e left here two or three days ago for Ain Mahdy."

"Left here! Good God!" and Owen threw up his arms. "Left two days
ago, and I have come from Ain Mahdy, nearly from Tunis, in search of
him! We have passed each other in the desert," he said, looking
round the great plain, made of space, solitude, and sun. It had
become odious to him suddenly, and he seemed to forget everything.

As if taking pity on him, Monsieur Beclere asked him to stay with him
until Tahar returned.

"We will hunt the gazelles together."

"That is very kind of you."

And Owen looked into the face of the man to whom he had introduced
himself so hurriedly. He had been so interested in Tahar, and so
overcame by the news of his absence, that he had not had time to
give a thought to the fact that the conversation was being carried
on in French. Now the thought suddenly came into his mind that the
man he was speaking to was not an Arab but a Frenchman. "He must
certainly be a Frenchman, no one but a Frenchman could express
himself so well in French."

"You are very kind," he said, and they strolled up the oasis
together, Owen telling Monsieur Beclere that at first he had
mistaken him for an Arab. "Only your shoulders are broader, and you
are not so tall; you walk like an Arab, not quite so loosely, not
quite the Arab shuffle, but still--"

"A cross between the European spring and the loose Arab stride?"

"Do you always dress as an Arab?"

"Yes, I have been here for thirty-one years, ever since I was
fourteen." Owen looked at him.

"Here, in an oasis?"

"Yes, in an oasis, a great deal of which I have created for myself.
The discovery of a Roman well enabled me to add many hundred
_hectares_ to my property.

"The rediscovery of a Roman well!"

"Yes. If the Sahara is barren, it is because there is no water." Owen
seemed to be on the verge of hearing the most interesting things
about underground lakes only twenty or thirty feet from the surface.
"But I will tell you more about them another time."

Owen looked at Beclere again, thinking that he liked the broad, flat
strip of forehead between the dark eyebrows, and the dark hair,
streaked with grey, the eyes deep in the head, and of an acrid
blackness like an Arab's; the long, thin nose like an Arab's--a face
which could have had little difficulty in acquiring the Arab cast of
feature; and there had been time enough to acquire it, though
Beclere was not more than forty-five.

"No doubt you s