“Listen, old imbecile!” he muttered. “Do you wish to lose your place with Prince Kāra? Be sensible, then. You are under my orders—the orders of Tadros the dragoman, and you must obey me.”
“I obey only the prince,” retorted Tilga, sullenly. “You will not be dragoman when the master hears you have violated his harem.”
“Ah, but he will not hear! It is to be our secret, Tilga. You are going to enter my service, and I will make you rich in a few months. See! here are five hundred piastres—five golden pounds in good English money. It is only a promise of more to come. Take it, Tilga.”
The hag took it, but with reluctance.
“If the prince discovers—” she began.
“But he won’t,” declared Tadros, promptly. “He will discover nothing. Just now I left him at the club, playing cards with an Englishman. Go outside, my Tilga, and watch in the courtyard.”
She hobbled away, still muttering protests, and the dragoman seated himself upon the divan beside Nephthys.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE TALISMAN OF AHTKA-RĀ.
Kāra found he had only time to dress for a dinner with Mrs. Everingham. Aneth was to be there also, and he must not neglect the intrigue he was conducting to obtain an ascendency over the girl. That was the reason, he told himself, why he was so anxious to attend.
His plans were progressing well at this time. The only adverse element was the obvious infatuation of Gerald Winston for Miss Consinor; but the Egyptian had carefully gauged the depths of the young girl’s character. She was interested in antiquities, and therefore encouraged Winston, who was a noted scholar; but there was no danger in that. Kāra knew more of Egyptology than all the scholars in Cairo, and had often seen Aneth’s face brighten when he told her some strange and interesting bit of unwritten history. To be sure, Winston was her own countryman, and had an advantage in that; yet Mrs. Everingham had once said in his hearing that a handsome foreigner was always fascinating to an Englishwoman, and he had remembered the careless remark and pondered its truth until he had come to believe it.