CHAPTER XXIX
The sound of that desperate conflict rang through the stillness of the night, reaching the ears of a man who was riding at break-neck speed along the sandy track leading in the direction of the oasis. Those diabolical shrieks of laughter filled him with a torture of mind almost past bearing. In them he heard the voices of hyenas mangling the girl he loved.
Le Breton had always known Pansy would run away if an opportunity occurred. But he had imagined that he had made escape impossible.
After dinner, he went to the gilded room, to pay an evening visit to his prisoner, since business affairs had kept him from dining with her.
However, she was not there.
Experience had taught him that it would be no use looking for her in the moonlit, rose-scented garden. She never went there after sunset, for fear he should come across her, and the beauty and romance of it all, combined with his presence, should force the surrender he was waiting for.
Not finding Pansy in her own private quarters, he went into the big hall of the harem, only to be told she had not been there since well before dinner.
On learning this he set the women searching in every corner of the harem. But Pansy was nowhere to be found.
Beyond a doubt, she had managed to escape. For a moment the news dazed him. He did not waste time in trying to discover how she had escaped, or who was responsible for her getting away. She had gone. That one fact glared at him. No one knew better than the Sultan himself the dangers awaiting the girl once she strayed beyond his care.
Within a few minutes all his servants and soldiers were out looking for the fugitive, scouring the city, with threats of the dire fate awaiting anyone who dared either hide or injure the Sultan's wife.
A hasty search brought no trace of the girl, but one of the search parties learnt that a horse was missing from the royal stables.
On hearing this the Sultan went at once to the stables, looking for a clue there. The missing horse was Pansy's. The discovery sent a sudden glow of hope coursing through him. It argued that somehow or other she had managed to reach the stables and had set out into the desert.
The Sultan understood horses, even better, it seemed to him now, than he understood women. Left to its own devices the old horse would go the way it knew the best; the way he generally took it. And left to itself it was almost certain to be, since its rider had no knowledge of any of the sandy tracks that lay around the city.
Within a few moments he was on the swiftest of his own horses, riding with all speed towards the oasis; but not before leaving orders with his officers to scour the desert in every direction.
He had ridden perhaps five miles when into the stealthy hiss of the sand another sound came. At first so far away that it was but a distant moan in the night. As he tore on rapidly it grew louder, developing into a chorus of hideous laughter, the cry of hyenas howling round their prey.
Desert reared, instinctively he knew there must be at least twenty of them.
When, above the mêlée he heard the terrorized screams of a horse, a deadly fear clutched him. Where the horse was, the girl was. And the sound told him the two had been attacked.
Around Pansy the ghastly conflict was raging. Around her mangled corpse, perhaps.
He suffered all the tortures of the damned, as with spur and crop he urged the great stallion onwards, until the animal was a lather of sweat and foam.
The hyenas heard the throb of those approaching hoofs, and fear gripped their cowardly hearts.
The disconcerting noise grew speedily louder. On the whiteness of the lonely desert a dark patch appeared; a patch that rapidly became bigger and headed straight towards them.
It was one thing to attack a tired old horse and a half-stunned girl, but another to face a huge black stallion and the big man in the white burnoose who rode it.
The hyenas did not face the combination. With a weird howl of disappointment, they turned tail suddenly and scuttled away into the desert, leaving the old horse shivering with relief and pain and exhaustion.
The feeling of someone touching her made Pansy open her eyes. Into her hazy world her captor's face intruded. He was half-kneeling on the sand beside her, examining her limbs, feeling her heart, to see if she were injured in any way.
For a moment Pansy could not believe her eyes.
Then she put out a weak hand to push him away. But a push did not remove him. He was still there, in white cloak and hood; a desert chief who wanted to marry her. Big and solid he knelt beside her, a fact not to be escaped from. And his hand was on her bosom as if to steal the heart she would not give him.
Satisfied Pansy was not hurt in any way, the Sultan got to his feet, and turned towards the horse. It needed more attention than the girl.
He petted and patted the worn-out shivering animal, talking to it in a deep, caressing voice, as he bound up its gaping wounds with lengths torn from his own white garments.
Then he lifted the girl on his own horse, and, mounting himself, set out on a slow walk towards his city.
Pansy made a feeble struggle when she found herself in his arms, her head resting against his shoulder, held in a tight, possessive grip.
"So, little flower, you would still try to escape from me," he said in a fierce, fond manner. "But I don't let love go so lightly."
He ignored her struggles as he talked to and encouraged the old horse that hobbled along by their side, with stiff, painful steps.
As the slow journey went on, Pansy fell asleep against the strength that held her.
The Sultan was quick to note this, and he smiled at the small tired face on his shoulder. He knew the nature of the girl he held. It would be impossible for her to go to sleep in any man's arms except those of the man she loved. She was very foolish to fight against him, but fight she would until he used his strength and ended the battle. An uneven contest the last round would be, with no doubt as to who would be the victor.