ost
at full length in a wide deck-chair against cushions, with a panama hat
tilted so far down over his eyes that its brim rested delicately upon
his well-cut, rather impertinent short nose. From his lips curled gently
pale smoke from a cigarette.

As Isaacson stepped upon the Oriental rugs which covered the deck, this
young man gently pushed up his hat, looked, let his legs quietly down,
and getting on his feet, said:

"Doctor Isaacson?"

"Yes," said Isaacson coming up to him.

The young man held out his hand with a nonchalant gesture.

"Glad to meet you. I'm Doctor Baring Hartley, in charge of this
sunstroke case aboard here. Came down to-day from Assouan to see how my
patient was getting on. Will you have a cigarette?"

"Thanks."

Doctor Isaacson accepted one.

"Fine air at Assouan! This your first visit to the Nile?"

The young man spoke with scarcely a trace of American accent. With his
hat set back, he was revealed as brown-faced, slightly freckled, with
very thick, dark hair, that was parted in the middle and waved
naturally, though it looked as if it had been crimped; a small
moustache, rather bristling, because it had been allowed only recently
to grow on a lip that had often been shaved; a round, rather sensual
chin; and large round eyes, in colour a yellow-brown. In these eyes the
character of the man was very clearly displayed. They were handsome, and
not insensitive; but they showed egoism, combined with sensuality. He
looked very young, but was just over thirty.

"Yes, it's my first visit."

"Won't you sit down?"

He spoke with the ease of a host, and sank into his deck chair, laying
his hat down upon his knees and stretching out his legs, from which he
pulled up the white ducks a little way. Isaacson sat down on a smaller
chair, leaned forward, and said, in a very practical, businesslike
voice:

"No doubt Mr. or Mrs. Armine--or both of them, perhaps, has explained
how I have come into this affair? I'm an old friend of your patient."

"So I gathered," said Doctor Hartley, in a voice that was remarkably
dry.

"I knew him long before he was married, very long before he was ever a
sick man, and being out here, and hearing about this sudden and severe
illness, of course I called to see how he was."

"Very natural."

"Probably you know my name as a London consulting physician."

"Decidedly. Your success, of course, is great, Doctor Isaacson. Indeed,
I wonder you are able to take a holid