“And Miss Scott? where does she come in?” questioned Reuel with an assumption of gaiety he was far from feeling.
“Oh,” replied Charlie, not at all nonplussed. “Cora isn’t in the picture; I’m thinking of a houri.”
“Same old thing, Charlie—the ladies?”
“No,” said Charlie, solemnly. “It’s business this time. Say, Briggs, the sight of a camel always makes me a child again. The long-necked beast is inevitably associated in my mind with Barnum’s circus and playing hookey. Pop wants me to put out my sign and go in for business, but the show business suits me better. For instance,” he continued with a wave of his hand including the entire caravan, “Arabs, camels, stray lions, panthers, scorpions, serpents, explorers, etc., with a few remarks by yours truly, to the accompaniment of the band—always the band you know, would make an interesting show—a sort of combination of Barnum and Kiralfy. The houris would do Kiralfy’s act, you know. There’s money in it.”
“Were you ever serious in your life, Charlie?”
“What the deuce is the need of playing funeral all the time, tell me that, Briggs, will you?”
The great desert had the sea’s monotony. They rode on and on hour after hour. The elements of the view were simple. Narrow valleys and plains bounded by picturesque hills lay all about them. The nearer hills to the right had shoulders and hollows at almost regular intervals, and a skyline of an almost regular curve. Under foot the short grass always seemed sparse, and the low sage-shrubs rather dingy, but as they looked over the plain stretching away in every direction, it had a distinctly green tint. They saw occasionally a red poppy and a purple iris. Not a tree was to be seen, nor a rock. Sometimes the land lay absolutely level and smooth, with hardly a stone larger than a bean. The soft blue sky was cloudless, the caravan seemed to be the only living creature larger than a gazelle in the great solitude. Even Reuel was aroused to enthusiasm by the sight of a herd of these graceful creatures skimming the plain. High in the air the larks soared and sang.
As they went southward the hot sun poured its level rays upon them, and the song of the drivers was a relief to their thoughts. The singing reminded travellers of Venetian gondoliers, possessing as it did the plaintive sweetness of the most exquisite European airs. There was generally a leading voice answered by a full chorus. Reuel thought he had never heard music more fascinating. Ababdis would assume the leading part. “Ah, when shall I see my family again; the rain has fallen and made a canal between me and my home. Oh, shall I never see it more?” Then would follow the chorus of drivers: “Oh, what pleasure, what delight, to see my family again; when I see my father, mother, brothers, sisters, I will hoist a flag on the head of my camel for joy!” About the middle of the week they were making their way over the Great Desert where it becomes an elevated plateau crossed by rocky ridges, with intervening sandy plains mostly barren, but with here and there a solitary tree, and sometimes a few clumps of grass. The caravan was skirting the base of one of these ridges, which culminated in a cliff looking, in the distance, like a half-ruined castle, which the Arabs believed to be enchanted. Reuel determined to visit this cliff, and saying nothing to anyone, and accompanied only by Jim and followed by the warnings of the Arabs to beware of lions, they started for the piles of masonry, which they reached in a couple of hours. The moon rose in unclouded splendor, and Moore’s lines came to his heart:
“O, such a blessed night as this,
I often think if friends were near,
How we should feel, and gaze with bliss
Upon the moonlight scenery here.”
He strolled into the royal ruin, stumbling over broken carvings, and into hollows concealed by luminous plants, beneath whose shades dwelt noisome things that wriggled away in the marvelous white light. Climbing through what was once a door, he stepped out on a ledge of masonry, that hung sheer seven hundred feet over the plain. Reuel got out his pipe and it was soon in full blast, while the smoker set to building castles in the curls of blue smoke, that floated lightly into space. Jim with the guns waited for him at the foot of the hill.
Under the influence of the soothing narcotic and the spell of the silver moon, Reuel dreamed of fame and fortune he would carry home to lay at a little woman’s feet. Presently his castle-building was interrupted by a low wail—not exactly the mew of a cat, nor yet the sound of a lute.
Again the sound.
What could it be?
“Ah, I have it!” muttered Reuel; “it’s the Arabs singing in the camp.”
Little did he imagine that within ten paces of him crouched an enormous leopard.
Little did he imagine that he was creeping, creeping toward him, as a cat squirms at a bird.
He sat on the ruined ledge of the parapet, within two feet of the edge; seven hundred feet below the desert sand glittered like molten silver in the gorgeous moonlight.
He was unarmed, having given Jim his revolver to hold.
Reuel sat there entirely unconscious of danger; presently a vague feeling struck him, not of fear, not of dread, but a feeling that if he turned his head he would see an enemy, and without knowing why, he slowly turned his head.
Great heavens! what did he see? A thrill of horror passed through him as his eyes rested upon those of an enormous brute, glaring like hot coals set in bloodred circles.
Its mouth was wide open, its whiskers moving like the antennae of a lobster. It lay on its belly,
