f
and Elsie. So, as soon as we had drained Upper Egypt journalistically
dry, we returned to Cairo on our road to Suez. I am glad to say, my
letters to the _Daily Telephone_ gave satisfaction. My employer wrote,
'You are a born journalist.' I confess this surprised me; for I have
always considered myself a truthful person. Still, as he evidently meant
it for praise, I took the doubtful compliment in good part, and offered
no remonstrance.

I have a mercurial temperament. My spirits rise and fall as if they were
Consols. Monotonous Egypt depressed me, as it depressed the Israelites;
but the passage of the Red Sea set me sounding my timbrel. I love fresh
air; I love the sea, if the sea will but behave itself; and I positively
revelled in the change from Egypt.

Unfortunately, we had taken our passages by a P. and O. steamer from
Suez to Bombay many weeks beforehand, so as to secure good berths; and
still more unfortunately, in a letter to Lady Georgina, I had chanced
to mention the name of our ship and the date of the voyage. I kept up a
spasmodic correspondence with Lady Georgina nowadays--tuppence-ha'penny
a fortnight; the dear, cantankerous, racy old lady had been the
foundation of my fortunes, and I was genuinely grateful to her; or,
rather, I ought to say, she had been their second foundress, for I will
do myself the justice to admit that the first was my own initiative and
enterprise. I flatter myself I have the knack of taking the tide on the
turn, and I am justly proud of it. But, being a grateful animal, I wrote
once a fortnight to report progress to Lady Georgina. Besides--let me
whisper--strictly between ourselves--'twas an indirect way of hearing
about Harold.

This time, however, as events turned out, I recognised that I had made a
grave mistake in confiding my movements to my shrewd old lady. She did
not betray me on purpose, of course; but I gathered later that casually
in conversation she must have mentioned the fact and date of my sailing
before somebody who ought to have had no concern in it; and the
somebody, I found, had governed himself accordingly. All this, however,
I only discovered afterwards. So, without anticipating, I will narrate
the facts exactly as they occurred to me.

[Illustration: AN ODD-LOOKING YOUNG MAN.]

When we mounted the gangway of the _Jumna_ at Suez, and began the
process of frizzling down the Red Sea, I noted on deck almost at once an
odd-looking young man of twenty-two or