Zoraida: A Romance of the Harem and the Great Sahara

Sitting in the noonday sun, with my burnouse loosened and my arms resting on my knees, that sweet odour brought back vividly the events of the previous night, its horrors, its surprises, its joys. Again I saw Zoraida, gorgeous in her silk and gauze, a vision of loveliness, an ideal of Arab beauty, ready to risk her life to save mine. But it was only for a second; then my memory became hazy again, and it all seemed like some strange, half-remembered dream.

A desert lark rose near me and burst into joyous song. My horse turned its head slowly, and regarded me steadily for a few moments with his large, serious eyes. The utter loneliness in that arid waste, one of the most dreary regions of the Sahara, was terribly depressing.

But on my finger was her ring. The souvenir was by no means a valuable one, yet so dearly did I prize it that I would not have given it in exchange for anything that might be offered. It was of a type common among Arab women; heavy oxydised silver, and around it, in small Arabic characters of gold, ran a text from the Korân, “Allah is gracious and merciful.” Taking it off, I examined the inside, and found it quite bright and smooth by constant wear.

Whatever my mysterious enchantress was, or whoever she would prove to be, this was her pledge of trust. And she, whose face I had not looked upon, had named me “the Faithful!”

Yet as I sat thinking, grim, uncanny feelings of doubt and insecurity filled my mind, for I remembered the strange words of Ali Ben Hafiz, and the fateful Omen of the Camel’s Hoof.

I had at last become enmeshed as the dead man had prophesied!

Chapter Six.

The Man with a Secret

At sundown, three days after my escape from the Ennitra, my eyes distinguished the palms of the Meskam Oasis standing at the foot of a large sand-hill. Zoraida had correctly informed me, for under feathery trees, amid the luxuriant vegetation which one finds here and there in the Sahara, the Spahis and Chasseurs d’Afrique had established an advanced post.

In an hour I had entered the camp, and being taken before the French commandant, related my story. I told him of my journey with Ali Ben Hafiz, of the attack, and of the massacre.

“Bien! and you alone escaped!” exclaimed the officer, a thorough boulevardier, who sat before his tent with outstretched legs, lazily puffing a cigarette.

“Yes,” I replied.

He was as well groomed, and his moustache was as carefully waxed, as if he were lounging outside the Café de la Paix.

“You were exceedingly fortunate,” he exclaimed, rolling his cigarette carelessly. “Those who fall into Absalam’s clutches seldom escape. Diable! he’s the most fierce cut-throat in all Algeria. How did you manage it?”

I hesitated. Had I not promised Zoraida to preserve the secret of their whereabouts for her sake? If her people were to escape, I should be compelled to make misleading statements. At last I replied —

“They left me bound to a tree during the night, and I succeeded in loosening the cords. Finding a horse ready saddled, I jumped upon it and rode away.” After I had uttered the words, I saw how lame was my story.

“But how did you know we were here?” asked the commandant, blowing a cloud of smoke from his lips, regarding me rather critically, and then offering me a chebli from his case.

“I had no idea,” I replied. “Seeing the palms from yonder ridge, I came here to rest. Had I not discovered the oasis, I should most likely have perished.”

“You certainly would not have lived many days,” he said. “The nearest well is two hundred miles in any direction, therefore, if you had missed this, the vultures would soon have made a meal off you. But,” he continued, “describe to me where we are likely to find Hadj Absalam. We have been in search of him these three months, but, strangely enough, his spies appear to watch all our movements, with the result that he evades us in a manner simply marvellous.”

I was silent for a moment, thinking.

“I have travelled for three days due north,” I said, apparently reflecting. “If you send your men due south three days’ journey, they will come upon a small oasis. This must be passed, and still south again, a three hours’ ride, there is a larger oasis on the further side of a high ridge. It is there that Hadj Absalam is taking his ease.”

“Good!” exclaimed the officer, calling over a Chasseur who was sauntering past with his hands in his pockets and ordering him to send immediately a sous-officier, whom he named.

“It’s a fine night,” he said. “We will start when the moon rises, and, mon Dieu! it will not be our fault if we do not exterminate the band, and bring the black-faced old scoundrel back with us. The caravans will never be safe until his head is in the lunette.”

“But he may have moved by this time,” I suggested.

“Then we will follow and overtake him,” he replied, brushing some dust from his braided sleeve. “He shall not escape us this time. When I was quartered in Biskra, I knew old Hafiz well. Though prejudiced against France, he was always good to our men, poor old fellow.”

“Yes,” I said. “Though a strict Moslem, he was most amiable and generous.”

At that moment a lieutenant of Chasseurs strode up and saluted.

“Victor,” the commandant exclaimed, addressing him, “we leave at once, with the whole of your enfants d’enfer, in search of Absalam, who is three days’ journey south. This time we will pursue him till we run him to earth. The Spahis will remain;” and, turning to me, he added: “M’sieur Holcombe, you are welcome to stay here also, if it pleases you.”

Thanking him, I assured him how deeply I appreciated his hospitality, and then, having been handed over to the care of a sous-officier, I was shown to the tent which the commandant ordered should be placed at my disposal, while the Spahis – or homards, as they are termed in the argot of the 19th Army Corps, because of their red burnouses – were busy assisting their comrades to prepare for departure.

Our evening meal of thin onion soup, black bread, and rough, bitter coffee having been disposed of, the Chasseurs, numbering about two hundred, paraded with their horses, and were briefly but keenly inspected by the officer in command, whose name I learned was Captain Paul Deschanel. The inspection over, the commandant addressed his men, and the order was given to mount. Then, amid the shouts of “Vive les Chasseurs! À bas les Ennitra! Vive la France!” from the assembled Spahis, the smart troop of cavalry, with the captain at their head, galloped away into the moonlit desert, and were soon lost in the gloom.

As I sat watching the receding horsemen, and inwardly chuckling that by sending them three days’ journey into the country of the Inemba-kel-Emoghri, Absalam and his people would be six days’ journey distant in an opposite direction, I was startled by a hand being laid upon my shoulder. Turning quickly, I found it was a Spahi.

“M’sieur is English, if I mistake not?” he inquired, with a pleasant smile upon his swarthy but refined face.

“True,” I replied. “And, judging from your accent, you are not an Arab, but a Parisian.”

“Yes,” he said, speaking in fairly good English. “I have been in England once. If you care to spend an hour in my tent, I can offer you absinthe and a cigarette. That is about the extent of the hospitalities of the oasis.”

Thanking him for his invitation, I accompanied him, and a few moments later we were sitting in the bright moonlight on a mat spread outside his small tent.

“So you have been in England?” I said presently, when he had told me his name was Octave Uzanne.

“Yes,” he replied, with a slight sigh, allowing the water to trickle slowly into his absinthe, and drawing his scarlet burnouse closer about him. It was strange to hear English in this region of silence and desolation.

“Is not the recollection of your visit pleasant?” I asked.

“Ah! forgive me, m’sieur,” he exclaimed quickly; “I can never hear your tongue, or think of London, without becoming triste. I associate with your great gloomy city the saddest days of my life. Had I not gone to London, I should never have been here, leading the wild semi-barbarous life in an Arab regiment of the Army of Africa. We of the Spahis have a saying, ‘N’éveillez pas le chat qui dort’ – but sometimes – ”

“It is a good adage, but we cannot always let our sorrows lie,” I interrupted sympathetically. He had spoken with the accent of a gentleman, and with the white light of the moon streaming upon his face, I saw that he was about thirty years of age, with a countenance clean-cut and noble, refined and somewhat effeminate. His dark eyes were deep-set and serious, yet in his face there was an expression of genuine bonhomie. The average Spahi is feared by Moor and Jew, by Biskri and Koulougli, as the fiercest and most daring of soldiers. In drink he is a brute, in love he is passionate, in the saddle he is one of the finest riders in the world; in the town he is docile and obedient, fond of lounging in the cafés, idling over his eternal cigarette; yet away in the desert, all his old instincts return; he is an Arab again, and knows no measure either in attachment or in hatred. A blow from his scabbard is the only payment when scouring the country for food, a thrust of his sabre the only apology to those he insults, while in the field, seated on his fleet horse, he rides like the wind, and has the strength and courage of a lion.

This quiet, intellectual, bearded young Frenchman sitting cross-legged on the mat beside me, was, I felt sure, a man with a past. One of his comrades came up and asked him a question in Arabic, to which he replied, speaking the language of his regiment like a true-born Bedouin. As we sipped our absinthe in silence for some minutes, watching the camp settling down for the night, it struck me as curious that, instead of being in the Chasseurs d’Afrique, he should be masquerading in burnouse in an exclusively native regiment.

We began talking of England, but he was not communicative regarding himself, and in reply to my question said —

“I desire to live here in the desert and to forget. Each time we return to Algiers, the glare and glitter of the European quarter unlocks the closed page of my history. It was because this wild roving beyond the pale of civilisation was suited to my mood that I became a homard.”

“Has your experience of life been so very bitter, then?” I asked, looking into the handsome face, upon which there was a shadow of pain, and which was set off by the spotless white haick surrounding it.

“Bitter? – Ah!” he exclaimed, with a deep sigh. “You see me now, dragging out a wretched existence in this wilderness, exiled from my home, with name, creed, nationality – everything changed.”

“In order to conceal your identity?” I hazarded.

“Yes, my past is erased. Dead to those who knew me, I am now merely known as Octave Uzanne. I have tasted of life’s pleasures, but just as I was about to drink of the cup of happiness, it was dashed from me. It is ended. All I have now to look for is – is a narrow bed in yonder sand.”

“My dear fellow,” I exclaimed, “don’t speak so despondently! We all have our little debauches of melancholy. Cannot you confide in me? Perhaps I might presume to give advice.”

Silently and thoughtfully he rolled a cigarette between the fingers of his bronzed hand, completing its manufacture carefully.

“My story?” he said dreamily. “Bah! Why should I trouble you – a stranger – with the wretched tragedy of my life?”

“Because I also have a skeleton in my cupboard, and I can sincerely sympathise with you,” I answered, tossing away my cigarette end and lighting a fresh one.

Murmuring some words that I did not catch, he sipped his absinthe slowly, and, passing his sinewy, sun-tanned hand wearily across his forehead, sat immovable and silent, with his eyes fixed upon the dense growth of myrtle bushes and prickly aloes before him.

Lighted candles stuck upon piles of rifles flickered here and there among the tents, the feathery leaves of the palms above waved in the night breeze like funeral plumes, the dry hulfa grass rustled and surged like a summer sea; while ever and anon there came bursts of hearty laughter from the Arab soldiers, or snatches of a chanson eccentrique with rollicking chorus that had been picked up a thousand miles away in the French cafés of Algiers.

Chapter Seven.

A Forgotten Tragedy

Octave Uzanne roused himself.

“My career has not been brilliant,” he said slowly, and with bitterness. “It is only remarkable by reason of its direful tragedy. All of us keep a debtor and creditor account with Fortune, and, ma foi! my balance has always been on the wrong side. Seven years ago I left the university at Bordeaux with honours. My father was a Senator, and my elder brother was already an attaché at our Embassy in London. In order to study English, with the object of entering the diplomatic service, I went over to reside with him, and it was he who, one night, when leaving a theatre, introduced me to the goddess at whose shrine I bowed – and worshipped. We became companions, afterwards lovers. Did she love me? Yes. Though she was a butterfly of Society, though it is through her that I am compelled to lead this life of desert-wandering, I will never believe ill of her. Never! Violet Hanbury – why should I conceal her name – had a – ”

“Violet Hanbury?” I cried, starting and looking to his face. “Do you mean the Honourable Violet Hanbury, daughter of Lord Isleworth?”

“The same,” he replied quickly. “What! – are you acquainted with her?”

“Well, scarcely,” I answered. “I – I merely know her by repute. I have seen her photograph in London shop-windows among the types of English beauty.”

I did not tell him all I knew. Vi Hanbury, the beauty of a season, had been mixed up in some unenviable affair. The matter, I remembered, had been enshrouded in a good deal of mystery at the time, but gossips’ tongues had not been idle.

“Ah!” he continued, enthusiastically; “I have no need then to describe her, for you know how handsome she is. Well – we loved one another; but it was the old story. Her parents forbade her to hold communication with me for two reasons – firstly, because I was not wealthy, and secondly, because they were determined that she should marry Henri de Largentière, a sallow, wizened man old enough to be her father, but who had been Minister of Education in the Brisson Cabinet.”

“Yes,” I said; “the engagement was discussed a good deal in the clubs after its announcement in the Morning Post.”

“Engagement? Sacré!” he exclaimed, with anger. “She was snatched from me and given to that old imbecile. I was compelled to fly from her and leave her, a pure and honest woman, at their mercy, because – because – ”

He paused for a moment. His voice had faltered and the words seemed to choke him. Flinging away his cigarette viciously, he took a gulp from the tin cup beside him, then, continuing, said —

“Because Violet’s cousin, Jack Fothergill, who was one of her most ardent admirers and had declared his love, was discovered one night dead in his chambers in St. James’s Street – he had been murdered!”

“Murdered?” I ejaculated. “I don’t remember hearing of it. I must have been abroad at the time.”

“Yes,” he said, speaking rapidly. “Jack Fothergill was brutally done to death with a knife that penetrated to the heart. But that was not all: the stiletto left sticking in the wound was discovered to be mine, a gold pencil-case belonging to me was found upon the floor, and the valet gave information to the police that at ten o’clock that night he had opened the door to allow me to depart!”

In the moonlight his eyes had a fierce glitter in them and his bare brown arms were thrust through the folds of his burnouse as he gesticulated to emphasise his words. There was a silence over the camp, but the gay café-chantant song of Mdlle. Duclerc, with which one of the Spahis was entertaining his comrades, sounded shrill and tuneful in the clear bright air —

“Je jou’ très bien d’ la mandoline,Ça fait moins d’ train que le tambourin;Puisque quand on a la jambe fine,Ça permet d’ la faire voir un brin.”

“Strangely enough,” my companion continued, after a pause; “I remained that night with a friend, and judge my horror and amazement when next morning I read in the newspapers of the tragedy, and learned that I was suspected of the crime! It was true that I had called upon the murdered man just before ten o’clock, that the pencil-case had been in my pocket, but of the murder I was entirely innocent. Yet how could I prove an alibi, especially when the doctor had given an opinion that death had occurred at ten o’clock – the hour I left! The police were searching for me, but through that long and terrible day I remained in hiding. Once or twice I was tempted to give myself up and bravely face the awful charge; but there was one thing which prevented this. All interest in life had been crushed from my heart by an announcement of two lines in the same issue of the paper, stating that a marriage had been arranged and would shortly take place between Violet and De Largentière. My hopes were shattered, for my love had been cast aside. She had actually accepted the man she had professed to hate!”

“But did you not clear yourself?” I asked. “Surely you could easily have done so?”

“How could I? Were not the suspicions rendered more justifiable by reason of my visit just prior to the crime. Again, I had not returned to my chambers that night, so day after day I remained in hiding. Though innocent, I was not wholly prepared to meet the charge, for I saw clearly that Jack and I had fallen victims of a foul plot. The crime that cost my friend his life was attributed to jealousy on my part, and with an incentive thus invented, I clearly saw that the circumstantial evidence was strong enough to convict me. I sought my brother’s assistance, and, half mad with terror and despair, I escaped from England. To return to France would be to run into the arms of the police, so I resolved to come here and in the wild life of the desert to bury the past.”

“But by whom was your friend Fothergill stabbed?” I asked.

“Let me tell you,” he replied. “Since that day, when like a criminal I fled from the trial I was afraid to face, I have learned only one fact, though not until a year ago did it come to my knowledge. It appears that on the evening of the murder, Fothergill wrote telling me that during a visit to Paris he had discovered certain details connected with the relations between Mariette Lestrade, a pretty singer whose chansons de poirrot were well known at the Moulin Rouge and Ambassadeurs and the ex-Minister of Education. He had that day called at Long’s Hotel, in Bond Street, where the General was staying, and in the course of a stormy interview threatened that if he still continued his suit, he would expose his secret attachment to this star of the café-concert, and take his cousin to her, so that she might investigate for herself. Lord Isleworth’s daughter would have a handsome dowry which was much needed to renovate the departed splendour of the ex-Minister’s estate in the Charente, therefore he was obstinate, laughed, snapped his fingers, and defied Jack. This interview took place at four o’clock in the afternoon, and Jack wrote to me from the Naval and Military Club, telling me everything, and stating that De Largentière had threatened his life. This letter was delivered at my chambers the same night, but I was not there, nor did I return, therefore my brother took charge of it and after nearly two years it reached me out here, unopened.”

“In face of such evidence as that,” I said, “the identity of the actual murderer is not very far to seek.”

“No,” he said, in a low, harsh tone.

“Why do you not take that letter, face the charge against you, and bring the criminal to his punishment?”

“Why?” he echoed, starting to his feet and looking me full in the face. “Why do I not denounce him, and return to civilisation? Because,” he said slowly, in a voice trembling with emotion, “because Violet – the woman I love – is Madame de Largentière. I think only of her. I adore her still. She shall never know of her husband’s terrible secret. Her innocent children shall never be branded as the spawn of a murderer!”

As he spoke, there was a bright flash in the dark clump of aloes immediately opposite us, and at the same instant the report of a rifle fired at close quarters caused me to start violently.

Octave Uzanne threw up his arms with a loud piercing cry, and, reeling, fell heavily backward, struck down by a coward’s bullet!

Chapter Eight.

The Fight in the Meskam

Our eyes were in a moment blinded by a flash, as fifty rifles opened fire upon us from every cover the thick bushes afforded.

For a few seconds, as the sounds of the first volley died away, there was a dead silence. So sudden had been the attack, that my comrades the Spahis stood dumbfounded, but ere the rifles of our unknown enemies were reloaded, fierce shrill yells rent the air, the arms that had been piled were snatched up, horses were untethered, and almost simultaneously with a second volley from the ambush, the homards, displaying cool courage, poured into the thick growth of myrtles, hulfa, acacias, and dwarf palms, a terribly withering fire.

The whole scene was enacted ere I could draw breath. The moon had disappeared, and in the darkness rifles seemed to pour forth flame on every hand. Evidently our enemies had been watching their opportunity, and while the camp was busy preparing for the departure of the Chasseurs, they had killed the three men on sentry duty on the other side of the sand-hill, and then crept into ambush, and lay there until the signal was given to open fire.

As the desperate combat commenced, and the fusillade burst forth with deafening report, I felt for my revolver, but my heart sank within me as I remembered that the Ennitra had relieved me of it, and I found myself standing alone and unarmed. A few feet away Uzanne’s rifle was lying, together with his bag of cartridges. I dashed towards them and bent to pick them up, but ere I could do so, a big fierce-looking Arab sprang from the myrtles towards me, yelling and whirling his knife above his head.

It was the work of an instant.

I remember feeling his sinewy grasp upon my shoulder, I saw his flashing blade above me, and heard him cry in Arabic —

“Let the dogs perish! Kill them! Kill them all!”

The heavy knife whistled in the air as uplifted it poised aloft for a moment.

Suddenly a shot sounded behind me. My assailant clapped his left hand to his breast and staggered back a few steps, then clutched violently at the air and fell. Glancing quickly in the direction whence the shot had come, I saw my friend Uzanne had with difficulty raised himself on one arm, and, drawing his revolver, had with unerring aim shot the Arab through the heart.

Octave Uzanne had saved my life.

“Sapristi!” he shouted, with a laugh, as I dashed towards him. “That was a close shave! Je lui ai collé un atout sur le nez!”

“Are you seriously hurt?” I gasped; noticing as the rifles flashed that blood was streaming from his shoulder.

“No,” he replied quickly. “I think not. Don’t trouble after me now, for I’m no good. I’ll patch myself up. Take my rifle and help the others.”

Snatching up the weapon, I loaded it, and, flinging myself on the ground behind the root of a fallen palm, I opened fire upon the thick bushes before me. In this way the minutes, full of anxiety, passed in ignorance of our foes. The deafening explosions were incessant, yells and cries of enemy and friend now and then sounded above the firing, and the air grew so thick with smoke, that I could scarcely distinguish the bushes where the Arabs lay in ambush.

As the terrible moments went by, I knew we were fighting for our lives. Altogether our force in camp only amounted to sixty, while we were, as yet, unaware of the character or number of our assailants. That they had dared to attack a military post showed they were present in overwhelming numbers, and, further, that they had waited until the Chasseurs had got away before swooping down to annihilate us.

Lying along the ground near my red-burnoused comrades, I fired as regularly as I was able, until suddenly a bugle sounded. It was the order to mount!