I was helping myself to the soup. The rising wind blew up the skirts of the Spahi’s scarlet robe. In the wind—was it imagination?—I seemed to hear some thin, passing echoes of a tom-tom’s beat. “Come in,” I said to the Spahi. “You shall sup with me to-night, and—and you shall sleep here with me.” D’oud’s expressive face became sinister. Arabs are almost as jealous as they are vain. “But, monsieur, he will sleep in the Café Maure. If monsieur wishes for a companion, I⸺” “Come in,” I repeated to the Spahi. “You can sleep here to-night.” The Spahi stepped over the lintel with a jingling of spurs, a rattling of accoutrements. The murderer stepped in softly after him, drawn by the cord. D’oud began to look as grim as death. He made a ferocious gesture towards the murderer. “And that man? Monsieur wishes to sleep in the same room with him?” I heard the sound of the tom-tom above the wail of the wind. “Yes,” I said. Why did I wish it? I hardly know. I had no fear for, no desire to protect myself. But I remembered the smile I had seen, the Spahi’s saying, “There will be death in Sidi-Massarli to-night,” and I was resolved that the three men who had heard the desert drum together should not be parted till the morning. D’oud said no more. He waited upon me with his usual diligence, but I could see that he was furiously angry. The Spahi ate ravenously. So did the murderer, who more than once, however, seemed to be dropping to sleep over his food. He was apparently dead tired. As the wind was now become very violent I did not feel disposed to stir out again, and I ordered D’oud to bring us three cups of coffee to the Bordj. He cast a vicious look at the Spahi and went out into the darkness. I saw him no more that night. A boy from the Café Maure brought us coffee, cleared the remains of our supper from the table, and presently muttered some Arab salutation, departed, and was lost in the wind. The murderer was now frankly asleep with his head upon the table, and the Spahi began to blink. I, too, felt very tired, but I had something still to say. Speaking softly, I said to the Spahi: “That sound we heard to-night⸺” “Monsieur?” “Have you ever heard it before?” “Never, monsieur. But my brother heard it just before he had a stroke of the sun. He fell dead before his captain beside the wall of Sada. He was a tirailleur.” “And you think this sound means that death is near?” “I know it, monsieur. All desert people know it. I was born at Touggourt, and how should I not know?” “But then one of us⸺” I looked from him to the sleeping murderer. “There will be death in Sidi-Massarli to-night, monsieur. It is the will of Allah. Blessed be Allah.”