“Say, Count,” he observed, as he returned, carrying a tray, from a colloquy at the prison-door with some person unknown, “I guess it’s my duty as your medical adviser to warn you against all this excitement. Now here’s some real good coffee that the sheikh has sent us, and I’ve concluded to allow you a cup if you’ll do your level best to sleep after it, but otherwise not so much as a drop.”
“Tyrant!” groaned Cyril. “You know that two days ago we should have been thankful to get drinkable water, but that, having got it, the soul of man refuses to be satisfied without coffee, especially when you tantalise him with the smell. Well, I give in.” He took the cup and sipped it, but his tone changed immediately. “Hicks, you villain! you’ve put some beastly stuff into this coffee.”
“Just to make you sure of a night’s rest, Count. How do you intend to go on the bust to-morrow if you don’t sleep?”
The narcotic produced the desired effect, and before long Cyril was sleeping as soundly as he had done the night before. As soon as this had become evident, Mansfield jumped up.
“Now then, Hicks, off you go!” he said, “and no keeping awake, mind. Honour bright!”
“Honest Injun!” assented Mr Hicks, accepting his dismissal to the recess which Mansfield had occupied the night before. “Guess I couldn’t keep awake if I tried, any way. But mind, you’re to call me if there’s any spiritual manifestation.”
“If I can do it without disturbing the manifestation,” agreed Mansfield, and went on with his preparations for observing, in a thoroughly scientific spirit, any phenomenon that might occur. He looped back the curtain which had been hung over the entrance to the passage, and arranged his bed directly opposite the opening, so that he could command both sides of the passage as far as the light of the lamp would extend. The lamp itself he placed in such a position that he himself was left in shadow, while the eyes of any intruder would be dazzled. Then he wrapped himself in his cloak, leaving a peep-hole through which he could see without being seen, lay down with his cocked revolver in his hand, and waited.
He waited so long, with every sense on the alert, yet disturbed only by purely imaginary noises, that he rebuked himself impatiently when it seemed to him that he felt a breath of cold air in his face, and that he heard at the same moment a slight rustle. But no, this time there was no delusion. From the darkness of the passage emerged the little old woman of whom Mr Hicks had spoken. She gave a quick glance round the cave, then turned her head for a moment, and a taller woman, also wrapped in the swathing white draperies, followed her out into the light. Mansfield’s heart stood still as the two white figures moved softly to Cyril’s side, and stood looking down at him. Could they intend to murder him? But even as he raised his revolver noiselessly to cover them, the taller woman’s veil dropped from her face, and he saw that her hands were clasped convulsively on her breast. Still she stood looking down at the sleeper, until her companion touched her gently, when, to Mansfield’s utter bewilderment, she stooped and kissed Cyril softly on the forehead. The old woman drew her away, and they vanished.
CHAPTER XVII.
FACE TO FACE.
“Mansfield, was any one in here last night?”