on need not be a great one. Some slight incident
might set him at the head of a rabble which would sweep Cairo like a
storm. Yet Renshaw saw, too, that once immersed in the work his mind
determined on, the Egyptian would go forward with relentless force. In
the excitement of the moment it seemed to him that Egypt was hanging in
the balance.

Dicky was eating sweetmeats like a girl. He selected them with great
care. Suddenly Abdalla touched his hand. "Speak on. Let all thy thoughts
be open--stay not to choose, as thou dost with the sweetmeats. I will
choose: do thou offer without fear. I would not listen to Ismail; to
thee I am but as a waled to bear thy shoes in my hand."

Dicky said nothing for a moment, but appeared to enjoy the comfit he
was eating. He rolled it over his tongue, and his eyes dwelt with a
remarkable simplicity and childlike friendliness on Abdalla. It was as
though there was really nothing vital at stake.... Yet he was probing,
probing without avail into Abdalla's mind and heart, and was never
more at sea in his life. It was not even for Donovan Pasha to read the
Oriental thoroughly. This man before him had the duplicity or evasion of
the Oriental; delicately in proportion to his great ability, yet it was
there--though in less degree than in any Arab he had ever known. It
was the more dangerous because so subtle. It held surprise--it was an
unknown quantity. The most that Dicky could do was to feel subtly before
him a certain cloud of the unexpected. He was not sure that he deceived
Abdalla by his simple manner, yet that made little difference. The
Oriental would think not less of him for dissimulation, but rather more.
He reached over and put a comfit in the hand of Abdalla.

"Let us eat together," he said, and dropped a comfit into his own mouth.

Abdalla ate, and Dicky dipped his fingers in the basin before them,
saying, as he lifted them again: "I will speak as to my brother. Ismail
has staked all on the Soudan. If, in the will of God, he is driven from
Berber, from Dongola, from Khartoum, from Darfar, from Kassala, his
power is gone. Egypt goes down like the sun at evening. Ismail will be
like a withered gourd. To establish order and peace and revenue there,
he is sending the man his soul loves, whom the nations trust, to the
cities of the desert. If it be well with Gordon, it will be well with
the desert-cities. But Gordon asks for one man--an Egyptian--who loves
the land and is of the people