The McCook tribune. (McCook, Neb.) 1886-1936, 1894-03-16
KADOUR AND KATEI..

KADOUR AND KATEII.
Kadour-ben Cherifa, sergeant major in
a native regiment Of tirailleurs, was al
most dying the evening they carried him
to Rippert's sawmill on the Sauerbach,
and for five long weeks, racked by the
pain of his wounds and burning with
fever, he lived as though in q dream.
At times he thought himself still in the
thick Of battle, shouting and leaping
through the fiaxfelds of Wissembourg,
or, again, he was away of in Algeria, in
the house of his father, the caid Of the
Matmatas.
AT last Il day he opened his eyes and
became vaguely conscious of a bright,
calm, white curtained room, with green
branches swaying outside its windows in
the soft, tempered sunshine, and near his
bed a silent little sister of charity, but a
little sister without beads or silver cross
or blue veil; only two heavy braids she
had, falling down over a velvet bodice.
From time to time some one would call
out, .Katel! Katel" and the girl would
go away On tiptoe. and the wounded boy
could hear in the distance a
young voice, as refreshing to listen to as
the brook running under the sawmilTs
windows.
Kadour-ber-Ch erifa has been ill a long
time, but the Ripperts have taken such
good care Of him thai his wounds are
healed, and they have hidden him so well
that the Prussia@s) have not found him
to send him Neof cold in the Mayence
prisons. gw he commences to talk, to
show his white teeth and to take a few
steps around the room, letting one of his
sieeves-the n with a wide, gaping
hole in the midst of its embroideries-
fall empty over a well dressed and ban
daged but still impotent arm. Every day
Katel carries a wicker chair down into
the little sawmill garden for the conva-
lescent and finds for him the sunniest
corner, along the wall, where the grapes
ripen quickest, and Kadour, who, being
a caid's son, was educated at the Arabian
college in Algiers, thanks her in some
what barbarous French, well sprinkled
with bono bezefs and macach bonos.
Without realizing it, the young Arab
is under a spell. This easy gayety Of a
Frankish girl, whose life is as free as a
birds, without enveloping wells out of
doors or barred windows at home, aston
ishes and enchants him. So different
from this is the clustered life of the
women of his land-the little white
masked, musk perfumed Moorish WON
en. Katel, on her side, finds Kadour q
trife too black, but he seems SO good, so
brave, and he does so detest the Prus-
siansi One thing only troubles her. Off
there in that Algeria of Africa men have
the right to marry several wives. Katel
cannot understand that at all. 30 when
the Algerian, to tease her, says in his
jargon: "Kadour marry soon. He take
four wives-four!" Katel becomes very
angry.
'Oh, what q wicked Kadouri What !.
heatheni"
Then the Arab laughs q hearty boys
laugh, but suddenly he becomes serious
again and is mute before the young girl,
opening upon her eyes so wide-so wide
you would thing he wished to carry her
away in their gaze.
1t was thus that the loves of Kadour
and Katel commenced.
Now that he is well, Kadour has re-
turned to his father, and you a imag-
inc If there has been merrymaking in
his honor in the land of the Matmatas.
The reed flutes and little Arab drums
have played their prettiest airs to receive
him. AS the old caid, who was sitting
before his door, saw in the distance
coming down the cactus alley this be-
loved son whom he thought dead, he
shook under his wooden burnoose as
though with chill. For . wholemonth
there was an uninterrupted series of diff
fas, Of fantasies, in the tribe. The caids
and agas of the neighborhood disputed
with each other the honor of having Ka-
dour-ben- Cherifa for their guest, and ev-
cry evening in the Moorish cafes they
would make him tell them over and over
again of the great battles in which he
mad ken part.
But all these honors, all this feasting,
do not make Kadour the happier. In
the paternal abode, surrounded though
he be by all the associations of his boy
hood-his horses, his dogs, his guns
there is something always lacking-Ka-
tells CHEEKY words and pleasant laughter.
The perpetual chatter of the Arabian
women, which used to cause his heart to
beat SO quickly, now wearies and annoys
him. He no longer admires headdresses
of coins nor wide trousers of rose COL
ored satin. Talk to him rather of long
braids falling down. without pearls or
gauze or flowers, only intermingled with
threads of gold from the setting sun in a
little Alsatian garden.
But if Kadour would? In the next
tribe to his there are beautiful black
eyes watching him from behind the
barred windows of the sga's dwelling
beautiful eyes sc elongated with kohl
that their every glance Is an INDECENT ca
ress. But Kadour no longer cares for
eyes like that. What he dreams of, what
he longs for, is Katels kind look, which
mead tn make the fOur Of his room 40