“Come,” said Helen, her beautiful teeth flashing in a delighted smile, “I’m more convinced than ever that my grandfather will be delighted to meet you.”
CHAPTER VI
“Neither with thine eyes hast thou seen, nor with thine heart hast thou loved.”—Arabic Proverb.
Zarah the Cruel leaned back in her ivory chair, staring unseeingly at the men she ruled. She frowned and stretched her arms and played with the crystal knobs until her jewelled fingers looked like the claws of some great cat, whilst the men glanced at each other as they watched the movement which, they knew, heralded the conception of some new idea or plan in the girl’s masterly, unscrupulous brain.
She had reigned for a year in her father’s stead, and the tales of her cruelty, her infamy and treachery had spread from Damascus to Hadramut, from Oman to the Red Sea. In the days of her father the wealthy only had been in danger of the gang’s predatory attacks; the humbler caravan had been certain of a safe journey and a sure arrival at its destination; the needy, just as sure of help in money or in kind from the man who quietened his conscience by robbing the one to assist the other, whilst keeping the best part of the spoil for himself and his men.
His daughter attacked all and sundry, and as much for the love of the fight as in the hope of gain, meting out dire punishment to those who fought to the last, and, if taken prisoner, lacked deep enough purse or strong enough sinew to pay or work their way back to freedom.
With the exception of Yussuf the men obeyed her and literally fought for the place of honour at her right hand when she led them to the attack.
The whole Peninsula rang with the tales of the mysterious, beautiful woman of the desert. Women used her name as a bogy with which to frighten their children, men looked at each other before they spoke of their affairs and then said but little. Her spies were everywhere, from Damascus to Cairo, from Jiddah to Bagdad, watching the movements and learning the whereabouts of wealthy people. The cities made great effort to discover the channels through which the almost legendary woman gained her information, sending out spy to counter spy, with the result that some were found in the holes and corners of the Bazaars at dawn, knifed through the back, and others, who had been sent to find out the lay of the land round and about the Sanctuary, buried up to their necks in the sands, dead, with the letter Z cut upon their foreheads.