relessness, he shook it off. After all,
this was comparatively safe for her. She was not out of bounds. At
an alarm he could slip away and no one could ever know. What risk
there might be was chiefly his own.

"When you asked who it was," he murmured, "it occurred to me that
you did not know my name--nor I yours. My own," he added, as she
stood unresponsive, "is Ryder--Jack Ryder. You can always get a
letter to me at the Agricultural Bank. That is the quickest way. My
friend, McLean there, always knows where my diggings are. When in
Cairo I stop with him; or at the Rossmore House."

"I shall not need to get a letter to you, monsieur," she told him
stiffly.

"But, if you did, how would you sign it?"

"Aimee.... That is French--after my mother."

"Aimee. That means Beloved, doesn't it?"

She was silent.

Surely, she thought with a swelling heart, if he were sorry he would
tell her now. It was the moment for contrition, for appeasement, for
whatever explanation his American ways might have.

She had thought about him all night. She had given his declaration a
hundred forms--but always it had been a declaration.

Now she waited, flagellating her sensitive pride.

Ryder was conscious of the constraint tightening about them and in
the dragging pause an uncomfortable common sense had time to put its
disconcerting questions.

What did it matter what her name meant? What in the world was he
doing here?.... And what did she think she was doing here?... Not
that he wanted her to go....

And suddenly it didn't matter--whatever they thought. It was enough
that they were together in that still, soft, jasmine-scented dark.
He was breathing quickly; his pulses were beating; he had a feeling
of strange, heady delight.

The crescent moon was up at last, sailing clear of the house tops,
sending its bright rays through the filigree of tall shrubs. A
finger of light edged the contour of her shrouded head.

He bent a little closer.

"Won't you," he said softly, "take off your veil for me?"

Appalled, she clasped it to her. He had no idea in the world of the
shock of that request. It would be only a faint parallel of its
impropriety to suggest to Jinny Jeffries that she discard her frock.
Even Ryder's acquaintance with Egypt could not tell him how that
swift, confident eagerness of his could startle and affront.

"I want to see you so very much," he was murmuring, and met the
chill disdain of her retort, "But it is not