Edith Wharton - "Tales Of Men And Ghosts"

Charles W. Sanders - "Sanders' Union Fourth Reader"

Henry A. Shute - "The Real Diary of a Real Boy"

George Berkeley - "Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous,"

The Sheik

E >> E. M. Hull >> The Sheik




He swung round swiftly and flung his arms about her, crushing her to
him savagely, forgetting his strength, his eyes blazing. "God! Do you
think it is easy to let you go, that you are taunting me like this? Do
you think I haven't suffered, that I'm not suffering now? Don't you
know that it is tearing my heart out by the roots to send you away? My
life will be hell without you. Do you think I haven't realised what an
infinitely damned brute I've been? I didn't love you when I took you, I
only wanted you to satisfy the beast in me. And I was glad that you
were English that I could make you suffer as an Englishman made my
mother suffer, I so loathed the whole race. I have been mad all my
life, I think--up till now. I thought I didn't care until the night I
heard that Ibraheim Omair had got you, and then I knew that if anything
happened to you the light of my life was out, and that I would only
wait to kill Ibraheim before I killed myself."

His arms were like a vice hurting her, but they felt like heaven, and
she clung to him speechless, her heart throbbing wildly. He looked down
long and deeply into her eyes, and the light in his--the light that she
had longed for--made her tremble. His brown head bent lower and lower,
and his lips had almost touched her when he drew back, and the love in
his eyes faded into misery.

"I mustn't kiss you," he said huskily, as he put her from him gently.
"I don't think I should have the courage to let you go if I did. I
didn't mean to touch you."

He turned from her with a little gesture of weariness.

Fear fled back into her eyes. "I don't want to go," she whispered
faintly.

He paused by the writing-table and took up the revolver he had loaded
earlier, breaking it absently, spinning the magazine between his finger
and thumb, and replaced it before answering.

"You don't understand. There is no other way," he said dully.

"If you really loved me you would not let me go," she cried, with a
miserable sob.

"_If_ I loved you?" he echoed, with a hard laugh. "_If_ I
loved you! It is because I love you so much that I am able to do it. If
I loved you a little less I would let you stay and take your chance."

She flung out her hands appealingly. "I want to stay, Ahmed! I love
you!" she panted, desperate--for she knew his obstinate determination,
and she saw her chance of happiness slipping away.

He did not move or look at her, and his brows drew together in the
dreaded heavy frown. "You don't know what you are saying. You don't
know what it would mean," he replied in a voice from which he had
forced all expression. "If you married me you would have to live always
here in the desert. I cannot leave my people, and I am--too much of an
Arab to let you go alone. It would be no life for you. You think you
love me now, though God knows how you can after what I have done to
you, but a time would come when you would find that your love for me
did not compensate for your life here. And marriage with me is
unthinkable. You know what I am and what I have been. You know that I
am not fit to live with, not fit to be near any decent woman. You know
what sort of a damnable life I have led; the memory of it would always
come between us--you would never forget, you would never trust me. And
if you could, of your charity, both forgive and forget, you know that I
am not easy to live with. You know my devilish temper--it has not
spared you in the past, it might not spare you in the future. Do you
think that I could bear to see you year after year growing to hate me
more? You think that I am cruel now, but I am thinking what is best for
you afterwards. Some day you will think of me a little kindly because I
had the strength to let you go. You are so young, your life is only just
beginning. You are strong enough to put the memory of these last months
out of your mind--to forget the past and live only for the future. No
one need ever know. There can be no fear for your--reputation. Things
are forgotten in the silence of the desert. Mustafa Ali is many hundreds
of miles away, but not so far that he would dare to talk. My own men
need not be considered, they speak or are silent as I wish. There is
only Raoul, and there is no question of him. He has not spared me his
opinion. You must go back to your own country, to your own people, to
your own life, in which I have no place or part, and soon all this will
seem only like an ugly dream."

The sweat was standing out on his forehead and his hands were clenched
with the effort he was making, but her head was buried in her hands,
and she did not see the torture in his face, she only heard his soft,
low voice inexorably decreeing her fate and shutting her out from
happiness in quiet almost indifferent tones.

She shuddered convulsively. "Ahmed! I go!" she wailed.

He looked up sharply, his face livid, and tore her hands from her face.
"Good God! You don't mean--I haven't--You aren't----" he gasped hoarsely,
looking down at her with a great fear in his eyes.

She guessed what he meant and the color rushed into her face. The
temptation to lie to him and let the consequences rest with the future
was almost more than she could resist. One little word and she would be
in his arms ... but afterwards----? It was the fear of the afterwards
that kept her silent. The colour slowly drained from her face and she
shook her head mutely.

He let go her wrists with a quick sigh of relief and wiped the
perspiration from his face. Then he laid his hand on her shoulder and
pushed her gently towards the inner room. For a moment she resisted,
her wide, desperate eyes searching his, but he would not meet her look,
and his mouth was set in the hard straight line she knew so well, and
with a cry she flung herself on his breast, her face hidden against
him, her hands clinging round his neck. "Ahmed! Ahmed! You are killing
me. I cannot live without you. I love you and I want you--only you. I
am not afraid of the loneliness of the desert, it is the loneliness of
the world outside the shelter of your arms that I am afraid of. I am
not afraid of what you are or what you have been. I am not afraid of
what you might do to me. I never lived until you taught me what life
was, here in the desert. I can't go back to the old life, Ahmed. Have
pity on me. Don't shut me out from my only chance of happiness, don't
send me away. I know you love me--I know! I know! And because I know I
am not ashamed to beg you to be merciful. I haven't any shame or pride
left. Ahmed! Speak to me! I can't bear your silence.... Oh! You are
cruel, cruel!"

A spasm crossed his face, but his mouth set firmer and he disengaged
her clinging hands with relentless fingers. "I have never been anything
else," he said bitterly, "but I am willing that you should think me a
brute now rather than you should live to curse the day you ever saw me.
I still think that your greater chance of happiness lies away from me
rather than with me, and for your ultimate happiness I am content to
sacrifice everything."

He dropped her hands and turned abruptly, going back to the doorway,
looking out into the darkness. "It is very late. We must start early.
Go and lie down," he said gently, but it was an order in spite of the
gentleness of his voice.

She shrank back trembling, with piteous, stricken face and eyes filled
with a great despair. She knew him and she knew it was the end. Nothing
would break his resolution. She looked at him with quivering lips
through a mist of tears, looked at him with a desperate fixedness that
sought to memorise indelibly his beloved image in her heart. The dear
head so proudly poised on the broad shoulders, the long strong limbs,
the slender, graceful body. He was all good to look upon. A man of men.
Monseigneur! Monseigneur! _Mon maitre et seigneur._ No! It would
never be that any more. A rush of tears blinded her and she stepped
back uncertainly and stumbled against the little writing-table. She
caught at it behind her to steady herself, and her fingers touched the
revolver he had laid down. The contact of the cold metal sent a chill
that seemed to strike her heart. She stood rigid, with startled eyes
fixed on the motionless figure in the doorway--one hand gripping the
weapon tightly and the other clutching the silken wrap across her
breast. Her mind raced forward feverishly, there were only a few hours
left before the morning, before the bitter moment when she must leave
behind her for ever the surroundings that had become so dear, that had
been her home as the old castle in England had never been. She thought
of the long journey northward, the agonised protraction of her misery
riding beside him, the nightly camps when she would lie alone in the
little travelling tent, and then the final parting at the wayside
station, when she would have to watch him wheel at the head of his men
and ride out of her life, and she would strain her eyes through the
dust and sand to catch the last glimpse of the upright figure on the
spirited black horse. It would be The Hawk, she thought suddenly. He
had ridden Shaitan to-day, and he always used one or other of the two
for long journeys. It was The Hawk he had ridden the day she had made
her bid for freedom and who had carried the double burden on the return
journey when she had found her happiness. The contrast between that
ride, when she had lain content in the curve of his strong arm, and the
ride that she would take the next day was poignant. She closed her
teeth on her trembling lip, her fingers tightened on the stock of the
revolver, and a wild light came into her sad eyes. She could never go
through with it. To what end would be the hideous torture? What was
life without him?--Nothing and less than nothing. She could never give
herself to another man. She was necessary to no one. Aubrey had no real
need of her; his selfishness wrapped him around with a complacency that
abundantly satisfied him. One day, for the sake of the family he would
marry--perhaps was already married if he had been able to find a woman
in America who would accept his egoism along with his old name and
possessions. Her life was her own to deal with. Nobody would be injured
by its termination. Aubrey, indeed, would benefit considerably. And
he----? His figure was blurred through the tears that filled her eyes.

Slowly she lifted the weapon clear of the table with steady fingers and
brought her hand stealthily from behind her. She looked at it for a
moment dispassionately. She was not afraid. She was conscious only of
an overwhelming weariness, a longing for rest that should still the
gnawing pain in her breast and the throbbing in her head.... A flash
and it would be over, and all her sorrow would melt away.... But would
it? A doubting fear of the hereafter rushed over her. What if suffering
lived beyond the border-line? But the fear went as suddenly as it had
come, for with it came remembrance that in that shadowy world she would
find one who would understand--her own father, who had shot himself,
mad with heartbroken despair, when her mother died in giving her birth.

She lifted the revolver to her temple resolutely.

There had been no sound to betray what was passing behind him, but the
extra sense, the consciousness of imminent danger that was strong in
the desert-bred man, sprang into active force within the Sheik. He
turned like a flash and leaped across the space that separated them,
catching her hand as she pressed the trigger, and the bullet sped
harmlessly an inch above her head. With his face gone suddenly ghastly
he wrenched the weapon from her and flung it far into the night.

For a moment they stared into each other's eyes in silence, then, with
a moan, she slipped from his grasp and fell at his feet in an agony of
terrible weeping. With a low exclamation he stooped and swept her up
into his arms, holding her slender, shaking figure with tender
strength, pressing her head against him, his cheek on her red-gold
curls.

"My God! child, don't cry so. I can bear anything but that," he cried
brokenly.

But the terrible sobs went on, and fearfully he caught her closer,
straining her to him convulsively, raining kisses on her shining hair.
"_Diane, Diane,_" he whispered imploringly, falling back into the
soft French that seemed so much more natural. "_Mon amour, ma
bien-aimee. Ne pleures pas, je t'en prie. Je t'aime, je t'adore. Tu
resteras pres de moi, tout a moi._"

She seemed only half-conscious, unable to check the emotion that,
unloosed, overwhelmed her. She lay inert against him, racked with the
long shuddering sobs that shook her. His firm mouth quivered as he
looked down at his work. Gathering her up to his heart he carried her
to the divan, and the weight of her soft slim body sent the blood
racing madly through his veins. He laid her down, and dropped on his
knees beside her, his arm wrapped round her, whispering words of
passionate love.

Gradually the terrible shuddering passed and the gasping sobs died
away, and she lay still, so still and white that he was afraid. He
tried to rise to fetch some restorative, but at the first movement she
clung to him, pressing closer to him. "I don't want anything but you,"
she murmured almost inaudibly.

His arm tightened round her and he turned her face up to his. Her eyes
were closed and the wet lashes lay black against her pale cheek. His
lips touched them pitifully.

"Diane, will you never look at me again?" His voice was almost humble.

Her eyes quivered a moment and them opened slowly, looking up into his
with a still-lingering fear in them. "You won't send me away?" she
whispered pleadingly, like a terrified child.

A hard sob broke from him and he kissed her trembling lips fiercely.
"Never!" he said sternly. "I will never let you go now. My God! If you
knew how I wanted you. If you knew what it cost me to send you away.
Pray God I keep you happy. You know the worst of me, poor child--you
will have a devil for a husband."

The colour stole back slowly into her face and a little tremulous smile
curved her lips. She slid her arm up and round his neck, drawing his
head down. "I am not afraid," she murmured slowly. "I am not afraid of
anything with your arms round me, my desert lover. Ahmed! Monseigneur!"

THE END

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