.
"I hope I shall endure as well as you, Monsieur," he said. "I go to Beni-Ha.s.san to visit Sidi El Hadj Aissa, one of the mightiest marabouts in the Sahara. In your Church," he added, turning again to Domini, "he would be a powerful Cardinal."
She noticed the "your." Evidently the Count was not a professing Catholic. Doubtless, like many modern Italians, he was a free-thinker in matters of religion.
"I am afraid I have never heard of him," she said. "In which direction does Beni-Ha.s.san lie?"
"To go there one takes the caravan route that the natives call the route to Tombouctou."
An eager look came into her face.
"My road!" she said.
"Yours?"
"The one I shall travel on. You remember, Monsieur Androvsky?"
"Yes, Madame."
"Let me into your secret," said the Count, laughingly, yet with interest too.
"It is no secret. It is only that I love that route. It fascinates me, and I mean some day to make a desert journey along it."
"What a pity that we cannot join forces," the Count said. "I should feel it an honour to show the desert to one who has the reverence for it, the understanding of its spell, that you have."
He spoke earnestly, paused, and then added:
"But I know well what you are thinking."
"What is that?"
"That you will go to the desert alone. You are right. It is the only way, at any rate the first time. I went like that many years ago."
She said nothing in a.s.sent, and Androvsky got up from the bench.
"I must go, Monsieur."
"Already! But have you seen the garden?"
"It is wonderful. Good-bye, Monsieur. Thank you."
"But--let me see you to the gate. On Fridays----"
He was turning to Domini when she got up too.
"Don"t you distribute alms on Fridays?" she said.
"How should you know it?"
"I have heard all about you. But is this the hour?"
"Yes."
"Let me see the distribution."
"And we will speed Monsieur Androvsky on his way at the same time."
She noticed that there was no question in his mind of her going with Androvsky. Did she mean to go with him? She had not decided yet.
They walked towards the gate and were soon on the great sweep of sand before the villa. A murmur of many voices was audible outside in the desert, nasal exclamations, loud guttural cries that sounded angry, the twittering of flutes and the snarl of camels.
"Do you hear my pensioners?" said the Count. "They are always impatient."
There was the noise of a tomtom and of a whining shriek.
"That is old Bel Ca.s.sem"s announcement of his presence. He has been living on me for years, the old ruffian, ever since his right eye was gouged out by his rival in the affections of the Marechale of the dancing-girls. Smain!"
He blew his silver whistle. Instantly Smain came out of the villa carrying a money-bag. The Count took it and weighed it in his hand, looking at Domini with the joyous expression still upon his face.
"Have you ever made a thank-offering?" he said.
"No."