And now!

Now she sat alone in her cabin, and she stared into the little mirror
which Baroudi had given her in the garden of oranges.

And Isaacson watched over her husband.

"The fate of every man have we bound about his neck."

The Arabic letters of gold seemed to be pressing down upon her, to crush
her body and spirit. She put down the box, and, almost savagely shut
down the lid upon it.

And now that she no longer saw herself, she seemed to see Hamza praying,
as he had prayed that day in the orange garden when she looked out of
the window. Then she had felt that the hands of the East had grasped
her, that they would never let her go, and something within her had
recoiled, though something else had desired only that--to be grasped by
Baroudi's hands.

The praying men had frightened her. Yet she believed in no God.

If there really was a God! If He looked upon her now!

She sprang up, and turned out the light.

* * * * *

The next day the _Loulia_ tied up under the garden of the Villa Androud,
just beyond the stone promontory that diverted the strong current of the
river. Nigel, too weak to walk up the bank to the house, was carefully
carried by the Nubians. The surprised servants of the villa, who had had
no notice of their master's arrival, hastened to throw back the
shutters, to open the windows, letting in light and air. And Ibrahim
once more began to look authoritative, for it seemed that Hamza's reign
was over. From henceforth only Meyer Isaacson gave food and drink and
"sick-food" to "my Lord Arminigel."

The change from dahabeeyah life to life on shore seemed at once to make
a difference to the patient. When he was put carefully down in the white
and yellow drawing-room, and, looking out through the French windows
across the terrace, saw the roses blowing in the sandy garden, he heaved
a sigh that was like a deep breathing of relief.

"I'm thankful to be out of the _Loulia_, Ruby," he said to his wife, who
was standing beside the sofa on which he was resting.

"Are you, Nigel. Why?"

"I don't know. It seemed to oppress me. And you know that writing?"

"What writing?"

"Over the door as you went in."

"Oh, yes."

"I used to think of it in the night when I felt so awful, and it was
like a weight coming down to crush me."

"That was fanciful of you," she said.

But she sent him a strange look of half-frightened suspicion.

He did not see it. He was loo