“Bon soir!,” I answered.
This was my host, the innkeeper whom the driver had called “Fin Tireur.”
I found out afterwards that he was not only landlord of the desolate inn, but cook, garçon; in fact, the whole personnel. He lived there absolutely alone, and was the only European in this Arab village lost in the great spaces of the Sahara. This information I drew from him while he waited upon me at dinner, which I ate in solitude. My companions of the diligence were Arabs, who had melted away like ghosts into the desolation so soon as the diligence had rolled into the paved courtyard round which the one-storied house was built.
When I had finished dinner I lit a cigar. I was now quite alone in the bare salle-à-manger. The storm was at its height; the sand was driven like hail against the wooden shutters of the windows, and I felt dreary enough. The French driver was no doubt supping in the kitchen with the landlord, perhaps beside a fire, I began to long for company, for warmth, and I resolved to join them. I opened the door, therefore, and peered out into the passage. There was no sound of voices; but I saw a light at a little distance, went towards it, and found myself in a small kitchen, where the landlord was sitting alone by a red wood fire in the midst of his pots and pans, smoking a thin black cigar, and reading a dirty number of the Journal Anti-Juif of Algiers. He put it down politely as I came in.
“You’re alone, monsieur,” I said.
“Yes, m’sieu. The driver has gone to see to the horses.”
I offered him one of my Havanas, which he accepted with alacrity, and drew up with him before the fire.
“You have been living here long, monsieur?”
“Twenty years, m’sieu.”
“Twenty years alone in this desert place!”