crept like huge spiders' legs as their armies wound
across the plain. Then they came to the cave, and once more one by one
flung themselves in unending files through the hole into the pit of
bones, and I awoke, shuddering, to see _She_, who had evidently been
standing between my couch and Leo's, glide like a shadow from the room.

After this I slept again, soundly this time, till morning, when I
awoke much refreshed, and got up. At last the hour drew near at which,
according to Ayesha, Leo was to awake, and with it came _She_ herself,
as usual, veiled.

"Thou shalt see, oh Holly," she said; "presently shall he awake in his
right mind, the fever having left him."

Hardly were the words out of her mouth, when Leo turned round and
stretched out his arms, yawned, opened his eyes, and, perceiving a
female form bending over him, threw his arms round her and kissed her,
mistaking her, perhaps, for Ustane. At any rate, he said, in Arabic,
"Hullo, Ustane, why have you tied your head up like that? Have you got
the toothache?" and then, in English, "I say, I'm awfully hungry. Why,
Job, you old son of a gun, where the deuce have we got to now--eh?"

"I am sure I wish I knew, Mr. Leo," said Job, edging suspiciously past
Ayesha, whom he still regarded with the utmost disgust and horror, being
by no means sure that she was not an animated corpse; "but you mustn't
talk, Mr. Leo, you've been very ill, and given us a great deal of
hanxiety, and, if this lady," looking at Ayesha, "would be so kind as to
move, I'll bring you your soup."

This turned Leo's attention to the "lady," who was standing by in
perfect silence. "Hullo!" he said; "that is not Ustane--where is
Ustane?"

Then, for the first time, Ayesha spoke to him, and her first words were
a lie. "She has gone from hence upon a visit," she said; "and, behold,
in her place am I here as thine handmaiden."

Ayesha's silver notes seemed to puzzle Leo's half-awakened intellect,
as also did her corpse-like wrappings. However, he said nothing at the
time, but drank off his soup greedily enough, and then turned over and
slept again till the evening. When he woke for the second time he saw
me, and began to question me as to what had happened, but I had to
put him off as best I could till the morrow, when he awoke almost
miraculously better. Then I told him something of his illness and of my
doings, but as Ayesha was present I could not tell him much except that
she was the Queen of