Stories by English Authors: Africa

V >> Various >> Stories by English Authors: Africa


"Yes," said Xantippe, quietly, repeating her husband's words as she
kissed the forehead of her child, "we must save him."

"There is only one way."

"Only one way," repeated Xantippe, dreamily. There was a pause, and
then, as though the words had grown to have a meaning to her that she
could not fathom, she queried, "What way, Gregorio?"

"That," he said, roughly, as he caught her by the wrist, and, dragging
her to the window, pointed to the women in the street beneath.

Xantippe hid her face on her husband's breast and cried softly, while
she murmured, "No, no; I will never consent."

"Then the child will die," answered the Greek, curtly, flinging her from
him.

And the poor woman cast herself upon the bed beside her boy, and when
her tears ceased for a moment stammered, "When?"

"To-morrow," was the answer, cruel and peremptory. And as Gregorio
closed the lattice, shutting out the noise of song and laughter, the
room echoed with the mighty sobbing of a woman who was betrayed, and who
repeated hysterically, while kissing the face of her child, "To-morrow,
to-morrow there will be food for you."

And Gregorio slept peacefully, for the danger of starvation was over; he
would yet live to see his son become rich.

And the woman?

He kissed her before he slept, and women always cry.




IV--CONCERNING TWO WOMEN

Gregorio felt a little bit ashamed of himself next morning. The
excitement had passed, and the full meaning of his words came back to
him and made him shudder. The sun, already risen, sent shafts of light
between the lips of the wooden lattice. A faint sound of life and
movement stole upward from the street below. But Xantippe and the boy
still slumbered, though the woman's form shook convulsively at times,
for she sobbed in her sleep.

Gregorio looked at the two for a minute and then raised himself with
an oath. The woman's heavy breathing irritated him, for, after all, he
argued, it was her duty as well as his to sacrifice herself for the lad.
Moreover, the Jew must be paid, and to-day was that appointed by Amos
for the settling of their account. There was no money to pay it with,
and they must lose their furniture, so much at least was certain. But
Amos would not have the best of the bargain, thought the Greek as he
looked round the room with a grin, and the certainty that he had got
the better of Amos for the moment cheered his spirits. Then, too, after
to-day there would be plenty to eat, for his wife could manage to earn
money; nor was the man so mean in his villainy as to shirk any effort to
earn money himself. After first looking at his wife critically and with
a satisfied smile, he touched her on the shoulder to wake her.

"I am going out for work," he said, as Xantippe opened her eyes.

"All right."

"Good-bye."

But Xantippe answered not. She turned her face to the wall wearily as
Gregorio left her.

Entering the street he made straight for Amos's house, and told the
porter, who was still lying on the trestle before the door, that he
could not pay the Jew's bill. Then without waiting for an answer, he
hurried off to the quay.

With better luck than on the previous day, he managed to obtain
employment for some hours. The Greek mail-boat had arrived, and under
the blazing sun he toiled good-humouredly and patiently. The work
was hard, but it gave him no opportunity of thinking. He had to be
continually dodging large bales of fruit and wine, and if he made a
mistake the officer on duty would shout at him angrily, "Lazy dog! you
would not have left Greece were you not an idle fellow." Such words
wounded his pride, and he determined to do so well that he should earn
praise. But the little officer, his bright buttons flashing in the
sunlight, who smoked quietly in the intervals of silence, never praised
anybody; but he left off abusing Gregorio at last, and when work ceased
for the day bade him come again on the morrow.

At sunset Gregorio pocketed his few hard-earned piastres and wandered
cityward. He did not care to go back to his home, for he knew there
would be miserable stories to tell of the Jew's anger, and, moreover,
he was terribly thirsty. So he went into a little cafe--known as the
Penny-farthing Shop--opposite his house and called for a flask of
kephisa. As he sipped the wine he glanced up nervously at his window and
wondered whether his wife had already left home. Were he sure that she
had, he would leave his wine untouched and hasten to look after his
son and give him food. But until he knew Xantippe had gone he would not
move. The sobs of yesterday still disturbed him, and he was more than
once on the point of cancelling his resolves. But as the wine stirred
his blood he became satisfied with what he had done and said. The little
cafe at Benhur that was to make his fortune seemed nearly in his grasp.
Had he not, he asked himself, worked all day without a murmur? It was
right Xantippe should help him.

As he sat dreamily thinking over these things, and watching the shadows
turn to a darker purple under the oil-lamps, a woman spoke to him.

"Well, Gregorio, are you asleep?"

"No," said he, turning toward his questioner.

The woman laughed. She was a big woman, dressed in loose folds of red
and blue. Her hair was dishevelled, and ornamented with brass pins
fastened into it at random. Her sleeves were rolled up to her armpits,
and she had her arms akimbo--fat, flabby arms that shook as she laughed.
Her eyes were almost hidden, she screwed them up so closely, but her
wide mouth opened and disclosed a row of gigantic, flawless teeth.

Gregorio frowned as he looked at her. He knew her well and had never
liked her. But he dare not quarrel with her, for he owed her money, and
"for the love of his black eyes," as she told him, she had ever a bottle
of wine ready for him when he wished.

"Well, my good woman," he blurted out, surlily, "you seem to be amused."

"I am, Gregorio. Tell me," she continued, slyly, seating herself beside
him and placing her elbows on the table, "how is she?"

"Who?"

"Xantippe. She came to me to-day, and I saw she had been crying. But I
said nothing, because it is not always wise to ask questions. I thought
she wept because she was hungry and because the baby was hungry. I
offered her food and she took some, but so little, scarcely enough to
cover a ten-piastre piece. 'That is for the baby,' I said; 'now some for
you.' But she refused."

"Perhaps she had food for herself," said Gregorio, shifting uneasily in
his chair.

"Perhaps," said the woman, and laughed again, more loudly than ever,
till the table shook. "But she asked me for something else," she
continued, when her merriment languished for want of breath; "she asked
me to let her have an old dress of mine, a bright yellow-and-red dress,
and she borrowed some ornaments. It is not right of you, Gregorio, to
keep an old friend on the door-step when you have a fantasia."

Gregorio scowled savagely. After a pause he said, "I don't know why my
wife wanted your dress and ornaments."

"Oh yes, you do, friend Gregorio." And she laughed again, this time
a suppressed, chuckling laugh that threatened to choke her; and she
supported her chin on her hands, while her eyes peered through the
enveloping fat at the man who sat opposite to her. Suddenly she stood
up, and taking Gregorio by the arm dragged him to the door.

"See, there she goes. My garments are cleverly altered and suit her
finely, don't they? Ah, well, my friend, a man who cannot support a wife
should marry a woman who can support him."

Gregorio did not stop to answer her, but pushed past her into the
street. The woman watched him enter the house opposite, and then
returned quietly to her work. But there was a smile hovering round her
lips as she murmured to herself, "Ah, well, in time."

Gregorio meanwhile had run up to his room and entered it breathless with
excitement. The first glance told him that Amos had seized all he
could, for nothing remained save a wooden bench and one or two coarse,
half-disabled cooking utensils.

Gregorio swore a little as he realised what had happened. Then he saw in
a corner by the window his son and Ahmed.

"She has gone," said Ahmed, as Gregorio's gaze rested on him. But she
might have gone merely to market, or to see a neighbour, for all the
imperturbable Arab face disclosed. As soon as he had spoken the man bent
over the child, laughing softly as the youngster played with his beard.
For the Arab, as he is miscalled, is fond of children, and there are
none to whom children take so readily as to the Egyptian fellahin.

Gregorio watched the two for a moment, and then placing his remaining
piastres in the man's hand bade him bring food and wine. As soon as
he was left alone with his son, he flung himself down on the floor and
kissed, "You shall be a great man, ay, a rich man, my son."

He repeated the sentence over and over again, punctuating it with
kisses, while the two-year-old regarded him wonderingly, until Ahmed
returned.

When the meal was ended Gregorio took the boy in his arms and sang to
him softly till at last the infant slept. Then he placed him gently on
the floor, having first made of his coat a bed, and went to the window
and flung back the shutters. He smoked quietly as the minutes went by,
waiting impatiently for his wife to return. It seemed to him monstrous
that the boy who was to inherit a fortune should be sleeping on the
dirty floor wrapped in an old coat; that an Arab, a mere fellah, should
amuse his son and play with him, when Greek nurses were to be hired in
Alexandria had one only the money. Long after midnight he heard a step
on the stairs, and a minute after the door opened. He recognised his
wife's footsteps, and he rose to meet her. As she came into the room she
looked quickly round, and seeing her son went toward him and kissed him.
Gregorio, half afraid, stood by the window watching her. She let her
glance rest on him a minute, then she turned round and laid her cloak
upon the floor.

"Xantippe!"

But she did not answer.

"Xantippe, I have fed our son. The good days are coming when we shall be
rich and happy."

But Xantippe was too busy folding out the creases of her cloak to
notice him. The moonlight streamed on to her, and her face shone like an
angel's. Gregorio made one step toward her, ravished, for she had never
appeared so beautiful to him. For the moment he forgot the whole hideous
history of the last few days and the brief, horrible conversation of the
night before. Fired with a desire to touch her, to kiss her, to
whisper into her ear, in the soft Greek speech, all the endearments and
tendernesses that had won her when he wooed her, he placed his hand upon
her arm. As if stung by a venomous snake, the woman recoiled from his
touch. With a quick movement she sprang back and flung at his face a
handful of gold and silver coins.

"Take them; they're yours," she cried, huskily, and retreated into the
farthest corner of the room.

With a savage curse Gregorio put his hand to his lips and wiped away the
blood, for a heavy coin had cut him. Then he ran swiftly downstairs, and
Xantippe, as she lay down wearily beside her boy, heard a woman laugh.




V--XANTIPPE LOOKS OUT OF THE WINDOW

The Penny-farthing Shop was full of customers, and Madam Marx, the
fat woman who followed Gregorio to the bar, was for a long time busy
attending to her clients. Some English war-ships had entered the harbour
at sunset, and many of the sailors had lost no time in seeking out their
favourite haunt. Most of them knew Madam Marx well, as a good-natured
woman who gave them plenty to drink for their money, and secreted
them from the eyes of the police when the liquor overpowered them.
Consequently there was much laughter and shaking of hands, and many a
rough jest, which Madam Marx responded to in broken English. Gregorio
watched the sailors gloomily. He hated the English, for even their
sailors seemed to have plenty of money, and he recalled the rich
Englishman he had seen at the Cafe Paradiso, drinking champagne and
buying flowers for the Hungarian woman who played the fiddle. The scene
he had just left contrasted disagreeably with the fun and jollity that
surrounded him. But he felt unable to shake off his gloom and annoyance,
and Madam Marx's attentions irritated him. He felt that her eyes
continually rested on him, that, however busy she might be, he was never
out of her thoughts. Every few minutes she would come toward him with a
bottle of wine and fill up his glass, saying, "Come, my friend; wine
is good and will drown your troubles." And though he resented her
patronage, knowing he could not pay, he nevertheless drank steadily.

Every few minutes he heard the sound of horses' hoofs on the hard
roadway, and through the windows he saw the military police pass slowly
on their rounds.

At last the strong drinks so amiably retailed by Madam Marx did their
work, and the men lay about the floor asleep and breathing heavily. The
silence succeeding the noise startled Gregorio from his sullen humour.
Madam Marx came and sat beside him, weary as she was with her long
labours, and talked volubly. The wine had mounted to his head, and he
answered her in rapid sentences, accompanying his words with gesture and
grimace. What he talked about he scarcely knew, but the woman laughed,
and he took an insane delight in hearing her. Just before daylight he
fell asleep, resting his head on his arms, that were spread across
the table. Madam Marx kissed him as he slept, murmuring to herself
contentedly, "Ah, well, in time."

When Gregorio woke the sun was high in the heavens, blazing out of a
brazen sky. Clouds of dust swept past the door from time to time, and
cut his neck and face as he stood on the threshold smoking lazily. It
was too late to go down to the quay, for his place must have long ago
been filled by another. He was not sorry, since he by no means desired
to toil again under the hot sun; the heavy drinking of the night had
made him lethargic, and he was so thirsty the heat nearly choked him.
He called out to a water-carrier staggering along in the scanty shade on
the opposite side of the street, and took eagerly a draught of water.
He touched the pigskin with his hand, and it was hot. The water was
warm and made him sick; he spat it from his mouth hastily, and hearing a
laugh behind him, turned round and saw Madam Marx.

"See, here is some wine, my friend; leave the water for the Arabs."

Gregorio gratefully seized the flagon and let the wine trickle down his
throat, while Madam Marx, with arms akimbo, stood patiently before him.

"I must go now," he said, as he handed back the half-emptied flask.

"Why?"

"Because I must get some work."

"It is not easy to get work in the summer."

"I know, but I must get some. I owe money to Amos."

"Yes, I know. But your wife is making money now."

The man scowled at her. "How do you know that? Before God, I swear that
she is not."

"Come, come, Gregorio. You were drunk last night, and your tongue wagged
pretty freely. It's not a bit of use being angry with me, because I only
know what you've told me. Besides, I'm your friend, you know that."

Gregorio flushed angrily at the woman's words, but he knew quite well
it was no use replying to them, for she was speaking only the truth. But
the knowledge that he had betrayed his secret annoyed him. He had grown
used to the facts and could look at them easily enough, but he had not
reckoned on others also learning them.

He determined to go out and find work, or at any rate to tramp the
streets pretending to look for something to do. The woman became
intolerable to him, and the Penny-farthing Shop, reeking with the odour
of stale tobacco and spilled liquor, poisoned him. He took up his hat
brusquely and stepped into the street.

Madam Marx, standing at the door, laughed at him as she called out,
"Good-bye, Gregorio; when will you come back?"

He did not answer, but the sound of her laughter followed him up the
street, and he kicked angrily at the stones in his path.

At last he passed by the Ras-el-Tin barracks. He looked curiously at the
English soldiers. Some were playing polo on the hard brown space to
the left, and from the windows of the building men leaned out, their
shirt-sleeves rolled up and their strong arms bared to the sun. They
smoked short clay pipes, and innumerable little blue spiral clouds
mounted skyward. Obviously the heat did not greatly inconvenience them,
for they laughed and sang and drank oceans of beer.

The sight of them annoyed Gregorio. He looked at the pewter mugs shining
in the sunlight. He eyed greedily the passage of one from hand to hand;
and when one man, after taking a long pull, laughed and held it upside
down to show him it was empty, he burst into an uncontrollable fit of
anger, and shook his fist impotently at the soldiers, who chaffed him
good-naturedly. As he went along by the stables, a friendly lancer,
pitying him, probably, too, wearying of his own lonely watch, called to
him, and offered him a drink out of a stone bottle. Gregorio drank again
feverishly, and handed the bottle back to its owner with a grin, and
passed on without a word. The soldier watched him curiously, but said
nothing.

When he reached the lighthouse Gregorio flung himself on to the
pebble-strewn sand and looked across the bay. The blue water, calm and
unruffled as a sheet of glass, spread before him. The ships--Austrian
Lloyd mail-boats, P. and O. liners, and grimy coal-hulks--lay motionless
against the white side of the jetty.

The khedive's yacht was bright with bunting, and innumerable
fishing-boats near the breakwater made grateful oases in the glare
whereon his eyes might rest. But he heeded them not. Angrily he flung
lumps of stone and sand into the wavelets at his feet, and pushed back
his hat that his face might feel the full heat of the sun. Then he lit a
cigarette and began to think.

But what was the good of thinking? The thoughts always formed themselves
into the same chain and reached the same conclusion; and ever on the
glassy surface of the Levantine sea a woman poised herself and laughed
at him.

When the sun fell behind the horizon, and the breakwater, after dashing
up one flash of gold, became a blue blur, Gregorio rose to go. As
he walked back toward the Penny-farthing Shop he felt angry and
unsatisfied. The whole day was wasted. He had done nothing to relieve
his wife, nothing to pay off Amos. Madam met him at the door, a flask of
wine in her hand. Against his will Gregorio entered her cafe and smiled,
but his smile was sour and malevolent.

"You want cheering, my friend," said madam, laughing.

"I have found nothing to do," said Gregorio.

"Ah! I told you it would be hard. There are no tourists in Alexandria
now. And it is foolish of you to tramp the streets looking for work that
you will never find, when you have everything you can want here."

"Except money, and that's everything," put in Gregorio, bluntly.

"Even money, my friend. I have enough for two."

Madam Marx had played her trump card, and she watched anxiously the
effect of her words. For a moment the man did not speak, but trifled
with his cigarette tobacco, rolling it gently between his brown fingers.
Then he said:

"You know I am in debt now, and I want to pay off all I owe, and leave
here."

"Yes, that's true, but you won't pay off your debts by tramping the
streets, and your little cafe at Benhur will be a long time building, I
fancy. Meanwhile there is money to be made at the Penny-farthing Shop."

"What are your terms?" asked Gregorio, roughly.

The woman laughed, but did not answer. The stars were shining, and the
kempsin that had blown all day was dead. It was cool sitting outside the
door of the cafe under the little awning, and pleasant to watch the blue
cigarette smoke float upward in the still air. Gregorio sat for a while
silent, and the woman came and stood by him. "You know my terms," she
whispered, and Gregorio smiled, took her hand, and kissed her. At that
moment the blind of the opposite house was flung back. Xantippe leaned
out of the window and saw them.




VI--BABY AND JEW

When the Penny-farthing Shop began to fill Gregorio disappeared quietly
by the back door. He muttered a half-unintelligible answer to the men
who were playing cards in the dim parlour through which he had to pass,
who called to him to join them. Gaining the street, he wandered along
till he reached the bazaars, intending to waste an hour or two until
Xantippe should have left the house. Then he determined to go back and
see the boy in whom all his hopes and ambitions were centered, who was
the unconscious cause of his villainy and degradation.

There was a large crowd in the bazaars, for a Moolid was being
celebrated. Jugglers, snake-charmers, mountebanks, gipsies, and
dancing-girls attracted hundreds of spectators.

The old men sat in the shadows of their stalls, smoking and drinking
coffee. They smiled gravely at the younger people, who jostled one
another good-humouredly, laughing, singing, quarrelling like children.
Across the roadway hung lamps of coloured glass and tiny red flags
stamped with a white crescent and a star. Torches blazed at intervals,
casting a flickering glow on the excited faces of the crowd.

Gregorio watched without much interest. He had seen a great many
fantasias since he came to Egypt, and they were no longer a novelty to
him. He was annoyed that a race of people whom he despised should be so
merry when he himself had so many troubles to worry him. He would have
liked to go into one of the booths where the girls danced, but he had no
money, and he cursed at his stupidity in not asking the Marx woman for
some. He no longer felt ashamed of himself, for he argued that he was
the victim of circumstances. Still he wished Xantippe had not looked out
of the window, though of course he could easily explain things to her.
And Xantippe was really so angry the night before, explanations were
better postponed for a time. "After all," he thought, "it really does
not much matter. Once we get over our present difficulties we shall
forget all we have gone through." This comfortable reflection had been
doing duty pretty often the last day or two, and though Gregorio did not
believe it a bit, he always felt it was a satisfactory conclusion, and
one to be encouraged.

Meanwhile he would not meet Xantippe. That was a point upon which he had
definitely made up his mind. As he strolled through the bazaars, putting
into order his vagabond thoughts, in a tall figure a few yards in front
of him he recognised Amos. Nervous, he halted, for he had no desire to
be interviewed by the Jew, and yet no way of escape seemed possible.

Nodding affably to the proprietor, he sat down on the floor of a shop
hard by and watched Amos. The old man was evidently interested, for he
was laughing pleasantly, and bending down to look at something on the
ground. What it was Gregorio could not see. A knot of people, also
laughing, surrounded the Jew. Gregorio was curious to see what attracted
them, but fearful of being recognised by the old man. However, after a
few moments his impatience mastered him, and he stepped up to the group.

"What is it?" he asked one of the bystanders.

"Only a baby. It's lost, I think."

Gregorio pushed his way into the centre of the crowd and suddenly became
white as death.

There, seated on the ground, was his own child, laughing and talking to
himself in a queer mixture of Greek and Arabic. Amos was bending kindly
over the youngster, giving him cakes and sweets, and making inquiries as
to the parents.

A chill fear seized on Gregorio's heart. He could not have explained the
cause, nor did he stay and try to explain it. Quickly he broke into the
midst of the circle and, catching up the boy in his arms, ran swiftly
away.

Having reached home, he kissed the boy passionately, sent for food to
Madam Marx, and wept and laughed hysterically for an hour. After a time
the boy slept, and Gregorio then paced up and down the room, smoking,
and puffing great clouds of smoke from his mouth, trying to calm
himself. But he could not throw off his excitement. He imagined the
awful home-coming had he not been to the bazaar, and he wondered what he
would have done then. A great joy possessed him to see his son safe,
and a fierce desire filled him to know who had taken the child away.
He longed for Xantippe's return that he might tell her. He forgot
completely that he had dreaded seeing her earlier this evening. Then he
began to wonder what Amos was doing at the fantasia, and why he was so
interested in the boy. Perhaps, Amos would forgive the debt for love of
the child. The idea pleased him, but he soon came to understand that
it was untenable. Oftener, indeed, he shuddered as he recalled the old
man's figure bent over the infant. A sense of danger to come overwhelmed
him. In some way he felt that the old man and the child were to be
brought together to work his, Gregorio's, ruin.