Hadj began suddenly to gesticulate with his thin, delicate hands and to look fiercely excited.
“Halima is at the Fontaine Chaude,” he cried.
“Keltoum will be there.”
“She will not. Her foot is sick. She cannot dance. For a week she will not dance. I know it.”
“And—Irena? Is she sick? Is she at the Hammam Salahine?”
Hadj’s countenance fell. He looked at his cousin sideways, always showing his teeth.
“Do you not know, Hadj-ben-Ibrahim?”
“Ana ma ‘audi ma nek oul lek!”[*] growled Hadj in his throat.
[*] “I have nothing to say to you.”
They had reached the end of the little street. The whiteness of the great road which stretched straight through the oasis into the desert lay before them, with the statue of Cardinal Lavigerie staring down it in the night. At right angles was the street of the dancers, narrow, bounded with the low white houses of the ouleds, twinkling with starry lights, humming with voices, throbbing with the clashing music that poured from the rival cafés maures, thronged with the white figures of the desert men, strolling slowly, softly as panthers up and down. The moonlight was growing brighter, as if invisible hands began to fan the white flame of passion which lit up Beni-Mora. A patrol of Tirailleurs Indigenes passed by going up the street, in yellow and blue uniforms, turbans and white gaiters, their rifles over their broad shoulders. The faint tramp of their marching feet was just audible on the sandy road.