d to play with their dogs..."

She broke off, between a laugh and a sigh, "Dogs are forbidden to
Moslems--but of course you know, if you have been here two years....
And emancipated as we may be, there is no changing the customs. We
must live as our grandmothers lived ... though we are not as our
grandmothers are..."

"With a French mother, you must be very far from what some of your
grandmothers were!"

"My poor French mother!" Whimsically the girl sighed. "Must I blame
it on her--the spirit that took me to the ball?... To-morrow
this will be a dream to me.... I shall not believe in my
shamelessness.... And you, too, must forget--"

"Forget?" said Ryder under his breath.

"Forget--and go. Positively you must go now, monsieur. It is very
dangerous here--"

"It is." There was a light dancing in his hazel eyes. "It is more
dangerous every moment--"

"But I mean--" Her confusion betrayed itself.

"But I mean--that you are magic--black magic," he murmured bending
over the black domino.

The crescent moon had found its way through a filigree of boughs.
Faintly its exploring ray lighted the contour of that shrouded head,
touched the lovely curves of her arched brows and the tender pallor
of the skin about those great wells of dark eyes.... From his own
eyes a flame seemed to pass into hers.... Breathlessly they gazed at
each other ... like dim shadows in a garden of still enchantment.

And then, as from a palpable clasp, she tried to slip away. "Truly,
I must go! It is so late--"

Ryder's heart was pounding within him. He did not recognize this
state of affairs; it was utterly unrelated to anything that had gone
before in his merry, humorous, rather clear-sighted and wary young
life.... He felt dazed and wondering at himself ... and
irresponsible ... and appalled ... but deeper than all else, he felt
eager and exultant and strangely, furtively determined about
something that he was not owning to himself ... something that
leaped off his lips in the low murmur to her, "But to-morrow
night--I shall see you again--"

She caught her breath. "Oh, never again! To-night has no
to-morrow--"

"Outside this gate," he persisted. "I shall wait--and other nights
after that. For I must know--if you are safe--"

"See, I am very safe now. For if I were missed there would be
running and confusion--"

He only drew a little closer to her. "To-morrow night--or another--I
shall come to this door--"

"It must not open to yo