"Yes, the same Ishmael Ameer that married the Coptic woman who lies buried on the edge of the desert."
And meantime the British Inspectors, suspecting some hidden quackery and fatuity, some fanatical intrigue masquerading as religious liberalism, were whispering among themselves—
"This is a new kind of religious game—what the deuce does it mean, I wonder?"
CHAPTER II
Within a month an immense concourse of people had gathered about Ishmael at Khartoum. They came first from Omdurman and the little shipbuilding village of Khogali, on the other side of the Blue Nile, which sent daily through the desert air a ceaseless noise of the hammering of rivets; then they came from Kordofan and still farther south, and from Berber and yet farther north.
A few who had means lodged in the houses of the native quarter, but the larger number encamped in tents on the desert side of old Mahmud's house. Men, women, and children, they flocked in thousands to see the holy man of Khartoum and to drink of the river of his words. They began to see in him a man sent from God, to call him "Master," and to speak of him as the "White Prophet."
At that the Governor of the city, a British Colonel, began to be alarmed, and with certain of his Inspectors he went over to see Ishmael.
"What can these people want here?" he asked. "What bread is there for them in this wilderness?"
"The bread of life," Ishmael answered, and the Christian Governor went away silenced though unsatisfied.
During Ishmael's first weeks in Khartoum his house was open, and anybody might come and go in it; but somewhat later it was observed that he was daily receiving messengers, agents, emissaries, and missionaries of some sort in secret. They came and went by camel, by boat, and by train, and rumour had it that they communicated with every quarter of Egypt and the Soudan. Ishmael appeared to spend the morning of every day in his house receiving and dispatching these people. What did it mean? The British Inspectors suspected the existence of a vast network of fanatical conspiracy, but only the members of Ishmael's own household knew what was going on.