What did all this movement mean?
The master of the Loulia must surely be expected—the man Isaacson had seen driving the Russian horses, and, clothed almost in rags, squatting in the darkness of the hashish café in the entrails of Cairo.
And Bella Donna was hurrying back after only one night in Cairo!
Isaacson forgot the marvellous beauty of the declining day. In a few minutes he returned to the house. But immediately after dinner, leaving Nigel sitting on the terrace, he went again to the bank of the Nile.
The Loulia was illuminated from prow to stern. Light gleamed from every cabin window, and the crew had not only the daraboukkeh but the pipes on board, and were making the fantasia. Some of them, too, were dancing. Against a strong light on the lower deck, Isaacson saw black figures, sometimes relieved for a moment, moving with a wild grotesqueness, like crazy shadows.
He stood for several minutes listening, watching. He thought of a train travelling towards Luxor. Then he went quickly across the garden, and came to the terrace and Nigel.
The deep voice within him must be obeyed. He could resist it no longer.
"They're lively on the Loulia to-night," Nigel said, as he came up.
"Yes," Isaacson answered.
He stood while he lighted a cigar. Then he sat down near to his friend. The light from the drawing-room streamed out upon them from the open French window. The shrill sound of the pipes, the dull throbbing of the daraboukkeh, came to them from across the water.