"Come on, come on," cried Paul, recovering himself. "We shall miss half the fun."
"Oh, no, we shan't," said Jardine. "Take it easy, for goodness' sake. They'll keep it up till morning, especially as there's a ship in."
As they approached, the glares and shadowy buildings ahead resolved themselves into more recognisable objects. They stopped at length on the edge of a crowd that was sitting at trestle tables in a half-light that faded into the dark night around. Everyone was looking towards a big ramshackle building that held out an open-air stage. Kerosine flares and oil lamps illuminated it. A band, in tattered crimson tunics, blared and beat below, but rather out of the way to the right to permit of the artistes descending into the auditorium, and on it, at the moment, a stout dark-haired Greek woman was singing. Her voice reached them only at intervals, for, harsh and loud and discordant as it was, the band beat it most of the time. Suddenly, with a gesture, she commanded the chorus. The audience took it up. Ragged Africans—Sudanese, Fellahin, Swahilis; Indians, and half-castes; frowsy Greeks and Levantines; and a sprinkling of white-ducked, more respectable looking, but distinctly dark Europeans; they all sang, shouted, beat time. It was obviously a popular item. Ursula laughed heartily. "Oh," she cried, "how priceless! Can't we go nearer the stage and sit down, Major?"
Jardine looked doubtful. "Oh, I don't know," he said.
But the guide had caught some of the English words. "Seet down?" he queried. "Yas, sar. Plenty room up there. Missy, come thees way."
"Right," said Ursula, smiling. "Lead on, Jacob."
The boy showed all his white teeth. "Me Abdullah, mees," he said. "You follow me."
"For goodness' sake, keep to the other side of the band," urged Muriel.
The boy leading, the girls following, the Major and Paul were bound to go. Paul was eager enough. Jardine was less ready, and, with some knowledge, more apprehensive. "Good God, Kestern," he said, "this is more than I bargained for. You never know what you're in for here."
It was impossible, however, to draw back easily now. The proprietor himself, an oiled smiling Syrian in evening dress, had come forward. With a magnificent gesture, he indicated a small table for four on the left, and waved Abdullah into the surrounding blackness. Jardine nodded to some ship's officers at a little distance, and seemed more relieved when he saw a sprinkling of women about them and even a group of ladies from the ship on the edge of the shadows. But they were too noticeably prominent for his liking. It was too late to move, however, and he bowed to the inevitable, giving orders for drinks to the Indian waiter, but with audible misgivings over that.