her with an acute self-loathing that was as intense as her passionate
hatred of the man who had forced her to endure his will. The memory of
it would live with her for ever. He had made her a vile thing. Her
cheeks scorched with the thought and she shivered at the remembrance of
all that she had gone through. She had been down into the depths and
she would carry the scars all her life. The girl who had started out so
triumphantly from Biskra had become a woman through bitter knowledge
and humiliating experience.

The pace was less killing now. Silver Star had settled down into the
steady tireless gallop for which Ahmed Ben Hassan's horses were famous.
The little breeze had died away as quickly as it had sprung up, and it
was very hot. Diana looked about her with glowing eyes. Everything
seemed different. From the first she had loved the desert, but back of
everything and mingled with everything had been the feeling of fear,
the continual restraint, the perpetual subservience to the whims of her
captor which had dominated everything. But now the whole aspect was
changed. She loved the endless, undulating expanse stretching out
before her, and as the grey topped each rise her interest grew keener.
What might not be behind the next one? For an hour or more the ground
rose and fell in monotonous succession, and then the desert grew level
again and quite suddenly she could see for miles. About two miles away
a few palm trees showed clustering together, and Diana turned in their
direction. They probably meant a well, and it was time she rested her
horse and herself. It was the tiniest little oasis, and she drew rein
and dismounted with fears for the well she had hoped to find. But there
was one, very much silted up, and she set to work to clear it as well
as she could to procure enough for herself and Silver Star, who was
frantically trying to get to the water. It was exhausting work, but she
managed to satisfy the grey, and, having unloosed his girths, she flung