Gregorio scowled and muttered, “An Arab,” and in that murmur none of the loathing was hidden that the pseudo-West bears for the East.
“The child is starving,” said Ahmed. “I have saved the child; maybe some day I shall save the father.” And Ahmed slipped away before Gregorio could answer him.
For a while neither he nor his wife spoke; they stood silent in the moonlight. At last Gregorio asked huskily, “Have you had food?”
“Not to-day,” was the answer; and the sweet voice was almost discordant in its pathos as it continued, “nor drink, and but for Ahmed the boy had died.”
Gregorio could not answer; there was a lump in his throat that blocked words, opening the gate for sobs. But he choked down his emotion with an effort and busied himself about the room. Xantippe sat watching him anxiously, smoothly with nervous fingers the covering of her son’s bed.
As the night advanced the heat increased, and all that disturbed the silence of the room was the echo of the streets. Gregorio walked to the window and looked out. Below him he saw the jostling crowd of men and women. These people, he thought, were happy, and two miserables only dwelt in the city—his wife and himself. And whenever he asked himself what was the cause of his misery, the answer was ever the same—poverty. He glanced at his son, tossing uneasily in his bed; he looked at his wife, pale and haggard in the moonlight; he remembered his own sufferings all day long in the hot cruel streets, and he spoke unsteadily:
“Xantippe?”
“Yes.”
“I have thought over things.”
“And I too.”