Zoraida: A Romance of the Harem and the Great Sahara

“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.