Then Gordon remembered everything. The events of the night before rose before him in a moment, and he drank of memory's very dregs. He had closed his eyes again with a groan when he heard shuffling footsteps coming into the room, and a husky, kindly voice, interrupted by gusty breathing, saying cheerfully—
"God be praised! Michael tells me you are awake and well."
The Coptic Patriarch was a little man in a black turban and a kind of black cassock, very old, nearly ninety years of age, and with a saintly face in which the fires of life had kindled no evil passions.
"Don't speak yet, my son. Don't exhaust yourself. The surgeon said you were to have rest—rest and sleep above all things. He came last night to dress your poor hand. It was wounded in the cruel fight at El Azhar. I was passing at the moment and the people put you into my carriage. 'Save him for the love of God,' they said. 'He is our brother and he will be taken.' So I brought you home, seeing you were hurt and not knowing what else to do with you. But now I am glad and thankful, having read the newspapers this morning and learned that you were in great peril.... No, no, my son, lie still."
Gordon had made an effort to raise himself on his elbow, but resting his weight on his left hand and finding it was closely bandaged and gave him pain, he was easily pushed back to his pillow.
"Lie still until the surgeon comes. Michael has gone for him. He will be here immediately. A good man—make yourself sure about that. He will be secret. He will say nothing."
Then there came through the open window the sound of footsteps on the gravel path of the garden, and the old Patriarch, leaning over Gordon, said in the same husky, kindly whisper—
"They are coming, and I must go into church. But don't be afraid. You did bravely and nobly, and no harm shall come to you while you are here."
Hardly knowing what to understand, but choking with confusion and shame, Gordon heard the old man's shuffling step going out of the room, and, a moment afterwards, the firm tread of the surgeon coming into it. The surgeon, who was a middle-aged man, a Copt, with a bright face and a hearty manner, took Gordon's right arm to feel his pulse, and said—
"Better! Much better! Last night the condition was so serious that I found it necessary to inject morphia. There was the hand too, you know. The third finger had been badly hurt, and I was compelled to take the injured part away. This morning, however——"