Volume Two—Chapter Twenty Eight.
Murad at Home.
The place was very still once more as Helen sat thinking, with her two attendants idling by the window. She had heard the sound of oars, and there had been men’s voices, but nothing more.
She was angry with herself for the ill success of her attempt to escape; but by degrees she calmed down, and her excitement passed off, for there was something inexpressibly comforting in the knowledge that the chaplain was not far away. She succeeded so well at last in recovering her equanimity that she told herself she was ready to crush Murad with the outburst of righteous indignation that would flow from her lips.
There was a calm, dreamy feeling about the place now, and her attendants seemed half asleep. It was intensely hot, and the birds and insects had ceased their whistlings and busy hum. So quiet did it seem in the late afternoon that everything might have been supposed asleep, when once more the sound of voices sent a thrill through Helen, and she began to tremble and feel weak once more, till suddenly there was one voice heard above the others, giving orders, and this voice sent a thrill through her—not of dread, but of anger.
She drew herself up, for the time had come, and, like one who has been for weeks dreading some painful scene, shrinking within herself, but grows brave and ready at the last moment when she is face to face with the difficulty, so Helen Perowne suddenly felt herself firm and ready for the encounter she had to endure.
It was Murad’s voice undoubtedly, giving orders in a sharp, commanding way; and though he spoke in the Malay tongue, she readily recognised the tones that had been used at the station, when he had hung over her ottoman, softened his words to the occasion, and then gazed at her with love-softened eyes.
“Idiot! idiot! weak coquette that I was!” she cried to herself. “Had I no more sense than to lead this savage on for the sake of gaining a little more adoration. Oh! father, it was a curse you gave me, and not a blessing, in those handsome features that all people praised.”
The weak tears rose to her eyes, and it was only by an effort that she kept them back, clenching her teeth and fingers, and striving to be firm.
“It is too late now,” she muttered then. “Oh! Grey Stuart, would to Heaven that you were here!”