The whole northern coast of Africa is inhabited by a medley of tribes, all owning a kind of subjection to the Sultan, but more in the sense of Pope than of King. The part of the coast where the tartane had been driven on the rocks was beneath Mount Araz, a spur of the Atlas, and was in the possession of the Arab tribe called Cabeleyze, which is said to mean ‘the revolted.’ The revolt had been from the Algerine power, which had never been able to pursue them into the fastnesses of the mountains, and they remained a wild independent race, following all those Ishmaelite traditions and customs that are innate in the blood of the Arab.
When Estelle awoke from her long sleep of exhaustion, she was conscious of a stifling atmosphere, and moreover of the crow of a cock in her immediate vicinity, then of a dog growling, and a lamb beginning to bleat. She raised herself a little, and beheld, lying on the ground around her, dark heaps with human feet protruding from them. These were interspersed with sheep, goats, dogs, and fowls, all seen by the yellow light of the rising sun which made its way in not only through the doorless aperture, but through the reeds and branches which formed the walls.
Close as the air was, she felt the chill of the morning and shivered. At the same moment she perceived poor Maître Hébert covering himself as best he could with a dirty brown garment, and bending over her with much solicitude, but making signs to make as little noise as possible, while he whispered, ‘How goes it with Mademoiselle?’
‘Ah,’ said Estelle, recollecting herself, ‘we are shipwrecked. We shall have to confess our faith! Where are the rest?’
‘There is M. l’Abbé,’ said Hébert, pointing to a white pair of the bare feet. ‘Poor Laurent and Victorine have been carried elsewhere.’
‘And mamma? And my brother?’
‘Ah! Mademoiselle, give the good God thanks that he has spared them our trial.’
‘Mamma! Ah, she was in the cabin when the water came in? But my brother! I had hold of his hand, he came out with me. I saw M. Arture swim away with him. Yes, Maître Hébert, indeed I did.’
Hébert had not the least hope that they could be saved, but he would not grieve the child by saying so, and his present object was to get her dressed before any one was awake to watch, and perhaps appropriate her upper garments. He was a fatherly old man, and she let him help her with her fastenings, and comb out her hair with the tiny comb in her étui. Indeed, friseurs were the rule in France, and she was not unused to male attendants at the toilette, so that she was not shocked at being left to his care.
For the rest, the child had always dwelt in an imaginary world, a curious compound of the Lives of the Saints and of Télémaque. Martyrs and heroes alike had been shipwrecked, taken captive, and tormented; and there was a certain sense of realised day-dream about her, as if she had become one of the number and must act up to her part. She asked Hébert if there were a Sainte Estelle, what was the day of the month, and if she should be placed in the Calendar if she never complained, do what these barbarians might to her. She hoped she should hold out, for she would like to be able to help all whom she loved, poor papa and all. But it was hard that mamma, who was so good, could not be a martyr too; but she was a saint in Paradise all the same, and thus Estelle made her little prayer in hope. There was no conceit or over confidence in the tone, though of course the poor child little knew what she was ready to accept; but it was a spark of the martyr’s trust that gleamed in her eye, and gave her a sense of exaltation that took off the sharpest edge of grief and fear.