was the girl, of course, who
had fixed the group in Billy's crowded impressions. He decided that
these ladies were the sister and Lady Claire--and Lady Claire, he
judiciously concluded, certainly had nothing on young America.

Young America was speaking. "Don't look so thunderous!" she
complained to her irate host. "How do you know I didn't plan to be
late so as to have you all to myself?"

This was too derisive for endurance. A dull red burned through the
tan on the young Englishman's cheeks and crept up to meet the
corresponding warmth of his hair. A leash within him snapped.

"It is simply inconceivable!" burst from him, and then he shut his
jaw hard, as if only one last remnant of will power kept a seething
volcano, from explosion.

"What is?"

"How any girl--in Cairo, of all places!" he continued to explode in
little snorts.

"You are speaking of--?" she suggested.

"Of your walking with that fellow--in broad daylight!"

"Would it have been better in the gloaming?"

The sweet restraint in the young thing's manner was supernatural. It
was uncanny. It should have warned the red-headed young man, but
oblivious of danger signals, he was plunging on, full steam ahead.

"It isn't as if you didn't know--hadn't been warned."

"You have been so kind," the girl murmured, and poured a cup of tea
the Arab had placed at her elbow.

The young man ignored his. The color burned hotter and hotter in his
face. Even his hair looked redder.

"The look he gave up here was simply outrageous--a grin of insolent
triumph. I'd like to have laid my cane across him!"

The girl's cup clicked against the saucer. "You are horrid!" she
declared. "When we were on shipboard Captain Kerissen was very
popular among the passengers and I talked with him whenever I cared
to. Everyone did. Now that I am in his native city I see no reason
to stalk past him when we happen to be going in the same direction.
He is a gentleman of rank, a relative of the Khedive who is ruling
this country--under your English advice--and he is----"

"A Turk!" gritted out the young man.

"A Turk and proud of it! His mother was French, however, and he was
educated at Oxford and he is as cosmopolitan as any man I ever met.
It's unusual to meet anyone so close to the reigning family, and it
gives one a wonderful insight into things off the beaten track----"

"The beaten--damn!" said the young man, and Billy's heart went out
to him. "Oh, I beg pardon, but you-