"He isn't mine. He's--".

"I want to know for certain whose he is. If he has anything to do with
my rival Hadji, there's more venom and wit inside that green turban
than I've given it credit for. Is there a reason, by the way, except
their riches, why one should want to 'get at' a member of the American
party?"

"By Jove!" said I, as if I had been pinched--for there was a sharp nip
in the thought Anthony's question jabbed into my mind. I had disliked
and distrusted Bedr el Gemaly, but I had associated my distaste for him
with Fenton's affairs. It had not occurred to me that Biddy's fears
meant more than a nervous woman's vague forebodings. During the few
hideous years of hide-and-seek she had passed in trying to protect the
traitor, Richard O'Brien, she had no doubt had real enough reason to
dread a spy in every stranger; but I had cheerfully advised her "not to
be morbid" when she spoke of herself as a dangerous companion, or
stopped me with a gasp in the midst of what seemed an innocent question
about her stepdaughter. Could it be possible that her alarms might
after all be justified, and that the powerful association betrayed by
O'Brien would visit his sins on his widow and daughter? That American
accent of Gemaly's! He admitted having been in New York. Of course, he
had made acquaintances there. My thoughts flashed back to the meeting
at the railway train. Could the fellow have found out in advance that I
was with Mrs. O'Brien, [alias Jones] and her friends? It seemed as if
such knowledge could have reached land ahead of us only by miracle. But
there was always Marconi. Perhaps news of Miss Gilder had been sent by
wireless to Alexandria, with our humbler names starred as satellites of
that bright planet. If this were so, Bedr, instructed from afar to