s civilly enough; but there was a flash of enmity in his eyes
and a tightening of his lips, which liked me not at all.

When the elder man had finished the letter, he hands it to the younger,
and he having read it in his turn, they fall to discussing it in a low
tone, and in a dialect of which not one word was intelligible to us.
Finally, Ali Oukadi, rising from his cushions, says gravely, addressing
Dawson:

"I will write without delay to Sidi ben Ahmed in answer to his letter."

"But my daughter," says Dawson, aghast, and as well as he could in the
Moorish tongue. "Am I not to have her?"

"My friend says nothing here," answers the old man, regarding the
letter, "nothing that would justify my giving her up to you. He says the
money shall be paid upon her being brought safe to Elche."

"Why, your Excellency, I and my comrade here will undertake to carry her
safely there. What better guard should a daughter have than her father?"

"Are you more powerful than the elements? Can you command the tempest?
Have you sufficient armament to combat all the enemies that scour the
seas? If any accident befall you, what is this promise of
payment?--Nothing."

"At least, you will suffer me to make this voyage with my child."

"I do not purpose to send her to Elche," returned the old man, calmly.
"'Tis a risk I will not undertake. I have said that when I am paid three
thousand ducats, I will give Lala Mollah freedom, and I will keep my
word. To send her to Elche is a charge that does not touch my compact.
This I will write and tell my friend, Sidi ben Ahmed, and upon his
payment and expressed agreement I will render you your daughter. Not
before."

We could say nothing for a while, being so foundered by this reverse;
but at length Dawson says in a piteous voice:

"At least you will suffer me to see my daughter. Think, if she were
yours and you had lost her--believing her a while dead--"

Mohand ou Mohand muttered a few words that seemed to fix the old Moor's
wavering resolution.

"I cannot agree to that," says he. "Your daughter is becoming reconciled
to her position. To see you would open her wounds afresh to the danger
of her life, maybe. Reflect," adds he, laying his hand on the letter,
"if this business should come to nought, what could recompense your
daughter for the disappointment of those false hopes your meeting would
inspire? It cannot be."

With this he claps his hands, and a servant, entering at a nod from hi