nks, no whiskey--never touch it--good
example to the slaves!" He laughed long and low, and looked at Dicky out
of the corner of his eye. "Good-looking lot I sent you, eh?"

"Oosters, every one of 'em. Butter wouldn't melt in their mouths. I
learnt their grin, it suits my style of beauty." Dicky fitted the action
to the word. "You'll start with me in the morning to Assiout?"

"I can start, but life and time are short."

"You think I can't and won't marry her?"

"This isn't the day of Lochinvar."

"This is the day of Kingsley Bey, Dicky Pasha."

Dicky frowned. He had a rare and fine sense where women were concerned,
were they absent or present. "How very artless--and in so short a time,
too!" he said tartly.

Kingsley laughed quietly. "Art is long, but tempers are short!" he
retorted.

Dicky liked a Roland for his Oliver. "It's good to see you back again,"
he said, changing the subject.

"How long do you mean to stay?"

"Here?" Dicky nodded. "Till I'm married."

Dicky became very quiet, a little formal, and his voice took on a
curious smoothness, through which sharp suggestion pierced.

"So long?--Enter our Kingsley Bey into the underground Levantine world."

This was biting enough. To be swallowed up by Cairo life and all that it
involves, was no fate to suggest to an Englishman, whose opinion of the
Levantine needs no defining. "Try again, Dicky," said Kingsley, refusing
to be drawn. "This is not one huge joke, or one vast impertinence, so
far as the lady is concerned. I've come back-b-a-c-k" (he spelled the
word out), "with all that it involves. I've come back, Dicky."

He quieted all at once, and leaned over towards his friend. "You know
the fight I've had. You know the life I've lived in Egypt. You know what
I left behind me in England--nearly all. You've seen the white man
work. You've seen the black ooster save him. You've seen the
ten-times-a-failure pull out. Have I played the game? Have I acted
squarely? Have I given kindness for kindness, blow for blow? Have I
treated my slaves like human beings? Have I--have I won my way back to
life--life?" He spread out a hand with a little grasping motion. "Have
I saved the old stand off there in Cumberland by the sea, where you can
see the snow on Skaw Fell? Have I? Do you wonder that I laugh? Ye gods
and little fishes! I've had to wear a long face years enough--seven hard
years, seven fearful years, when I might be murdered by a slave, and
I and my slaves