ld be a sacred place for
ever. And as they looked in silence all that Beni-Mora meant to her came
upon her. She saw again the garden hushed in the heat of noon. She saw
Androvsky at her feet on the sand. She heard the chiming church bell and
the twitter of Larbi's flute. The dark blue of trees was as the heart of
the world to her and as the heart of life. It had seen the birth of her
soul and given to her another newborn soul. There was a pathos in
seeing it fade like a thing sinking down till it became one with the
immeasurable sands, and at that moment she said to herself, "When shall
I see Beni-Mora again--and how?" She looked at Androvsky, met his eyes,
and thought: "When I see it again how different I shall be! How I shall
be changed!" And in the sunset she seemed to be saying a mute good-bye
to one who was fading with Beni-Mora.

As soon as they had got off the camel and were standing in the group
of staring Arabs, Batouch begged them to come to their tents, where
tea would be ready. He led them round the angle of the wall towards the
west, and there, pitched in the full radiance of the sunset, with a wide
space of hard earth gleaming with gypse around it, was a white tent.
Before it, in the open air, was stretched a handsome Arab carpet, and on
this carpet were set a folding table and two folding chairs. The table
held a japanned tray with tea-cups, a milk jug and plates of biscuits
and by it, in an attitude that looked deliberately picturesque stood
Ouardi, the youth selected by Batouch to fill the office of butler in
the desert.

Ouardi smiled a broad welcome as they approached, and having made sure
that his pose had been admired, retired to the cook's abode to fetch the
teapot, while Batouch invited Domini and Androvsky to inspect the tent
prepared for them. Domini assented with a dropped-out word. She still
felt in a dream. But Androvsky, after casting towards the tent door
a glance that was full of a sort of fierce shyness, moved away a few
steps, and stood at the edge of the hill looking down upon the incoming
caravan, whose music was now plainly audible in the stillness of the
waste.

Domini went into the tent that was to be their home for many weeks,
alone. And she was glad just then that she was alone. For she too, like
Androvsky, felt a sort of exquisite trouble moving, like a wave, in her
heart. On some pretext, but only after an expression of admiration, she
got rid of Batouch. Then she stood and l