Ziska (Gothic Classic). Marie Corelli
I am fond of study, you know; I am studying her. What! Are you determined to run away?"
"I am engaged for this dance to Mr. Courtney," said Helen, nervously.
"Well, well! We'll resume our conversation another time," and Dr. Dean took her hand and patted it pleasantly. "Don't fret yourself about Denzil; he'll be all right. And take my advice: don't marry a Bedouin chief; marry an honest, straightforward, tender-hearted Englishman who'll take care of you, not a nondescript savage who'll desert you!"
And with a humorous and kindly smile, Dr. Dean moved off to join the two motionless and picturesque figures that stood side by side looking at the moon, while Helen, like a frightened bird suddenly released, fled precipitately back to the ball-room, where Ross Courtney was already searching for her as his partner in the next waltz.
"Upon my word," mused the Doctor, "this is a very pretty kettle of fish! The Gezireh Palace Hotel is not a hotel at all, it seems to me; it is a lunatic asylum. What with Lady Fulkeward getting herself up as twenty at the age of sixty; and Muriel and Dolly Chetwynd Lyle man-hunting with more ferocity than sportsmen hunt tigers; Helen in love, Denzil in love, Gervase in love—dear me! dear me! What a list of subjects for a student's consideration! And the Princess Ziska … "
He broke off his meditations abruptly, vaguely impressed by the strange solemnity of the night. An equal solemnity seemed to surround the two figures to which he now drew nigh, and as the Princess Ziska turned her eyes upon him as he came, he was, to his own vexation, aware that something indefinable disturbed his usual equanimity and gave him an unpleasant thrill.
"You are enjoying a moonlight stroll, Doctor?" she inquired.
Her veil was now cast aside in a careless fold of soft drapery over her shoulders, and her face in its ethereal delicacy of feature and brilliant coloring looked almost too beautiful to be human. Dr. Dean did not reply for a moment; he was thinking what a singular resemblance there was between Armand Gervase and one of the figures on a certain Egyptian fresco in the British Museum.
"Enjoying—er—er—a what?—a moonlight stroll? Exactly—er—yes! Pardon me, Princess, my mind often wanders, and I am afraid I am getting a little deaf as well. Yes, I find the night singularly conducive to meditation; one cannot be in a land like this under a sky like this"—and he pointed to the shining heaven—"without recalling the great histories of the past."
"I daresay they were very much like the histories of the present," said
Gervase smiling.
"I should doubt that. History is what man makes it; and the character of man in the early days of civilization was, I think, more forceful, more earnest, more strong of purpose, more bent on great achievements."
"The principal achievement and glory being to kill as many of one's fellow-creatures as possible!" laughed Gervase—"Like the famous warrior, Araxes, of whom the Princess has just been telling me!"
"Araxes was great, but now Araxes is a forgotten hero," said the Princess slowly, each accent of her dulcet voice chiming on the ear like the stroke of a small silver bell. "None of the modern discoverers know anything about him yet. They have not even found his tomb; but he was buried in the Pyramids with all the honors of a king. No doubt your clever men will excavate him some day."
"I think the Pyramids have been very thoroughly explored," said Dr.
Dean. "Nothing of any importance remains in them now."
The Princess arched her lovely eyebrows.
"No? Ah! I daresay you know them better than I do!" and she laughed, a laugh which was not mirthful so much as scornful.
"I am very much interested in Araxes," said Gervase then, "partly, I suppose, because he is as yet in the happy condition of being an interred mummy. Nobody has dug him up, unwound his cerements, or photographed him, and his ornaments have not been stolen. And in the second place I am interested in him because it appears he was in love with the famous dancer of his day whom the Princess represents to-night—Charmazel. I wish I had heard the story before I came to Cairo; I would have got myself up as Araxes in person to-night."
"In order to play the lover of Charmazel?" queried the Doctor.
"Exactly!" replied Gervase with flashing eyes; "I daresay I could have acted the part."
"I should imagine you could act any part," replied the Doctor, blandly.
"The role of love-making comes easily to most men."
The Princess looked at him as he spoke and smiled. The jewelled scarab, set as a brooch on her bosom, flashed luridly in the moon, and in her black eyes there was a similar lurid gleam.
"Come and talk to me," she said, laying her hand on his arm; "I am tired, and the conversation of one's ball-room partners is very banal. Monsieur Gervase would like me to dance all night, I imagine; but I am too lazy. I leave such energy to Lady Fulkeward and to all the English misses and madams. I love indolence."
"Most Russian women do, I think," observed the Doctor.
She laughed.
"But I am not Russian!"
"I know. I never thought you were," he returned composedly; "but everyone in the hotel has come to the conclusion that you are!"
"They are all wrong! What can I do to put them right?" she inquired with a fascinating little upward movement of her eyebrows.
"Nothing! Leave them in their ignorance. I shall not enlighten them, though I know your nationality."
"You do?" and a curious shadow darkened her features. "But perhaps you are wrong also!"
"I think not," said the Doctor, with gentle obstinacy. "You are an
Egyptian. Born in Egypt; born OF Egypt. Pure Eastern! There is nothing
Western about you. Is not it so?"
She looked at him enigmatically.
"You have made a near guess," she replied; "but you are not absolutely correct. Originally, I am of Egypt."
Dr. Dean nodded pleasantly.
"Originally—yes. That is precisely what I mean—originally! Let me take you in to supper."
He offered his arm, but Gervase made a hasty step forward.
"Princess," he began—
She waved him off lightly.
"My dear Monsieur Gervase, we are not in the desert, where Bedouin chiefs do just as they like. We are in a modern hotel in Cairo, and all the good English mammas will be dreadfully shocked if I am seen too much with you. I have danced with you five times, remember! And I will dance with you once more before I leave. When our waltz begins, come and find me in the upper-room."
She moved away on Dr. Dean's arm, and Gervase moodily drew back and let her pass. When she had gone, he lit a cigarette and walked impatiently up and down the terrace, a heavy frown wrinkling his brows. The shadow of a man suddenly darkened the moonlight in front of him, and Denzil Murray's hand fell on his shoulder.
"Gervase," he said, huskily, "I must speak to you."
Gervase glanced him up and down, taking note of his pale face and wild eyes with a certain good-humored regret and compassion.
"Say on, my friend."
Denzil looked straight at him, biting his lips hard and clenching his hands in the effort to keep down some evidently violent emotion.
"The Princess Ziska," he began—
Gervase smiled, and flicked the ash off his cigarette.
"The Princess Ziska," he echoed—"Yes? What of her? She seems to be the only person talked about in Cairo. Everybody in this hotel, at any rate, begins conversation with precisely the same words as you do—'the Princess Ziska!' Upon my life, it is very amusing!"
"It is not amusing to me," said Denzil, bitterly. "To me it is a matter of life and death." He paused, and Gervase looked