voices of the Arabs who
accompanied them. It was not a time to speak.

She wondered where they were, in what part of the oasis, whether
they had yet gained the beginning of the great route which had always
fascinated her, and which was now the road to the goal of all her
earthly desires. But there was nothing to tell her. She travelled in a
world of dimness and the roar of wind, and in this obscurity and uproar,
combined with perpetual though slight motion, she lost all count of
time. She had no idea how long it was since she had come out of the
church door with Androvsky. At first she thought it was only a few
minutes, and that the camels must be just coming to the statue of the
Cardinal. Then she thought that it might be an hour, even more; that
Count Anteoni's garden was long since left behind, and that they
were passing, perhaps, along the narrow streets of the village of old
Beni-Mora, and nearing the edge of the oasis. But even in this confusion
of mind she felt that something would tell her when the last palms had
vanished in the sand mist and the caravan came out into the desert.
The sound of the wind would surely be different when they met it on the
immense flats, where there was nothing to break its fury. Or even if it
were not different, she felt that she would know, that the desert would
surely speak to her in the moment when, at last, it took her to itself.
It could not be that they would be taken by the desert and she not
know it. But she wanted Androvsky to know it too. For she felt that the
moment when the desert took them, man and wife, would be a great moment
in their lives, greater even than that in which they met as they came
into the blue country. And she set herself to listen, with a passionate
expectation, with an attention so close and determined that it thrilled
her body, and even affected her muscles.

What she was listening for was a rising of the wind, a crescendo of its
voice. She was anticipating a triumphant cry from the Sahara, unlimited
power made audible in a sound like the blowing of the clarion of the
sands.

Androvsky's hand was still on hers, but now it did not move as if
obeying the pulsations of his heart. It held hers closely, warmly, and
sent his strength to her, and presently, for an instant, taking her mind
from the desert, she lost herself in the mystery and the wonder of human
companionship. She realised that the touch of Androvsky's hand on hers
altered for her herself,