ab village lost in
the great spaces of the Sahara. This information I drew from him while
he waited upon me at dinner, which I ate in solitude. My companions
of the diligence were Arabs, who had melted away like ghosts into the
desolation so soon as the diligence had rolled into the paved courtyard
round which the one-storied house was built.

When I had finished dinner I lit a cigar. I was now quite alone in the
bare _salle-a-manger_. The storm was at its height; the sand was driven
like hail against the wooden shutters of the windows, and I felt dreary
enough. The French driver was no doubt supping in the kitchen with
the landlord, perhaps beside a fire, I began to long for company, for
warmth, and I resolved to join them. I opened the door, therefore, and
peered out into the passage. There was no sound of voices; but I saw a
light at a little distance, went towards it, and found myself in a small
kitchen, where the landlord was sitting alone by a red wood fire in the
midst of his pots and pans, smoking a thin black cigar, and reading
a dirty number of the _Journal Anti-Juif_ of Algiers. He put it down
politely as I came in.

"You're alone, monsieur," I said.

"Yes, m'sieu. The driver has gone to see to the horses."

I offered him one of my Havanas, which he accepted with alacrity, and
drew up with him before the fire.

"You have been living here long, monsieur?"

"Twenty years, m'sieu."

"Twenty years alone in this desert place!"

"Nineteen years alone, m'sieu. Before that I had my little Marie."

"Marie?"

"My child, m'sieu. She is buried in the sand behind the inn."

I looked at him in silence. His brown, wrinkled face was calm, but in
his prominent eyes there was still the hot shining look I had observed
in them when I arrived.

"The palms begin there," he added. "Year by year I have saved what I
could, and now I have bought all the palm-trees near where she lies."

He puffed away at his Havana.

"You come from France?" I asked presently.

"From the Midi--I was born at Cassis, near Marseille."

"Don't you ever intend to go back there?"

"Never, m'sieu. Would you have me desert my child?"

"But," I said gently, "she is dead."

"Yes; but I have promised her that her _bon papa_ will lie with her
presently for company. Leave her alone with the Arabs!"

A sudden look of horror came into his face.

"You don't like the Arabs?"

"Like the dirty dogs! You haven't been told about me, m'sieu?"