The Veiled Man Part 7

I glanced around upon the few miserable ruins of mud-built houses, and saw beyond them large mounds which, in themselves, indicated that the foundations of an important centre of a forgotten civilisation lay buried beneath where we stood.

"Lebo had one son," continued Zohra, "and he had revolted against his father; therefore the latter, feeling that his strength was failing, and having been told by the sorcerers that on his death his great kingdom would dwindle until his name became forgotten, resolved to build these three pyramids, that they should remain throughout all ages as monuments of his greatness."

"And the treasure?" I asked. "Is it stated what became of it?"

"Most precisely. It is recorded here," she answered, pointing to a half-defaced line in the mysterious screed. "The king feared lest his refractory son, who had endeavoured to usurp his power in the country many marches farther south, would obtain possession of the spoils of war, therefore he concealed them in one of yonder monuments."

"In there!" I cried eagerly. "Is the treasure actually still there?"

"It cannot have been removed. The secret lies in the apex of the third and lastly constructed monument," she explained.

"But the summit cannot be reached," I observed, glancing up at the high point. "It would require a ladder as long as that of Jacob's dream."

"There is a secret way," she answered quite calmly. "If thou art prepared for the risk, I am quite ready to accompany thee. Let us at once explore."

Together we approached the base of the third pyramid, and Zohra, after careful calculation and examination, led me to a spot where there was a hole in the stone just of sufficient size to admit a human foot. One might have pa.s.sed it by unnoticed, for so cunningly was it devised that it looked like a natural defect in the block of granite.

"Behold!" she cried. "Climb, and I will follow."

The day was hot, and the sun had only just pa.s.sed the noon, nevertheless I placed my foot in the burning stone, and scrambling forward found that she had made no mistake. At intervals there were similar footholds, winding, intricate, and in many instances filled with the nests of vultures, but always ascending. For fully half an hour we toiled upward to the apex, until we at length reached it, perspiring and panting, and minutely examined the single enormous block of stone that capped the summit. By its size I saw that no human hands could move it. If the treasure lay beneath, then it must remain for ever concealed.

"That parchment giveth no instructions how the spoils of war may be reached. We must discover that for ourselves," she observed, clambering on, still in her ragged male attire with which I had furnished her before leaving the stronghold of the Black Sultan.

I was clinging with one arm around the apex itself, and with the other grasping her soft white hand. She had looked down from the dizzy height and shuddered, therefore I feared lest she might be seized with a sudden giddiness. But quickly she released herself, and proceeded to scramble along on hands and knees, making a minute investigation of the wall.

Her sudden cry brought me quickly to her side, and my heart leapt wildly when I discerned before me, in the wall of the pyramid, immediately at the base of the gigantic block forming the apex, an aperture closed by a sheet of heavy iron, coloured exactly the same as the stone and quite indistinguishable from it. Some minutes we spent in its examination, beating upon it with our fists. But the secret how to open it was an enigma as great as that of the closed cavern in our book of the "Thousand Nights and a Night," until suddenly, by merest chance, we both placed our hands upon it, and it moved slightly beneath our touch. Next moment, with a cry, we both pushed our hardest, and slowly, ever so slowly, it slid along, grating in the groove, which was doubtless filled by the dust of centuries, disclosing a small, dark, low chamber roofed by the apex-stone.

Stepping inside, our gaze eagerly wandered around the mysterious place, and we at once saw that we had indeed discovered the treasure-house of Lebo the Great, for around us were piled a wondrous store of gold and gems, personal ornaments and great golden goblets and salvers. The aggregate value of the treasure was enormous.

"Of a verity," I cried, "this is amazing!"

"Yea," she answered, turning her fine eyes upon me. "I give this secret entirely and unreservedly unto thee, as reward for thine aid. At the going down of the sun I shall part from thee, and leave this home of my race for ever. In six hours' march, by the secret gorges, I can reach our encampment, therefore trouble no further after me. Close this treasure-house, return to thine own people, and let them profit by thy discovery."

"But thou, Zohra, boldest me in fascination," I cried pa.s.sionately.

"Thou hast entranced me. I love thee!"

"Love can never enter mine heart," she answered with a calm smile, but sighing nevertheless. "I am already the wife of thine enemy, Melaki, ruler of the Kel-Oui."

"Wife of Melaki!" I exclaimed amazed. "And thou hast done this?"

"Yes," she answered in a lower voice. "I have given thee thy promised reward, so that thou and thy people may become rich, and some day make brotherhood with us, and unite against the Black Sultan."

"If such is in my power it shall be done," I said, stooping and imprinting a pa.s.sionate kiss upon her soft white hand. Then soon afterwards we closed the mouth of the chamber and descended, finding the task no easy one. At the base of the "Dwarf" we parted, and never since have mine eyes beheld her beautiful countenance.

Ere a moon had pa.s.sed away, I had conducted a party of my clansmen unto the Three Dwarfs, and we had removed the treasure of the great founder of the Kel-Oui. Of such quant.i.ty was it that seven camels were required to convey it to Mourzouk, where it was sold to the Jews in the market, and fetched a sum which greatly swelled our finances.

True to my promise, when I a.s.sumed the chieftains.h.i.+p of the Azjar, I effected a friendly alliance with the Kel-Oui, and endeavoured to seek out Zohra.

But with poignant grief I learnt that soon after her return to her people she had been seized by a mysterious illness which proved fatal.

Undoubtedly she was poisoned, for it was her evil-faced husband, Melaki, who told me how he had found in her possession a mysterious screed relating to the treasure of Lebo, and how, when questioned, she had admitted revealing its secret to the man who had rescued her from the harem of the Black Sultan.

Melaki never knew that the man with whom she fled from Agadez, and who loved her more devotedly than any other man had ever done, was myself.

CHAPTER FIVE.

THE COMING OF ALLAH.

One breathless evening, when the golden sun had deepened to crimson, and the shadows of the rocks were lengthening upon the white furnace of the sands, an alarm spread through our camp that strange hors.e.m.e.n were riding hard down the valley in our direction. Marauders that we were, fierce reprisals were of no infrequent occurrence, therefore the women and children were quickly hurried out of the way, the camels tethered, and each man gripped his spear, prepared to resist whatever onslaught might be made.

Along the Wady Ereren, six days' march south of the town of Ghat, where we were at that time encamped, we had taken the precaution to post three men in order to give us warning in case of any projected attack by the Kel-Alkoum, the powerful people with whom we were at feud on account of the murder of six of our clansmen up in the north of Fezzan. Our outposts, however, had sent us no word, therefore the only conclusion was that they had been surprised and killed ere they could reach us.

Hearing the news, I clambered up the bank of the ancient dried-up watercourse, in the bed of which we had pitched our tents, and, looking across the bend, we saw four dark specks approaching. The eye of the Touareg is as keen as that of the eagle, for, living as we do upon plunder, our intelligence becomes so sharpened that we somehow instinctively scent the approach of the stranger long before we see or hear him. In a few moments the men crowded about me for my opinion.

Tamahu was dead, and this occurred in the first year of my chieftains.h.i.+p of the Azjar.

"Let all four be captured and brought to me," I said, my eyes still fixed upon the approaching figures. "If they resist, kill them."

In an instant twenty men, dark and forbidding in their black veils, sprang into their high-backed bra.s.s-mounted saddles, and with their gleaming spears held high, ready to strike, swept away down the valley to meet the new-comers.

Half an hour pa.s.sed anxiously. The women in the rear chattered excitedly, and the children, held back by them, rent the air by their cries. From where I stood I was unable to witness the meeting of our men with the strangers, but suddenly the sound of firearms reached our ears. Then I felt a.s.sured that the mysterious hors.e.m.e.n must either be the advance-guard of some valuable caravan from Algeria, or of an army from the north. Yet again and again the guns spoke forth, and so rapidly that I feared for the safety of our men; but at last there was silence deep and complete, and when I descended to the camp I found a tumultuous excitement prevailing. The four men, escorted by those who had gone to arrest them, were still carrying their guns, and as they slipped from their saddles before me, smiles broadened their unveiled faces.

I looked at them puzzled. It seemed as though the firing had been but powder-play.

"Behold! O Ahamadou, our Sheikh! We are thy kinsmen, yet thou hast sent to attack us!" they exclaimed.

"Our kinsmen!" I cried, noticing that they wore the white burnouse of the north, with their _haicks_ held around their heads by ropes of twisted camel's hair. They wore no veils, and a Touareg is unrecognisable, even to his relatives, if his black _litham_ be removed.

"Yea," cried one, the elder of the four. "Lend us a veil, and we will show thee."

A strip of black cotton cloth was thrust into his hand by one of the crowd, and he a.s.sumed it, twisting it deftly as only a Touareg can.

Then he turned and faced the onlookers, who with one accord laughed immoderately, hailing him as Taghma, son of Ifafan. Then the other three a.s.sumed the veil, and were, one by one, recognised and received back by their relatives.

At the conclusion of this strange ceremony, Taghma turned to me explaining how long ago before Ramadan they had wandered afar with their flocks to the oasis of Ezirer, and were there taken captives by the Kel-Alkoum.

"But," he added, "we have seen with our eyes the greatest wonder on earth. Allah himself hath come down from heaven!"

"What?" I cried, starting to my feet. "Thou liest!" The sensation caused by the man's calm announcement was intense.

"If my tongue uttereth falsehood, O Sheikh! then let it be cut out," he said. "I have seen Allah, the One. He guideth the Kel-Alkoum our enemies, and we are of a verity forsaken."

"Ah!" wailed the old marabout Ajrab. "Did I not warn ye that because of your inattention to your devotions and your neglect to say the five prayers, the One Merciful would leave you to perish and be eaten by the vultures like the lame camel in the wilderness?"

"Loose not thy tongue's strings," I commanded quickly. "Let us hearken unto Taghma, who hath seen the One from above."

"Of a verity, O Ahamadou!" answered the escaped captive, "we are lost, for Allah hath promised to render a.s.sistance unto the people he favoured in their expeditions. He declareth that we, of the Touaregs, are the parasites of the earth, and that we shall be exterminated, not one being left. Truly he can render our spears as broken reeds, and our blades as useless as rusted tin. Each day at the _maghrib_ he standeth beneath a baldachin of purple and giveth the people an a.s.surance of his favour, while all fall down and kiss the hem of his crimson garment so that they may be blessed. In Salemma, El Had, El Guerat, and the villages around Gatron, he hath healed the sick and performed wondrous miracles, while before our own eyes hath he caused a great tree to rise from the bare sand--a marvel which no earthly being could accomplish."

"The latter thou hast thyself seen?" I enquired, much interested in this most remarkable statement.

"We have, O Sheikh!" he answered. "The face of Allah is in the darkness as a s.h.i.+ning light. Verily the promise in the _sura_ is fulfilled. He hath come in person to lead the Faithful unto conquest."