was fixed from
the side to the shore and over it a sentry stood, or was supposed to
stand. During the night a Khamsin wind began to blow, though lightly as
was to be expected at this season of the year. I did not hear it for, as
a matter of fact, I slept very soundly, as it appears did everyone else
upon the dahabeeyah, including the sentry as I suspect.

"The first thing I remember was the appearance of Lady Longden just
at daybreak at the doorway of my cabin and the frightened sound of her
voice asking if Luna, that is my wife, was with me. Then it transpired
that she had left her cabin clad in a fur cloak, evidently some
time before, as the bed in which she had been lying was quite cold.
Quatermain, we searched everywhere; we searched for four days, but from
that hour to this no trace whatever of her has been found."

"Have you any theory?" I asked.

"Yes, or at least all the experts whom we consulted have a theory. It is
that she slipped down the saloon in the dark, gained the deck and thence
fell or threw herself into the Nile, which of course would have carried
her body away. As you may have heard, the Nile is full of bodies. I
myself saw two of them during that journey. The Egyptian police
and others were so convinced that this was what had happened that,
notwithstanding the reward of a thousand pounds which I offered for any
valuable information, they could scarcely be persuaded to continue the
search."

"You said that a wind was blowing and I understand that the shores are
sandy, so I suppose that all footprints would have been filled in?"

He nodded and I went on. "What is your own belief? Do you think she was
drowned?"

He countered my query with another of:

"What do _you_ think?"

"I? Oh! although I have no right to say so, I don't think at all. I
am quite sure that she was _not_ drowned; that she is living at this
moment."

"Where?"

"As to that you had better inquire of our friends, Harut and Marut," I
answered dryly.

"What have you to go on, Quatermain? There is no clue."

"On the contrary I hold that there are a good many clues. The whole
English part of the story in which we were concerned, and the threats
those mysterious persons uttered are the first and greatest of these
clues. The second is the fact that your hiring of the dahabeeyah
regardless of expense was known a long time before your arrival in
Egypt, for I suppose you did so in your own name, which is not
exactly that of Smi