"What!" says Sadie. "After you knew the kind of monster he was, Lindy, did you keep on writing to him?"
"But he was still my husband," protested Lindy.
"Bah!" says Sadie, throwin' a scornful glance at the Pasha.
Don Carlos he spreads out his hands, and shrugs his shoulders. "These English!" says he. "At first I laughed at the letters. They would come at such odd times; for you can imagine, Madam, that my life has been--well, not as the saints'. And to many different women have I read bits of these letters that came from so far,--to dancing girls, others. Some laughed with me, some wept. One tried to stab me with a dagger afterward. Women are like that. You never know when they will change into serpents. All but this one. Think! Month after month, year after year, letters, letters; about nothing much, it is true, but wishing me good health, happiness, asking me to have care for myself, and saying always that I was loved! Well? Can one go on laughing at things like that? Once I was dangerously hurt, a spearthrust that I got near Biskra, and the letter came to me where I lay in my tent. It was like a soothing voice, comforting one in the dark. Since then I have watched for those letters. When chance brought me to this side of the world, I found myself wishing for sight of the one who could remain ever the same, could hold the faith in the faithless for so long. So here I am."
"Yes, and you ought to be in jail," says Sadie emphatic. "But, since you're not, what do you propose doing next?"
"I return day after to-morrow," says Don Carlos, "and if the lady who is my wife so wills it she shall go with me."
"Oh, shall she!" says Sadie sarcastic. "Where to, pray?"
"Three days by camel south from Moorzook," says he. "It is an oasis in the Libyan Desert."
"Indeed!" says Sadie. "And what particular business are you engaged in there,--gambling, robbing, slave selling, or----"
"In El Kurfah," breaks in Don Carlos, bowin' dignified, "I am Pasha Dar Bunda, Minister of Foreign Affairs and chief business agent to Hamid-al-Illa; who, as you may know, is one of the half-dozen rulers claiming to be Emperor of the Desert. Frankly, I admit he has no right to such a title; but neither has any of the others. Hamid, however, is one of the most up-to-date and successful of all the desert chieftains. My presence here is proof of that. I came to arrange for large shipments of dates and ivory, and to take back to Hamid an automobile and the latest phonograph records."