n the house?
She caught Ibrahim's hand. He said something which was carried away and
lost to her in the wind. She dropped his hand; he rang, and in a moment
the door was opened by Hassan.

"Ask him if--if anything has happened, if there is any message, anything
for me!" she said to Ibrahim directly she was in the house.

Ibrahim spoke to Hassan in Arabic.

"My lady, he says there is nothin'."

"Very well. I'll go to bed. Good night, Ibrahim."

And she went upstairs.

When she was in her bedroom she shut the door and sat down just as she
was, with a veil over her face, the collar of her dust-coat turned up,
her shining hair dishevelled by the angry hands of the gale. A lamp was
burning on the dressing-table, upon which, very oddly arranged, stood a
number of silver things, brushes, bottles, boxes, which were usually in
the dressing-room. They were set out in a sort of elaborate and very
fantastic pattern, which recalled to her sharply a fact. She had no
longer a maid. She had got rid of Marie, who had left Luxor on the
previous day, neither tearful nor, apparently, angry, but looking sharp,
greedy, and half-admiringly inquisitive to the very last. Mrs. Armine
had come to her two days before holding an open letter from Nigel, and
had announced to her his decision that a lady's maid in the Fayyum would
be an impossibility, and that Marie would have to be left behind, for
the time, at Luxor. And then had followed a little scene admirably
played by the two women; Mrs. Armine deploring the apparent necessity of
their separation, but without undue feeling or any exaggeration; Marie
regretting "monsieur's" determination to carry "une dame si delicate, si
fine" into "un monde si terrible, si sauvage," but at the same time
indicating, with a sly intention and the most admirably submissive
_nuances_, the impossibility of her keeping house in the villa alone
with a group of Nubians. Both women had really enjoyed themselves, as
talent must when exercising itself with perfect adroitness. Mrs. Armine
had regretted Marie's decision, while at the same time applauding her
maidenly _delicatesse_, and had presently, by chance, discovered that
several charming purchases from Paris were no good to her, that two or
three remarkably attractive gowns made her look "like nothing at all,"
and that, as she was going to the Fayyum, she "couldn't be bothered
with" some hats that were, as Marie had often said, _"plus chic que le
diable_!" Then