cy has come, then, to continue his
search for the remains of the old people?"

"Hah!" cried the professor, "that's right. Now let's understand one
another at once. No, Ibrahim, I have not."

"Not come, Excellency?" cried the Sheikh, in a disappointed tone, and
his hands flew up to his long flowing grey beard, but he did not tear
it, contenting himself with giving two slight tugs.

"No, not come to explore."

"But, your Excellency, I and my people have found a fresh temple with
tombs, and deep in the sand where no one has been before."

"Yes, and you know too that the authorities have given strict orders
that no expeditions are to be made right out in the desert on account of
the danger?"

"It is true, O Excellency," said the Arab, with a sigh, "and I and mine
will starve. We had better have been driving our sheep and goats here
and there for pasture far away yonder, than waiting for English
travellers. All who are here go up the river in boats. There are no
journeys into the wilds this year. I have been stopped twice."

Frank glanced at the professor, and saw that his eyes were glittering as
he spoke in a low tone.

"Yes, Sheikh," he said; "it is very ill for you, and it is bad for me.
There are those stones cut into and painted that we left buried in the
sand."

"Yes, Excellency; hidden safely away, waiting for your servants to dig
them out. Why not let me gather my people and let us go so many days'
journey out into the wilderness and carry them off, before some other
learned traveller to whose eyes all the mysteries of the past are like
an open book shall come and find them?"

"That would be bad, Ibrahim," said the professor slowly.

"It would break thy servant's heart, Excellency," said the man. "Look
here, Excellency. It is forbidden, but my people are away there to the
south with the tents and camels, and their Excellencies might come and
dwell with us in the tents for days, and then some night the camels
would be ready--the poor beasts are sobbing and groaning for burdens to
bear and long journeys into the desert--and some moonlight night they
might be loaded with their sacks of grain and skins of water, and no one
would know when we stole away into the desert to where the old tombs are
hidden. Then the treasures could be found and brought away by his
Excellency's servants, who would rejoice after and have the wherewithal
to buy oil and honey, dhurra and dates, so that their faces might shi