was there, which had
earned for Nevill the nickname of "Choir Boy" and "Wings."

"Hullo, Legs!" called out Caird, waving his Panama.

"Hullo, Wings!" shouted Stephen, and was suddenly tremendously glad to
see the friend he had thought of seldom during the last eight or nine
years. In another moment he was introducing Nevill to Miss Ray and
hastily asking questions concerning her hotel, while a fantastic crowd
surged round all three. Brown, skurrying men in torn bagging, the
muscles of whose bare, hairless legs seemed carved in dark oak; shining
black men whose faces were ebony under the ivory white of their turbans;
pale, patient Kabyles of the plains bent under great sacks of flour
which drained through ill-sewn seams and floated on the air in white
smoke, making every one sneeze as the crowd swarmed past. Large grey
mules roared, miniature donkeys brayed, and half-naked children laughed
or howled, and darted under the heads of the horses, or fell against the
bright bonnets of waiting motor cars. There were smart victorias, shabby
cabs, hotel omnibuses, and huge carts; and, mingling with the floating
dust of the spilt flour was a heavy perfume of spices, of incense
perhaps blown from some far-off mosque, and ambergris mixed with grains
of musk in amulets which the Arabs wore round their necks, heated by
their sweating flesh as they worked or stalked about shouting guttural
orders. There was a salt tang of seaweed, too, like an undertone, a
foundation for all the other smells; and the air was warm with a hint of
summer, a softness that was not enervating.

As soon as the first greeting and the introduction to Miss Ray were
confusedly over, Caird cleverly extricated the newcomers from the thick
of the throng, sheltering them between his large yellow motor car and a
hotel omnibus waiting for passengers and luggage.

"Now you're safe," he said, in the young-sounding voice which pleasantly
matched his whole personality. He was several years older than Stephen,
but looked younger, for Stephen was nearly if not quite six feet in
height, and Nevill Caird was less in stature by at least four inches. He
was very slightly built, too, and his hair was as yellow as a child's.
His face was clean-shaven, like Stephen's, and though Stephen, living
mostly in London, was brown as if tanned by the sun, Nevill, out of
doors constantly and exposed to hot southern sunshine, had the
complexion of a girl. Nevertheless, thought Victoria--se