s or beads when there was
always milk and oil needed in the house. And if, when these were
bought, there was any coin left, then her real luxury was to buy
food for the poor thin camel that lay at night in the mud-yard
behind their hut, and to go and feed it secretly in the starlight.
And she would press her hands into the soft fur of its neck as it
leant towards her, feeling that delight that springs from being
kind and loving, and being loved. The law of her life was love, a
law springing naturally in her mind, as the beauty and health in
her body. Her father, her mother, her brothers were all loved by
her; and, beyond these, the unfortunate camels and the donkeys
whose sides bled where the girths cut them as the careless
Englishmen rode them in and out of the village to and from the
Mahdi's tomb, and the lean, barking curs in the mud street that
seldom barked as she passed by. All these she loved and sympathised
with, though she had not been taught sympathy any more than she had
been taught grace.

This morning she was radiant and happy as she looked through the
quivering, yellow light that danced above the sand towards the
river. Last night she had fed the camel and caressed it, and she
had listened, half awe-struck, to the tom-toms in the distance. The
music had seemed to come to her ears with a new sound. The breeze
had blown from the river with a new kiss to her face. She was
growing into a woman, and the sap of life was rising fast and
vigorous within her, lifting her up with the boundless joy of life.
And as she looked, two white spots, a crested turban and a solar
topee, appeared over the edge of the bank, moving towards her.

"My sister!" said the Soudanese boy, with a regal air, when they
stood at the mudhouse door. And some instinct, as he was young and
foolish, made the Englishman drag off both goggles and solar topee
for a moment, and so Merla looked up and saw him with the sun
bright on his light Saxon hair and friendly blue eyes.

"Merla," went on the boy rapidly to his sister in his own tongue,
"this English mister from Khartoum must have a guide to Kerreree. I
go back to the boat: other Englishman want me. You go to Kerreree,
Show everything; carry black box for him--carry everything. Salaam,
Stanhope Mister."

And, without waiting for either assent or dissent, he swiftly, yet
without any loss of dignity or show of hurry, departed. Merla's
large eyes were downcast. She was a free woman, and came