Louise Gerard

“ On it the Sultan seated himself, the girl in his arms. And in the scented, sighing silence he tried to soothe the tears his methods had roused.
And trembling she lay against the passion and power that held her, refusing to be comforted.
"There's nothing to weep about, my darling," he whispered. "Sooner or later you have to learn that I'm your master. Just as you've taught me that all women are not ripe fruit, willing and anxious to fall into my hands. And I must have some closer tie between us since love alone won't keep you from running away from me."
Pansy's tears fell all the faster. ”

“ On the wide dressing-table was a litter of silver toilet appointments, each with a pansy in purple enamel on it.
Le Breton did not give the room a glance.
He had eyes for nothing but the figure sitting up in bed. A figure no longer in pyjamas—they lay in a wet heap in the middle of the floor—but in a pretty nightgown; and from beneath a flood of golden curls wide, purple eyes looked at him, sparkling with innocent mischief.
It was no boy who had come to his assistance, but a girl! A lovely girl with a full, perfect mouth, vividly red, a milk-white skin and cheeks where roses bloomed. ”

“ Then he glanced at the girl, longing in his eyes.
"Let me give you one kiss, Pansy. A good-bye kiss," he whispered. "It's years since I've kissed you. You're such a one for keeping a fellow at arm's length nowadays."
With death knocking at the door Pansy could not refuse him; this nice boy she had always liked, yet never loved.
She thought of the man who had feasted so freely on her lips that night in the moonlit garden in Grand Canary. She wanted no man's kisses but his, no man's love but his, and his race and colour barred him out from her for ever. ”

“ I'm an actress. At Mr. Le Breton's invitation I came here with him from Paris, to stay until he tires of me or I of him. Comme vous voulez," she finished, with a shrug.
For a moment Pansy just stared at the truth confronting her: the truth, lazy, languid, and smiling, in white satin and emeralds.
There was a little noise, hard and sharp, like a shower of frozen tears rattling down on the table. The hands clinging to the string of amber beads clung just a thought too hard, for the necklace snapped suddenly. The beads poured down like tears—the tears Pansy herself was past shedding. ”

“ It lay with its skull smashed in, its brains bespattering the horse's hoofs—hoofs over which now a red stream oozed, filling the hot night air with the smell of live blood.
A desperate battle raged in the lonely desert under the white light of the moon. A battle that filled the night with the mad mirth of hyenas, and the wild shrieks of a frightened, hurt, infuriated horse—"The Sultan"—fighting as he had fought that day in the East End of London when Pansy had first come across him. But fighting for her life as well as his own, against the cowards that beset him. ”

“ With a flutter about her heart, Pansy picked it out and read it:—
"Heart's Ease, My Own Dear Little Girl,
This little gift comes to you with all my love, my heart, my soul, my very life indeed, given forever into your keeping.
A week ago, if anyone had told me I should write such words to a woman, I should have laughed at them. Until meeting you I did not know what love was. I had no idea one woman could be so satisfying. In you I have found the heaven I have been searching for all my life. ”

“ Le Breton thought of the desert kingdom he ruled alone, and he laughed. Then he kissed the little mouth so temptingly close to his own; a long, passionate caress that seemed to take all strength from the girl. Her head fell on his shoulder, and she lay limp within his arms, watching him in a vague, dreamy manner.
For a time there was silence. Le Breton sat with her pressed against his heart, as if to have her there were all-sufficient.
"I feel like Jonah," Pansy said presently. "All swallowed up. There seems to be nothing in the whole wide world now but you." ”

“ Lucille saw before her the rival she had suspected, who had changed Le Breton's lukewarm liking into cutting indifference. With the perception of her kind she realised that Pansy was something quite different from herself and the women Le Breton usually amused himself with. That slim girl with her wide, purple eyes and vivid, flower-like face was no courtesan, no toy; but a woman with a spirit and a soul that could hold and draw a man, apart from her physical attractions; the sort of woman, in fact, that a man like Raoul Le Breton might be tempted to marry. ”

“ Allah, give him into my hands, the Sultan Casim Ammeh, who has robbed me of the flower of my desire. That milk-white maid—a houri of thy sending. Guide my step to those who are his enemies. To those who would break him, as he has broken me. Surely a man so mighty has others as mighty who hate him. There are always kings ready to make war on other kings. Allah, most high, let me find them. Allah, most merciful, grant my prayer. Like the wind in the desert I will roam—to the east, the west, the north, the south—until I find them.—His enemies. ”

“ Above the screening trellis of roses, a tree grew, covered with great bunches of pink flowers, like apple blossom but more vivid, filling the air with fragrance.
Pansy had seen the flower before; among the blossoms that used to come to her every morning in the dim, gilded chamber.
"Still only a few flowers, Pansy?"
Le Breton's remark in the orange groves at Telde suddenly flashed across her mind. She remembered also his array of Arab servants, how obsequious they had been to their master on that occasion; and his wealth and magnificence; a splendour that was almost regal. ”

“ It is night," she cried. "And my heart is hungry for love. For the love of my Lord Casim. For his arms. His kisses. Again it is night. And he has not come."
Then through the vaulted room piercing shriek after piercing shriek rang—the shrieks of a lovesick girl in the throes of hysteria.
As Sara sat patting Rayma's hands and trying to soothe her, she thought of the milk-white maid with the wide blue eyes and the golden curls, whom the Sultan himself had brought unconscious to his palace, and who was lodged—as no other slave girl had ever been—in his own private suite. ”

“ Pansy read of Annette's dreary years in the harem of her captor.
"Years that have no light in them, save my son. Years that I should not have endured except for my child, my boy, the son of my brave Raoul."
It was a heart-breaking story of love and sacrifice, of a mother tortured to save her child from the fate that had befallen his father.
"The Sultan will make my boy like himself," the letter went on. "For there is no one at hand to stop him. Daily my influence grows less, and his stronger. The boy admires and copies the man he deems his father. ”

“ A world of dreams, remote, unreal, lost to her for ever, where she had been Pansy Langham, fêted and courted, with society at her feet. Now she was a sultan's slave, a chattel, her very life dependent on a barbaric ruler's whim.
On what punishment would be doled out to her for her attempt to get away, she next brooded. There had been such a set, determined expression on her captor's face when he brought her back to her prison.
The sound of someone coming towards her apartment broke in on her dreary reverie. It was close on midnight. She had never been disturbed at that hour before. ”

“ He laughed with a touch of fierceness.
"What cruel words to throw at your lover! But since you won't come, my little slave, then—I must take you."
He would have taken her there and then, but with a swift movement she avoided him.
Then Pansy ran, as she had run from him once before, like a white wraith in the moonlight. But this time he followed.
There were no electric lights and ragtime band to run to now. Only a moonlit garden full of the scent of roses. There was no crowd of people to give her shelter, only the deep shadows of the cypresses. ”

“ Her steps had taken her into a big room like a hall, where a crowd of women were gathered; half a dozen of them, girls dressed in a similar style to herself.
Then Pansy's strength went from her suddenly.
She realized where she was. In the Sultan's harem! And she knew there would be no escape.
Sara had come to her, and had led her towards a pile of cushions set by a fountain where the other girls were. And the woman had said sharp words to the assembly, who had risen as if to crowd around her—words that had kept them at bay. ”

“ Pansy looked at Lucille in her white satin and emeralds—Lucille, big and voluptuous, her profession written on her face.
"Who is that woman?" she demanded.
Lucille did not wait for Le Breton to answer.
One glance at him told her everything. On his face were concern, love, and annoyance; the look that comes to a man's face when the girl he would make his wife and the woman who is his mistress by some unfortunate circumstance chance to meet. ”

“ It was incredible that she, Pansy Langham, could be a slave in a Sultan's harem, garbed as these other slave girls were. Incredible that only that afternoon she had been playing tennis with Raoul Le Breton, as she might have played with any man in her own place in England.
What ages ago it was! Yet perhaps it was only an hour. Like a beautiful dream that had vanished.
There was no Raoul Le Breton. No big, masterful man whom she had had to love, in spite of everything. There was only this barbaric Sultan who hated her father. ”

“ She did not mind the life in tents, the rough jolting of her camel, the poor food, the heat, the flies; she minded nothing so long as she was with her husband. He was a man of rare fascination, as many women had found to their cost; a light lover until Annette had come into his life and captured his straying heart once and for all.
On the edge of the Sahara Le Breton met a man who, on the surface at least, appeared to see even more quickly than the majority of negro kings and Arab chiefs he had come in contact with, the advantages attached to being under the shadow of the French flag. ”

“ When Le Breton returned he dismissed Alice, and he seated himself by the couch and stayed there watching the unconscious girl.
Evening shadows crept into the tent, bringing a deft-handed, silent servant, who lighted the heavy silver lamp and withdrew as silently as he had come. Dinner appeared; a sumptuous meal that the Sultan waved aside impatiently.
Then Edouard came again, to see how the patient was faring; to give an injection and go, after a curious glance at the big, impassive figure of his patron sitting silent and brooding at his captive's side. ”

“ Pansy took one of his hands, holding it in a tight, nervous grip.
"Yes, it is really you," she said. "In the whole wide world there's no one who feels quite the same as you."
She had forgotten his coldness and harshness on the occasion of their last meeting in Grand Canary—his colour, his religion, everything except that he was there and she was safe.
He laughed tenderly and put the loose curls back from her face with a lingering, caressing touch.
It was Pansy as he had never known her, frightened and clinging to him. Pansy as he would have her, looking at him with eyes full of love. ”

“ When night came Pansy tried not to think of Le Breton, but the idea of him out there in the moonlight haunted her. She wondered how long he would wait; patience did not look to be one of his virtues.
There was a dance at the hotel again that evening. As she whirled round and round, slim and light, looking in her chiffon and diamonds a creature of mist and dew, her thoughts were with none of her partners. They were out in the garden with the big, masterful man who was so different from all others of his sex who had come into her life. ”

“ Le Breton had never had to wait for any woman he fancied, and he had no intention of waiting now.
"No, Pansy, you must marry me now, at once," he said firmly.
"What a hustler you are, Raoul. You must have American blood in you."
She said his name as if she loved it: on her lips it was a caress.
With a touch of savagery his arms tightened round the girl. Even with her in his embrace he guessed that if she knew of the Sultan Casim Ammeh there would be no chance for him. His dark blood would be an efficient barrier; one she would never cross willingly. ”

“ But it was not the punishment England would dole out to him if he were caught that filled Le Breton's mind as he sat cross-legged among the cushions, with the cruel lines about his mouth very much in evidence. His thoughts were all with Sir George Barclay's daughter.
What desert harem would be her future home? What wild chief would call that golden-haired girl his chattel?
Casim Ammeh had determined to carry out his vengeance to the letter, where Pansy was concerned. To sell her in the slave-market of his capital; and keep her father alive, tortured by the knowledge of his daughter's fate. ”

“ You rouse a man without the least intention of satisfying him."
Pansy flushed under his contempt. She hated being called "a flirt"; she was not one. She did not know why she had acted as she had done the previous night. But once in his arms, she had wanted to stay. And once he had started talking of love, she wanted to listen. With him she had forgotten all about her own scheme of life and her cherished liberty.
She knew she had not played the game with Le Breton. From the bottom of her heart she was sorry. She did not blame him, but herself. ”

“ At that moment it seemed as if the dim, gilded room were full of tears and sorrows; the faint, sweet fragrance of the girl who had lived there long years ago, suffering and enduring for the sake of her boy.
It was not in Pansy's kind heart to refuse that tragic mother pleading for her son.
Then she remembered that Colonel Le Breton's son was out there fighting against his own people. If, indeed, he were still left alive to fight. ”