"Oh, Manöel doesn't mean to kill him, does he? Ourïeda said he wouldn't do that! But Arab women are so strange, so different from us, I don't believe she'd care much if he did; except that if he were a murderer they could seize him, even in another country—Spain, where they both hope to go when they can get out of Djazerta."
"Manöel wouldn't care much, either, except for that same reason," Max admitted. "But he does care for that. He intends only to surprise and stun Tahar. He doesn't want his life with Ourïeda spoiled, for he'll be a public character, you know, if he succeeds in escaping from Algeria. He'll be a great singer. He can take back his own name."
"Why not France?" Sanda wanted to know. "Surely France would be better for a singer than Spain, or even Italy?"
"Perhaps, but, you see, he has had to desert from the Legion. In France he could be brought back to Algeria to the penal battalion."
"Oh, I hadn't thought of that!"
"It was—a hateful necessity, his deserting."
Sanda looked at him anxiously. "Will it make trouble for you?"
"Possibly. I hoped it needn't happen. But it had to. There was no other way in the end."
"How he must love Ourïeda, to risk all that for her sake!"
"He risked a great deal more."