in and would see no one but Clarice. On the following day
Bellairs went very early to the dahabeeyah and asked for her. Abdul took
his message, and, after an interval, returned to him with the following
note:--

"DEAR MR BELLAIRS,--I am very sorry I cannot see you this
morning, but I am still very unwell. I think the mental agony
I have been and am undergoing accounts for my condition. I
must tell you the truth. I cannot marry you. I mistook my
feeling for you. I honestly thought it love. I find it is only
friendship. Can you ever forgive me the pain I am causing you?
I cannot forgive myself. But I should do you a much greater
wrong by marrying you than by giving you up. I have told my
father and mother. See them if you like. We sail to-morrow
morning for Assouan.

"BETTY."

Bellairs, crumpling this note in his hand, would have burst forth into a
passion of useless rage and despair, but Abdul's lustrous eyes were
fixed upon him. Abdul's dignified form calmly waited his pleasure.

"Where is Lord Braydon?" said Bellairs, "I must see him."

"His lordship is on the second deck, sir."

"Take me to him."

The interview that followed only increased the despair of Bellairs. Lord
Braydon was most sympathetic, most courteously sorry, but he said that
his daughter's decision was absolutely irrevocable, and he could not
attempt to coerce her in such an important matter.

"At any rate, I must see her before you sail," said Bellairs at last. "I
think she owes me at least that one last debt."

"I think so too," said Lord Braydon. "Come at six. I will undertake that
you shall see her."

How Bellairs spent the intervening hours he could never remember. He did
not go back to the hotel; he must have wandered all day along the river
bank. Yet he felt neither the heat, nor any fatigue, nor any hunger. At
six o'clock he reached the dahabeeyah. Lady Betty was sitting alone on
the deck. She looked very pale and grave.

"My father and mother and Clarice have gone up to the hotel," she said.
"That Austrian is playing again this evening."

"Is he?" Bellairs answered. He sat down beside her and tried to take her
hand. But she would not let him.

"No," she said. "No, it's no use. I have made a ghastly mistake, but I
will not make another. Oh, forgive me, do forgive me!"

"How can I? If you will not try to love me my life is ruined."

"Don't say that