t man, with kind eyes, but
already far on in the winter of life. Opposite him sat his host,
the owner of the tent and father of the girls. Shrewd-eyed,
keen-faced, quietly he did his bargaining. Earlier in the day the
elder girl had laid the plan before him: herself for Melun, the
necklace-seller of Assouan, who owned neither camels nor goats, but
would pay well in silver straight from the hands of the tourists;
her younger sister for the Sheik, who would give doubtless two more
camels for her wonderful beauty. The father listened placidly. It
was not a bad bargain.

"But," he answered finally, "why should you not go to the Sheik now
for two camels and by and by another will come for your sister and
give four camels. Then shall I have had six for the two of you."

"But she may die," objected the ready Doolga, the keen-witted
daughter of her father. "Better secure the camels now, father."

"True, she may die, and the bargain be lost," mused the father,
and at last he spread out his hands with a gesture of conclusion.

"It is for the Sheik to decide," he said merely, and Doolga was
content. She knew beforehand what the Sheik would decide when he
saw her sister. Now the two girls sat clasped in each other's arms
behind a curtain hung across a corner of the tent, and waited
silently till they should be summoned.

"If she be fairer than your daughter Doolga," they heard the Sheik
say good-humouredly, "she must be fair indeed, and worth four
camels. Let me see her."

At those words Silka rose and stepped from behind the little
curtain. With timid steps she came forward to the centre of the
tent. A linen tunic clasped round the base of her throat fell
almost to her ankles, caught lightly in at the waist by a scarlet
cord; loose sleeves falling from the shoulder half-concealed her
rounded arms; but her lovely face, with its arching brows and
liquid eyes, looked out unveiled from her frame of cloudy hair, and
drew the Sheik's heart towards her. Wrapt in the enthusiasm of the
holiest of all loves, that of sister for sister, tense with the
ardour of her sacrifice, a light shone out from the tender soul
within that fired all her beauty, making it burn like the sun, and
intoxicate like wine.

Her father eyed her, and wished he had asked five camels.

The Sheik stretched out his right hand towards her.

"Are you pleased to come, my daughter, to the oasis of roses with
me?"

"My lord beholds his slave," answered Silka, a