. You may
be wrong." He struggled for mind-control.

He urged his camel to a quicker pace. They rode on in silence. Abdul
was now convinced that the harlot--or, in other words, Mohammed Ali's
"golden lady"--had wreaked her vengeance on his master. He had taken
into his camp the fever-stricken saint; she had slipped away in the
night and discovered the treasure. With a comprehensiveness which
would have astounded the impurest of Western ears, he cursed Millicent
and her vile offspring into the third and fourth generations.

CHAPTER XI

As Michael got off his kneeling camel, a young Englishman left a tent,
the outer one of the three which formed the excavation-camp, the white
tents which Michael had seen from his high seat, and came quickly
forward. It was obvious that strangers might come thus far and no
further. In a voice of official authority, yet by no means
ungraciously, he said to Michael:

"Can I do anything for you? What do you want? I'm afraid you can't
come any nearer."

Michael looked blankly into the thin, intelligent face, a sunburnt
face, which any woman would have described as attractively ugly. For a
moment or two neither man spoke. There was an unpleasant silence. It
was significant of the atmosphere of the meeting. It expressed to the
excavator strain, rather than shyness, on the traveller's part. He had
told Michael that he might come no further; he had asked him if he
wanted anything.

At both remarks Michael almost laughed hysterically. He was not
allowed to come any closer to his own treasure, to the gift of
Akhnaton, to the legacy of the Pharaoh, which had been divinely
revealed to him! This interloper had asked him if he wanted anything!

Quicker than light these thoughts flashed through his bewildered brain,
while between himself and this representative of the Government the
figure of the world's first divinely-inspired man, with the rays of
Aton shining brilliantly from behind his head, became clearer and
clearer. It obliterated the figure of the excavator.

"What are these tents doing here?" He managed to ask the question by
sheer force of will power; he felt relieved that the words had come.
"And that flag?"--he pointed to the Khedivial banner.

His companion hesitated for a moment. Who was this dazed questioner,
who had suddenly appeared out of the sands of the desert? He looked
almost as worn and physically exhausted as a desert fanatic.

"This is an e