VIII
As they left the arcaded streets of commercial Algiers, and drove up thelong hill towards Mustapha Superieur, where most of the best and finesthouses are, Stephen and Nevill Caird talked of what they saw, and ofVictoria Ray; not at all of Stephen himself. Nevill had asked him whatsort of trip he had had, and not another question of any sort. Stephenwas glad of this, and understood very well that it was not because hisfriend was indifferent. Had he been so, he would not have invitedStephen to make this visit.
To speak of the past they had shared, long ago, would naturally have ledfarther, and though Stephen was not sure that he mightn't some dayrefer, of his own accord, to the distasteful subject of the Case andMargot Lorenzi, he could not have borne to mention either now.
As they passed gateways leading to handsome houses, mostly in the Arabstyle, Nevill told him who lived in each one: French, English, andAmerican families; people connected with the government, who remained inAlgiers all the year round, or foreigners who came out every winter forlove of their beautiful villa gardens and the climate.
"We've rather an amusing society here," he said. "And we'd defendAlgiers and each other to any outsider, though our greatest pleasure isquarrelling among ourselves, or patching up one another's rows andbeginning again on our own account. It's great fun and keeps us fromstagnating. We also give quantities of luncheons and teas, and are sickof going to each other's entertainments; yet we're so furious if there'sanything we're not invited to, we nearly get jaundice. I domyself--though I hate running about promiscuously; and I spend hoursthinking up ingenious lies to squeeze out of accepting invitations I'dhave been ill with rage not to get. And there are factions which loatheeach other worse than any mere Montagus and Capulets. We have rivalparties, and vie with one another in getting hold of any royalties orsuch like, that may be knocking about; but we who hate each other most,meet at the Governor's Palace and smile sweetly if French people arelooking; if not, we snort like war-horses--only in a whisper, for we'reinvariably polite."
Stephen laughed, as he was meant to do. "What about the Arabs?" heasked, with Victoria's errand in his mind. "Is there such a thing asArab society?"
"Very little--of the kind we'd call 'society'--in Algiers. In Tunisthere's more. Much of the old Arab aristocracy has died out here, ormoved away; but there are a few left who are rich and well born. Theyhave their palaces outside the town; but most of the best houses havebeen sold to Europeans, and their Arab owners have gone into theinterior where the Roumis don't rub elbows with them quite asoffensively as in a big French town like this. Naturally they prefer thecountry. And I know a few of the great Arab Chiefs--splendid-lookingfellows who turn up gorgeously dressed for the Governor's ball everyyear, and condescend to dine with me once or twice while they're stayingon to amuse themselves in Algiers."
"Condescend!" Stephen repeated.
"By Jove, yes. I'm sure they think it's a great condescension. And I'mnot sure you won't think so too, when you see them--as of course youwill. You must go to the Governor's ball with me, even if you can't bebothered going anywhere else. It's a magnificent spectacle. And I get onpretty well among the Arabs, as I've learned to speak their lingo a bit.Not that I've worried. But nearly nine years is a long time."
This was Stephen's chance to tell what he chose to tell of his briefacquaintance with Victoria Ray, and of the mission which had brought herto Algiers. Somehow, as he unfolded the story he had heard from the girlon board ship, the scent of orange blossoms, luscious-sweet in thisregion of gardens, connected itself in his mind with thoughts of thebeautiful woman who had married Cassim ben Halim, and disappeared fromthe world she had known. He imagined her in an Arab garden where orangeblossoms fell like snow, eating her heart out for the far country andfriends she would never see again, rebelling against a monstrous tyrannywhich imprisoned her in this place of perfumes and high white walls. Orperhaps the scented petals were falling now upon her grave.
"Cassim ben Halim--Captain Cassim ben Halim," Nevill repeated. "Seemsfamiliar somehow, as if I'd heard the name; but most of these Arab nameshave a kind of family likeness in our ears. Either he's a person of noparticular importance, or else he must have left Algiers before my UncleJames Caird died--the man who willed me his house, you know--brother ofAunt Caroline MacGregor who lives with me now. If I've ever heardanything about Ben Halim, whatever it is has slipped my mind. But I'lldo my best to find out something."
"Miss Ray believes he was of importance," said Stephen. "She oughtn't tohave much trouble getting on to his trail, should you think?"
Nevill looked doubtful. "Well, if he'd wanted her on his trail, she'dnever have been off it. If he didn't, and doesn't, care to be got at,finding him mayn't be as simple as it would be in Europe, where you canalways resort to detectives if worst comes to worst."
"Can't you here?" asked Stephen.
"Well, there's the French police, of course, and the military in thesouth. But they don't care to interfere with the private affairs ofArabs, if no crime's been committed--and they wouldn't do anything insuch a case, I should think, in the way of looking up Ben Halim, thoughthey'd tell anything they might happen to know already, Isuppose--unless they thought best to keep silence with foreigners."
"There must be people in Algiers who'd remember seeing such a beautifulcreature as Ben Halim's wife, even if her husband whisked her away nineyears ago," Stephen argued.
"I wonder?" murmured Caird, with an emphasis which struck his friend asodd.
"What do you mean?" asked Stephen.
"I mean, I wonder if any one in Algiers ever saw her at all? Ben Halimwas in the French Army; but he was a Mussulman. Paris and Algiers are along cry, one from the other--if you're an Arab."
"Jove! You don't think----"
"You've spotted it. That's what I do think."
"That he shut her up?"
"That he forced her to live the life of a Mussulman woman. Why, whatelse could you expect, when you come to look at it?"
"But an American girl----"
"A woman who marries gives herself to her husband's nation as well as toher husband, doesn't she--especially if he's an Arab? Only, thank God,it happens to very few European girls, except of the class that doesn'tso much matter. Think of it. This Ben Halim, a Spahi officer, falls deadin love with a girl when he's on leave in Paris. He feels he must haveher. He can get her only by marriage. They're as subtle as the devil,even the best of them, these Arabs. He'd have to promise the girlanything she wanted, or lose her. Naturally he wouldn't give it awaythat he meant to veil her and clap her into a harem the minute he gother home. If he'd even hinted anything of that sort she wouldn't havestirred a step. But for a Mussulman to let his wife walk the streetsunveiled, like a Roumia, or some woman of easy virtue, would be ahorrible disgrace to them both. His relations and friends would cuthim, and hoot her at sight. The more he loved his wife, the less likelyhe'd be to keep a promise, made in a different world. It wouldn't behuman nature--Arab human nature--to keep it. Besides, they have thejealousy of the tiger, these Eastern fellows. It's a madness."
"Then perhaps no one ever knew, out here, that the man had brought homea foreign wife?"
"Almost surely not. No European, that is. Arabs might know--throughtheir women. There's nothing that passes which they can't find out. Howthey do it, who can tell? Their ways are as mysterious as everythingelse here, except the lives of us _hiverneurs_, who don't even try veryhard to hide our own scandals when we have any. But no Arab could bepersuaded or forced to betray another Arab to a European, unless formotives of revenge. For love or hate, they stand together. In virtuesand vices they're absolutely different from Europeans. And if Ben Halimdoesn't want anybody, not excepting his wife's sister, to get news ofhis wife, why, it may be difficult to get it, that's all I say. Going toMiss Ray's hotel, you could see something of that Arab street close by,on the fringe of the Kasbah--which is what they call, not the old fortalone, but the whole Arab town."
"Yes. I saw the queer white houses, hud
dled together, that looked likeblank walls only broken by a door, with here and there a barred window."
"Well, what I mean is that it's almost impossible for any European tolearn what goes on behind those blank walls and those little squareholes, in respectable houses. But we'll hope for the best. And here weare at my place. I'm rather proud of it."
They had come to the arched gateway of a white-walled garden. The sunhad set fire to the gold of some sunken Arab lettering over the centralarch, so that each broken line darted forth its separate flame. "Djenanel Djouad; House of the Nobleman," Nevill translated. "It was built forthe great confidant of a particularly wicked old Dey of Algiers, insixteen hundred and something, and the place had been allowed to fallinto ruin when my uncle bought it, about twenty or thirty years ago.There was a romance in his life, I believe. He came to Algiers for hishealth, as a young man, meaning to stay only a few months, but fell inlove with a face which he happened to catch a glimpse of, under a veilthat disarranged itself--on purpose or by accident--in a carriagebelonging to a rich Arab. Because of that face he remained in Algiers,bought this house, spent years in restoring it, exactly in Arab style,and making a beautiful garden out of his fifteen or sixteen acres.Whether he ever got to know the owner of the face, history doesn'tstate: my uncle was as secretive as he was romantic. But odd things havebeen said. I expect they're still said, behind my back. And they'reborne out, I'm bound to confess, by the beauty of the decorations inthat part of the house intended for the ladies. Whether it was everoccupied in Uncle James's day, nobody can tell; but Aunt Caroline, hissister, who has the best rooms there now, vows she's seen the ghost of alovely being, all spangled gauze and jewels, with silver khal-khal, oranklets, that tinkle as she moves. I assure my aunt it must be a dream,come to punish her for indulging in two goes of her favourite sweet atdinner; but in my heart I shouldn't wonder if it's true. The whole lotof us, in our family, are romantic and superstitious. We can't help itand don't want to help it, though we suffer for our foolishness oftenenough, goodness knows."
The scent of orange blossoms and acacias was poignantly sweet, as thecar passed an Arab lodge, and wound slowly up an avenue cut through agrove of blossoming trees. The utmost pains had been taken in the layingout of the garden, but an effect of carelessness had been preserved. Theplace seemed a fairy tangle of white and purple lilacs, gold-drippinglaburnums, acacias with festoons of pearl, roses looping from orangetree to mimosa, and a hundred gorgeous tropical flowers like paintedbirds and butterflies. In shadowed nooks under dark cypresses, glimmeredarum lilies, sparkling with the diamond dew that sprayed from carvedmarble fountains, centuries old; and low seats of marble mosaiced withrare tiles stood under magnolia trees or arbours of wistaria. Giantcypresses, tall and dark as a band of Genii, marched in double line oneither side the avenue as it straightened and turned towards the house.
White in the distance where that black procession halted, glittered theold Arab palace, built in one long facade, and other facades smaller,less regular, looking like so many huge blocks of marble groupedtogether. Over one of these blocks fell a crimson torrent ofbougainvillaea; another was veiled with white roses and purple clematis;a third was showered with the gold of some strange tropical creeper thatStephen did not know.
On the roof of brown and dark-green tiles, the sunlight poured, makingeach tile lustrous as the scale of a serpent, and all along the edgegrew tiny flowers and grasses, springing out of interstices to wavefilmy threads of pink and gold.
The principal facade was blank as a wall, save for a few small,mysterious windows, barred with _grilles_ of iron, green with age; buton the other facades were quaint recessed balconies, under projectingroofs supported with beams of cedar; and the door, presently opened byan Arab servant, was very old too, made of oak covered with an armour ofgreenish copper.
Even when it had closed behind Stephen and Nevill, they were not yet inthe house, but in a large court with a ceiling of carved and paintedcedar-wood supported by marble pillars of extreme lightness and grace.In front, this court was open, looking on to an inner garden with afountain more delicate of design than those Stephen had seen outside.The three walls of the court were patterned all over with ancient tilesrare as some faded Spanish brocade in a cathedral, and along theirlength ran low seats where in old days sat slaves awaiting orders fromtheir master.
Out from this court they walked through a kind of pillared cloister, andthe facades of the house as they passed on, were beautiful in puresimplicity of line; so white, they seemed to turn the sun on them tomoonlight; so jewelled with bands and plaques of lovely tiles, that theywere like snowy shoulders of a woman hung with necklaces of preciousstones.
By the time they had left this cloistered garden and threaded their wayindoors, Stephen had lost his bearings completely. He was convincedthat, once in, he should never find the clue which would guide him outagain as he had come. There was another garden court, much larger thanthe first, and this, Nevill said, had been the garden of thepalace-women in days of old. It had a fountain whose black marble basinwas fringed with papyrus, and filled with pink, blue, and white waterlilies, from under whose flat dark pads glimmered the backs of dartinggoldfish. Three walls of this garden had low doorways with cunninglycarved doors of cedar-wood, and small, iron-barred windows festoonedwith the biggest roses Stephen had ever seen; but the fourth side wasformed by an immense loggia with a dais at the back, and an open-frontedroom at either end. Walls and floor of this loggia were tiled, andbarred windows on either side the dais looked far down over a worldwhich seemed all sky, sea, and garden. One of the little open rooms washung with Persian prayer-rugs which Stephen thought were like fadingrainbows seen through a mist; and there were queer old tinselledpictures such as good Moslems love: Borak, the steed of the prophet,half winged woman, half horse; the Prophet's uncle engaged in mightybattle; the Prophet's favourite daughter, Fatma-Zora, daintily eatingher sacred breakfast. The other room at the opposite end of the tiledloggia was fitted up, Moorish fashion, for the making of coffee; wallsand ceiling carved, gilded, and painted in brilliant colours; the floortiled with the charming "windmill" pattern; many shelves adorned withcountless little coffee cups in silver standards; with copper and brassutensils of all imaginable kinds; and in a gilded recess was a curiousapparatus for boiling water.
Nevill Caird displayed his treasures and the beauties of his domain withan ingenuous pride, delighted at every word of appreciation, stoppingStephen here and there to point out something of which he was fond,explaining the value of certain old tiles from the point of view of anexpert, and gladly lingering to answer every question. Some day, hesaid, he was going to write a book about tiles, a book which should havewonderful illustrations.
"Do you really like it all?" he asked, as Stephen looked out from abarred window of the loggia, over the wide view.
"I never even imagined anything so fantastically beautiful," Stephenreturned warmly. "You ought to be happy, even if you could never gooutside your own house and gardens. There's nothing to touch this on theRiviera. It's a palace of the 'Arabian Nights.'"
"There was a palace in the 'Arabian Nights,' if you remember," saidNevill, "where everything was perfect except one thing. Its master wasmiserable because he couldn't get that thing."
"The Roc's egg, of Aladdin's palace," Stephen recalled. "Do you lack aRoc's egg for yours?"
"The equivalent," said Nevill. "The one thing which I want, and don'tseem likely to get, though I haven't quite given up hope. It's a woman.And she doesn't want me--or my palace. I'll tell you about her someday--soon, perhaps. And maybe you'll see her. But never mind my troublesfor the moment. I can put them out of my mind with comparative ease, inthe pleasure of welcoming you. Now we'll go indoors. You haven't an ideawhat the house is like yet. By the way, I nearly forgot this chap."
He put his hand into the pocket of his grey flannel coat, and pulled outa green frog, wrapped in a lettuce leaf which was inadequate as agarment, but a perfect match as to colour.
"I
bought him on the way down to meet you," Nevill explained. "Saw anArab kid trying to sell him in the street, poor little beast. Thought itwould be a friendly act to bring him here to join my happy family, whichis large and varied. I don't remember anybody living in this fountainwho's likely to eat him, or be eaten by him."
Down went the frog on the wide rim of the marble fountain, and satthere, meditatively, with a dawning expression of contentment, soStephen fancied, on his green face. He looked, Stephen thought, as if hewere trying to forget a troubled past, and as if his new home with allits unexplored mysteries of reeds and lily pads were wondrously to hisliking.
"I wish you'd name that person after me," said Stephen. "You're beingvery good to both of us,--taking us out of Hades into Paradise."
"Come along in," was Nevill Caird's only answer. But he walked into thehouse with his hand on Stephen's shoulder.