voices of the shaduf men ever calling on
the banks of the river.

When they were on the upper deck those voices seemed to her louder. That
evening it was a sunset of sheer gold. The cloudless sky--so it
seemed--would brook no other colour; the hills would receive no gift
that was not a gift of gold. A pageant of gold that was almost barbaric
was offered to Mrs. Armine. Out of the gold the voices cried from banks
that were turning black. Always, in Egypt, the gold turns the barques on
the Nile, its banks, the palm-trees that sometimes crown them, the
houses of the native villages, black. And so it was that evening, but
Nigel only saw and thought of the gold.

"At last we are sailing into the gold," he said. "This makes me think of
a picture that I love."

"What picture?"

"A picture by Watts, called 'Progress.' In it there is a wonderful glow.
I remember I spoke of it to Meyer Isaacson on the evening when I
introduced him to you."

She had been leaning over the rail on the starboard side of the boat.
Now she lifted her arms, stood straight up, then sat down in a beehive
chair, and leaned back against the basket-work, which creaked as if
protesting.

"To Meyer Isaacson!" she said. "What did you say about it?"

He turned, set his back against the rail, and looked at her in her
hooded shelter.

"We spoke of progress. The picture's an allegory, of course, an
allegory of the spiritual progress of the world, and of each one of us.
I remember telling Isaacson how firmly I believed in the triumph of good
in the world and the individual."

"And what did he say?"

"Isaacson? I don't know that he quite took my view."

"He's a tiny bit of a suspicious man, I think."

"Perhaps he wants more solid proof--proof you could point to and say,
'Look there! I rely on that!' than I should."

"He's ever so much more _terre a terre_ than you are."

"Oh, Ruby, I don't know that!"

"Yes, he is. He's a delightfully clever and a very interesting man, but,
though he mayn't think it he's _terre a terre_. He sees with
extraordinary clearness, but only a very little way, and he would never
believe anything important existed beyond the range of his vision. You
are not like that!"

"He's a thousand times cleverer than I am."

"Yes, he's so clever that he's distrustful. Now, for instance, he'd
never believe in a woman like me."

"Oh--" he began, in a tone of energetic protest.

"No, he wouldn't," she interrupted, quietly. "To the