“I can do something. I’ve done a little in my day; but my day, like Ismail’s, is declining. They are his subjects, and he needs money, and he puts a price on their heads—that’s about the size of it. Question How much will you have to pay? How much have you in Cairo at the bank?”
“Only about ten thousand pounds.”
“He’d take your draft on England, but he’ll have that ten thousand pounds, if he can get it.”
“That doesn’t matter, but as for my arrest—”
“A trick, on some trumped-up charge. If he can hold you long enough to get some of your cash, that’s all he wants. He knows he’s got no jurisdiction over you—not a day’s hold. He knows you’d give a good deal to save your men.”
“Poor devils! But to be beaten by this Egyptian bulldozer—not if I know it, Dicky”
“Still, it may be expensive.”
“Ah!” Kingsley Bey sighed, and his face was clouded, but Dicky knew he was not thinking of Ismail or the blackmail. His eyes were on the house by the shore, now disappearing, as they rounded a point of land.
“Ah” said Donovan Pasha, but he did not sigh.
III