"I cannot hear Mademoiselle DeLisle spoken of in that way, even by my colonel's friend, sir," said Max. "If your daughter has run away——"
"If! Thou knowest well that she has run away with her lover, who has half murdered the man who should by now be her husband. Thou knowest and Mademoiselle knows!"
"You are mistaken," broke in Max, not troubling to hide his anger. "If you think your daughter——"
"I think she is here! But thou canst not protect her from me. Try, and thou and every man with thee shall perish."
"Search our camp," said Max.
As he spoke, Sanda appeared at the door of the mean little tent hired for her at Touggourt. From the shelter of the bassourah, close by on the sand, Khadra peeped out. The search was made quickly and almost without words. If the power of France had not been behind the soldier and the girl whom Ben Râana now hated, he would have reverted—"enlightened" man as he was—to primitive methods. He would have killed the pair with his own hand, while the men of his goum put the Arabs to death, and all could have been buried under the sand save the camels, which would have been led back to Djazerta. But France was mighty and far reaching, and he and his tribe would have to pay too high for such indulgence.
When he was sure that Ourïeda and Manöel Valdez were not concealed in the camp, with cold apologies and farewells he turned with his men and rode off toward the south—a band of shadows in the night. The visit had been like a dream, the desert dream that Sanda had had of Max, Max of Sanda. Yet dimly it seemed to both that these dreams had meant more than this. The girl let her "Soldier St. George" warm her small, icy hands, and comfort her with soothing words.
"You were not treacherous," he said. "You did exactly right. You deserve happiness for helping to make that girl happy. And you'll have it! You must! You shall! I couldn't stand your not being happy."
"Already it's to-day," she half whispered, "to-day that we come to Touggourt. The greatest thing in my father's life happened there. I thought of that when I passed through before, and wondered what would happen to me. Nothing happened. But—what about to-day?"
"May it be something very good," Max said steadily. But his heart was heavy, as in his hands her own grew warm.