“My lady,” said Ibrahim, very gently, “there is good jackal-shootin’ here.”

“Jackal-shooting, duck-shooting—­so you think of nothing but your master’s pleasure!” she said, indignantly.  “Do you suppose I’m going to sit still here in the sand for days, and do nothing, and see nobody, while—­while—­”

She stopped.  She could not go on.  The fierceness of her anger almost choked her.  If Nigel had been beside her at that moment, she would have been capable of showing even to him something of her truth.  Ibrahim’s voice again broke gently in upon her passion.

“My lady, for jackal-shootin’ you have to go out at night.  You have to go down there when it is dark, and stay there for a long while, till the jackal him come.  You tie a goat; the jackal him smell the goat and presently him comin’.”

She stared at him almost blankly.  What had all this rhodomontade to do with her?  Ibrahim met her eyes.

“All this very interestin’ for my Lord Arminigel,” said Ibrahim, softly.

Mrs. Armine said nothing, but she went on staring at Ibrahim.

“P’r’aps my gentleman go out to-night.  If he go, you take a little walk with Ibrahim.”

He turned, and pointed behind her, to the distance where the rising sand-hill seemed to touch the stooping sky.

“You take a little walk up there.”

Still she said nothing.  She asked nothing.  She had no need to ask.  All the desolation about her seemed suddenly to blossom like the rose.  Instead of the end of the world, this place seemed to be the core, the warm heart of the world.

When at last she spoke, she said quietly: 

“Your master will go jackal-shooting to-night.”

Ibrahim nodded his head.

“I dessay,” he pensively replied.

The soft crack of a duck-gun came to their ears from far off among the tamarisk bushes beside the green-grey waters.

“I dessay my Lord Arminigel him goin’ after the jackal to-night.”

XXIV

The dinner in camp that night was quite a joyous festival.  Nigel brought back two duck, Ibrahim made a fine fire of brushwood to warm the eager sportsman, and Ruby was in amazing spirits.  She played to perfection the part of ardent housewife.  She came and went in the sand, presiding over everything.  She even penetrated into the cook’s tent with Ibrahim to give Mohammed some hints as to the preparation of the duck.

“This is your holiday,” she said to Nigel.  “I want it to be a happy one.  You must make the most of it, and go out shooting all the time.  They say there’s any amount of jackals down there in the tamarisk bushes.  Are you going to have a shot at them to-night?”

Nigel stretched out his legs, with a long sigh of satisfaction.

“I don’t know, Ruby.  I should like to, but it’s so jolly and cosy here.”

He looked towards the fire, then back at her.