That, however, was not the worst. Hébert concealed from his little lady what Lanty did not spare Victorine. ‘And there—enough to melt the heart of a stone—there lay on the beach poor Madame la Comtesse, and all the three. Good was it for you, Victorine, my jewel, that you were not in the cabin with them.’
‘I know not,’ said the dejected Victorine; ‘they are better off than we?’
‘You would not say so, if you had seen what I have,’ said Lanty, shuddering. ‘The dogs!—they cut off Madame’s poor white fingers to get at her rings, and not with knives either, lest her blessed flesh should defile them, they said, and her poor face was an angel’s all the time. Nay, nor that was not the worst. The villainous boys, what must they do but pelt the poor swollen bodies with stones! Ay, well you may scream, Victorine. We went down on our knees, Maître Hébert and I, to pray they might let us give them burial, but they mocked us, and bade Hassan say they never bury dogs. I went round the steeper path, for all the load at my back, or I should have been flying at the throats of the cowardly vultures, and then what would have become of M. l’Abbé?’
Victorine trembled and wept bitterly for her companions, and then asked if Lanty had seen the corpse of the little Chevalier.
‘Not a sight of him or M. Arthur either,’ returned Lanty; ‘only the ugly face of the old Turk captain and another of his crew, and them they buried decently, being Moslem hounds like themselves; while my poor lady that is a saint in heaven—’ and he, too, shed tears of hot grief and indignation, recovering enough to warn Victorine by no means to let the poor young girl know of this additional horror.
There was little opportunity, for they had been appropriated by different masters: Estelle, the Abbé, and Hébert to the sheyk, or headman of the clan; and Lanty and Victorine to a big, strong, fierce-looking fellow, of inferior degree but greater might.
This time Estelle was to be kept for the night among the sheyk’s women, who, though too unsophisticated to veil their faces, had a part of the hut closed off with a screen of reeds, but quite as bare as the outside. Hébert, who could not endure to think of her sleeping on the ground, and saw a large heap of grass or straw provided for a little brown cow, endeavoured to take an armful for her. Unluckily it belonged to Lanty’s master, Eyoub, who instantly flew at him in a fury, dragged him to a log of wood, caught up an axe, and had not Estelle’s screams brought up the sheyk, with Hassan and one or two other men, the poor Maître d’Hôtel’s head would have been off. There was a sharp altercation between the sheyk and Eyoub, while Estelle held the faithful servant’s hand, saying, ‘You did it for me! Oh, Hébert, do not make them angry again. It would be beautiful to die for one’s faith, but not for a handful of hay.’
‘Ah! my dear demoiselle, what would my poor ladies say to see you sleeping on the bare ground in a filthy hut?’
‘I slept well last night,’ returned Estelle; ‘indeed, I do not mind! It is only the more like the dungeon at Lyon, you know! And I pray you, Hébert, do not get yourself killed for nothing too soon, or else we shall not all stand out and confess together, like St. Blandina and St. Ponticus and St Epagathius.’
‘Alas, the dear child! The long names run off her tongue as glibly as ever,’ sighed Hébert, who, though determined not to forsake his faith, by no means partook her enthusiasm for martyrdom. Hassan, however, having explained what the purpose had been, Hébert was pardoned, though the sheyk scornfully observed that what was good enough for the daughters of a Hadji was good enough for the unclean child of the Frankish infidels.