Page:Weird Tales Volume 7 Number 3 (1926-03).djvu/114

400 tious awe by the natives; and, as a result, Bennett, well versed in the lore of ancient Egypt, had set out with the Arab to open the tomb.

Sometimes in the evening, after they had watched the sun rush in a sea of purple-gold fire past the horizon and the stars leapt forth suddenly, startlingly, Hadji would speak of the object of their quest in low, slurring tones, would tell the story that had been whispered down through the ages: of the Little Princess who had loved and sinned and whose body, as a punishment, had been carried away on the back of a camel to the very heart of the Great Desert for burial.

"And there through the centuries she has slept, heart of my heart, and there she will continue to sleep unless, belike"

He slurred, paused, did not go on. An inscrutable smile touched the thin lips for a moment, and in his eyes there burned all the knowledge of the ages.

"Unless what?" asked Bennett, sharply.

"You are well versed in the knowledge of the ancients, in the laws of Horus and Isis and Osiris; and tomorrow you will learn more. Tomorrow you will know!"

And the Arab lay back on the cooling ground.

"What do you mean?" growled Bennett.

"Tomorrow," smiled the Arab, and he muttered something under his breath about "people too impatient to wait till they were without teeth to buy false ones" and "crossing a river that was still miles away."

days and then the weeks passed by and they had pushed nearer and nearer to the center of that vast inconsistent desert of deserts. Came the day at last when they would make the final lap of their journey. Finally, when the progress became too slow, the blacks were left with the camels some five miles from the range of hills that jutted sharply out above the lower plateau land over which they were passing.

Bennett and the Arab rode deeper into the hills. The way became rockier and harder to traverse the farther they went. At last the animals could go no farther, and the adventurers halted for a few minutes. It lacked but little of the noon hour, and the Arab turned toward Mecca and prostrated himself in one of his frequent prayers.

"O Thou All-Powerful! O Holy of Holies! O Light that knows no blotting put! O"

With a curse Bennett, already nearly a nervous wreck, walked away. Shortly, however, he returned and suggested that they go on.

"Follow this canyon, heart of my heart," said the Arab, casually. "Turn not to the right or to the left and there can be no mistake."

"Aren't you going too?" Bennett questioned in decided wonder, for in hiring the Arab at Tripoli the Americans had specifically stated that one of their number was to be accompanied to the tomb of the Little Princess. Though the scientists had never heard of her before, they knew from the Arab's sincerity in telling his story that he was speaking the truth.

"I stop here," said Hadji; and rather dreamily: "So it was written on the scroll of Fate by the archangel."

"Why?" growled Bennett.

"There is the curse," answered the Arab, enigmatically.

"What do you mean?"

"There is but one who may enter the tomb of the Little Princess."

"I'm going to enter it."

"That rests with Allah."

A curse rose to Bennett's lips, but he recognized at once the futility of trying to argue with the Arab. As