ppers, Mrs. Armine fell into silence. The disagreeable
impression she had received here on her first visit was returning. But
on her first visit she had been tired, worn with travel. Now she was
strong, in remarkable health. She would not be the victim of her nerves.
Nevertheless, as the donkeys covered the rough ground, as she saw the
pale facade of the temple confronting her in the pale sands, backed by
the almost purple sky, she remembered the carven face of the goddess,
and a fear that was superstitious stirred in her heart. Why had Nigel
suggested that they should seek the blessing of this tragic Aphrodite?
No blessing, surely, could emanate from this dark dwelling in the sands,
from this goddess long outraged by desertion.

They dismounted, and went into the temple. No one was there except the
chocolate-coloured guardian, who greeted them with a smile of welcome
that showed his broken teeth.

"May your day be happy!" he said to them in Arabic.

"He ought to say, 'May all your days on the Nile be happy,' Ruby," said
Nigel.

"He only wants the day on which we pay him to be happy. On any other day
we might die like dogs, and he wouldn't care."

She stood still in the first court, and looked up at the face of Hathor,
which seemed to regard the distant spaces with an eternal sorrow.

"I think you count too much on happiness, Nigel," she added. She felt
almost impelled by the face to say it. "I believe it's a mistake to
count upon things," she added.

"You think it's a mistake to look forward, as I am doing, to our Nile
journey?"

"Perhaps."

She walked on slowly into the lofty dimness of the temple.

"One never knows what is going to happen," she added. And there was
almost a grimness in her voice.

"And it all passes away so fast, whatever it is," he said. "But that is
no reason why we should not take our happiness and enjoy it to the
utmost. Why do you try to damp my enthusiasm to-day?"

"I don't try. But it is dangerous to be too sure of happiness
beforehand."

She was speaking superstitiously, and she was really speaking to
herself. At first she had been thinking of, speaking to, him as if for
his own good, moved by a sort of dim pity that surely belonged rather to
the girl she had been than to the woman she actually was. Now the
darkness of this lonely temple and the knowledge that it was
Aphrodite's--she thought always of Hathor as Aphrodite--preyed again
upon her spirit as when she first came to