That night at sunset, as Soada lay upon the sheepskin spread for her, with the child nestled between her arm and her breast, a figure darkened the doorway, and old Fatima cried out:

"Mahommed Selim!"

With a gasping sound Soada gathered the child quickly to her breast, and shrank back to the wall. This surely was the ghost of Mahommed Selim— this gaunt, stooping figure covered with dust.

"Soada, in the name of Allah the Compassionate, the Merciful, Soada, beautiful one!"

Mahommed Selim, once the lithe, the straight, the graceful, now bent, awkward, fevered, all the old daring gone from him, stood still in the middle of the room, humbled before the motherhood in his sight.

"Brother of jackals," cried old Fatima, "what dost thou here? What dost thou here, dog of dogs!" She spat at him.

He took no notice. "Soada," he said eagerly, prayerfully, and his voice, though hoarse, was softer than she had ever heard it. "Soada, I have come through death to thee—Listen, Soada! At night, when sleep was upon the barrack-house, I stole out to come to thee. My heart had been hard. I had not known how much I loved thee—"

Soada interrupted him. "What dost thou know of love, Mahommed Selim?
The blood of the dead cries from the ground."

He came a step nearer. "The blood of Wassef the camel-driver is upon my head," he said. "In the desert there came news of it. In the desert, even while we fought the wild tribes, one to ten, a voice kept crying in my ear, even as thou hast cried, 'What didst thou know of love, Mahommed Selim!' One by one the men of Beni Souef fell round me; one by one they spoke of their village and of their women, and begged for a drop of water, and died. And my heart grew hot within me, and a spirit kept whispering in my ear: 'Mahommed Selim, think of the village thou hast shamed, of Soada thou hast wronged! No drop of water shall cheer thy soul in dying!'"

Fatima and Soada listened now with bated breath, for this was the voice of one who had drunk the vinegar and gall of life.

"When the day was done, and sleep was upon the barrack-house, my heart waked up and I knew that I loved Soada as I had never loved her. I ran into the desert, and the jackals flew before me—outcasts of the desert, they and I. Coming to the tomb of Amshar the sheikh, by which was a well, there I found a train of camels. One of these I stole, and again I ran into the desert, and left the jackals behind. Hour after hour, day and night, I rode on. But faintness was upon me, and dreams came. For though only the sands were before me, I seemed to watch the Nile running- -running, and thou beside it, hastening with it, hastening, hastening towards thy home. And Allah put a thorn into my heart, that a sharp pain went through my body—and at last I fell."

Soada's eyes were on him now with a strange, swimming brilliancy.

"Mahommed—Mahommed Selim, Allah touched thine eyes that thou didst see truly," she said eagerly. "Speak not till I have done," he answered. "When I waked again I was alone in the desert, no food, no water, and the dead camel beside me. But I had no fear. 'If it be God's will,' said I, 'then I shall come unto Soada. If it be not God's will, so be it: for are we not on the cushion of His mercy, to sleep or to wake, to live or to die?'"

He paused, tottering, and presently sank upon the ground, his hands drooped before him, his head bent down. Old Fatima touched him on the shoulder.

"Brother of vultures didst thou go forth; brother of eagles dost thou return," she said. "Eat, drink, in the house of thy child and its mother."

"Shall the unforgiven eat or drink?" he asked, and he rocked his body to and fro, like one who chants the Koran in a corner of El Azhar, forgetting and forgotten.

Soada's eyes were on him now as though they might never leave him again; and she dragged herself little by little towards him, herself and the child—little by little, until at last she touched his feet, and the child's face was turned towards him from its mother's breast.

"Thou art my love, Mahommed Selim," she said. He raised his head from his hands, a hunger of desire in his face.

"Thou art my lord," she added: "art thou not forgiven? The little one is thine and mine," she whispered. "Wilt thou not speak to him?"

"Lest Allah should strike me with blindness and dry up the juice of my veins, I will not touch thee or the child until all be righted. Food will I not eat, nor water drink until thou art mine—by the law of the Prophet, mine."

Laying down the water-jar, and the plate of dourha bread, old Fatima gathered her robe about her, and cried as she ran from the house: "Marriage and fantasia thou shalt have this hour."

The stiffness seemed to pass from her bones as she ran through the village to the house of the Omdah. Her voice, lifting shrilly, sang the Song of Haleel, the song of the newly married, till it met the chant of the Muezzin on the tower of the mosque El Hassan, and mingled with it, dying away over the fields of bersim and the swift-flowing Nile.

That night Mahommed Selim and Soada the daughter of Wassef the camel- driver were married, but the only fantasia they held was their own low laughter over the child. In the village, however, people were little moved to smile, for they knew that Mahommed Selim was a deserter from the army of the Khedive at Dongola, and that meant death. But no one told Soada this, and she did not think; she was content to rest in the fleeting dream.

"Give them twenty-four hours," said the black-visaged fat sergeant of cavalry come to arrest Mahommed Selim for desertion.

The father of Mahommed Selim again offered the Mamour a feddan of land if the young man might go free, and to the sergeant he offered a she-camel and a buffalo. To no purpose. It was Mahommed Selim himself who saved his father's goods to him. He sent this word to the sergeant by Yusef the drunken ghaffir: "Give me to another sunset and sunrise, and what I have is thine—three black donkeys of Assiout rented to old Abdullah the sarraf."

Because with this offer he should not only have backsheesh but the man also, the fat sergeant gave him leave. When the time was up, and Mahommed Selim drew Soada's face to his breast, he knew that it was the last look and last embrace.

"I am going back," he said; "my place is empty at Dongola."

"No, no, thou shalt not go," she cried. "See how the little one loves thee," she urged, and, sobbing, she held the child up to him.

But he spoke softly to her, and at last she said: "Kiss me, Mahommed
Selim. Behold now thy discharge shall be bought from the palace of the
Khedive, and soon thou wilt return," she cried.

"If it be the will of God," he answered; "but the look of thine eyes I will take with me, and the face of the child here." He thrust a finger into the palm of the child, and the little dark hand closed round it. But when he would have taken it away, the little hand still clung, though the eyes were scarce opened upon life.

"See, Mahommed Selim," Soada cried, "he would go with thee."

"He shall come to me one day, by the mercy of God," answered Mahommed
Selim.

Then he went out into the market-place and gave himself up to the fat sergeant. As they reached the outskirts of the village a sorry camel came with a sprawling gallop after them, and swaying and rolling above it was Yusef, the drunken ghaffir, his naboot of dom-wood across his knees.

"What dost thou come for, friend of the mercy of God?" asked Mahommed
Selim.

"To be thy messenger, praise be to God!" answered Yusef, swinging his water-bottle clear for a drink.