o the
city which she could already see lying before her with its pylons, its
citadel and its houses, veiled in evening mist. In a quarter of an hour
at most she would have crossed the desert, and reach the fertile meadow
land, whose emerald hue grew darker and darker every moment. The sun
was already sinking to rest behind the Libyan range, and soon after, for
twilight is short in Egypt, she was wrapped in the darkness of night.
The westwind, which had begun to blow even at noon, now rose higher,
and seemed to pursue her with its hot breath and the clouds of sand it
carried with it from the desert.

She must certainly be approaching water, for she heard the deep pipe of
the bittern in the reeds, and fancied she breathed a moister air. A few
steps more, and her foot sank in mud; and she now perceived that she was
standing on the edge of a wide ditch in which tall papyrus-plants were
growing. The side path she had struck into ended at this plantation, and
there was nothing to be done but to turn about, and to continue her walk
against the wind and with the sand blowing in her face.

The light from the drinking-booth showed her the direction she must
follow, for though the moon was up, it is true, black clouds swept
across it, covering it and the smaller lights of heaven for many minutes
at a time. Still she felt no fatigue, but the shouts of the men and the
loud cries of the women that rang out from the tavern filled her with
alarm and disgust. She made a wide circuit round the hostelry, wading
through the sand hillocks and tearing her dress on the thorns and
thistles that had boldly struck deep root in the desert, and had grown
up there like the squalid brats in the hovel of a beggar. But still, as
she hurried on by the high-road, the hideous laughter and the crowing
mirth of the dancing-girls still rang in her mind's ear.

Her blood coursed more swiftly through her veins, her head was on fire,
she saw Irene close before her, tangibly distinct--with flowing hair
and fluttering garments, whirling in a wild dance like a Moenad at a
Dionysiac festival, flying from one embrace to another and shouting and
shrieking in unbridled folly like the wretched girls she had seen on her
way. She was seized with terror for her sister--an unbounded dread such
as she had never felt before, and as the wind was now once more behind
her she let herself be driven on by it, lifting her feet in a swift run
and flying, as if pursued by the Eri