第96章

Naomi must have been lying at the farther end of it.She spoke when the door was opened.As though by habit, she framed the name of her jailer Habeebah, and then stopped with a little nervous cry and seemed to rise to her feet.In his confusion Ali said simply, "It is I," as though that meant everything.Recovering himself in a moment he spoke again, and then she knew his voice: "Naomi!""It's Ali," she whispered to herself.After that she cried in a trembling undertone "Ali! Ali! Ali!" and came straight in the accustomed darkness to the spot where he stood.

Then, gathering courage and voice together, Ali told her hurriedly why he was there.When he said that her father was no longer in prison, but at their home near Semsa and waiting to receive her, she seemed almost overcome by her joy.Half laughing, half weeping, clutching at her breast as if to ease the wild heaving of her bosom she was transformed by his story.

"Hush!" said Ali; "not a sound until we are outside the town,"and Naomi knitted her fingers in his palm, and they passed out of the place.

The banquet was now at its height, and hastening down dark corridors where they were apt to fall, for they had no light to see by, and coming into the garden, they heard the ripple and crackle of laughter from the great hall where Ben Aboo and his servile rascals feasted together.They reached the quiet alley outside the Kasbah (for the negro was gone from his post), and drew a lone breath, and thanked Heaven that this much was over.There had been no group of beggars at the gate, and the streets around it were deserted;but in the distance, far across the town in the direction of the Bab el Marsa, the gate that goes out to Marteel, they heard a low hum as of vast droves of sheep.The Spaniard was coming, and the townsmen were going out to meet him.Casual passers-by challenged them, and though Ali knew that even if recognised they had nothing to fear from the people, yet more than once his voice trembled when he answered, and sometimes with a feeling of dread he turned to see that no one was following.

As he did so he became aware of something which brought back the shame of that awful moment when he stood with the key in hand at the door of Naomi's prison.By the light of the lamps in the hands of the passers-by Naomi was looking at him.Again and again, as the glare fell for an instant, he felt the eyes of the girl upon his face.At such moments he thought she must be drawing away from him, for the space between them seemed wider.But he firmly held to the outstretched arm, kept his head aside, and hastened on.

"What matter about me?" he whispered again.But the brave word brought him no comfort."Now she's looking at my hand," he told himself, but he could not draw it away."She is doubting if I am Ali after all,"he thought."Naomi!" he tried to say with averted head, so that once again the sound of his voice might reassure her;but his throat was thick, and he could not speak.Still he pushed on.

The dark town just then was like a mountain chasm when a storm that has been gathering is about to break.In the air a deep rumble, and then a loud detonation.Blackness overhead, and things around that seemed to move and pass.

Drawing near to the Bab Toot, the gate that witnessed the last scene of Israel's humiliation and Naomi's shame, Ali, with the girl beside him, came suddenly into a sheet of light and a concourse of people.

It was the Mahdi and his vast following with lamps in their hands, entering the town on the west, while the Spaniards whom they had brought up to the gates were coming in on the east.The Mahdi himself was locking the synagogues and the sanctuaries.

"Lock them up," he was saying."It is enough that the foreigner must burn down the Sodom of our tyrant; let him not outrage the Zion of our God."Ali led Naomi up to the Mahdi, who saw her then for the first time.

"I have brought her," he said breathlessly; "Naomi, Israel's daughter, this is she." And then there was a moment of surprise and joy, and pain and shame and despair, all gathered up together into one look of the eyes of the three.

The Mahdi looked at Naomi, and his face lightened.Naomi looked at Ali, and her pale face grew paler, and she passed a tress of her fair hair across her lips to smother a little nervous cry that began to break from her mouth.Then she looked at the Mahdi, and her lips parted and her eyes shone.Ali looked at both, and his face twitched and fell.

This was only the work of an instant, but it was enough.

Enough for the Mahdi, for it told him a secret that the wisdom of life had not yet revealed; enough for Naomi, for a new sense, a sixth sense, had surely come to her; enough for Ali also, for his big little heart was broken.

"What matter about me?" thought Ali again."Take her, Mahdi,"he said aloud in a shrill voice."Her father is waiting for her--take her to him."

"Lady," said the Mahdi, "can you trust me?"And then without a word she went to him; like the needle to the magnet she went to the Mahdi--a stranger to her, when all strangers were as enemies--and laid her hand in his.

Ali began to laugh, "I'm a fool," he cried."Who could have believed it?

Why, I've forgotten to lock the Kasbah! The villains will escape.

No matter, I'll go back."

"Stop!" cried the Mahdi.

But Ali laughed so loudly that he did not hear."I'll see to it yet,"he cried, turning on his heel."Good night, Sidi! God bless you!

My love to my father! Farewell!"

And in another moment he was gone.