“Isn’t he, though, Yankee?” Dicky repeated, and pressed a knuckle into the other’s waistcoat.
“Isn’t he what?”
“Isn’t he bully—in your own language?”
“In figure; but I couldn’t see his face distinctly.”
“You’ll see that presently. You could cut a whole Egyptian Ministry out of that face, and have enough left for an American president or the head of the Salvation Army. In all the years I’ve spent here I’ve never seen one that could compare with him in nature, character, and force. A few like him in Egypt, and there’d be no need for the money-barbers of Europe.”
“He seems an ooster here—you know him?”
“Do I!” Dicky paused and squinted up at the tall Southerner. “What do you suppose I brought you out from your Consulate for to see—the view from Ebn Mahmoud? And you call yourself a cute Yankee?”
“I’m no more a Yankee than you are, as I’ve told you before,” answered the American with a touch of impatience, yet smilingly. “I’m from South Carolina, the first State that seceded.”
“Anyhow, I’m going to call you Yankee, to keep you nicely disguised. This is the land of disguises.”
“Then we did not come out to see the view?” the other drawled. There was a quickening of the eye, a drooping of the lid, which betrayed a sudden interest, a sense of adventure.