ds to his name.

He went to Dicky Donovan and asked the loan of a thousand pounds.
It took Dicky's breath away. His own banking account seldom saw a
thousand--deposit. Dicky told Kingsley he hadn't got it. Kingsley asked
him to get it--he had credit, could borrow it from the bank, from the
Khedive himself! The proposal was audacious--Kingsley could offer no
security worth having. His enthusiasm and courage were so infectious,
however, though his ventures had been so fruitless, that Dicky laughed
in his face. Kingsley's manner then suddenly changed, and he assured
Dicky that he would receive five thousand pounds for the thousand within
a year. Now, Dicky knew that Kingsley never made a promise to any one
that he did not fulfil. He gave Kingsley the thousand pounds. He did
more. He went to the Khedive with Kingsley's whole case. He spoke as he
had seldom spoken, and he secured a bond from Ismail, which might not
be broken. He also secured three thousand pounds of the Khedive's
borrowings from Europe, on Kingsley's promise that it should be returned
five-fold.

That was how Kingsley got started in the world again, how he went mining
in the desert afar, where pashas and mamours could not worry him. The
secret of his success was purely Oriental. He became a slave-owner. He
built up a city of the desert round him. He was its ruler. Slavery gave
him steady untaxed labour. A rifle-magazine gave him security against
marauding tribes, his caravans were never over powered; his blacks were
his own. He had a way with them; they thought him the greatest man in
the world. Now, at last, he was rich enough. His mines were worked
out, too, and the market was not so good; he had supplied it too well.
Dicky's thousand had brought him five thousand, and Ismail's three
thousand had become fifteen thousand, and another twenty thousand
besides. For once the Khedive had found a kind of taxation, of which he
got the whole proceeds, not divided among many as heretofore. He got
it all. He made Kingsley a Bey, and gave him immunity from all other
imposts or taxation. Nothing but an Egyptian army could have removed him
from his desert-city.

Now, he was coming back--to-night at ten o'clock he would appear at the
Khedivial Club, the first time in seven years. But this was not all. He
was coming back to be married as soon as might be.

This was the thing which convulsed Dicky.

Upon the Nile at Assiout lived a young English lady whose life was
d