loved Maieddine better. She
had forgiven him for bringing her the long way round, sacrificing her to
his wish for the girl's society, because the journey was four-fifths
finished, and instead of being worse, her health was better. Besides,
whatever Maieddine wanted was for the Roumia's good, or would be
eventually.

When they were only a short march from Touggourt, and could have reached
there by dark, Maieddine nevertheless ordered an early halt. The tents
were set up by the Negroes among the dunes, where not even the tall
spire of Temacin's mosque was visible. And he led the little caravan
somewhat out of the track, where no camels were likely to pass within
sight, to a place where there were no groups of black tents in the
yellow sand, and where the desert, in all its beauty, appeared lonelier
than it was in reality.

By early twilight the camp was made, and the Soudanese were preparing
dinner. Never once in all the Sahara journey had there been a sunset of
such magical loveliness, it seemed to Maieddine, and he took it as a
good omen.

"If thou wilt walk a little way with me, Ourieda," he said, "I will show
thee something thou hast never seen yet. When my cousin is rested, and
it is time for supper, I will bring thee back."

Together they mounted and descended the dunes, until they could no
longer see the camp or the friendly smoke of the fire, which rose
straight up, a scarf of black gauze, against a sky of green and lilac
shot with crimson and gold. It was not the first time that Victoria had
strolled away from the tents at sunset with Maieddine, and she could not
refuse, yet this evening she would gladly have stayed with Lella
M'Barka.

The sand was curiously crisp under their feet as they walked, and the
crystallized surface crackled as if they were stepping on thin, dry
toast. By and by they stood still on the summit of a dune, and Maieddine
took from the hood of his burnous a pair of field-glasses of the most
modern make.

"Look round thee," he said. "I have had these with me since our start,
but I saved them for to-day, to give thee a surprise."

Victoria adjusted the glasses, which were very powerful, and cried out
at what she saw. The turmoil of the dunes became a battle of giants.
Sand waves as high as the sky rushed suddenly towards her, towering far
above her head, as if she were a fly in the midst of a stormy ocean. The
monstrous yellow shapes came closing in from all sides, threatening to
eng