"With our God is forgiveness," and in the immensity and majesty of His compassion, the Almighty had willed it that he, even he, might yet do something. He would join the forces of the new prophet! Why not? Their cause was a good one. It was not a crusade of Egypt against England, but of right against wrong, of justice against injustice, of belief against unbelief, of God against the world. Hold! A traitor to his Church and country? No, for this was the great universal war—the war of an empire that had no boundaries, the holy war that had been waged all the earth over and all the ages through—the war of religion and truth against the powers of darkness and death. So thinking God’s hand was leading him, he saw himself—white man and Christian and British soldier though he was—following Ishmael Ameer into the desert, working by his side, and then coming back at last when his sin had been forgiven and his redemption won. "Yet wait! What about my father?" he thought. But he could not think of his father at the same time as he thought of his return. He remembered his mother, though, and saw himself taking her in his arms and saying, "Mother, I’ve come back to you, as you always said I would. I only meant to do what was right, and if I did what was wrong, God has pardoned me." And then far off, very far, hardly daring to see itself yet, in his awakened soul there was a hope of Helena. Somehow and somewhere he would meet her again—he knew not how or where or when, but Heaven knew everything, and the end would be with God. Thus with a labouring and quivering heart, and with clouded eyes that were running over, he sat on his bed, looking into the stream of sunlight that was pouring into the room, and feeling with an immense joy that God had manifested His will at last. Meanwhile Hafiz, still tuning his speech to the spirit of the natural man, was chuckling and crowing over his new chance of getting Gordon out of the country. "Damn it all, man, we’ll beat them yet, if you’ll only leave yourself to me. And you will, I know you will!" "Hafiz," said Gordon, "you thought last night you could help me to get away from here—do you still think you could?" "Certainly! Isn’t that what I’m saying?" "Do you think you could do it now?" "Why not ... that is to say, if you are well enough ... It’s your hand, isn’t it?" "That’s nothing—only a sore finger, you know." "God! A sore finger, and old Michael says it’s gone—half of it, anyway! But if it had been half your arm it wouldn’t have stopped you—I know that quite well. So if you’re game I’m ready. The sooner the better too! The dear old Patriarch will close his eyes, and as for Michael——" "What day is this, Hafiz?" said Gordon—he had lost count of time.