"IF AT FIRST YOU DON'T SUCCEED"

Now that we were thoroughly launched on this somewhat quixotic adventure, I envied Anthony because his part in the drama kept him "in the wings," within sight of the stage. He was to watch the house of Rechid Bey, and if the rescue party of two did not appear after an hour's absence, the true story of the affair and Mabel's appeal was to be laid before the Inspector General of Upper Egypt—laid before him not by "Ahmed Antoun Effendi," but by Captain Anthony Fenton, officially on leave, secretly on a special mission for the British government.

My rÔle, less exciting but perhaps no less important, was to play the diplomat in beguiling the American Consul to stand by the wife of Rechid Bey, if the attempt at rescue succeeded, or—if possible—even if it failed.

"Antoun" accounted for his presence in front of Rechid Bey's high garden wall, by attracting a crowd, and lecturing them in his character of Hadji, while I dashed off in a jingling arabeah, to the American Consulate. As in Cairo, my progress was one long adjuration of the crowd by the driver, who would have revelled in conducting the car of Juggernaut.

"Shemalak, ya welad!" ("To the left, oh, boy!"), or "Yeminick!" ("To the right!"), he roared, while men dived and dipped under his horse's prancing feet. A hawk flew by on my right side, and my right eyelid twitched, as we neared the Consulate. In Egypt these were good omens. Besides, there had been a red sunrise, which in the Nile country had meant, since Egyptians superseded the prehistoric "new race," that RÃ had conquered his enemies, and stained the sky with their blood. Therefore all should be well with me and the world; and it did seem as if my hopes bade fair to be fulfilled, when in the Consul I recognized a man I had been able to advise in a small official difficulty in my early days at the Embassy in Rome. This was even more fortunate than the case of Slaney. We shook hands warmly, and as soon as was decent, I interrupted a flow of reminiscent gratitude by flooding Mr. James Bronson with the story of Rechid Bey's unhappy American bride, Mabella HÂnem, ill treated as well as cruelly deceived, if her story were true. He knew Rechid slightly, but the marriage was news to him. With interest he listened to my account of the lonely little governess in Paris, bewitched by the love-making of a handsome Turk as white as herself. But when I asked for help, the Consul shook his head.

"Lord Ernest," he said, "there's nothing I'd like better than to pay my debt by doing you some favour. But you're asking me the one thing that's hardest, as you probably know. You understand as well as I do that when a girl marries a man, she ceases to be a subject of her native land. And to interfere with the inmate of a harem is just about impossible. But I'll tell you what I will do for your sake. If you can get the girl out of Rechid Bey's house—which, mind you, I doubt—you may bring her to my wife, and we'll cook up some story about her being a relative of mine. So she is, I guess, through Adam and Eve! If you think she's been badly treated, we'll stand by her, once she's under this roof (which means she'll be on American soil), through thick and thin, whatever the consequences. I can't go farther, and I don't believe you expected that I would."

I admitted that I had not, and thanked him for his promise.

By this time, I thought that Brigit and Monny might be on their way to meet me at the Consulate, as arranged, escorted by "Antoun," and perhaps bringing Mabel. Even the route they were to take was planned, so that I could not miss them if I started.

Meanwhile, Mr. Bronson was to interest his wife in our protÉgÉe. Back I flew, my ears deafened by more "Ya Welads," but though I met many things and many creatures on the congested road, there was no arabeah containing the desired ones. I made my driver slacken pace as we neared the big, square pink house of Rechid Bey, set far back in its garden of palms and impossible statues, on the bank of the Nile. No green turban was in sight, and I wondered what could have happened, as we drove slowly past the ponderous black gate-keeper, apparently half asleep on his bench. There was nothing to do but crawl along at a snail's pace, lest that droop of the crocodile-lids should be assumed for effect. I went on, meaning to turn presently; but when the arabeah had taken me beyond eyeshot of Rechid's gate-keeper, an Arab sacca, or water seller, ran forward, striking his musical gong. From his brass jar, protected by crimson-dyed horse hair to keep out dust, he offered a draught; and his look said that he had something more for me than a drink of water. I beckoned him close, stopping the arabeah; and under the tumbler he handed up was a folded bit of paper. None save the water seller had attention to spare for me just then, as a wedding procession was approaching, with a crude but gorgeous curtained litter drawn by camels, and a number of musicians with rÄitas, darabukas, the "key and bottle," and other Eastern instruments which may have been ancestors of the Highlanders' bagpipes. The street crowd followed, enchanted by the plaintive, monotonous notes, grotesque to newcomers from the west, but enthralling to those who have fallen under the spell of their melancholy magic.

"Failure for the present, but Miss G. and Mrs. J. safe," Anthony had scrawled in pencil. "Couldn't wait in front of R.'s house, but you'll find us at an Arab restaurant to which the messenger will guide you. All you have to do is to discharge your arabeah, and walk in the direction the man takes, keeping your distance in case you're watched."

I obeyed instructions, and in the town of Asiut, far from the gardens along the Nile front, I came to a house between the mosque of the tallest minaret, and the great market whither Arabia as well as Egypt sends her wares. It was a house of some pretension, though in a narrow unpaved street, lined with humble native dwellings. I guessed that it must have been built for a rich man who had died or failed in business, but now a sign in Arabic announced that it was a restaurant. A nod from the water seller told that I had reached the end of the journey. Nubian servants salaamed in the big room where once the master of the house had held receptions, and in a smaller room beyond I saw Antoun, Brigit, and Monny. They were seated at a low table where no forks or knives or even plates were laid. In the centre of the white cloth stood a large dish of something sweet and rich-looking, from which everybody pretended to eat; but at sight of me, Brigit and Monny began talking together. They told me breathlessly how they had been informed by the gatekeeper that "Mabella HÂnem" was not well. Having insisted that they were intimate friends whom she would desire to see, they had been bidden to return in an hour. Reluctantly coming away, they had as soon as was prudent been joined by Antoun. He had then taken them to the bazaars, hoping to give them a glimpse of the shops before the Set returned from the Tombs; but they had met Neill Sheridan, who had something to tell. He had caught sight of Bedr running after the carriage of a Turk strongly resembling Rechid Bey. The carriage had stopped near the railway station; and after an instant's conversation the horses had been turned to gallop off in the direction whence they had come.

"Of course we were sure the Turk was Rechid," said Monny, "so Antoun Effendi thought we'd better go back to watch his house. When we got there, it was too late, for already some time had passed since Mr. Sheridan saw Bedr. Rechid's gate-man said that Mabella HÂnem was suddenly better, and had gone away with her husband. He could talk a little French, so we understood perfectly—and, anyhow, you know I'm studying Arabic. It's so discouraging when Arabs answer me in Cockney English, or say "Sure" in American! We believed the fellow, because it seemed exactly what Wretched would do—come back and grab Mabel away at a minute's notice. So unfortunate about Neill Sheridan! Wretched was idiotically jealous of him on the Laconia; and if he caught a glimpse of him to-day he's certain to think Mr. Sheridan's here to try and see Mabel. We tore to the railroad depot, but the train was just going out. No doubt Rechid and his wife were both on it. Isn't it heartbreaking?"

I sat mute, thinking things over, but Anthony tried to give consolation by saying that he still had some hope. He had found out that Rechid Bey owned a sugar plantation, with a house on it, near Luxor. The train which had left Asiut was bound for Luxor. In a very few days our boat would land us there, and we would try our luck again.

"Not much doubt," Fenton added, speaking as always in French, "that this is Bedr's revenge on us. He must have told Rechid that Miss Gilder had mentioned his name saying she hoped he was leaving home. That hint of danger would be enough for any Turk."

"It will be my fault, then," moaned Monny, "if he kills Mabel. He's deceived and shut her up and tried to convert her. Worse than all, he has another wife. The next step will be murder. Oh, how can we bear the delay of going on to Luxor by boat! Hadn't we better take a train? Better miss all the things we've come to Egypt to see, rather than leave Mabel to her fate."

"Rechid isn't the sort to have her put out of the way,"! said Anthony. "He's not a bad fellow, as such men go, and he's hardly had time to tire of his conquest yet. According to his lights, he's right not to allow any interference with his harem from Europeans. He was jealous on board ship, of one or two men of your acquaintance, you've told me. This attempted visit of yours will revive his interest in his wife, inconveniently for us; but if I know his type it will die down again, the minute he thinks he has covered his tracks. For a day or two he will be a dragon. Then he'll begin to think we're discouraged, or that we haven't found out about his sugar plantation, or that nothing more than a visit to his wife was intended, and he'll turn his attention to other things than watch-dogging. It's far better to go on by boat, and make a dash when he's off guard again."

After a few arguments, we agreed with "Antoun," as we usually ended by doing, and soothed our restlessness by visiting Mr. Bronson to tell him of our disappointment. If it hadn't been for Monny, I think the Consul would have taken the point of view that he was now "out" of the affair, but Monny, sapphire-eyed with generous zeal, is rather irresistible. Fired by her enthusiasm, as he had not been by my beguiling, he volunteered to go to Luxor on two or three days' leave, with his wife, to visit a Syrian friend who had often vainly invited them to his villa, and arriving if possible about the time our boat was due. If we succeeded in our quest, we might bring Mabel to them, and they would smuggle her back to the American Consulate at Asiut.

Our great adventure thus postponed, we let the Nile-dream take us once more; and though we had moments of impatience, the dream was too fair to be resisted. Besides, we were all four dreaming it together. Poor Cleopatra was the only one outside, for Rachel Guest was dreaming her own dream, with an extremely practical side to it, unless Biddy and I were mistaken. She wore Monny's clothes, and used her special perfume, and took advantage of the same initials, to accept gifts of filmy handkerchiefs and monogrammed bags and brushes. Also she had firmly annexed most of the men on board who would, in normal states of mind, have belonged to the Gilded Rose. But they all seemed to have gone mad on the subject of Miss Guest. Even Harry Snell, who had been the property of Enid Biddell on board the Candace, on the Enchantress Isis was gravitating Guest-ward, lured by that meek, mysterious witchery which I was trying hard to understand.

We got past SohÂg, and the famous White and Red Coptic Monasteries built by Saint Helena, without jarring notes of any sort in the Nile-dream (save for the failure of our rescue plot): past Akhmin, which Herodotus wrote of as Chemmis: past Girgah, where once stood ancient This, that gave the first dynasty of kings to Egypt: but when we arrived at Baliana to visit Abydos, between Enid Biddell and Harry Snell I had an interlude of nightmare. It was Rachel's fault, but it was I who had to suffer for her sins. I, who had engaged as Conductor of the Set and found myself their Arbiter as well.

Other tourists on other boats do not see Abydos until the return trip; but the aim of Sir Marcus was originality as well as "exclusiveness." This was a special tour, and everything we were to do must be special. Some passengers might wish to stay longer than others at Khartum, or from there go up the White or Blue Nile after Big Game. Or they might tire of the Nile, and wish to tear back to Cairo by train. Sir Marcus was boldly outdoing his rivals by allowing clients to engage cabins for "up Nile" only, instead of paying the return also: and they were not to miss any temple because of this concession. "I consider it an advertisement, and a cheap one," he had explained to me, in saying that we were to visit at Abydos on our way south.

Beautiful smiling donkeys, adorned with beads and amulets, met us at the boat-landing. We ought to have called it Al-Balyana, but we didn't. We called it Baliana, and we pronounced Abydos according to our education. We had a ride of an hour and a half from the boat to the temple; and having sent off Cleopatra and Lady Biddell in a carriage, my conscience was free, my heart light. The sun shone on tawny desert hills, like lions creeping stealthily out from the horizon toward the Nile to drink. There were sweet smells of unseen flowers, and herbs such as ancient Egyptian doctors used, and I looked forward to keeping my donkey near Biddy's. Of course I ought to have preferred Monny's, but then, I could talk of Monny to Biddy, and we had had so many subjects in common since childhood that it was restful to ride even the most energetic donkey at the side of "Mrs. Jones." No sooner, however, had I begun to urge my gray animal after her white one, than I was called by Enid Biddell. "Oh, Lord Ernest! I must speak to you!" she pleaded so piteously that I couldn't pretend not to hear.

When we were ambling side by side, separated from the rest of the party by a gleaming cloud of copper dust, a few long-haired, brown sheep, some blue-eyed water buffalo, and a plague of little birds, Enid turned upon me a pair of tear-wet eyes.

"Why, Miss Biddell, what is the matter—or is it a cold in your head?" I asked anxiously.

"It's not a cold in my head," she confessed. "It's a dreadful, dreadful pain in my heart. And you're the only one who can cure it."

For a fearful moment I thought that she was going to propose. One hears of these awful visitations. But I need not have trembled.

"I feel as if I could say anything to you," she murmured. "You are so understanding, and so sympathetic."

It was on the tip of my tongue to reply that it was my duty as Conductor to be so, and that, if I succeeded, a mountain full of hidden treasure might perhaps reward me. But just in time I realized that this speech would not be tactful. Instead of speaking, I looked at her and let her go on.

"It's Harry Snell," she said. "You have influence with him. He thinks you such a great swell, he'd hate to do anything you would call unworthy of a gentleman. He—he's making me so unhappy. He's done —everything—to win my love and now—now he's gone over to that Miss Guest." The donkey having begun inopportunely to trot, the words were jolted out, one after another, like a shower of pebbles. And they fell on my feelings like paving stones. She expected me to do something about it! Horrible! I should almost have preferred the proposal.

"My dear Miss Biddell," I soothed her in my best salad-oil voice, cultivated at the Embassy, "you are much prettier than Miss Guest, and you can win Snell back easily if you want him. Probably he's only flirting, to make you jealous."

"It's me he was flirting with," she moaned. "But I don't believe he cares for Miss Guest. It's only a case of 'follow my leader,' because other men like her so much. Nothing succeeds like success, you know. And other men's admiration is the most becoming background a girl can have. He told Mrs. Harlow it was haunting him, that Elaine and I would get fat like our mother, and the men who married us would have to spend dull years seeing us slowly grow into mother's likeness. Wasn't it cruel? And we eat scarcely anything except pickles on purpose to keep thin. But that's only his excuse. It's the romance of the situation, and the secret that appeals to him."

"What secret?" I felt entitled to inquire.

"Why, the secret between those two girls, Miss Gilder and Miss Guest. You know what all the men believe about them, don't you? But of course you do."

"But of course I don't."

"Why, that they've changed places, to deceive people, just as heiresses and poor girls do in old-fashioned plays or books. They think Miss Gilder (I mean the girl we call Miss Gilder) is really the school-teacher, and the one we call Miss Guest, and that all the men are after, is Rosamond Gilder the cannon heiress."

"Whew!" I whistled, bumpily, as my donkey kept up with Enid's. "For goodness' sake, what makes them think that?"

"I don't know exactly how the story started, but it seems authentic. Have you known them long?"

"Only since Naples. But—"

"Then you can't be certain whether it's true or not?"

I paused, swallowing an answer. So this was the explanation of the Monny puzzle! Yet it was but the first word of another enigma. Who was responsible for the wild story? There was more than met the eye—or ear—in this. I could hardly believe that Monny would have chosen, or Rachel dared, to start this rumour, though it might have amused the real heiress, and suited the false one, to watch it run. I dared not contradict it flatly, without consulting Brigit or the Gilded Rose herself. It was not my business to be a spoil-sport, if there were sport to spoil, no matter how sternly I might disapprove.

"In the matter of actual knowledge, I have very little about Miss Gilder," I decided to reply, "except that she's charming enough and pretty enough for any man to fall in love with, if she hadn't a penny. As for Miss Guest"

"Miss Guest is a cat! And if only you'll tell Harry Snell so, I'll bless you all my life."

"Good gracious! I couldn't do that."

"I mean, tell him you think she isn't the heiress, that she's only what she seems to be, and nothing mysterious or interesting. He'll believe you! Why, she can't have any money, or even a nice mind. She always writes 'No,' with her finger on top of her cold cream at hotels, she told me so herself. Not that it's any good with Arabs, they don't want to steal cold cream. But such a trick would never occur to a rich girl, would it? She grows vainer every day, too, till one can just see vanity spouting from the top of her head. She intends to use this mistake people are making about her, to bag a rich man like Harry Snell, or a successful one with a big, growing reputation like Mr. Bailey the American sculptor. You will help me save Harry from her, and bring him back to me, won't you? You're the only one he'll listen to. If you don't speak, I shall simply jump overboard into the Nile, and Sir Marcus Lark would hate that."

"So should I, dear Miss Biddell," I assured her. "But what can I possibly do in—in such a very intimate matter?"

"Why, you're a diplomat, aren't you? I thought they always knew what to do. You make us all dance to your tune like puppets, and imagine we're prancing about to please ourselves. Tell him he's breaking my heart."

"By Jove! You're not in earnest?"

"I am. Oh, he must come back! I thought on board the Candace we were as good as engaged. I—I submitted to his kisses, and now—"

"'Submitted' is a good word," I sneered to my inner self, but outwardly I submitted a handkerchief to the lady, as she had lost hers in one of the last donkey jolts, and ventured to insert sympathetically into a pause a small suggestion. It was usual, I reminded Miss Biddell, if a gentleman's intentions had to be asked, that the father did the asking. This hint, however, fell flatter than a flounder; and all the way to Abydos, most sacred temple of ancient Egypt, I was persecuted with Enid Biddell's woes, when I should have been free to meditate upon the tragic history of Isis and Osiris. It was here that the head of the murdered god was buried, and perhaps his whole body, when the magic secret of Thoth had enabled Isis to collect the fourteen separate pieces Set had hidden. Many temples claimed the sacred body of Osiris, ruler over departed spirits and Amenti, their dim dwelling place beyond the western desert; Philae and Memphis among others; but it was Abydos to which the Egyptians give their most reverent faith, as the true burial place of the Beloved One. It was there they wished to lie when they died and were mummied, in order to rest through eternity near the relic of their most precious god. Thus a necropolis grew like a poppy-garden of sleep, round the temple; and a city rose also. But even in the long-ago time of Strabo, the city was reduced to a village, and all traces of the shrine had vanished. The great white jewel of the temples—temple of Seti I, and the temple of his son Rameses II—remain to this day, however, with the Tablet of Ancestors which has helped in the tracing of Egyptian history. Therefore is it that this treasure of the Nile-desert is still a shrine for travellers from the four corners of the earth.

After the long, straight road, and a high, sudden hill, we came face to face with the marble-white columns of the outer court. If I had been with Brigit or Monny, I could have run back into the past, hand in hand with either, to see with my mind's eyes the white limestone palace of Memnon, copied from the Labyrinth, standing above the city between the canal and the desert. I should have peered into the depths of its fountain; and with a hand shading my eyeballs from the sun I should have gazed at the grove of Horus' sacred acanthus trees, dark against the burning blue. I should have found the Royal tombs which Rameses restored, grouped near the buried body of Osiris. But bad luck gave me Enid Biddell for my companion. She would not let any one else come near me, even had the Right Somebody wished to dispute my battered remains with her. "Antoun Effendi" had the others hypnotized, and I wondered if they noticed how like his boldly cut profile was to certain portraits of the youthful Rameses carved on the glittering white walls. So splendid were they that had I been a woman my spirit would have rushed back along the sand-obliterated, devious paths of Egypt's history, to find and fall at the feet of their original. But—there was Antoun, much easier to get at, and perhaps better worth the gift of a woman's heart than Rameses the Great with all his faults and cruelties!

Crowds of birds lived in interstices of the broken columns, and their tiny faces peeped out like flowers growing among rocks, their eyes bright and arresting as personal anecdotes in long, dull chapters of history. They seemed to look at me, and sympathize, cocking their heads on one side as if to say, "Poor, foolish, modern man, why don't you make a virtue of necessity and get rid of this still more foolish modern maid, by promising her anything she asks? Then you can go listen to that princely looking person in the green turban, who might be descended from the kings our ancestors used to behold. He does seem to know something about the history of this place, on which we are authorities! The dragomans who bring crowds of tourists to our temple and gabble nonsense, put us really off our feed. Peep, peep! Just hear him tell about the staircase we're so proud of. Did you know there was a picture of it in the Book of The Dead, with Osiris standing at the top, like a good host waiting to receive his guests? Well, then, if you didn't, do anything you must to escape from that lovesick girl, while there's time to hear a real scholar talk of 'Him who is at the Head of the Staircase!' Peep, peep! Hurry up, or you'll lose it all, you Silly. Of course, the real staircase is in Amenti, which your Roman Catholics call Purgatory; and no doubt Osiris is standing on it to this day."

So I took the birds' advice, and promised Enid to have a "heart to heart" talk with Harry Snell. Satisfied that she had got all that was to be got out of me, she powdered her nose (in the same spirit that David anointed his head) and attached herself to Rachel, in whose train was the Desired One. Thus basely did I free myself to enjoy the society of Biddy and Osiris, with lovely carved glimpses of Isis thrown in, to say nothing of Seti I and Rameses II. Trying to push into the background of my mind the nauseating thought of my vow and its fulfillment, I helped Brigit and Monny take snapshots of King Seti showing his son Rameses how to lasso, and also to catch by its tail the most fascinating of bulls. They were on the wall, of course (Rameses and Seti, I mean, not Brigit and Monny), but seemed so real they might leap off at any instant; and so charmed was Monny with Rameses' braided "lock of youth" that she resolved to try one over her left temple in connection with an Egyptian Princess costume she was having made for some future fancy-dress ball. "I can't take a grain of interest in any one but Egyptian Princes and Princesses and their profiles," she exclaimed; then blushed faintly and added, "I mean Princes and Princesses of the past."

We got some good pictures of the temple of Seti, for Monny had an apparatus for natural colour photography which gave sensational results in ancient wall-paintings—when any one except Monny herself did the taking. It was better still in the Seven Chapels, the holy of holies at Abydos, and in the joy of my first colour photography I forgot the doom ahead. Appropriately, the sword I had hung up over my own cranium descended in the Necropolis, at that place of tombs called Umm el-Ka'ab, "Mother of Pots." Nobody wanted to see the fragments of this mother's pots, but I insisted on a brief visit, as important discoveries have been made there, among the most important in Egypt. It was a dreary place where Harry Snell strolled up and caught me alone, gazing at a desolation of sandy hillocks, full of undiscovered treasure.

"Look here," said he. "You're supposed to know everything. Tell me why they call seats outside shops in bazaars, and tombs of the Ancient Empire by the same name: mastaba?"

I explained that mastaba was an Arab word meaning bench. Then, realizing that it would be flying in the face of Providence not to get the ordeal over while my blood was up, I spoke of Enid. Among the shattered pots and yawning sepulchres, I racked up her broken heart and blighted affections. I talked to Snell like a brother, and when he had heard me through in silence, to the place where words and breath failed, I thought that I had moved him. His eyes were downcast. I fancied that I saw a mist as of tears, a man's slow tears. Then suddenly he opened his eyelids wide, and glared—a glare stony as the pots, and as the desert hills. "Borrow," he said, "I thought you were a good fellow and a man of the world. I see now that you're a damned sentimental ass."

With this he stalked off, and I could not run after him to bash his head, because what he said was perfectly true. I was almost sorry that evening, on board the boat, when he apologized and the Nile-dream went on as if I hadn't broken it by being the sort of fool Snell had said that I was.

In the dream were Nile cities, with crowding houses whose walls were heightened by tier upon tier of rose-and-white pots, moulded in with honey-coloured mud. There were stretches of sandy shore, and green gloom of palm groves. There were domed tombs of saints, glittering like snow-palaces in the sun. There were great golden mounds inlaid with strips of paler gold picked out with ebony. There were sinister hillsides cut into squarely by door-holes, leading to cave-dwellings. There were always shadoofs, where giant soup-ladles everlastingly dipped water and threw it out again, mounting up from level to level of the brown, dyke-like shore. The wistful, musical wail of the men at the wells was as near to the voice of Nature as the sighing of wind, or the breaking of waves which has never ceased since the world began. Sometimes the horizon was opal, sometimes it throbbed with azure fire, or blazed ruby red, as the torch of sunset swept west and east before the emerald darkness fell. When our Enchantress landed, great flocks of kites, like in form and wing to the sacred vulture of Egypt, flew to welcome us with swoopings of wide purple wings. Their shadows on the water were like passing spirits; and at night when the Nubian boatmen danced, their feet thudding on the lower deck to the cry of the darabukah, the Nile whispered of the past, with a tinkling whisper, like the music of Hathor's sacred sistrum. Gyassas glided by, loaded with pots like magic melons, long masts pointing as though they had been wands in the hands of astrologers: and the reflection of the piled pots as they moved gave vague glimpses as of sunken treasure.

Denderah meant work for Fenton. There had been trouble there, and tourists had complained of insults. It was the Hadji's business to find out whether natives or Europeans had been more to blame, and whether there were wrongs to right, misunderstandings to adjust. But to the rest of us, Denderah meant the sacred temple of Hathor, Goddess of Love, in some ways one of the most beautiful of all the Nile temples; though, being not much over two thousand years old (it was built upon ruins more ancient than King Menes) archeologists like Neill Sheridan class it as "late Ptolemaic," uninterestingly modern.

Mrs. East had been looking forward to the temple of Denderah more eagerly than to any other, because she had read that on an outer wall was carved the portrait of Cleopatra the Great. That of CÆsarion was there also, as she must have known; but Cleopatra's son was never referred to by her reincarnation, who chose to ignore the CÆsar incident. Mrs. East had not yet deigned to mount a donkey, but to reach the temple she must do so or walk, or sway in a dangerous looking chaise À porteur. Rather than miss the joy of seeing herself on a stone wall as others had had the privilege of seeing her for two thousand years, she consented to accept as a seat a large gray animal, tasselled with red to keep off flies and evil eyes. "Won't you ride with me, Antoun Effendi?" she asked. "I'm afraid. This creature looks as large as an elephant and as wild as a zebra. I feel you could calm him." But Antoun Effendi was not going to ride. He had other fish to fry; and poor Cleopatra's luminous dark eyes were like overflowing lakes, when he had politely excused himself on the plea of a pressing engagement. I felt sure that she would have been kind to Sir Marcus if at that moment he could have appeared from behind the picturesque group of bead-necklace sellers, or emerged from one of the huge bright-coloured baskets exposed for sale on a hill of brown-gold sand.

I don't know whether it made things better or worse that the gray donkey should be named "Cleopatra," but it was evidently a blow when the animal's white-robed attendant announced himself as Anthony.

"I can't and won't have the creature with me!" she murmured, as I helped her to mount when she had pushed the boy aside. "Thank you, Lord Ernest. You're very kind. But Antoun ought to have been here. Fancy seeing this temple, of all others, without an Anthony of any sort on the horizon! A pity it isn't your middle name! If you could spare time to ride with me, that would be better than nothing!"

"I'll be delighted," I said hypocritically, for I had been dying to talk with Brigit about the Monny and Rachel imbroglio which, as a hard-worked Conductor, I had not since Abydos found a chance to discuss. Besides, Biddy had whispered in passing that a letter just delivered at Denderah, had brought exciting news of EsmÉ O'Brien: But I was sorry for Cleopatra, and wondered whether I could manage after all to hint an explanation of the hieroglyphic love-letter—that fatal letter of mine which had stealthily made mischief between Mrs. East and Anthony. I didn't quite see how the subject was to be broached: still, some way might open. "I'm sorry about the middle name," I said. "But if I assumed it—like a virtue which I have not—I should be the third person connected with this trip, labelled the same fashion."

"Who is the second person?" she asked abruptly, as all the animals of the party started to trot vivaciously through the blowing yellow sand.

"Sir Marcus. Surely you've heard that his 'A' stands for Antonius?"

"Good heavens!" she gasped: and I hardly knew whether it was the shock of my news, or a jolt of the donkey which forced the exclamation. Whatever it was, the emotion she felt bound her to silence after that one outburst. She said not a word, and did not even groan or threaten to fall off when both our beasts broke into a thumping gallop. In silence we swept round that great bulk of rubbish heap, Roman and early Christian, under which lies An, the town of the Column. Cleopatra did not cry out when suddenly we came in sight of Hathor's temple, honey-gold against the turquoise sky, and vast as some Wagnerian palace of the gods. The tasselled donkey (or I) had given her cause to think. Or perhaps she did not consider me worth talking to, as we approached the temple toward which all her previous travelling had been a mere pilgrimage. Still silently, when we had left our donkeys and were following the crowd up the dromos (Harry Snell actually with Enid, thanks to me and the wisdom of second thoughts), Cleopatra's eyes wandered over the Hathor-headed columns with their clinging colour; and over the portal with its brilliant mass of yellow, of dark Pompeian red, and the green-blue sacred to Hathor, whom Horus loved —Venus-Hathor, whose priestesses danced within these walls in Cleopatra's day. "Oh, this red and this green-blue were my colours, I remember," she murmured, and then hardly spoke when I walked with her in the gloom of the temple itself—the rich gloom under heavily ornamented ceilings. She wanted to save the portrait till the last, she announced, until after she had seen everything else: and she didn't care what Mr. Sheridan said about her temple; it was wonderful. I tried to interest her in the crocodiles, which had been detested and persecuted at Denderah in the late Cleopatra's time as ardently as they were worshipped at Crocodilopolis and other places. I joked about Old Egypt having consisted of "crocs and non crocs," just as the inhabitants of Florence had to be Guelphs or Ghibellines. I explained carefully the geography of the place, or rather, "reminded" Cleopatra of it, adding details of the canal which once led to Koptos, where the magic book of the Wisdom of Thoth lay hidden under the Nile. I could not waken Mrs. East from reverie to interest, as Antoun would have had the power to do; but my vanity was not hurt. It was only my curiosity which suffered, for I wanted desperately to know whether the donkey had seriously jolted the lady's spine, or whether the news that Sir M. A. Lark was Marcus Antonius, not a more obvious Marcus Aurelius, had fired her imagination.

In any case I devoted myself to her while Monny and Brigit frolicked with others; and I had a reward of a kind. When we had seen all the halls and chambers, and the crypt with its carvings all fresh as if made yesterday; when we had been on the roof where chanting priests had once awaited the rising of Sirius; when I had taken her outside the temple, where blowing columns of dusty sand rose like incense from hidden altars of Hathor, we stood at last alone together, gazing up at the figures of Cleopatra and her son. The wall on which they were carved rose behind the Holy of Holies, where the golden statue of the Goddess had been kept; but alas, the figures themselves! Alas! I knew how Cleopatra must be feeling; and I dared not speak. Perhaps she was even blushing: but I did not look. Instead, I gazed helplessly up at that exposed, misshapen form, that flaccid chin.

"Thank heaven it's only you who are with me!" breathed Mrs. East.

That was my reward. Or should I call it a punishment? Anyhow, it made it easier for the insignificant person in question to unburden his conscience about the hieroglyphic letter. I stammered it all out, on the way back, apropos of the rubbish-heap which had been Tentyra. I let it remind me of FustÂt and our digging expedition. I had meant to follow Mrs. East's advice and propose to Miss Gilder, I explained, but Monny had not found my buried love-letter. What had become of it I—er —had never been told. All I knew was that it hadn't come into Miss Gilder's hands; and I should never have as much courage again.

"Oh!" Cleopatra exclaimed, with a curious light in her eyes, more like relief than disappointment. "You really do want to marry my niece? You delayed so, that I wondered. I wasn't sure, sometimes, if it were Monny or—but I am on your side, Lord Ernest. It isn't too late yet for any of us, perhaps. Trust in me. I'm going to help you."

I could have bitten my tongue out, though I had blundered with the best intentions. "Mrs. East," I protested almost ferociously, "you mustn't do anything. I said before I began, that I was going to tell you a secret."

"I won't betray your confidence. But I will help. I want to. It would be a good thing for Monny to accept you, Lord Ernest, a very good thing in more ways than one. Mrs. Jones wants it too, or did. I promise you, I'll be discreet."

With that, we arrived in sight of the boat. Once more, necklaces and scarabs and baskets were thrust under our noses. Anthony had returned from his mysterious whisperings in cafÉs or mosques in the new town, and was waiting for us. Cleopatra called him, with a note of gayety in her voice, to help her off "the elephant." He came. I felt she was going to hint to him that I was in love with Monny—hint to Brigit also.

Virtue may be its own reward, but it makes you very lonely!

I hadn't another easy moment for dreaming the Nile-dream. And we all woke out of it when, with the pink dawn of a certain morning, we saw a vast temple, repeated column for column, in the clear river, as in a mirror of glass.

We were at Luxor; and somewhere not far off, Mabella HÂnem was praying for release.