immer like a lantern on the very level
of their path. They looked again, and it was a hand's-breadth up, and
another was shining beneath it. Hour after hour the broad stream flowed
sedately across the deep blue background, worlds and systems drifting
majestically overhead, and pouring over the dark horizon. In their
vastness and their beauty there was a vague consolation to the prisoners
for their own fate, and their own individuality seemed trivial and
unimportant amid the play of such tremendous forces. Slowly the grand
procession swept across the heaven, first climbing, then hanging long
with little apparent motion, and then sinking grandly downwards, until
away in the east the first cold grey glimmer appeared, and their own
haggard faces shocked each other's sight.

The day had tortured them with its heat, and now the night had brought
the even more intolerable discomfort of cold. The Arabs swathed
themselves in their gowns and wrapped up their heads. The prisoners beat
their hands together and shivered miserably. Miss Adams felt it most,
for she was very thin, with the impaired circulation of age. Stephens
slipped off his Norfolk jacket and threw it over her shoulders. He rode
beside Sadie, and whistled and chatted to make her believe that her aunt
was really relieving him by carrying his jacket for him, but the attempt
was too boisterous not to be obvious. And yet it was so far true that he
probably felt the cold less than any of the party, for the old, old fire
was burning in his heart, and a curious joy was inextricably mixed with
all his misfortunes, so that he would have found it hard to say if this
adventure had been the greatest evil or the greatest blessing of his
lifetime. Aboard the boat, Sadie's youth, her beauty, her intelligence
and humour, all made him realise that she could at the best only be
expected to charitably endure him. But now he felt that he was really of
some use to her, that every hour she was learning to turn to him as one
turns to one's natural protector; and above all, he had begun to find
himself--to understand that there really was a strong, reliable man
behind all the tricks of custom which had built up an artificial nature,
which had imposed even upon himself. A little glow of self-respect began
to warm his blood. He had missed his youth when he was young, and now in
his middle age it was coming up like some beautiful belated flower.

"I do believe that you are all the time enjoyin