g it, Mr. Stephens," said
Sadie, with some bitterness.

"I would not go so far as to say that," he answered. "But I am quite
certain that I would not leave you here."

[Illustration: Certain that I would not leave you here p152]

It was the nearest approach to tenderness which he had ever put into a
speech, and the girl looked at him in surprise.

"I think I've been a very wicked girl all my life," she said, after a
pause. "Because I have had a good time myself, I never thought of those
who were unhappy. This has struck me serious. If ever I get back I shall
be a better woman--a more earnest woman--in the future."

"And I a better man. I suppose it is just for that that trouble comes
to us. Look how it has brought out the virtues of all our friends. Take
poor Mr. Stuart, for example. Should we ever have known what a noble,
constant man he was? And see Belmont and his wife, in front of us,
there, going fearlessly forward, hand in hand, thinking only of each
other. And Cochrane, who always seemed on board the boat to be a rather
stand-offish, narrow sort of man! Look at his courage, and his unselfish
indignation when any one is ill used. Fardet, too, is as brave as a
lion. I think misfortune has done us all good."

Sadie sighed.

"Yes, if it would end right here one might say so. But if it goes on and
on for a few weeks or months of misery, and then ends in death, I don't
know where we reap the benefit of those improvements of character which
it brings. Suppose you escape, what will you do'?"

The lawyer hesitated, but his professional instincts were still strong.

"I will consider whether an action lies, and against whom. It should
be with the organisers of the expedition for taking us to the Abousir
Rock--or else with the Egyptian Government for not protecting their
frontiers. It will be a nice legal question. And what will you do,
Sadie?"

It was the first time that he had ever dropped the formal Miss, but the
girl was too much in earnest to notice it.

"I will be more tender to others," she said. "I will try to make some
one else happy in memory of the miseries which I have endured."

"You have done nothing all your life but made others happy. You cannot
help doing it," said he. The darkness made it more easy for him to break
through the reserve which was habitual with him. "You need this rough
schooling far less than any of us. How could your character be changed
for the better?"

"You show how little