Her disappointment flamed into anger at his words, and she responded coldly to his adieux. When he had left the room she sat down once more upon the sofa, and in the few moments of silence which followed, she experienced a variety of sensations. She felt as though he were the schoolmaster again who had scolded her; she felt abashed and did not know why; she felt angry with him, and, after their happy hours together, her displeasure fell like a destructive hand upon the day’s edifice; she felt that they belonged to different worlds, and that it was hopeless to attempt to understand him; she felt that she was right and he was wrong, and yet there was a doubt at the back of her mind as to whether the opposite might not somehow be the case.
[CHAPTER XIV—THE COURT PHILOSOPHER]
In the West an interest in Philosophy is considered to be an indication of eccentricity; and the thought brings before the imagination some long-haired and ancient professor, detached from the active world, wandering around a college quadrangle, his hands folded, and his face upturned to the sky as though averted from the stains of spilt food upon his breast. In the East, however, the Philosopher is held in high honour; and his vocation calls to mind a thousand tranquil figures each of whom has been the power behind an Oriental throne.
Daniel Lane was a philosopher by inclination and by education, and his great common sense was the definite consequence of careful reasoning.
He believed that Right was an unconquerable force which needed no display of manners or sounding of trumpets to signal its movement; and so long as he did not offend against the laws formulated by his philosophy, he did not look for difficulties or defeat.
Nor was he a man who could be terrorized by any threats; and though Lord Blair had warned him that assassination was a likely end to a political career in Cairo, he was not in the slightest degree troubled by the thought. Very reluctantly he consented to profit by the activities of the Secret Service; and he determined to dispense with their aid as soon as he had made himself acquainted with the ramifications of native intrigue.
He began his work at the Residency, therefore, without trepidation; and on the first morning of his official employment he inaugurated a procedure which before nightfall was the talk of many in the native quarter.
In a secluded corner of the garden, at the end of a short terrace at the edge of the Nile, there was a luxuriant group of palms, in the shade of which stood a marble bench of Arabic design, built in a half-circle upon a base of Damascus tiles. A mass of shrubs and prolific rose bushes shut it off from the main grounds; while from passing boats it was screened by a low parapet covered by a wild tangle of flowering creepers. This sheltered and peaceful alcove was promptly appropriated by Daniel, and in this setting he made his appearance in the political life of Cairo.
His first visitor was a wealthy, silk-robed land-owner from Upper Egypt, who desired to lay certain complaints before the British authorities, in regard to the hostile actions of a native inspector of Irrigation. The man had been shown into the waiting-room in the Residency, where he had been filled with anxiety by the ticking of the typewriters in the adjoining room, the constant ringing of telephone bells, and the hurried passage to and fro of clerks and liveried servants. He had wondered whether he knew sufficient English to make himself understood without the aid of an interpreter, and whether, if the interpreter’s services were required, he would have to give him very handsome backshish to render his tongue persuasive.
Therefore, when he was led presently across the lawn to the sunny terrace beside the Nile, where he came upon a mild and quiet figure who stood smoking his pipe, and idly tossing pebbles into the placid waters, and who now greeted him in the benevolent language of the Koran, his agitation left him upon the moment, and with it went the need of cunning. He stated his case frankly, as he strolled to and fro with Daniel in the sunlight, and he blessed God and his Prophet that the interview which he had dreaded so long in anticipation should prove so undisturbing in actuality.