hurt her like the searing of a flame, and yet in the hurt
there was rapture. For the icy blast of the desert could never reach her
now. Unless--unless--ah, was there not a flaming sword still threatening
her wherever she pitched her camp? Surround herself as she would with
the magic essences of love, did not the vengeance await her--even
now--even now? Could she ever count herself safe so long as she remained
in this land of treachery and terrible vengeance? Could there ever be
any peace so near to the burning fiery furnace?

Slowly the night wore on. The air blew in cool and pure with a soft
whispering of spring and the brief splendour of the rose-time. The howl
of a prowling jackal came now and then to her ears, making her shiver
with the memory of Monck's words. Away in the jungle the owls were
calling upon notes that sounded like weird cries for help.

Once or twice she heard a shuffling movement outside the door and knew
that Peter was still on guard. She wondered if he ever slept. She
wondered if Tommy had returned. He often dropped into the Club on his
way back, and sometimes stayed late. Then, realizing how late it was,
she came to the conclusion that she must have dozed in her chair.

She got up with a sense of being weighted in every limb, and began to
undress. Everard would be vexed if he returned and found her still up.
Not that she expected him to return for a long time. His absence lasted
sometimes till the night was nearly over.

She never questioned him regarding it, and he never told her anything.
Dacre's revelation on that night so long ago had never left her memory.
He was engaged upon secret affairs. Possibly he was down in the native
quarter, disguised as a native, carrying his life in his hand. He had a
friend in the bazaar, she knew; a man she had never seen, but whose shop
he had once pointed out to her though he would not suffer her--and
indeed she had no desire--to enter. This man--Rustam Karin--was a dealer
in native charms and trinkets. The business was mainly conducted by a
youth of obsequious and insincere demeanour called Hafiz. The latter she
knew and instinctively disliked, but her feeling for the unknown master
was one of more active aversion. In the depths of that dark native stall
she pictured him, a watcher, furtive and avaricious, a man who lent
himself and his shrewd and covetous brain to a Government he probably
despised as alien.

Tommy had once described the man to her and h