“I’ve got a map,” said the American, “and sometimes far away from anything in the very midst of the waterless, trackless desert, I see ‘ruins’ marked upon it—­or ‘remains of a temple,’ perhaps.  For example, the temple of Jupiter Ammon, which was one of the most considerable shrines in the world, was hundreds of miles away back of anywhere.  Those are the ruins, solitary, unseen, unchanging through the centuries, which appeal to one’s imagination.  But when I present a check at the door, and go in as if it were Barnum’s show, all the subtle feeling of romance goes right out of it.”

“Absolutely!” said Cecil Brown, looking over the desert with his dark, intolerant eyes.  “If one could come wandering here alone—­stumble upon it by chance, as it were—­and find one’s self in absolute solitude in the dim light of the temple, with these grotesque figures all round, it would be perfectly overwhelming.  A man would be prostrated with wonder and awe.  But when Belmont is puffing his bulldog pipe, and Stuart is wheezing, and Miss Sadie Adams is laughing—­”

“And that jay of a dragoman speaking his piece,” said Headingly; “I want to stand and think all the time, and I never seem to get the chance.  I was ripe for manslaughter when I stood before the Great Pyramid, and couldn’t get a quiet moment because they would boost me on to the top.  I took a kick at one man which would have sent him to the top in one jump if I had hit meat.  But fancy travelling all the way from America to see the pyramid, and then finding nothing better to do than to kick an Arab in front of it!”

The Oxford man laughed in his gentle, tired fashion.  “They are starting again,” said he, and the two hastened forwards to take their places at the tail of the absurd procession.

Their route ran now among large, scattered boulders, and between stony, shingly hills.  A narrow winding path curved in and out amongst the rocks.  Behind them their view was cut off by similar hills, black and fantastic, like the slag-heaps at the shaft of a mine.  A silence fell upon the little company, and even Sadie’s bright face reflected the harshness of Nature.  The escort had closed in, and marched beside them, their boots scrunching among the loose black rubble.  Colonel Cochrane and Belmont were still riding together in the van.

“Do you know, Belmont,” said the Colonel, in a low voice, “you may think me a fool, but I don’t like this one little bit.”

Belmont gave a short gruff laugh.

“It seemed all right in the saloon of the Korosko, but now that we are here we do seem rather up in the air,” said he.  “Still, you know, a party comes here every week, and nothing has ever gone wrong.”

“I don’t mind taking my chances when I am on the war-path,” the Colonel answered.  “That’s all straightforward and in the way of business.  But when you have women with you, and a helpless crowd like this, it becomes really dreadful.  Of course, the chances are a hundred to one that we have no trouble; but if we should have—­well, it won’t bear thinking about.  The wonderful thing is their complete unconsciousness that there is any danger whatever.”