“For the gambling. That’s hardly travelling. Now, I’ve studied this subject a little, quietly in Harley Street. I’m no traveller myself, but I have dozens of patients who are. And I’m convinced that the modern facilities for travel, besides giving an infinity of pleasure, bring about innumerable tragedies.” He turned to me. “You go abroad a great deal. What do you say?” “That you’re perfectly right. And I’m prepared to affirm that, in highly-strung, imaginative, or over-worked people change of climate does sometimes actually cause, or seem to cause, change of nature.” Young England, who was by no means highly-strung or imaginative, looked politely dubious, but the doctor was evidently pleased. “An ally!” he cried. He glanced at me for an instant, then added: “You’ve got a case that proves it, at any rate to you, in your mind.” “Quite true.” “Can you give it us?” “Jove! let’s have it!” exclaimed young England. “Certainly, if you like,” I said. “I don’t know whether you ever heard of the Marnier affair?” Young England shook his head, but the doctor replied at once. “Three years ago, wasn’t it?” “Four.” “And it happened in some remote place in the Sahara Desert?” “In Beni-Kouidar. I was with Henry Marnier in Beni-Kouidar at the time.” “Go ahead!” said young England more eagerly. “Poor Marnier was not an old friend of mine, but an acquaintance whom I had met casually at Beni-Mora, which is known as a health resort.” “I send patients there sometimes,” said the doctor. “The railway stops at Beni-Mora. To reach Beni-Kouidar one must go on horse or camel back over between three and four hundred kilometres of desert, sleeping on the way at Travellers’ Houses—Bordjs as they are called there. Beni-Kouidar lies in the midst of immeasurable sands, and the air that blows through its palm gardens, and round its mosque towers, and down its alleys under the arcades, is startling: dry as the finest champagne, almost fiercely pure and fresh, exhilarating—well, too exhilarating for certain people.” The doctor nodded. “Champagne goes very quickly to some heads,” he interjected. “Beni-Kouidar has nothing to say to modern civilisation. It is a wild and turbulent city, divided into quarters—the Arab quarter, the Jews’ quarter, the freed negroes’ quarter, and so on—and furthermore, is infested at certain seasons by the Sahara nomads, who camp in filthy tents on the huge sand dunes round about, and sell rugs, burnouses, and Touareg work to the inhabitants, buying in return the dates for which the palms of Beni-Kouidar are celebrated. “I wanted to see a real Sahara city to which the Cook’s tourist had not as yet penetrated, and I resolved to ride there from Beni-Mora. When Henry Marnier heard of it he asked if he might accompany me.