"I was in France for four years," he carried on, evidently anxious to hold her in conversation, "so I speak both languages fairly well. Do you speak Arabic?" He asked the question solemnly, but his eyes were bright with laughter.
"Not very well," she answered gravely. "Are you staying very long?" It was a conventional question and she was unprepared for the reply.
"I leave to-night," he said, "though very few people know it. You have surprised a State secret," he smiled again.
And then he began to talk of Morocco and its history, and with extraordinary ease he traced the story of the families which had ruled that troubled State.
He touched lightly on his own share in the rebellion which had almost brought about a European war.
"My uncle seized the throne, you know," he said, taking up a handful of sand and tossing it up in the air. "He defeated my father and killed him, and then we caught his two sons."
"What happened to them?" asked Jean curiously.
"Oh, we killed them," he said carelessly. "I had them hanged in front of my tent. You're shocked?"
She shook her head.
"Do you believe in killing your enemies?"
She nodded.
"Why not? It is the only logical thing to do."
"My brother joined forces with the present Sultan, and if I ever catch him I shall hang him too," he smiled.
"And if he catches you?" she asked.
"Why, he'll hang me," he laughed. "That is the rule of the game."
"How strange!" she said, half to herself.
"Do you think so? I suppose from the European standpoint——"
"No, no," she stopped him. "I wasn't thinking of that. You are logical and you do the logical thing. That is how I would treat my enemies."
"If you had any," he suggested.
She nodded.
"If I had any," she repeated with a hard little smile. "Will you tell me this—do I call you Mr. Muley or Lord Muley?"
"You may call me Wazeer, if you're so hard up for a title," he said, and the little idiom sounded queer from him.
"Well, Wazeer, will you tell me: Suppose somebody who had something that you wanted very badly and they wouldn't give it to you, and you had the power to destroy them, what would you do?"
"I should certainly destroy them," said Muley Hafiz. "It is unnecessary to ask. 'The common rule, the simple plan'" he quoted.
Her eyes were fixed on his face, and she was frowning, though this she did not know.
"I am glad I met you this afternoon," she said. "It must be wonderful living in that atmosphere, the atmosphere of might and power, where men and women aren't governed by the finicking rules which vitiate the Western world."
He laughed.
"Then you are tired of your Western civilisation," he said as he rose and helped her to her feet (his hands were long and delicate, and she grew breathless at the touch of them). "You must come along to my little city in the hills where the law is the sword of Muley Hafiz."
She looked at him for a moment.
"I almost wish I could," she said and held out her hand.
He took it in the European fashion and bowed over it. She seemed so tiny a thing by the side of him, her head did not reach his shoulder.
"Good-bye," she said hurriedly and turning, walked back the way she had come, and he stood watching her until she was out of sight.
Chapter 32
"Jean!"
She looked round to meet the scowling gaze of Marcus Stepney.
"I must say you're the limit," he said violently. "There are lots of things I imagine you'd do, but to stand there in broad daylight talking to a nigger——"
"If I stand in broad daylight and talk to a card-sharper, Marcus, I think I'm just low enough to do almost anything."
"A damned Moorish nigger," he spluttered, and her eyes narrowed.
"Walk up the road with me, and if you possibly can, keep your voice down to the level which gentlemen usually employ when talking to women," she said.
She was in better condition than he, and he was a little out of breath by the time they reached the Café de Paris, which was crowded at that hour with the afternoon tea people.
He found a quiet corner, and by this time his anger, and a little of his courage, had evaporated.
"I've only your interest at heart, Jean," he said almost pleadingly, "but you don't want people in our set to know you've been hobnobbing with this infernal Moor."
"When you say 'our set,' to which set are you referring?" she asked unpleasantly. "Because if it is the set I believe you mean, they can't think too badly of me for my liking. It would be a degradation to me to be admired by your set, Marcus."