Hall Caine - The White Prophet, Volume I (of 2)

"You are satisfied, sir, that this man is likely to lead the poor, foolish people into rapine and slaughter?"

"I recognise a bird by its flight. This is another Mahdi – I see it – I feel it," said the Consul-General, and his eyes flashed and his voice echoed like a horn.

"You want me to smash the Mahdi?"

"Exactly! Your namesake wanted to smash his predecessor – romantic person – too fond of guiding his conduct by reference to the prophet Isaiah; but he was right in that, and the Government was wrong, and the consequence was the massacre you represented to-day."

"I have to arrest Ishmael Ameer?"

"That's so, in open riot if possible, and if not, by means of testimony derived from his sermons in the mosques."

"Hadn't we better begin there, sir – make sure that he is inciting the people to violence?"

"As you please!"

"You don't forget that the mosques are closed to me as a Christian?"

The Consul-General reflected for a moment and then said —

"Where's Fatimah's son, Hafiz?"

"With his regiment at Abbassiah."

"Take him with you – take two other Moslem witnesses as well."

"I'm to bring this new prophet back to Cairo?"

"That's it – bring him here – we'll do all the rest."

"What if there should be trouble with the people?"

"There's a battalion of British soldiers in Alexandria. Keep a force in readiness – under arms night and day."

"But if it should spread beyond Alexandria?"

"So much the better for you. I mean," said the Consul-General, hesitating for the first time, "we don't want bloodshed, but if it must come to that, it must, and the eyes of England will be on you. What more can a young man want? Think of yourself" – he put his hand on his son's shoulder again – "think of yourself as on the eve of crushing England's enemies and rendering a signal service to Gordon Lord as well. And now go – go up to your General and get his formal consent. My love to Helena! Fine girl, very! She's the sort of woman who might … yes, women are the springs that move everything in this world. Bid good-bye to your mother and get away. Lose no time. Write to me as soon as you have anything to say. That's enough for the present. I'm busy. Good day!"

Almost before Gordon had left the library the Consul-General was back at his desk – the stern, saturnine man once more, with a face that seemed to express a mind inaccessible to human emotions of any sort.

"As bright as light – sees things before one says them," he said to himself, as Gordon closed the door on going out. "Why have I wasted myself with weaklings so long?"

Gordon kissed his pale-faced mother in the drawing-room and his swarthy foster-mother in the porch, and went back to his quarters in barracks – a rather bare room with bed, desk, and bookcase, many riding boots on a shelf, several weapons of savage warfare on the walls, a dervish's suit of chain armour with a bullet-hole where the heart of the man had been, a picture of Eton, his old school, and above all, as became the home of a soldier, many photographs of his womankind – his mother with her plaintive smile, Fatimah with her humorous look, and of course Helena, with her glorious eyes – Helena, Helena, everywhere Helena.

There, taking down the receiver of a telephone, he called up the headquarters of the Egyptian army and spoke to Hafiz, his foster-brother, now a captain in the native cavalry.

"Is that you, Hafiz? … Well, look here, I want to know if you can arrange to go with me to Alexandria for a day or two … You can? Good! I wish you to help me to deal with that new preacher, prophet, Mahdi, what's his name now? … That's it, Ishmael Ameer. He has been setting Moslem against Christian, and we've got to lay the gentleman by the heels before he gets the poor, credulous people into further trouble… What do you say? … Not that kind of man, you think? … No? … You surprise me… Do you really mean to say … Certainly, that's only fair … Yes, I ought to know all about him… Your uncle? … Chancellor of the University? … I know, El Azhar… When could I see him? … What day do we go to Alexandria? To-morrow if possible… To-night the only convenient time, you think? Well, I promised to dine at the Citadel, but I suppose I must write to Helena… Oh, needs must when the devil drives, old fellow… To-night, then? … You'll come down for me immediately? Good! By-bye!"

With that he rang off and sat down to write a letter.

Gordon Lord loved the Egyptians. Nursed on the knee of an Egyptian woman, speaking Arabic as his mother tongue, lisping the songs of Arabia before he knew a word of English, Egypt was under his very skin, and the spirit of the Nile and of the desert was in his blood.

Only once a day in his childhood was there a break in his Arab life. That was in the evening about sunset, when Fatimah took him into his father's library, and the great man with the stern face, who assumed towards him a singularly cold manner, put him through a catechism which was always the same: "Tutor been here to-day, boy?" "Yes, sir." "Done your lessons?" "Yes, sir." "English – French – everything?" "Yes, sir." "Say good-night to your mother and go to bed."

Then for a few moments more he was taken into his mother's boudoir, the cool room with the blinds down to keep out the sun, where the lady with the beautiful pale face embraced and kissed him, and made him kneel by her side while they said the Lord's Prayer together in a rustling whisper like a breeze in the garden. But, after that, off to bed with Hafiz – who in his Arab caftan and fez had been looking furtively in at the half-open door – up two steps at a time, shouting and singing in Arabic, while Fatimah, in fear of the Consul-General, cried, "Hush! Be good, now, my sweet eyes!"

In his boyhood, too, he had been half a Mohammedan, going every afternoon to fetch Hafiz home from the kuttab, the school of the mosque, and romping round the sacred place like a little king in stockinged feet, until the Sheikh in charge, who pretended as long as possible not to see him, came with a long cane to whip him out, always saying he should never come there again – until to-morrow.

While at school in England he had felt like a foreigner, wearing his silk hat on the back of his head as if it had been a tarboosh; and while at Sandhurst, where he got through his three years more easily in spite of a certain restiveness under discipline, he had always looked forward to his Christmas visits home – that is to say, to Cairo.

But at last he came back to Egypt on a great errand, with the expedition that was intended to revenge the death of his heroic namesake, having got his commission by that time, and being asked for by his father's old friend, Reginald Mannering, who was a Colonel in the Egyptian army. His joy was wild, his excitement delirious, and even the desert marches under the blazing sun and the sky of brass, killing to some of his British comrades, was a long delight to the Arab soul in him.

The first fighting he did, too, was done with an Egyptian by his side. His great chum was a young Lieutenant named Ali Awad, the son of a Pasha, a bright, intelligent, affectionate young fellow who was intensely sensitive to the contempt of British officers for the quality of the courage of their Egyptian colleagues. During the hurly-burly of the battle of Omdurman both Gordon and Ali had been eager to get at the enemy, but their Colonel had held them back, saying, "What will your fathers say to me if I allow you to go into a hell like that?" When the dervish lines had been utterly broken, though, and one coffee-coloured demon in chain armour was stealing off with his black banner, the Colonel said, "Now's your time, boys; show what stuff you are made of; bring me back that flag," and before the words were out of his mouth the young soldiers were gone.