d out. The search was made quickly and almost without
words. If the power of France had not been behind the soldier and the
girl whom Ben Raana now hated, he would have reverted--"enlightened" man
as he was--to primitive methods. He would have killed the pair with his
own hand, while the men of his _goum_ put the Arabs to death, and all
could have been buried under the sand save the camels, which would have
been led back to Djazerta. But France was mighty and far reaching, and
he and his tribe would have to pay too high for such indulgence.

When he was sure that Ourieda and Manoeel Valdez were not concealed in
the camp, with cold apologies and farewells he turned with his men and
rode off toward the south--a band of shadows in the night. The visit had
been like a dream, the desert dream that Sanda had had of Max, Max of
Sanda. Yet dimly it seemed to both that these dreams had meant more than
this. The girl let her "Soldier St. George" warm her small, icy hands,
and comfort her with soothing words.

"You were _not_ treacherous," he said. "You did exactly right. You
deserve happiness for helping to make that girl happy. And you'll have
it! You must! You shall! I couldn't stand your not being happy."

"Already it's to-day," she half whispered, "to-day that we come to
Touggourt. The greatest thing in my father's life happened there. I
thought of that when I passed through before, and wondered what would
happen to me. Nothing happened. But--_what about to-day_?"

"May it be something very good," Max said steadily. But his heart was
heavy, as in his hands her own grew warm.

CHAPTER XXIII

"WHERE THE STRANGE ROADS GO DOWN"

Shadows of evening flowed over the desert like blue water out of whose
depths rose the golden crowns of the dunes. The caravan had still some
miles of sand billows between them and Touggourt, when suddenly a faint
thrill of sound, which might have been the waking dream of a tired
brain, or a trick of wind, a sound scarcely louder than heart-throbs,
grew definite and distinct: the distant beating of African drums, the
shriek of raeitas, and the sighing of ghesbahs. The Arabs on their camels
came crowding round Max, who led the caravan, riding beside Sanda's
mehari.

"Sidi," said their leader, "this music is not of earth, for Touggourt is
too distant for us to hear aught from there. It is the devil. It comes
from under the dunes. Such music we have heard in the haunted desert
where the grea