cancy of expression. At the corners of the
alleys unveiled women squatted, grinding corn in primitive hand-mills,
or winding wool on wooden sticks. Their heads were covered with plaits
of imitation hair made of wool, in which barbaric silver ornaments were
fastened, and their black necks and arms jingled with chains and bangles
set with squares of red coral and large dull blue and green stones. Some
of them called boldly to Batouch, and he answered them with careless
impudence. The palm-wood door of one of the houses stood wide open, and
Domini looked in. She saw a dark space with floor and walls of earth,
a ceiling of palm and brushwood, a low divan of earth without mat or
covering of any kind.

"They have no furniture?" she asked Batouch.

"No. What do they want with it? They live out here in the sun and go in
to sleep."

Life simplified to this extent made her smile. Yet she looked at the
squatting figures in the gaudy cotton rags with a stirring of envy. The
memory of her long and complicated London years, filled with a multitude
of so-called pleasures which had never stifled the dull pain set up in
her heart by the rude shock of her mother's sin and its result, made
this naked, sunny, barbarous existence seem desirable. She stood for a
moment to watch two women sorting grain for cous-cous. Their guttural
laughter, their noisy talk, the quick and energetic movements of their
busy black hands, reminded her of children's gaiety. And Nature rose
before her in the sunshine, confronting artifice and the heavy languors
of modern life in cities. How had she been able to endure the yoke so
long?

"Will Madame take me to London with her when she returns?" said Batouch,
slyly.

"I am not going back to London for a very long time," she replied with
energy.

"You will stay here many weeks?"

"Months, perhaps. And perhaps I shall travel on into the desert. Yes, I
must do that."

"If we followed the white road into the desert, and went on and on for
many days, we should come at last to Tombouctou," said Batouch. "But
very likely we should be killed by the Touaregs. They are fierce and
they hate strangers."

"Would you be afraid to go?" Domini asked him, curiously.

"Why afraid?"

"Of being killed?"

He looked calmly surprised. "Why should I be afraid to die? All must
pass through that door. It does not matter whether it is to-day or
to-morrow."

"You have no fear of death, then?"

"Of course not. Have you, Ma