In the agony of his impatience every noise in the streets was like the sound of a pursuer. If a boy shouted to his playmate, he shuddered; if a hawker yelled over his tray, he trembled. When they had passed out of the busy thoroughfares into the darker streets, where watchmen call to each other through the hours of the night, the cry of a ghafir far ahead (Wahhed!) seemed to Hafiz like the bay of a bloodhound, and the answer of another close behind was like the shrill voice of some one who was pouncing upon his shoulders.
"It would be a pity to be taken now—at the last moment, too," he whispered, and he strained his ear to catch the faintest sound of footsteps behind them.
After that no more was said until they came to the open space under the heights of the Citadel where one path goes up to the Mokattam Hills and another crosses the arid land that lies on the east bank of the Nile. Then suddenly Hafiz, who had been panting and gasping, began to laugh and crow.
"I know what we've got to do," he said. "Good Lord alive! why didn't I think of it before?"
With that he stooped and whipped off the slippers he wore over his boots and called on Gordon to hold up his foot.
"What for?" asked Gordon.
"I have a reason—a good one. Hold up! The other one! Quick!"
In a moment the slippers he had taken off his own boots had been pulled over Gordon's.
"Right! And now, my dear Gordon, you and I are going to part company."
"Here?" said Gordon.