"Would you like to jump down?" I asked, reluctantly. For the first time I did not wish Biddy O'Brien to give me her society. I hoped she would say "No, thank you," for I wanted Fenton to point out our mountain (which he had told me could be seen): and it would be inconvenient to answer questions.
"Yes, we should like it," they both replied together: so Anthony and I had to look delighted. It really was a pleasure to help them down: but even that we could have waited for till our arrival at Khartum. And the first remark that Biddy made was too intelligent. "What are those weird things off there in the distance, that look exactly like ruined pyramids—sort of mudpie pyramids?"
"Mountains," said Fenton.
"What, didn't anybody make them?"
"The legend is, that Djinns, or evil spirits, created them to use as tombs for themselves."
"But they're almost precisely like the made pyramids, only a little more tumbledown. Have they names?"
"Some have, I believe," Anthony returned, with his well-put-on air of indifference. "That blackest and most ruined looking one of all, for instance, between two which are taller—there, away to the left, I mean—that is called the 'Mountain of the Golden Pyramid.'"
Our eyes met over the girls' veiled hats. After all, he had found an opportunity of telling me what I wanted to know.
"What a fascinating name!" said Monny. "It sounds as if there were some special story connected with it. Is there?"
"Ye—es," Anthony was obliged to admit. "There is a legend that it was used as a tomb by the first Queen Candace, who lived about two hundred years B.C. after Ptolemy Philadelphus. She used to reign over what they called the "Island of Meröe." It was this once fertile kingdom, between the Atbara River over there, and the Blue Nile. They say she wished to be buried with all her jewels and treasure, and was afraid of her tomb being robbed, so she wouldn't trust to a man-made pyramid. She ordered a secret place to be hollowed out in the heart of a mountain; and that's the one they pretend it is."