"Yes, I remember. A poor thing at its best. It was a woman with a
dagger in her hand."

"Yes, awfully fine, don'cher know! She was a very dark woman--too
dark for my taste,--and she'd got a poignard clasped in in her
right hand. Of course, she was going to murder somebody with it;
that was plain enough. You meant it so, didn't you?"

"I suppose I did."

"She was in a sort of Eastern get-up," pursued Fulkeward, "one of
your former studies in Egypt, perhaps."

Gervase started, and passed his hand across his forehead with a
bewildered air.

"No, no! Not a former study, by any means. How could it be? This
is my first visit to Egypt. I have never been here before."

"Haven't you? Really! Well, you'll find it awfully interesting and
all that sort of thing. I don't see half as much of it as I should
like. I'm a weak chap--got something wrong with my lungs,--awful
bother, but can't be helped. My mother won't let me do too much.
Here we are; this is the Princess Ziska's."

They were standing in a narrow street ending in a cul-de-sac, with
tall houses on each side which cast long, black, melancholy
shadows on the rough pavement below. A vague sense of gloom and
oppression stole over Gervase as he surveyed the outside of the
particular dwelling Fulkeward pointed out to him--a square,