he Caid of the
Nomads punctuated their progress with loud grunts of heavy satisfaction,
occasionally making use of Batouch as interpreter to express his hopes
that they would visit his palace in the town, and devour a cous-cous on
his carpet.

When they came to the tents it was necessary to entertain these
personages with coffee, and they finally departed promising a speedy
return, and full of invitations, which were cordially accepted by
Batouch on his employer's behalf before either Domini or Androvsky had
time to say a word.

As the _cortege_ disappeared over the sands towards the city Domini
burst into a little laugh, and drew Androvsky out to the tent door to
see them go.

"Society in the sands!" she exclaimed gaily. "Boris, this is a new
experience. Look at our guests making their way to their palaces!"

Slowly the potentates progressed across the white dunes towards the
city. Shabah wore a long red cloak. His brother was in pink and gold,
with white billowing trousers. The Caid of the Nomads was in green.
They all moved with a large and conscious majesty, surrounded by their
obsequious attendants. Above them the purple sky showed a bright evening
star. Near it was visible the delicate silhouette of the young moon.
Scattered over the waste rose many koubbahs, grey in the white, with
cupolas of gypse. Hundreds of dogs were barking in the distance. To the
left, on the vast, rolling slopes of sand, glared the innumerable fires
kindled before the tents of the Ouled Nails. Before the sleeping tent
rose the minarets and the gilded cupolas of the city which it dominated
from its mountain of sand. Behind it was the blanched immensity of the
plain, of the lonely desert from which Domini and Androvsky had come
to face this barbaric stir of life. And the city was full of music, of
tomtoms throbbing, of bugles blowing in the Kasba, of pipes shrieking
from hidden dwellings, and of the faint but multitudinous voices of men,
carried to them on their desolate and treeless height by the frail wind
of night that seemed a white wind, twin-brother of the sands.

"Let us go a step or two towards the city, Boris," Domini said, as their
guests sank magnificently down into a fold of the dunes.

"Towards the city!" he answered. "Why not--?" He glanced behind him to
the vacant, noiseless sands.

She set her impulse against his for the first time.

"No, this is our town life, our Sahara season. Let us give ourselves to
it. The lon