Each of them danced in turn, without any musical accompaniment, her companions meanwhile grouping themselves in a circle round her, and encouraging her with their savage shouts, and by clapping their hands together. Gradually her body turns, her knees are bent, and her arms become rigid. She seems to be trying to resist some magnetic force which slowly draws her on towards one comer of the room. She advances, step by step, trembling in every limb, always following the gaze of her companions, and swayed by their shouts, which degenerate into howls like those of a wild beast.
The woman in the diadem has not left her place; she squats in the same corner, but her yells mingle with the others, and her gaze, fixed on the dancer, seems to mesmerize her. Her right arm is extended at full length, and her claw-like fingers nervously clutch the leathern-thonged whip.
Finally, the dancer, weary of struggling, appears to yield to the influences which surround her, and to obey orders mysteriously conveyed to her, and she ends by falling exhausted at the feet of the spectator in whose honour the entertainment has been given.
M. Delange might very well have had enough of dancing, but he was bent on seeing everything and comparing everything. So having made the acquaintance of these dancing slaves, he thought he would see what the dancing girls, who are their own mistresses, the Almehs to wit, were like. He wished to ascend from the black to the copper-coloured votaries of Terpsichore, and his visit to this other locality in Khartoum was within an ace of having a very disastrous result.
CHAPTER XLV.
The guide whom M. Delange had hired, before fulfilling his engagement with regard to the Almehs, suggested a visit to a slave-merchant. In obedience to the orders of the Khedive, public sales are forbidden by the Governor, and have been so for some years past, but certain houses known to, and tolerated by the police, have ever been and will always be devoted to the exchange or the sale of slaves, new and old. At the door of one of these houses, a sombre-looking building in a dismal, narrow street, the guide stopped, and, after having knocked in a peculiar way, the door was opened.
M. Delange, who was made to pass in first, was shown along a dimly-lighted passage, and emerged into a court-yard surrounded by high walls. The master of the house quickly came out to meet his fresh customers, as he thought. The animal predominated in his countenance, and his eyes were small, with red-rimmed lids, his nose hooked, his lips colourless and thin, his skin yellow, and his beard sparse and reddish. The guide took him aside and whispered a few words in his ear, explaining, doubtless, that he had not brought with him a purchaser, but merely a traveller anxious for information and ready to pay high for a cursory inspection of what was to be seen.
Accustomed to these visits, from which he derived a certain revenue, the man at once proceeded to display his wares. First of all he conducted his visitor towards some mud hovels built against the walls. He opened a door, and about a score of negresses were exposed to view, some half-naked and the remainder clothed in garments of a dirty yellow. Many of them were nursing children, and others, lying here and there, were sleeping, as negroes so well know how to sleep, so soundly that nothing disturbed them. A few laughed carelessly as they saw M. Delange, and showed their white teeth.
"I have something better than this," said the merchant.
For the fun of the thing he had first of all exposed only his inferior brands, commercially speaking. He was now about to display his choice goods.