Sure enough it was genuine Golden Cloud, and the relief overpowered me. There I was after a space, half-lying, half-sitting in the clean warm sand, my hands clasped at the back of my head as I looked up into the shimmering light and shade of the leaves.
"Upon my soul I envy you, _fakeer-ji_. We who go to bed at set times and seasons don't know the world we live in."
"Religion is its own reward," remarked the graven image beside me, for he had gone back to his penwiper by this time. But I was talking more to myself than to him, in the half-drowsy excitement of physical pleasure, so I went on unheeding.
"Was there ever such a night since the one Jessica looked upon! and what a scent there is in the air,--orange blossoms or something!"
"It is a tree farther up the water-cut, _Huzoor_, a hill tree. The river may have brought the seed; it happens so sometimes. Or the birds may have brought it from the city. There was a tree of the kind in a garden there. A big tree with large white flowers; so large that you can hear them fall."
The graven image sat so still with its face to the river, that it seemed to me as if the voice I heard could not belong to it. A dreamy sense of unreality added to my drowsy enjoyment of the surroundings.
"Magnolia," I murmured sleepily; "a flower to dream about--hullo! what's that?"
A faint footfall, as of some one passing down an echoing passage, loud, louder, loudest, making me start up, wide awake, as the _fakeer's_ cry rose on the still air: "In the name of your God!"
Some one was passing the bridge from the river, and after adding his mite to the bowl, went on his way.
"It is the echo, _Huzoor_" explained the old man, answering my start of surprise. "The tree behind us is hollow and the cut is deep. Besides, to-night the water runs deep and dark as Death because of the flood. The step is always louder then."
"No wonder you hear so quickly," I replied, sinking back again to my comfort. "I thought it must be the Footstep of Death at least."
He had turned towards me, and in the moonlight I could see those clear eyes of his shining as if the light had come into them again.
"Not yet, _Huzoor!_ But it may be the next one for all we know."
What a gruesome idea! Hark! There it was again; loud, louder, loudest, and then silence.
