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Show man, and she considered Sir Claude an exceedingly handsome specimen of humanity. "What brought you to this outof- the-way place?'' continued Sir Claude. The landlady sipped her cognac with an "a votre sante, monsieur!" and proceeded to relate her history, ·or that part of it which she thought edifying-how she had been born at Marseilles and brought to Algiers by parents; how she had married a waiter in a cafe who had taken to drink and at last lived only for absinthe; how they had drifted from one place to another, and finally settled at El-Alia, where he had died three years before. "And you live alone here among the Arabs?" cried Sir Claude. "No, m'sieur, I have my nephew Robert. But to-night he is at BelliHe has gone to buy provi- 78 sions. All our tinned food 5!omes from there." She sipped again with her eyes on Sir Claude. The shadows beneath the vine grew deeper. The pale salt mountain was fading away like a ghost in the night. Over the wide and lonely land the desert wind came sighing, bringing a vital, an almost stinging freshness of the wastes. Sir Claude gazed out across the plain, then at the gray-haired Frenchwoman with her little liqueur- glass in her fingers. "Even so, it's a solitary life, madame," he said. " But I suppose you make friends with the Arabs?" The landlady curled her lips, and / )i an almost malignant, catlike look/ ' / came into her face. "Oh, la, la! The Arabs!" she claimed. "The Arab is traitre, m'sieur. Every Arab that was born is tra!tre. You may take |
