If this affair ever got out wouldn't it just be pickled walnuts for old putty-faced, jabberwocking Speedway! O God! What a position she was placed in! O, gosh!
She gave one of her old time boyish leaps from the couch and seized the small object she saw on a nearby tabaret.
The object was the stump of a cigarette--a pretty long one. Thank heavens, indeed, that it hadn't burned itself to naught in the night!
She remembered sticking it down there when she began the first round of her terrific battle with Amut Ben Butler. She remembered, too, that it had been her last fag.
Apparently the ciggy had gone out the same time she did.
She scuffled her britches for a match. She lighted up. She took a deep inhale. It was tonic. She filled her lungs again.
A "V" now formed between her black eyebrows.
She hopped into her pants. She began to stir about looking for other things to put on. Just then a swarthy, black-haired young creature, a slip of a girl about six feet tall, entered.
"Ay bane Hulda, the maid," said this little Arab girl. "You could have a wash for yourself back of that curtain over there. It's a bath in it. And your trunks bane come."
"Three cheers for both those things at least," murmured Verbeena. And soon she had tossed her clothes back through the curtain and was splashing about in her usual vigorous fashion.
When a little later she thrust her head through the curtain she saw that Hulda had neatly arranged her riding britches and jacket, her military brushes and her cigarette cases out upon the divan and was digging deep in one of the satchels that was part of Verbeena's luggage regarding which it would seem Sheik Amut Ben Butler must have sent a retrieving party to grab it back from Musty Ale.
"What are you doing in that satchel?" asked Verbeena sharply.
"Ay bane looking for your razor, kiddo," said Hulda deferentially.
"My girl," she said, "don't you know there's no safety in this awful place?"
By this time Hulda had a trunk open. It contained the pretty dresses Verbeena had brought along for girlish evenings on the Sahara. Girlish evenings! She choked back a sob.
Aw, gee! Why couldn't she have been let alone to swagger about always in her cute boyish britches!
Hulda looked again and studied Miss Mayonnaise's head and shoulders as they stuck before the curtain.