“Yes. Then you had Dick Merriwell stripped and were on the point of having him cruelly whipped. You threatened to have him sold into slavery in Arabia.”
“Which would have been his fate only for the unlucky appearance of that old devil of a sheik, Ras al Had. He turned up with his followers at the wrong moment.”
“At the right moment!” cried Nadia. “The whipping you intended for Merriwell you received yourself.”
Bunol’s face flushed.
“Yes,” he said, in a low, fierce tone. “The scars are on my back, and I shall bear them to the grave.”
“Retribution!”
“The end is not yet. I have sworn to make Merriwell suffer, even as I suffered!”
“That shows your true nature and the blackness of your heart, for it was not Dick Merriwell that caused you to be whipped. Ras al Had was the one. Dick interfered, or you would have been lashed until you fainted.”
“Why did he interfere? I know! It was because he feared I would be so weakened by the punishment that I would not be able to stand the journey to Arabia. He left me with those Bedouins, who were commanded to take me out of Syria and sell me into slavery in Arabia. He intended that I should perish a wretched slave of black men.”
“Which was the fate you had chosen for him and would have forced on him, only for the fortunate coming of the sheik. Do you never think that there is such a thing as retributive justice? I shuddered and was sorry for you when I learned what had happened. But now—now my only regret is that you escaped!”