The Fortieth Door

the very thought of it. Every f

self-conscious advances, flirtations ending in giggles! Tourists as nuns,

as a very engaging girl-that was the mischief of it. She stood smiling there in the brigh

Gezireh Palace Hotel, one trip to the Sultan al Hassan Mosque, one excursion

ng her to the camp on the edge of the Libyan desert where he was excavating, although her party

s and she had encountered him by chance upon a corner of the crowde

, Jinny," he was protesting. "I

ng up ruins all the time-it must be frightfully lonely o

the world, that his ruins held more thrills than all the fevers of her tourist crowds, and that he would rather gaze upon th

d he liked Jinny-though not as he liked Queen Hatasu or the l

odern. She was the incarna

al reason why he should not s

d his promise and abandoned him to the c

e. Let him go as-here he disgustedly eyed the garment that the

nk's robes that were too redolent of former wearers; he rejected the hot l

hing. Tartans, the real Scotch plaids. Some use, now,

quarters where the streets were wider and emptier of Cairene traff

or; the streets a flood of molten amber. A little wind from the north rustled the acac

d a sailing canoe-but no, he was goi

residence that was the home of his friend, Andrew McLean, and th

him across the tiled entrance into the long room wh

an was saying. "We've quest

o men had not lingered-if McLean had not remembered that he was an

a French excavator?" McLean suddenly asked of him.

to have died of the fever,

ompanion was one of the secretaries of the French legation.

d library shelves. He saw a thin

Thi," he said suddenly. "Paul De

had whetted his passion for the past, when his student mind was first kindling

bered that he had read it with absorption. And now the special age

ration-and he becomes so now through the whim of a capricious woman to disinheri

d that Delca

that the same fever-but nothing, positively, was known.... A sad story, monsieur.... This Delcassé was young and adventurous

oman about the desert.... Not much chance of a clue after all

be sundered from the American wh

eather case and from the case

e miniature. "It was done in France before he returned on that last

his unlucky searcher of the past who had left his own secret in the sands he had come to con

t understand a

comprehensible idiocy. Woman, as far as he was concerned, had never been crea

ed briefly, fingering the curio

of sand.... By luck, you know, you might just stumble on something, some native who knew the story, but if fever carried them off and the Arabs rifled th

ere was a stir about two crazy lads who are supposed to have joined the Mecca pilgrims in disguise.... Of course our clerks are Copts and do pick up a bit and the Copts will

gyptian fle

ave to show them to-night.... A ball-in masquerade. At a hotel. Tourist crowd.... How

promptly sardonic McLean. "You-at a masquer

friend Delcassé-a pleasant, retired spot for a body to have his honeymoon ... no distractions of society ... undiluted companionship, you might say..

n.... But while you are talking trot out your tartans. Something clannish now-one of those ance

promised McLean, dragging out a

ff he

cot of the Scots, kilted in vivid plaid, a rakish cap on his black hair, a tartan draped acro

," warbled McLean merrily, as he straightened

ther pointlessly, for he felt

ness and the desert brown of his face.... Milky pale they gleamed at him from the glass.... Bon

ll for my ri

ed o'er t

all

ell me her na

ing. "I say, aren't there any pocke

a grand sight," he pronounced with a special Scottish burr. "If ye dinna win her now-'Bonny Charley'

he'll be back again as

ing's promise, the departing one stalked, li

as he listened to the rattle of the wheels and the harsh gutturals

o himself, "if some girl now liked you enough to get yo