that lay near, and said: "I will write to Kaid. I will
have naught to do with the army."

"It shall be the whole, not the part," answered David determinedly. "The
truth is known. It can serve no end to withhold the writing to the army.
Remember what I have said to thee. The disloyalty of the army must not
be known. Canst thou not act after the will of Allah, the all-powerful,
the all-just, the all-merciful?"

There was an instant's pause, and then suddenly Harrik placed the paper
in his palm and wrote swiftly and at some length to Kaid. Laying it
down, he took another and wrote but a few words--to Achmet and Diaz.
This message said in brief, "Do not strike. It is the will of Allah.
The army shall keep faithful until the day of the Mahdi be come. I spoke
before the time. I go to the bosom of my Lord Mahomet."

He threw the papers on the floor before David, who picked them up, read
them, and put them into his pocket.

"It is well," he said. "Egypt shall have peace. And thou, Eminence?"

"Who shall escape Fate? What I have written I have written."

David rose and salaamed. Harrik rose also. "Thou wouldst go, having
accomplished thy will?" Harrik asked, a thought flashing to his mind
again, in keeping with his earlier purpose. Why should this man be left
to trouble Egypt?

David touched his breast. "I must bear thy words to the Palace and the
Citadel."

"Are there not slaves for messengers?" Involuntarily Harrik turned his
eyes to the velvet curtains. No fear possessed David, but he felt the
keenness of the struggle, and prepared for the last critical moment of
fanaticism.

"It were a foolish thing to attempt my death," he said calmly. "I have
been thy friend to urge thee to do that which saves thee from public
shame, and Egypt from peril. I came alone, because I had no fear that
thou wouldst go to thy death shaming hospitality."

"Thou wast sure I would give myself to death?"

"Even as that I breathe. Thou wert mistaken; a madness possessed thee;
but thou, I knew, wouldst choose the way of honour. I too have had
dreams--and of Egypt. If it were for her good, I would die for her."

"Thou art mad. But the mad are in the hands of God, and--"

Suddenly Harrik stopped. There came to his ears two distant sounds--the
faint click of horses' hoofs and that dull rumble they had heard as they
talked, a sound he loved, the roar of his lions.

He clapped his hands twice, the curtains parted opposite, and a slave
slid