-"

"It's not doing anything for you to save Aimee," he told her.
"That's what you are doing for her and for me.... But if ever you
want me for anything after this--my name is Ryder, Jack Ryder, and
you can reach me at the Agricultural Bank."

He had a vague vision of some day repaying his enormous debt by
assisting this girl, grown tired of her Hamdi, out of this aperture
and into a waiting boat. He would do it like a shot, he told himself
gladly; he would do anything on God's green earth if only she helped
him get Aimee away from that infernal villain.

"Jack," she repeated, under her breath, and then in her slow
English, "I like--Jack."

"Don't forget it. I'll always come and do anything for you. And if
you'll tell me your name--"

"Aziza."

"Aziza. I'll never forget that. And now, if you'll tell me how I can
get to her and then the best way out--"

"Why you so hurry--"

"Why?" he looked a little blank. "I can't lose a minute--he may be
with her--"

She came a little nearer to him, her head tilting back with a slow,
indolent challenge.

Gone was the silken mantle that had been about her below stairs and
he saw now that she was a vivid, exotic shimmer of gauzy green
against the saffron veil that fell from her henna hair. There was
barbaric beauty in her, in the bold, painted face, the bare,
gold-banded arms, the slender, sinuous lines, and there was barbaric
splendor in the heavy jewels that winked and flashed....

It struck Ryder that she was gotten up regardless.... In pride,
perhaps, on her rival's wedding night?... Or had there been some
defiant, desperate design upon Hamdi--?

She did not miss that sudden prolonging of his look upon her.

"You like me--yes?" she murmured, and then slipping back into
the vernacular, "I--I am not the stupid veiled girl of the
seclusion--not forever. I come from the west, the deserts. I have
seen the world: Men--men, I know ... I danced before them, not the
dances of the Cairene cafes," she uttered with swift scorn, "but the
dance of the two swords, the dance of the serpents.... Men threw the
gold from their turbans about my feet when I had danced to them ...
And others, English, French--"

She broke off, but her eyes told many things. "Then--Hamdi," she
said slowly. "Him I ruled--and his palace.... But I have known other
things."

Closer yet she came to him. Her eyes, golden fires of eyes, were
smiling up into his, her scarlet lips gathered in soft, sensual
c