ows.

"Speak, Kaffir," said Nejoumi; "so shall you escape death."

Feversham smiled and grimaced, and shook his head loosely from side to
side. It was astonishing to him that he could do it, that he did not
fall down upon his knees and beg for mercy. It was still more
astonishing to him that he felt no temptation so to demean himself. He
wondered whether the oft repeated story was true, that criminals in
English prisons went quietly and with dignity to the scaffold, because
they had been drugged. For without drugs he seemed to be behaving with
no less dignity himself. His heart was beating very fast, but it was
with a sort of excitement. He did not even think of Ethne at that
moment; and certainly the great dread that his strong hope would never
be fulfilled did not trouble him at all. He had his allotted part to
play, and he just played it; and that was all.

Nejoumi looked at him sourly for a moment. He turned to the men who
stood ready to draw away from Feversham the angareb on which he was
placed:--

"To-morrow," said he, "the Kaffir shall go to Omdurman."

Feversham began to feel then that the rope of palm fibre tortured his
wrists.

CHAPTER XXI

ETHNE MAKES ANOTHER SLIP

Mrs. Adair speculated with some uneasiness upon the consequences of the
disclosures which she had made to Durrance. She was in doubt as to the
course which he would take. It seemed possible that he might frankly
tell Ethne of the mistake which he had made. He might admit that he had
discovered the unreality of her affection for him, and the reality of
her love for Feversham; and if he made that admission, however carefully
he tried to conceal her share in his discovery, he would hardly succeed.
She would have to face Ethne, and she dreaded the moment when her
companion's frank eyes would rest quietly upon hers and her lips demand
an explanation. It was consequently a relief to her at first that no
outward change was visible in the relations of Ethne and Durrance. They
met and spoke as though that day on which Willoughby had landed at the
garden, and the evening when Ethne had played the Musoline Overture upon
the violin, had been blotted from their experience. Mrs. Adair was
relieved at first, but when the sense of personal danger passed from
her, and she saw that her interference had been apparently without
effect, she began to be puzzled. A little while, and she was both angry
and disappointed.

Durrance, indeed, quickly made