The departure of Mrs. Armine brought to Meyer Isaacson a sudden and immense feeling of relief. When he looked at his watch and knew that the train for Cairo had left the station of Luxor, when half an hour later Ibrahim came in to tell Nigel that "my lady" had gone off "very nice indeed," he was for a time almost joyous, as a man is joyous who has got rid of a heavy burden, or who is unexpectedly released from some cruel prison of circumstance. How much the enforced companionship with Mrs. Armine had oppressed him he understood fully now. And it was difficult for him to realize, more difficult still for him to sympathize with, Nigel's obvious regret at his wife's going, obvious longing for her to be back again by his side.

Isaacson's sympathy was not asked for by Nigel. Here the strong reserve existing between the two men naturally stepped in. Isaacson strove to dissimulate his joy, Nigel to dissimulate his feeling of sudden loneliness. But either Isaacson played his part the better, or his powers of observation were far more developed than Nigel's; for whereas he saw with almost painful clearness the state of his friend's mind on that first evening of their dual solitude, Nigel only partially guessed at his, or very faintly suspected it.

Their dinner together threatened at first to be dreary. For Mrs. Armine's going, instead of breaking down, had consolidated for the moment the reserve between them. But Isaacson's inner joyousness, however carefully concealed, made its influence felt, as joy will. Without quite knowing why, Nigel presently began to thaw. Isaacson turned the conversation, which had stumbled, had halted, to Nigel's condition of health, and then Nigel said, as he had already said to his wife:

"To-day I feel that I am waking up to life."

"Only to-day?" said the Doctor.

"Oh, I've been feeling better and better, but to-day it's as if a door that had been creaking on its hinges was flung wide open."

"I'm not surprised. These sudden leaps forward are often a feature of convalescence."

"They—they aren't followed by falling back, are they?" Nigel asked, with a sudden change to uneasiness.

"Sometimes, in fever cases especially. But in a case like yours we needn't anticipate anything of that kind."

The last words seemed to suggest to Nigel some train of thought, and after sitting in silence two or three minutes, looking grave and rather preoccupied, he said:

"By the way, what has been the matter with me, exactly? What have I really had in the way of an illness? All this time I've been so occupied in being ill that I've never asked you."

The last words were said with an attempt at lightness.

"Have I?" he added.

"No, I don't think you have," said Isaacson, in a voice that suggested a nature at that moment certainly not inclined to be communicative.

"Has it been all sunstroke! But—but I'm sure it hasn't."

"No, I shouldn't put it down entirely to sunstroke. Hartley wasn't quite right there, I think."

"Well, then?"

Nigel had found a safe topic for conversation, or thought he had. It was sufficiently evident that he felt more at ease, and perhaps he was atoning for former indifference as to the cause of his misery by a real and keen interest about it now.

"You were unwell, you see, before you went out digging without a hat. Weren't you?"

"Yes, that bath in the Nile near Kous. It seemed all to begin somewhere about then. But d'you know, though I've never said so, even to you, I believe I really was not quite myself when I took that dip. I think it was because of that I got the chill."

"Very possibly."

"When I started, I was splendidly well. I mean when we went on board of the Loulia. It's as if it was something to do with that boat. I believe I began to go down the hill very soon after we started on her. But it was all so gradual that I scarcely noticed anything at first. My bath made things worse, and then the digging fairly finished me."

"Ah!"

The last course of the very light dinner was put on the table. Isaacson poured out some Vichy water and began to squeeze the juice of half a lemon into it. Nigel sat watching the process, which was very careful and deliberate.

"You don't tell me what exactly has been the matter," he said, at last.

"You've had such a complication of symptoms."

"That you mean it's impossible to give a name that covers them all?"

Isaacson squeezed the last drop almost tenderly into the tumbler, took up his napkin, and carefully dried his long, brown fingers.

"'What's in a name?'" he quoted.

He looked across the table at Nigel, and questions seemed to be shining in his eyes.

"Do you mean that you don't want to tell me the name?" Nigel said.

It seemed that he was roused to persistence. Either curiosity or some other feeling was awakened within him.

"I don't say that. But you know we doctors often go cautiously—we don't care to commit ourselves."

"Hartley, yes. But that isn't true of you."

He paused.

"You are hedging," he said, bluntly.

Isaacson drank the Vichy and lemon. He put down the glass.

"You are hedging," Nigel repeated. "Why?"

"Isn't it enough for you to get well? What good will it do you to know what you have been suffering from?"

"Good! But isn't it natural that I should wish to know? Why should there be any mystery about it?"

He stopped. Then, leaning forward a little with one arm on the table, he said:

"Does my wife know what it is?"

"I've never told her," Isaacson answered.

"Well, but does she know?"

The voice that asked was almost suspicious. And the eyes that regarded Isaacson were now suspicious, too.

"How can I tell? She told me she supposed it to be a sunstroke."

"That was Hartley's nonsense. Hartley put that idea into her head. But since you came, of course she's realized there was more in it than that."

"I dare say."

Nigel waited, as if expecting something more. But Isaacson kept silence. Dinner was over. Nigel got up, and walking steadily, though not yet with the brisk lightness of complete strength and buoyancy, led the way to the drawing-room.

"Shall we sit out on the terrace?"

"If you like. But you must have a coat. I'll fetch it."

"Oh, don't you—"

But the doctor was gone. In a moment he returned with a coat and a light rug. He helped Nigel to put the coat on, took him by the arm, led him out to the chair, and, when he was in it, arranged the rug over his knees.

"You're awfully good to me, Isaacson," Nigel said, almost with softness, "awfully good to me. I am grateful."

"That's all right."

"We were speaking about it only to-day, Ruby and I. She was saying that we mustn't presume on your kindness that we mustn't detain you out here now that I'm out of the wood."

"She wants to get rid of me! Then she must be coming back!" The thought darted through Isaacson's brain, upsetting a previously formed conviction which, to a certain extent, had guided his conduct during dinner.

"Oh, I'm in no hurry," he said, carelessly. "I want to get you quite strong."

"Yes, but your patients in London! You know I've been feeling so ill that I've been beastly selfish. I've thought only of myself. I've made a slave of my wife, and now I've been keeping you out of London all this time."

As he spoke, his voice grew warmer. His reserve seemed to be melting, the friend to be stirring in the patient. Although certainly he did not realize it, the absence of his wife had already made a difference in his feeling towards Isaacson. Her perpetual silent hostility was like an emanation that insensibly affected her husband. Now that was withdrawn to a distance, he reverted instinctively towards—not yet to—the old relation with his friend. He longed to get rid of all the difficulty between them, and this could only be done by making Isaacson understand Ruby more as he understood her. If he could only accomplish this before Ruby came back! Now this idea came to him, and sent warmth into his voice, warmth into his manner. Isaacson opened his lips to make some friendly protest, but Nigel continued:

"And d'you know who made me see my selfishness—realize how tremendously unselfish you've been in sticking to me all this time?"

Isaacson said nothing.

"My wife. She opened my eyes to it. But for her I mightn't have given a thought to all your loss, not only your material loss, but—"

Isaacson felt as if something poisonous had stung him.

"Please don't speak of anything of that kind!" he said.

"I know I can never compensate you for all you've done for us—"

"Oh, yes, you can!"

The Doctor's voice was almost sharp. Nigel was startled by it.

"We can? How?"

"You can!" Isaacson said, laying a heavy stress on the first word.

"How?"

"First, by never speaking to me of—of the usual 'compensation' patients make to doctors."

"But how can you expect me to accept all this devoted service and make no kind of return?"

"Perhaps you can make me a return—the only return I want."

"But what is it?"

"I—I won't tell you to-night."

"Then when will you tell me?"

Isaacson hesitated. His face was blazing with expression. He looked like a man powerfully stirred—almost like a man on the edge of some outburst.

"I won't tell you to-night," he repeated.

"But you must tell me."

"At the proper time. You asked me at dinner what had been the matter with you, what illness you had been suffering from. You observed that I didn't care to tell you then. Well, I'll tell you before you get rid of me."

"Get rid of you!"

"Yes, yes. Don't think I misunderstand what you've been trying to tell me to-night. You want to convey to me in a friendly manner that now I've accomplished my work it's time for me to be off."

Nigel was deeply hurt.

"Nothing of the sort!" he said. "It was only that my wife had made me understand what a terrible loss to you remaining out here at such a time must be."

"There is something I must make you understand, Armine, before I leave you. And when I've told you what it is, you can give me the only compensation I want, and I want it badly—badly!"

"And you won't tell me what it is now?"

"Not to-night—not in a hurry."

He got up.

"When are you expecting Mrs. Armine back?" he asked.

"In four nights. She wants a couple of full days in Cairo. Then there are the two night journeys."

"I'll tell you before she comes back."

Isaacson turned round, and strolled away into the darkness of the garden.

When he was alone there, he tacitly reproached himself for his vehemence of spirit, for the heat of his temper. Yet surely they were leading him in the right path. These words of Nigel had awakened him to the very simple fact that this association must come to an end, and almost immediately. He had been, he supposed now, drifting on from day to day, postponing any decision. Mrs. Armine was stronger than he. From her, through Nigel, had come to him this access of determination, drawn really from her decision. As he knew this, he was able secretly to admire for a moment this woman whom he actively hated. Her work in the dark would send him now to work in the light.

It was inevitable. While he had believed that very possibly her departure to Cairo was a flight from her husband, Isaacson had had a reason for his hesitation. If Bella Donna vanished, why torture Nigel further? Let him lose her, without knowing all that he had lost. But if she were really coming back, and if he, Isaacson, must go—and his departure in any case must shortly be inevitable—then, cost what it might, the truth must be told.

As he paced the garden, he was trying to brace himself to the most difficult, the most dreadful duty life had so far imposed upon him.

When he went back to the terrace, Nigel was no longer there. He had gone up to bed.

The next day passed without a word between the two men on the subject of the previous night. They talked on indifferent topics. But the cloud of mutual reserve once more enveloped them, and intercourse was uneasy.

Another day dawned.

Mrs. Armine had now been away for two nights, and, if she held to her announced plan, should leave Cairo on her return to Luxor on the evening of the following day. No letter had been received from her. The question in Isaacson's mind was, would she come back? If he spoke and she never returned, he would have stabbed his friend to the heart for no reason. But if she did return and he had not spoken?

He was the prey of doubt, of contending instincts. He did not know what to do. But deep down within him was there not a voice that, like the ground swell of the ocean, murmured ever one thing, unwearied, persistent?

Sometimes he was aware of this voice and strove not to hear it, or not to heed it, this voice in the depths of a man, telling him that in the speaking of truth there is strength, and that out of weakness no good ever came yet, nor ever will come till the end of all things.

But the telling of certain truths seems too cruel; and how can one be cruel to a man returning to life with almost hesitating steps?

Perhaps something would happen to decide the matter, something—some outside event. What it might be Isaacson could not say to himself. Indeed, it was almost childish to hope for anything. He knew that. And yet, unreasonably, he hoped.

And the event did happen, and on that day.

Late in the afternoon a telegram arrived for Nigel. Ibrahim brought it out to the terrace where the two men were together, and Nigel opened it with an eagerness he did not try to disguise.

"It's from her," he said. "She starts to-night, and will be here to-morrow morning early. She's in such a hurry to be back that she's only staying the one night in Cairo."

He looked across to Isaacson, who seemed startled.

"Is there anything the matter with you?" he asked.

"No. Why?"

"You don't look quite yourself."

"I feel perfectly well."

"Oh!"

Almost directly Isaacson made an excuse and got away. His decision was made. There was no more combat within him. But his heart was heavy, was sick, and he felt an acute and frightful nervousness, such as he could imagine being experienced by a man under sentence of death, who is not told on what day the sentence will be carried out. Apprehension fell over him like an icy rain in the sultry air.

He walked mechanically to the bank of the Nile.

To-day the water was like a sheet of glass, dimpled here and there by the wayward currents, and, because of some peculiar atmospheric effect, perhaps, the river looked narrower than usual, the farther bank less far off. Never before had Isaacson been so forcibly struck by the magical clearness of Egypt. Even in the midst of his misery, a misery which physically affected him, he stood still to marvel and to admire.

How near everything looked! How startlingly every detail of things stood out in this exquisite evening!

Presently his eyes went to the Loulia. She, too, looked strangely near, strangely distinct. He watched her, only because of that at first, but presently because he began to notice an unusual bustle on board. Men were moving rapidly about both on the lower and on the upper deck, were going here and there ceaselessly.

One man swarmed up the long and bending mast. Another clambered over the balcony-rail into the stern.

What did all this movement mean?

The master of the Loulia must surely be expected—the man Isaacson had seen driving the Russian horses, and, clothed almost in rags, squatting in the darkness of the hashish cafÉ in the entrails of Cairo.

And Bella Donna was hurrying back after only one night in Cairo!

Isaacson forgot the marvellous beauty of the declining day. In a few minutes he returned to the house. But immediately after dinner, leaving Nigel sitting on the terrace, he went again to the bank of the Nile.

The Loulia was illuminated from prow to stern. Light gleamed from every cabin window, and the crew had not only the daraboukkeh but the pipes on board, and were making the fantasia. Some of them, too, were dancing. Against a strong light on the lower deck, Isaacson saw black figures, sometimes relieved for a moment, moving with a wild grotesqueness, like crazy shadows.

He stood for several minutes listening, watching. He thought of a train travelling towards Luxor. Then he went quickly across the garden, and came to the terrace and Nigel.

The deep voice within him must be obeyed. He could resist it no longer.

"They're lively on the Loulia to-night," Nigel said, as he came up.

"Yes," Isaacson answered.

He stood while he lighted a cigar. Then he sat down near to his friend. The light from the drawing-room streamed out upon them from the open French window. The shrill sound of the pipes, the dull throbbing of the daraboukkeh, came to them from across the water.

"The whole vessel is lighted up," he added.

"Is she? Perhaps Baroudi has come up the river."

"Looks like it," said Isaacson.

He crossed, then uncrossed his legs. Never before had he felt himself to be a coward. He knew what he must do. He knew he would do it before Nigel and he went into the room behind them. Yet he could not force himself to begin. He thought, "When I've smoked out this cigar."

"You've never seen Baroudi," Nigel said. "He's one of the handsomest fellows I've ever clapped eyes on. As strong as a bull, I should think; enormously rich. A very good chap, too, I should say. But I don't fancy my wife liked him. He's hardly a woman's man."

"Why d'you think that?"

"I don't know. His manner, perhaps. And he doesn't seem to bother about them. But we only saw him about twice, except on the ship coming out. He dined here one night, and the next day we went over the Loulia with him, and we've never set eyes on him since. He went up river, and we went down, to the Fayyūm."

"But—but you went off alone to the Fayyūm, didn't you? At first, I mean?"

"Oh, yes. The morning after Baroudi had sailed for Armant."

"And Mrs. Armine was alone here for some time?"

"Yes. Just while I was getting things a little ship-shape for her. But we didn't have much luxury after all. However, she didn't mind that."

"Wasn't—don't you think it may have been rather dull for Mrs. Armine during that time?"

"Which time? D'you mean in the Fayyūm?"

"I mean, while you were away in the Fayyūm."

"I dare say it was. I expect it was. But why?"

"Well—"

Isaacson threw away his cigar.

"Not going to finish your cigar?" said Nigel.

He was evidently beginning to be surprised by his friend's words and manner.

"No," Isaacson said. "I don't want to smoke to-night; I want to talk. I must talk to you. You remember our conversation on the night of Mrs. Armine's departure?"

"About my illness?"

"Yes."

"Of course I do."

"I said then that I wouldn't accept the usual money compensation for anything I had been able to do for you."

"Yes, but—"

"And I told you you could compensate me in another way."

"What way?"

"That's what I'm going to try and tell you now. But—but it's not easy. I want you to understand—I want you to understand."

There was a moment of silence. Then Nigel said:

"But what? Understand what?"

"Armine, do you believe thoroughly in my friendship for you?"

"Yes."

"You believe, you know, it's a friendship that is quite disinterested?"

"I'm sure it is."

"And yet you have treated me all this time with almost as much reserve as if I had been a mere acquaintance."

Nigel looked uncomfortable.

"I didn't mean—I am deeply grateful to you," he said; "deeply grateful. You have saved my life."

"I have, indeed," Isaacson said, solemnly. "If I had not followed you up the river, you would certainly have died."

"Are you—you said you would tell me what was the matter with me."

"I'm going to."

"What was it?"

"The bath at Kous had nothing to do with it. As to sunstroke, you never had it. You began to feel unwell—didn't you?—soon after you started for your voyage?"

"Yes."

"Hasn't it ever struck you as very strange that you, a young man in magnificent health, living an outdoor life in one of the finest climates in the world, should be struck down by this mysterious illness?"

"Mysterious?"

"Well, wasn't it?"

"It was very odd. I always thought that, of course."

He leaned forward a little in his chair, fixing his eyes on Isaacson.

"What was my illness?"

"You've been suffering from lead-poisoning," said Isaacson, slowly, and with an effort.

"Lead?"—Nigel leaned farther forward, moving his hands along the arms of his reclining chair—"lead-poisoning?"

"Yes."

"I've been—you say I've been poisoned?"

"Poisoned from day to day, gradually poisoned through a considerable period of time."

"Poisoned!"

Nigel repeated the word heavily, almost dully. For a moment he seemed dazed.

"If I had not arrived in time, you would have been killed, undoubtedly."

"Killed! But—but who, in the name of God, should want to kill me?"

Isaacson was silent.

"I say, who should want to kill me?" reiterated Nigel.

And this time there was a sound of violence in his voice.

"There was somebody on board of the Loulia who must have wished for your death."

"But who—who? The Nubians? Ibrahim? Hamza?"

Isaacson did not answer. He could not answer at that moment.

"I treated them well, I paid them well, they had everything they could possibly want. They had an easy time. They all seemed fond of us. They were fond of us. I know they were."

"I don't say they were not."

"Then what d'you mean? There was nobody else on board with me."

"Yes, there was."

"There was? Then I never saw him! Do you mean to say there was some one hidden on board? What are you talking about, Isaacson?"

He was becoming greatly, almost angrily excited.

"Armine, the compensation I want is this. I don't want to clear out and leave you here in Egypt; I want to take you away with me."

"Take me away? Where to?"

"Anywhere—back to England."

"We are going to England as soon as I'm quite strong. But you haven't told me! You say I've been poisoned. I want to know by whom."

---

"But perhaps you don't know! Do you know?"

Isaacson got up. He felt as if he could not speak any more sitting down.

"If you will only give me my compensation, let me take you away quietly—I'm a doctor. Nobody will think anything of it—I need say nothing more."

"Take me away! But I'm nearly well now, and there can be no more danger."

"If you come away with me—no!"

"But you forget, I'm not alone. I must consult my wife."

"That is what I don't wish you to do."

"Don't? You mean, go away with you without—?"

"I mean, without Mrs. Armine."

"Leave my wife?"

"Leave Ruby? Desert her after all she's done for me?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

Isaacson said nothing.

Nigel looked at Isaacson in silence for what seemed to Isaacson a long time—minutes. Then his face slowly flushed, was suffused with blood up to his forehead. It seemed to swell, as if there was a pressure from within outwards. Then the blood retreated, leaving behind it a sort of dark pallor, and the eyes looked sunken in their sockets.

"You—you dare to think—you dare to—to say—?" he stammered.

"I say that you must come away from Mrs. Armine. Don't ask me to say why."

"You—you liar! You damnable liar!"

He spoke slowly, in a low, husky voice.

"That you hated her, I knew that! She told me that. But that you—that you should dare to—"

His voice broke, and he stopped. He leaned forward in his chair and made a gesture.

"Go!" he said. "Get out! If I—if I were myself, I'd put you out."

But Isaacson did not move. He felt no anger, nothing but a supreme pity for this man who could not see, could not understand the truth of a nature with which he had held commune for so long, and, as he in his blindness believed, in such a perfect intimacy. There was to the Doctor something shocking in such blindness, in such ignorance. But there was something beautiful, too. And to destroy beauty is terrible.

"If I am to go, you must hear me first," he said, quietly.

"I won't hear you—not one word!"

Again there was the gesture towards the door.

"I have saved your life," Isaacson said. "And you shall hear me!"

And then, without waiting for Nigel to speak again, very quietly, very steadily, and with a great simplicity he told him what he had to tell. He did not, even now, tell him all. He kept secret the visit of Mrs. Chepstow to his consulting-room, and her self-revelation there. And he did not mention Baroudi. At this moment of crisis the man bred up in England fought against the Eastern Jew within Isaacson, and the Eastern Jew gave way. But he described his visits to the Savoy, how the last time he had gone with the resolution to beg Mrs. Chepstow not to go to Egypt, not to link herself with his friend; how he had begun to speak, and how her cold irony, pitiless and serene, had shown him the utter futility of his embassy. Then he came on to the later time, after the marriage and the departure, when he received his friend's letter describing his happiness and his wonderful health, when he received soon afterwards that other letter from the lady patient, speaking of Nigel's "extraordinary colour." He told how in London he had put those letters side by side and had compared them, and how some strong instinct of trouble and danger had driven him, almost against his will, to Egypt, had bound him to silence about his arrival. Then on the terrace at Shepheard's an acquaintance casually met had increased his fears. And so, in his quick, terse, unembroidered narrative, almost frightfully direct, he reached the scene in the temple of Edfou. From that moment he spared Nigel no detail. He described Mrs. Armine's obvious terror at his appearance; her lies, her omission to tell him her husband was ill until she realized that he—Isaacson—had already heard of the illness in Luxor; her pretence that his dangerous malady was only a slight indisposition caused by grief at the death of Lord Harwich; her endeavor to prevent Isaacson from coming on board the Loulia; the note she had sent by the felucca; his walk by night on the river bank till he came to the dahabeeyah, his eavesdropping, and how the words he overheard decided him to insist on seeing Nigel; the interview with Mrs. Armine in the saloon, and how he had forced his way, by a stratagem, to the after part of the vessel. Then he told of the contest with Doctor Hartley, already influenced by Mrs. Armine, and of the final victory, won—how? By a threat, which could only have frightened a guilty woman.

"I told Mrs. Armine that either I took charge of your case or that I communicated with the police authorities. Then, and only then, she gave way. She let me come on board to nurse you back to life."

"How could you have known?" Nigel exclaimed, with intensely bitter defiance, when at last a pause came. "Even if it had been true, how could you have known?"

"I did not know. I suspected. To save you, I drew a bow at a venture, and I hit the mark. Your illness has been caused by the administration, through a long period of time, of minute doses of some preparation of lead—almost impalpable doubtless, perhaps not to be distinguished from the sand that is blown from the desert. And Mrs. Armine either herself gave or caused it to be given to you."

"Liar! Liar!"

"Did she ever herself give you food? Did she ever prepare your coffee?"

Nigel started up in his chair with a furious spasm of energy.

"Go! Go!" he uttered, in a sort of broken shout or cry. His face was yellowish white. His mouth was working.

"By God! I'll put you out!"

Grasping the arms of his chair, he stood up and he advanced upon Isaacson.

"I'll go. But I'll leave you that!"

And Isaacson drew from his pocket the letter Mrs. Armine had sent by the felucca, and laid it on the coffee-table.

Then he turned quickly, and went away through the dark garden.

Before he was out of sight of the house, he looked back. Nigel had sunk upon his chair in a collapsed attitude.

From the western bank of the Nile came the shrill, attenuated sound of the pipes, the deep throbbing of the daraboukkeh, the nasal chant of the Nubians.

And the lights of the Loulia were like a line of fiery eyes staring across the Nile.

---