The White Prophet, Volume II (of 2). Sir Hall Caine
and the sense of being left friendless and alone he became a harder and severer man than before. His secretaries were more than ever afraid of him, and his servants trembled as they entered his room.
It heightened his anger against Gordon to believe that by his conduct he had hastened his mother's end. In his absolute self-abasement there were moments when he would have found it easier to forgive Gordon if he had been a prodigal, a wastrel, prompted to do what he had done by the grossest selfishness; but deep down in some obscure depths of the father's heart the worst suffering came of the certainty that his son had been moved by that tragic earnestness which belongs only to the greatest and noblest souls.
Still more hardening and embittering to the Consul-General than the memory of Gordon was the thought of Ishmael. It intensified his anger against the Egyptian to feel that having first by his "visionary mummery," by his "manoeuvring and quackery," robbed him of his son, he had now, by direct consequence, robbed him of his wife also.
All the Consul-General's bull-necked strength, all his force of soul, were roused to fury when he thought of that. He was old and tired and he needed rest, but before he permitted himself to think of retirement, he must crush Ishmael Ameer.
Not that he allowed himself to recognise his vindictiveness. Shutting his eyes to his personal motive, he believed he was thinking of England only. Ishmael was the head-centre of an anarchical conspiracy which was using secret and stealthy weapons that were more deadly than bombs; therefore Ishmael must be put down, he must be trampled into the earth, and his movement must be destroyed.
But how?
Within a few hours after Lady Nuneham's funeral the Grand Cadi came by night, and with many vague accusations against "the Arab innovator," repeated his former warning —
"I tell you again, O Excellency, if you permit that man to go on it will be death to the rule of England in Egypt."
"Then prove what you say – prove it, prove it," cried the Consul-General, raising his impatient voice.
But the suave old Moslem judge either could not or would not do so. Indeed, being a Turkish official, accustomed to quite different procedure, he was at a loss to understand why the Consul-General wanted proof.
"Arrest the offender first and you'll find evidence enough afterwards," he said.
An English statesman could not act on lines like those, so the Consul-General turned back to the despatches of the Sirdar. The last of them – the one received during the dark hours preceding his wife's death – contained significant passages —
"If this man should develop supernatural pretensions I shall know what to do."
Ha! There was hope in that! The charlatan element in Ishmael Ameer might carry him far if only the temptation of popular idolatry were strong enough.
Once let a man deceive himself with the idea that he was divine, nay, once let his followers delude themselves with the notion of his divinity, and a civilised Government would be bound to make short work of him. Whosoever and whatsoever he might be, that man must die!
A sudden cloud passed over the face of the Consul-General as he glanced again at the Sirdar's despatch and saw its references to Christ.
"How senseless everybody is becoming in this world," he thought.
Pontius Pilate! Pshaw! When would religious hypocrisy open its eyes and see that, according to all the laws of civilised states, the Roman Governor had done right? Jesus claimed to be divine, His people were ready to recognise Him as King; and whether His kingdom was of this world or another, what did it matter? If His pretensions had been permitted they would have led to wild, chaotic, shapeless anarchy. Therefore Pilate crucified Jesus, and, scorned though he had been through all the ages, he had done no more than any so-called "Christian" governor would be compelled to do to-day.
"Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews." Why would not people understand that these words were written not in derision but in self-defence? There could be only one authority in Palestine then, and there could be only one authority in Egypt now.
"If this visionary mummer, with his empty quackeries, should develop the idea that he is divine, or even the messenger of divinity, I will hang him like a dog!" thought the Consul-General.
CHAPTER XVIII
Five days after the death of Lady Nuneham the Consul-General was reading at his breakfast the last copy of the Times to arrive in Cairo. It contained an anticipatory announcement of a forthcoming Mansion House Banquet in honour of the King's Birthday. The Foreign Minister was expected to speak on the "unrest in the East, with special reference to the affair of El Azhar."
The Consul-General's face frowned darkly, and he began to picture the scene as it would occur. The gilded hall, the crowd of distinguished persons eating in public, the mixed odours of many dishes, the pop of champagne corks, the smoke of cigars, the buzz of chatter like the gobbling of geese on a green, and then the Minister, with his hand on his heart, uttering timorous apologies for his Proconsul's policy, and pouring out pompous platitudes as if he had newly discovered the Decalogue.
The Consul-General's gorge rose at the thought. Oh, when would these people, who stayed comfortably at home and lived by the votes of the factory-hands of Lancashire and Yorkshire, and hungered for the shouts of the mob, understand the position of men like himself, who, in foreign lands, among alien races, encompassed by secret conspiracies, were spending their strength in holding high the banner of Empire?
"Having chosen a good man, why can't they leave him alone?" thought the Consul-General.
And then, his personal feelings getting the better of his patriotism, he almost wished that the charlatan element in Ishmael Ameer might develop speedily; that he might draw off the allegiance of the native soldiers in the Soudan and break out, like the Mahdi, into open rebellion. That would bring the Secretary of State to his senses, make him realise a real danger, and see in the everlasting "affair of El Azhar" if not light, then lightning.
The door of the breakfast-room opened and Ibrahim entered.
"Well, what is it?" demanded the Consul-General with a frown.
Ibrahim answered in some confusion that a small boy was in the hall, asking to see the English lord. He said he brought an urgent message, but would not tell what it was or where it came from. Had been there three times before, slept last night on the ground outside the gate, and could not be driven away – would his lordship see the lad?
"What is his race? Egyptian?"
"Nubian, my lord."
"Ever seen the boy before?"
"No … yes … that is to say … well, now that your lordship mentions it, I think … yes I think he came here once with Miss Hel … I mean General Graves's daughter."
"Bring him up immediately," said the Consul-General.
At the next moment a black boy stepped boldly into the room. It was Mosie. His clothes were dirty, and his pudgy face was like a block of dark soap splashed with stale lather, but his eyes were clear and alert and his manner was eager.
"Well, my boy, what do you want?" asked the Consul-General.
Mosie looked fearlessly up into the stern face with its iron jaw, and tipped his black thumb over his shoulder to where Ibrahim, in his gorgeous green caftan, stood timidly behind him.
At a sign from the Consul-General, the Egyptian servant left the room, and then, quick as light, Mosie slipped off his sandal, ripped open its inner sole, and plucked out a letter stained with grease.
It was the letter which Helena had written in Khartoum.
The Consul-General read it rapidly, with an eagerness which even he could not conceal. So great, indeed, was his excitement that he did not see that a second paper (Ishmael's letter to the Chancellor of El Azhar) had fallen to the floor until Mosie picked it up and held it out to him.
"Good boy," said the Consul-General – the cloud had passed and his face bore an expression of joy.
Instantly apprehending the dim purport of Helena's hasty letter, the Consul-General saw that what he had predicted