“Yes, oh She,” answered Leo hastily, “I would fain know whither the young lady who was looking after me has gone to.”

“Ah,” said Ayesha:  “the girl—­yes, I saw her.  Nay, I know not; she said that she would go, I know not whither.  Perchance she will return, perchance not.  It is wearisome waiting on the sick, and these savage women are fickle.”

Leo looked both sulky and distressed at this intelligence.

“It’s very odd,” he said to me in English; and then, addressing She, “I cannot understand,” he said; “the young lady and I—­well—­in short, we had a regard for each other.”

Ayesha laughed a little very musically, and then turned the subject.

XIX

“GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT!”

The conversation after this was of such a desultory order that I do not quite recollect it.  For some reason, perhaps from a desire to keep her identity and character in reserve, Ayesha did not talk freely, as she usually did.  Presently, however, she informed Leo that she had arranged a dance that night for our amusement.  I was astonished to hear this, as I fancied that the Amahagger were much too gloomy a folk to indulge in any such frivolity; but, as will presently more clearly appear, it turned out that an Amahagger dance has little in common with such fantastic festivities in other countries, savage or civilised.  Then, as we were about to withdraw, she suggested that Leo might like to see some of the wonders of the caves, and as he gladly assented thither we departed, accompanied by Job and Billali.  To describe our visit would only be to repeat a great deal of what I have already said.  The tombs we entered were indeed different, for the whole rock was a honeycomb of sepulchres,[*] but the contents were nearly always similar.  Afterwards we visited the pyramid of bones that had haunted my dreams on the previous night, and from thence went down a long passage to one of the great vaults occupied by the bodies of the poorer citizens of Imperial Kor.  These bodies were not nearly so well preserved as were those of the wealthier classes.  Many of them had no linen covering on them, also they were buried from five hundred to one thousand in a single large vault, the corpses in some instances being thickly piled one upon another, like a heap of slain.

[*] For a long while it puzzled me to know what could have been done with the enormous quantities of rock that must have been dug out of these vast caves; but I afterwards discovered that it was for the most part built into the walls and palaces of Kor, and also used to line the reservoirs and sewers.—­L.  H. H.

Leo was of course intensely interested in this stupendous and unequalled sight, which was, indeed, enough to awake all the imagination a man had in him into the most active life.  But to poor Job it did not prove attractive.  His nerves—­already