r-fatigued
men sometimes shiver in daylight. An extraordinary, almost motherly,
sensation of pity for him came over her. She did not know why. The
intense heat of his hand, the shiver that ran over his body, his
attitude as he shrank with a kind of timid, yet ferocious, politeness
against the white wall, the expression in his eyes when their hands
touched--a look she could not analyse, but which seemed to hold a
mingling of wistfulness and repellance, as of a being stretching out
arms for succour, and crying at the same time, "Don't draw near to me!
Leave me to myself!"--everything about him moved her. She felt that
she was face to face with a solitariness of soul such as she had never
encountered before, a solitariness that was cruel, that was weighed down
with agony. And directly she had passed the man and thanked him formally
she stopped with her usual decision of manner. She had abruptly made up
her mind to talk to him. He was already moving to turn away. She spoke
quickly, and in French.

"Isn't it wonderful here?" she said; and she made her voice rather loud,
and almost sharp, to arrest his attention.

He turned round swiftly, yet somehow reluctantly, looked at her
anxiously, and seemed doubtful whether he would reply.

After a silence that was short, but that seemed, and in such
circumstances was, long, he answered, in French:

"Very wonderful, Madame."

The sound of his own voice seemed to startle him. He stood as if he had
heard an unusual noise which had alarmed him, and looked at Domini as
if he expected that she would share in his sensation. Very quietly and
deliberately she leaned her arms again on the parapet and spoke to him
once more.

"We seem to be the only travellers here."

The man's attitude became slightly calmer. He looked less momentary,
less as if he were in haste to go, but still shy, fierce and
extraordinarily unconventional.

"Yes, Madame; there are not many here."

After a pause, and with an uncertain accent, he added:

"Pardon, Madame--for yesterday."

There was a sudden simplicity, almost like that of a child, in the sound
of his voice as he said that. Domini knew at once that he alluded to the
incident at the station of El-Akbara, that he was trying to make amends.
The way he did it touched her curiously. She felt inclined to stretch
out her hand to him and say, "Of course! Shake hands on it!" almost as
an honest schoolboy might. But she only answered:

"I know it was only