“You have done well for us, Rupert,” said Mea, as they headed homewards. “Tama has not been so wealthy since the days of my forefathers, who called themselves kings, and now that the Khalifa is broken and the land has become safe, this is but a beginning of riches.”
“I don’t know about that,” he answered, with his jolly laugh, “but I have done very well for myself. Do you know that out of my percentage I have saved more money than I can spend? Now I am going to build a hospital and hire a skilled man to attend to it, for I am tired of playing doctor.”
“Yes,” she answered, “I have thought of it before, only I said nothing because it means bringing white folk into the place, and we are so happy without them. Also, our people do not like strangers.”
“I understand,” he answered, “but the Europeans have discovered us already. It is impossible to keep them out now that we pay taxes to the Government. You remember that man a few months ago who came to tell me that I am Lord Devene, and that since I became so my wife is making inquiries about me. I would not see him, and you sent him away, but he, or others, will be back again soon.”
“And then will you wish to leave with him, Rupert, and take your own place in the West?” she asked anxiously.
“Not I,” he answered, “not if they offered to make me a king.”
“Well, why should you?” Mea said, with her sweet little laugh, “who are already a king here,” and she touched her breast; “and there,” and she nodded towards some people who bowed themselves before him; “and everywhere,” and she waved her hand at the oasis of Tama in general.
“Well,” he answered, “the first is the only crown I want.” Then, having no more words to say, this strange pair, divorced for the kingdom of Heaven’s sake, yet wedded indeed, if ever man and woman have been, for truly their very souls were one, looked at each other tenderly. They had changed somewhat since we saw them last over seven years before. Their strange life had left its seal upon them both. Mea’s face was thinner, the rich, full lips had a little wistful droop; the great, pleading eyes had grown spiritual, as though with continual looking over the edge of the world; the air of mystery which her features always wore had deepened; also, her figure was somewhat less rounded than it appeared in those unregenerate days when she turned herself about before Rupert, and assured him that she was “not so bad.” Yet she was more beautiful now than then, only the beauty was of a different character.
Rupert, on the other hand, had greatly improved in looks. The eye that remained to him was quite bright and clear, and the flesh had healed over the other in such a fashion that it only looked as if it were shut. The scars left by the hot irons on his face had almost vanished also. The bleaching of the sun, combined with other causes, had turned his hair from red to an iron grey, to the great gain of his appearance; moreover, the wide, rough beard, which had caused Edith mentally to compare him to Orson as pictured in the fairy books of her youth, was kept short, square, and carefully trimmed. Lastly, his face, like Mea’s, had fined down, till it resembled that of a powerful ascetic, which, in truth, he was. Indeed, although they were so strangely different, they had yet grown like to one another; seen in certain lights, and in their Arab robes, it would have been quite possible to mistake them for brother and sister, as their people called them among themselves.
For a long while, to these simple inhabitants of the desert, the relations between the two had been a matter of mystery. They were unable to understand why a man and woman, who were evidently everything to each other, did not marry. At first they thought that Rupert must have taken other wives among the women of the place, but finding that this was not so, secretly they applied to Bakhita to enlighten them. She informed them that because of vows that they had made, and for the welfare of their souls, this pair had agreed to adopt the doctrine of Renunciation.