“You can go where you will.  Shall I show you the paths?”

He lifted his hand and calmly smelt his red rose, keeping his great eyes fixed upon her.  Domini’s wish to be alone had left her.  This was surely the geni of the garden, and his company would add to its mystery and fragrance.

“You need not stay by the door?” she asked.

“No one will come.  There is no one in Beni-Mora.  And Hassan will stay.”

He pointed with his rose to a little tent that was pitched close to the gate beneath a pepper tree.  In it Domini saw a brown boy curled up like a dog and fast asleep.  She began to feel as if she had eaten hashish.  The world seemed made for dreaming.

“Thank you, then.”

And now for the first time she looked round to see whether Batouch had implied the truth.  Must the European gardens give way to this Eastern garden, take a lower place with all their roses?

She stood on a great expanse of newly-raked smooth sand, rising in a very gentle slope to a gigantic hedge of carefully trimmed evergreens, which projected at the top, forming a roof and casting a pleasant shade upon the sand.  At intervals white benches were placed under this hedge.  To the right was the villa.  She saw now that it was quite small.  There were two lines of windows—­on the ground floor and the upper story.  The lower windows opened on to the sand, those above on to a verandah with a white railing, which was gained by a white staircase outside the house built beneath the arches of the arcade.  The villa was most delicately simple, but in this riot of blue and gold its ivory cleanliness, set there upon the shining sand which was warm to the foot, made it look magical to Domini.  She thought she had never known before what spotless purity was like.

“Those are the bedrooms,” murmured the Arab at her side.

“There are only bedrooms?” she asked in surprise.

“The other rooms, the drawing-room of Monsieur the Count, the dining-room, the smoking-room, the Moorish bath, the room of the little dog, the kitchen and the rooms for the servants are in different parts of the garden.  There is the dining-room.”

He pointed with his rose to a large white building, whose dazzling walls showed here and there through the masses of trees to the left, where a little raised sand-path with flattened, sloping sides wound away into a maze of shadows diapered with gold.

“Let us go down that path,” Domini said almost in a whisper.

The spell of the place was descending upon her.  This was surely a home of dreams, a haven where the sun came to lie down beneath the trees and sleep.

“What is your name?” she added.

“Smain,” replied the Arab.  “I was born in this garden.  My father, Mohammed, was with Monsieur the Count.”