Burning Sands Read online

  CHAPTER X--"FOR TOMORROW WE DIE"

  Amidst the wildest clamour the rowing-boat was launched, and twored-jerseyed native sailors took the oars, while a third, shouting andgesticulating, stood at the tiller holding up a hurricane-lamp. Just asthey pushed off, Professor Hyley, carrying another lantern, tumbled intothe stern; and, in the unreasoning excitement of the moment, called out"Mr. Helsingham, Mr. Helsingham! Hi, hi! Mr. Helsingham!" in a pipingvoice which sounded through the darkness like that of a lost soul.

  The pandemonium upon the steamer was appalling. The jabbering nativesailors ran aimlessly to and fro, flinging ropes and buoys into theriver from the vessel's stern; while the Egyptian captain, completelylosing his head, rang and bawled orders down to the engine-room, as aresult of which the paddle-wheels churned up the water, now this way,now that. Lady Smith-Evered and Mr. Bindane leant over the rail,shouting instructions to Professor Hyley as the boat dropped into thedistance.

  Muriel and Kate Bindane stood together in agonized silence. There wasnothing to be done; for there was not a second rowing-boat, nor werethere any available lamps or buoys. Their eyes were fixed upon the twopoints of light drifting astern, and on the illuminated figures of thesearchers. And now the misshapen moon, in its last quarter, crept outfrom behind the horizon, as though curious to know what all the potherwas about, but too disdainful to throw any light upon the scene.

  At length there were renewed shouts from the boat, and much splashing ofthe oars; and presently it was apparent that the men were liftingsomething out of the ink-black water. A few minutes of horrible suspenseensued as the searchers returned; and at last, in a dazed condition,Muriel watched them raise the limp, dripping form out of the boat andlay it on the deck.

  Mr. Bindane's servant, Dixon, knew something about the method ofresuscitation to be employed in such cases; and, with the aid of Murieland Professor Hyley, the sodden clothes were removed from the upper partof the prostrate figure, and the bare white arms were worked to and fro.Brandy in a teaspoon was forced between the blue lips by Kate Bindane,who sent her helpless and apparently callous husband off with theweeping Lady Smith-Evered to fetch blankets and the one hot-water bottlewhich chanced to be available.

  Their efforts, however, were all in vain. With the tears flowing fromher eyes, Muriel rose from the puddle of water in which she had beenkneeling, and stood clinging to Kate's arm.

  "He's dead," she sobbed. "He's been dead all the time;" and a shudderalmost of repulsion shook her.

  She dried her tears and tried hard to pull herself together: she feltthat this undefined feeling of disgust was unworthy of any woman, andwas altogether despicable in one who had been so lately clasped inRupert's arms. She wanted to run away, and that primitive instinct whichproduces in the mind the nameless horror of a dead body was strong uponher. Yet, bracing herself, she resisted the sensation of nausea, andstood staring down at the prostrate figure before her, vividlyilluminated in the glare of the electric light.

  His mouth, from which the water oozed, was slightly open, and a pale,swollen tongue protruded somewhat from between his lips. His eyes wereclosed, and wet strands of dark hair were plastered over his forehead.His bare neck and shoulders looked thin and poor; and damp wisps of haircovered his chest. The soaked, black trousers clung to his legs; and hisill-shapen toes, from which the socks and shoes had been removed, wereghastly in their greenish whiteness as they rested upon the hot-waterbottle.

  Suddenly she swayed, and the lights seemed to grow dim. She heard KateBindane call out sharply for the brandy, and she was dimly consciousthat she was being led away by her maid, Ada. Her perceptions, however,were not clear again until she aroused herself to find that she waslying upon her bed in her cabin, and that Mr. Bindane was standing atthe door, staring down at her with his mouth open.

  She sat up quickly. "Did I faint?" she said, as the horror ofremembrance came upon her once more.

  "No," he answered. "You were only a bit giddy. You must try to sleep:we're all going to try to. We shall be back in Cairo before sunrise."

  "Where is he?" she asked, pressing her fingers to her pale face.

  "On the sofa at the end of the deck," he said.

  She sprang to her feet. "No, no!" she cried. "Not there--please notthere!"

  She buried her face in her hands; and Benifett Bindane, dislikinghysteria, hurried away to the saloon, where he played Patience byhimself until the small hours; while his wife, Kate, wedging herselfinto Muriel's narrow bed, comforted her friend until dozing sleep fellupon them.

  The next two or three days were like a nightmare. An impenetrable gloomseemed to rest upon the Residency; and, although the body lay in themortuary of a neighbouring hospital, it was as though the presence ofdeath were actually in the house.

  The funeral came almost as a relief; and when the imposing ceremony wasat an end, she felt as though the weight were beginning to be liftedfrom her heart. For the first time since the tragedy she was able tospeak of it with calmness.

  "You know, father dear," she said, "Rupert and I came to mean a verygreat deal to one another in these few weeks that we've been together."

  He glanced at her timidly, and patted her hand.

  "Yes," he answered, "I have eyes, Muriel."

  She turned and looked at him with a little smile of confidence. "We weregoing to be married," she said.

  He started violently. "What!" he exclaimed. "Well, well, we must seeabout that."

  "It's no good seeing about it, father," she corrected him, feeling anhysterical desire to laugh; "he's dead."

  "The poor boy, the poor boy!" he murmured. "Such a capital fellow."

  "It was just after he had proposed to me that he fell overboard," shetold him.

  "Dear me, dear me!" he sighed. "And you had accepted him? I suppose theshock.... How very, very sad!--He just fell backwards."

  Awkwardly, but with great tenderness, he put his arm about her. "Youmust forget all about it," he whispered. "You must have a good time."

  "It was so ghastly," she said. "You see, when he asked me to be hiswife, I didn't say 'yes.'"

  "Of course not, of course not," he murmured. "Very proper, I'm sure."

  "But he thought I was only playing with him," she faltered. "He was soangry, so hurt. And then the paddle-wheel started with a jerk, and heoverbalanced."

  "Ah, my dear," he answered, "the course of true love never runssmoothly. An ancient saw, but a very true one! But you are young: youwill soon get over it. You must throw yourself into your duties ashostess at the Residency; and, in the first place, I want you to help mein a little scheme I have in mind."

  Muriel guessed what was coming, and her feelings were peculiarlydiversified.

  "I want to persuade Daniel Lane to accept some official position," hesaid. "Of course I can't offer him the mere Oriental Secretaryship whichpoor dear Rupert has left vacant; but I think its scope and importancecould be greatly extended, amplified, and he might be tempted."

  "I doubt it," Muriel replied. She did not know quite what to say.

  "I shall write to him at once," Lord Blair went on, nodding archly ather. "I shall say how whole-heartedly you second my proposal."

  Muriel stiffened. "O, no, _please_," she answered, quickly, and thecolour mounted to her face. "Please leave me out of it; Mr. Lane and Ihave nothing in common. I hardly know him, and much of what I do know Idislike."

  Her father's face fell. There is no telling how far his scheming mindhad advanced into the future, nor what plans he was forming for thewell-being of his only child. It may only be stated with certainty thathe had a very great admiration for Daniel, and that he was not blind tothe fact that the object of this admiration was heir-presumptive to aman who, by common report, was drinking himself to death.

  To Muriel, however, the prospect of having the masterful Mr. Laneactually on the premises was disturbing in the extreme, and, during theensuing days, added not a little to her mental distress.

  She greatly missed Rupert's entertaining comp
any; and although, as thedays passed, she realized that his death was not as shattering a blow toher as she had thought, the remembrance of their brief romance oftenbrought the tears to her eyes. Yet even as she wiped them away she wasconscious that her sorrows were aroused rather by the tragedy itselfthan by her own heart's desolation. It is true that her emotions hadbeen deeply stirred by his passion; but gradually the fires, lighted forso brief a moment, died down, and she was obliged to admit that herheart was not broken.

  But if the romantic effect of the sad affair was proved in these fewdays to be less severe than she had at first supposed, there was anotheraspect of the matter which had a very profound bearing upon her mentalattitude. The sudden termination of Rupert's career had set her thinkingabout life in a way that she had never thought before. If death werealways so near at hand, if so simple an accident so quickly put out thelittle lamp of existence, ought one not to concentrate all the forces ofthe human constitution upon the enjoyment of each passing hour?

  She stood off from herself as an artist stands back from his picture,and she saw that she was but a shadow amongst shadows, a speck of vapourpassing across time's fixed stare, having no substance of which onecould say, "this at least will remain." Today she was here; tomorrow shewould be dissolved and gone.

  To Kate Bindane she confessed all that had occurred on that fatal night."I don't want to be romantic," she told her. "I don't want to make moreof the thing than there was really in it. But his death means more to methan it does to any of you others. I can't forget the sight of the solesof his shoes disappearing into that black water. It's as though I'd seenDeath himself swallow him up. I had always thought of Death as a sort ofunknown country where one goes to; but in this case I saw it come forhim and swallow him. I saw it as an ink-black monster; it snapped himup, and spit out the limp shell of him, but kept the essence of him inits stomach. And it's waiting to snap up you and me. It's close at hand,always close at hand...."

  She shuddered as she spoke; and her friend, putting her strong armaround her, found difficulty in soothing her.

  "Well, perhaps," she replied, "it was an act of Providence to save youfrom a mistaken marriage."

  "O, but he loved me," said Muriel, "and I should have come to love himentirely. He was so sweet, so good-natured."

  "Perhaps there's something better in store for you, old girl."

  Muriel shook her head. "No," she answered, "there's nothing much butDeath for any of us. It all comes to that in the end: it all leads justto Death."

  "Well, then, let's eat, drink, and be merry," said her friend.

  "Yes," Muriel replied, with conviction. "That's what I'm going to do.Omar Khayyam was right: I've been reading him again."

  "He was a wise old bird," Kate Bindane commented. "Wasn't he the fellowwho said something about a bottle of claret and a hunk ofbread-and-butter in the desert? I've always thought it a fine conceptionof bliss."

  Muriel clasped her hands together, and looked up with youthful fervour."Yes," she replied, "and he said 'Ah, make the most of what we yet mayspend, Before we too into the dust descend,' and 'Ah, fill thecup:--what boots it to repeat how time is slipping underneath ourfeet.'"

  "Yes," said Kate, "I always remember that line by thinking of boots andslippers and feet."

  Muriel was speaking with too much earnestness to give heed to herfriend's lack of poetic reverence. "Life's so short," she went on, "thatI'm going to make the most of it. I'm going to have my fling, Kate. I'mgoing to be merry."

  "Right-o!" said Kate. "I'm with you, old bean."