"And till I"m in it with you," Nevill finished. "By the way, that reminds me. Some one else intends to play the game with us, whether we like or not."
"Who?" asked Stephen, surprised and half defiant.
"My aunt. That"s the mystery she was hinting at. You know how unnaturally quiet she was while we arranged that you should look after Maeddine, on your own, till the dinner-party was over, anyhow, and I could get off, on a wire from you--wherever you might be?"
"Yes. She seemed interested."
"And busy. Her "great work" was getting herself ready to follow you with me, in the car."
"Magnificent!" said Stephen. "And like her. Hurrah for Lady MacGregor!"
"I"m glad you take it that way. I wasn"t sure you would, which might have made things awkward for me; because when my aunt wants to do a thing, you know by this time as well as I do, it"s as good as done."
"But it"s splendid--if she can stand the racket. Of course her idea is, that if we find Miss Ray she oughtn"t to come back alone with us, perhaps a long way, from some outlandish hole."
"You"ve got it. That"s her argument. Or rather, her mandate. And I believe she"s quite able to stand the racket. Her state of mind is such, that if she looked sixteen in the morning, this afternoon she"s gone back to fifteen."
"Wonderful old lady! But she"s so fragile--and has nervous headaches----"
"She won"t have any in my motor car."
"But Hamish and Angus. Can she get on without them?"
"She intends to have them follow her by train, with luggage. She says she has a "feeling in her bones" that they"ll come in handy, either for cooking or fighting. And by Jove, she may be right. She often is. If you go to Biskra and wire when you get there, I"ll start at once--_we"ll_ start, I mean. And if Maeddine goes on anywhere else, and you follow to keep him in sight, I"ll probably catch you up with the car, because the railway line ends at Biskra, you know; and beyond, there are only horses or camels."
"Can motors go farther?"
"They can to Touggourt--with "deeficulty," as the n.o.ble twins would say."
"Maeddine may take a car."
"Not likely. Though there"s just a chance he might get some European friend with a motor to give him a lift. In that case, you"d be rather stuck."
"Motor cars leave tracks," said Stephen.
"Especially in the desert, where they are quite conspicuous," Nevill agreed. "My aunt will be enchanted with your opinion of her and her plan--but not surprised. She thinks you"ve twice my sense and knowledge of the world."
Nevill usually enjoyed his own dinner-parties, for he was a born host, and knew that guests were happy in his house. That night, however, was an exception. He was absent-minded, and pulled his moustache, and saw beautiful things in the air over people"s heads, so often that not only Lady MacGregor but Angus and Hamish glared at him threateningly. He then did his best to atone; nevertheless, for once he was delighted when every one had gone. At last he was able to read for the second time a letter from Roslin, sent in while dinner was in progress. There had been only time for a glance at it, by begging his friends" indulgence for an instant, while he bolted the news that Stephen had followed Maeddine to Biskra. Now, Nevill and Lady MacGregor both hugely enjoyed the details given by Roslin from the report of an employe; how cleverly Monsieur had kept out of sight, though the Arab had walked up and down the platform, with two friends, looking about keenly. How, when Maeddine was safely housed in his compartment, his companions looking up to his window for a last word, Monsieur Knight had whisked himself into a second-cla.s.s compartment at the other end of the train.
Next day, about four o"clock, a telegram was brought to Djenan el Djouad. It came from Biskra, and said: "Arrived here. Not spotted. He went house of French commandant with no attempt at concealment. Am waiting. Will wire again soon as have news. Perhaps better not start till you hear."
An hour and a half later a second blue envelope was put into Nevill"s hand.
"He and an officer leave for Touggourt in private carriage three horses relays ordered. Have interviewed livery stable. They start at five will travel all night. I follow."
"Probably some officer was going on military business, and Maeddine"s asked for a lift," Nevill said to Lady MacGregor. "Well, it"s too late for us to get away now; but we"ll be off as early as you like to-morrow morning."
"If I weren"t going, would you start to-day?" his aunt inquired.
"Yes, I suppose so. But----"
"Then please give orders for the car. I"m ready to leave at five minutes" notice, and I can go on as long as you can. I"m looking forward to the trip."
"But I"ve often offered to take you to Biskra."
"That"s different. Now I"ve got an incentive."
XLII
Just as he came in sight of the great chott between Biskra and Touggourt, Stephen heard a sound which struck him strangely in the silence of the desert. It was the distant teuf-teuf of a powerful motor car, labouring heavily through deep sand.
Stephen was travelling in a carriage, which he had hired in Biskra, and was keeping as close as he dared to the vehicle in front, shared by Maeddine and a French officer. But he never let himself come within sight or sound of it. Now, as he began to hear the far-off panting of a motor, he saw nothing ahead but the vast saltpetre lake, which, viewed from the hill his three horses had just climbed, shimmered blue and silver, like a magic sea, reaching to the end of the world. There were white lines like long ruffles of foam on the edges of azure waves, struck still by enchantment while breaking on an unseen sh.o.r.e; and far off, along a mystic horizon, little islands floated on the gleaming flood. Stephen could hardly believe that there was no water, and that his horses could travel the blue depths without wetting their feet.
It was just as he was thinking thus, and wondering if Victoria had pa.s.sed this way, when the strange sound came to his ears, out of the distance. "Stop," he said in French to his Arab driver. "I think friends of mine will be in that car." He was right. A few minutes later Nevill and Lady MacGregor waved to him, as he stood on the top of a low sand-dune.
Lady MacGregor was more fairylike than ever in a little motoring bonnet made for a young girl, but singularly becoming to her. They had had a glorious journey, she said. She supposed some people would consider that she had endured hardships, but they were not worth speaking of. She had been rather b.u.mped about on the ghastly desert tracks since Biskra, but though she was not quite sure if all her bones were whole, she did not feel in the least tired; and even if she did, the memory of the Gorge of El Kantara would alone be enough to make up for it.
"Anything new?" asked Nevill.
"Nothing," Stephen answered, "except that the driver of the carriage ahead let drop at the last bordj that he"d been hired by the French officer, who was taking Maeddine with him."
"Just what we thought," Lady MacGregor broke in.
"And the carriage will bring the Frenchman back, later. Maeddine"s going on. But I haven"t found out where."
"H"m! I was in hopes we were close to our journey"s end at Touggourt,"
said Nevill. "The car can"t get farther, I"m afraid. The big dunes begin there."
"Whatever Maeddine does, we can follow his example. I mean, I can,"
Stephen amended.
"So can Nevill. I"m no spoil-sport," snapped the old lady, in her childlike voice. "I know what I can do and what I can"t. I draw the line at camels! Angus and Hamish will take care of me, and I"ll wait for you at Touggourt. I can amuse myself in the market-place, and looking at the Ouled Nals, till you find Miss Ray, or----"
"There won"t be an "or," Lady MacGregor. We must find her. And we must bring her to you," said Stephen.
He had slept in the carriage the night before, a little on the Biskra side of Chegga, because Maeddine and the French officer had rested at Chegga. Nevill and Lady MacGregor had started from Biskra at five o"clock that morning, having arrived there the evening before. It was now ten, and they could make Touggourt that night. But they wished Maeddine to reach there first, so they stopped by the chott, and lunched from a smartly fitted picnic-basket Lady MacGregor had brought.
Stephen paid his Arab coachman, told him he might go back, and transferred a small suitcase--his only luggage--from the carriage to the car. They gave Maeddine two hours" grace, and having started on, always slowed up whenever Nevill"s field-gla.s.ses showed a slowly trotting vehicle on the far horizon. The road, which was hardly a road, far exceeded in roughness the desert track Stephen had wondered at on the way from Msila to Bou-Saada; but Lady MacGregor had the courage, he told her, of a Joan of Arc.
They b.u.mped steadily along, through the heat of the day, protected from the blazing sun by the raised hood, but they were thankful when, after the dinner-halt, darkness began to fall. Talking over ways and means, they decided not to drive into Touggourt, where an automobile would be a conspicuous object since few motors risked springs and tyres by coming so far into the desert. The chauffeur should be sent into the town while the pa.s.sengers sat in the car a mile away.
Eventually Paul was instructed to demand oil for his small lamps, by way of an excuse for having tramped into town. He was to find out what had become of the two men who must have arrived about an hour before, in a carriage.
While the chauffeur was gone, Lady MacGregor played Patience and insisted on teaching Stephen and Nevill two new games. She said that it would be good discipline for their souls; and so perhaps it was. But Stephen never ceased calculating how long Paul ought to be away. Twenty minutes to walk a mile--or thirty minutes in desert sand; forty minutes to make inquiries; surely it needn"t take longer! And thirty minutes back. But an hour and a half dragged on, before there was any sign of the absentee; then at last, Stephen"s eye, roving wistfully from the cards, saw a moving spark at about the right height above the ground to be a cigarette.