"
"My salaams to you, Chief, for your goodness. To-morrow if it please
you I will go with your promises to the British."
"It is a command, Sahib--to-morrow. And may the Peace of Allah be upon
thee and thy house always!"
He held out a hand and his large dark eyes hovered lovingly over the
face of the Englishman.
CHAPTER XXVI
Captain Barlow walked along to the tent of Bootea to tell her of the
arrangement that had been made for their leaving the camp so that she
might be ready. He could see in the girl's eyes the reflection of a
dual mental struggle, an ineffable sweetness varied by a changing cloud
of something that was apprehension or doubt.
"The Sahib is a protector to Bootea," she said. "Sometimes I wondered
if such men lived; yet I suppose a woman always has in her mind a vague
conception that such an one might be. But always that, that is like a
dream, is broken--one wakes."
Prosaically taking the matter in hand Barlow said, "You would wish to
go back to your people at Chunda--is it not so?"
The girl's eyes flashed to his face, and her brows wrinkled as if from
pain.
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