e?"

Ilderim hesitated; but, rallying, he answered, "I know you, yet I
am not free to tell you more."

"Some one holds you in restraint?"

The sheik closed his mouth, and walked away; but, observing Ben-Hur's
disappointment, he came back, and said, "Let us say no more about the
matter now. I will go to town; when I return, I may talk to you fully.
Give me the letter."

Ilderim rolled the papyrus carefully, restored it to its envelopes,
and became once more all energy.

"What sayest thou?" he asked, while waiting for his horse and
retinue. "I told what I would do, were I thou, and thou hast
made no answer."

"I intended to answer, sheik, and I will." Ben-Hur's countenance
and voice changed with the feeling invoked. "All thou hast said,
I will do--all at least in the power of a man. I devoted myself
to vengeance long ago. Every hour of the five years passed, I have
lived with no other thought. I have taken no respite. I have had
no pleasures of youth. The blandishments of Rome were not for me.
I wanted her to educate me for revenge. I resorted to her most
famous masters and professors--not those of rhetoric or philosophy:
alas! I had no time for them. The arts essential to a fighting-man
were my desire. I associated with gladiators, and with winners of
prizes in the Circus; and they were my teachers. The drill-masters
in the great camp accepted me as a scholar, and were proud of my
attainments in their line. O sheik, I am a soldier; but the things
of which I dream require me to be a captain. With that thought,
I have taken part in the campaign against the Parthians; when it
is over, then, if the Lord spare my life and strength--then"--he
raised his clenched hands, and spoke vehemently--"then I will be an
enemy Roman-taught in all things; then Rome shall account to me in
Roman lives for her ills. You have my answer, sheik."

Ilderim put an arm over his shoulder, and kissed him, saying,
passionately, "If thy God favor thee not, son of Hur, it is
because he is dead. Take thou this from me--sworn to, if so thy
preference run: thou shalt have my hands, and their fulness--men,
horses, camels, and the desert for preparation. I swear it! For
the present, enough. Thou shalt see or hear from me before night."

Turning abruptly off, the sheik was speedily on the road to the
city.

CHAPTER VI

The intercepted letter was conclusive upon a number of points of
great interest to Ben-Hur. It had all the effect of a