to the Effendi Lampton, and to the native
mind time was of so little account that one day was as good as another.
Besides, deep down in his heart there was a pool of jealousy; he wished
to nurse his beloved master back to life and health with his own hands.
If the Effendi Lampton knew that he was ill, he would come to him or
send someone to wait upon him who would rob him of his sweet work. And
to do Abdul justice, he did not know if his master would like any
stranger, or even the Effendi Lampton himself, to know all the secrets
of his heart which his ravings revealed. Michael had so often
expressed the wish to Abdul that it should be from his own lips, or
from his own letters, that the Effendi Lampton should hear that the
harlot had been with them in the desert, and the whole story of their
desert journey.

Abdul was quite convinced that his master's letters had not yet been
delivered at the hut in the Valley. It did not seem to him a very long
time for a letter to take to travel across the desert and the Nile.
The carrying of news was a different matter; he had a native's
knowledge of how that can be transmitted with great rapidity. A letter
belonged to a widely-different means of communication. And so he let
the matter rest.

To the hospitable _Omdeh_ he confided nothing. The old man was pleased
and delighted to have Michael as his guest. During the patient's rapid
recovery, after his first weeks of intermittent convalescence, he was
as pleased as a child to be allowed to entertain Michael with all the
delights which he had held out before his eyes when he had invited him
to spend two or three days with him, before he journeyed to the camp in
the hills.

During that time Michael became learned in the points of well-bred
gazelles. He saw some native dancers, both male and female, who
charmed him with their beauty and their art. And he listened so many
times to celebrated _A'laleeyeh_ (professional musicians) that, with
the help of the _Omdeh_, be became familiar with the remarkable
peculiarity in the Arab system of music--its division of tones into
thirds. Egyptian musicians consider that the European system of music
is deficient in sounds. This small and delicate gradation of sound
gives a peculiar softness to the performance of good Arab musicians.

At first Michael was unable to appreciate the excellence of the music
he listened to, for the finer and more delicate gradations of tone are
difficult t