"I suppose we shall meet again some day," he said. "They have a proverb
here, 'Meet before dawn--part not till dawn.' They see into the future
in a few drops of water in any hollow thing. Well, good-night"--and
before she could answer he was off beyond the hotel up the road and
then turning to the right on a sand-path, galloped out of sight into
what must be the vast desert.

Where on earth could he be going to?--possibly the devil--if one knew.




CHAPTER II


When Tamara woke in the morning the recollection of her camel ride
seemed like a dream. She sat for a long time at the window of her room
looking out toward the green world and Cairo. She was trying to adjust
things in her mind. This stranger had certainly produced an effect upon
her.

She wondered who he was, and how he would look in daylight--and above
all whither he had galloped into the desert. Then she wondered at
herself. The whole thing was so out of her line--so bizarre--in a life
of carefully balanced proprieties. And were the thoughts the Sphinx had
awaked in her brain true? Yes, certainly she had been ruled by others
always--and had never developed her own soul.

She was very sensitive--that last whimsical smile of the unknown had