n
Margaret. The tableau created by his unexpected entrance was tense,
painful.

Millicent turned her head away and hid her face in her hands. Her
first thought was that he must not see her face. She flung herself
down on the sofa.

Margaret became deadly pale, but remained motionless. Michael looked
from her to Millicent with an expression of horrified surprise on his
face. He had expected to see her in all her perfection of toilet and
looks, her shining head, the "golden lady," instead of which a bundle
of crepe, a mere armful, something soft and black, lay face downwards
on the sofa before him.

"What are you doing here?" he said sternly. "Haven't we seen the last
of you yet?"

Margaret put up her hands as if to ward off his words. Her own
happiness had made her feel more pity than anger for the miserable
woman, who for probably the first time in her life was trying to act
honourably and courageously. The security of love made her wondrous
kind.

"What has she come for?" Michael demanded. But for his sunburn, his
face would have been as white as Margaret's own. The sight of
Millicent's cowering figure brought back to him, with the quickness of
light, the evening in the desert when he had flung her from him in his
agony of temptation.

"She came to give us some information, Mike. Tell him, Millicent, why
you have come."

Millicent took no notice of Margaret's words. She was crouching on the
sofa, her face still buried in her hands.

"No, no," she moaned, when Margaret again urged her to speak. "I only
wanted to tell you. Ask him to go away--do, please, beg him to go. If
he wants you I will disappear and never come back again. I have said
all I have to say."

"I am going to stay here," Michael said, "until I hear what you came to
say. Was it necessary to come?" He looked to Margaret for his answer.

"It was better," Margaret said. "She never reached the hills, she
never saw the treasure."

Michael started. "Go on," he said. "That is not all--she need not
have come to tell us that. I never accused her; I never believed it.
I thought that after all she did do, she would have had shame enough to
stay away."

Millicent's body quivered. His words lashed her.

"One of her servants ran away--he left her the same night as she left
your camp," Margaret said. Again Michael saw the black figure shiver
as Margaret spoke of her cowardly act. The very mention of it brought
to both their ey