ble, than any mystery that dwelt in Nigel. This mystery seemed
to her to be connected with his belief in an all-powerful God, in some
Being outside of the world, presiding over its destinies, ordering all
the fates which it contained. And whereas the belief of her husband,
which she divined and was often sharply conscious of, moved her to a
feeling of irony such as may be felt by a naturally sardonic person when
hearing the naive revelations of a child, the faith of Baroudi
fascinated her, and moved her almost to a sensation of awe. It was like
a fire which burnt her, and like an iron door which shut against her.

Yet he had never spoken of it; he did not speak of it now. But he had
sung the song of Nubia.

"Did you tell Ibrahim that he was to choose Hamza as my donkey-boy
to-day?" she said.

She was still preoccupied, still she seemed to see Hamza running beside
her towards the mountains, praying among the rocks.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Hamza is a very good donkey-boy."

In that moment Mrs. Armine began to feel afraid of Hamza, even afraid of
his prayers. That was strangely absurd, she knew, because she believed
in nothing. Baroudi now let himself sink down a little, and rested his
cheek upon his hand. Somewhere he had learnt the secret of European
postures. There had been depths of strangeness in his singing. There was
a depth of strangeness in his demeanour. He had greeted her from the
Nile by night when he was far away in Alexandria; he had ordered Ibrahim
and Hamza to bring her into this solitary place, and now he lay beside
her with his strong body at rest, and his mind, apparently, lost in some
vagrant reverie, not heeding her, not making any effort to please her,
not even--so it seemed to her now--thinking about her. Why was she not
piqued, indignant? Why was she even actually charmed by his
indifference?

She did not ask herself why. Perhaps she was catching from him a mood
that had never before been hers.

For a long time they remained thus side by side, quite motionless, quite
silent. And that period of stillness was to Mrs. Armine the most strange
period she had ever passed through in a life that had been full of
events. In that stillness she was being subdued, in that stillness
moulded, in that stillness drawn away. What was active, and how was it
active? What spoke in the stillness? No echoes replied with their
charmed voices among the gleaming rocks of the Libyan mountains.
Nevertheless, something h