"Who will prevent it?"
"Your Highness will. Your Highness could not permit it—the time is far past. Suppose Kingsley Bey gave you his whole fortune, would it save one palace or pay one tithe of your responsibilities? Would it lengthen the chain of safety?"
"I am safe."
"No, Highness. In peril—here with your own people, in Europe with the nations. Money will not save you."
"What then?"
"Prestige. Power—the Soudan. Establish yourself in the Soudan with a real army. Let your name be carried to the Abyssinian mountains as the voice of the eagle."
"Who will carry it?" He laughed disdainfully, with a bitter, hopeless kind of pride. "Who will carry it?"
"Gordon-again."
The Khedive started from his chair, and his sullen eye lighted to laughter. He paced excitedly to and fro for a minute, and then broke out:
"Thou hast said it! Gordon—Gordon—if he would but come again!—But it shall be so, by the beard of God's prophet, it shall. Thou hast said the thing that has lain in my heart. Have I had honour in the Soudan since his feet were withdrawn? Where is honour and tribute and gold since his hand ruled—alone without an army? It is so—Inshallah! but it is so. He shall come again, and the people's eyes will turn to Khartoum and Darfdr and Kordofan, and the greedy nations will wait. Ah, my friend, but the true inspiration is thine! I will send for Gordon to night—even to-night. Thou shalt go—no, no, not so. Who can tell—I might look for thy return in vain! But who—who, to carry my word to Gordon?"