The Penguin Book of the British Short Story, Volume 1

by Philip Hensher

  ‘Let me teach you,’ said he.

  ‘You do talk such nonsense. I declare there is that Miss Dawkins looking at us as though she had twenty eyes. Could you not teach her, Mr Ingram?’

  And so they emerged from the palm-tree grove, through a village crowded with dirty, straggling, Arab children, on to the cultivated plain, beyond which the Pyramids stood, now full before them; the two large Pyramids, a smaller one, and the huge sphynx’s head all in a group together.

  ‘Fanny,’ said Bob Damer, riding up to her, ‘mamma wants you; so toddle back.’

  ‘Mamma wants me! What can she want me for now?’ said Fanny, with a look of anything but filial duty in her face.

  ‘To protect her from Miss Dawkins, I think. She wants you to ride at her side, so that Dawkins mayn’t get at her. Now, Mr Ingram, I’ll bet you half-a-crown I’m at the top of the big Pyramid before you.’

  Poor Fanny! She obeyed, however; doubtless feeling that it would not do as yet to show too plainly that she preferred Mr Ingram to her mother. She arrested her donkey, therefore, till Mrs Damer overtook her; and Mr Ingram, as he paused for a moment with her while she did so, fell into the hands of Miss Dawkins.

  ‘I cannot think, Fanny, how you get on so quick,’ said Mrs Damer. ‘I’m always last; but then my donkey is such a very nasty one. Look there, now; he’s always trying to get me off.’

  ‘We shall soon be at the Pyramids now, mamma.’

  ‘How on earth I am ever to get back again I cannot think. I am so tired now that I can hardly sit.’

  ‘You’ll be better, mamma, when you get your luncheon and a glass of wine.’

  ‘How on earth we are to eat and drink with those nasty Arab people around us, I can’t conceive. They tell me we shall be eaten up by them. But, Fanny, what has Mr Ingram been saying to you all day?’

  ‘What has he been saying, mamma? Oh! I don’t know – a hundred things, I dare say. But he has not been talking to me all the time.’

  ‘I think he has, Fanny, nearly, since we crossed the river. Oh, dear! oh, dear! this animal does hurt me so! Every time he moves he flings his head about, and that gives me such a bump.’ And then Fanny commiserated her mother’s sufferings, and in her commiseration contrived to elude any further questioning as to Mr Ingram’s conversation.

  ‘Majestic piles, are they not?’ said Miss Dawkins, who, having changed her companion, allowed her mind to revert from Mount Sinai to the Pyramids. They were now riding through cultivated grounds, with the vast extent of the sands of Lybia before them. The two Pyramids were standing on the margin of the sand, with the head of the recumbent sphynx plainly visible between them. But no idea can be formed of the size of this immense figure till it is visited much more closely. The body is covered with sand, and the head and neck alone stand above the surface of the ground. They were still two miles distant, and the sphynx as yet was but an obscure mound between the two vast Pyramids.

  ‘Immense piles!’ said Miss Dawkins, repeating her own words.

  ‘Yes, they are large,’ said Mr Ingram, who did not choose to indulge in enthusiasm in the presence of Miss Dawkins.

  ‘Enormous! What a grand idea – eh, Mr Ingram? The human race does not create such things as those now-a-days!’

  ‘No, indeed,’ he answered; ‘but perhaps we create better things.’

  ‘Better! You do not mean to say, Mr Ingram, that you are a utilitarian. I do, in truth, hope better things of you than that. Yes! steam mills are better, no doubt, and mechanics’ institutes, and penny newspapers. But is nothing to be valued but what is useful?’ and Miss Dawkins, in the height of her enthusiasm, switched her donkey severely over the shoulder.

  ‘I might, perhaps, have said also that we create more beautiful things,’ said Mr Ingram.

  ‘But we cannot create older things.’

  ‘No, certainly; we cannot do that.’

  ‘Nor can we imbue what we do create with the grand associations which environ those piles with so intense an interest. Think of the mighty dead, Mr Ingram, and of their great power when living. Think of the hands which it took to raise those huge blocks—’

  ‘And of the lives which it cost.’

  ‘Doubtless. The tyranny and invincible power of the royal architects add to the grandeur of the idea. One would not perhaps wish to have back the kings of Egypt—’

  ‘Well, no; they would be neither useful nor beautiful.’

  ‘Perhaps not; and I do not wish to be picturesque at the expense of my fellow-creatures.’

  ‘I doubt even whether the kings of Egypt would be picturesque.’

  ‘You know what I mean, Mr Ingram. But the associations of such names, and the presence of the stupendous works with which they are connected, fill the soul with awe. Such, at least, is the effect with mine.’

  ‘I fear that my tendencies, Miss Dawkins, are more realistic than your own.’

  ‘You belong to a young country, Mr Ingram, and are naturally prone to think of material life. The necessity of living looms large before you.’

  ‘Very large, indeed, Miss Dawkins.’

  ‘Whereas with us, with some of us at least, the material aspect has given place to one in which poetry and enthusiasm prevail. To such among us the associations of past times are very dear. Cheops, to me, is more than Napoleon Bonaparte.’

  ‘That is more than most of your countrymen can say – at any rate, just at present.’

  ‘I am a woman,’ continued Miss Dawkins.

  Mr Ingram took off his hat in acknowledgement both of the announcement and of the fact.

  ‘And to us it is not given – not given as yet – to share in the great deeds of the present. The envy of your sex has driven us from the paths which lead to honour. But the deeds of the past are as much ours as yours.’

  ‘Oh, quite as much.’

  ‘’Tis to your country that we look for enfranchisement from this thraldom. Yes, Mr Ingram, the women of America have that strength of mind which has been wanting to those of Europe. In the United States woman will at last learn to exercise her proper mission.’

  Mr Ingram expressed a sincere wish that such might be the case; and then wondering at the ingenuity with which Miss Dawkins had travelled round from Cheops and his Pyramid to the rights of women in America, he contrived to fall back, under the pretence of asking after the ailments of Mrs Damer.

  And now at last they were on the sand, in the absolute desert, making their way up to the very foot of the most northern of the two Pyramids. They were by this time surrounded by a crowd of Arab guides, or Arabs professing to be guides, who had already ascertained that Mr Damer was the chief of the party, and were accordingly driving him almost to madness by the offers of their services, and their assurance that he could not possibly see the outside or the inside of either structure, or even remain alive upon the ground, unless he at once accepted their offers made at their own prices.

  ‘Get away, will you?’ said he. ‘I don’t want any of you, and I won’t have you! If you take hold of me, I’ll shoot you!’ This was said to one specially energetic Arab, who, in his efforts to secure his prey, had caught hold of Mr Damer by the leg.

  ‘Yes, yes, I say! Englishman always take me; me – me – me, and than no break him leg. Yes – yes – yes – I go. Master say, yes. Only one leetle ten shilling!’

  ‘Abdallah!’ shouted Mr Damer, ‘why don’t you take this man away? Why don’t you make him understand that if all the Pyramids depended on it, I would not give him sixpence!’

  And then Abdallah, thus invoked, came up, and explained to the man in Arabic that he would gain his object more surely if he would behave himself a little more quietly: a hint which the man took for one minute, and for one minute only.

  And then poor Mrs Damer replied to an application for backsheish by the gift of a sixpence. Unfortunate woman! The word backsheish means, I believe, a gift; but it has come in Egypt to signify money, and is eternally dinned into the ears of strangers by Arab suppliants. Mrs Damer
ought to have known better, as, during the last six weeks, she had never shown her face out of Shepheard’s Hotel without being pestered for backsheish; but she was tired and weak, and foolishly thought to rid herself of the man who was annoying her.

  No sooner had the coin dropped from her hand into that of the Arab, than she was surrounded by a cluster of beggars, who loudly made their petitions, as though they would, each of them, individually be injured if treated with less liberality than that first comer. They took hold of her donkey, her bridle, her saddle, her legs, and at last her arms and hands, screaming for backsheish in voices that were neither sweet nor mild.

  In her dismay, she did give away sundry small coins – all, probably, that she had about her; but this only made the matter worse. Money was going, and each man, by sufficient energy, might hope to get some of it. They were very energetic, and so frightened the poor lady, that she would certainly have fallen, had she not been kept on her seat by their pressure around her.

  ‘Oh, dear! oh, dear! get away,’ she cried. ‘I haven’t got any more; indeed, I haven’t. Go away, I tell you! Mr Damer, oh, Mr Damer!’ and then, in the excess of her agony, she uttered one loud, long, and continuous shriek.

  Up came Mr Damer; up came Abdallah; up came M. de la Bordeau; up came Mr Ingram; and at last she was rescued. ‘You shouldn’t go away, and leave me to the mercy of these nasty people. As to that Abdallah, he is of no use to anybody.’

  ‘Why you bodder de good lady, you dam blackguard?’ said Abdallah, raising his stick, as though he were going to lay them all low with a blow. ‘Now you get noting, you tief!’

  The Arabs for a moment retired to a little distance, like flies driven from a sugar bowl; but it was easy to see that, like the flies, they would return at the first vacant moment.

  Our party, whom we left on their road, had now reached the very foot of the Pyramids, and proceeded to dismount from their donkeys. Their intention was first to ascend to the top, then to come down to their banquet, and after that to penetrate into the interior. And all this would seem to be easy of performance. The Pyramid is undoubtedly high, but it is so constructed as to admit of climbing without difficulty. A lady mounting it would undoubtedly need some assistance, but any man possessed of moderate activity would require no aid at all.

  But our friends were at once alarmed at the tremendous nature of the task before them. A sheikh of the Arabs came forth, who communicated with them through Abdallah. The work could be done, no doubt, he said; but a great many men would be wanted to assist. Each lady must have four Arabs, and each gentleman three; and then, seeing that the work would be peculiarly severe on this special day, each of these numerous Arabs must be remunerated by some very large number of piastres.

  Mr Damer, who was by no means a close man in his money dealings, opened his eyes with surprise, and mildly expostulated; M. de la Bordeau, who was rather a close man in his reckonings, immediately buttoned up his breeches pocket, and declared that he should decline to mount the Pyramid at all at that price; and then Mr Ingram descended to the combat.

  The protestations of the men were fearful. They declared with loud voices, eager actions, and manifold English oaths, that an attempt was being made to rob them. They had a right to demand the sums which they were charging, and it was a shame that English gentlemen should come and take the bread out of their mouths. And so they screeched, gesticulated, and swore, and frightened poor Mrs Damer almost into fits.

  But at last it was settled, and away they started, the sheikh declaring that the bargain had been made at so low a rate as to leave him not one piastre for himself. Each man had an Arab on each side of him, and Miss Dawkins and Miss Damer had each in addition one behind. Mrs Damer was so frightened as altogether to have lost all ambition to ascend. She sat below on a fragment of stone, with the three dragomans standing around her as guards; but even with the three dragomans the attacks on her were frequent; and as she declared afterwards, she was so bewildered, that she never had time to remember that she had come there from England to see the Pyramids, and that she was now immediately under them.

  The boys, utterly ignoring their guards, scrambled up quicker than the Arabs could follow them. Mr Damer started off at a pace which soon brought him to the end of his tether, and from that point was dragged up by the sheer strength of his assistants; thereby accomplishing the wishes of the men, who induce their victims to start as rapidly as possible, in order that they may soon find themselves helpless from want of wind. Mr Ingram endeavoured to attach himself to Fanny, and she would have been nothing loth to have had him at her right hand, instead of the hideous brown, shrieking, one-eyed Arab who took hold of her. But it was soon found that any such arrangement was impossible. Each guide felt that if he lost his own peculiar hold he would lose his prey, and held on, therefore, with invincible tenacity. Miss Dawkins looked, too, as though she ought to be attended by some Christian cavalier, but no Christian cavalier was forthcoming. M. de la Bordeau was the wisest, for he took the matter quietly, did as he was bid, and allowed the guides nearly to carry him to the top of the edifice.

  ‘Ha! so this is the top of the Pyramid, is it?’ said Mr Damer, bringing out his words one by one, being terribly out of breath. ‘Very wonderful, very wonderful indeed!’

  ‘It is wonderful!’ said Miss Dawkins, whose breath had not failed her in the least, ‘very wonderful indeed! Only think, Mr Damer, you might travel on for days and days, till days became months, through those interminable sands, and yet you would never come to the end of them! Is it not quite stupendous?’

  ‘Ah, yes, quite,’ – puff, puff – said Mr Damer, striving to regain his breath.

  Mr Damer was now at her disposal – weak, and worn with toil and travel, out of breath, and with half his manhood gone; if ever she might prevail over him so as to procure from his mouth an assent to that Nile proposition, it would be now. And after all, that Nile proposition was the best one now before her. She did not quite like the idea of starting off across the Great Desert without any lady, and was not sure that she was prepared to be fallen in love with by M. de la Bordeau, even if there should ultimately be any readiness on the part of that gentleman to perform the rôle of lover. With Mr Ingram the matter was different; nor was she so diffident of her own charms as to think it altogether impossible that she might succeed, in the teeth of that little chit, Fanny Damer. That Mr Ingram would join the party up the Nile she had very little doubt; and then there would be one place left for her. She would thus, at any rate, become commingled with a most respectable family, who might be of material service to her.

  Thus actuated, she commenced an earnest attack upon Mr Damer.

  ‘Stupendous!’ she said again, for she was fond of repeating favourite words. ‘What a wondrous race must have been those Egyptian kings of old!’

  ‘I dare say they were,’ said Mr Damer, wiping his brow as he sat upon a large loose stone, a fragment lying on the flat top of the Pyramid, one of those stones with which the complete apex was once made, or was once about to be made.

  ‘A magnificent race! so gigantic in their conceptions! Their ideas altogether overwhelm us, poor, insignificant, latter-day mortals. They built these vast Pyramids; but for us, it is task enough to climb to their top.’

  ‘Quite enough,’ ejaculated Mr Damer.

  But Mr Damer would not always remain weak and out of breath, and it was absolutely necessary for Miss Dawkins to hurry away from Cheops and his tomb, to Thebes and Karnac.

  ‘After seeing this it is impossible for any one, with a spark of imagination, to leave Egypt without going further a-field.’

  Mr Damer merely wiped his brow and grunted. This Miss Dawkins took as a signal of weakness, and went on with her task perseveringly.

  ‘For myself, I have resolved to go up, at any rate, as far as Asouan and the first cataract. I had thought of acceding to the wishes of a party who are going across the Great Desert by Mount Sinai to Jerusalem; but the kindness of yourself and Mrs Damer is so g
reat, and the prospect of joining in your boat is so pleasurable, that I have made up my mind to accept your very kind offer.’

  This, it will be acknowledged, was bold on the part of Miss Dawkins; but what will not audacity effect? To use the slang of modern language, cheek carries everything now-a-days. And whatever may have been Miss Dawkins’ deficiencies, in this virtue she was not deficient.

  ‘I have made up my mind to accept your very kind offer,’ she said, shining on Mr Damer with her blandest smile.

  What was a stout, breathless, perspiring, middle-aged gentleman to do under such circumstances? Mr Damer was a man who, in most matters, had his own way. That his wife should have given such an invitation without consulting him, was, he knew, quite impossible. She would as soon have thought of asking all those Arab guides to accompany them. Nor was it to be thought of, that he should allow himself to be kidnapped into such an arrangement by the impudence of any Miss Dawkins. But there was, he felt, a difficulty in answering such a proposition from a young lady with a direct negative, especially while he was so scant of breath. So he wiped his brow again, and looked at her.

  ‘But I can only agree to this on one understanding,’ continued Miss Dawkins, ‘and that is, that I am allowed to defray my own full share of the expense of the journey.’

  Upon hearing this Mr Damer thought that he saw his way out of the wood. ‘Wherever I go, Miss Dawkins, I am always the paymaster myself,’ and this he contrived to say with some sternness, palpitating though he still was; and the sternness which was deficient in his voice he endeavoured to put into his countenance.

  But he did not know Miss Dawkins. ‘Oh, Mr Damer,’ she said – and as she spoke her smile became almost blander than it was before – ‘oh, Mr Damer, I could not think of suffering you to be so liberal; I could not, indeed. But I shall be quite content that you should pay everything and let me settle with you in one sum afterwards.’

  Mr Damer’s breath was now rather more under his own command. ‘I am afraid, Miss Dawkins,’ he said, ‘that Mrs Damer’s weak state of health will not admit of such an arrangement.’