Complete Works of L. Frank Baum

by L. Frank Baum

  This being settled, Will was called upon for an explanation, and related the strange story of his finding his father in London. Mr. Carden followed with a brief outline of his successful career in Birmingham, where his wonderful process had made for him a great fortune and a respected name.

  The conference being now ended, Will and his father hurried away to meet the mother and wife, who was as yet ignorant of the glad surprise awaiting her. For father and son had gone straight to the office of the steel works from the station, delaying only long enough to place Mrs. Williams in the carriage that had been sent to whirl her home to the waiting arms of her eager children.

  As for Mr. Jordan, he was turned over to the mercies of the commercial traveller and the little detective in plain clothes, who would see he did not escape until he had fulfilled his obligation of refunding his fortune to John Carden.

  When Will and his father neared the cottage the boy went on ahead to prepare his mother for the great surprise, and after she had clasped him in her arms and hugged the boy to her heart’s content, (with Flo dancing merrily around and Egbert smiling his pleasure at his brother’s return,) he said to her earnestly:

  “Mother, Mr. Jordan has been discovered to be a very wicked man.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,” she exclaimed; “what has he done?”

  “Why, he’s robbed father, for one thing, by stealing his secret and selling it; and besides he tried to make us all believe father was dead.”

  She gave a sudden cry, at this, and clasped her hands above her heart. Then, reading his face with questioning eyes, she managed to say:

  “Speak, Will! What do you mean?”

  “Why, father wasn’t lost at sea at all. He’s been in Birmingham all this time.”

  She swayed for an instant, as if about to fall. Then, drawing herself tense, she said:

  “If this is true, why did he never write to us? Why has he been silent so long?”

  “Because Mr. Jordan made him believe we were dead, too, and poor father has been mourning for us all these years.”

  “I — I don’t understand,” she murmured, brokenly. “How do you know all this, my son?”

  “Father told me. I met him in London, and he came back with me.”

  A light seemed to break upon her, glorifying her worn face.

  “Where is he, Will?”

  “Here!” said a new voice, and John Carden stepped within the door and held out his arms.

  She fainted then, which was a very natural thing to do under such trying circumstances; but when she regained consciousness she lay happily within her husband’s close embrace, and now Will seized the staring Flo by one hand and the confused Egbert by the other, and led them softly from the room.

  Great was the excitement in Bingham when the news of John Carden’s return flew from lip to lip, together with the dreadful tale of Mr. Jordan’s wickedness. When the latter had made restitution and slunk away to some unknown part of the country, there was none to regret his loss, but many willing to declare they had always mistrusted him. Scores of citizens flocked to congratulate Mr. Carden and his wife, and the poor woman was happier than she had ever been since the days when her handsome and talented husband had first led her to the altar.

  The two steel magnates talked over their business complications together, and decided to form a partnership, continuing the manufacture of the Carden Process Steel both in Bingham and in Birmingham, and thus controlling the industry on both sides of the ocean.

  And Mrs. Williams gave a big dinner to celebrate this important event, and kissed Mrs. Carden very sweetly when she arrived upon the arm of her distinguished husband. And Nora, so happy that she had to pause frequently to wipe away the tears that gathered in her kindly eyes, quite outdid herself in the preparation of the feast.

  “Glory be!” she said to the imperturbable Thomas, “The Cardens, God bless ‘em! have come to their own again.”

  Will and Annabel sat side by side at the table, smiling and contented at being together. Even Reginald was on his good behavior, and Gladys, who had conceived a violent love for her mother since that lady’s return, was demure and silent. Flo sat next to Theodore, and Mary Louise was beside Egbert, to whom, being pitiful of his deficiencies, she was very attentive.

  Merrier comrades were never seated at one table, and Will was the hero of the hour. Mr. Williams made a neat speech, at dessert, praising the boy so highly that his cheeks grew as red as cherries. Said he:

  “We owe to Will the discovery of Mr. Carden — ”

  “Oh, no,” cried Will. “We owe that to Mrs. Williams.”

  “And the dress suit,” added his father, with a smile and a proud glance at his son.

  “And we owe to Will the discovery of the papers in the oak tree,” continued Mr. Williams.

  “Why, that was Annabel!” said Will.

  “Anyhow,” declared the doctor, who, with his napkin tucked under his chin, was supremely happy, “we owe to Will those famous mushrooms we have just eaten.”

  “Oh, Doctor!” remonstrated Will. “You’re the head of the firm, and I’ve no doubt you sold them to Nora at a big profit.”

  They all laughed, then; but they were glad to laugh at the slightest excuse to be merry. And it was an evening they all remembered as long as they lived.

  Having made such satisfactory arrangements with Mr. Williams to continue the business at Bingham, Mr. Carden prepared to return to Birmingham, taking with him Mrs. Carden and Flo and Egbert. For the scene of his prosperity was to become his future home. It was arranged that Will should remain in America and attend college, after which he was promised Mr. Jordan’s place as secretary at the Bingham mills, in order that he might represent his father’s American interests.

  “We’re going to be partners, some day, my boy,” said Mr. Williams, slapping Will’s shoulder with characteristic heartiness; “so hurry through college, and get ready for work. And remember that every vacation you are to come straight to my home.”

  Of course Will was very happy at this prospect; and, because he must enter Princeton in September, he devoted most of the days that remained to him in driving or walking with Annabel.

  One afternoon they met the doctor striding down the road with his stout cane in one hand and his medicine case in the other.

  He halted before Annabel and Will, scowling dreadfully.

  “What’s this I hear about your going to college?” he asked the boy.

  “It’s true,” said Will, smiling. “I’m afraid, Doctor, I’ll have to give up growing mushrooms.”

  “You will, eh? Well, sir, what’s going to become of those poor grandchildren of mine?” growled the doctor.

  “If they are ever in need, sir, I’ll agree to support them.”

  “In that event, we’ll dissolve partnership,” said the old fellow, less gruffly. Then he added:

  “Put out your tongue!”

  “What for?” asked Will.

  “You’ve got symptoms.”

  “Of what?”

  “A disease that’s mighty common,” declared the other, with an amused laugh at his own pleasantry; “but one that seldom proves fatal.”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” said the boy, with downcast eyes.

  Dr. Meigs turned suddenly to Annabel, chucking her playfully underneath her chin before she could draw back.

  “Aren’t you in this young lady’s company pretty often these days?”

  Will straightened perceptibly, plainly showing his confusion. He glanced shyly at Annabel who stood with downcast eyes, her face suffused with blushes, then he blurted out:

  “Of course I am. Annabel’s an old chum.”

  THE END

  THE LAST EGYPTIAN

  Baum’s final novel intended for an adult audience was The Last Egyptian, published anonymously by Edward Stern & Company in 1908, illustrated by Francis P. Wightman. H. Rider Haggard’s exotic novels provided inspiration for all of Baum’s adventure tales. Three different cha
racters narrate the novel. Gerald Winston Bey is an English Egyptologist, Kara an Egyptian, and Tadros, a dragoman. A complicated plot evolves, featuring, among other things, secrets and revenge, a romance, and vast quantities of gold and rare jewels. Baum used his five week trip to Egypt in 1906 to good effect, providing much local color and detail. In 1914, he adapted the book as a movie under the same title, produced by his own Oz Film Manufacturing Company.

  A first edition copy of ‘The Last Egyptian’

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER I.

  CHAPTER II.

  CHAPTER III.

  CHAPTER IV.

  CHAPTER V.

  CHAPTER VI.

  CHAPTER VII.

  CHAPTER VIII.

  CHAPTER IX.

  CHAPTER X.

  CHAPTER XI.

  CHAPTER XII.

  CHAPTER XIII.

  CHAPTER XIV.

  CHAPTER XV.

  CHAPTER XVI.

  CHAPTER XVII.

  CHAPTER XVIII.

  CHAPTER XIX.

  CHAPTER XX.

  CHAPTER XXI.

  CHAPTER XXII.

  CHAPTER XXIII.

  CHAPTER XXIV.

  CHAPTER XXV.

  CHAPTER XXVI.

  CHAPTER I.

  WHERE THE DESERT MEETS THE NILE.

  The sun fell hot upon the bosom of the Nile and clung there, vibrant, hesitating, yet aggressive, as if baffled in its desire to penetrate beneath the river’s lurid surface. For the Nile defies the sun, and relegates him to his own broad domain, wherein his power is undisputed.

  On either side the broad stream humanity shrank from Ra’s seething disc. The shaduf workers had abandoned their skin-covered buckets and bamboo poles to seek shelter from the heat beneath a straggling tree or a straw mat elevated on stalks of ripe sugarcane. The boats of the fishermen lay in little coves, where the sails were spread as awnings to shade their crews. The fellaheen laborers had all retired to their clay huts to sleep through this fiercest period of the afternoon heat.

  On the Nile, however, a small steam dahabeah puffed lazily along, stemming with its slow motion the sweep of the mighty river toward the sea. The Arab stoker, naked and sweating, stood as far as possible from the little boiler and watched it with a look of absolute repulsion upon his swarthy face. The engineer, also an Arab, lay stretched upon the deck half asleep, but with both ears alert to catch any sound that might denote the fact that the straining, rickety engine was failing to perform its full duty. Back of the tiny cabin sat the dusky steersman, as naked and inert as his fellows, while under the deck awning reclined the one white man of the party, a young Englishman clothed in khaki knickerbockers and a white silk shirt well open at the throat.

  There were no tourists in Egypt at this season. If you find a white man on the Nile in April, he is either attached to some exploration party engaged in excavations or a government employee from Cairo, Assyut or Luxor, bent upon an urgent mission.

  The dahabeah was not a government boat, though, so that our Englishman was more likely to be an explorer than an official. It was evident he was no stranger to tropical climes, if we judged by his sun-browned skin and the quiet resignation to existing conditions with which he puffed his black briar and relaxed his muscular frame. He did not sleep, but lay with his head upon a low wicker rest that enabled him to sweep the banks of the Nile with his keen blue eyes.

  The three Arabs regarded their master from time to time with stealthy glances, in which wonder was mingled with a certain respect. The foreigner was a fool to travel during the heat of the day; no doubt of that at all. The native knows when to work and when to sleep — a lesson the European never learns. Yet this was no casual adventurer exploiting his folly, but a man who had lived among them for years, who spoke Arabic fluently and could even cipher those hieroglyphics of the dead ages which abound throughout modem Egypt Hassan, Abdallah and Ali knew this well, for they had accompanied Winston Bey on former expeditions, and heard him translate the ugly signs graven upon the ugly stones into excellent Arabic. It was all very wonderful in its way, but quite useless and impractical, if their opinion were allowed. And the master himself was impractical. He did foolish things at all times, and sacrificed his own comfort and that of his servants in order to accomplish unnecessary objects. Had he not paid well for his whims, Winston Bey might have sought followers in vain; but the Arab will even roast himself upon the Nile on an April afternoon to obtain the much-coveted gold of the European.

  At four o’clock a slight breeze arose; but what matter? The journey was nearly done now. They had rounded a curve in the river, and ahead of them, lying close to the east bank, were the low mountains of Gebel Abu Fedah. At the south, where the rocks ended abruptly, lay a small grove of palms. Between the palms and the mountains was the beaten path leading from the Nile to the village of Al-Kusiyeh, a mile or so inland, which was the particular place the master had come so far and so fast to visit.

  The breeze, although hardly felt, served to refresh the enervated travelers. Winston sat up and knocked the ashes from his pipe, making a careful scrutiny at the same time of the lifeless landscape ahead.

  The mountains of gray limestone looked very uninviting as they lay reeking under the terrible heat of the sun. From their base to the river was no sign of vegetation, but only a hardened clay surface. The desert sands had drifted in in places. Even under the palms it lay in heavy drifts, for the land between the Nile and Al-Kusiyeh was abandoned to nature, and the fellaheen had never cared to redeem it.

  The water was deep by the east bank, for the curve of the river swept the current close to the shore. The little dahabeah puffed noisily up to the bank and deposited the Englishman upon the hard clay. Then it backed across into shallow water, and Hassan shut down the engine while Abdallah dropped the anchor.

  Winston now wore his cork helmet and carried a brown umbrella lined with green. With all his energy, the transition from the deck of the dahabeah to this oven-like atmosphere of the shore bade fair to overcome his resolution to proceed to the village.

  But it would never do to recall his men so soon. They would consider it an acknowledgment that he had erred in judgment, and the only way to manage an Arab is to make him believe you know what you are about. The palm trees were not far away. He would rest in their shade until the sun was lower.

  A dozen steps and the perspiration started from every pore. But he kept on, doggedly, until he came to the oblong shadow cast by the first palm, and there he squatted in the sand and mopped his face with his handkerchief.

  The silence was oppressive. There was no sound of any kind to relieve it. Even the beetles were hidden far tinder the sand, and there was no habitation near enough for a donkey’s bray or a camel’s harsh growl to be heard. The Nile flows quietly at this point, and the boat had ceased to puff and rattle its machinery.

  Winston brushed aside the top layer of sand with his hands, for that upon the surface was so hot that contact with it was unbearable. Then he extended his body to rest, turning slightly this way and that to catch in his face the faint breath of the breeze that passed between the mountains and the Nile. At the best he was doomed to an uncomfortable hour or two, and he cast longing glances at the other bits of shade to note whether any seemed more inviting than the one he had selected.

  During this inspection his eye caught a patch of white some distance away. It was directly over the shadow of the furthest tree of the group, and aroused his curiosity. After a minute he arose in a leisurely fashion and walked over to the spot of white, which on nearer approach proved to be a soiled cotton tunic or burnous. It lay half buried in the sand, and at one end were the folds of a dirty turban, with faded red and yellow stripes running across the coarse cloth.

  Winston put his foot on the burnous and the thing stirred and emitted a muffled growl. At that he kicked the form viciously; but now it neither stirred nor made a sound. Instead, a narrow slit appeared between the folds of the turban, and an eye, black and glistenin
g, looked steadfastly upon the intruder.

  “Do you take me for a beast, you imbecile, that you dare to disturb my slumbers?” asked a calm voice, in Arabic.

  The heat had made Winston Bey impatient.

  “Yes; you are a dog. Get up!” he commanded, kicking the form again.

  The turban was removed, disclosing a face, and the man sat up, crossing his bare legs beneath him as he stared fixedly at his persecutor.

  Aside from the coarse burnous, sadly discolored in many places, the fellow was unclothed. His skin showed at the breast and below his knees, and did not convey an impression of immaculate cleanliness. Of slender build, with broad shoulders, long hands and feet and sinewy arms and legs, the form disclosed was curiously like those so often presented in the picture-writing upon the walls of ancient temples. His forehead was high, his chin square, his eyes large and soft, his cheeks full, his mouth wide and sensual, his nose short and rounded. His jaws protruded slightly and his hair was smooth and fine. In color the tint of his skin was not darker than the tanned cuticle of the Englishman, but the brown was softer, and resembled coffee that has been plentifully diluted with cream. A handsome fellow in his way, with an expression rather unconcerned than dignified, which masked a countenance calculated to baffle even a shrewder and more experienced observer than Winston Bey.

  Said the Englishman, looking at him closely:

  “You are a Copt.”

  Inadvertently he had spoken in his mother tongue and the man laughed.

  “If you follow the common prejudice and consider every Copt a Christian,” he returned in purest English, “then I am no Copt; but if you mean that I am an Egyptian, and no dog of an Arab, then, indeed, you are correct in your estimate.”

  Winston uttered an involuntary exclamation of surprise. For a native to speak English is not so unusual; but none that he knew expressed himself with the same ease and confidence indicated in this man’s reply. He brushed away some of the superheated sand and sat down facing his new acquaintance.