salts afforded her a curious satisfaction. They
told her that her management had been perfect; they appealed to her
barbaric love of contrasts. It fed her pride very pleasantly to know
that she could command these luxuries; to know that by her own wealth
she could bring the trivialities of civilization into the elemental
life of the desert excited her senses.

Her natural beauty could have triumphed over the ravages made by the
sun and the dry desert air. She was one of those fortunate women who
needed few, if any, of the absurdities which she carried about with her
wheresoever she went. To have done without them would have been to
deprive herself of a very genuine pleasure, to have starved one of her
eager appetites. Margaret's rapid tub, the swift brushing and combing
and plaiting of her dark hair, generally while she read some passage
from a book which interested her, and her total disregard for
cosmetics, would have horrified Millicent if she had known of her
habits. The height of civilization to Millicent was expressed in a
luxuriously-appointed dressing-table and in an excessive care of her
body. Progress touched its high-water mark in the perfection of her
creature comforts. Taken from this standpoint, progress could scarcely
go any further, or so Michael would have thought if he had watched her
ritual of going to bed.

She dawdled pleasantly through it, enjoying every moment of the time,
appreciating the handling of artistically-designed silver objects,
performing with care the washing of her face with oatmeal and the
dusting of her fair skin with the latest luxury in powder. She liked
to take the same care of her person as a young mother takes of her
first baby, and--as she expressed it--to smell like one when the
ceremony was finished.

Her love of contrasts appealed to her, when she stood, all ready for
bed in her foolish nightgown--a mere veil of chiffon--becomingly
guarded by a Japanese kimono of the softest silk. She visualized the
timeless desert outside her tent, the trackless ocean of silence, the
uninhabited primitive world. She felt like a queen, travelling in
state through a waterless, foodless world.

She held up her empty arms. Some other night! Some other night! Her
heart assured her. With a sigh of content she lay down to sleep, well
satisfied with her own diplomacy and cunning. Her last conscious
thoughts were of Margaret Lampton. What was she doing to-night? What
were her