“Let the garment be heavy with the gold of love, rich with the purples of passion, aflame with the crimson of thy desire, forgetting not the caress of the rose, nor the light mingling of opal and saffron, and the faint touch of amethyst and topaz, in which shall she find her delight.

“Bind thy love with the broad bands of the setting sun so that she cleaves unto thee, and carry her unto the twilight of thy tent, which shall slowly darken until the roof thereof is swathed in purple gloom, through which shall shine the stars of thy beloved.

“And there lie down in thy delight, until the hour of dawn calleth thee to prayer.”

The voice was stilled, whereupon Jill lifted her face bathed in rosy colour, which might or might not have been the reflection from the sky, whilst her red mouth quivered ever so slightly, and her great blue eyes looked for a moment into those of the man, and as quickly looked away.

So seductive was she in her youth and utter helplessness that the man stepped back two paces, and saluting her for whom his whole being craved, gathered his cloak about him and departed to his tent.

And Jill also entered her tent, and having earlier and under the lash of terror departed therefrom in blind haste, stood amazed.

She had imagined a mattress, a rug, an earthenware basin on the ground, and sand over everything, and on the top of the sand scorpions, spiders, and all that creepeth and flieth both by day and by night.  Not at all.

A carpet of many colours stretching to the corners of the desert tent, which is not peaked like the European affair, into which you crawl fearing to bring the whole concern about your ears, when if you should be over tall you hit the top with your head.  It was as big as a fair-sized room, high enough for a man of over six feet to stand erect, not so broad as long, with sides which, lifted according to the direction of the sun, and through the uplifted portion of which the faint delicious evening breeze blew refreshingly.  A white enamelled bedstead covered in finest, whitest linen stood in the centre of the carpet, surrounded by a white net curtain hanging from the tent ceiling, each foot in a broad tin of water.  In the corners were a canvas folding dressing-table, a full length mirror, a long chair and a smaller one, over which hung diaphanous garments of finest muslin, and a shimmering wrap of pearl white satin, and through a half-drawn curtain which hung across the narrower end of the tent, the vision of a big canvas bath filled with water, big white towels, and another canvas table upon which stood all the things necessary to a woman’s toilet.

So that it was a very refreshed Jill who, wrapped in a loose Turkish bath-gown, with little feet thrust into heelless slippers, went in search of raiment.  And wonderfully soft, simple things she found into which she slipped, and out of which she slipped again, holding them out at arm’s length for inspection, then burying her face in the soft perfumed folds in very thankfulness.