Part 30 (2/2)

”Wait a little, Agnes; I will hide: you shall find me.”

Innocent Agnes obediently waited, while Ziffa ran down the wrong side of the cactus hedge, and kept up with the seaman--a little in rear of him.

”Ho! Ally Babby,” shouted Ted Flaggan, when he was within hail--it might be a hundred yards or so--of his friend, ”what d'ee think? that little brown-faced chip of Hadji Baba has been up here eavesdropping, and has got to windward of us a'most. Leastwise she knows enough o' the Riminis to want to know more--the dirty little spalpeen.”

”Thank you,” thought Ziffa, as she listened.

When Flaggan had varied his remarks once or twice, by way of translating them, Rais Ali shook his head.

”That bad,” said he, ”ver' bad. We mus' be tremendous cautious.

Ziffa's a little brute.”

”Ha!” thought Ziffa.

”You don't say so?” observed Flaggan. ”Well, now, I'd scarce have thought we had reason to be so fearful of a small thing, with a stupid brown face like that.”

”Brute!” muttered Ziffa inaudibly.

”Oh! she werry sharp chile,” returned Rais, ”werry sharp--got ears and eyes from the sole of hers head to de top of hers feets.”

Ziffa said nothing, either mentally or otherwise, but looked rather pleased.

”Well,” continued Rais, ”we won't mention the name of Rimini again nowhars--only w'en we can't help it, like.”

”Not a whisper,” said Flaggan; ”but, be the way, it'll be as well, before comin' to that state of prudent silence, that you tell me if the noo hole they've gone to is near the owld wan. You see it's my turn to go up wi' provisions to-morrow night, and I hain't had it rightly explained, d'ye see?”

Here Rais Ali described, with much elaboration, the exact position of the new hole to which the Rimini family had removed, at the head of Frais Vallon, and Mademoiselle Ziffa drank it all in with the most exuberant satisfaction.

Shortly afterwards Agnes Langley found her friend hiding close to the spot in the garden where she had last seen her.

That night Hadji Baba made an outrageous disturbance in his household as to the lost diamond ring, and finally fixed, with the sagacity of an unusually sharp man, on his old negro as being the culprit.

Next morning he resolved to have the old man before the cadi, after forenoon attendance at the palace. While there, he casually mentioned to Omar the circ.u.mstance of the theft of his ring, and asked leave to absent himself in the afternoon to have the case tried.

”Go,” said Omar gravely, ”but see that thou forget not to temper justice with mercy.--By the way, tell me, friend Hadji, before thou goest, what was the meaning of that strange request of thine the other day, and on which thou hast acted so much of late?”

The story-teller turned somewhat pale, and looked anxious.

The strange request referred to was to the effect that the Dey should give him no more gifts or wages, (in regard to both of which he was not liberal), but that instead thereof he, Hadji Baba, should be allowed to whisper confidentially in the Dey's ear on all public occasions without umbrage being taken, and that the Dey should give him a nod and smile in reply. Omar, who was a penurious man, had willingly agreed to this proposal, and, as he now remarked, Baba had made frequent use of the license.

”Pardon me, your highness,” said Baba; ”may I speak the truth without fear of consequences?”

”Truly thou mayest,” replied the Dey; ”and it will be well that thou speakest nothing _but_ the truth, else thou shalt have good reason to remember the consequences.”

”Well, then, your highness,” returned Baba boldly, ”feeling that my income was not quite so good as my position at Court required, and desiring earnestly to increase it without further taxing the resources of your highness's treasury, I ventured to make the request which I did, and the result has been--has been--most satisfactory.”

”Blockhead!” exclaimed the irritable Dey, ”that does not explain the nature of the satisfaction.”

”Your slave was going to add,” said Hadji Baba hastily, ”that my frequent whispering in your ear, and your highness's gracious nods and smiles in reply, have resulted in my being considered one of the most influential favourites in the palace, so that my good word is esteemed of the utmost value, and paid for accordingly.”

<script>