buds were beginning to wither.  And Sir Chetwynd had heard much of Cairo; he understood that there was a great deal of liberty allowed there between men and maids,—­that they went out together on driving excursions to the Pyramids, that they rode on lilliputian donkeys over the sand at moonlight, that they floated about in boats at evening on the Nile, and that, in short, there were more opportunities of marriage among the “flesh-pots of Egypt” than in all the rush and crush of London.  So here he was, portly and comfortable, and on the whole well satisfied with his expedition; there were a good many eligible bachelors about, and Muriel and Dolly were really doing their best.  So was their mother, Lady Chetwynd Lyle; she allowed no “eligible” to escape her hawk-like observation, and on this particular evening she was in all her glory, for there was to be a costume ball at the Gezireh Palace Hotel,—­a superb affair, organized by the proprietors for the amusement of their paying guests, who certainly paid well,—­even stiffly.  Owing to the preparations that were going on for this festivity, the lounge, with its sumptuous Egyptian decorations and luxurious modern fittings, was well-nigh deserted save for Sir Chetwynd and his particular group of friends, to whom he was holding forth, between slow cigar-puffs, on the squalor of the Arabs, the frightful thievery of the Sheiks, the incompetency of his own special dragoman, and the mistake people made in thinking the Egyptians themselves a fine race.

“They are tall, certainly,” said Sir Chetwynd, surveying his paunch, which lolled comfortably, and as it were by itself, in front of him, like a kind of waistcoated air-balloon.  “I grant you they are tall.  That is, the majority of them are.  But I have seen short men among them.  The Khedive is not taller than I am.  And the Egyptian face is very deceptive.  The features are often fine,—­ occasionally classic,—­but intelligent expression is totally lacking.”

Here Sir Chetwynd waved his cigar descriptively, as though he would fain suggest that a heavy jaw, a fat nose with a pimple at the end, and a gross mouth with black teeth inside it, which were special points in his own physiognomy, went further to make up “intelligent expression” than any well-moulded, straight, Eastern type of sun-browned countenance ever seen or imagined.

“Well, I don’t quite agree with you there,” said a man who was lying full length on one of the divans close by and smoking.  “These brown chaps have deuced fine eyes.  There doesn’t seem to be any lack of expression in them.  And that reminds me, there is at fellow arrived here to-day who looks for all the world like an Egyptian, of the best form.  He is a Frenchman, though; a Provencal,—­every one knows him,—­he is the famous painter, Armand Gervase.”

“Indeed!”—­and Sir Chetwynd roused himself at the name—­“Armand Gervase!  The Armand Gervase?”

“The only one original,” laughed the other.  “He’s come here to make studies of Eastern women.  A rare old time he’ll have among them, I daresay!  He’s not famous for character.  He ought to paint the Princess Ziska.”