Then he laughed, joyfully, stretched the girl's arms wide, then crushed her hands above her heart.
"Of course! of course!" he cried. "They are at my House 'an Mahabbha, the House of Love, even now, where they have met to see if they, the dears, thy wise old godmother, my beautiful wise mother, can find an answer to this very question."
They were not. Sick with suspense, they had landed on the far side of the Nile, on their race with Time to the Gate of To-morrow.
"We will go to them to-morrow, thou and I. To the Gate of To-morrow, thou with the mare Pi-Kay, I with the stallion Sooltan, who will well-nigh kill thy mare, my woman, in jealousy. Yea!" He bent and whispered in her ear so quietly, so coldly as to cause the girl to tremble. "As I will kill anyone who looks at thee when thou art my wife."
Then he laughed like a boy as he swung her round and held her at arm's-length by both hands. "We will start to-morrow to meet them, when we will lay the question before them. And then—and then—why———?"
Damaris, with all the smart of the wound to her pride revived, had shaken her head.
"I want you—I want you—to———"
Hugh Carden Ali understood by the grace of intuition.
"We will start for Khargegh to-morrow," he continued after a little pause. "And at the same time—if it will please thee, with thy consent—I will send my swiftest runner to Luxor, where he will despatch by cable the news of—oh! my beloved!—of our engagement—Allah! what a word to describe the opening of the gates of Paradise—to all the great cities of my country and of thy country. Have I thy consent?"
Incapable of speech, Damaris nodded; having cast the die, she trembled like a leaf; and at the sight of her, white, with big, frightened eyes staring at him and teeth driven into her lip, he took her in his arms.