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1.
Evelyn was punctual. Dressed in her new travelling outfit, she arrived at the appointed place at the appointed time. Before setting out, she scribbled a hasty note which she handed to a messenger, instructing him to take it to Lord Bannister; then she climbed into the saddle of the kneeling camel.
Azrim, the Berber guide, uttered a strange strident guttural sound, whereupon the camels rose in two separate swinging movements. Evelyn thought first, that she was being ejected from her saddle and would fall on her face; then, that she was being catapulted backwards. When at last she reached an erect position, she found herself at an alarming height.
"Reg-lak! Reg-lak!"
The camels broke into a trot.
2.
Only twelve hours previously, a much bigger caravan had departed along the same route: it consisted of thirty Arabs, handpicked gems of Mellah, headed by the two leaders, Adams and Gordon, who had become great friends.
The gang had arrived from Lyons by chartered plane and had immediately dispersed in search of the girl, having divided the town into sectors among themselves. Rainer was left to act as liaison in the lobby of the Hotel Mammunia, where the hoary killer picked up the manager of a European engineering firm, and before long the two of them were playing chess.
It was Yoko, the man with the full beard, whose efforts were crowned with success. He had started from the assumption that, as the girl was looking for a soldier, she was certain to call on the Commanding Officer of the fortress. He therefore concealed himself in the neighbourhood of Fort Guéliz, where he soon spotted Evelyn. From there, he tailed her for the rest of the afternoon until she checked in at the Hotel de Paris to have a rest.
Yoko then returned to the Berber guide whom he had seen talking with the girl, for he knew that he must discover what place Evelyn Weston was bound for.
"Salaam" Yoko greeted the Berber.
"Bon jour" said the man.
"I want to make a longish trip in the Sahara, but I must start without delay, and I am looking for a reliable guide."
"I am sorry, Sir", replied the Berber, "I have been hired for five days."
As he spoke these words he remembered the British lady, and, with a smile about his lips, watched the flushed and happy child playing with the amulet.
"Perhaps you could merge the two caravans," Yoko suggested. "I want to go to Ain Sefra; and if your people are going that way..."
All unsuspecting, the guide told Yoko just what he wanted to know.
"We are going in another direction - to the oasis Marbouk."
"Too bad. Salaam aleikum."
"Au revoir."
Yoko had learned what he wanted. Since Evelyn was preparing to go to the oasis Marbouk, it was probable that the wounded soldier "Münster" was to be found there. Quickly, he returned to the hotel to give Rainer this information; the other members of the gang were then recalled, and within an hour, they were holding a conference.
"It's quite simple," said Adams. "We'll ride out ahead today." He touched the map with one finger. "When Evelyn Weston sets out early tomorrow morning, we'll have reached this well. There we'll lie in wait, take the map from her and then go and see this fellow Münster in the oasis."
"What's public safety in Oasis Marbouk like?" Dr. Courtlier butted in in his low-pitched, drowsy, aristocratic voice, beating a slow devil's tattoo with his large freckled white fingers. "I mean in case we find we can't win the man over by persuasion only."
"We should in any case recruit some thirty or forty Arabs here," the man with the beard said. "I know a landlord in the Quartier Reserve - an old pal of mine. He'll help us. In these desert enterprises you're liable to meet with surprises. I'm all for playing it safe."
Shortly afterwards, Beefy made the acquaintance of an army officer who told him that public safety in Oasis Marbouk was, from the doctor's point of view, pretty encouraging: no police, no soldiers; peace and order, never disturbed in Oasis Marbouk from time immemorial, was maintained by the very small garrison of the little army convalescent camp.
"I think," Adams said in the afternoon, "we can leave within the hour. Everything's been arranged."
"Not everything," Rainer dissented. "We must take a few thermos flasks filled with tea. Tea is a good drink in tropical heat."
No one deigned to answer.
3.
"In this moment of departure, my grateful thoughts go out to you. God bless you for your kindness. As you will never see me again, I trust you will forget the trouble and inconvenience that were caused to you by the unhappy
Evelyn Weston"
He looked up from the letter and gazed out across the garden. He felt a heaviness pressing on his heart. It seemed that in spite of all the trouble she had brought him he had become dangerously accustomed to the company of this harum-scarum but infinitely sweet girl who was always in such a state of alarm, rushing about and getting excited about her chief enemy - his toilet case. The Blonde Hurricane. She swept through his life, leaving only confusion in her wake, and she herself rushed on into mortal danger. Not that she had so much courage; she was simply reckless.
Her departure had certainly brought him one great blessing - the possibility of a quiet night's sleep; and his peace would be no longer disturbed by her abrupt and untimely appearances.
4.
"Good afternoon. I am looking for Miss Evelyn Weston."
Lord Bannister was taken aback; in fact, he very nearly fainted with surprise.
Standing at the door was a good-looking young man wearing shining top-boots and white breeches and holding in his hand a sun-helmet the size of a car-wheel - in a word, he was wearing the tropical kit seen only on film stars and members of escorted tours commonly seen in Venice and along the Adriatic coast; but here in the tropics tourists who sport the latest Sahara fashion are more conspicuous; they are also figures of fun, for their fashionable garb is an open invitation to sunstroke.
"Wh-who are you?" Lord Bannister stammered with misgiving.
"My name is Edward Rancing. Am I speaking to Lord Bannister?"
"Certainly... yes... Er... Why do you ask?"
"I am looking for Miss Evelyn Weston. I should like to speak to her."
His lordship's eyes wandered vaguely about the room as if to say that he had just put her down somewhere recently, but didn't remember where. Then he came to his senses and drew himself up.
"I don't quite see what I can do for you, Mr. Rancing."
"I should have thought I'd made it sufficiently clear. I am looking for Miss Evelyn Weston. She was last photographed in your company, Lord Bannister."
Lord Bannister cowered once more, shrinking visibly. Eddy produced a photograph from his pocket.
"I think this is an authentic photograph. I am informed that you arrived here with this lady, ostensibly your wife; it seems reasonable, therefore, to come to you to discover the whereabouts of Miss Evelyn Weston."
"Are you a detective?" asked Lord Bannister, as devious as any pickpocket playing hide-and-seek with the police.
"Oh, no. I am an old acquaintance of Miss Weston's. I have been her next-door neighbour in the King's Road for some years."
"I suppose it's not merely a neighbourly action of yours to have followed Miss Weston to Africa?" Lord Bannister observed moodily.
"No. I would like to see her on business."
"Now which country are you spying for?"
"Me? For Lappland."
"By gad, sir, do you mean to say you have come all the way to Africa disguised as an opera chorus-singer just to tell me bad jokes?"
"It's no more of a joke than your question, Lord Bannister."
"After all that's been written in the papers..."
"I have been Miss Weston's next-door neighbour for several years. She lives in great penury with her widowed mother. She is an honest, hard-working person and I am quite sure that she has been innocently involved in this horrible affair."
All this was news to Lord Bannister. So she was no spy, after all.
"That's all very well," he said at last. "Nevertheless, I haven't the faintest idea where Miss Weston may be now. All I can tell you is that she won't come back here anymore."
Eddy smiled sarcastically.
"I am sure Miss Weston will come back. I'm not going to stir from here till she does."
"As I have no desire to spend my remaining years in your company I shall be compelled to..."
"Go to the police? All right. That'll mean a hundred thousand francs for me. For you, it will most likely mean jail."
That was a possibility Lord Bannister had not anticipated and he fell back limply into his chair. Fate was against him. He might have guessed that that girl would land him in jail.
"I don't want to pester you, Lord Bannister. All I ask is that you will allow me to remain."
"What else can I do? I must behave like a gentleman. Please take a seat."
Eddy sat down and proceeded to mix himself a drink from some bottles that stood on the table. When he spoke again it was a more light-hearted and friendly tone.
"Have you really married Miss Weston?"
"I haven't. As I found out in the end, I had only been protecting her. There was always someone following the poor girl, and whenever she found out she would come and wake me up and then fall asleep herself. So far her plan has worked very well. And you say you are no accomplice of hers?"
"Miss Weston, I repeat, is a decent middle-class girl."
"She lives rather a rough-and-tumble life to be that."
"She is searching for her lawful inheritance."
"I know. Also a certain gentleman's honour. I can assure you, if you are interested, that she and I have been quite active in both matters. Well, do you seriously plan to stay with me from now on?"
"I do. But I won't be here for long. I firmly believe that Miss Weston will soon be back."
"You are, it seems, an English Nostradamus. Though it is a historical fact that even that illustrious gentleman made some mistakes now and then."
"I am not mistaken. You will soon realise that I am right."
"But I shall have to pay rather a high price for the realisation," replied Lord Bannister ruefully.
"Never mind. If I am Nostradamus, you should look upon yourself as Catherine de Medici and sacrifice something so that my prediction will come true."
"Mr. Rancing, I give you my word that I have been speaking the truth. You may call me a scoundrel and a cad if Miss Evelyn Weston ever comes back to this house."
"Well," replied Eddy, with a sigh, "with all respect, I have the honour to inform your lordship that your lordship is a scoundrel and a cad."
Evelyn Weston was standing at the door.
5.
For several hours Evelyn and her guides made their way through the desert. Eastwards they could see crumbling stone pillars and torsos-ruins of an ancient city dating from the time of the Roman conquest. Then Evelyn accidentally tore her coat and in order to prevent it from tearing further, she decided to mend it immediately. For this purpose she opened her small black case.
"Good gracious! Where's the envelope?" was her horrified exclamation.
Inside the case lay a folded towel, flanked, on either side, by a clothes-brush and a cake of soap. It was her old enemy, Lord Bannister's toilet case! Once again they had each picked up the other's case. Now it was Lord Bannister who had the orange-coloured envelope with him! What was she to do?
There was nothing for it but to turn back! Lord Bannister was in mortal peril. What would happen if he opened the case in the presence of other people, and found the envelope? He might even hand it over to the police.
Oh, how she longed to dash the case to the ground, along with that hateful shaving kit which it no doubt contained. Yet now she would have to take it back to him if she wanted to exchange it for her own.
"Azrim! We must turn back! Quick! We must return immediately."
6.
She was standing on the doorstep. But the fresh surprise which greeted her there robbed her of speech. How on earth had Edward Rancing come to be here? Dimly she began to make out the outlines of a confused and fantastic story. Her head was swimming as if she had drunk too much wine.
"Mr. Rancing!"
"Hullo, Miss Weston," said Eddy, smiling. "How nice to see you again."
Lord Bannister dared not speak. Gradually, his surprise gave way to alarm. Her reappearance must herald an approaching storm. In the midst of the dead calm, she had arrived mysteriously, a hurricane; and she would disappear again in the same silent mysterious fashion, leaving wreckage everywhere in her wake.
Alarm sirens began to wail in Lord Bannister's mind. It was quite certain, he decided, that she was being followed, that robbers were lying in wait of her, and that before long she would insist on his joining her on some long and inconvenient trip. And so he hurriedly filled his pockets with cigarettes, and took from his wardrobe a warm comforter. He had better be somewhat prepared.
"What... How on earth did you get here?" she asked Rancing.
"Why should he know that, of all people?" Lord Bannister mused sadly. "Nothing strange about that. The only thing that's to be wondered at is the fact that I am still here. Where are we going to?" he asked Evelyn rather anxiously.
"For once I am not going to drag you along with me on my uncomfortable errand."
"May those words prove to be a prophecy. I have lost my faith in miracles like that."
"With your permission, I would like to accompany you," Eddy butted in.
Lord Bannister cast a nervous sideways glance in his direction.
"I am glad to see," he said turning to Evelyn, "that neighbourly solidarity is so strong in the King's Road."
For a second she scrutinised Lord Bannister's face searchingly. Oh, dear, was it possible that he was being jealous?
"I wish you would express yourself more clearly, Mr. Rancing. What do you expect me to do for you?"
"I offer you my services. I have an idea that in the present situation you need the assistance of a man. With my help, you may be able to recover the heirloom more quickly."
"How do you come to know anything about my inheritance?"
"Miss Weston! You will despise me. I was eavesdropping."
"And what is your next move? You know everything; you know that I am being followed, and that I am looking for something that's worth a fortune. So you propose to blackmail me? Is that it?"
"Shall I be frank with you? I was thinking of doing that. But somehow, I can't. Miss Weston, I feel like a naughty boy caught by a kind and aged teacher. I suppose I respect you, and this sentiment has been known to kill many a resolution at the very moment when action was necessary. I would like the chance to play out this gamble to the end. But I am not going to blackmail you. If you won't take me with you, I will go away."
"And go to the police, of course," she said sarcastically, "to denounce me."
"Miss Weston," protested Eddy, deeply hurt, and his blushes revealed Edward F.G.H. Rancing, the genius, for what he really was - a great child.
"Miss Weston, you are doing me an injustice. I could have done that before. I am a frivolous sort of fellow; I love money; but this time I really wanted to get hold of your inheritance so that I would be able to bring it to you and ask you to marry me."
Evelyn burst out laughing.
"Oh, all right, Eddy. I suppose you'll just never sober down. You are a madcap. All right, then. I have nothing against your joining me. I have been very much left to my own devices so far. I've had nobody by my side."
"Mainly," said Lord Bannister, trying to justify himself before Eddy, "because the night-shirt I was wearing was so conspicuous that I was compelled to sit in the back of my car on the floor."
"That's all over now. You will not be asked to make any more inconvenient trips on my behalf."
"Miss Weston, you have said that so many times. I believe we are in God's hands, all of us."
"Well, I am about to explain to you that it is my intention to leave you here in peace and never ask you for anything again."
She was a lovely girl, Lord Bannister thought. The trouble was that you simply couldn't tell when she was going to change into a hurricane.
"I have come back because we have taken the wrong cases again. I've brought back this hateful toilet case of yours. I just took a glance at the contents, and slammed the lid on them all. Here you are!" She threw the case down on the table with so much disgust that inside the Buddha's belly, the blades and the shaving block positively danced together. "Now I will thank you to give me back my own case. Then Eddy and I will go away and you will have seen the last of us."
"It's nice to know that in the King's Road the neighbours use Christian names to each other - a custom prevalent in the rest of England only among relatives or very good friends."
With this acid remark, Lord Bannister crossed over to the fireplace and took the small case from the mantelpiece.
"But this is my case," he said. "Are you sure you're not mistaken, Miss Weston?" With a practised gesture he opened the lid of the case.
Three heads turned to look, three mouths opened in amazement, and three hearts missed a beat.
Just inside the case they could see the orange-coloured envelope with the five seals.
7.
Evelyn walked resolutely towards the case.
However, Lord Bannister closed it, and slowly placed his hand over it with the lazy, possessive movement of a lion when she curls her paw over a piece of meat, staking a claim to possession.
"Give me my case, please," she said nervously.
"You may have your case, of course; but I am afraid I can't let you take the envelope. Until now, I have ignored the information which has come to my ears. Unfortunately however, as things are at present, the envelope would have to pass through my hands to reach you, and later, your employers. In which case I should become just as much of an intelligence agent as, say, Mata Hari."
Evelyn reflected. It was true Lord Bannister had until now played only a passive role in the affair. And it was equally true that by handing the envelope to her he would become her accomplice. Lord Bannister an intelligence agent! A prospective candidate for the Nobel Prize, a celebrated scientist and - what made it even more impossible to contemplate - a gentleman with very high moral standards.
"You realise, don't you, Miss Weston, that you are asking the impossible of an old-fashioned scientist when you expect him to hand over this letter to you? However, I promise to let you get a good start and escape before I hand in this document."
Eddy Rancing was toying with the neck of the whisky bottle as if only waiting for a sign from the girl to hit Lord Bannister over the head with it and thus close this whole painful argument. But Evelyn gave him not the slightest encouragement.
She made some silent calculations while Lord Bannister watched her anxiously. At last she came out with her tentative suggestion.
"Do you think," she asked, "that it would be too much trouble for you to make a longish trip by camel?"
"That's just what I've been expecting," Lord Bannister replied dejectedly.
8.
The first minor blast of the hurricane caught at his nerves. Her eyes were shining bright as she turned over various plans in her mind and there was no doubt about it: she was intending to make full use of the famous but defenceless student of sleeping-sickness.
"You plan to hand in this envelope to the authorities, don't you?"
"I do. But I don't propose to deliver it by camel. I shall go on foot. For some time past, I have had a morbid aversion to all forms of transport, if you know what I mean."
"If you want to hand it in here in Morocco, we will go to the police together. But I wonder if the humane spirit of a trueborn English gentleman permits him to deny his assistance to a defenceless woman and an innocent man whose name has been dragged through the mud."
"You have already used that excuse for dragging me halfway across Europe - first in tails and later in my nightshirt."
"This time it's only to a nearby oasis."
"That's what you say at this moment. But once we are on our way, we may find it impossible to stop, however much we would like to do so, till we get to Cape Town. To say nothing of the fact that a camel is no motor-car; it has no replaceable spare parts and if any part gets detached, we shall be stuck in the desert."
"I wish you would stop being sarcastic. We can travel with a heavy escort. It's only two days' ride by camel. You may keep the document and you need not part with it unless you are satisfied that it will get into the hands of the right person. If you refuse to do this you will be sacrificing for the sake of your own convenience the rightful inheritance of a poor family and the honour of a man who has been wronged."
He felt the blast of the hurricane lifting him up and sucking him in - he had no more strength to resist.
"Can you give me any reasonable explanation? Can you prove what you have been telling me?"
"I can bear out the greater part of her story," said Eddy.
"And I can explain everything else. In the first place, this...
"Wait!" Lord Bannister interrupted. "Don't tell me anything. I want to preserve my ignorance of the facts. After all that I've read about it, I am afraid I should hardly be in a position to place myself at your disposal if you acquainted me with the facts. My position at the moment is like this. I consider that you have entrusted me with this envelope and have asked me to hand it over to the authorities not here but at Oasis Marbouk. I intend to comply with your request. We'd better stick to that, I think. In this way, my conscience is, in a way, quite clear. You have, to my great regret, invested me with so much power that I dare not refuse. Let me warn you, however, that beyond the Sahara there is the Belgian Congo, and that nothing - neither your inheritance nor the honour of my fellow-men nor the knowledge that you are being followed - will induce me to follow you there. I won't go farther than the Sahara!"
Evelyn looked at him sorrowfully.
"Are you sure, Lord Bannister?"
Lord Bannister hesitated - and was lost.
"Well, you... er... would have to supply some very powerful reasons," he said in an uncertain voice. "But even if I did go as far as, say, the Congo... I would on no account go farther than Cape Town... I mean to say... er... Ah, all right. Let's go."
Perched on the hump of a camel, Lord Bannister had the sullen air of an officer in command of a punitive expedition. Nor was his temper improved by the presence of a great variety of biting and stinging insects which the camel harboured on its body and which made forays to collect his own blood like so many research workers studying sleeping-sickness. He nodded jerkily along to the rhythm of the animal's gait, reflecting bitterly that once again his kind-heartedness had involved him in an uncomfortable journey to defend other people's honour and good name. The truth was very much simpler.
He was following a pretty woman - a little priggishly perhaps, but nevertheless obeying man's eternal law of gravity. He was following her meaninglessly and hopelessly, into the Sahara. But because he was an English peer and a scientist, he liked to justify what he was doing and make his actions seem less humiliating. He was, in fact, doing nothing more and nothing less than one might expect in such circumstances from, say, an enamoured haberdasher.
"Reg-lak! Reg-lak!"
The camel broke into a canter, tossed back its head, and gave Lord Bannister such a shaking that he began to cough and splutter helplessly.
"Reg-lak! Reg-lak!"
After a few more blows in the chest from the camel, he managed to sit upright in the saddle, and this position made him feel strong and authoritative once more.
9.
On this particular journey we have to record that Eddy Rancing's powers of endurance did not equal those of Lord Bannister, in spite of the fact that he was much younger. He soon realised that it is not for nothing that camels have been called 'ships of the desert': the undulating movement of the animal he was riding induced in him symptoms that most decidedly resembled sea-sickness. Then too, the dust made his eyes sting so painfully that he could scarcely bear it and there were moments when Eddy felt that he was at the end of his tether.
Evelyn, on the other hand, had had some practice in steeling herself against sea-sickness. Besides, women usually manage to endure the hardships of the tropics more equably than men and she was therefore riding along by the side of the guide in relatively good cheer.
The sun's rays began to lengthen and between the softly contoured sand-dunes stretching away on every side, there appeared tiny shadows, turning the desert into a vast chessboard with alternating squares of light and dark.
Lord Bannister stroked his chin moodily.
"I forgot to shave," he muttered, but broke off as he caught the girl's eye.
She glimpsed the toilet case he had tied between the two goatskins on the water-bearing camel! When they arrived at the oasis he would doubtless retire to a room and shave! Angrily, she hoped he would have to walk about with half an inch of stubble on his chin for the next few days.
As for her own case, she never stopped clutching it.
The desert, where the sand was mingled with the dusty bones of so many people who had been assassinated according to the rules of vendetta, infected Evelyn with the idea of merciless revenge.
She made up her mind to pay off old scores by getting rid of that toilet case for good. She would let the shirting sands of the Sahara swallow up that nuisance of a toilet kit, soap, brush, blades and all.
Much as Othello must have edged his way towards Desdemona's bed so now Evelyn stealthily approached the waterbearing camel, allowing Lord Bannister and the guide to ride ahead. Presently, the treacherous knife flashed, and the leather strap groaned as it was slashed by the blade. There was only a slight thud as the impudent little case dropped into the dust muffling the painful clatter of the clashing toiletware within. Then it was left far behind.
Lord Bannister was preoccupied with his own thoughts and did not notice the incident. Evelyn glanced back. She alone could see that tiny, immobile speck in the distance...
Thus the toilet case was left in the desert-and inside the case was the "Dreaming Buddha" within which there was a diamond worth one million pounds sterling.
10.
"Reg-lak! Reg-lak!"
"We aren't following the normal route, Mademoiselle," said Azrim, the Berber guide.
"Why?"
"It was Allah's will that you gave my daughter an amulet. He has therefore preserved you from grave peril by mixing up your cases and thus causing you to turn back. In this way I learned at home that a lot of bad people were hired in Mellah last night. They have now pitched camp by the desert well, along the caravan route to Marbouk. There is among them a man who yesterday spoke with me and deceived me: he learned from me that you were preparing to go to Marbouk."
Evelyn nearly tumbled down from her saddle.
"I have an idea that those people intend to intercept you by the well, and rob you. But we will make a detour and by-pass them by going through the shott. That's what they call the great salt swamp. It is no longer that way, but the route is a bad one and somewhat dangerous. Still, I should think it's better than death."
The end of the conversation was overheard by Lord Bannister and Eddy.
"Well, they've found me," Evelyn said, almost in tears.
"Who are these people?" asked Lord Bannister.
"A group of intelligence agents and gangsters. They are the men whom the police tried to catch when they made the big raid in Paris."
Lord Bannister reflected.
"Do you seriously intend to hand over the envelope to the proper authorities in Marbouk?"
"Yes, I do."
"And can you face the police with a clear conscience when the matter of the envelope has been cleared up?"
"Certainly."
"Right," Lord Bannister nodded. "In that case we must act like honourable citizens. We must give the police this information so that they can run this gang of dangerous criminals to earth by the desert well on the road to Marbouk."
They looked at him in surprise.
"Once you have handed in the envelope," Lord Bannister explained, "and have nothing more to fear, there is no reason why these enemies of society should not be incarcerated in the place where they belong. Mr. Rancing cannot in any case support all this hardship; on the other hand, I have become hardened in Miss Weston's company; therefore I believe the best idea would be for you, Mr. Rancing, to turn back and inform the police of what has come to our knowledge."
Eddy had no objection to his plan, especially as Evelyn declared that she would appreciate that service just as much as if he were to come with her all the way to Marbouk.
"You can't miss the route," said Azrim. "Ride straight ahead with your back to the setting sun. By evening, you will be in sight of the Great Atlas and from there on you'll have something to guide you."
Eddy took leave of the party, and, cooked tender in his picturesque costume, turned his camel for the return journey, his back to the setting sun...
The rest of the party trotted on, forcing the pace as much as their strength permitted. In the blood-red and violet lights of the westering sun the shadows between the sand dunes looked quite black. The hear of the dust-filled air was stifling, and as they advanced, the sulphurous stench of the putrid salt swamp was wafted more and more heavily towards them.
11.
Eddy urged his camel into a steady canter. The heat was intense, his eyes had become inflamed, he was aching in every limb, and he felt both sick and giddy. But he remembered the appalling day spent in Mügli am See, and the thought that he was away from it all kept him in the saddle.
Conditions here in the Sahara were a good deal better than there, he reflected. By now, Uncle Arthur must either have gone out of his mind or committed suicide. He wondered which. He would have enjoyed seeing what happened after the wedding. There must eventually have arrived the moment when Her Excellency Yakihashi (this was the name Eddy had bestowed on old Wollishoff's so-often-betrothed daughter), presumably with eyes cast down, and wearing one of those amazingly broad smiles, retired to the nuptial bedroom.
And then - ah then, Uncle Arthur would have seized the statuette!
Eddy imagined him stealing quietly away with it to the remotest corner of the park, cautiously avoiding the basement windows behind which Frau Victoria, Head Gardener Krüttikofer's spouse, might be whiling away her time, possibly with Herr Maxl, author of Wilhelm Tell, who would doubtlessly be instructing her on some aspect of the drama. At last, at last, would come the long-awaited moment when, by the light of a torch, he would knock the "Dreaming Buddha" sharply against, the rim of the fountain.
Eddy saw the Buddha break into fragments; he imagined the contents one by one as each item fell from the little enamelled box, the scissors, thimbles, and thread... and he saw Uncle Arthur rummaging among the debris... looking, and looking, but in vain...
Eddy shuddered, and the Sahara seemed to him at that moment a most desirable place to be in!
That was relativity for you! Inflammation of the eyes and 140 deg. Fahrenheit was bliss when compared with marriage to Grete.
The sun sank and now the desert could be seen in all the beauty of a starry African night.
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