Chapter 41

The next day, when Margaret met Michael in the garden square, she was not in her V.A.D.'s uniform. She told him that she was now her own mistress, so much so that she had that morning almost completed the purchase of her trousseau, and that she was free to stay out as long as she liked.

"But I want you," she said, "to return with me now to Clarges Street, to the Iretons. They are in town, and Hadassah says we can be married from their rooms to-morrow."

"They are the kindest people in the world," he said. "I felt sure you were making friends with Hadassah while I was in the desert. I often comforted myself with the fact that she would understand the whole situation and help you."

"She's a brick!" Margaret said. "She has been your ardent champion all the time."

They signalled to a taxi-cab to drive them to Clarges Street. It was necessary to do everything as quickly as they could; there was no time for leisurely walking or discussion.

Suddenly Margaret said, "Look! Quick, Mike, there! I saw that black figure again. She was sitting in the gardens when I arrived. She never used to be here--I feel convinced that she is following us. I believe one of these taxies is waiting for her." Her eyes indicated two taxis, which were waiting outside the gardens.

"Why do you think so?" Michael said. "What can any human being want with us? Why should our movements be interesting to any one but our two selves?" He laughed. "By Jove, they are interesting to us, though, aren't they?"

His eyes spoke of the morrow.

Margaret laughed, too. Michael's high spirits allowed her no time for reflection. He was carrying her off her feet in his old magnetic way. If he had only beckoned, she would have followed him to the ends of the earth; wings would have carried her, the air would have borne her. The dull realities of her life in London had vanished as if they had never been. The black figure, which had stepped into a cab and followed them, was forgotten.

* * * * * *

For something like half an hour Michael sat talking with Hadassah and Margaret. He had so much to tell them that he succeeded in telling them nothing connectedly or completely. He began a hundred different things and left most of them halfway through, to plunge headlong into another and entirely different subject. The things he wanted to say were tumbling over each other in his mind. The bewildering idea that he was going to be married the next day sent all his thoughts reeling.

Margaret was not the sort of girl to worry over a lot of superficial clothes for a ten days' honeymoon. What she needed she had got together in a couple of hours at Harrod's and one or two good shops in the West End.

They had made up their minds to spend their brief period of married life together at Glastonbury. It was not too far from London and Michael had once stayed in the historical old inn in that quiet city of Arthurian romance. In Egypt he had inspired Margaret with a desire to see Glastonbury in the spring time, when the maythorns were in bloom and the luscious meadows gay with flowers.

Like all soldiers, Michael was very silent upon the subject of his own personal experiences at the Front, although at intervals he would suddenly burst out with some dramatic incident in which he had taken part.

When Hadassah congratulated him on being offered a commission, he laughingly said, "Oh, I must accept it. It isn't fair to shirk it, though I'd rather remain as I am."

Margaret's heart stood still. She knew what he meant; she was not ignorant of the appalling death-rate of officers.

"You mean," Hadassah said, "that----"

She got no further, for Michael interrupted her. "I mean that if I'm capable of leading the men I ought to do it, but I dread the responsibility. That's why I never tried for a commission--I. didn't feel confident. But as the deaths amongst the officers are much greater than among the men, I can't remain a Tommy, can I?" He pulled his notebook out of his pocket. "Read that," he said. "That's the sort of thing that proves whether a man can lead or not."

Margaret and Hadassah read the newspaper cutting. It had been quoted from the _Petit Journal_.

"The British High Command relies more and more on the value of the individual soldier, and in this we see one of the main factors which will mean German defeat. Take the case of the heroism of a sergeant who, seeing his officer seriously wounded, himself assumed command of his company and led them victoriously to the third line. There he fell in his turn, but one of the men immediately took his place and completed the conquest of the objective. It is thanks to such acts that . . . has been seized, crossed and left behind."

When Hadassah and Margaret looked up, they met Michael's eyes. They were looking into the things beyond, things very far from Clarges Street.

"That was my sergeant," he said, "the finest fellow that ever wore shoe-leather!"

"And the Tommy," Hadassah said, "has he been promoted?"

Michael's eyes dropped; his tanned skin flushed slightly.

"Of course he'll have to take a commission if it's offered to him. He can't very well refuse. He has proved his ability to lead, poor chap! I expect he'd rather remain as he was. I know I would--it's a terrible responsibility, inspiring your men as well as teaching them, but one can't shelter oneself while others face greater risks."

Hadassah's quick brain read the truth, while Margaret merely lost herself in visualizing the dangers which Michael would so soon have to face. The twelve days would be gone so soon that they were scarcely worth counting.

From the war their sketchy talk returned again to Michael's experiences in the desert. He told them briefly about the saint, omitting the nature of his illness. He spoke so naturally and unguardedly about Millicent, and of his annoyance at her appearance and at her persistence in remaining, that if there had been any lingering doubt in Hadassah's mind upon the subject of his absolute loyalty to Margaret, it was completely dispersed.

When he was hurriedly telling them about the meeting of the saint and all about his knowledge of the hidden treasure, and how completely it tallied with the African's prophecies, he produced a tiny parcel from his pocket-book. He handed it to Margaret, who felt as if she had been listening to the last chapter of a long story from _The Arabian Nights_.

The little packet was made up of many folds of tissue-paper. With nervous fingers Margaret unwrapped it.

When the last piece was discarded and she saw that uncut jewel lying against the palm of her hand, she gave a cry of delight mixed with apprehension. Its beauty was unique, its colour as indescribable as the crimson of an afterglow in the Valley.

She looked almost pitifully at Michael. She wished that the world was a little less strange; some of the humdrum of her pantry-maid's existence would be almost welcome.

"The saint carried it in his ear," he said. "He took it from Akhnaton's treasure."

"Have you had it with you at the Front all this time?" Hadassah said. Margaret's emotion touched her.

"Yes. But now it is for you, Meg. I will have it made into anything you like, so that you can always wear it. It will be my wedding-present, a jewel of Akhnaton."

"No, no!" Margaret said quickly. "You must take it, it belongs to you. You must always carry it about with you, Mike--it is your talisman." She stopped, for Michael had closed her fingers over the stone.

"But I want you to have it," he said. "Let it be my wedding-gift--there is no time for the buying of presents."

"No," Margaret said. "Don't urge me, Mike. I shan't like it. Hadassah, don't you agree with me?--he must never part with it!" She smiled. "I should be terribly afraid if you did, I should think your luck had deserted you. Dearest, do take it--I believe Akhnaton meant you to keep it."

While she spoke she was longing to tell him of the hand which had written, of her message. The words almost passed her lips, but again she refrained, she obeyed her super-senses. She was convinced that Michael, when his blood was up, ran terrible risks, that he was reckless to the verge of folly. She had heard a letter read in the hospital which had been written to a mother about her son. His Colonel had said, "There are some men who will storm hell, there are others who will follow, and there are some who will lag behind. Your son belongs to the first of the three. What he needs to learn is caution and the value in this war of officers as able as himself." Margaret knew that Michael's rash nature needed no encouragement.

Hadassah championed Margaret. "I think you should keep it," she said to Michael, "and give it to Margaret after the war."

They all laughed, not unmirthfully, and yet not happily. "After the war!" they echoed in one voice. "Oh, that wonderful 'after'!"

"That promised land," Michael said. "Never mind--it's coming. The labour and travail of the war will bring forth Liberty. The pains of childbirth are soon forgotten--mothers know how soon, when the infant is at their breast."

Hadassah and Margaret looked at one another. Their eyes said many things; Margaret's were full of pride because Hadassah was hearing from his own lips that Michael was as whole-heartedly in the war as even Freddy could have desired.

She was still fingering and gazing at the wonderful stone. It seemed scarcely more strange to her that it had actually once belonged to the first king who had abhorred war, had once formed a part of his great royal treasury, than the fact that it had played its part in the mystical drama of her life in Egypt. As Michael talked, she questioned herself dreamily. Which was real--her humdrum pantry-maid existence in London, with her dreary walks through darkened streets, with now and then a Zeppelin scare to make her lonely bedroom seem more lonely? Or her life in the Valley, surrounded by the unearthly light of the Theban hills, her life of intellectual excitement and strange intimacy with things and people which the world had forgotten for thousands of years?

Michael felt her abstraction. He put his hand on the top of hers, which held the jewel, and pressed it.

"Come back," he said, laughing. "We're in Clarges Street, and we're going to be married to-morrow."

Meg looked up with startled eyes. "Are we?" she said.

"My dear, practical mystic, we are." He caught her round the waist and looked at Hadassah as he spoke. "You'll get her ready, won't you?"

She laughed. "Well, if you really mean it, I think we must all be up and doing."

"If!" Michael cried. "With this in my pocket, I should rather think I do mean it!" He brandished the special licence in the air. "Do you know what this means, Meg? It's your death-warrant. Are you resigned? Have you anything to confess? You've not been married to anyone else while I was away?"

Margaret shook her head. He had brought laughter back to her eyes. Just at that moment the ex-butler entered the room. As they all turned to look at him, he said:

"A person has called to see Miss Lampton."

"Who is it?" Margaret said. Her thoughts flew to her dressmaker, who was hurriedly making a light frock, bought ready-made, the proper length for her; in all other respects it fitted her.

"I don't know, miss. She has a box in her arms."

"Oh, I'll go," Margaret said. "I won't be long."

"Then, while you're gone, I'll make use of my time," Michael said as he rose to his feet. "I'll be back in ten minutes." He looked into Margaret's eyes. "Don't waste any time on dressmakers, Meg! Wear any old things,--you always look delightful."

"Catch me wasting time!" Margaret said. Her eyes assured him of her words. "Come upstairs for me in ten minutes--I'll be ready."

* * * * * *

A minute or two later Margaret returned to the sitting-room. Michael had left it. She was glad.

"Hadassah," she said, "listen. The most extraordinary thing has happened. Millicent Mervill is up in the drawing-room." Margaret was trembling with anger and nervousness.

"What? That woman here? How has she found you, how dare she come to see you?" Hadassah's voice was indignant, furious; her eyes flashed.

Margaret hurriedly explained to her how for the last two days she had felt that someone was following her, a dark figure, indistinctly dressed in black.

"She watched me in the square this morning. With her old cunning, she managed to get in by bringing some corset-boxes with her. Smith thought she had come to try something on. Isn't it like her?"

"Have you seen her?"

"No, not yet. She gave this note to Smith to give to me; he thought it was just a list of the things she had brought. I knew her handwriting the moment I saw it. Please read it."

Hadassah read the letter. It was very short.

"Dear Miss Lampton,

"If you will let me see you, I will tell you something which you ought to know. Please don't refuse. What I know may greatly help Mr. Amory.

"I only heard the other day that he never discovered the treasure. It is about that I want to see you.

"Yours,

"MILLICENT MERVILL."

When Hadassah had finished reading the note, she raised her eyes; they met Margaret's.

"You had better see her." Hadassah spoke quickly.

"Yes, I must, I suppose. I only wanted to know if you would mind--it is your house. I think it's such impertinence."

"Of course not. But what can she have to tell you?"

"I don't know, but whatever it is, I do wish she hadn't come." Margaret sighed. "We were all so happy, and she is associated with everything that is hateful."

"Would you like me to come with you?"

"No, no." Margaret shook her head. "I am always best alone, but I dread the interview."

She paused for a moment or two before leaving the room. She was building up her courage, trying to subdue her nervousness. As she went out, Hadassah's eyes followed her.

"Poor girl!" she said to herself. "She has gone through so much. I thought she was in for a little time of peace and happiness. Poor Margaret!" She sighed. "And what is there still before her?" Hadassah's eyes looked into the future, "with this cruel, cruel war only beginning, for we are really just getting into it!"

She had been preparing to write some letters relating to Margaret's affairs, but for a moment or two she did not take up her pen. A little of the truth of what did actually happen to Michael on the battlefields of Flanders swam before her eyes; it was just the things which were happening and have happened to England's brave boys and men during these three wonderful years. The war was still in its infancy, but even then the vices of Germany were as old as her race and as terrible.

She pictured the truth--Michael's charmed life, his reckless courage, his magnetic power over his men. She foresaw it all. His temperament foretold it, his absolute belief in the triumph of righteousness.

While Hadassah was thinking these things, and thanking God in her heart that her husband, by reason of his special qualifications, had at once been placed in a post of great responsibility and one far removed from the danger-zone, Margaret had reached the drawing-room. She paused for a moment outside the door; she needed all her self-control.

As she entered the room, and before she had closed the door behind her, a slight figure, so shapelessly enveloped in black and closely-veiled that she could not distinguish any individuality, turned from the window, which opened into a small glass recess full of ferns and flowers.

Margaret did not hold out her hand; she could not. Nor did Millicent Mervill; she stood before Margaret, her head bent and her hands clasped in front of her, a slight bundle of drooping black, as mysterious as any veiled Egyptian woman.

"You have something to tell me?" Margaret said. In spite of her anger, the humility of the fragile figure brought a suggestion of pity into her voice. The radiant beauty whom she had steeled her nerves to meet had given place to this meek, formless penitent. "Please put up your veil--I can't see you." She knew that she could not trust the woman's words; she wished to watch her eyes while she spoke.

"I am wearing it," Millicent said, "because I can't bear you to look at me, to see how changed I am. Please let me keep it down, while I tell you all I know about Mr. Amory and the treasure."

"What has happened?" Margaret said. Millicent's voice was agonized.

"I had smallpox in Alexandria--it has left me hideous. Soon after I last saw you I sickened with it. I was very, very ill."

"Smallpox!" There was genuine sympathy in Margaret's voice. "Are you really disfigured? How dreadful that nowadays you should be!"

"Yes," Millicent said, lifelessly. "I have nothing left to live for now. My looks are gone. I was very ignorantly nursed; they were kind people, but hopelessly ignorant."

"Perhaps your looks will come back--give yourself time." Even as Margaret spoke, she wondered how she found it possible to talk to the woman in the way she was doing. Only five minutes ago she had hated her, hated her so intensely that she had had to exercise great control over her passions so that she should not lose her temper in her presence. Now she felt a sincere pity for her, the poor creature. Margaret's subconscious womanhood knew the reason. It was because she could afford, to be sorry for her, now that all rivalry between them was dead.

"I didn't come to tell you about myself," Millicent said. "It is nothing to you--you must be glad." She wrung her hands more tightly. "You are saying in your heart at this moment that I deserve it. So I do. I see things clearly now--I do deserve it. I brought it all on myself, everything. But I have suffered, you don't know how I have suffered."

"Sit down," Margaret said quietly, "and tell me all about it."

"No, no. You are only speaking like this because you feel you ought to, because I am now a thing to pity. You really hate me. I came to tell you that I never reached the hills, I never saw the hidden treasure, I never tried to find it." She paused. "And that your lover was never mine. He never desired any woman but you--he scorned me, ignored my advances."

"I know that," Margaret said hotly. A fire had kindled her calm eyes; it quickened her spirit.

"But it is none the less my duty to tell you. Your lover is too fine, too loyal--he won't stoop to tell you how I tempted him. He wouldn't blacken even _my_ name. He has too much respect for womanhood."

"Then why tell me?" Margaret said. "I don't want to hear it. All that is past. We are going to be married tomorrow--Michael is home from the Front. We are perfectly happy--don't recall it all."

A cry rang through the room. Its tone of envy and passion convinced Margaret that even in the worst human beings there is the divine spark. It actually hurt her that her own joy should mean this agony to another woman.

"You are going to be married," Millicent said, "to the finest lover and the truest gentleman I have ever known, or ever shall know, the finest in the world, I think."

"Yes," Margaret said. "He is all that, and more--at least, to me."

"Much more," Millicent said, "much more. And will you tell him that I never reached the hills, that I am not guilty of that one meanness?"

"Then who did?" Margaret said quickly.

"Oh, then you thought I did? You thought I robbed him of his discovery? Does he think so, too?" Her voice shook. Her curious sense of honour scorned the idea.

"No, no," Margaret said. Her love of truth made her speak frankly. "He wouldn't believe it. He is still convinced that you never went to the hills, that you are innocent."

"But you believed it?"

"Yes," Margaret's voice was stern. "Yes, I believed it for a time."

"I have nothing worth lying for now," Millicent said bitterly; "so what I tell you is perfectly true. I never reached the hills; I was too great a coward. I fled away in the night, as fast as I could, back to civilization."

"Then who anticipated Michael's discovery? It's absurd to assume that someone who knew nothing of his theory should have discovered it at the very same time, almost. Do you expect me to believe that?"

"My dragoman told me that one of my men absconded. He left me on the same night as I left Michael's camp. He must have discovered it; he must have heard the saint telling Michael all about it." She paused. "You know the whole story, don't you? All about the saint, and how his illness turned out to be smallpox?" She shuddered at the very mention of the saint.

"No," Margaret said. "I haven't heard about the smallpox. Was that how you got it?"

"Indirectly, yes, but it was my own fault. When I heard that he had got it, I stole away in the night, I left Michael to face it alone." She paused.

Margaret held her tongue. There was something so horrible about smallpox that, in spite of the woman's cowardly behaviour, she felt some sympathy for her.

"He had begged me to go before the saint turned up. I wouldn't. When the saint appeared he forgot almost everything else, and so for one whole day I remained confident in the belief that he had taken my presence for granted. And then," she shuddered, "he came to tell me that the holy man had smallpox."

"And you forgot your love?" Margaret said.

"It was swallowed up in fear, in anger. I was so furious at Michael's rash generosity. I had warned him that the man might be suffering from some contagious malady, but I never dreamed of smallpox."

"It was horrible!" Margaret said. "And Michael has never said a word about it."

"His charity is divine," Millicent said. "It is Christ-like, if you like."

"It is true charity, for it is love, love for everything which God has created."

"He is so happy that he can afford to love almost everything and everyone."

"He is happy because he loves them."

"I don't believe he has ever heard of hell," Millicent said. "His religion's all heaven and beauty and love."

"Hell!" exclaimed Margaret. "But surely," she paused, "surely we're not primitives, we don't need the fear of such impossible cruelties to keep us from doing wrong? His great saint, or reformer, Akhnaton, had no hell in his religion, and he lived, as you know, centuries before David. Even Akhnaton realized that human beings create their own hells. The other hell, of fire and brimstone, which terrorized the ignorant people into obedience and order, belongs to the same category as the crocodile god and the wicked cat-goddess Pasht, of Egypt. It was necessary in its day."

"You and Michael live on such a high plane!"

"Oh no, we don't. You know Michael is very human--that is why he is so understanding, so forgiving."

"He will never forgive me--that would be expecting too much. But I had to come and tell you all that I know about his treasure. I have only just heard--I saw it in the Egyptian monthly Archaeological Report--that Michael never had the glory of discovering the Akhnaton chambers in the hills."

"You didn't know that when I saw you in Cairo?"

"No, I never dreamed of it. If you had only told me that he hadn't, I should have explained, I should have told you about the man who absconded."

Margaret looked at her searchingly, but she could learn nothing more than the voice told her, for Millicent's veil was still covering her disfigured face.

"I never wished to rob him of the honour of the discovery. If I had known when I saw you, I should have cleared my name, at least, of that contemptible deed."

Margaret blushed. "I couldn't tell you," she said. "I was too unhappy, too angry. I didn't want you to know of our disappointment. I pretended that I had heard from Michael."

"You led me to suppose that he had discovered it."

"I know," Margaret said. "I didn't wish to add to your satisfaction by telling you of his disappointment. I was convinced that you knew, and that you had slipped off to the hills." She paused. "We were bluffing each other."

"I was incubating smallpox. I was wearing a blouse and skirt which had been packed with the clothes I wore in the desert. Probably it had come in touch with some infected thing."

"Were you very bad?" Margaret said. "Where have you been all this time?"

Millicent shivered. "I was just going to sail for England, but I was too ill when I reached Alexandria to go on board the boat--I had to stay behind. I have been hiding myself from the world ever since. Yes, I was dreadfully ill, and now. . . ." Her voice broke. "You don't know what I feel when I look at myself--my own face makes me sick."

"I am so sorry," Margaret said. "You were so beautiful, such a wonderful colour!"

"How kind of you to say so!" Millicent's voice left no doubt of her feeling of shame, although Margaret's nobility was beyond her understanding; it humbled her. "I came to you because I wanted to do what I can to undo what I have done. If Michael had known that my servant anticipated his discovery, it might have given him a clue as to where the treasure has gone. You do believe now that I never saw the jewels? I never dreamed of robbing him!" She paused. "In my poor way I loved him. I couldn't have done that--not that."

"And yet you were so horribly cruel! You knew a great deal about men. Michael is only human, and he is so ready to believe the best of everyone."

"Yes, I know. But I suppose I was born bad, born with feelings you don't understand. Michael did his best to help me; he tried to awaken something higher in me. I suppose you won't believe it, but he has--he has helped me; I am not quite what I was. While I was ill, when I thought I was dying, all that he had ever said to me came back to me with a new meaning. I determined that if I got well I would tell you everything--how wonderful his love for you is, how strong he can be--and it is not the strength of a man who does not feel."

"Oh, I know it," Margaret said. Her voice was resentful.

"But please let me tell you, even if you do know it. It is only right to Michael--I must exonerate him, even if you resent hearing me speak of his love for you. Let me make a clean breast of it, show you how ignorant he was of my plans for meeting him. He never was more surprised in his life."

"I didn't mean to resent it, but there are some things we never need telling, things which are better left unsaid. Michael needs no telling that you never stole the jewels, for instance, that you never tried to reach the hills."

"Stole the jewels! No, I never stole them. You thought that?" Horror was in Millicent's voice. "You thought I stole them for my personal use? To wear them?"

"It would not have been so cruel as to steal my lover, would it?"

"It would have been less difficult."

"You tried--oh, how you tried to steal him! How could--you?" A revulsion of feeling hardened Margaret. Her eyes showed it. She was visualizing Millicent in all her former beauty. Even without beauty, she knew how strongly her vitality would appeal to men. Despondent, in her drooping black shawls, Millicent was keenly alive still. Margaret had always felt her vitality; she knew that men felt it. It stirred them to conquest; it invited contest.

Millicent answered her truthfully. "Because I am bad, not good, and I loved him with the only kind of love I know. It swept aside all scruples. You can't judge--try to believe that--you can't begin to judge. I lived for conquest and men's admiration, and now I have lost both."

Margaret felt humbled to the dust. Her judgment had been so crude, so narrow. She realized that the woman before her left her far behind in the matter of vitality, passion and self-criticism. Her energy and vitality demanded an outlet, an object.

"Don't feel like that," she said gently. "Your looks will come back. Do let me see your face. It is early days yet--the marks will disappear, grow fainter. It is only one year--give it time, forget all about it in hard work, and while you are working. Nature will be working too."

"No, no!" Millicent cried. "Never! I am going to fly from my friends--I am going to hide myself."

Margaret had attempted to raise her thick veil, but Millicent refused to let her. Instead, she threw another thickness of it over her face. Her pride could not stand even Margaret's pity and comforting words.

"I am humbled enough as it is," she said. "Don't do that."

"I didn't want to humble you," Margaret said. "I only thought, and I do still think, that you are exaggerating the change in your appearance. One sees every little thing about oneself so clearly. I know how a wee spot seems like a Vesuvius when it is on one's nose. With smallpox the marks do get more and more invisible."

"No, my looks will never come back," Millicent said miserably. "And for a woman like me, when her looks are gone, what is there left?"

"Work," Margaret said. "The war will make you forget all about personal things--it will, really. Life is different now. If you will only take up some war-work--and I know you will, for every able-bodied woman in England is working at something; every superfluous woman has become a thing of value--life will be completely changed. There is only one idea, one aim for us all--to win the war. You must do your bit. It is just our 'bit' that keeps us sane, for without it we should have time to think. We women must not think, we must work."

"But what could I do?"

"Almost anything," Margaret said. "You know you could--you are so clever."

"Don't flatter, please," Millicent said. "How can you be so forgiving?"

"I suppose because I'm so happy. As soon as ever you can," Margaret said, "take up some work which necessitates using all your brain, all your energy. You will become so interested in what you are doing that you will forget your troubles. I had no time to grieve over mine when I was working in the hospital. At night I was so tired out that I went to sleep as soon as my head was on the pillow. The atmosphere of work, the awfulness of this war, makes personal things seem very trivial--one grows ashamed of them."

"You are trying to give me hope," Millicent said. "It is so big and kind of you, but honestly, I only came here to tell you about your lover, not to talk about my hideous self. What does it matter what I do? You were always a worker--I was not."

"Well, you have told me about Michael, and now I can at least try to help you. I have seen the effect of almost a year of the war on the idle women of England. It is wonderful! And we used to be called superfluous!" Margaret laughed proudly.

"You believe me? You know that I am not lying? that I never reached the hills? that I never knew that Michael had not discovered the treasure?" Millicent had gone back to the original object of her visit. What Margaret had advised seemed to her impossible.

As she said the last words, the door opened and Michael entered the room. He had heard Millicent's voice. His eyes were fixed on Margaret. The tableau created by his unexpected entrance was tense, painful.

Millicent turned her head away and hid her face in her hands. Her first thought was that he must not see her face. She flung herself down on the sofa.

Margaret became deadly pale, but remained motionless. Michael looked from her to Millicent with an expression of horrified surprise on his face. He had expected to see her in all her perfection of toilet and looks, her shining head, the "golden lady," instead of which a bundle of crêpe, a mere armful, something soft and black, lay face downwards on the sofa before him.

"What are you doing here?" he said sternly. "Haven't we seen the last of you yet?"

Margaret put up her hands as if to ward off his words. Her own happiness had made her feel more pity than anger for the miserable woman, who for probably the first time in her life was trying to act honourably and courageously. The security of love made her wondrous kind.

"What has she come for?" Michael demanded. But for his sunburn, his face would have been as white as Margaret's own. The sight of Millicent's cowering figure brought back to him, with the quickness of light, the evening in the desert when he had flung her from him in his agony of temptation.

"She came to give us some information, Mike. Tell him, Millicent, why you have come."

Millicent took no notice of Margaret's words. She was crouching on the sofa, her face still buried in her hands.

"No, no," she moaned, when Margaret again urged her to speak. "I only wanted to tell you. Ask him to go away--do, please, beg him to go. If he wants you I will disappear and never come back again. I have said all I have to say."

"I am going to stay here," Michael said, "until I hear what you came to say. Was it necessary to come?" He looked to Margaret for his answer.

"It was better," Margaret said. "She never reached the hills, she never saw the treasure."

Michael started. "Go on," he said. "That is not all--she need not have come to tell us that. I never accused her; I never believed it. I thought that after all she did do, she would have had shame enough to stay away."

Millicent's body quivered. His words lashed her.

"One of her servants ran away--he left her the same night as she left your camp," Margaret said. Again Michael saw the black figure shiver as Margaret spoke of her cowardly act. The very mention of it brought to both their eyes a vivid picture of the surroundings which had witnessed their last meeting. Millicent knew that Michael was seeing it as clearly as though they had been standing together under the golden stars, the tents dotted about on the pale night sands. She could hear the sick man reciting _suras_ from the Koran in sonorous tones.

"And she thinks he found the treasure?" Michael said the words absently, as though his mind was occupied with distant visions.

"Yes--he was a likely character to do the deed."

"Does she know anything about him--where he went to?"

"No, Mike, but I do." Margaret spoke gently. "Millicent has been very