The peril of Dongola
was past, he had found Trench, he was in Omdurman. That prison house was
his longed-for goal, and he had reached it. He might have been dangling
on a gibbet hundreds of miles away down the stream of the Nile with the
vultures perched upon his shoulders, the purpose for which he lived
quite unfulfilled. But he was in the enclosure of the House of Stone in
Omdurman.
"You have been here a long while," he said.
"Three years."
Feversham looked round the zareeba. "Three years of it," he murmured. "I
was afraid that I might not find you alive."
Trench nodded.
"The nights are the worst, the nights in there. It's a wonder any man
lives through a week of them, yet I have lived through a thousand
nights." And even to him who had endured them his endurance seemed
incredible. "A thousand nights of the House of Stone!" he exclaimed.
"But we may go down to the Nile by daytime," said Feversham, and he
started up with alarm as he gazed at the thorn zareeba. "Surely we are
allowed so much liberty. I was told so. An Arab at Wadi Halfa told me."
"And it's true," returned Trench. "Look!" He pointed to the earthen bowl
of water at his side. "I filled that at the Nile this morning.
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