Shortly after, she was lifted to the back of a horse, and surrounded by Arabs, was escorted through the gateway of the village and off into the jungle toward the west.Half an hour later the party turned north, and northerly was their direction for the balance of the march.
M.Frecoult spoke with her but seldom, and she understood that in carrying out his deception he must maintain the semblance of her captor, rather than protector, and so she suspected nothing though she saw the friendly relations which seemed to exist between the European and the Arab leader of the band.
If Werper succeeded in keeping himself from conversation with the young woman, he failed signally to expel her from his thoughts.A hundred times a day he found his eyes wandering in her direction and feasting themselves upon her charms of face and figure.
Each hour his infatuation for her grew, until his desire to possess her gained almost the proportions of madness.
If either the girl or Mohammed Beyd could have guessed what passed in the mind of the man which each thought a friend and ally, the apparent harmony of the little company would have been rudely disturbed.
Werper had not succeeded in arranging to tent with Mohammed Beyd, and so he revolved many plans for the assassination of the Arab that would have been greatly simplified had he been permitted to share the other's nightly shelter.
Upon the second day out Mohammed Beyd reined his horse to the side of the animal on which the captive was mounted.It was, apparently, the first notice which the Arab had taken of the girl; but many times during these two days had his cunning eyes peered greedily from beneath the hood of his burnoose to gloat upon the beauties of the prisoner.
Nor was this hidden infatuation of any recent origin.
He had conceived it when first the wife of the Englishman had fallen into the hands of Achmet Zek; but while that austere chieftain lived, Mohammed Beyd had not even dared hope for a realization of his imaginings.
Now, though, it was different--only a despised dog of a Christian stood between himself and possession of the girl.How easy it would be to slay the unbeliever, and take unto himself both the woman and the jewels! With the latter in his possession, the ransom which might be obtained for the captive would form no great inducement to her relinquishment in the face of the pleasures of sole ownership of her.Yes, he would kill Werper, retain all the jewels and keep the Englishwoman.
He turned his eyes upon her as she rode along at his side.How beautiful she was! His fingers opened and closed--skinny, brown talons itching to feel the soft flesh of the victim in their remorseless clutch.
"Do you know," he asked leaning toward her, "where this man would take you?"
Jane Clayton nodded affirmatively.
"And you are willing to become the plaything of a black sultan?"
The girl drew herself up to her full height, and turned her head away; but she did not reply.She feared lest her knowledge of the ruse that M.Frecoult was playing upon the Arab might cause her to betray herself through an insufficient display of terror and aversion.
"You can escape this fate," continued the Arab;
"Mohammed Beyd will save you," and he reached out a brown hand and seized the fingers of her right hand in a grasp so sudden and so fierce that this brutal passion was revealed as clearly in the act as though his lips had confessed it in words.Jane Clayton wrenched herself from his grasp.
"You beast!" she cried."Leave me or I shall call M.
Frecoult."