? ? ? ? At sight of him she staggered back in shocked and terrified surprise. It was The Sheik!
? ? ? ? Instantly all the old fears and terrors of her childhood returned upon her. She stood trembling before this horrible old man, as a murderer before the judge about to pass sentence of death upon him. She knew that The Sheik recognized her. The years and the changed raiment had not altered her so much but what one who had known her features so well in childhood would know her now.
? ? ? ? "So you have come back to your people, eh?" snarled The Sheik. "Come back begging for food and protection, eh?"
? ? ? ? "Let me go," cried the girl. "I ask nothing of you, but that you let me go back to the Big Bwana."
? ? ? ? "The Big Bwana?" almost screamed The Sheik, and then followed a stream of profane, Arabic invective against the white man whom all the transgressors of the jungle feared and hated. "You would go back to the Big Bwana, would you? So that is where you have been since you ran away from me, is it? And who comes now across the river after you--the Big Bwana?"
? ? ? ? "The Swede whom you once chased away from your country when he and his companion conspired with Nbeeda to steal me from you," replied Meriem.
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