“Al-Asad! Thy wounds!”
He turned and looked at the beautiful woman who, carried out of herself by the intoxication of the moment, held out her arms to him, then down at the mark of her teeth upon his arm.
“My wound, O woman, is thy seal upon me, which I shall carry to the day when Allah, the one and only God, shall bid me leave this maze which we call life. I go to work upon my plan, so that the desire of thy heart is granted thee.” He paused for one moment with his hand upon the curtain and took his revenge for all the bitterness of the past. “I have kissed thy hair, I have held thee upon my heart, I have bruised thee. Go to the white man an thou wilt; he will find thee marked by another man. I will have nothing, not even one kiss from thee, until of thy own free will thou givest it me.”
He was gone, leaving her staring at the curtain. She laughed, laughed at the thought of the white man’s love which awaited her, laughed at the memory of the just fled hour, and raised her hands to call her body-woman; then turned her head and listened.
From somewhere outside amongst the rocks came the sound of a man singing.
Over and over again he sang the Arabian proverb mockingly, sweetly.
“‘They wooed her and she resisted; they left her, and she fell in love.’”
Over and over again the Nubian sang the words in his golden tenor voice as he made his way to the men’s quarters.
Then she clapped her hands sharply, threw herself on the couch, and sought for the photograph of Ralph Trenchard, which she wore upon her heart in Helen Raynor’s golden locket.