CHAPTER XIV THE DESERT GIRL
Attracted by the sound of a drum, beating rhythmically and unceasingly, we strolled after sunset to the entrance of an Arab tent. Old women, with straggling hair and wizened faces, and with eyes ablaze with excitement, were pounding the drum. The tent was thronged with young men and women, who watched tensely and eagerly the dancers in their center. Only young women were dancing. The dance was in honor of a holy man, and was called the djdib.
Women, urged on by the drum and by the cries of the spectators, whirled and swayed. Their heads rocked from side to side like tree-tops in a tempest. The spirit of the dance had taken possession of them and urged them on until there was no more strength left in their lithe bodies.
They danced until they became exhausted, then others threw aside their scarves and renewed the dance.
I saw a golden-haired girl of about fifteen standing among the tawny Arab girls. The contrast between her quiet beauty and the bold charms of her companions drew the attention of all of the members of our party. I pointed her out to General Eaton. He began to wonder aloud as to whether she was one of the Circassian race, brought down from the mountains by Arabian bandits in some raid, or whether she was of Anglo-Saxon stock.
"She must be a Circassian," he concluded, "it is unbelievable that an English or American girl should be owned by this desert tribe!"
An old woman poked her hatchet-shaped face into that of the young girl.
"Go and dance! All these years you have been under the protection of Allah. Who is this Nazarene—that you place him above Mohammed and his saints? Go and dance. Give your spirit to the djinn! May Allah wither your budding beauty if you refuse to worship his saint in the dance!"
She seized the young girl by her thick sash and pulled her into the center. The band of ribbon that had bound her golden hair became loose; her hair poured like a flood of gold over her shoulders. She stood trembling amidst the wild dancers, some of whom, in their frenzy, were digging her with their sharp elbows.
The drum beat insistently, but the girl did not obey its urge to dance. She stood trembling, and now she raised her eyes towards us with a pleading that roused us to interfere.
General Eaton motioned to a sheik.
"We would not interrupt the dance, or offend the hospitality of this tent in any way. But that girl seems to be of our blood, and the dance is strange to her. Would it not offend the marabout in whose honor you dance to have a Nazarene take part? What is worship of the hands and feet if the heart is not submissive too? I pray you, permit the girl to withdraw."
The young Arabs cast hostile glances at us, but the sheik was good-natured and was expecting rich gifts from the general. He called the girl to him. She came quickly. He spoke to her in Arabic, and she withdrew to an alcove.
"She is an adopted daughter of our tribe," he explained.
The famine lay heavily upon this people. Perhaps it was due to the biscuits we offered this tribe that our interference with their ceremony was not hotly resented. Perhaps, indeed, the famine was responsible for their next move.
An old woman came out of the alcove that had hidden the girl and came directly to General Eaton. "The fair-haired one is a trouble to me," she said. "We have given her food and shelter for many years, yet when we speak to her of marriage, she weeps. When we tell her that we will sell her to become a dancing-girl in the bazaars and cafes if she will not wed one of our young men, she threatens to kill herself! Lovelier damsels than she have gone into the harem, happy to have a lord who will keep them from want. And there are worse lives than to dance at the fantasias of rich men, and to win the approval of the cafes. The girl is ungrateful and a burden to us. Our own children are starving. Give us money to buy food and take the unthankful girl!"
"Let the girl be summoned," said the general. She came forth, glancing from the Sheik Abdullah to General Eaton with fear in her eyes.
"My girl," said the general through an interpreter, "these people have offered you for sale. My purpose in buying you would be to find you a good home, where you will be brought up in the way of people of your color and race. Do you consent?" She looked at him as if she could not believe her ears, then sobbed, then nodded earnestly.
"Done!" thundered the general, "I call on Sheik Abdullah to witness that the offer has been made and accepted. I shall be liberal, too! Tell me what price such girls bring at the slave-market in Murzuk and it shall be paid."
The money was poured into the old hag's outstretched palms. The members of her family gathered round to gloat over it. The young Arabs laughed at the prospect of food. The departure of the girl in our company did not cause them the slightest concern. Maidens are held cheaply in the Sahara. A swift camel is worth more than a girl. What value has a Nazarene maiden compared with food for one's own famished children?
The general, to shield the girl as much as possible from the curious soldiers, gave her a tent where she dwelt alone, watched over by an old Nubian woman who had become attached to our party in Egypt and had been taken along for her value as a cook.
The general told a group of us briefly that the girl remembered little of her early life. There was a vague remembrance of a mother who had lived among these dark people. There came a day when she went out of her life and a scolding Arab woman took her place.
The girl and her black servant traveled on donkeys. A young sheik, a friend of the sheik, who had sold the girl to our party, joined Hamet's forces at this village. I wondered if he had planned to add the maiden to his circle of wives.