"I thought you called."
And he was gone.
In his own room, having noiselessly closed and locked the door, he drew from his bosom the Koran. Holding the book reverently in his small, right hand, he raised his head, and stood waiting with closed eyes for inspiration. Presently, opening the Koran, he read:
"The doom of God cometh to pass."
This text was the answer to his prayer for guidance?
He seated himself by the window, and gazed out into the darkness. He considered piously the wonders of terrestrial life, a succession of accidents all foreordained by God, an apparent drifting that was in fact one steady propulsion by the hand of fate. From the rich, ancestral house of coraline limestone across the sea to strange lands. From dignity to abasement. From loneliness to this faint, delicious fragrance in which the heart dissolved. From a dream of freedom to the service of love through the agency of death.
CHAPTER LI
It was twilight. David Verne sat in the study, his chin on his breast. Hamoud, appearing in the doorway, gazed round the room. He had a folded newspaper in his hand.
He looked carefully at the fireplace, where logs were piled ready for lighting over a heap of brushwood and crumpled wrapping paper. Then he regarded the center table, on which stood the Venetian goblet, the caraffe, and the bottle filled with the medicine prescribed by Dr. Fallows. In the expiring daylight Hamoud, motionless in his robes, loomed paler than usual, his handsome face very grave.