Sitting down beside the bed, Georgia took the hot little hands into one of hers, and with the other smoothed back the tangled hair from the child’s brow. It was more than an hour before all her stories and her talk could banish the haunting horror from Zeynab’s mind, and induce her to close her bright eyes, and her doctor was nearly worn out when she was at last able to leave her. Sheer fatigue made Georgia sleep soundly, in spite of the excitement of the past day, and she and Rahah were not disturbed again that night. In the morning Fitz flashed an inquiry as to the time at which she would like to be fetched from Bir-ul-Malikat, and about eleven o’clock she saw the cavalcade she was expecting enter the courtyard. There was a hurried collecting together of packages, a hasty farewell to Zeynab, who wept copiously, and would not be comforted even by the promise that she should receive every picture-paper Georgia could lay her hands on, and then, accompanied by Khadija, the visitors went down to the courtyard. To Georgia’s surprise and disappointment, it was Stratford and Fitz who came eagerly to meet her as she appeared at the door shrouded in her _burka_. “Where is Dick? He is not ill, is he?” she asked anxiously of Stratford, remembering Fitz’s message of the night before. “He is so busy that he was obliged to send his apologies, and allow us the honour of escorting you instead of coming to fetch you himself,” said Stratford, in tones which were absolutely devoid of any suggestion of ulterior meaning. “Oh!” said Georgia, blankly. “He found himself compelled to hold a full-dress review of his detachment, or inspect their kits, or do stables, or something complicated and professional of that kind,” said Fitz, with a dogged resentment aggressively conspicuous in his manner. “Nonsense, Anstruther! You know as well as I do that he would have allowed nothing but absolute necessity to keep him from coming,” said Stratford. “Oh yes, of course,” said Georgia, in the most natural tone she could command. She would not let it be seen that she perceived the flimsy character of the excuse, but she felt deeply mortified as she allowed Stratford to mount her on her horse, and she resented his evident determination to smooth things over almost more than Fitz’s undisguised incredulity. “How _horrid_ of Dick!” was what she said to herself as she gathered up the reins, and the hot tears rose to her eyes under the shadow of the _burka_. “Stay, Englishman!” cried Khadija from the doorstep, when Stratford, having seen Rahah and the luggage safely bestowed, was about to mount his own horse. “Where is Yakub, my son, whom I left at Bir-ul-Malik as a pledge for the safe return of the doctor lady?”