Having given her luggage ticket to a porter, Domini passed out of the station followed by Suzanne, who looked and walked like an exhausted marionette. Batouch, who had emerged from a third-class compartment before the train stopped, followed them closely, and as they reached the jostling crowd of Arabs which swarmed on the roadway he joined them with the air of a proprietor.
"Which is Madame's hotel?"
Domini looked round.
"Ah, Batouch!"
Suzanne jumped as if her string had been sharply pulled, and cast a glance of dreary suspicion upon the poet. She looked at his legs, then upwards.
He wore white socks which almost met his pantaloons. Scarcely more than an inch of pale brown skin was visible. The gold buttons of his jacket glittered brightly. His blue robe floated majestically from his broad shoulders, and the large tassel of his fez fell coquettishly towards his left ear, above which was set a pale blue flower with a woolly green leaf.
Suzanne was slightly reassured by the flower and the bright buttons.
She felt that they needed a protector in this mob of shouting brown and black men, who clamoured about them like savages, exposing bare legs and arms, even bare chests, in a most barbarous manner.
"We are going to the Hotel du Desert," Domini continued. "Is it far?"
"Only a few minutes, Madame."
"I shall like to walk there."
Suzanne collapsed. Her bones became as wax with apprehension. She saw herself toiling over leagues of sand towards some nameless hovel.
"Suzanne, you can get into the omnibus and take the handbags."
At the sweet word omnibus a ray of hope stole into the maid's heart, and when a nicely-dressed man, in a long blue coat and indubitable trousers, assisted her politely into a vehicle which was unmistakable she almost wept for joy.
Meanwhile Domini, escorted serenely by the poet, walked towards the long gardens of Beni-Mora. She passed over a wooden bridge. White dust was flying from the road, along which many of the Arab aristocracy were indolently strolling, carrying lightly in their hands small red roses or sprigs of pink geranium. In their white robes they looked, she thought, like monks, though the cigarettes many of them were smoking fought against the illusion. Some of them were dressed like Batouch in pale-coloured cloth. They held each other's hands loosely as they sauntered along, chattering in soft contralto voices. Two or three were attended by servants, who walked a pace or two behind them on the left. These were members of great families, rulers of tribes, men who had influence over the Sahara people. One, a shortish man with a coal-black beard, moved so majestically that he seemed almost a giant. His face was very pale. On one of his small, almost white, hands glittered a diamond ring. A boy with a long, hooked nose strolled gravely near him, wearing brown kid gloves and a turban spangled with gold.
"That is the Kaid of Tonga, Madame," whispered Batouch, looking at the pale man reverently. "He is here /en permission/."
"How white he is."
"They tried to poison him. Ever since he is ill inside. That is his brother. The brown gloves are very chic."
A light carriage rolled rapidly by them in a white mist of dust. It was drawn by a pair of white mules, who whisked their long tails as they trotted briskly, urged on by a cracking whip. A big boy with heavy brown eyes was the coachman. By his side sat a very tall young negro with a humorous pointed nose, dressed in primrose yellow. He grinned at Batouch out of the mist, which accentuated the coal-black hue of his whimsical, happy face.
"That is the Agha's son with Mabrouk."
They turned aside from the road and came into a long tunnel formed by mimosa trees that met above a broad path. To right and left were other little paths branching among the trunks of fruit trees and the narrow twigs of many bushes that grew luxuriantly. Between sandy brown banks, carefully flattened and beaten hard by the spades of Arab gardeners, glided streams of opaque water that were guided from the desert by a system of dams. The Kaid's mill watched over them and the great wall of the fort. In the tunnel the light was very delicate and tinged with green. The noise of the water flowing was just audible. A few Arabs were sitting on benches in dreamy attitudes, with their heelless slippers hanging from the toes of their bare feet. Beyond the entrance of the tunnel Domini could see two horsemen galloping at a tremendous pace into the desert. Their red cloaks streamed out over the sloping quarters of their horses, which devoured the earth as if in a frenzy of emulation. They disappeared into the last glories of the sun, which still lingered on the plain and blazed among the summits of the red mountains.
All the contrasts of this land were exquisite to Domini and, in some mysterious way, suggested eternal things; whispering through colour, gleam, and shadow, through the pattern of leaf and rock, through the air, now fresh, now tenderly warm and perfumed, through the silence that hung like a filmy cloud in the golden heaven.
She and Batouch entered the tunnel, passing at once into definite evening. The quiet of these gardens was delicious, and was only interrupted now and then by the sound of wheels upon the road as a carriage rolled by to some house which was hidden in the distance of the oasis. The seated Arabs scarcely disturbed it by their murmured talk. Many of them indeed said nothing, but rested like lotus-eaters in graceful attitudes, with hanging hands, and eyes, soft as the eyes of gazelles, that regarded the shadowy paths and creeping waters with a grave serenity born of the inmost spirit of idleness.
But Batouch loved to talk, and soon began a languid monologue.