"I confess I was conceited enough to think you'd given yourself all this trouble with the costumier in order to take a rise out of me. But when you speak of spies, I begin to put two and two together—your business in Cairo—the powers that be, keeping you from me last night, etc. I suppose it's an official job, this fancy dress affair?"

"Yes. In my own capacity, I'm not in Cairo. I turned up day before yesterday, jolly glad to get back from Adrianople—though it was good fun there, I can tell you, for a while; and I looked forward to wallowing no end in the alleged delights of civilization. I reported myself, and all seemed well. I took a room at Shepheard's where you and I had arranged to meet, and when I'd scrubbed, I strolled over to the Turf Club to see what the gay world would have to say to a fellow in disgrace."

"Only silly asses swallowed that newspaper spoof! Every one in London who knows anything about you was betting his boots that the story had been spread on purpose to save our face with Turkey." I couldn't resist interrupting his narrative to this extent. But Anthony merely smiled, and watched a long-lived smokering settle like a halo over the head of an Arab at the nearest table. He was not giving away official secrets, but I was sure and always had been sure that he was a martyr, not a rebel, in the matter of the Balkan incident, just closed. What the public were led to suppose was this: that Captain Fenton had asked for two months' leave from regimental duty at Khartum, in order to spend the time with a relative who was seriously ill in Constantinople. That instead of remaining at his relative's bedside, he had used his leave for a dash to the Balkans. That this indiscretion might have been kept a secret had he not capped it with another: a flight with a Greek officer in an army aeroplane which had ended by crashing down in the midst of a Turkish encampment.

What I and friends who knew him best supposed, was that the "leave" had been a pretext—that Fenton had been sent on a secret mission of some sort—and that he was bound to take the blame if anything went wrong. Aeroplanes have the habits of other fierce, untamed animals: they won't always obey their trainers. Thus Anthony and his plan had both been upset. (Or had it really been premeditated that he should fall into that camp?) The remainder of his "leave" was cancelled, in punishment, and he had been "recalled" to Egypt, to be scolded in Cairo before proceeding to Khartum.

"Queer how many silly asses one knows!" Anthony said. "Still, considering what a mess I seem to have made of things, fellows were jolly kind, at the Turf Club. Nobody cut me, and only a few let me alone. Maybe there'd have been still fewer if there hadn't been a hero present who claimed attention: an American chap, Jack Dennis, who knows Miss Gilder and was telling the good news that she was on her way to Egypt. He called her the Gilded Rose and said it was going to be a good flower season in Cairo and up the Nile. All the men with one exception seemed to have heard a lot about her and to find her an interesting subject, and to want Dennis to introduce them."

"I can guess the 'one exception'!" said I.

"Can you? Well, I don't read newspaper gossip about heiresses. Thank heaven, I've something better to do with my time. But the others wanted to meet her, or pretended to, perhaps to chaff Dennis, rather a cocky youth, though I oughtn't to say so, as he was nice to me, according to his lights. He got Sam Blake to introduce us, when he happened to hear my name, and went out of his way to pay me compliments, which I daresay he thought I'd like. When there was a lull in the discussion of what could be done to make Miss Gilder enjoy herself in Egypt—chaps suggesting trips in their motor cars or on their camels and a lot of rot, Dennis remarked that I was the only man who hadn't chipped into the conversation. And hadn't I any ideas for entertaining the Golden Girl? Naturally I said that I didn't know who she was and had never heard of her, and even if I had, entertaining girls wasn't in my line. They all roared, and Dennis wouldn't believe at first that I didn't know of such an important person's existence; but the other men rotted a bit, and described me to him according to their notions of me. So he let me alone on the subject; and having plenty of other things to think of, I forgot all about it till the lady in question introduced herself this morning. Then—well, it struck me as rather amusing at first that I, the only one in the crowd who hadn't made plans to get at her, should have her trying to get at me. That was partly why I came up on the terrace when she beckoned."

"Partly? For purely intellectual reasons I'm curious to know the rest. I suppose it had nothing to do with her looks?"

"As it happened, my cynical friend, it hadn't. I've got eyes in my head and I could see she was pretty, very pretty, though not my ideal type at all. That little sprite of a woman in fawn colour, the one with green eyes and a lot of black lashes, is more what I'd fall in love with if I were frivolous. But apart from the funny side of my meeting with Miss Golder, or Gilder, it popped into my head that I might make her a victim in a certain cause. Don't ask me to explain yet, because there are a lot of things that have got to be explained first, or you couldn't understand. You were right, of course, when you thought I'd stationed myself in front of Shepheard's to take a rise out of you. I gave up my room there yesterday, for reasons I'll tell you. But I knew you'd be in the hotel, and that you'd be bound to show yourself on the terrace, in order to go out. I wanted to see if you'd recognize me, and to have a little fun with you if you didn't. By the way, I'm not pleased that you did. It's a poor compliment to my make-up, which I may tell you has been warmly praised in high quarters!" "Well, you see," I apologized, "I knew you were a nailer at that sort of thing, or you would never have got to Mecca, and earned your green turban. I knew you'd been pretty often called upon to disguise yourself and go about among the natives for one thing or another. And besides, we were chums before you had the shadow of a moustache, so I have an advantage over the other Sherlock Holmeses! But even as it was, I couldn't be sure at first. You must have got some fun out of my expression."

"I did. I took revenge on you for recognizing me by tormenting you as far as I dared. Dear old boy, I knew you'd see me through to the end, bitter or sweet!"

"Which was it?" I inquired.

"Mixed. The girl riled me, rather, so much so that I definitely decided it would be fair play to make use of her as a cat's-paw. But it depends on you, whether she's to lose or win her bet."

"If she loses, I get her hat. If she wins, I've engaged myself to procure for her—your green turban."

"Did you think you could, without my consent?"

"No. I distinctly thought I couldn't. But I would have been willing to bet the head in the turban, served up on a charger, so sure I was that you'd refuse to come near her. I thought I knew you au fond, you see."

"You do. I haven't changed. But—circumstances have changed. And that brings me near to the stage of this business which concerns you and me. First, before I go further though, I'll tell you a part of the reason why I'm sporting the green turban. There's been the dickens to pay here, about a new street that had to be made; an immensely important and necessary street. Well, they couldn't make it, because the tomb of a popular saint or sheikh was in the way. To move the body or even disturb a saint's tomb would mean no end of a row. You remember or have read enough about Mohammedans to know that. What to do, was the question. Nobody'd been able to answer it till yesterday, when the sight of me reminded them of a trick or two I'd brought off some time ago, by disguising myself and hanging about the cafes. They wanted me to try it again. Consequently Captain A. Fenton received a telegram and had to leave Cairo at once on business. He gave up his room at Shepheard's, and the only regrettable thing to the official mind is, that the fellow'd been seen about town even for an hour. However, it couldn't be helped. Luckily Ahmed Antoun is not unknown in Cairo cafes. He's made quite an impression upon the public on several occasions since his pilgrimage to Mecca, two years ago. And since yesterday afternoon, he's been drinking enough coffee to give him jaundice, while casually spreading the story of a dream he had. Our friend the Hadji related how he had slept in the mosque of Ibn Tulun after the noon hour, and dreamed of the sheikh whose tomb is so inconveniently placed. In the dream, the saint clamoured to have his tomb moved on account of a bad smell of drainage which he considers an insult to his own memory. Also dogs have taken to howling round his resting-place at night, and you know that to the true believer a dog is an unclean animal. Except for hunting purposes, or watch-dogging in various branches, good Mohammedans class dogs and Christians together in their mind. Well, already the Hadji's dream is working like yeast. The news of it is being carried from one cafe to another; and I hope that a few more nights' work will do the trick. The votaries of the saint will get up a petition to have his body moved. When it has found another abode, the making of the new thoroughfare will be suggested."

"Very neat! I see it all, except the connection with Miss Gilder. What has your saint got to do with her?"

"Very little, I should say, by the look in her eyes. But though a green turban's as good as an heirloom, and extorts respect wherever it goes, even a Hadji may have jealous detractors. I have mine. Another green turban in this town, whose genuineness is doubted for some obscure reason or other, has sneered at my dream."

"I say! That sounds as if you might be in danger. If one man suspects you to-day, to-morrow———"

"Oh, it's only the dream he suspects—at present. I know all the little prayer tricks so well, and I've invented my own history so ingeniously, with a patois to match my province, that I shall get through this incident as I have through others of the sort. There's only one hole in my jebbah. Last night, when my rival sprang a sudden question as to what I was doing in Cairo (I'm supposed to be a Luxor man), on the spur of the moment I replied that I was acting as dragoman to a rich family of tourists. On that, the brute inquired with honeyed accents where they were staying. I said Shepheard's, because I expected you to be there, and thought if I were followed, you might be useful as a dummy."

"Ah, that's where Miss Gilder comes in? A gilded gingerbread lamb, ready for the sacrifice. Why didn't you accept her offer at once, as she seemed so providential?" "I'm coming to that. It sounds complicated, but it isn't. For one thing, though, it may be well to wait and find out a little more about that goat-eyed Armenian of yours."

"He isn't mine. He's—".

"I want to know for certain whose he is. If he has anything to do with my rival Hadji, there's more venom and wit inside that green turban than I've given it credit for. Is there a reason, by the way, except their riches, why one should want to 'get at' a member of the American party?"

"By Jove!" said I, as if I had been pinched—for there was a sharp nip in the thought Anthony's question jabbed into my mind. I had disliked and distrusted Bedr el Gemaly, but I had associated my distaste for him with Fenton's affairs. It had not occurred to me that Biddy's fears meant more than a nervous woman's vague forebodings. During the few hideous years of hide-and-seek she had passed in trying to protect the traitor, Richard O'Brien, she had no doubt had real enough reason to dread a spy in every stranger; but I had cheerfully advised her "not to be morbid" when she spoke of herself as a dangerous companion, or stopped me with a gasp in the midst of what seemed an innocent question about her stepdaughter. Could it be possible that her alarms might after all be justified, and that the powerful association betrayed by O'Brien would visit his sins on his widow and daughter? That American accent of Gemaly's! He admitted having been in New York. Of course, he had made acquaintances there. My thoughts flashed back to the meeting at the railway train. Could the fellow have found out in advance that I was with Mrs. O'Brien, [alias Jones] and her friends? It seemed as if such knowledge could have reached land ahead of us only by miracle. But there was always Marconi. Perhaps news of Miss Gilder had been sent by wireless to Alexandria, with our humbler names starred as satellites of that bright planet. If this were so, Bedr, instructed from afar to watch Richard O'Brien's widow, might easily have been clever enough to suborn a messenger waiting for one Ernest Borrow.

"What are you mumbling about?" Anthony wanted to know, when I forgot to answer. "Have I put some idea that you don't like into your head?"

"I was turning your question over in it," I explained, "and wondering what to answer. Of course, Miss Gilder's rather important, and I believe her father's obsession used to be when she was a child, that she'd be kidnapped for ransom. The 'little sprite of a woman' you admire so much, knew the Gilders in those days. She says that the unfortunate baby used to be dragged about in a kind of caged perambulator, and that some of her nurses were female detectives in disguise, with revolvers under their white aprons. No wonder the girl revels in emancipation and travel! I should think, now she's grown up to twenty-one years and five foot eight or nine of height, without being kidnapped, there's not much danger so long as she keeps in the boundaries of civilization. Still, one never knows, in such a queer world as ours, where newspapers live on happenings we'd laugh to scorn if they came out of novel writers' brains."

"That's the only incentive you can suggest for spying, unconnected with my affairs?"

I hesitated, for Biddy's secret was not my secret, and it seemed that I had no right to pass it on, even to my best friend. I must ask Biddy's permission before telling Fenton that Mrs. Jones was the widow of the informer Richard O'Brien; that she feared over-subtlety on the part of the enemy might confuse her girl travelling companion with Esme O'Brien, hidden in a convent school near Monaco. "It's just credible that there may be other incentives," I said. "But I must confess, I'd rather believe that Armenian spies were on the track of Ahmed Antoun, who can take care of himself, than after poor Miss Gilder or—any of her party."

"What's the name of the laughing sprite?" suddenly asked Fenton.

"Mrs.—er—Jones. Brigit Jones."

"Where's her husband?"

"In his grave."

"Oh! Well, his widow looks ready to bubble over with the joy of life, so I suppose we can't associate spies or anything shady with her? That's too much to hope for?"

"Why to 'hope' for?"

"It would make her too interesting."

"Look here, my dear fellow, you can't have them both!"

The dark eyes of Antoun lit with a spark of surprise and laughter. "I don't want either, thanks. I admire flowers, but I never gather them. I leave them growing. However, you might tell me which one you want for your own buttonhole?" "Really, I don't know," I mumbled, taken aback. "All I do know is, it's not likely I can get either."

Anthony stared at me with a curious expression, then abruptly changed the subject. "You've heard of Sir Marcus Lark?" he asked.

"Of course," said I, surprised at this question sandwiched into our affairs. Sir Marcus Lark is a man who has had his finger in many pies, but I didn't see how he could poke one into ours. Everybody knows Sir M. A. Lark, given a baronetcy by the Radicals some years ago in return for services to the party—starting and running a newspaper which must have cost him fifty thousand pounds before it began to pay. He has financed theatres, and vegetarian restaurants; he owns cocoa plantations and factories, and a garden city; he has a racing yacht which once beat the German Emperor's; he owns two hotels; he has written a book of travel; his name as a director is sought by financial companies; he has lent money to a distressed South American government in the making; and though the success of his enterprises has sometimes hung in the balance for months or years, his wonderful luck seems invariably to triumph in the end; so much so, that "Lark's Luck" has become a well-known heading for newspaper columns, in the middle of which his photograph is inset. At the mention of his name, the oft-seen picture rose before my eyes—a big man, anywhere between thirty-six and fifty—good head, large forehead, curly hair, kind eyes, pugnacious nose, conceited smile under waxed moustache, heavy jaw, unconquerable chin, and prize-fighter's neck and shoulders. "What has Sir Marcus Lark to do with us?" "He's in Egypt—in Cairo just now; and—he's got our mountain."

"Good heavens!" I stared blankly at Anthony, seeing not his dark face under the green turban, but that everlasting, ever-smiling newspaper block portrait. Down toppled our castle in the air, Anthony's and mine—the shining castle which had been the lodestone of my journey to Egypt, the secret hope and romance of our two lives, for all those months since Anthony first read the Ferlini papers and began negotiations with the Egyptian Government.

"It's all up then," I said, when I felt that I could speak without betraying palsy of the jaw. "We're done!"

"I'm not sure of that," Fenton answered. "If I had been, I shouldn't have broken the news so brutally. It's on the cards that we may be able to bring the thing off yet."

"But how, if that bounder has got the place for himself? He must have found out the truth about it somehow, or he wouldn't have bothered. And if he knows what we know—or think we know—he certainly won't give up to us what he's grabbed for himself. A beastly shame we should have been let in like this, after being given to understand that it would be all right."

"Lark must have had a pull of some sort, I haven't learned what; but I will. The one hope is, that he hasn't stumbled onto the secret."

"What! You think he hit on our pitch by a mere coincidence—an accident?"

"No. There's not a shadow of doubt that he had a special motive for wanting our mountain and no other." "Have you formed an idea what the motive is, if not the same as ours?"

"I've heard his version from his own lips. It's rather astounding. And I want you to hear it from him, too."

"You've met him!"

"Yesterday at Shepheard's, before I went in for this dressing-up business. Lark heard I had wired for a room at the hotel, and was lying in wait for me on the terrace when I got back from the Agency. We had a talk. I'd heard just before, the news about the mountain. But he explained. Now he wants to see you. He's got something special to say, and I've made an appointment for you with him at two o'clock."



CHAPTER VI

THE GREAT SIR MARCUS

The appointment was at the Semiramis Hotel, where Sir Marcus Lark was staying. I went with my mind an aching void, and my heart a cold boiled potato. I can think of nothing more disagreeable! For not a word more would Fenton let drop as to the great man's business with us or the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid.

I sent up my card, and a few minutes later was shown into a private salon more appropriate to a beautiful young duchess than to a middle-aged, bumptious financier. It was pale green and white, full of lilies and fragrance, and an immense French window opened out upon a roofed loggia overlooking the Nile. This would have been the ideal environment for our Gilded Rose; and I felt more venomous than before, if possible, toward the rich bounder who posed against such an unsuitable background. I thought, as the door of the salon was opened for me by the smart Arab servant, that the room was untenanted, and that Sir Marcus Lark meant to keep me waiting; but there he was, on the balcony, gazing in rapture at the shining river. As if he were capable of raptures, he, an earth-bound worm! But there was no mistaking that back, those shoulders, or the face, as the big body turned. He advanced through the open window, holding out a hand as big as a steak. He was exactly like his photograph, except that there was even more of him than I had been led to expect. The pretty room was net small, but entering, he seemed to turn it into a doll's house parlour. "Six foot two, if he's an inch!" I said to myself, longing to play David to his Goliath. "Big, rich, common brute!" I thought. "You snatch our mountain out of our mouths, and then you send for us as if we were servants—men whose boots you ought to be blacking!" I was vindictive. I stared him straight between the eyes—where a stone from David's sling would have fitted in neatly.

The eyes were wide apart, and kinder than in the photographs. They were even curiously innocent, and boyish. His grin of greeting made the large, waxed black moustache point joyously up. He showed teeth white as a child's, and had dimples—actually dimples—in his big cheeks, to say nothing of the one in his chin, with which snapshots had familiarized me. He looked like a huge, overgrown schoolboy with a corked moustache. My glare faded in the light of his smile. No man with a gleam of humour could have kept a mask of grimness. I found my hand enveloped in the pound of steak, and warmly shaken up and down inside it.

"Lord Ernest Borrow, I'm delighted to see you. Very good of you to come, I'm sure!" to David quoth Goliath, in a big voice, mellow despite a slight Cockney accent. "Nice view I've treated myself to here, what? I'm in Egypt on business, but I like to have pretty things around me —pleasant colours and flowers and a view. That's a specialty of mine. I'm great on specializing. And that brings me to what we have in common; a scheme of yours; a scheme of mine."

I wanted to detest the man, but somehow couldn't. To hate him would be hating an overpowering force, like heat, or electricity.

With an old-fashioned politeness he made me sit down, picking out my chair, the most comfortable in the room, then taking the next best for himself. He fitted into it as tightly as a ripe plum into its skin, and talked with one leg crossed over the other and swinging, the points of his brown fingers joined. I was glad they were brown.

"I'm afraid you're sore with me," he began, having ordered coffee and liqueurs, and forced upon his guest a cigar as big as a sausage. "I've got what you and your friend wanted; and I'm going to be frank with you as I've been with him, and admit that I got it because you did want it. Simply and solely for that reason and nothing else. He told you this?"

"He left the telling to you," I said, wondering why I wasn't more furious than curious. But it was the other way round.

"Good egg! He promised he would, and he looks the sort of chap to keep his promise. Well, I see you want me to get down to business, and I will. I'm going to lay all my cards on the table. I came here to Egypt for the first time in my life, to see a scheme through, and I landed on the scene in time to find that I was likely to fail. I haven't told any one else that, but your friend Fenton; for I never have made a business failure yet, and I don't mean to now if I can help it. The scheme had to be saved in a hurry if it could be saved at all; and when I set my wits to work I saw that I must get hold of some such young men as you and Captain Fenton to help me. I don't know how the thought of you two popped into my head, but I suppose it was seeing a lot of stuff about Fenton in the papers, his Balkan adventure, and the announcement that he'd been recalled to his regiment. There were paragraphs about him as a linguist, and an Egyptologist, and anecdotes of him as a smart soldier. You know the sort of thing. And the stories about his parentage caught my fancy a bit. They're romantic. I've got enough romance in me to see that side of life, and to know how it goes down with the women. This scheme of mine depends on women. Most schemes do. At the same time the Egyptian papers were printing paragraphs about Lord Ernest Borrow. I don't know whether you're aware of that or not? No? Would you like to see 'em? I've had my secretary cut 'em out—and the Fenton stuff, too. The minute this idea began to wiggle in my mind like a tadpole in water, I kept everything."

"Don't trouble about the paragraphs, thanks," I said.

"All right. It will save our time not to. But your wish to go in with your friend, for the rights of excavating in the Sudan, was mentioned, and the delay on account of alleged interference with Garstang's pitch."

"By Jove, I wonder how the reporters got onto that?" I couldn't help exclaiming.

"It's their livelihood to get onto everything. 'Well then,' I said to myself, 'Here's my chance, my only one. I want those two young men. They're the right combination nation for me, to give real distinction to my undertaking. I have money, but they ain't the sort you can buy with money. There must be an incentive. If I get what they want, perhaps I can get them.' So I went into the job tooth and nail. Neither you nor Fenton was on the spot. I was—very much on it. Nothing was definitely fixed up between the Government and Fenton for the right to excavate at the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid, as they call the little old molehill, and I scored. Now, if you two will do what I want, you can have your mountain, and whatever you find you can keep. You're worth more to me than any beads and broken-nosed statues under the sand of Egypt. I think I've made some impression on your friend. He may be inclined to go in with me, if you will. He's explained that in any case he can't use his own name, on account of his position in the army and so on. That's a disappointment to me, but I'll put up with it for the sake of his accomplishments and his looks. Your name alone will carry the necessary weight as a leader."

"You're very flattering," said I. "But I'm in the dark."

"I'm going to put you wise, as Americans say. My scheme was—and is—to be a rival de luxe of Cook on the Nile. Not only that, but all over the near East. You've heard, of course, about my buying the Marquis of Redruth's yacht Candace, on his bankruptcy—the second biggest, and the most up-to-date yacht in the world—and turning her into a pleasure cruiser for the Mediterranean?"

"If I've heard, I'm afraid my memory's treacherous," said I, glad to show how unimportant to me were the schemes of financiers, but interested in the yacht's name, which carried my thoughts away to Meroee.

"Great Scout! And I've spent two thousand in advertising! I've taken whole pages of London and Continental papers!"

"I never read advertisements if I can help it, except of new patents in razors. They're a fad of mine."

"Thank goodness you've got fads. Then we've something in common. I make money out of my fads. I call 'em inspirations. I thought the Candace business was one of my inspirations, and that I'd have some fun out of it. I advertised her to start on her first pleasure cruise from Marseilles to Gib, Algiers, Tangier, Tunis, Greece, Alexandria, and Jaffa. 'That'll be a smack in the eye for the big liners,' I said to myself. 'I'll skim the top layer of clotted cream off their passenger lists!' I was going to do the thing de luxe straight through—bid for the swell set, exclusiveness my motto. Of course I didn't expect to hit the dukes and dollar kings first shot, but I thought if everything went right the passengers would tell their friends at home how much better we did them on board than any one else had ever done, and we'd get a 'snowball' ad, that nothing could stop. All would have worked out first rate, if I hadn't made one mistake. I engaged a retired army colonel for a conductor on board my yacht. I got the man cheap. But I was a fool to economize on him. I ought to have launched out on a belted earl. Folks, especially Americans, don't like retired colonels. The woods are full of 'em over there, crawling with 'em. Most Americans are colonels and not retired. Besides, this chap of mine's no good anyhow —fancies himself as a politician, and is a first-class snob; has no tact; rubs up the passengers the wrong way, and outrages their feelings. We got a lot of people from the north of England, rich and a bit crude, like me. Will you believe it, Colonel Corkran began his job by sneering audibly at 'provincials' to some beastly friend of his, come to see him off at Marseilles? Instead of making his dinner-table lectures a kind of travellogue as he was hired to do, he turns 'em into political tirades, and calls the Liberals scoundrels, half of our folks being red-hot Rads. Not only that, if the girls and boys talk while the band's playin' any of his favourite airs, he hisses out 'Silence,' through a hole in his mouth where one tooth's missin'. That tooth bein' gone, has got on the girls' nerves worse than anything else, it would seem, except his being down on Suffragettes. And the crisis was reached when he insulted Miss Hassett Bean, the richest and most important woman in the bunch, when she expressed her political opinions. Said to her, 'My dear lady, why do you bother to have opinions? They give you a lot of trouble to collect, and nobody else will trouble to listen. Why not collect insects or stamps instead?' Of course she did think Germany had already invaded England with a large army of soldiers disguised as hotel waiters, which was calculated to rile an old officer; but that's no excuse for a man who's paid to please. And now the fellow's wondering why he's not popular with the passengers!"

I laughed, but Sir Walter had worked himself into a state past smiling point. "It's no laughing matter," he said, "This snob Corkran's killing my scheme. There's a plot on foot for the party to walk off the yacht at Alexandria, and demand half their passage money. Some old grampus on board has started the story that the Candace has been down three times———"

"A lie, of course," I soothed him.

"A dastardly lie. She's been down only twice. The first time was a collision, the second a coincidence."

"But I thought she was the most up-to-date yacht in the world!"

"So she is, as the Candace. That was the Marquis's name for her: gave it after a trip to Egypt. He bought her second hand, and rechristened her while she was being redecorated. He spared no expense, which he could well afford, seeing that he never paid a penny. I got her at cost price, as you may say. But these plotters are going to claim that they were inveigled on board under false pretences, by my advertising the Candace as the newest thing in yachts. I've had a letter and several cypher telegrams from the assistant conductor, a useful chap, telling me the whole story of the plot, which he's nosed out; and I'm faced with humiliating failure unless I can save the situation by a grand coup at the eleventh hour. Now, you can guess why on the spur of the moment I bought up your rights to dig in the Sudan, can't you?"

"I confess I can't," I said.

"Why, I want you to take Colonel Corkran's place on the Candace as conductor. And I want you and your friend Fenton to go up Nile in charge of the splendid steam dahabeah I've bought to supplement the Mediterranean trip. There you have my motives in a nutshell!"

I burst out laughing. "A cracked nutshell," I remarked. Sir Marcus' rosy face turned royal purple. "What—you won't undertake it?"

"I couldn't," I assured him. "For one thing, I'd be a fish out of water. My dear sir, perhaps you don't know that my nickname since the age of five has been 'Duffer?' I'm proud of it. I take pains to live up to it——"

"I bet you do. I bet it opens doors and lays down velvet carpets for you. Why, a duffer with a title is exactly what I want! Duffers are the rage nowadays. You and your friend will make a brilliant pair, a fine contrast, especially with your friend's present get up. If you'd both been born for me you couldn't suit me better."

I laughed again. "You said you ought to have launched out on belted earls. We're humble——"

"There's no earls handy, and if there were any, they wouldn't be what you two are in looks and talents, to say nothing of your brother being a marquis. I'm offering you both the softest kind of job. All you have to do is to be agreeable young gentlemen, with a knowledge of society, and history; that means, you can be yourselves. You get a fine trip on high salaries if you don't scorn to accept my money; and as a reward for a good holiday you receive the right to explore your golden mountain. I suppose you must think it is a golden mountain, or you wouldn't be such nuts on it. You'd better consult your friend before you refuse my offer, anyhow."

"Haven't you heard that Fenton's left Cairo?" I took the precaution to ask. "That doesn't look as if he were entertaining the idea of going up the Nile on your steam dahabeah." "I have heard that he's left. But I happen to know—it isn't so. I saw him standing in front of Shepheard's Hotel this morning, waiting for you. I got on to what was in that green turban before the pretty girl in white—Miss Gilder, I've found out since—called him on to the terrace. Don't look as if you wanted to eat me, Lord Ernest. I've won my way up from the bottom rung of the ladder by keeping my eyes open, and by putting two and two together. I specialize on that. I don't suppose there's another man in Cairo except me and you, would have recognized Fenton, so you needn't worry. I twigged that he'd dressed up for serious business, not for fun, because I read about some smart coups he'd brought off by going among the natives like one of themselves. I'm not a sneak, and I shan't revenge myself by giving him away, even if you two do show me the frozen face. Captain Fenton encouraged me to think he might consider my proposition if you would, though he refused to influence your decision one way or the other. Naturally I conclude that he could be on my Nile boat if he wanted to, even if not in his own capacity as an officer. I'll take him in his green turban. He makes the best looking Egyptian I ever saw, and he'd go down with the ladies like hot cakes."

"Sir Marcus," I smiled, "you're one of the most amusing as well as the sharpest men, if you'll allow me to say so, that I ever met. Whatever happens I shall not forget this conversation."

"I don't want you to forget it," he grinned, beginning to hope. "Think it over. We're the chance of a lifetime for each other. And remember the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid." I rose, and he got up heavily. "When will you let me know?" he asked.

I was tempted to reply that he must have taken Fenton's seeming encouragement too seriously, that, mountain or no mountain, it was practically impossible for us to accept his amazing proposition. But suddenly I seemed to hear "Antoun Effendi" telling Miss Gilder that she must wait for his decision until evening. He had said afterward, also, that it depended on me. It was evident that he had a scheme of his own, worked by wheels within wheels. He had consoled me after the first blow by saying that all was not lost. And I had four months' leave from duty. A lot could be done in four months. "I will let you know before night," I said to Sir Marcus Lark.



CHAPTER VII

THE REVELATIONS OF A RETIRED COLONEL

Fenton's orders were, when the Cairo business should be finished, to go slowly up the Nile in native dress, and get at the truth of certain rumours which had disturbed officialdom at Cairo. At Denderah, Luxor, and two or three other places there had been "incidents," small but troublesome. English sightseers had complained of being hustled, and even insulted by the inhabitants of several river towns, and it was important to find out whether the Egyptians or the foreigners had been more to blame; whether there were real symptoms of sedition, as reported, or whether the young men of the suspected places had merely resented with roughness some discourtesy of tactless tourists. Fenton had seized upon the idea that, as Egyptian lecturer and conductor—a sort of super-dragoman—on board Lark's Nile boat, he might find a plausible pretext for his secret errand. "Why do you travel?" would be the question he must expect from suspicious leaders of any plot that might be hatching, if he journeyed from one Nile village to another without the excuse of business. As a glorified conductor of a pleasure-trip for a party of tourists his excuse would be readymade for him; but he had been far from sure that I would fall in with Sir Marcus Lark's plan, despite the bribe. He had wanted me to hear the whole story, the whole project, from Sir Marcus' own lips; and in his uncertainty of the result, he had thought of Miss Gilder as an attractive "victim." There she was, as he had said, presented to him by Providence. If I should pour scorn upon the Lark suggestion, he might find it worth while to guide the Gilded Girl and her friends on their Nile pilgrimage. He left the question for me, and I decided to kill as many birds as possible with one stone. The name of the yacht was in itself an incentive: Candace—Queen of Meroee—our Meroee. She seemed to call, and to promise good luck. We would accept Lark's terms, and enter his service in return for a written agreement to hand over his ill-got digging rights to us, whether or no we turned out to be satisfactory as guides. We could but do our best, and at all events we should earn the reward which we had looked upon as ours already. Anthony would play his double part, serving the interests of government and those of Sir Marcus Lark. As for Monny Gilder, why shouldn't she and her party become Lark's passengers? The only reason against this "inspiration" (as Sir Marcus would have called it), lay in the fact that Monny wished to engage a private dahabeah. When she wished for a thing, it appeared that only a miracle or a cataclysm could induce her to give it up for something else suggested by an outsider. But when I mentioned this peculiarity to Fenton, he was fired to punish the girl by forcing her compliance with our will. She had treated him like a servant. She looked upon a man supposedly of Egyptian blood, even though of princely birth, somewhat as she looked upon an American "nigger." True, Anthony Fenton had in his veins but very few such drops. On his father's side he was all English, and his mother had been more than two thirds Greek and Italian. Nevertheless this spoilt girl had struck a blow at the pride which went ever walking about the world with a chip lightly poised on its shoulder. Anthony had no desire to poach on my preserves. At the same time he yearned to show Miss Gilder that he could be her master, not her servant.

Once Anthony and I had made up our minds, everything else arranged itself with lightning speed. Sir Marcus, rejoicing in his ill-got conquest of us, broke to me the news that I must go by the first ship to the Piraeus, to meet the Candace, and head off the recalcitrant band of passengers. He flattered me by thinking that, if I took the place of Colonel Corkran as conductor, they would abandon their plot to desert the yacht at Alexandria. It was, according to Lark's secret information, only the "smart and would-be smart set" who had combined to spring this mine upon the management. The rest grumbled no more than it was normal for all pleasure-pilgrims to grumble; and as, roughly speaking, the contented travellers were all going on to Palestine after a week's wild sightseeing in Cairo, the colonel might be allowed to continue his voyage without the interruption of a "row."

"I should have had enough common sense at the start," growled Sir Marcus with crude candour, "to engage a lord for the Smart Set, and a parson for the Ernest Inquirers. There's a world of difference catering for a Set, and a Flock. The art is, to know it, and how to do it. Now I've secured you, I'm all right with the S. S. and thanks be, I've a young reformed missionary on board to shepherd the Flock. Now the Reverend Watts will come in handy, herding his sheep through Palestine, while the colonel swaggers and fancies he's bossing the show. It's the Egypt lot I worry about: girls out for dukes, and dukes out for dollars. Not that there's a darned duke on board, but there are some who think they out-duke the dukes, and it's our business to humour 'em. You just duff all you want to, Lord Ernest, they'll swallow anything you do, like honey. Don't bother about a line of conduct: only be genial. Murmur soft nothings to the women; flirt but don't have favourites. Don't be too political with the men: work in plenty of anecdotes about your swell relations."

I replied that I could confidently promise geniality, except if seasick: but Sir Marcus implored me at all costs not to be seasick. That was the one thing I must not be. My whole time between the Piraeus and Alexandria, on board the Candace, must be spent ingratiating myself with the sulky passengers, and obliterating from their memories the crimes of Colonel Corkran. In Sir Marcus' opinion my future charges had taken passage on the Candace, and would go up the Nile, not to see sights, but to be seen doing the right things. According to him not two out of twenty cared tuppence for Egypt, but wished to talk about it in sparkling style at home. My friend Captain Fenton and I must make it sparkle. Sir Marcus had resigned himself to the fact that one of his trump cards—Anthony—could not be produced until the arrival in Cairo of the troupe, and that even then, the name of Fenton must not be used as an attraction. Lark felt confident that I was a good enough card to make his hand worth playing, and in spite of the half contemptuous amusement with which I regarded the whole scheme, I couldn't help being "on my mettle." I found myself wanting to succeed, wanting to please the big, common man whom a few hours ago I had been cursing.

I had to start for Greece the night after our decision. Meanwhile, I was anxious to explain the unexplainable to Brigit and Monny, and secure the party for Sir Marcus Lark's alleged dahabeah, which turned out to be one of Cook's old boats bought and newly decorated. Both my tasks would be difficult. I had to hide the secret reason for selling myself to the financier, and at the same time keep the respect of the ladies. As for inducing Miss Gilder to give up her dream of a private dahabeah, I foresaw that it would be like persuading the youngest lioness in the Cairo Zoo to surrender her cherished wooden ball. But I began by giving Monny a present; a fine old turban-box of rare, red tortoise shell inlaid with mother of pearl, which I found at an antiquary's. In the silklined box reposed a green turban; and that green turban told its own story. Miss Gilder flushed with pleasure at sight of it. "I've won my bet!" she exclaimed.

"Yes," said I. "To my astonishment! The man consents. He's a great prize, knows Cairo and upper Egypt like a book. But you'll have to surrender him when you go on the Nile."

In her haste to know why, Monny forgot to ask how I had obtained the green turban; and for this I was glad, because it was only the second best headgear of my smart friend the Hadji. In explaining that the distinguished Egyptian had been engaged by Sir Marcus Lark, I slipped in a word about my own part in the trip, describing it as an ideal rest-cure for a budding diplomat on sick leave. I praised the boat and spoke of the fun on board. I regretted Miss Gilder's preference for a private dahabeah, so obvious, so millionairy! Still, I added, every one to his taste! And anyhow, no doubt all the best cabins on the Enchantress Isis were taken.

That was the entering wedge—the mention of an obstacle to overcome. Miss Gilder looked thoughtful, though she kept silence: and next day, when making my adieux before starting for Alexandria, she flung out a careless question. When would the Enchantress Isis leave Cairo? How many passengers would she carry? Would there be a rush at the Temples, or would there be plenty of time for proper sightseeing? And was I sure that all the nicest cabins were engaged? No, I was not sure. I could inquire. I tried not to look triumphant, but I must have darted out a ray, because Monny withdrew into her shell. She had inquired out of curiosity, she explained. I had told such stories about the Enchantress Isis that she would like to see her. Perhaps Antoun Effendi could get permission for a visit to the boat.

In this state I had to leave affairs, and start for the Piraeus, where I must await the return of the tourists from Athens. I had two days at sea in which to work up an agony of apprehension, and I could have thanked heaven when, arriving on board the big white yacht, I found that I was ahead of the passengers. I was expected, however, and a deck cabin was ready for my occupation. I hoped that I had not turned out my rival from the room, but dared not question the steward. He seemed to know all about me, nevertheless, and said that my name had been "posted up" as conductor of the Nile party. "If I may take the liberty of mentioning it, my lord," he added, "it has made a very good impression." We were to steam for Alexandria the moment the passengers arrived in the special train—having had three days of sightseeing in Athens—and I had just got my possessions stowed away when a wave of chattering voices broke over the ship. My heart gave a jump, as a soldier's must when called to fight on an empty stomach at dawn on a winter's morning. What ought I to do? How was I to make the acquaintance of my future charges? Must it be en masse, or could it be done singly? I had neglected to ask Sir Marcus what would be expected of me, and I was in a worse funk than a new boy on his first day at school. Soon it would be dinner time. I wished that I were ill, but I remembered that the one thing I must not do was to be seasick. Already the ship was beginning to move out of the Greek harbour, or I should have been tempted to get a telegram calling me home. Even the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid seemed not too great a sacrifice to make—but it was too late to make it—and some one was knocking at my door.

I opened it with such courage as I had; and the instant I set eyes on the man I knew that he was Colonel Corkran. He was born to be a retired colonel. What came before the retiring could have been but a prelude. A stout figure of middle height; red face, veined on cheeks and nose; pale blue eyes which looked as if they had faded in the wash; purple moustache and eyebrows; close-cropped gray hair; a double chin clamouring for extra collar space; and a bridge-player's expression. This was the rival whose place I had virtually, though not officially, usurped.

I was prepared to hear him hiss "Viper!" between his teeth, as characters in melodramatic serials do to perfection, their front teeth having doubtless been designed for such purposes. But his look seemed to denote pity rather than hatred. So might a prison-warder regard a condemned man, in coming to announce the hour of execution.

"Lord Ernest Borrow?" said he, in a slightly hoarse voice. "I'm Colonel Corkran. Delighted to meet you. I've met your brother, Lord Killeena. Daresay he wouldn't remember me. I don't think I can begin better than by thanking you for coming to take over my job."

"Oh, I haven't done that!" I hastened to protest, as he sat fatly down in a chair I pushed forward. "As I understand, I'm to take a few people off your hands, and the hands of your assistant, Mr. Kruger, so that you can go to Palestine instead of leaving that important excursion entirely to the chaplain, Mr. Watts."

Colonel Corkran laughed. "Thank you for trying to save my feelings," said he. "But I assure you they're not hurt. I'm sincerely delighted to see you—for my own sake. For yours—well, that's another pair of shoes! My dear fellow, I wonder if you've the smallest idea what you're in for?"

"In for?" I echoed.

"Yes. I'm saying this as a friend. Don't think I'm jealous. Lord, no! I look on you as a deliverer. And don't think I want to frighten you. It isn't that. But I feel it's my duty to prepare you. I might have got on better if there'd been some one to do the same by me. There wasn't. Kruger, my so-called assistant, is a spy. At best, he's a mere accountant, not supposed to look after the passengers socially. I gather that he was some secretary of Lark's. Beware of him. He writes to Lark from every port. As for the passengers, the saintly lot are bad enough. Yet it's only the food and the cabins and the attendance they grumble about. I'm shunted off the worldly lot onto them in future. But at their worst, they'll be a rest-cure! and Lark has the decency not to reduce my screw. It's the worldly lot that's going to make you curse the day you were born."

He wanted me to speak, or groan; but I maintained a stricken silence, to which I gave some illusion of dignity. After a disappointed pause he went on: "You'd better know something about these people. Beasts, every one of 'em, young or old, some beastly common beasts, but all beastly rich, except those that are beastly poor, and on the make—to marry their daughters, or cadge for smart friends. Lark was bidding for swells, and got snobs. Thinks his silly title will carry weight in society as it does in the city. 'Lark Pie,' we're called, I hear. I call us a 'Pretty Kettle of Fish!' The girls are the worst of the caboodle, though some of 'em aren't bad looking. You won't believe the trouble I've had with the creatures till you begin to get the same yourself."

"What kind of trouble?" I inquired gingerly.

"Every kind a woman can make. Apart from food troubles, they think they're not being entertained enough on board; think I ought to get up more dances; tango teas I suppose! Don't like the way I organize games; are mad because they can't have music at meals—which they can't because the band's all stewards; blame me because the men don't make love to them, or because they do. And at the hotels where we go on shore, it's Hades. Naturally the people staying in the hotels resent us. They look on us as a menagerie—a rabble. So we are. At least, they are. I don't count myself in with them. What can I do? I'm not omnipotent. Perhaps you are. Anyhow, they're prepared to believe it, for you're a new broom—a broom with a fine handle. I'm only a poor colonel with a few medals given by my country for services that were appreciated. You're brother to a marquis."

"You paint a lurid picture" I said, when he stopped for breath.

"I couldn't paint it lurider than it is. But you'll have to find out for yourself. It won't be so bad while you're a novelty. Don't say I haven't warned you. And oh, by the way, I've announced that you're to be presented to the passengers at dinner to-night, on coming in, before the soup is served."

"As a sort of hors d'oeuvre, I suppose," I murmured weakly.

Colonel Corkran stared, without a smile. "As the titled conductor of the Egypt tour," he explained to my dull intelligence, with a slight sneer. "So will you please be in the dining saloon just before the bugle blows the beasts in? I have to introduce you, in a short speech. It's all I can do, except say, God help you! But I don't see how He can. I suppose your friend Sir Marcus told you that you would be expected to deliver a lecture on Egypt, to-night at the dinner table? After you've finished your dinner, of course. I hope the cracking and crunching of nuts doesn't disturb you much? I confess I've found it getting on my nerves."

I was aghast. My mind jumped to the wild thought of eating soap, in order to froth at the mouth and simulate a fit. It seemed my only way of escape, and after that, the Deluge. But my rival was so revelling in the mental havoc he had wrought that I rallied, replying that, as Sir Marcus had not broken the news to me, I didn't see how it would be possible to deliver a lecture.

"Aren't you up on Egypt?" the colonel asked, pityingly. "Neither am I, though I've sweated over Baedeker with my head in wet towels, when I wanted to be at bridge. But I thought that was the excuse for engaging you? That, and your title, of course, which is going to make you popular. As fast as I fag up the names of those beastly Egyptian gods or kings and queens, they run out of my brains like water out of a sieve. Or if I do contrive to remember any, by chance, together with their dates, which is almost more than can be expected of the human intellect, why, I find that I pronounce 'em wrong; or they're spelled another way in the next book. But I suppose as you know Egypt, its d—d history comes natural as breathing."

How I wished it did! And how different was this new programme from the one outlined by Sir Marcus. Just to be genial, and flirt with the girls. "My recollections of Egypt are from some time ago," I admitted. "To give a lecture at half an hour's notice.——"

"In justice to yourself I'm afraid you'll have to," the colonel persisted. "It's been announced that you will give the lecture, and the Egypt lot are looking forward to it as the animals in a zoo look forward to their food. If they're defrauded, they'll think you a slacker, and that you're presuming on your title."

"I shouldn't like that!" my anguish racked out of me.

"I fancied you wouldn't. But what's to be done? Am I to announce, when I introduce you, that your knowledge of Egypt isn't equal to the strain?"

I took an instant for reflection. I knew that he was hoping I might throw myself on his mercy, or else that I would speak and fail; but I determined to do neither. "On second thoughts, I may be able to give some kind of a pow-wow," I replied.

Colonel Corkran's face fell. "That's all right, then!" he exclaimed, getting to his feet. "Well, I must be off. Will you have a cocktail?"

"No, thanks," said I. "I think I can get on without it."

He was at the door. "Kind of hash of gods and goddesses with a peppering of kings and queens, and mixed sauce of history and legend, is what's needed," were his farewell words. Then he shut the door; and I tore my watch from the pocket of my waistcoat. I had twenty-eight minutes in which to prepare the said hash with its seasoning and sauce; and the bugle was inviting my judges to dress for the inquisition.



CHAPTER VIII

FOXY DUFFING

"I'll show you your place," Corkran volunteered, lying in wait for me inside the saloon door, with a cocktail in his hand. "Sorry you wouldn't have one. You'll need it. But no time to change your mind. I've put you at the head of the table that would be the captain's, if he ate with us, which he doesn't—happy man! Place of honour. 'Twas mine, 'tis yours. But I can't go on with the quotation unless I turn it into 'You're slave to thousands.' Sixty odd can be as formidable as thousands."

"Are there sixty odd?" I asked.

"Yes, very 'odd.' The Egypt lot will be about twenty-five. But the whole gang's yours for the present. I give them to you, with the seat of honour."

"Please don't put me in your place," I protested. "I prefer———"

"My poor boy, it isn't a question of what you prefer, as you'll learn if you stick this out. Of course if you funk it—but that's a joke! This table's the only one where you can be heard. Do you see?"

I did see; and accepted the situation, because the dinner bugle began to sound, and I could not be scampering round the saloon like a frightened rabbit as the Set and the Flock began dropping in to dinner. As it happened, they did not drop—they poured into the room in a steady stream, which phenomenon, whispered Corkran, was caused by curiosity for a first sight of me. My heart counted each new arrival, with a bump.

If Corkran had not represented "Lark's Party" as being a menagerie for which I had inadvertently engaged as tamer, I should have thought they looked a harmless crowd. But then, of course, I was not obliged to tame anybody on the Laconia, which makes a difference in one's point of view. Miss Gilder needed taming, no doubt, but I hadn't tackled the task. My thoughts flew to Cairo, as I stood struggling to look pleasant; and I wished myself back where Anthony Fenton was now in the taming business. I envied him, for there was only one Monny, whereas in this terrible, bright dining saloon, the air was pink and white with girls, dozens of girls, with eyes fixed on me, glittering eyes, which appeared like the headlights of motor cars. I didn't suppose there could be so many eyes in the world as these people of all ages and every possible sex seemed to own. Sixty odd they were, according to Corkran, but they looked like six hundred; a human miracle of loaves and fishes.

Yes, the creatures might have appeared harmless enough had there been no retired colonel. But there was a retired colonel, and so deftly had he undermined my courage that almost any shock might cause it to explode in a blue flame of funk. His speech of introduction was now to come, and if I survived that, I might hope to live through my own fireworks.

"They've put on their best bibs and tuckers," Corkran mumbled in a stage whisper, as the eight dwellers at our table began to sort themselves for places. Then, in portentous silence he paused till everybody everywhere was seated. Waiting still, until satisfied that eyes and ears were focussed upon us, he rapped on the table with the handle of a knife.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he roared, "I have the pleasure of introducing to you Sir Marcus Lark's Great Surprise, entitled Lord Ernest Borrow, younger brother of the Marquis of Killeena, a peer, as Sir Marcus has reminded us, of the oldest lineage in Ireland. Let me reassure you all by saying that Lord Ernest's last name is as unsuited to his nature as the first is true to it. If you'll pardon the pun it is Sir Marcus who 'Borrows' for your benefit, and he hasn't Borrowed Trouble, but a Blessing—in disguise. I am now left free, as suits my superior age and experience, to devote my attention to the serious minded ones among you, who are to proceed with the Reverend Mr. Watts and myself to Palestine. This young and gallant neophyte will 'lord' it over the fleshpots of Egypt and those about to seek them. I hope you'll help him as loyally as you have helped me: and later we'll drink to his health and success, in any beverage we happen to have signed for!"

To have killed Corkran might have been butchery; no jury could have brought in a verdict of murder or even manslaughter, had I stabbed him with the knife he used to pound upon the table. I smiled the smile of a skull in a doctor's waiting-room, and in a sickly voice bleated my pleasure in meeting these new acquaintances. I hoped we might be—er —friends as well as shipmates. Then like a mass of jelly out of its mould I plopped onto my chair. The colonel had sneaked off to his own table and I was left to recover myself as best I might among eight of his enemies. They proved (in whispers) to be the most active of these, and tacitly offered me allegiance which I accepted in the same manner. There was a Sir John Biddell, who informed me in the first five minutes that he had been Lord Mayor of London. He promised to show me a speech he had made in the presence of King Edward which, in the form of a newspaper cutting, he never travelled without. This, however, was his first trip farther than Paris, and he had brought with him, not only the speech, but his wife and twin daughters. The distinguished family occupied one side of my table: the other was given up to a General Harlow, his wife (both with high profiles and opinions of themselves), a youngish newspaper proprietor from Manchester, evidently rich and a "catch," and a maiden lady doubtless of importance equal to her proportions, as she was allowed to bring to the table a melancholy marmoset. These people did their best to raise my spirits. The girls, who copied royalties in their hair-dressing, looked alike, dressed alike, talked and laughed alike, and entertained me with chat about high society in London. They had red cheeks, black eyes, white teeth, and an almost indecent familiarity with the private lives of the aristocracy. The Misses Biddell and fat Miss Hassett-Bean (the lady of the marmoset) hinted that the cream of the yacht's social life had risen to our table, and told me, not only what to lecture about, but how to treat the rival cliques. My brain felt more and more like a blotting-pad. I answered at random and longed for the meal to end —until I remembered my lecture. Then I wished that dinner might go on indefinitely like the tea party of the Mad Hatter. All too soon the glory of a French menu flickered down to a dying spark of nuts and raisins, and hardly had I cracked my first almond (was it an ill omen that there should be a worm in it?) when a steward handed me a twisted note from the executioner. "The rule for conductor's dinner speech is, rise with the raisins! Hope you won't find your lecture too hard a nut to crack. Yours sympathetically, Corkran. Bang on the table to make them stop gabbling. Or shall I do it for you? If you haven't by the time I count ten, I will."

He did. I trust it wasn't my courage that failed. But having a raisin in my mouth I could not on the instant respond to the lash. And as Corkran would have said, it takes more than one swallow to make a speech. Ruthlessly he rapped, seizing what I wished might be his dying chance to indulge a mania for puns and thumping wood.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he bawled from his comparatively obscure corner. "Lord Ernest Borrow will render your last moments the most enjoyable of the meal, by washing down your nuts and raisins with the wine of his eloquence. Take your desserts now. We conscientious conductors hope for ours in heaven."

How ardently I desired that these might indeed be the "last moments" not only of my audience but of Colonel Corkran. If the next second had brought a tidal wave or a collision I should have blessed Providence. But I got to my feet—and nothing happened. I seemed to be in a dream, of having shot up to a gigantic height, and having put on the wrong clothes, or none. My hands weighed two pounds each, and ought to have been at the butcher's. My mouth was the size of a negro minstrel's, and so full of large bones which once had been teeth that I could not utter a syllable. I clacked my jaws, and emitted a hacking cough which fortunately so much resembled that of a professional lecturer that I kept my senses. Not only did I keep them, but they seemed suddenly to become my servants. The thought of a certain fable jumped into my head, and I began thereupon to speak; although I had forgotten everything I had ever read of Egyptian history.

"It happens," said I, in a phonographic voice, "that I was born in Egypt. I played with clay gods and goddesses instead of tin soldiers. I preferred stories of Egypt's past and present to tales of adventure. I confess to you what I fear I didn't confess to Sir Marcus Lark. The trouble is, I'm stuffed too full of facts about Egypt. I want you to help me get them out, and not duplicate yours. No doubt all of you, in travelling to the East, have packed your brains with knowledge as well as your boxes with guide books. Why should I bore you by telling you things that you were born knowing? A plan has occurred to me by which your knowledge can be turned into account. As I said, I beg your help. And permission to drink a cup of coffee would be first aid."

People laughed, whether at me, or with me, I was not sure; yet I felt that I had tickled their curiosity. Coffee was going round. Corkran was unctuously sipping his, and had not expected me to receive mine till after the battle. But I got it in spite of him, and mapped out a programme as I drank. Then I ceased to tremble before the confused assemblage or bird-headed gods, cat-faced goddesses, and sacred vultures that danced or flapped in my brain.

I no longer felt inclined to commit suicide because I could remember nothing about Egypt except that the Delta was shaped like a lily, with the Fayum for a bud, and the Nile for its stem: that Alexander the Macedonian defeated Darius the Persian B. C. three hundred and something; that ancient Egyptians loved beer, but were forbidden to eat beans.

"My proposal is," I went on, "that before I unload any of my knowledge upon you, I gleam some idea of what you know already. Thus I can spare you repetitions. Any one who has anything particularly interesting to say about Egypt, let him—or her—hold up a hand."

Now was the crucial moment. If no hand went up, I was lost. But hardly were the words out of my mouth when there was a waving as if in a wind-swept wheatfield Place aux dames! I called upon Miss Hassett-Bean to begin. She rustled silkily up, bowing to me, then directing an acetylene glare upon Colonel Corkran's end of the room. She was, I foresaw, about to kill two birds with one stone, to say nothing of the marmoset, who fell off her arm into General Harlow's coffee and created a brief diversion. As soon, however, as the monkey was rescued and before General Harlow's shirt front was dried, the lady began to speak.

"We all thank Lord Ernest," she said, looking from the colonel to the Reverend Wyman Watts, and back again, "for sparing us one of those commonplace inflictions from which we've nightly suffered on board this yacht. If we didn't know already, such school-book facts as Christianity being introduced to Egypt by St. Mark in Nero's time, and Moses and Plato both studying philosophy at Heliopolis, and things like that, we wouldn't be spending our money with Sir Marcus A. Lark to see Egypt. Never before have we been encouraged to air our views. Those of us with political opinions have been snubbed; and we who are interested in Woman Suffrage have been assured that we'll find nothing to please us in the land of Veiled Women. At last I am given a chance to state without being interrupted that Egypt was once the most enlightened country in her treatment of women. Long before the time of the Greeks, and even before the Shepherd Kings Mr. Watts has told us so much about, using his Old Testament as if it were a Baedeker, the women of Ancient Egypt had rights according to their class. Queens and princesses were considered equal with their husbands. Women were great musicians, playing on many instruments, especially the sistrum, sacred to the goddess Hathor. And weren't all the best gods goddesses, when you come to think of it? Women used to drive their own chariots, as we do our motors, and hold salons, like the French ladies. There was Rhodopis, for instance, who married the brother of Sappho. I wonder if Colonel Corkran could have told you that the story of Cinderella comes from an anecdote of Rhodopis? I hardly think that he's been able to spare enough time from bridge to study Strabo, who was the Baedeker of Egypt for tourists six hundred years before Christ. An eagle saw Rhodopis bathing, and stealing one of her sandals flew with it to Memphis, where he dropped it into the king's lap. It was so small and dainty that King Hophra scoured Egypt for the owner, and when he found her at last, according to Strabo, made her his queen."

"If Strabo was right, she lived long before Sappho's day!" interpolated the colonel's voice.

"Of course, Strabo was right. There were two of Rhodopis. Everybody knows that. The Third Pyramid was built for the tomb of the first one, not for King Mycineris, I believe. Why shouldn't a woman have a Pyramid to herself? The Sphinx is a woman, as I will insist to my dying day, if it were my last word! I hope Lord Ernest won't ram down our throats any nonsense about that noble and graceful tribute to the Mystery of Womanhood being a stupid King Harmachis, or Horemkhu. I wouldn't believe it if I found a hundred nasty stone beards lying buried in the sand under her chin, instead of one, which could easily have been put there to deceive people. Probably King Harmachis had the Sphinx altered to look like him. No wonder she shuddered at such profanation, and shed her false beard. There you have my theory. And as for Egypt being now the land of Veiled Women, where Suffragettes find no sympathy, I've heard that the prophet's order for veiling has been purposely misconstrued by tyrannical men, with their usual jealousy. Even Mohammed himself was jealous."

With this Miss Hassett-Bean sat down, amid fitful applause; and at my earnest request, Miss Enid Biddell, the prettier twin, stood bravely up. She wished, before the subject was changed, to tell some little things she had read about the girls of Ancient Egypt, how like they were to girls of to-day, in all their ways, especially in—in things concerning love. It was they who first questioned the petals of flowers for their lovers' loyalty. How much they thought about their clothes, too, getting their best things from foreign countries, as women did now, from Paris! It was so funny to read how the girls of Old Egypt had consulted palmists and fortune tellers and astrologers just as girls did in Bond Street now; and that what 'Billikens' and 'Swasticas' and birth-stones were to us, images of gods were to the girls of Egypt who lived before the days of Moses! They had scarab rings with magic inscriptions, and sacred apes for the symbol of Intelligence, and lucky eyes of Horus, wounded by the wicked god Set, and cured by the love of Isis. On their bracelets and necklaces they hung charms, and their dressing-tables were covered with images of favourite gods and goddesses. Hathor, the goddess of Love and Joy, was supposed to give her choicest gifts to girls who wore her special colour (that green-blue in the Temple of Edfu which Robert Hichens calls "the colour of love") and to those who had her pet stones, emeralds, or turquoises. Nowadays, in Egypt, the jewels of the women Were only lent to them by their men, and could be taken away as a punishment, or be pawned or sold in case of need; but in old days Egyptian women had all their most beautiful possessions buried with them.

When her sister had finished I urged the other twin to speak, and timidly Miss Elaine repeated to us what a friend of hers, a clergyman (here a blush) had told her. That the Red Sea was not red but a brighter blue than any sea in the world, and called red only because it washed the Red Lands. Her friend had written down for her in verse such a sweet legend about the Nile rising every spring from a single tear shed by Isis, a much more powerful goddess than Hathor, because she was the goddess of goodness as well as love. And the Nile used to be named Sihor by the Egyptians; and the year separated into three seasons, Flood time, Seed time, and Harvest. Miss Biddell's friend was writing a book about Egypt and was going to divide it in three parts like that. It was to be dedicated to her.

Bless the dear creatures, how they kept the ball rolling to please themselves, and—indirectly—to sort out my stock of ideas!

Harry Snell, the newspaper man, was not hard to persuade to his feet. He was studying the resemblance between Arabic and English words. He had found out, among other things, that Tallyho was "Tallyhoon," brought home by the Crusaders. He even had a theory that some of our words came from the early Egyptian. "Amen," for instance, he believed to be derived from "Amon," the name of the great god, father of all the other gods of Egypt, which was cried aloud, he understood, in the temples, during religious services. The parson jumped eagerly up to dispute this theory, and happily forgetful of me, seized the opportunity to spring upon us a few facts from his own store. When, however, Mr. Watts' discourse got him as far as Joseph's Well in the Citadel, General Harlow could bear no more, but sprang up to inform us that the Joseph of the Well in the Citadel was quite another Joseph, some Yusef of the Arab conquerors. The general knew all about that, because his son was stationed in the Citadel. And he proceeded to meander on historically, over a period between the first Arab conqueror Amru, to Haroun-al-Raschid, assuring us that old Cairo was the city of the Arabian Nights. He would, to my joy, have gone on indefinitely from Saladin to Napoleon if Sir John Biddell, as the only baronet on board, had not cut the only general short. He is a square man whose portrait could be properly done only by a Cubist. "Too much history, my friend!" he shouted, getting up with the manner of one accustomed to making dinner-table speeches. "What most of us are coming to Egypt for is mummies. Egyptian history is too troublesome, anyhow, for a normal man to grasp. Give me mummies! There's something in them. Why, even if you get a king or queen fixed in your head, somebody who's paid to make you know things you don't know" (an eye-shot for Corkran) "comes along and swears they didn't exist. Now, there's Mena. I'd pinned him like a stuck butterfly. I could remember that he was the first known king, and founded Memphis and lived six thousand years before Christ, all because we're going to stay at Mena House, which is named after him. I don't know why I remembered him that way, but I did. Just as I could recall the queen with a name like a sneeze by thinking of her as Queen Hat-and-Shoes. Now Colonel Corkran informs us that we must pronounce her, in a different way. And what's the consequence to me? I've ceased to try and keep track of her. King Mena, too, is lost to me forever, through the over-conscientiousness of our late conductor, who says there never was a Mena, only several kings they've mixed into one. I seem to be the one who's most mixed up! To whet my appetite for Egypt now, I have to have something tasty. Where's the good of stuffing my mind with a string of names which I couldn't mention to any one at home, because I can't pronounce them? The word Dynasty (he pronounced it Die-nasty) makes me sick! Luckily I feel that nobody else will know any more than I do. I'm coming to Egypt for a rest-cure, because I don't have to learn its history. But some lecturers won't let me have a minute's peace. A king named Sneferu couldn't expect to appeal to a man like me, even if he did build the oldest Pyramid, and even if you could show me his mummy, which you can't. But I draw the line at kings without mummies. I don't want to know them. Now, my wife is against mummies on show. She's heard that the malignance of mummies, especially in museums, is incredible. And she thinks it a judgment that some of the most distinguished ones are going bad. She says it's spite. I say its management. But I'm not ready to sit down yet! My wife means to start a society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Mummies, with the object of sending them back to their tombs where they can rest in that state of death it pleased their gods to call them to. Their object was eternal privacy, and they spent more on their tombs than their houses, because they expected to be dead a long tune, and wanted all the comforts of home. But I judge mummies by myself. It wouldn't have taken me these thousands of years to realize how narrow and un-christian my notions had been. I should see that I owed some duty to the world; and as so much posterity had rolled by since my day, I'd feel that lying in a museum at some large place like Cairo, was, after all, the only way to keep my name before the public. Now, that brings me to my tip for Lord Ernest. He asks what there is we don't know, and want to know. I'll answer for us all, being used to feel the pulse of crowds. We want to know what the deuce Ancient Egyptians really believed about death and religion. Had they any sense, or were they just plain fools?"

On the tide of applause which congratulated the boat's only baronet, I rose. I felt that I was on the crest of the wave; for the ancient religion of Egypt appeals to me; and as I now had reason to hope that others were comfortably ignorant of my subject I could spread myself as much as I pleased.

"The Ancient Egyptians were far from being fools," I answered Sir John with the air of being in their confidence. "We who are tempted to think so, don't take the trouble to try the key of their Faith in its door. I might say that its door was the door of the Tomb. If we go through that door into the Kingdom of Osiris, Amenti, which the Greeks renamed Hades, the mysteries which appear tangled sort themselves graciously out. The story of Isis the Great Enchantress, and her search for the body of her husband Osiris, murdered by Set, his wicked and jealous brother, Spirit of Evil, is perhaps the most lovable legend of the world. But in hearing that Horus, the son of Isis, was really the same god as Osiris, modern ideas begin to get mixed, and confuse themselves over Isis, goddess of love and goodness, cow-headed Hathor, mistress of love and joy, cat-headed Pasht and lioness-headed Sekhet, goddesses of love and passion. There's hawk-headed Horus, the youth, too; and Horus the child, represented in statues with his thumb in his mouth. How is one to make sense of them all? But once you have the key, it is easy and even beautiful. The esoteric or secret religion known to the high priests and the instructed ones was different from the animal-worship and adoration of bird-headed deities, which gave the common people such interest in daily life. They would have been lost without their monsters; and the priests would have been lost without the temples necessary for the worship of such a menagerie. For Egypt was a priest-ridden country in old days. The explanation of the many gods and goddesses was this: each was a different phase of the one God, Ra, the Sun, by whom and through whom only the world could exist. Animals and birds were chosen to express the different phases, because animals were considered to be nearer nature, therefore nearer God than human beings; besides, to give a god the head of a man would not set him apart from humanity, as it would to make him appear with the body of a man and the head of some bird or beast. Horus, finished off with the head of a hawk (that sacred bird who could look the sun in the face), became to the uneducated eye a supernatural being, which he would not have been with the face of a smiling youth. The child Horus, or Harpocrates, was not respected as was Horus of the Hawk Head. He was merely petted and loved. Even Set, god of evil, wasn't all bad. He was the Spirit of Storm and Strife in Nature, and had to be propitiated by the ignorant. Typhon, or Typhoon, and he were one. Red was his colour, and red-haired people were his children. There were a hundred phases of the one god, each made incarnate, given his own mission, and worshipped in a different place. It's an ill wind (of Set) that blows nobody good, and animals had a gorgeous time in those days. Very few weren't sacred for some reason or other. It was death and destruction to kill a cat. And I don't think that cats have forgotten to this day the importance they had in Egypt. It's made them the most supercilious of animals.

"If Amon-Ra were angry he could become Menthu, the war god. If he were inclined to be gentle, he could shrink to the dimensions of Horus, child-god of the Rising Sun. If he were weary, he could rest as the old god Tum, of the Setting Sun. Probably gods and goddesses never enjoyed themselves so much as in Ancient Egypt; and though it does seem a drawback from our artistic point of view for Hathor to have the head or ears of a cow, for wise Thoth to have the long beak of an ibis, and so on, it was for them only an amusing kind of masquerade or 'tete' party, on the walls of the temples and tombs. At home, they could be what they liked. Think how interesting for the Egyptians to have all these queer gods, and what variety it gave to their lives. Perhaps the priests really meant well in keeping the secret of the One God for themselves and the kings, as the people weren't fitted to bear its solemnity. Fancy how amusing it was for the children to be told, on silver-bright nights, about Khonsu, god of the moon, always young, wearing the curled lock of youth on his brow—who staked five nights of his light playing draughts with Thoth, father of Magic. But he had a more serious phase, for when he was not a gambler he was an Expeller of Demons, a most popular accomplishment. Indeed, almost every god had several thriving businesses, conducted under different aliases. Khnum the Creator, dweller at the Cataracts, is my favourite, and is still busy, as he looks after the rise and fall of the river. Hekt, goddess of birth, was a pal of his, in spite of her appalling ugliness; and she used to kneel by his potter's wheel. While he fashioned the clay she would hold the Sign of Life, so that spirit might enter into the formed body when Khnum got it to the right state. For very important babies, royal ones or geniuses, she held a Sign of Life in each hand, which made them extraordinarily vital. When you arrive in Egypt, the first thing you'll be asked to buy will be the Sign, or Key of Life, in the shape of paper knives or brooches or what not, and it will be pointed out to you in tombs till you're tired and sick of it. You can buy Hekt, too, and funny old Bes, nurse-goddess of children, quite the golliwog of her day; and all the other gods and goddesses will be offered to you, to say nothing of the kings who were entitled to worship themselves as gods if they wanted to.

"It's easy, you see, to make fun of the ancient religion, and other nations did make fun of it. But to be serious, the priests were nearer right than it would seem; for they believed that God was All: that there was nothing in this or any Universe which was not part of God."

That note was my highest, and I stopped on it. Besides, I could think of nothing more to say. I ventured to sit down; and because the people were glad to hear the last of me, or because I had helped them finish their almonds and raisins, they applauded. Secretly I shook hands with myself, as the monkey must have done, when, with the catspaw, he had pulled the hot chestnuts out of the fire. I had carefully selected my chestnuts—and waited till they were cool. Also, I had disappointed Colonel Corkran.



CHAPTER IX

WHAT HAPPENED WHEN MY BACK WAS TURNED

Three letters for me, brought out by the pilot! One I had expected from Anthony; but my heart gave a bound as I recognized Brigit's handwriting, not seen for years; and instinct told me that the third was from Monny Gilder.

My one thought for the last two days, steaming back from the Piraeus to Alexandria, had been that I was drawing nearer to Cairo, and to those whose doings in my absence pulled at my curiosity and keyed my interest to breaking point. But if you think that I tore open those envelopes and greedily absorbed their contents the moment they were put into my hands, you have never been a conductor or even an observant passenger on a "pleasure yacht." When the letters arrived I was engaged in persuading breakfast-lingerers (they of the eggs-and-bacon habit, who ought never to leave their peaceful English homes) that it would give them more real pleasure to be first in the shore boats than last at the table. Then to get them into the boats; then to hypnotize Lady Biddell and Mrs. Harlow into the belief that they would not, could not, be seasick on the dancing waves which bobbed us up and down. No time to think of the letters; much less to feel the strangeness of fate which brought me back in such queer circumstances to the port I had entered on the Laconia eight days ago.

"As soon as we get on shore," I soothed my gnawing impatience, "I'll steal a minute somehow." But each moment was so conspicuously labelled that I could not be a thief of time—my time, which was my charges' time, bought and paid for by Sir Marcus Lark.

This was not the first occasion on which I'd heard the clanking of my chains, for, although I flattered myself that I was a popular success, popularity had penalties. On the night of the lecture I had used the passengers. Since then they had used me. Old ladies appealed to me on questions of etiquette, health or religion, and retailed my answers, not always correctly. Girls asked my advice about keeping up flirtations, and men wanted my help in getting out of them. I was expected to spout pages of Strabo or Pliny at an instant's notice; I must know why Plato went to Egypt, or how long he stayed; and be umpire between American and British bridge-players. I must be able to explain the true meaning and age of the Sphinx; invent new deck games; and show those who hadn't learned, how to dance the Tango. But with those three letters burning over my heart the duties of conductor became infuriating.

It was an awful day; for what was Pompey's Pillar to me while I remained ignorant of my friends' adventures? As I discoursed (more or less) learnedly about Diocletian, and Ptolemy's plot to drown Pompey in the Nile, something inside was asking, "Has Anthony fallen in love with Monny Gilder?" "What scrapes has that blessed girl got into?" "Has anything happened to worry Biddy?" Even that nameless but incomparable tomb on the hill of Kom esh-Shukafa could not distract my thoughts from the sealed envelopes; and three very modern handwritings came obstinately between my eyes and the matchless wall-paintings—paintings as fresh in their underground hiding-place as if finished yesterday instead of in days when it was dowdy to be pagan, fashionable to be Christian.