Then before him, silhouetted against the blue, clear light of the desert night, rose two figures—Europeans, a man and a woman.

The woman, who wore a white dress, was clasped in the arms of the man, while he rained hot, passionate kisses upon her brow.

Waldron stood upon the soft sand, a silent witness of that exchange of passionate caresses. He feared to move lest he should attract their attention and be accused of eavesdropping.

From where he was, half concealed by the big trunk of a date-palm, he could distinctly hear the words uttered by the man.

“I have been here for three days awaiting you, darling. I travelled by Port Sudan and Khartoum, and then on here to meet you.”

“And I, too, Henri, have been wondering if you would arrive here in time,” was the girl’s response, as her head lay in sweet content upon her lover’s shoulder. “Imagine my delight when the Arab came on board and slipped your note into my hand.”

“Ah, Lola darling, how I have longed for this moment!—longed to hold you in my arms once again,” he cried.

Lola!

Hubert Waldron held his breath, scarce believing his own ears.

Yes, it was her voice—the voice he knew so well. She had met her lover there—in that out-of-the-way spot—he having travelled by the Red Sea route to the Sudan in order to keep the tryst.

Waldron stood there listening, like a man in a dream.

It was all plain now. The man who had been marked out as Lola’s husband she hated, because of her secret love for that young Frenchman in whose arms she now stood clasped.

He was telling her how he had left Brindisi three weeks before, and going down the Red Sea had landed at Port Sudan, afterwards taking sail to Khartoum and then post-haste across the desert to Haifa.

“Had I not caught the coasting steamer I could not have reached here until you had left,” he added.

“Yes, Henri. But you must be most careful,” she urged. “My uncle must never suspect—he must never dream the truth.”

“I know, darling. If I travel back to Cairo with you I will exercise the utmost discretion, never fear.”

“Neither by word nor by look must the truth 

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