CHAPTER XXIII
“Remove the gates of thy stable to another side.”—Arabic Proverb.
An ominous dawning.
Misty, silvery shadows fleeing before the coming light left no mark upon the Crimson Desert, which stretched to the east and west a desolate unbroken plain, to the north and south in motionless, blood-red waves of sand. Sunrays, yellow, orange, red, spread like gigantic searchlights across the sky from behind a mass of clouds which the west wind had driven eastward and piled low down upon the horizon.
Copper-coloured masses against a background of green and rose and dun, concealing the end or the beginning of an arch of clouds, which flared, a signal of disaster, a pennant of death, blood-red, high across the sapphire firmament, where one great star still defied its enemy—the dawn.
Over the empty plain, under the ominous arc, straight towards the stupendous sunrise fled the three camels, leaving a dead-black trail stretching back as far as eye could see.
Namlah the body-woman glanced over her shoulder at the Morning Star and touched the amulet of good luck which hung about her neck. She looked round at the ill-omened sky and back over the miles across which the huge beasts had raced, at the almost incredible speed to which the camel can attain when urged to its greatest effort. Scarcely a word had the riders said since the sky had lightened when, wondering if the alarm had been given in the camp, they had turned to see if Yussuf overtook or if Zarah pursued them through the misty, silvery shadows.
Ralph and Helen rode side by side, their dromedaries almost touching, as they raced death for their lives, their liberty, their love. Namlah, the desert born, rode ahead, steering her course unerringly by the great star.
She glanced back at Helen’s face, showing death white in the shadows of the passing night and distressed at the signs of a great fatigue, anxious to advise, to help, touched her camel upon the right shoulder, so that it turned to the right in a wide circle, whilst its companions, ignoring or totally unconscious of their leader’s change of route, and utterly lacking in imagination, reasoning power or sense of any kind, forged ahead on a non-stop run.